Trading & Smuggling

Main Page: Starpoint Gemini

Commodity trading takes place on stations and planets. Various planets and stations trade in different commodities. Planets usually have larger stocks and trade in more commodities than stations, but planets charge a special “Planetary customs fee”. Exact fee depends on the planet in question and size of the ship attempting to land. Every ship has a fixed Cargo hold size. In general, freighter and freightliner classes have larger cargo holds, since their main purpose is trading and cargo hauling.

Commodities
Commodities are divided into several categories.

A special “contraband” flag can be set on a commodity which makes it illegal to trade in or even transport through a region. This attribute can change over time (most commonly scripted as a random event). While transporting commodities various AI security ships will scan the player and look through his cargo manifest to see if there’s anything of interest. Pirates might then demand the player to drop the cargo in exchange for his life. Security ships might scan and find contraband cargo. They will then demand the player to drop that particular cargo and pay a fine (fine depends on the commodity and its quantity).

Smuggling
Smuggling is the act of transporting and trading of contraband goods (explained in the “Commodities” section). Smuggling is a good, but risky way to earn Credits, since security ships scan passing vessels in search of contraband. Smuggling chance is calculated each time you’re being scanned by security ships or when attempting to sneak onto a planet. Smaller ship classes automatically have a higher chance of a successful smuggling.

Best prices for Contraband goods can be found on planets, but Planetary customs perform checks on landing and player can only land on a planet if he manages to avoid inspection and smuggle the contraband planet-side. If the smuggling attempt fails, player gets a substantial penalty fee and reputation decrease.