A thread of 3 messages, 23 February 1988 to 24 February 1988, in the order they were sent.
Are there any good methods for determining major trading routes,
other than just connecting all A and B starports? I seem to
remember that the rules are pretty vague about this.
Suggestions?
- --Brett Slocum "Never bet with a Sicilian where Death is involved."
UUCP: ...{uunet,[email removed]}!hi-csc!slocum
Arpa: [email removed]>Are there any good methods for determining major trading routes, >other than just connecting all A and B starports? I seem to >remember that the rules are pretty vague about this. >Suggestions? That depends on which trading rules you are playing by. If you use "Merchant Prince", the only decent trade routes are those with lots of A-class starports, on Hi population planets, with roughly the same tech level. Try a tour of the Vegan Autonomous district, in Solomani Rim sector. I have a ship doing so right now, and it's about to emerge a multi-millionaire! If you use the speculative rules in Book 2, you get much more satisfactory conclusions. The obvious trade route is between Agricultural and Industrial worlds, and this is rewarded in the Book 2 system. The only problem is, the availability of cargoes is too random. You are quite likely to go to the Agricultural world, only to find that the only cargo available is Machinery, or something equally useless. If you use the regular cargo and passenger tables from Book 2 or Merchant Prince then again, stick to high population worlds. Starport class doesn't feature here, but tech level may (I disregard TL modifiers for these charts, otherwise I can never visit lower tech agro worlds). Now for another question. Book 2 mentions mail briefly. Under "Revenues", it says "Mail Cr25000 (if fitted). How does an honest merchant get mail fitted? "Keyboard? Tis quaint!" - M. Scott Adrian Hurt | JANET: [email removed] UUCP: ..!ukc!cs.hw.ac.uk!adrian | ARPA: [email removed]
> Are there any good methods for determining major trading routes, > other than just connecting all A and B starports? I seem to > remember that the rules are pretty vague about this. > Suggestions? > --Brett Slocum "Never bet with a Sicilian where Death is involved." My edition 1 Traveller rules had a probability table for assigning randomized "Jump Routes": TRAVELLER, Volume 3, Copyright 1977 Game Designer's Workshop, page 2 World --------Jump Distance-------- Pair Jump-1 Jump-2 Jump-3 Jump-4 A-A 1 2 4 5 A-B 1 3 4 5 A-C 1 4 6 - A-D 1 5 - - A-E 2 - - - B-B 1 3 4 6 B-C 2 4 6 - B-D 3 6 - - B-E 4 - - - C-C 3 6 - - C-D 4 - - - C-E 4 - - - D-D 4 - - - D-E 5 - - - E-E 6 - - - However, I have reservations in using such a simplistic and non-deterministic system for generating Trade Routes. Maybe something that looks at at least Starport Class and Population, and maybe Trade Classifications, too? With a great enough number of dependent variable, the randomness could be almost done away with. I think it would be an entertaining enterprise to try to come up with such a scheme. Perhaps something based on the average profit gain between two systems, weighted by jump distance and surrounding worlds (i.e. suppose one world provides a link across a great rift... even were it Class D now, it would probably be a crucial trade route between the societies on each side of the rift). When I get a spare week or two I'll look at this item. Maybe I'll come up with something great and (after everyone on the list gets to alter it, playtest it, add suggestions, etc.) send it off to the editors of Challenge magazine as a definitive system for trade routes. And maybe I'll become President of the United States.... :-) I doubt I'll ever find time to even start on this myself. How about a communal effort? James