MGT Only: Trade Goods Table

[SpaceBadger]

Anybody have a good replacement for the Trade Goods Table on p.165-166 of Mongoose Traveller Main Rulebook?

I like some of the ideas for Trade Goods in MgT, such as having illegal goods available only from black market dealers, and having other trade goods available only if they are "common" or appropriate to the trade class of the source world.

What I have a problem with are some of the "common" goods that are available on any/every world. So whenever a trader visits a primitive TL3 world with a Pop of 7,000 inhabitants, there will always be 1d6x10 tons of Basic Electronics available (Simple electronics including basic computers up to TL 10)? Really? And with no price mods on purchase? Same for Basic Mechanical Parts?

Yeah, I could just ignore the silly results, or make up some explanation, but these aren't even silly die roll results, these are automatic trade goods always available on every world.

Just wondering if anybody has fixed this system for MgT to make more sense.

 

[HG_B]

So whenever a trader visits a primitive TL3 world with a Pop of 7,000 inhabitants, there will always be 1d6x10 tons of Basic Electronics available

Maybe limit it to primitive voltaic piles? :toast:

 

[pendragonman]

Anybody have a good replacement for the Trade Goods Table on p.165-166 of Mongoose Traveller Main Rulebook?

I like some of the ideas for Trade Goods in MgT, such as having illegal goods available only from black market dealers, and having other trade goods available only if they are "common" or appropriate to the trade class of the source world.

What I have a problem with are some of the "common" goods that are available on any/every world. So whenever a trader visits a primitive TL3 world with a Pop of 7,000 inhabitants, there will always be 1d6x10 tons of Basic Electronics available (Simple electronics including basic computers up to TL 10)? Really? And with no price mods on purchase? Same for Basic Mechanical Parts?

Yeah, I could just ignore the silly results, or make up some explanation, but these aren't even silly die roll results, these are automatic trade goods always available on every world.

Just wondering if anybody has fixed this system for MgT to make more sense.

TL 10 abaccuses? abacci?

 

[rancke]

What I have a problem with are some of the "common" goods that are available on any/every world. So whenever a trader visits a primitive TL3 world with a Pop of 7,000 inhabitants, there will always be 1d6x10 tons of Basic Electronics available (Simple electronics including basic computers up to TL 10)? Really? And with no price mods on purchase? Same for Basic Mechanical Parts?

Yeah, I could just ignore the silly results, or make up some explanation, but these aren't even silly die roll results, these are automatic trade goods always available on every world.

What you need is a rule to determine the maximum amount of goods available based on some fraction of the world's GWP. The problem with that is that a plausible result will render many worlds useless for free traders. A world that produces Basic Electronics would still take decades or centuries to produce 10 tons of them if the population is small.

Complicating the question is trade hubs where the goods available are mostly not manufactured locally but imported from elsewhere.


Hans

 

[Marchand]

I don't have that much of a problem with your TL3, Pop 4 world having 60T of basic electronics available. Just because they're for sale at the starport doesn't mean they were made on that world. They could have been imported as part of another deal that fell through. You might even leave a clue on some other world about the deal on XXXX that went south - "I wonder what that guy did with all those holovid players - they're probably still gathering dust over there..." And then the players might get a positive DM on the value table.

If you still feel this is a problem, a simple solution is just to provide the basic goods you feel would plausibly be avaialble.

 

[rancke]

I don't have that much of a problem with your TL3, Pop 4 world having 60T of basic electronics available. Just because they're for sale at the starport doesn't mean they were made on that world. They could have been imported as part of another deal that fell through.

Assuming for purposes of argument that that's true, that would work for one world. It wouldn't work for every world in Charted Space. I doubt it would work for two worlds in Charted Space. It would be a rare occasion indeed when the inhabitants of a TL3 world got involved in a deal involving 60 tons of basic eletronics. The shipment would be worth a good deal more than their GWP (Impossible to say how many years' worth, as the rules for GWP and currency exchange don't go below TL5).


Hans

 

[HG_B]

Assuming for purposes of argument that that's true, that would work for one world. It wouldn't work for every world in Charted Space. I doubt it would work for two worlds in Charted Space. It would be a rare occasion indeed when the inhabitants of a TL3 world got involved in a deal involving 60 tons of basic eletronics. The shipment would be worth a good deal more than their GWP (Impossible to say how many years' worth, as the rules for GWP and currency exchange don't go below TL5).


Hans

Right. A once in a lifetime occurrence. Not a once every 36 weeks occurrence...

 

[SpaceBadger]

Complicating the question is trade hubs where the goods available are mostly not manufactured locally but imported from elsewhere.

In that situation, I often arbitrarily add whatever other trade classifications I think should apply based on trade passing through, even if the mainworld doesn't otherwise qualify.

 

[SpaceBadger]

Right. A once in a lifetime occurrence. Not a once every 36 weeks occurrence...

