Corel Trading Company / CORELCO

Inspiration

The inspiration for this company comes from the British East India Company. The British East India Company was a trading company founded in 17th century England for the purpose of trading on the Indian sub-continent. The company started out sailing three merchant ships around the Horn of Africa to India, and by the middle of the 18th century, the company had its own navy. That’s the goal. A monopolistic, militarized, untouchable company with nothing but dedicated players to keep it running smoothly.

What Do We Do?

Based in the Corel system, the company will mostly be trading with the Banu. Corel III is supposedly the heart of commerce between mankind and the Banu so that is going to hopefully be our base of operations. To begin, Corelco is without question a legitimate trading organization. Corelco merchants will not engage ships while flying on the company’s behalf except to defend themselves. If the company’s assets are threatened, there will be planned and company sanctioned actions taken to get rid of the threat. To protect our commodities, Corelco merchants travel in protected convoys. Each ship in a convoy will have task to fulfill, making trade runs as safe and efficient as possible. Every pilot will be trained on how to operate in a formation. The backbone of our operations are our starmen. These men fly our smaller ships, fighters, utility ships, smaller sized freighters, etc. For those starmen who don’t have the fanciest ships, that’s ok, you will be manning our multi-crew ships. Officers will be in charge of formations of smaller ships, or they will be put in command of a larger ship. Every person is going to have a job to do.

Something to Note

A large problem that seems to be common in these organizations is people who join just to join and then become inactive. If we take the time to train you, you don’t have to devote your life, but don’t drop off the Earth either. The way the company is organized requires that members are available at least some times to conduct operations.

How Do We Work?

Speaking of organization, the organization of the company is similar to the organization of a military branch. There are different levels, each level having more and more people in it. The base level is a flight, led by a Lieutenant. A flight has approximately three or more fighter aircraft, or two or more bomber/transport aircraft. A flight is the smallest element any merchant will be traveling in. Traveling alone on official business is strictly forbidden. The next level of organization is a squadron. A squadron is a group of approximately two or more flights. A squadron is led by a Captain. And the final element is the Wing, led by a Colonel. A wing is approximately two squadrons. If the entire company is moving in one formation, that is a division, led by whomever. These levels don’t just apply to formations either. A squadron or flight sized element may be assigned to an individual ship to crew it.

While this might sound complicated, there’s a reason for this regimented organization system. It ensures accountability. If every starman is assigned to an experienced officer, that officer can communicate effectively what the goals are. There’s no confusion. Each Lieutenant can train his flight, each Captain can order his Lieutenants to mobilize their flights for a convoy, each Colonel can plan his own operations without the the top leadership having to tell him every step. The goal is self-sufficiency.

Training

A large problem I’ve noticed with other organizations is that training is always difficult due to people’s conflicting schedules/ lack of interest. With this system of organization a Lieutenant only has to get 2-3 people together to train. Large scale training operations almost never work so it’s best to have small ones. For larger ships who need a crew to all be there to train, only the most dedicated starmen will be assigned.

Always Active

Something every organization has to deal with is inactive people. The way we deal with this is making each position easily replaceable. If someone’s inactive for weeks on end, they get the boot and another recruit is trained to take his place. Officers are the same way. Ideally an officer would be totally dedicated to the company, but things happen and people disappear, so we’d just train a talented starman to take his place. Every element doesn’t have to be the exact same size, but there won’t be any floaters, everyone either is assigned to an officer, or is one.

Officers

On the topic of officers, an officer must demonstrate knowledge of the game (not so much right now since no one has much knowledge on the game), the ability to think on their own with the best interest of the company in mind, and he needs to be active in the company. Officers won’t just be leading their elements. Every officer will either help out with recruiting, marketing, or they will be writing doctrine and training recruits.

We won’t pretend we know exactly what we’ll be trading, and exactly what our role will be, but our vision will become much clearer as details of the game trickle out. Once it’s clear what we’re going to be doing, then the serious training will start, but for now, all that can be said to our merchants, is learn what you can right now, and it will help you in the future.

