Struggling with Station trading

Harryg · Post by **Harryg** » Mon, 21. Mar 16, 10:21

This is driving me crazy I can't seem to get this right.

I built a basic water production station (nice and easy to get started). Added the miner and trade ship. The miner fills up the ice perfectly and I have it stocked with cheap energy.

My problem is that if I restrict access to other factions my trade ship won't sell the water. Right next door is a factory paying + 66% for water and my trader wont move it (I can manually but I want to automate of course) If I open up the trade restriction on water my trader comes and fills up but then it went and sold it to a station further away for +14% ! Why didn’t it see the offer closer for higher profit?. Also I don’t want other traders coming in and taking my water as they immediately do when I open it up to trade… this is driving me crazy, what am I doing wrong.?

Post by **Sparky Sparkycorp** » Mon, 21. Mar 16, 11:21

Trading within zones is preferentially done via station-owned cargolifters flying along mass traffic networks. Therefore I'd not expect your assigned capital to be trading with a station in the same zone.

I'm not sure why changing the Manager restriction setting triggered your ship to sell at other stations because I thought it only affected whether the Manager would trade with NPC Faction ships. The info on the wiki about that may be incorrect about that if it wasn't coincidence.

Harryg · Post by **Harryg** » Mon, 21. Mar 16, 12:19

Sparky Sparkycorp wrote:Trading within zones is preferentially done via station-owned cargolifters flying along mass traffic networks. Therefore I'd not expect your assigned capital to be trading with a station in the same zone.

I'm not sure why changing the Manager restriction setting triggered your ship to sell at other stations because I thought it only affected whether the Manager would trade with NPC Faction ships. The info on the wiki about that may be incorrect about that if it wasn't coincidence.

Thank you for your reply but I’m afraid I don’t understand you - sorry. Unfortunately I’m no closer to understanding how people use stations to trade wares effectively..

I am trying to do something very simple and it doesn't seem to work or it can't work i'm not sure which and I’m trying to work out how people set up the station in this simple model.

I want to have:
My manger Automatically manage the trade ship I’ve given him and I want him to sell the water we make to the highest bidder (best buy offer – makes sense right, why sell for 11c if you can sell for 20c). And I don’t want other faction’s ships coming to the station and taking the wares.

Can this be done? If not why not surely it’s the most basic and simple requirement. – What do others do to move wares? Surely not by hand else you would be sat watching the stations all day

The use of the “transfer ware” function to sell ware to a station because it happens be close seems to me to be nonsense, its not automatic and not documented anywhere as a part of the game that I can see.

When you say :

“I'm not sure why changing the Manager restriction setting triggered your ship to sell at other stations because I thought it only affected whether the Manager would trade with NPC Faction ships.”

What do you mean? did I say that? All I said is “the trade that the manager gave to trade ship was for a lower value than the best available and that it was also further.

Post by **Sparky Sparkycorp** » Mon, 21. Mar 16, 12:48

It partly depends on what you mean by " Right next door". If you mean in the same zone, the Managers use cargolifter drones to trade wares with each other instead of using them to load and unload ships. So if the stations are in the same zone, the trade ship isn't needed for selling water to the other station.

The text you asked me was about when you wrote "If I open up the trade restriction on water my trader comes and fills up but then it went and sold it to a station further away", which I found surprising because I didn't think they restriction setting affected ships assigned to the station.

Post by **eMYNOCK** » Mon, 21. Mar 16, 13:09

Unfortunately i am not able nor am i allowed to attach Screenshots in this Thread... but i can add a GDrive link. (This is a Zip File, you will have to extract it first.)

Also i can make a "Quick" Guide so explan what is to see in the Picures.

Setting 1:

This is the default Setting, Player Freighters and NPC Ships will approach the Station, make deliveries, buy stuff and so on.

Setting 2:
Setting: Station not Restricted for the NPC but a few Wares.

In this Example for a Cell Fab Matrix the NPC are allowed to deliver Energy Cells, Food Rations and Spacefuel but have no permissions to Sell any Liquids or Buy the Produced Cells.

The Player Freighters are also not allowed to Sell or buy the Restricted Wares outside the Players Company.

Setting 3:
Setting: Station is Restricted for NPC but a few Wares are not.

In this Example for a Cell Fab Matrix the NPC are not allowed to interact with the entire Station, but the Stations Freighters are allowed to Buy Energy Cells, Food Rations and Spacefuel outside the Player Company.

Notice:

The understanding for Restricted Wares is always that the Station is or is not allowed to Buy / Sell outside the Players Company.

Additionally, if a Station is Restricted for other Factions no NPC will interact with it.
A Station that is Restricted will always require Freighters to buy / sell its Resources and Products.

Harryg · Post by **Harryg** » Mon, 21. Mar 16, 13:12

Sparky Sparkycorp wrote:It partly depends on what you mean by " Right next door". If you mean in the same zone, the Managers use cargolifter drones to trade wares with each other instead of using them to load and unload ships. So if the stations are in the same zone, the trade ship isn't needed for selling water to the other station.

