Obvious lack of Black Market Traders ("shadyguys")

[Vectorial1024]

I can trace posts on this topic from e.g. around 2022 (2 years ago as of writing) but basically, there are recurring posts about "can't find black market traders", and most replies are basically the useless recurring "find more signal leaks".

For example, a reddit thread complaining a glaring lack of shadyguys in the vanilla sectors: https://www.reddit.com/r/X4Foundations/ ... space_why/ ; misinformation flies. OP gets downvoted. Nothing gets solved.

Today I want to point out: no, finding more signal leaks does not really find you a black market trader because for some reason, the shadyguys init script sometimes fails, and the entire "core sectors" group receive ZERO shadyguys. Comms signals will still spawn, but none of them will be shadyguy missions. Drug trading is non-existent, and the transition to mid-game has become unreasonably harder due to a lack of large-sized, easy-to-plan, but risky income source: missions are too grindy, trading is too slow, loot farming got nerfed (7.0), fly-by boarding got cancelled (7.0), mining (eg Nividium) got nerfed (4.0) + might get Khaak (4.0), and crystal mining got nerfed (I think 3.0?), and scrap recycling can be difficult to handle (5.0; Manticore has high drag to make it difficult to fly).

I myself was playing a X4RE (Remergence) + DA script + signal leak hunter game, and I scanned all stations in several Argon sectors, and I found ZERO shadyguys. This betrayed my distant memory of somewhat easily finding shadyguys, and had driven me to finally open up a new mod to tell me where the shadyguys were at. Turned out there were none to begin with, and it was not my fault.

My mod is still WIP, but I want to point out this very strange situation as some sort of PSA.

[Axeface]

Yeh the amount and where they are is predefined per gamestart iirc, ive raised this issue before because I really hate it. Imo the player should be able to build a black market wherever they want. Its fine to make it more difficult in certain places but to have some sectors where you will never be able to build one is horrible (1st hand experience, my main game is a teladi druglord). It would be super cool for example to be able to hire black marketeers and tell them where to work - its station workforce buying our gear, let us exploit them directly.

[YorrickVander]

I made a quick test mod to see this - there are a lot of potential shady types in the game, but it is rng which stations per game. I don't think the number of possible locations is the issue, but the really tedious unlock method Something visible on the map at freeports would be a better solution, the yellow quest giver icons to trigger the black market guy instead of endlessly scanning stations hoping the signal leak is the type you want...

Edit - or an extension to the curent behavior - we can do -spolier mission name- to get at least 1 shady in any start, then a convo option like 'do you have any contacts in teladi space or whatever' with some sort of bribe/job/randon yeah nah responses

if you want to ake a look, aside from the tool in this forum to check saves, you can pop this into a loop through all sectors:

Code: Select all

<do_if value="$UncoverStations.{$us}.shadyguy.exists == true">
        <set_entity_traits entity="$UncoverStations.{$us}.shadyguy" tradesvisible="true"/>

        <get_safe_pos result="$safepos" value="$UncoverStations.{$us}.position" radius="2km" zone="$UncoverStations.{$us}.zone" />

        <create_object name="$AdvSatellite" macro="macro.eq_arg_satellite_01_macro" owner="faction.player" zone="$UncoverStations.{$us}.zone">
              	<position value="$safepos" />
        </create_object>  
</do_if>

[zakaluka]

> but it is rng which stations per game

It's supposed to be random. There's been a long-standing issue where at gamestart most shadyguys might end up in DLC sectors. Very few in any core faction sectors.

And we know from viewtopic.php?f=146&t=447260&start=20#p5133697 that shadyguys are placed on stations during universe creation, NOT when the player performs some action.

The trouble is that reading a savegame to troubleshoot this is a bit too far above most people's heads. Even looking to see if you're affected by the issue is non trivial (a script on github to find them).

edit: if I had some way of actually finding black markets in my chosen faction's space (my save, only 8 in teladi space) that'd help a lot, yes.

[dayang]

There is no lack... but they are random and rare. One day I can go into a sector and every other signal leak will be a lucrative opportunity. The next day... same sector (because I had to reload due to unrelated bug...) nuthin.

It's just one of those things you have to keep going around for. Random means random, there's a possible chance that you will basically never ever see one in your entire play through... likewise there's a chance every signal leak *will* be a lucrative opportunity. Pray to RNGesus.

[foxxbl]

The trouble is that reading a savegame to troubleshoot this is a bit too far above most people's heads. Even looking to see if you're affected by the issue is non trivial (a script on github to find them).

edit: if I had some way of actually finding black markets in my chosen faction's space (my save, only 8 in teladi space) that'd help a lot, yes.

You can use the UI tool: viewtopic.php?t=463804 to parse the game and search for the black marketeers. Makes this task very trivial.

[Vectorial1024]

There is no lack...

I am trying to say, there is a bug that is forcing shadyguys to be fewer than usual. This "lack" is the result of a bug.

Random means random, there's a possible chance that you will basically never ever see one in your entire play through...

It is spawned at game start, and it literally says in the readable MD code: pick random but have at least 1 per sector. If I go through the stations one by one, I should be guaranteed to find one, and yet sometimes in core sectors, I literally find none. This is a bug.

[Vectorial1024]

Cross-linking to the relevant bug report thread; see viewtopic.php?p=5237234