free traders

        Cynthia rambles at length...

Mike Metlay:

>> In a game today a player requested of me equipment that could enhance
>> his handguns skill (ie heads up battle disply or somethin) .
>>
>> What do people out there use ??????

>This varies strongly based on what the ref will let you get away with.
>The cybernetic guidance systems that Richard tacitly approved for the
>weapons 'Vouf uses in the PBEM were scaled down by a huge amount when
>Mark and I took over.

....personally, I just steal heavily from 2300AD rules on Cyberware, or
from GURPS Ultratech/Cyberpunk.  Works fine, lasts long time.  And of
course, there's that long forgotten article on prosthetics/bionics from
Traveller's Digest #whatever...

Scott Kellog:

>And with the option of regrown, I don't see where the army of cyborgs
we've
>been hearing about lately is coming from.  How many people out there are
gonna
>have artificial parts?  My guess is not many  (apart from the odd cultures
and
>botched medical cases.)  Wouldn't it be easier to get a TL9 regrown arm
than
>a TL 12 bionic arm?

    I tend to agree with you, especially at high stellar TLs.  With the
ability to regrow everything in prime condition, I have defined TL 14/15
medical as being able to "put you back together if there are enough large
pieces left", the tricky part being the brain, of course.  They can even
regrow your brain, but if there isn't enuff left, no memories.  (Not until
someone perfects memory recording & transfer at TL17 or so.  Of course,
at "lower" TLs like 15 we have the possibility of taking a blank mind and
building an artificial personality on it...kind of like an organic robot.
I can imagine some unpleasant possibilities for some of the more fascist
governments out there...)  In a Hi Stellar society, a cyborg, or a cripple
(handicapped person, physically challenged -- pick yer fave PC word) is,
frankly, a freak.  Something almost never seen, and subject to a lot of
attention and stares.   Kind of like the old folks in Logan's Run.
    On the other hand, at lower tech levels, if robotics technology runs
ahead of medical tech on a particular world, it may be easier to use cyber-
netic replacements than to regrow/transplant natural parts.  This is
uncommon, but far from impossible; one route for cyborgs, if you want them.
Other fun possibilities: at pre/early stellar TLs, they may have perfected
transplants -- but they may have a shortage of voluntary donors.  Organ-
legging for fun and profit, heh, heh.  (SF Historical note: it was not a
cyberpunk author who invented organlegging.  It was another, non-cyber-
punk-type author who came up with the idea of implanting electronics in
your skull so your brain could talk directly to the computer. Anybody
else remember who these mystery authors were?)
    And then there are the aforementioned odd cultures where robotics and
medicine have progressed hand-in-hand, where people use machine tools to
extend their brains and bodies in a more intimate fashion than most.
Places where people choose to have cyberware plugged into their brains,
and body parts replaced with enhanced cybernetic parts.  Efate is one
such place (in my universe).  Note that at Efate's medical TL, no cyber-
modification is irreversible; you get tired of bionic eyes, have 'em
removed and real ones regrown.  It just takes time and money.  Of course,
most of Efate's neighbors, and most spacers think Efate is just plain
weird, if not unnatural.

Edmund, who is really Michael:

>I saw a for posts from people talking about the high cost of free traders
>and how they are not economically viable . I am not sure about the outcome

>of these discussions but here are some ideas I was mussing about with
......
        Me and Steve were some of the people discussing that... See also
Hans Rancke and Rob Dean.

> But what of the
>poor honest free trader .   <stuff omitted>
        First, let's correct this delusion that free traders are poor.
Anyone hauling around MCr 4 to MCr 60 in assets (depending on his equity)
is not poor; said anyone could sell off his interest in the ship and
retire as a multi-millionaire.

>I mean as a small time business who had to transport your precious commod-
>ities who would you trust ? The cleaming Tukera lines or some battered
>old free trader run by captain ahab who has a wooden leg .
        Well, in the REAL world, Capt Ahab is charging much LOWER PRICES
than gleaming Tukera lines to haul your commodities, so you insure your
commodities for much less than what you save by shipping with Capt Ahab
for say, a year, and take the risk.  Of course, in the Imperium, where
megacorp interests are carefully protected by Imperial law, you have these
FIXED shipping rates that kill the small hauler...  He can't discount
when his costs are cheaper than the big boys, and he can't raise his prices
when they're higher.  Wait until Hard Times hits my PBEM; Imperial price
regs will go out the window.