The text you asked me was about when you wrote "If I open up the trade restriction on water my trader comes and fills up but then it went and sold it to a station further away", which I found surprising because I didn't think they restriction setting affected ships assigned to the station.

Ok thanks for coming back to me on this, i understand a bit better...

Yes its in the same zone. So if its a in zone cargo transfer where do i see the transactions? the moving of the ware and the money when the manager is doing it himself?.

Also after reading the wiki it says that the manger will use the trade ship to sell ware even if trades are restricted, well in my case i could not get him to to any trades until i lifted restriction.

It also says that the skill of the trade ship caption is used, which skill is important for a trade ship caption?

Finally also i have budget set to 0 as I'm supplying the goods in, but will this need to be set with money even for selling? if so why does he need money to sell ?

thanks again for your help with this

Harryg · Post by **Harryg** » Mon, 21. Mar 16, 13:35

eMYNOCK wrote:Unfortunately i am not able nor am i allowed to attach Screenshots in this Thread... but i can add a GDrive link. (This is a Zip File, you will have to extract it first.)

Also i can make a "Quick" Guide so explan what is to see in the Picures.

Setting 1:

This is the default Setting, Player Freighters and NPC Ships will approach the Station, make deliveries, buy stuff and so on.

Setting 2:
Setting: Station not Restricted for the NPC but a few Wares.

In this Example for a Cell Fab Matrix the NPC are allowed to deliver Energy Cells, Food Rations and Spacefuel but have no permissions to Sell any Liquids or Buy the Produced Cells.

The Player Freighters are also not allowed to Sell or buy the Restricted Wares outside the Players Company.

Setting 3:
Setting: Station is Restricted for NPC but a few Wares are not.

In this Example for a Cell Fab Matrix the NPC are not allowed to interact with the entire Station, but the Stations Freighters are allowed to Buy Energy Cells, Food Rations and Spacefuel outside the Player Company.

Notice:

The understanding for Restricted Wares is always that the Station is or is not allowed to Buy / Sell outside the Players Company.

Additionally, if a Station is Restricted for other Factions no NPC will interact with it.
A Station that is Restricted will always require Freighters to buy / sell its Resources and Products.

Thank you that is much clearer now,

i'm still a little confused on the manger owned trade ship if it can trade or not if the ware is restricted. the wiki says yes but i cant seem to get it to and i think you say not too...

also on my station i still cant click on the ware icon on the station for the output goods (water) where i can on the input goods, is this normal, the water does show up in the trade list as a green ware.

one last thing pls if i may: What are the important skills for the caption of the trade ship? i think his skills might be making the poor decisions on where to sell the water. my manger is 5* but the trade ship caption is not.

Post by **Sparky Sparkycorp** » Mon, 21. Mar 16, 13:44

I'm afraid I don't know the answers to most of those questions.

eMY has provided some great info above that is more precise than the info on the wiki (the wiki will need updating to account for it).

For NPC skills, there's info on the wiki for Captains and Pilots in terms of their flight skills but not about trading yet. Having said that, it may still be the case that the relative weighting for the skills listed there may apply to trading too.

Post by **Sparky Sparkycorp** » Tue, 22. Mar 16, 02:01

Based on the info from eMY, the wiki text about controlling station trade with NPC factions has been updated. If there are any errors in interpretation, please feel free to fix them.

https://www.egosoft.com:8444/confluence ... I/Stations

Edit: The info on controlling how stations trade has been moved to a separate page:
https://www.egosoft.com:8444/confluence ... tion+trade

Lord Crc · Post by **Lord Crc** » Tue, 22. Mar 16, 02:48

Harryg wrote:I want to have:
My manger Automatically manage the trade ship I’ve given him and I want him to sell the water we make to the highest bidder (best buy offer – makes sense right, why sell for 11c if you can sell for 20c). And I don’t want other faction’s ships coming to the station and taking the wares.

I would try with _not_ restricting water to be traded with other factions, and manually set the sell price quite high (like max-2 credits or something). Then I'd monitor the trade ship and water stock levels to see if the manager actively sold the water or not.

Kregoth · Post by **Kregoth** » Tue, 22. Mar 16, 07:12

For stations right next to you, I have noticed S/M ships will trade happily with neighbors. You might want to start with a Grigarums or something and see if they would rather trade, I think L ships are really only looking for trips that require jumping.

CommanderTM · Post by **CommanderTM** » Tue, 22. Mar 16, 09:07

I wonder why devs usually dont reveal how the game really works. How skills affect things and how managers and trade ships do their thing, exactly.

It would be so much easier to plan and, well, play. Right now, most of it is a mystery and we can only guess. I would love to get my hands on rules that govern managers and trade ships.

But, i mean, why be so secretive about that???

I imagine, if i was a dev, it would be rather fun for me to explain how exactly i made the ai behave and all that stuff.

Post by **Sparky Sparkycorp** » Tue, 22. Mar 16, 10:18

They tend to provide info in various places, such as guides released with major updates, posts in threads here and on reddit, and modding-related info
on their wiki. We can at least now record snippets and things we discover ourselves on the wiki.

