Any suggestions on salvaging rights?

[kinfo_howlingwolf]

First off, awesome community =)

Second, I havent been able to find any certain guide lines as far as salvaging/looting rights and I was wondering if anyone has worked this up themselves?

Our current campaign has us in a pro-imperial sector with local factions having a larger influence than the Imps. A few mercenaries went at with each other while the "Royal" navy just let them slug it out and shooed off any civvies tat got close. Now the battle was over and a PC wanted to scan down and salvage some ships for vital (i.e. expensive) parts.

For that instance the team was shooed away since it wasnt clear who was in the legal clear but I can guarantee this will more than likely show up again.

Any thoughts on how to handle it?

[garhkal]

I know for 1 home game i did (mostly fringer types doing odd jobs for the corporate sector), they actually had stuff like that bartered for prior to any jobs/during the time frames of employment.
Otherwise, if battle was fought (salvage) and imps were there, they most often shunned off any salvagers till the imps were done (Intel branch searching through it etc)... After that, first come first serve.
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Confucious sayeth, don't wash cat while drunk!

[Fallon Kell]

On Earth, international maritime law, as well as any U.S. waterways I know of, allows anybody to take possession of any unmanned floating vessels on a first-come first-serve basis, since a vessel adrift is a navigational hazard. (There may be exceptions for military vessels to protect classified information and technology.) I don't know about sunken ships, but I hear that sunken Spanish gold legally still belongs to Spain, and such.

So, I would say the Empire would offer nominal support to player characters trying to salvage non-imperial ships, so long as they weren't known rebels or criminals. The support would likely not be very strong, unless the debris was a major navigational hazard interfering with imperial interests, and not liable to be quickly cleared without expense to the Empire.

The other factions, however would probably want to salvage their own vessels, (and their enemies as well!) They would probably be willing to use force to chase off civvies, unless there was enough of an enemy presence in the area to distract them. Regardless, the factions would likely have legal right to crew member's remains, and could take legal action with the Empire if they were withheld, (even unintentionally or unknowingly).

Just my $.02 worth.
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Or that excessively long "Noooooooooo" was the Whining Side of the Force leaving him. - Dustflier

Complete Starship Construction System

[cheshire]

Here's my thing, all the other legal professions in Star Wars (bounty hunting, scouting, etc.) have one thing in common: the Imps want their cut. I think that all legal salvage would require a salvage license, for which you have to pay credits annually to maintain, and I also imagine that you would have to register your salvage with the Imps. Either before or after you've taken it, you would have to report the coordinates of the salvage.

The Empire wouldn't be happy about ANY salvage from their military or contracted commercial vessels. Any of that would be strictly illegal. They can't have private citizens getting their hands on military tech, nor would they want any losses of any recoverable material.

That being said, your campaign is probably going to be more interesting if they WERE going after some things that were military tech. I had a campaign outline where the players received some coordinates, and went to check it out. There they found the remains of a Clone Wars era battle. However, one of the ships is still under power. The logs showed that a convoy of Republic ships had been on a highly classified mission that wouldn't show up on record, and on that mission they engaged a heavy contingency of Separatist forces. In the end, the Separatists had destroyed the republic vessels, but only two Separatist capital ships survived, and one was so heavily damaged, that its hyperdrive and backup were disabled. The least damaged ship went to Mustifar to report in and get a repair team, but by the time the ship arrived, the war was over. The current ship went to minimal power and has been awaiting a repair team that would never arrive.

Viola, a ship ripe for our party of vultures to pick over. Of course, that's where the real problems begin...
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Before we take any of this too seriously, just remember that in the middle episode a little rubber puppet moves a spaceship with his mind.

[Bren]

[Ray]

"I have the ship with the Turbolaser Batteries, so I have the right."

[atgxtg]

I suspect it is fairly close to what we have on Earth. The Squibbs and Ugor show that lots of salvaging is done, and also that the Empire doesn't give it a lot of scrutiny.

I would expect that some planets might claim some sort of rights on ships and cargo salvaged close by, but that most stuff is up for grabs. There might be some requirement to prove that the ship/cargo was actually salvaged rather that pirated, and the requirement is probably ignroed in some of the seedier parts of the galaxy.


