It's time! require them both to be there, whatever, but this is SO necessary!

It is a really good idea, it's convenient for the players, more realistic... blah... blah... etc... etc...

so long as its in the same station....

Yeah... they would have to be in the same station. Other wise there would have to be some kind of motorized cargo conveyance capable of containing and transporting items over long distances and able to withstand the troubles of space travel and probably it would also need some kind of mobilized offensive/defensive fighting unit capable of defending the motorized conveyance from potential attacks from the unknown space horrors.

oh well, its a shame that with the advent of space stations no one thought to invent motorized cargo conveyances and mobilized offensive/defensive fighting unit and then had the idea to put them in groups to ferry goods for a price.

Yeah, I meant inside the same station.

I dont see why there couldnt be an option to hire a convoy to transfer it to a different station.

Because being able to hire a convoy would irritate the pirates :P

You kidding? We've been rooting for players to be able to hire idiot NPCs to carry their stuff for YEARS now.

So you'd be happy to let some lazy bastard such as myself sit in Odia and send voys of porn to Sol and Itan, after which I would safely fly to the stations in my unarmed hog 2 and gradually sell the goods over several days. An active pirate might not even ever see me in flight. I thought the idea of moving trade to grey was to get more trader / pirate interactions happening.

Perhaps I am grossly misunderstanding Ryan's suggestion. If so, I retract my comment and apologize. Otherwise, I'm all for this happening since I've been wishing for it for ages myself.

Edit: This would actually get me into Grey and trading again :P
Edit2: Also, if I'm understanding this concept correctly, we're looking at a major exploit potential since a clever guild would be able to control the market and keep prices low for other individuals and groups.
Edit3: And this is off the subject, but we really need to eliminate the infinite items for sale at stations. As product is purchased, the buy price should increase in a similar fashion to how the profit decline "SHOULD" work. Note, I said should, not does.

So you'd be happy to let some lazy bastard such as myself sit in Odia and send voys of porn to Sol and Itan

Uh, yeah. Because I will be liberating yer voy's sweet, sweet porn cargo and conveying it to a station of my choosing. Or I'll just space it as a nice drain on your bank account. NPCs are not a great solution for trade that involves putting your own credits at risk.

And as I did when I was a serious trader, I would either avoid you, pay you to leave them alone or pay someone to pay attention to you. Or as I did to Peytros when he annoyed me, send them through with Free power cells, Aquean Ore and Government Issued Plasma Cannons :P

Seriously though, I agree NPC's are risky. It could make the game more interesting but I stand by my reservations.

And I'm sure this has already been suggested (probably by myself) but if you really want to get more trade happening in Grey, set up the really good Proc missions to run high cost items between nation space and Grey. Plasteel absolutely sucks. Also, and I realize in saying this that there are drastic changes to the faction system coming, however I think this should be part of it- BUT, faction standing should erode over time to mid or low level respect.

Edit: With regards to NPC's though, I would much rather have the option to hire my own permanent fleet, which I would have to sustain financially- after my initial purchase or hiring costs. Failure to do so should cause them to abandon my corporation. My ability to sustain my fleet while having them active should have an impact on future purchases. This means sending them through places like B8 when its highly active with pirates would be a stupid thing to do without guarantees in place.

Which brings us back to my suggestion of lockers with pin numbers. Once the buyer pays the seller he is given the pin number and can retrieve the cargo in whatever station it is in, without the necessity of the other player being there.

Question, why not player owned convoys, but they can only fly under the personal supervision of the player himself. This should please the pirates since there any player they encountered would have more to lose, and therefore be more willing to pay. Or, if he does not pay there are more ships to destroy.

Hiring convoys would ROCK. You pay by distance and they are piloted by idiot AIs. They would force traders into grey because they'd saturate the nation space trade routes with hired convoys.

I will restrain my sarcastic bastardy nature briefly to make a legitimate point.

The real problem with implementing npc convoys whether hired or player owned to move player freight would only have very limited uses in the current economy. Most notably, moving porn from Odia to Sol or Itan. I'm sure there are a few other opportunities to move large amounts of good that would benefit traders who would then either sit on and sell gradually or spread out to local stations.

The profit margin for 99% of the current non static routes can be significantly reduced with a single moth or XC load of goods, making the need for mass transport unnecessary. Even the best procurement missions can be easily accomplished with a regular moth or XC.

With so few current good routes out there that would be better worked with hired transports, the good routes would be easily controlled by a few players setting up shop and building plugins to slow sell their wares. I'm not saying anyone does this, but I think the lua savy people (which does not include me) would find this a simple project judging by some of the plugins I've found on the vo-wiki and projects forums.

However, I like the idea and believe that this might become viable in the 'near future'.

That being said, I only want to say three other words. "Enhanced Trade Routes"

I would much rather have the option to hire my own permanent fleet, which I would have to sustain financially- after my initial purchase or hiring costs. Failure to do so should cause them to abandon my corporation. My ability to sustain my fleet while having them active should have an impact on future purchases. This means sending them through places like B8 when its highly active with pirates would be a stupid thing to do without guarantees in place.

i believe this was the best thing mentioned in this thread. if you want to be lazy and sit on your ass while idiot NPC's do the work, it aint gonna be cheap. only problem is the lack of players to intercept these voys. maybe in a more crowded universe. i hate to say it, but VO is light years away from this kind of a.i. interaction anyway.

According to Incarnate player owned convoys is a dream of his that will be coming “soon”™

I don’t know about everyone else but I would like the ability to move several of my ships from one point to another using AI pilots to get them there. While in convoy they would act like current AI convoys (for better or worse) but once they land they would revert to normal ships.

Not only could a person ferry a number of their favorite type ships to where they are needed, some players might prefer a more “nomadic’ play style instead of having of stash spare ships all over the place

I concur that in-station cargo transfers should be implemented immediately.

I want this feature too, but defer to the devs to choose when best to add it according to their work cycles.