Harryg · Post by **Harryg** » Tue, 22. Mar 16, 14:44

CommanderTM wrote:I wonder why devs usually dont reveal how the game really works. How skills affect things and how managers and trade ships do their thing, exactly.

It would be so much easier to plan and, well, play. Right now, most of it is a mystery and we can only guess. I would love to get my hands on rules that govern managers and trade ships.

But, i mean, why be so secretive about that???

I imagine, if i was a dev, it would be rather fun for me to explain how exactly i made the ai behave and all that stuff.

Yes exactly where I'm coming from, i get so much more from a game when i think i have mastered the mechanics. With this game i'm having fun, don't get me wrong, i like it a lot now (not at launch) but i really would like to feel "in Control"

CommanderTM · Post by **CommanderTM** » Tue, 22. Mar 16, 15:37

Harryg wrote:
CommanderTM wrote:I wonder why devs usually dont reveal how the game really works. How skills affect things and how managers and trade ships do their thing, exactly.

It would be so much easier to plan and, well, play. Right now, most of it is a mystery and we can only guess. I would love to get my hands on rules that govern managers and trade ships.

But, i mean, why be so secretive about that???

I imagine, if i was a dev, it would be rather fun for me to explain how exactly i made the ai behave and all that stuff.
Yes exactly where I'm coming from, i get so much more from a game when i think i have mastered the mechanics. With this game i'm having fun, don't get me wrong, i like it a lot now (not at launch) but i really would like to feel "in Control"

Yes, exactly

Kregoth · Post by **Kregoth** » Tue, 22. Mar 16, 19:57

You know it be nice if every ship/station had a short Logbook. Something that would give us some information on what the AI ship/station has been doing. You would only see something like the last 10 or 15 entrees to keep from bloating save file data.

Example:
"Delivered 7000 Energy Cells! From: Energy Ray II, To: H20 Fab I" (Log of the last delivery)
"Searching for Trades - Success! Price Match found" (Something out there is willing to pay the Station asking price)
"Searching for Trades - Failed! Unable to find price match." (Basically they could not find a trade that matched what their station is asking for)

This would really help better understand what my Ships are doing, and why they aren't doing something. I don't know if you could Log the AI information like that, but it would sure be nice to have!

birdtable · Post by **birdtable** » Tue, 22. Mar 16, 20:40

Only one person knew how trading between stations worked and it was so secret they shot him,,, The bloke who did the Warehouse's trading methodology is in Chile, had a sex change and goes by the name of Berndadette .....

Post by **eMYNOCK** » Tue, 22. Mar 16, 20:55

birdtable wrote:Only one person knew how trading between stations worked and it was so secret they shot him,,, The bloke who did the Warehouse's trading methodology is in Chile, had a sex change and goes by the name of Berndadette .....

Nonsense...

Trade between Stations is a simple offer / demand thing...

IF your Prize fits the Prize of an other Station.. and you Trader can match it in a proper amount of time the deal is good.

If the prize does not fit.. or the trip take too long there is simply no deal.

Also.. for inter Zone Trade.. if prize matches.. deal.. otherwise no deal.

RAVEN.myst · Post by **RAVEN.myst** » Sat, 26. Mar 16, 22:27

It's been my experience that when trade restriction is on, the station will not buy or sell that ware from/to NPCs by any mechanism, own ships included - I use it (and I think this is its design intention) to keep a particular ware "for internal office use only", so to speak. I've never seen this violated, though I think that orders already in place when the restriction is applied, will still be executed, and this can take some time if the ship in question is far away at the time (and there's no mechanism whereby we can see what NPC ships are inbound - I miss the "report inbound ships" of TC/AP, even if it was a bit flakey) so it may look like a player-owned ship is selling restricted goods to NPCs, while in effect it's merely concluding an already-agreed transaction.

(Please note: this is mainly surmise from behaviour I've observed - I by no
means know this for a fact.)

As Kregoth mentions, the small piloted delivery vans (Gigurum, Nyanae, Mercancias) work really well for short hauls, and are waaaaay more cost-effective. Since the trips are short, it doesn't even matter if a delivery takes more than one trip - in fact, in a way it's better, as something you don't want is a bored freighter standing around smoking a cigarette, especially if it cost you several millions, plus the ball-ache of getting a skipper, a greasemonkey, and a gunnery chief. The smaller freighters also dock and undock quicker, and with their movement buff in 4.0 they are both more efficient, and better at not getting themselves killed.

Another note: when evaluating the behaviour of managed traders, you sometimes have to be patient. I've been mind-boggled lately by weird idle periods, and things not happening even when everything is in place, and there are orders to be filled. And I watch and I watch and I watch, and nothing happens - then I look away to do something else, and before I know it, what I was trying to get done has happened - but often I can't even be sure it was done by my intended minions, in the intended manner, as there is no record. My point is, sometimes you need to give it time. Also, it seems that after staff assignations and such, it can sometimes take a while for behaviour subroutines to stabilise, or perhaps to initialise.