Agreed, but actually it is worse than that.

I wouldn't mind so much making up some explanation for randomly-rolled goods that don't seem to fit, but these are "common" goods which means under MgT trade rules that they are available on every single world, no matter what trade class, no matter what UWP.

Every world has the common goods available, all the time!

 

[SpaceBadger]

Further contemplation of this thread has me considering going out on a new limb w respect to spec trade goods - except for on some roll to account for the "stranded goods that need to be moved along to somewhere else" and similar rare occurrences, you can't buy spec goods that aren't a product of the world where you are buying them. So worlds that don't produce any sort of goods will very rarely have any sort of goods available - unless they are busy trade hubs, at which it is much more plausible to pick up goods don't originate there.

 

[Shonner]

Don't trade common goods with planets that have common goods already. Buy common goods to supply either yourself, or produce your own common goods and sell locally. Your trading should reflect your campaign setting.

 

[Marchand]

Assuming for purposes of argument that that's true, that would work for one world. It wouldn't work for every world in Charted Space....

Of course, it only has to work for one world which is the world the PCs are visiting. The trade rules are a game aid to facilitate roleplay and NOT an economics simulator. What's more, they are not even remotely close to being a credible model of an economy.

GURPS Far Trader has the only economically literate trade rules that I'm aware of. As that book makes clear, other rules sets are the economic equivalent of a perpetual motion machine.

But that's fine - as stated, we don't need a simulator, we need a gamable system.

Your trading should reflect your campaign setting.

Agreed.

 

[rancke]

Of course, it only has to work for one world which is the world the PCs are visiting.

No, it also has to work for the NEXT world the PCs visit. And the next. And the next. And the next. And the next. Etc. etc..


Hans

 

[Marchand]

It wouldn't work for every world in Charted Space.

No, it also has to work for the NEXT world the PCs visit. And the next. And the next. And the next. And the next. Etc. etc..

I agree that a universally plausible set of trade rules by definition is going to rule out the unusual, unexpected cases like 60T of electronics on our Pop 3, TL3 world.

If you think it's a good thing for unusual / unexpected cases to occur from time to time, e.g. because you want the trade rules themselves to be a source of story, then you have two options. One is for it to pop out of the RAW, and the ref can ignore implausible results when preferred - essentially my suggestion for handling the MGT rules. The second is to have only plausible results emerge, and the ref can insert the special cases him/herself.

Functionally, those two approaches are identical - both require manual input to derive the desired result.

I prefer 1) to 2) because it provides a spur to the ref's imagination.

I can't think of a good reason to prefer 2) to 1). I can only think of a bad reason, which is treating the rules as a reality simulator, rather than as a facilitator of SF adventure gaming.

If you don't think it's a good thing ever to have such atypical cases come up, then you have got Business 101: the RPG. It's a perfectly valid approach and one I have no problem with - GURPS Far Trader comes closest, and I have a lot of time for that product.

 

[McPerth]

What I find more absurd in the MgT trade system is the fact that neither the TL difference nor the population of a world have any influence in the prices nor (in the case of pop) in the possibility to find supplier/buyer.

Aside from (as already said) being able to buy large cargoes from a planet with population 1, you're as likely to sell your 50 dtons of anything in a world with 10 inhabitants that in a world with 50 billion. I guess the demand would not be the same...

In any case, it is quite better (IMHO) than the Merchant Prince system found in most other versions, both, from the realism and the game POV.

 

[Marchand]

What I find more absurd in the MgT trade system is the fact that neither the TL difference nor the population of a world have any influence in the prices nor (in the case of pop) in the possibility to find supplier/buyer.

True enough, although MGT Merchant Prince introduces a GURPS FT-like system for bidding for lots of freight where pop and TL difference do come into play. Essentially, lower pop and bigger TL difference means less freight, but it's easier to bid a higher price - which nicely mimics a classic demand/supply relationship. MGT Merchant Prince is a nice system, although it can get a bit roll-heavy. I would love to see it automated.

 

[owlbear]

Assuming for purposes of argument that that's true, that would work for one world. It wouldn't work for every world in Charted Space. I doubt it would work for two worlds in Charted Space. It would be a rare occasion indeed when the inhabitants of a TL3 world got involved in a deal involving 60 tons of basic eletronics. The shipment would be worth a good deal more than their GWP (Impossible to say how many years' worth, as the rules for GWP and currency exchange don't go below TL5).


Hans

<delurk>

Maybe not every world, but dubiously made low quality local sweatshop goods are possible at these TLs.

<relurk>

 

[jaggeh_ie]

I did up an excel file in the spreadsheets section thats available on google docs. It randomly generates a list of cargo based on the advanced tables in Merchant Prince. If you find it useful let me know and i can do some more work on it to add modifiers for working with different worlds.