DISCORD – https://discord.gg/HW7bHkr

TEAMSPEAK (backup) – TS.CORELCO.ORG

First let’s start by saying that it’s difficult to say exactly how the company will work since the game isn’t even in beta yet, but we’ll begin to create some of the general rules and regulations so that new members can learn. The company is going to evolve with the game, so everything is subject to change.

The Goal For The Company

According to the small novel about the economy Chris Roberts posted a while back, the economy is very fluid and dynamic. It’s mostly basic economics; supply and demand and all of that. The jist of it is that the primary role of traders will be to move goods from a planet/factory/installation that has something another planet/factory/installation needs to produce a product. This creates a chain that ends with a final product such as a weapon or ship (don’t think we’ll be able to produce our own ships however). What separates us from other trading companies is that we don’t want to be a link in the chain, we want our own chain. From piece of asteroid to laser cannon, not one step in the process will be outsourced. That’s an ambitious goal but with enough people it should be able to be done.

Piracy

There’s a zero tolerance policy for law breaking. Combat is for self-defense only. If a convoy or installation is attacked, all members of the company will help, since everyone will be trained. Convoys will consist of players from the escort and transport wings, or it could be more depending on the value of the haul. The officer in charge will decide what is appropriate. The system for organization is still the same for land installations such as mining facilities, stores, or factories. Several officers will be in charge of land installations to make sure they’re manned most of the time.

Bounty Hunting

Bounty hunting will be open on PvE targets to all members. PvP targets will need to be either on the company kill on sight (KOS) list or sanctioned by the duty officer online at the time. This will help prevent allies from being attacked by company members.

Training

Lieutenants should train their flights at least once a month. They should be teaching them how to fight in combat in space and on land, as well as how the economy works so that one day they may take over their own parts of the company. Crew elements should practice in their assigned ships. Captains should make sure their Lieutenants are doing their jobs and training their flights.

Deploying a Convoy

When goods need to be moved from one place to another, an officer will take charge of the convoy and plan the necessary routes to make sure it gets there quickly and safely. He will then gather the necessary manpower relative to the value of the cargo and then they will be on their way. If a convoy happens to be destroyed then whoever is responsible will be hunted down so we can get our cargo back. If a particular faction or organization is harassing us, a high ranking officer will organize a fleet to disperse of the nuisance. It’s preferred that we don’t get into wars with other organizations or factions, but being an online game, people can be very unpredictable.

Potential Issues

The first issue that comes to mind is: how will enough people be online and in the same place to able to organize a convoy whenever it’s needed? Well the solution to this problem is have a large collection of company ships in Corel at all times. Company members who are okay with allowing their ships to be used part time by the company will have their ships in hangars on Lo ready to be deployed whenever it’s needed. The next issue is: with the whole officer/starman system what happens when no officer has his element with him? The solution is simple. The starmen assigned to officers are only to be trained by those officers. A Lieutenant can find any two random company members to be in his flight. They don’t have to be the ones assigned to him. As long as there are some officers and some starmen in a given area, a convoy can be deployed.

Ground Rules

These are a few rules for us to follow for right now and for when the game is released.

1. Be somewhat respectful. This goes for when you’re in chat, on the forums, or in space. If the company was just a bunch of bumbling trolls we wouldn’t get much done.

2. No piracy. If you blow up a ship for no reason and claim its cargo as a prize then you’re a pirate. If you were flying for the company at the time, you’ll be kicked. We don’t need to be pissing people off.

3. Be somewhat active. We need the people we have to be there when we need them. You don’t need to live in game, just stop in every couple of days to see if you can help with anything. Officers should be regularly active. If you don’t want to be active don’t become an officer.

4. Every officer has a job to do besides leading an element. If you become an officer you’ll be assigned to marketing or recruiting. Learn your job and become good at it. Marketing Officers will help out with graphics and visuals and videos and such while recruiters will obviously be recruiting players.

5. Make an effort to learn some things on your own. Read up on the economy, or watch some tutorials on dog fighting. If everyone knows what they’re doing on their own we don’t have to teach everyone everything.

Allied With:

Galactic Business Federation – https://robertsspaceindustries.com/orgs/GTF