Fwurg

[Mercury]

Food and Healthcare products are in short supply for reasons explained in the news.

No Organics , Food or Healthcare Products can be purchased from or sold to the open market until this situation is resolved.

The only way to resolve the situation is to provide emergency aid to the Azaryan people. Their total needs come down to 2500 and 2500 (after deducting donations by NPC worlds for my convenience).

Making a donation does not require trade capacity. You can donate using an economic directive, but you should note any and all donations in your turn report.

The block on buying or selling these goods remains in effect until the emergency aid has been provided.

The amount need not be paid instantly, but can be collected over time and from multiple parties.

[Dragonmaster352]

Are the Hiocan Society and the ACA capable of providing aid with the Mandalorians blocking all trade?

[Mercury]

Good question. Since trade through their sector is not available and this includes the open market, I would say that this is not possible unless you secured a fleet to cover your transport.

[Chriz]

But this makes no sense since we are not able to reach the Azaryans with supplies either...

[Brend]

I have to agree with Chriz there....


I would also like to add that I kinda dislike the "We'll now be modelling the internal workings of your faction" vibe I get from suddenly blocking Open Market trades. It seems a bit harsh to go "The press will rage on you, so you are no longer allowed to trade within your own economy."

I'd understand something like "prices are now halved", but "Nope. You don't get to trade" feels as too much meddling in internal affairs: how would you know what the press would actually say about me trading ? Maybe no care is given by the veolian media about the Azaryans because they are seen as a) traitors that invited the Mandalorians in and b) a people that already cost the Veolian Commonwealth loads of because of the fleets have to be sent in to clean up after their treachery...

I'm just posing this as an example, though this is in a nutshell the current sentiments of the veolian popluation with regards their insectoid neighbours at the moment.

[Stuiter]

How will the food and healtcare reach Azarya as there is also war and no trade is possible?
I propose delaying this until the sector is clear again.

[Chriz]

I have to agree with Brend that this looks like storytelling without consultation with other storytellers or involved worlds... You are declaring what the media on all of our worlds say about this...

Next to the fact that the mechanics on this event are broken I do not see how we could have prevented this event in the first place. It looks like we are powerless due to the fact that we could not see it coming or have any choice...

With the current proposal it seems that the Food, Healthcare and Organics join the special goods by disappearing from the open market...

[Brend]

Humz humz. I would like to express my support for cool economic events. But done this way it feels rather forced.

Chriz has a good point about the prevention of this: my problem here isn't the economic event per se, but the way it suddenly pops up. There was not run-up to the protester's frustrations nor any reason at all for the protesters' appearance really -- we weren't doing anything wrong, and reacted (in my view of things) adequately to the threat over the Azaryans. And all of a sudden every media outlet is against the sellers of those goods without even a single hint of this!

I would have loved this event if the charity run was announced first, and was open for 10 before protesters actually started demanding things. That way we could have ignored it, which would enrage people (still not convinced about this whole all media outlets and protesters suddenly rage on everyone thing though), or we could have risen to the challenge and actually joined in on the charity run (which would even allow us to buy food and healthcare from the OM to aid the Azaryans)!


My proposal (which holds for every single ST that wishes to influence things like this!):

• Don't make the events 'no choice': Shaping the prices of the OM is fine (e.g. double the buy price, half the sell price), but by taking away the option everyone is forced to either aid the Azaryans or drop their food on space; that's not cool.
• Consult with (at least one) other STs before executing making a universal declaration (or at least check the mechanics of the event you want to implement)
• Foreshadow such heavy events

Again, I think these economic events are cool, and add to the game. It's just the execution of this specific event that bugs me.

[Gerben]

Mmm, I share the overall sentiment that economic events are cool. Given the success of the Black market event I would definitely continue with similar events.

This current event however, puzzles me a bit. The main reason for this the fact the offered goods cannot reach the Azaryan homeworld, as they are being raided by Mandalorian Fleets. It has already been stated that for this reason the Hiocan and Astrian people cannot contribute, so how does the trade reach the Azaryans which are in a similar position. Unless that is not issue since the goods required will mainly be 'stored' and then shipped later.

I would not be against such a solution, but it creates problems with actual event, as it states that the sale is not possible until the goods have been delivered.

Secondly, I feel a full ban on the market seems a bit harsh. It would be more likely to model a steep increase (or drop) in both the buy and sale prices of the market, as the need is obviously high.

[Mercury]

I can't respond to every single argument here (and a lot a repeats), so will react to the general gist:

Aid not being able to reach the Azaryans

The aid organizations indeed cannot reach the Azaryans easily at this moment, however, they are working on setting up the relief efforts to launch as soon as the opportunity presents itself. These supplies need to be gathered before being sent (this is a bit of a deviation from the "resources as flow" I will admit).

Secondly, this is relief effort, which is different from efforts by commercial shipping captains. Charity workers sign up for this kind of jobs knowing what to expect and they willingly take risks to help others. This is clearly not the same as paying a merchant captain to ship goods for a profit. People will more readily risk their lives to save other lives than to earn a wage they could also earn doing a different job.

Finally relief efforts can and do in practice deliver to warzones, even where normal economic activity has become impossible. I can see food droppings being made over the Azaryan system for example, even in the middle of an extended battle if necessary.

