Sketchy Trade Encounters In The Dark
- Thread starter jawillroy
- Start date
ThunderChilde
SOC-13
Ship to ship trade is generally shady, by and large to transfer goods to be kept off the radar. I can see a more organized trade in a frequented port. I know there were places in the Chesapeake where Fishing boats and Coasters used to meet. They traded goods, seafood and produce, mostly by barter. The trade wasn't illegal, just more convienient than meeting in a port.
There is smuggling going on in most or all of the worlds harbors right down to the little fishing wharves. Under limit or out of season fish, untaxed items, contraband. In other words the small package trade is an insiders market of supply and demand.
You deal with people you know, or through a broker of somekind. New people will need some sort of a vouche to be accepted even as a possible trading partner. Once in, it is easier to get introduced to fences, other smugglers and criminal ring representatives.
Anyone else consider the use of something like Drop Pods for high value very illegal goods to bypass the patrol and customs barriers? Not effective against High Tech worlds, they'd see it and you'd be busted, even if they didn't intercept the goods. However, for places like Garda-Vilis, and other mid to low tech insurgencies, it's alot sneakier than running a ship or shuttle to the surface.
Smuggling might mean leaving the goods at an asteroid or orbital cargo container, ala EVE Online. Dead drops in otherwords.
There is smuggling going on in most or all of the worlds harbors right down to the little fishing wharves. Under limit or out of season fish, untaxed items, contraband. In other words the small package trade is an insiders market of supply and demand.
You deal with people you know, or through a broker of somekind. New people will need some sort of a vouche to be accepted even as a possible trading partner. Once in, it is easier to get introduced to fences, other smugglers and criminal ring representatives.
Anyone else consider the use of something like Drop Pods for high value very illegal goods to bypass the patrol and customs barriers? Not effective against High Tech worlds, they'd see it and you'd be busted, even if they didn't intercept the goods. However, for places like Garda-Vilis, and other mid to low tech insurgencies, it's alot sneakier than running a ship or shuttle to the surface.
Smuggling might mean leaving the goods at an asteroid or orbital cargo container, ala EVE Online. Dead drops in otherwords.
ThunderChilde
SOC-13
Try this on for size.
Trade Point
There is a cluster trade point, off the beaten path, yet frequented by traders because it is near 2 seperate tradelines. It is a brown dwarf star system with a small GG. There is a small Space station in far orbit around the GG. It masses 3,000dts,500 tons of which is a greenhouse. It has a 2,000dt fueling station trailing it in orbit, fed by automated fuel skimmers. There is a repair platform that can handle up to a 3,000t ship. It can handle major repairs, might need to oder in the parts, yearly maintenece is expensive here, they charge a premium on account that it stretches their resources.
There are a couple of orbital cargo platforms in near orbit as well. The station is armed, and has 2 300t SDB's.
A small transfer fee, and 25% discount on fuel costs are the main features aside from freedom from the numerous fees charged elsewhere. The station is the only Hab in system, and is the Government in Being for what it's worth.
A small trade in generating new cargo manifests, above board listing of the manifest outgoing, no intrest in incoming as long as the fee is paid.
In game terms this is a borderline d-c starport, refined fuel, repair capable on a small scale, warehousing.
Trade Point
There is a cluster trade point, off the beaten path, yet frequented by traders because it is near 2 seperate tradelines. It is a brown dwarf star system with a small GG. There is a small Space station in far orbit around the GG. It masses 3,000dts,500 tons of which is a greenhouse. It has a 2,000dt fueling station trailing it in orbit, fed by automated fuel skimmers. There is a repair platform that can handle up to a 3,000t ship. It can handle major repairs, might need to oder in the parts, yearly maintenece is expensive here, they charge a premium on account that it stretches their resources.
There are a couple of orbital cargo platforms in near orbit as well. The station is armed, and has 2 300t SDB's.
A small transfer fee, and 25% discount on fuel costs are the main features aside from freedom from the numerous fees charged elsewhere. The station is the only Hab in system, and is the Government in Being for what it's worth.
A small trade in generating new cargo manifests, above board listing of the manifest outgoing, no intrest in incoming as long as the fee is paid.
In game terms this is a borderline d-c starport, refined fuel, repair capable on a small scale, warehousing.
Sure. You can drop real rocks too, as long as you're sure they won't hit anyone, this way if they are tracked, it could be space debris.
Some planets offer meteor showers at certain points of the year, most burn up on re-entry, however I wonder how many generate radar blips ?
Might be an opportune time to do some dropping, although it probably would enter the mind of a sophisticated planetary defense system.
Leaving goods in orbit, is basically what the Scouts do regularly on frontier worlds where they operate. Refueling bases and goods and supplies are part of their SOP.
Scouts also have probes (in GURPS anyway) which are simply 300mm missiles packed with sensors. They should have ways of deploying these secretly, such as launching them on one side of the planet, wait for it it turn and then guide it down via a meson comm, (or something equally remote). This way there's no correllation between ship and object unless the planetary security net "sees all" in space. If so, then you launch it X AU from the world and pre-program it to do its thing.
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