Hi All,

I had some success with the rules for organisations, so I thought I'd merge together some rules from Edge of the Empire and the old Galaxy Guide 6 to formulate how Speculative Trading might occur under the Edge of the Empire system.

I therefore present:

Speculative Trading v1.0

Feel free to give some feedback. Please note that much of what has been contained is not my own work, and has been pulled from Galaxy Guide 6 and the Edge of the Empire Core Rule Book. This is by no means an original work, but an amalgamation and merging of systems.

Let me know your thoughts.

Haven't read them yet, but I will. Just want to say the pages look absolutely amazing. Like ripped from the official books. Awesome job on that!

I'll read them later and comment on the actual system :-)

Thanks for posting.

No problem. All done on Microsoft Word too

It looks beautiful and the rules seem to be workable. I have one player that would absolutely love this. Unfortunately, I have another player that would groan out loud at the thought of spending table time on trading. Still, I might slip some in here and there.

Did you obtain permission from and give credit to the artist for the piece on page 3?

I have not given credit...yet. I am attempting to find the artist so that I may do so. I just wanted to get the rules out there for feedback.

Hey, these look great! (Especially that these days I'm into the new Elite game)... When my group is done with helping the Alliance, we will definitely try them out! I wish I had had them a year ago...

No problem. All done on Microsoft Word too

Care to share a template? Or just offering your document in .doc so the formatting can be used? My creations look pretty horrible. It appears you've grabbed the appropriate fonts, etc.

Thanks for making trade rules. As soon as I get a chance I will be reading and commenting! Old Traveller fan who appreciates the joy of trading.

Here's the template for this document

WORD TEMPLATE

Neat ruleset! I'm a little confused by Table 2-5, though: what's the rationale behind making something that's traditionally a bulk, low-profit trade good like foodstuffs only Encumbrance 1, whereas things like gold is Encumbrance 40? I would think that volume would be far more important than weight in shipping, especially in space opera. It also makes Minerals worth less than 10% of foodstuffs by encumbrance.

Also, could we get an example of a crew going through these rules?

If I'm reading Table 2-5 correctly, a crew can get into the hold of a stock YT-1300 (Enc 165):

• 577Kcr worth of gold ((165 enc / 40 enc) * 140Kcr)
• 297Kcr worth of foodstuffs ((165 enc / 1 enc) * 1.8Kcr)
• 165Kcr worth of silver ((165 enc / 20 enc) * 20Kcr)
• 19.8Kcr worth of metals ((165 enc / 10 enc) * 1.5Kcr)

I think the encumbrance of each unit needs to be overhauled--unless I'm misreading how the table is used, foodstuffs should probably have the highest Encumbrance/unit, followed by things like Low-Technology, with things like High-Technology, Metals, Medicines, and Spice having low Encumbrance/unit.

My Group Tonight Are Traders. I'm Using This Starting Tonight!

Looks pretty solid - at least at the short glance I was able to give it over lunch. Yeah, I can very much see the GG6 roots here.

Pity we don't do much smuggling / cargo hauling anymore. Not much chance to try this out. . ..

It looks pretty good, but I did have a couple of thoughts.

1) " This system does not take into account other expenses which the characters may have, such as docking costs, ship repairs, and so forth. Those rules can be treated as happening in the background, and will not be covered here."

This feels very dangerous to me, because these expenses are exactly what makes interstellar trade running a risky business . I feel like you should either find a way to work these into the rules or give some guidance to the GM to include these kinds of expenses - otherwise your hand waving a large part of overhead. Like making a retail-shop rule set and handwaving renting the store.

2) Types of Good

Minerals - No company in their right mind transports unrefined material long distances, it's just not cost effective compared to refining and shipping the refined product.

Technology - I'd consider splitting the technology into "Consumer Goods", "Industrial Equipment" and "High Technology". Except for the exceptionally advanced items most planets can't produce, most markets are going to be more sensitive to the use of the transported goods then they are to the technology level.

3) World Technology

This feels like an odd one to me, as the worlds in Star Wars don't deviate as much as, say, 40k. I can't think of any, say, truly Industrial Age planets. Consider replacing this with "Industrial Base", a measure of how industrialized the world is, from None (Endor, Dathomir) and Minor (Tatooine) to Mega-Industry (Kuat)

4) Drop-Ship Fees

I'd consider basing it off of distances rather than fees. Particularly as it hardly takes a day to take off or land. Something like, Base cost + 10% base cost per sector transited, with an extra 'remote location' fee if the system is far from a hyper route. Also, i'd be careful with the values - 2000 credits was a "respectable" fee for renting an entire YT-1300 (165 cargo) from Tatooine to Alderaan.

