Ganidiirsi O'Flynn wrote:
"I did a bit o' lookin' about on that, Larsen, and I didn't find a thing that says that you can't trade with a Type S. You just can't do it very well. Three tons ain't alot to try speculating on, eh?"
Mr. O'Flynn,
I didn't claim otherwise. I can't remember reading a 'no trading' prohibition anywhere, then again my memory resembles a sieve.
And you're right, three dTons isn't much room. Of course, a DD-Scout doesn't need to earn a lot to make ends meet. He gets free fuel and life support at scout bases. If he wishes, he can also scoop and purify his fuel for free. Having no mortgage and no crew salaries really cuts down on your operating costs. A dTon of geegaws at 6K CrImps per can go a long way when your debits aren't too high.
"Insofar as smuggling goes, however, I would point out that if your detached duty boat ever finds itself in a system with a scout base, the local Scout Commander will pull your logs. This is one aspect I think alot of folks tend to forget. Could be sticky if you've been dodging about in Red Zones....."
Very true. People do tend to forget the existence of those logs and the long list of folks who can look at them. IMTU, those logs aren't automatic either. Sure, they'll get a dump from your transponder, but they want more than that. The DD-Scout is out there to use his eyes and ears. They want the rumors he's heard, the ships he's seen, all the seemingly inconsequential stuff that makes up the grist of intelligence gathering. As a GM, I made DD-Scout PCs keep diaries* and penalized them when they didn't. How does a mandatory skills refresher course sound during your next scout base layover? The commander there can impose all sorts of nastiness if she doesn't care for the condition of your logs.
As for Red Zones, if the DD-Scout brings back a nice enough piece of information, I'd think the base commander would look the other way.
Oddly enough, most smuggling won't involve Red Zones at all. Look at the 'Bretheren of the Coast', those rugged individuals who have smuggled across the Channel 'tween Britain and France since Caeser's time. They don't move prohibited goods, they move goods that would normally be taxed; an important distinction. It's scotch and cigarettes going south while brandy and wines goes north. The items aren't illegal, however paying no duty on them is.
Most smuggling involves cheating the tax man and not getting 8 metric tons of crystal meth over the border. When state taxes on smokes began being raised in the early 70s, I knew fellows who used to move a trailer load of cigarettes from North Carolina into New England every month. They'd sell them out of car trunks at construction sites and bars. That's the type of smuggling you'll find IMTU. It isn't always plutonium, bio-agents, and black globes.
Sincerely,
Larsen
* - Kept a diary in game terms and not in actuality. He merely had to set aside time every so often the update it. If he put it off, there was a roll against his INT stat to see if he had left anything out.
P.S. For those of you who cite the 3I's support of free trade to question my take on smuggling as a tax dodge, Remember - the Imperium protects free trade *between* starports, that means *inside* the extrality line. Crossing the extrality line onto the world proper is another kettle of fish. Worlds can impose taxes and tariffs IF those fees are assessed impartially. If you wish to tax wheat imports, you must tax all wheat from everywhere outside your system and not just wheat from Trin's Veil.
but if you pick your speculative cargo right that J2 can help you score big even on a few D-tons. Then of course there's usually a few "personal items" that people will pay a premium to have transported without documentation.