>So how do free traders fit into it . Well yes they are rare, they pick up
>the more unprofitable cargos or run the speculative markets, or get the
>smaller, luctrative cargos .
        My assumptions: lucrative routes (like Efate-Louzy, Rhylanor-
Porozlo) have much of the commodities hauling locked up in semi-
permanent contracts.  Since those routes are profitable year-in and year-
out, and the markets are constant, somebody on planet A makes widgets
specifically for export to planet B; he contracts with shipper C to haul
widgets from A to B and sell them on B, for the next 1-20 years.  Either
that, or he contracts to sell his widgets to trading company D, who hauls
them on his own ships to planet B and sells them.  Since the market is
fairly constant, and constantly profitable, and the price of interstellar
transport won't change (fixed by law), company A will stick with the same
shipper C or trader D as long as they are willing to haul from A to B.
C or D has a guaranteed income for as long as the contract lasts, A has
a guaranteed buyer, and B has a guaranteed source of A-widgets.  Thus,
most profitable commodities tradable between A & B will be locked up in
long-term contracts.  Note that shipper C or trader D need not necessarily
be a megacorp or other huge company; they just have to have been in the
right place at the right time to negotiate a contract, and be able to
maintain a regular schedule.  C or D can be one free trader; what it can't
be is a tramp freighter.  Most PCs own tramp freighters -- i.e., they
don't want to do the safe Rhylanor-Porozlo run 25 times a year for 40
years, they want to wander a bit.  At least, I hope they do.
        So what do "tramp" free traders do?  They pick up "spot" cargoes;
those cargoes available because the regular carrier couldn't take them
for some reason, because they're a new product or one not normally exported
or for some other reason aren't exported regularly enuff to be the
subject of a contract.  BTW, there's nothing to stop PC-owned ships from
operating a regular route, and picking up some of those lucrative
contracts;
the March Harrier in the Traveller Adventure is an example of a ship on
a regular route (a subsidized merchant, in fact) whose crew finds adventure
where they go... of course, one of the rewards of the adventure is getting
your subsidy contract paid off so you don't have to stick to that fixed
route...

>(I mean whats the point in generating a merchant captain to
>go and live a life of ease straight afterwards : Ref "What does your
>character do ?", Player "Oh I dunno, hang around the jukuzzi") .
        Which is why I assume that PC ship owners don't sell off their
interests in their ships and retire to a life of luxury...

>Free Traders get their vessels from say a fellow free trader whose
retiring,
>a bankrupt orgainization, etc .
        So who built the free trader in the first place?? Those little
ships aren't good for anything else, they were purpose-built in a shipyard
to be free traders.

>The bank repayments are large on a free trader (About 175,000/Month),
        No, they're not.  Run some numbers thru a calculator and find out
what you would be expected to pay per month on a 40-year loan of $45
million at real-world rates...

>Compare interest rates today, something like 13%
>for the average small business, and 20% for the corp) .
        Maybe in Australia.  In the U.S., big corps get their loans at
the Prime Rate, which is significantly  lower than what Joe
SmallBusinessman
gets from his town bank.

>their money again . Consequently the large interest rates, high repayments
 .
>(I mean theres none of this just having to pay the interest each year) .
        Large interest rates??  A standard starship loan is about 5%
annual interest!  What kind of interest rates do they charge Down Under?
And don't forget the rather hefty collateral represented by a starship;
one can leverage VERY large loans based on that... or should be able to,
if your GM's running things anything like the real world.

>Why become a free trader . Throughout history people admire the underdog,
        Because, if you can come up with the seed money, you can get
mind-blowingly wealthy?  Why did Bill Gates write software?

>Also free traders (the really good ones)
                     ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
                     any idiot with two brain cells to rub together...

>can survive and prosper, just like any profession with high risk, and
>possible high gain, there will always be someone working in it .

>I hope this helps accept the high cost and running of independant
>merchant vessels, and the rather large repayments due . It helps to

        I do agree with you that the cost of a building a merchant vessel
is too high for the picture Traveller paints of the independant mercantile
community, but I don't feel like going into that whole can of worms again.


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