The Robigo Blockade
10 Sep 2024N1njadeer
{Non-RP explanations of the events will be provided in these brackets}October 6th, 3301. {1.4 CQC Update}
A day that will live an infamy.
The Federation was unveiling their new VR "CQC" program, to the delight of many commanders, and unveiling their newest ships: The Federal Assault Ship and the Federal Gunship. The former was well-received by pilots, but in a little-known sector of the bubble, crime was brewing....
A commander made the trek to the then-obscure Sothis and Ceos and discovered something BIG. Missions, garnering absolutely massive payouts, were being generated and sending goods back to the main bubble, 200-300 LY away.
A Gold Rush.
Many commanders, like flies to... well, you know... flocked to Sothis and Ceos, surely eager to get their bag. I, myself, having finished outfitting my Anaconda, FDL, and Python, was eager to see what was going on. I didn't really need the money, but something was definitely rubbing me the wrong way.
And then I saw it.
Don's Inheritance. Full of hollow squares. At least 30 of them. All sitting there, docked. Trying to get their share. There was a wide distribution of ship types, from Cobras to Anacondas, but a lot of Asps (surely for the huge jump range). Sothis and Ceos was a good 250+ LY from any civilized space, and they must have taken that into consideration. I decided to dock my own ship, to see it for myself.
Bingo! A 5,000,000 CR mission, ripe for the taking. There were only one mission like that available, but I could see commanders disappearing and reappearing out of thin air {refreshing the mission board}. I did a couple of tests to see if there were any other missions appearing, and they did, but they were extremely rare.
I thought: "Is there a better location for this?" And found Ceos. I went to Ceos and looked at the station:
Another 30+ commanders. They were hogging all of MY missions. I was blinded by greed.
I thought to myself: "Why are they paying SO much money to deliver all this cargo so far?"
And then it hit me:
Distance.
They were paying this much money because of the distance required. And if you were to take multiple missions and stack them, you only have to make the large trek once. {Missions could only spawn 200+ LY away because there weren't any systems close by. Because FDEV never intended for missions to generate 200+ LY away, the payouts got massive}
I opened my galaxy map and looked around:
There weren't any other inhabited systems nearb- wait, what is that?
There was a small trail of inhabited systems leading up to Sothis and Ceos. I saw a system called Almagest {There's a whole separate story about this system and how it literally disappeared}, but then I saw it:
A tiny, inhabited, mining colony. An Anarchy system.
Robigo
I plotted a course for Robigo, a relatively short 50 LY away from Sothis and Ceos and jumped.
The system was void of other Commanders. The entire area was an afterthought, or so it seemed. I landed on the only station, an outpost called "Robigo Mines".
I opened correspondence with the Robigo Cartel and explored their offerings:
And my jaw dropped.
Multiple 5,000,000 CR missions, offering to Smuggle Slaves back to the main bubble. Despite being closer, they actually paid MORE money than the Sothis/Ceos missions because the slaves were illegal cargo.
I had hit the JACKPOT. I didn't need this money, but how could I (or anyone) say no?
I was still blinded by greed. I was an informal "Privateer" for the CODE {A major and notorious pirate group} at the time, sitting in our comms channel, when I broke the news to everyone there.
I did a trial run. Accepted as many missions as my cargo could hold. I could only do it with medium ships, because the outpost couldn't hold large ships, and despite the lower cargo capacity, the Asp became the best ship to do it in because of the jump range.
I looked at my clock and my credit balance when I was done:
50,000,000 CR/hr
{Making money was MUCH, MUCH harder in 3301. Peak earnings capped at 10-15M cr/hr}
This was UNHEARD of profits! I knew some commanders who could make 10,000,000-15,000,000 CR/hr with some extremely lucrative trade routes in a Type 9 or Anaconda but that really was the limit. Bounty Hunting (my preferred occupation) really capped at about 3-5 Million/hr (powerplay could increase this) I relayed the news to CODE of the Robigo Gold Mine.
That was a mistake.
Commanders started flocking to Robigo. The Robigo slave trade had been leaked, and now, EVERYONE was in on it. I saw people in Cobras, Asps, Pythons, all coming here and making absolute BANK.
I felt cheapened. All the hard work I had put to get my FDL, my Python, my Anaconda. It means NOTHING now. Anyone can get to an anaconda in hours, not WEEKS or even MONTHS.... Now we had "Mostly Harmless" Anacondas flying around.
A monster had been created. I was bitter.
I had to stop it.
I went back to the bubble and got my FDL, ready to jump to Robigo from Shinrata Dezra and plotted a course
57 Jumps.
Ugh. Fine.
An hour lated, I had landed. I had my fuel scoop, an Interdictor, and a mission:
Blockade Robigo.
I was not about to let this Slave Trade {Fdev's oversight on mission generation} cheapen MY accomplishments and MY hard work I had earned. And besides, Robigo was MY discovery, NOT theirs. I should be entitled to this, NOT them.
Thankfully, Robigo has some things working in my favor:
With only 1 station {at the time}, Robigo Mines, it was very easy to defend it and destroy commanders before they could dock. Normally, the station would fire back at me, but because the Robigo Cartel had control, an Anarchy Faction, there were no rules. I could blow up other commanders without consequence. I just had to be careful I didn't shoot the Station itself, as it WOULD return fire back and possibly get me killed.
