Ideas for the Black Market in the new system

[Indirik]

Some possibilities for black market trading opportunities under the new trading system:

1) The most obvious seems to be to trade on offers that are restricted. I.e. an Ally trading on a Realm Only trade, or non-Ally trading on an Ally trade. For a bigger challenge, a non-Ally trading on a Realm Only trade.

2) Trading on offers from a realm with which you are at war.

3) Skimming gold from the transaction by shorting the seller, then pocketing the difference. The challenge here would be to try to hide it in some way that is not obvious. Perhaps a delayed message about a shortage in the trade balance in the next tax report? You couldn't charge the buyer too much, as the money has to come from somewhere. To fleece the buyer, see the next idea...

4) Trading on mismatched offers. I.e. matching a 400 bushel Buy with 350 bushels of Sell, and pocketing the difference. As above hiding the mismatch would be difficult. Delayed message in the Harvest report? You couldn't short-match the seller, as that would leave bushels floating around in limbo.

All of these could have varied risk levels. The greater the risk, the greater the potential profit. Failure could result in confiscation of the food and/or bonds by either the buyer or seller, or maybe even arrest of the trader by agents of either party.

[egamma]

All interesting. Maybe offer a menu, similar to all the options that Infiltrators get?

[fodder]

hang on.. what trade balance in tax report?! that doesn't exist anymore.

[Indirik]

Some kind of note could be added. The key is that it is delayed. The tax report seems the logical place.

[fodder]

why? only the lord and steward gets any trade info
--

Food Sold   (29 days, 21 hours ago)
message to the lord and steward of Avengmil
Kendrick Date of Riombara, Duke of Rines, Margrave of Rines, Marshal of the Storm of the South has accepted your offer for 300 bushels of food. You gained 60 bonds.

Scammed (19 days, 21 hours ago) <- random length between 4 and 10 days?
message to the lord and steward of Avengmil
Apparently 20 bonds from a previous transaction are forgories.

hmm... that doesn't work.. because i've not seen an actual trade message from traders matching offers....

and eh.... it'll be dead obvious if you don't keep any bonds and suddenly get 40 bonds even when you are told you are supposed to get 60.. unless you lose 20 bonds when you get the scammed message (.. guess could work similar to "fine")

now.. if it's food, then it's very easy to miss.. but only because most people don't log their food every day.

[egamma]

Some kind of note could be added. The key is that it is delayed. The tax report seems the logical place.

Since they get paid in bonds, perhaps they get the message the next time they visit the bank?

[Foundation]

That's very hard to keep track of.  When you get bonds, you get bonds.  There's nothing saying "you got bonds from XX and YY".  The bank's the exception.

[egamma]

That's very hard to keep track of.  When you get bonds, you get bonds.  There's nothing saying "you got bonds from XX and YY".  The bank's the exception.

All you need is to add a second database column to "gold" and "bonds" called "fraud" or something. Whenever the lord tries to change bonds into gold or send bonds to someone else, the script (whatever you call it when the button is clicked) checks  to see if the "fraud" column is nonzero, and if so, notifies the lord and deducts those bad bonds from their count. Probably best to fail the transaction entirely, so that sending 50 bond doesn't turn into sending 30, or causes a negative bond count on the lord or something.

[Indirik]

The problem is that the lord could get rid of all their bonds via trade offers. This would be a trivial way to avoid paying the cost of the fraud. Then those fraudulent bonds would already be gone. Its quite possible that that idea just won't work.

[fodder]

eh... to make it go full circle.... use the equivalent of a "fine" I mentioned except it's automatically deducted from the next tax?

ie.. you get a delayed notice saying you got scammed.. and then the tax after that you have to cough up to replace the dodgy bonds...

[Foundation]

Would that not discourage the normal use of bonds?

[egamma]

Would that not discourage the normal use of bonds?

Would it not discourage selling your food to begin with? People will just have to live with it.

Of course...do we want to make players unhappy?

[Jeckyl]

You're all over-complicating this whole scammed business. Traders used to keep anonymity after a black market transaction because their name was not mentioned, and the food mysteriously disappeared, no message whatsoever.

With the new system, it does not matter what message the lords get, or when. So long as the trader's name is not mentioned. My thoughts on the options presented:

1) The most obvious seems to be to trade on offers that are restricted. I.e. an Ally trading on a Realm Only trade, or non-Ally trading on an Ally trade. For a bigger challenge, a non-Ally trading on a Realm Only trade.

Perfect.

2) Trading on offers from a realm with which you are at war.

Perfect.

3) Skimming gold from the transaction by shorting the seller, then pocketing the difference. The challenge here would be to try to hide it in some way that is not obvious. Perhaps a delayed message about a shortage in the trade balance in the next tax report? You couldn't charge the buyer too much, as the money has to come from somewhere. To fleece the buyer, see the next idea...

Leave the Trader's name out of the report. Highten security for a short time in case they try again on another of that lords offers.

4) Trading on mismatched offers. I.e. matching a 400 bushel Buy with 350 bushels of Sell, and pocketing the difference. As above hiding the mismatch would be difficult. Delayed message in the Harvest report? You couldn't short-match the seller, as that would leave bushels floating around in limbo.

Tell Seller "The order has been fulfilled here is your X gold, yada yada yada" - all completely true.
Tell Buyer "You have purchased 350 bushels for the price of X. The deal was supposed to have been for 400." Then you throw in a line about either not catching the trader's name, or are provided with a fake one, an alias.


I really like that alias idea, come to think of it. Just imagine "You have purchased 350 bushels for the price of X. The deal was supposed to have been for 400. You are told the trader's name was Ben Franklin, but you cannot find any record of him." The only restriction would be it cannot use a family name of anyone, and preferably not the given name of any character on that particular island.

[mykavykos]

You're all over-complicating this whole scammed business. Traders used to keep anonymity after a black market transaction because their name was not mentioned, and the food mysteriously disappeared, no message whatsoever.

With the new system, it does not matter what message the lords get, or when. So long as the trader's name is not mentioned. My thoughts on the options presented:
Perfect.
Perfect.
Leave the Trader's name out of the report. Highten security for a short time in case they try again on another of that lords offers.
Tell Seller "The order has been fulfilled here is your X gold, yada yada yada" - all completely true.
Tell Buyer "You have purchased 350 bushels for the price of X. The deal was supposed to have been for 400." Then you throw in a line about either not catching the trader's name, or are provided with a fake one, an alias.


I really like that alias idea, come to think of it. Just imagine "You have purchased 350 bushels for the price of X. The deal was supposed to have been for 400. You are told the trader's name was Ben Franklin, but you cannot find any record of him." The only restriction would be it cannot use a family name of anyone, and preferably not the given name of any character on that particular island.

I disagree with the part where you say to inform the buyer that the deal have differences.
A message saying "your buying offer was filled" to the buyers and "your products were sold" to the sellers is more than enough.
Also we could get a history of the food income and outcome in the granary. This way only those who track down their business will realize that they were stolen.

Also I don't think that "create" a profit in a trade must be something made in the black market.
I'm playing as trader and this is something that really hurt the profession. But I will talk more about this in the proper post.


Another thing that could be done is the trader simply buy the food from anywhere and then be able to create a fake offer in any market to sell it latter. It would be a black market action because you are not a lord. Also this could inform, to the buyer, that the food would come from a random region. This way if the lord care from where the food comes, he may talk with the other lord to confirm its origin.

[mykavykos]

Another thing is also that broker trade in the black market could be done with gold and not only with bonds.