The problem with CT's economics (as you noted) is that they allow players to benefit SERIOUSLY from just moving goods from place to place.
Tbeard,
We're forgetting something extremely important here. The
only things any players are
allowed to do in
any RPG are those things which the
GM allows.
The rules are not there to tie your hands. As long as your rulings as a GM maintain some level of
internal consistency, you can do as you wish. A die roll on a
LBB table is not a mandate, it's a suggestion.
It renders adventuring unprofitable by comparison, which forces the Referee to go to all kinds of trouble to create rationales for adventuring...
Adventuring is only unprofitable when you allow a roll on a
table to rule
your game.
It's economically absurd. In a free market system like CT envisions, super lucrative trade routes would attract hordes of ship operators, which would quickly eliminate the lucrative profits because of competitive pressures on pricing. So, such routes would exist for very short times, like "boom towns" on Earth in the 19th century.
Which was
exactly what I told my players when I
heavily modified their die rolls on the various trade tables.
As independent ship operators newly arrived in the region, they are
NOT going to be able to blithely plug into some "Gravy Train" trade route between that hi-pop In world and T-prime Ag world.
And why not, you may ask?
Because such a route has
already attracted shipping lines, large and small, who have forged long-term, stable relationships with producers and purchasers on a basis of proven and professional service, that's why. Lykes Lines move the millions of shipping containers between the US and China and not Jonas Grumby(1) of the
SS Minnow. Similarly, outfits like Arekut or Al Morai move all the containers between Glisten and Aki and not Cap'n Blackie of the free trader
Running Boil.
All the trade along the "Gravy Train" is already spoken for. The only stuff left are those crumbs which I -
as the GM - allow and, as long as those crumbs are handed out with in an internally consistent manner, the players cannot grumble about "GM fiat" or "capriciousness".
Anyhow, my preferred course of action is simple...
Mine was simpler. Instead of reworking the
entire economic system, I simply remembered that -
as the the GM - the rules only work in the manner I say they do. I therefore applied the trade rolls in a logical, economically rational manner and didn't allow "gypsies" to carry the 57th Century version of Reeboks from Korea to France. Those jobs are almost always spoken for by large, stable, well known firms, something the players never are.
In this manner, taking risks by engaging in adventures is the primary way for the players to earn large (or even middling) sums of money.
Everyone needs to remember: The rules are a suggestion and only you as the GM rule.
Have fun,
Bill
1 - Trivia Fact #11653: Jonas Grumby is the Skipper's name on
Gilligan's Island. It was only mentioned once and then during the first episode. (Yes, I have no life.)