Robigo was also VERY far away from any occupied space, and commanders were surely going to be outfitted for jump distance instead of combat. Besides my fuel scoop, I was fully outfitted for combat.
It also meant that any commander who was destroyed without docking at Robigo Mines would be sent back to the last station they docked at {this is how redeployment used to work}, which was back at the bubble, 200+ LY away. They would have to make another 10+ jumps to get back here. It would make it a challenge, and time consuming, for them to try and get back.
I could do this. I could legitimately Blockade Robigo.
I saw my first commander in the system. A novice AspX. I interdicted them and indiscriminately blew them up.
And another, Mostly Harmless Asp.
And another. Competent Python.
Soon it became like clockwork, blowing up Commanders in Supercruise or before they dock at the station. Soon it was 10 commanders. Then 20. Then 50.
I was defending my Turf.
My antics became widespread throughout the Galaxy. Initially, I used Aisling Duval and anti-slave sentiment as a cover-up and justification for my operations. But the truth was bitterness.
This went on for about a month. Nobody challenged me. Nobody wanted to trek the 50+ jumps to get here in a combat ship {this was before engineering, so the FDLs jump range was like 13 LY}.
At one point, I decided to dock at Robigo in my Python and look at the missions. Some cartel members told me to NOT get scanned or they would not give me a payout, while others didn't care, but required 10-15x the slaves to be delivered {FDEV had changed the Robigo smuggling missions so that they either required 50+ slaves (so less missions could be accepted), or would fail upon being scanned (adding a tiny bit more risk, but not really a big deal for most commanders)}.
I thought to myself:
150 slaves is really quite a lot... what if I just didn't deliver them and just sold them.
I looked around the outpost, and found the Black Market. I shouted "I WANT TO SELL ILLEGAL GOODS" and was granted entry.
They bought slaves.
I knew that failing a mission would result in a HEFTY fine from the Robigo Cartel... Or... Would it?
Robigo is an Anarchy System. And that means {at the time} you, by definition, COULD NOT get fines or bounties.
And the puzzle pieces came together.
1. Accept the mission for 100+ slaves.
2. Abandon the mission {You keep the slaves, but lose reputation. You can't get fined because Robigo is an Anarchy System.}
3. Sell the slaves on the Black Market {You gain Reputation selling on the black market, and it's MORE reputation than you lose from abandoning the mission}.
4. ???
5. Profit
AND IT WORKED. I had discovered the 2ND gold mine at Robigo. I had become The Spiffing Brit, quite literally. {It's debatable if this was an exploit, but it CLEARLY wasn't intended or good for the game and wasn't something that should be abused. However, all the game mechanics were working as intended. If I recall, FDEV actually did suspend people who abused this}.
I did a test to see how much CR/hr could be made:
150,000,000 CR/hr!
This couldn't be allowed to happen. 10x the money of any Non-Robigo occupation?! I disclosed the exploit on our comms, and a video was eventually publicly released, documenting how the "exploit" was performed {Outside of testing reputation changes to prove it could be done indefinitely, replication, and identifying how much money could be made/hr, I never used this "exploit" to make money}.
But that was enough. I was more committed than ever to this Blockade. I had to STOP all these gravy trains. STOP all the money coming in.
But there were commanders literally appearing and disappearing, docked in Robigo Mines. I couldn't do anything about it. Sure I could destroy all the other commanders trying to dock or enter the system, but nothing could be done here...
Or... Could it?
I recalled that these "Smuggling missions" would all fail upon your ship getting scanned. But that requires System Security to scan them, and security can't scan them while docked... Unless... I became the police...
I went on a trip to secure a Cargo Scanner {Manifest Scanner}. Surely... SURELY this doesn't work... Does it?
It worked.
All these appearing and disappearing commanders {mission board swapping} could be scanned with my trusty Cargo Scanner, and ANY missions they had would immediately fail, just like the police, AND tank their reputation, preventing them from taking more missions.
The blockade was working even better than planned. Commanders were getting destroyed left and right, and those who couldn't be destroyed were failing their missions. After a few months, over 1000 {I checked} commanders had been destroyed by me at the Robigo Blockade. Some commanders seeked the challenge of trying to run the blockade, trying to dock in silent running. Many died, but a few were successful. Eventually, a few commanders tried to fight me, to stop the blockade, but those fights ended in a stalemate, with neither side claiming a victory.
Nothing could stop the blockade.
Until one day {2.1 update, I think} I checked the mission board at Robigo.
The missions had dried up {Fdev changed the mission board to not spawn them}. Robigo is dead. Victory was achieved. {I quit the game shortly after engineering was released because I did not want to do that grind}.
Fast-Forward several years later:
Passengers. All wanting to see some stupid beacon in Sothis. All paying great rewards. All coming from... Robigo. My homeland. Sure, it wasn't the most efficient way to make money, but it was the easiest and fastest way to make money in the midgame.
I knew what I had to do. This was MY land. I had EARNED it.
I will continue to defend it.
And besides, how can the stories of Heroes be written without the Villains? I always wanted to be the hero, but you can't have heroes without villains.
{In total, roughly 1500 Commanders were destroyed by myself during the initial 2015-2016 Robigo Slave Smuggling blockade. The Robigo blockade continues to this day.}