Meddling in internal affairs

I disagree that the open market is an internal affair. The open market isn't something that's local to your planet or system, but it is a single market that expands over the entire Union. Thus its not about what for example the Veolians think of this, but what the union community believes as a whole.

The Veolians might not mind if you sell organics, but you can bet your ass that the Miomanian Colonists do for example. When your open market traders risk having their ships and foreign assets attacked by angry protesters who are outraged, this causes them to not be willing to get into business with you. It's not a local thing.

Halving prices instead of blocking altogether

I considered halving prices instead, but the impact of this is already very small in and of itself. Few people trade these goods with the open market and the economic impact is very minimal. If I just change the prices the impact becomes so small that nobody is going to want to pay to fix it. I want there to be some actual motivation behind the event, for fear it'd become irrelevant otherwise...

Prevention & Foreshadowing

I believe this event was perfectly preventable. If the Union had sent fleets immediately instead of delaying 4 turns before arriving in the Azaryan system (which they did not do for other Union members) then there would have been no Azaryantarian crisis. However a system which has effectively zero defences fighting a group known for their skill at raiding is gonna suffer from that raid.

Regarding the media outrage on this... I cannot see how that could ever be prevented no matter the foreshadowing. If the Azaryan people are starving from hunger and instead of giving them Food you have left over, you sell it to a third party for a profit, people are going to get instantly enraged by that. Not after 3 weeks, immediately. That just seems logical to me. Its not about built up frustration or anger over time that you could have intercepted, its about doing something immediately outrageous and people throwing a fit over that.

Choice

I think there are choices here, but its centered around how to pay the necessary trade goods. Ministers and Chancellors could spend Union funds purchasing spare resources from players to donate to the cause for example.

[b]Cooperation with other Storytellers[/n]

This one I agree with. I probably should check economic storylines with other storytellers in general... We need a more fundamental solution for this, I think...

[Dragonmaster352]

What you say in your first post and your reply above here is some what contradictory with the answer you give to my question.

I'm a bit confused here could you explain why I or Stuiter need a guarded trade fleet when others don't even need a trade fleet at all?

[Brend]

I'm not entirely convinced yet by the 'internal affairs + no more trading' thing, as I fail to see why couldn't the veolian OM traders trade with Praetorian OM traders, for example... That would definitely make sense, but it would influence prices. Then again, I understand the no impact argument, but there is one thing that still bugs me...

RIght now as I see it, those that actually make and will actually benefit from the complete trade block, and have zero economic motivation ( altruistic arguments are a thing too): since no one can get those things from the OM, the price of their goods actually goes up...

Either way, I will update the Open Market page, and remove the , and rows for now.

Again, I like the economic events, and think that we can make them even cooler if two or three STs collaborate on coming up with them!

[Mercury]

What you say in your first post and your reply above here is some what contradictory with the answer you give to my question.

I'm a bit confused here could you explain why I or Stuiter need a guarded trade fleet when others don't even need a trade fleet at all?

You dont need a guarded trade fleet. Just a guard.

[Elmer]

about the prevention and foreshadowing:

I think we acted as fast we reasonably could. All the available fleets were already sent to the front. When the surprise attack on Nest started, we had to make fleets available. As switching status takes 2 turns, flying takes 1 turn and engaging takes another turn, which together are 4 turns. Next to that the engage had to be timed with all three fleets. So the delay of 4 turns is actually rather fast. Yes the whole military fleet rule system is designed to be slow.

In the end I think it is nice to have economical events directly related to politics and other events. But a meaningful choice, as with the black market weapons trade has my preference over the rather absolute event as with this one.

What I mean is: with the black market event, a faction could decide whether or not to give in, which is (in my point of view) a meaningful choice about the culture of your faction. With this event, most factions cannot make a meaningful decision, as they have not the required products. (At least, my faction can't really do anything about this event.)

But still, this kind of economical events are a nice experiment to see if it adds anything to the game :)

[Mercury]

I have taken careful note of all the opinions and I will take them into consideration for my future economic events :)

[Brend]

Wasn't there talk (at the write-a-thon) of ending this event when the trade deals between the IO and the Veolians ended? (Which they did in 154 by the way.)

[Chriz]

I agree that it is time to close this event.

[Stuiter]

I still want to continue to deliver after I corporated my organics.

[Brend]

Yes well.... We have already discussed this during the write-a-thon, Mercury is just being slow. Also, there was going to be for participating worlds... If events such as these are in effect forever, we might do better by removing the Open Market :P

Regarless of all that, you ARE still allowed to continue sending healthcare and food! The end of the event does not have to be the end of the aid the Hiocans send!

[Stuiter]

As Mercury has not closed it, I will continue.
It will take ages before it is finished.
So let's decide what to do.

[Mercury]

I am okay with closing it, there does not seem to be much enthusiasm. If nobody says "I want to continue" I will finish it up this weekend.

[Mercury]

I am hereby officially closing this event. Will post a news message on that this week.

[Brend]

I fixed the open market to once more buy/sell and and !

[Stuiter]

Yeah, made last payment. Finished!

[Chriz]

I believe the Hiocan Society should be rewarded 5 for their goodwill and persistence in this matter.