Acts of War

[xdesperado]

Is there any possibility that encounters with foriegn flagged warships can be adjusted to reflect the political situation?

Example: I'm a Thulun captain in a Thulun flagged ship. I have trade permit and rank with Thulun and I'm trying to land a cargo on Thulun-Prime. Cadar is currently neutral with Thulun yet their warships are interdicting my landing. In the real world this would be considered an act of war or at least create a serious diplomatic crisis.

Would like to see warships be more common in their home space except when they have hostile relationships with another faction.

Having a Thulun warship inspect me at Thulun-Prime before allowing landing makes sense. Having another factions warships do so when they are neutral or friendly doesn't.

On a related note you should get far fewer encounters with foriegn flagged pirates in a planets sector as their navy should be more concentrated there and making life rough for them.

[Cory Trese]

I agree if you mean "in the real world" as like planet Earth's current international geo-political arrangement.

The Star Traders RPG setting is a sci-fi space opera that includes a very different political and legal structure.

Your character is a "Star Trader" which includes him or her in a very special social-economic status -- an privileged caste essentially.

Now, agree, if your Captain was a full member (not a Reputation'd Shalun Star Trader) of Thulun the Cadar patrol might be looked upon differently.

---

Setting discussions aside, the mathematical rules suggestion that you make is already fully implemented throughout the game system.

I will investigate making some parts of it stronger, but the current solution is very responsive to Conflicts, Rumors and sector Faction ownership.

You do get far fewer encounters with foreign flagged pirates in a planet's sector, strongly relative to position in quadrant and Security Ratings.

[xdesperado]

Nice to hear that ship distribution is affected by the politics of the Quadrant. That said its surprising how many times you can run into another factions warships when trying to land on a planet. Can really mess up the early career of said captain when a third party who shouldn't have a legitimate concern with comings and goings on said planet decides to stick their nose in.

Now if the two factions have Trade Embargoes, Trade Wars or Solar Wars declared then it makes some sense. Otherwise they are just interfering with the normal business of a neutral of even friendly power and my poor captain gets screwed.

[athios]

Jun 6, 2013 23:01:10 GMT -5 xdesperado said:

its surprising how many times you can run into another faction's warships when trying to land on a planet. Can really mess up the early career of said captain...

I don't get what the big deal is. If the warship is not the same faction as the territory/planet, you can just ignore it with no reputation penalty, correct? The only risk is running out of water-fuel from repeated landing attempts.

[xdesperado]

Jun 7, 2013 1:49:52 GMT -5 athios said:

Jun 6, 2013 23:01:10 GMT -5 xdesperado said:

its surprising how many times you can run into another faction's warships when trying to land on a planet. Can really mess up the early career of said captain...

I don't get what the big deal is. If the warship is not the same faction as the territory/planet, you can just ignore it with no reputation penalty, correct? The only risk is running out of water-fuel from repeated landing attempts.

No you'll take the rep hit for ignoring a warship regardless of where its at.
Also just because you say ignore doesn't mean they'll ignore you and may force the action regardless.
Either way you end up with a negative event for your captain.
Only excuss they might be able to use would be if I had already built up enough negative rep with them to reach wanted status, but that's unlikely for a captain under 5th level unless he's been forced to do a lot of trading with embargoed factions.
It's mainly a concern for very early game on the higher difficulties.