5) Encumberance Ratings

I agree with Enoch - the Encumberance Ratings don't make a whole lot of sense. Also, I wouldn't bother with precious metals. They are so easy to move and have such a high level of intrinsic value it's hard to imagine their cost being dramatically different across the galaxy. As a small hauler, we need to be moving something that isn't being covered by Bulk Haulers.

Also keep in mind the system has to work for Wayfarers as well as it does for YT-1300, so make sure it scales well. Right now a good, six day full load voyage in a wayfarer nets over 50,000 credits. Or make 3 million credits transporting food up a single rarity. To be honest, Star Wars suggests that nobody ever got rich being a Space (indeed according to several sources, under the Empire many captains turned to smuggling because it was almost impossible to support a ship with legal trade.) The rules should refect that.

This is great, and makes good use of combining both FFGs and the D6 ruleset. Well done.

I was wondering if you have thought about adding in some of WoTCs efforts, particularly the Commerce and the Shadow Wing supplement?

I'm with Quicksilver on the importance of balancing profit and expense. Speculative trading has basically ruined two campaigns I've been in (Rogue Trader and D&D) by introducing way too much profit. In both campaigns we basically went from one ship to a small fleet, with no real limits on our purchasing power outside of availability. It changed the flavor of the campaign for the worse in both cases. Two different GMs as well, so it wasn't just one person's mistake in running it.

The rules themselves look very good, but without the counterbalance of expenses at the same level of detail, they could easily turn into credit-printing. Since FFG has balanced some of the items through price, this could unbalance a campaign.

On the positive side, if you want to run a couple adventures that need speculative trading (not just as part of a campaign), then these rules would be excellent.

I'm with Quicksilver on the importance of balancing profit and expense. Speculative trading has basically ruined two campaigns I've been in (Rogue Trader and D&D) by introducing way too much profit. In both campaigns we basically went from one ship to a small fleet, with no real limits on our purchasing power outside of availability. It changed the flavor of the campaign for the worse in both cases. Two different GMs as well, so it wasn't just one person's mistake in running it.

The rules themselves look very good, but without the counterbalance of expenses at the same level of detail, they could easily turn into credit-printing. Since FFG has balanced some of the items through price, this could unbalance a campaign.

On the positive side, if you want to run a couple adventures that need speculative trading (not just as part of a campaign), then these rules would be excellent.

I am working on something that would introduce a more detailed level of "operational expenses" but its a fair way from being ready. Much of the writing is done, but it needs editing and polishing, and then laying out. SO could be a while before its out.

Hopefully, it might make work well with Hoolys work.

Any time large amounts of anything (money, equipment, ships, XP, etc) are introduced to a campaign, there needs to be a corresponding "sink" for them. If there's a fleet of ships, have them attacked by pirates and lose a few. Get the Empire involved and impose taxes. Have a Rebel cell target them for "crimes against the people."

Just make sure that there's balance.

Thanks for the feedback guys, I really appreciate it.

These rules are the first draft, and I've already made some changes. I wrote these rules without playing a single session, as this was one of the elements my players wanted in the game.

Now with a bit more experience with the system, I've had a change of heart with some of the things introduced, and realised I didn't go far enough with others. I found the rules for Drop Point Delivery overly complex, and will either adjust or remove completely, and instead provide suggestions for costs which can be modified by Success/Advantage/Threat/Despair.

Any specific suggestions on the rules would be appreciated, such as Quicksilver has.

I was wondering if you have thought about adding in some of WoTCs efforts, particularly the Commerce and the Shadow Wing supplement?

Where is this from?

It was a web supplement for the D20 Herod guide, it's easy to find with a quick web search.

One of the thing it mentions is about finding a buyer, this might be one of the balancing factors for selling goods. There is also info about the amount of goods a community has to sell at any one time. Useful stuff.

For those who are interested:

LINK

For those who are interested:

LINK

Thanks for posting this for everyone, I had an old copy that I had printed off many moons ago. It has some interesting info about adjusting the base price based on current levels of the product in an area. It also has more about negotiating the starting price to get a better profit margin, this could link in with the standard use of the negotiation skill, which would keep all of the mechanics in one place. I hope this helps.