Open - Hybrid - Smuggling Operation | Star Wars Galaxies Restoration

Open Hybrid Smuggling Operation

This idea/suggestion is Open. You can respond to ask questions or discuss the idea and either vote it up or down if you believe it should or should not be implemented, respectively. Popular suggestions and ideas will be considered by the development team to become reality in-game.
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Jul 19, 2021
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Proposal
Exciting missions for Master Smugglers (similar to how bounty hunters get high level missions)
Justification
It gives smugglers more missions that involve risk and reward. It provides more to do for the ace pilots. potentially provides more marks for bounty hunters.
Motivation
I always thought smugglers should have more to do in space and this idea i think fits in with what smugglers are shown doing in star wars universe.
Just an idea I had for a mission for smugglers and ace pilots.

There are out of the way places for smugglers to go talk to an npc, npc says something like 'you need to transport this spice/weapons/etc' to x location (maybe the hutts, valarians, black sun, etc or even rebel or imperial) and they say something like 'we will have our guys load it on your ship' and this is where it gets interesting. a timer starts to count down from when you receive the go ahead to when you board your ship, if the timer runs out before you get to space, authorities get alerted and when you launch into space, you may be met with heavy resistance.


in order for the next part of the mission to start, you need to launch your ship (must be a gunship or multicrew ship, perhaps the contraband shipment can be placed onto the ship as a "component" that only gunships or ships with cargo hold can take) into space, once you are in space you need to go from your start point to a waypoint/hyperspace beacon avoiding detection by players that can scan your ship for contraband (if you choose to take a higher payout higher risk shipment) and try to take you down or npcs that spawn in and try to stop you.

once you are at the waypoint your ship automatically starts the hyperspace sequence to the location where you're dropping off your shipment, when you exit hyperspace you then head towards the space station and request landing.

if you've been scanned by a player during your run, you get flagged/marked for bounty hunters (perhaps this can only be an option if you want a higher payout ie higher level contraband that runs the risk of being put on the bounty terminals).

once you get to your destination planet, you report to an npc in x amount of time to receive your payout. Maybe this can be timed where if you miss your window, you either have to pay for the loss in credits or fight it out, if you choose to fight it out and npcs spawn in to take you down, if it's high level contraband and you haven't been marked already and you defeat the npcs, a mark gets placed on your head for the amount that the contraband shipment was worth.

If you are aligned with the opposite faction that controls the planet you are on and you take on a smuggling mission, higher tier npcs may be after you, as if you are attempting to break a blockade.

If you're not a smuggler, maybe you could take on smuggling missions as well but they won't have the same payout as you would be considered high risk, so it might be smaller shipments maybe to get players more interested in furthering their smuggling career.
 
I like it! All the enemy faction ships in the sector could bee-line to you.

Imperials could get missions to transport classified technology, prisoners etc, Rebels could get stuff like death star plans, capital ship layouts, escaped prisoners etc, and neutrals could get stuff like sliced weapon and armor shipments, drugs etc. with a mix of everything for all of the factions. There's something in this for all of the factions. You could gain GCW, tokens etc for successful missions with bigger payouts for pvp flagged pilots. Make the runs over 10k in a given sector for high level missions. Then you could brag about how fast your ship is and it would mean something for PvE. Maybe you could do the Kessel run in 9 parsecs :p

The devs could require that contraband be actually run through these missions to enable vendor sales of it, and give actual smugglers skills to reduce the amount of enemy aggro.

This would bring the element of danger into moving goods around. That's one of the things I really like about eve-online. Not saying JTL should become eve, but there are some elements that could be incorporated.

You could take it further and give a small random stat boost to items moved through PvP missions like this.
 
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A random stat boost would give crafters the incentive to smuggle goods around and hire the best pilots. The risk would be that players could disable your ship and ransom your cargo, or blow you up and take it.
 
Adding to what have been said so far on the topic.

Just an idea how it could be applied and could link all of this to the ongoing Galactic Civil War?

Give crafters a way to be part of the GCW and give a hand to change the outcome?

(Note that I'm just brainstorming here, I'm not 100% sure on the how)

Part 1 : Crafting the goods
Part 2 : Finding a Smuggler
Part 3 : Smuggler Investigation
Part 4 : Get Cargo loaded
Part 5 : Space part
Part 6 : Delivery
Part 7 : Reward


Part 1 : Crafting the goods
Let's say I am a Rebel Weaponsmith, I go to a GCW "Mission Terminal", I see that Rebels are in need for 40 Carbines to a secret location and are paying 100000 credits, I take on the mission and go craft those 40 Carbines. Once they are crafted, I drop them off to a selected location. At this point, Artisan determines the percentage of total reward that he's willing to give to Smuggler (25% = 25000cr, can be set by Artisan).

Part 2 : Finding a Smuggler
A Smuggler has to take on the mission. Either you can ask your Smuggler friend or let the mission on a Terminal for any Smuggler to take. As long as the Smuggler is not in possession of the cargo, he won't be a target.

Part 3 : Smuggler's Investigation
Smuggler job starts here, he needs to find out what is the secret location for the delivery. For that he will have to find some NPCs, in cantina or other "public" places. NPCs will give hints. Those NPC might have a "trust" system (going way overboard here lol) that works like the Faction system. The more trusty an NPC will be, the more accurate hints will be, the faster investigation will go.

Part 4 : Get Cargo
Either it's gonna be a pickup on land location or a space pickup location. As soon as the cargo is in possession of the Smuggler, the Timer will start and a target will be on his head, every connected Bounty Hunter will receive a message saying that this Smuggler needs to be found dead or alive

Part 5 : Once in space, the Smuggler will have to follow a given route within time limit (waypoints) to "avoid" detection and reach an safe hyperspace point. Hyperspace be automatic and end up to a safe hyperspace entry point. Then again, follow a specific waypoint route, to the space station. Not following that waypoint route will send hints to Bounty Hunters seeking for the Smuggler, current position, current destination maybe?
PS: Waypoints have a timer attached to them, failure to reach waypoint within given time will give hints to BH.

Part 6 : Landing on the planet
Smuggler land on the planet and get the goods to given "rebel base" or something, dropping the cargo.

Part 7 : Reward
Quest is over, Crafters receive the credits and automatically sends the 25% to the Smuggler that completed the mission. Faction points will be given as well.

How it affects GCW?
Maybe we could have Rebel NPCS combat level getting higher in the region that received the cargo.

Risk and rewards
The higher the risks, the higher the rewards. Higher risks means narrower time between checkpoints.

I know this is just fantasy but it would be Epic if drop location could be inside a Corvette in space (docking and entering the Vette, let's say limited to the Ship Cargo Bay of the ship).

(This could also affect Space Ship battles that are occuring, lets say spawn a few more enemy fighters)

I have a lot in my head right now but I have to stop here.
 
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