On Earth the ship salvage rules are pretty open. it is the rules for sunken treasure that can get complicate, with countries wanting a cut (some want 100%) of treasure recovered. Where the ship goes down is ususally the factor for deciding who has the strongest claim. And sometimes other countires will make claims of artifacts, but those claims have to be fought for in court. Spain does not have an automatic right to any spanish doubloons that are recovered. They might make a claim to that effect, but it is about as valid as the claims the major sports leagues make about recording telecast games.


On Earth, even military ships are up for grabs, and there have been a couple of incidents involving lost submarines that have caused worries. And at least one case where the US ran a clandestine operation to secretly recover a Soviet sub.

Also, on Earth, some sites can be declared to be grave or memorial to those lost at sea and off limits. The remains of the USS Arizona for instance.

[garhkal]

Hows about this for a brief rundown on 'licensed' salvagers.

All salvage licensed personnel must be
A) registered with the local imperial authorities, corporate sector authorities, or other governing body for their sector.
B) all salvage ships will be licensed and certified by said bodies
C) all salvagers will be given 'keyed' salvage marker beacons that have a miniscule hyperspace comm to broadcast their placement to said authorities, so that not only do they know where/when a new salvage site is up and running, but whom it is making said claim.
D) all salvage ships are authorized to carry 1 military grade weapon system to assist in fending off salvage claim jumpers and pirates.
E) 25% of all claimed salvage is payable to the local authorities as taxes, or the salvage itself in leu of credits, with military grade items being first on the offering block.
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Confucious sayeth, don't wash cat while drunk!

[Bren]

A) is good, but I think you license the salvage company (or person) not their ship.
B) BOSS registration and such is more than enough red tape for most games, so I would skip B).
C) I mostly like C, but I'd want to arrange the technology so that claim jumping is possible.
D) I think this is more location dependent than a flat rule. Salvage in the Coruscant system shouldn't need defense, but out in the Outer Rim, then sure.
E) If local governing authorities are involved (Imperial, Corporate Sector, Hutt Space, etc.) then the % probably varies as well. Also the percentage may be higher or lower depending on how much the Empire wants to encourage salavage. So the governmental cut may be higher in the Core where there is enough traffic that wrecks will be quickly cleared and salvage doesn't need to be transported very far to reach a salvage yard, while out on the Rim, salvage ships are few and far between and the time and cost to transport the salvage is much higher (and the pirate and other risks are higher as well).

[Crimson_red]

[cheshire]

I actually like most of what garkhal is saying here. I think the additional license for the salvage vessel seems just like the Empire. Do they have the information on BOSS? Yeah. If the captain himself has to have a license is it a redundancy? Yeah. Is that just like the bureaucratic nightmare of a crappy regime? Oh yeah. So, it seems to fit, especially after reading GG 10: Bounty Hunters. They have fees and fines for EVERYTHING.

So really, it would make sense if they were allowed one military grade weapon... if you get all the additional fees. Of course, to have a restricted weapon, it's already a fee isn't it?

Furthermore, I like this idea of a deep space/in sector difference. I would say that x distance from a planetary body had to be registered with the local government, y distance from a solar system had to be registered with the sector, and z distance from a sector was considered deep space and only registered through your general Imperial scavenger license.

Though I do have questions about the tax and "finders keepers" idea. This is all well and good for unclaimed space junk, but suppose a corporate supply ship has a hyperspace mishap or is attacked by pirates or something of that nature. It was a corporate owned ship, and thus the junk is still their property; broken property perhaps, but still property. It seems reasonable that they could contract a legal salvage to collect the remains and bring them back. However, the tax would kind of be unfair. Yes, I may have to pay tax on a car, but I don't have to pay taxes on the value of a car when it breaks down on the road and I have it towed to my house.

Man... there's enough to go on here to make a whole galaxy guide. If I had half an inkling that we'd actually finish this project, I'd say we should go for it.
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Before we take any of this too seriously, just remember that in the middle episode a little rubber puppet moves a spaceship with his mind.

[Raven Redstar]

That would be an interesting GG.
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RR
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[garhkal]

Thanks chesire...

[Bren]

[jmanski]

There should be a time limit on how long it can sit there (like a car on the side of the highway).
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Blasted rules. Why can't they just be perfect?