I really like these ideas, because I hate the fact that to be a smuggler you have to depend on pistol XP, whats up with that anyway.  If you are a smuggler you should be trying to avoid a firefight to avoid drawing attention to yourself.  To advance as a smuggler you should .. well smuggle, not hunt, because hunting or going on a killing spree right now is the only way to be a better smuggler.  Hard to RP a smuggler when you spend all your time just shooting things, that is for the hunters and soldiers isnt it.  There should at least be NPC smuggler mission terminals like the BH mission terminals, where you would get missions asking you to smuggle some kind of contraband.  Missions could be neutral, Imperial, or Rebel ( even the empire need to transport things in a low profile mannor at times ) and the missions could even require the transport of people like rebel spies or scientist, or for those of the darker minded side slaves could be transported.  Each mission would give out credits and Smuggling XP upon completion.  For those with JTL there could be missions that take place in space.  I would love to work up to the point I could have a YT-1300 outfitted with seceret compartments to use for missions, maybe even some elite ones that require a complete crew to man the turrets and such, would really make for a fun RPing session.  The ultimate would have been a rescue Princess Leia from the Death Star mission    SWG is more than a shooter, so lets develope more non combat professions which dont depend on combat for their XP.

The past is there to guide us into the future not to dwell in

Bioda Idack Master Shipwright Ahazi Master Pilot CorSec

Ossus Master Shipwright Tarquinas Master Pilot SA

I really like the ideas but i have to agree with some of the posts about loosing an item completely.  If its a one time only item then what...

 

The theft idea however isnt half bad. A few changes though since the devs wont go for simple theft like that. If in some way the player could get it back, by bounty hunter, another smuggler or by themself. (kill them and get it back) if the smuggler defends himself he continues to own the item and say cant trade it/use it for X days (giving the person a chance to get it back) And the player is able to attack the smuggler anytime as long as they still own the item. (which will remain on him for those X days)

 

But even that has its problems because they could just not play those days (even if its 30 days and its something rare, i doubt they would play because of the pay out) would have to work out some kind of online timer. What happens if they succeed and sell it...then its still theft (well earned theft but theft)

 

Maybe a smuggler could not fulfill his contract but instead of owning the item (which would become non-useable or tradeable, preventing theft, which ill explain lower down..) they could hold on to the item and demand a higher fee (since they need something gained from this) This is when the owner could higher a BH to retrieve the item instead of paying the smuggler his fee. So the bounty could be worth the orginal amount of money that the owner and smuggler agreed on or something different. The smuggler, if killed, looses the item and any payment. Not sure what happens if the smuggler wins. Maybe collects the BH fee and still holds the item, making the owner do it again or pay the fee he demands. The player however should have some role in retrieving the item, but player wouldnt loose out which should happen...maybe they could help the BH, (if they are a bh then no problem, they should be able to hunt that player down) and how would the player (if not a BH) track the player...

 

away to make the item un-useable/tradeable to the smuggler could be a bio-locked suitcase (which would be made by the smuggler which would be a must to make the deal) This way the smuggler cant get the item out and would be unuseable to anyone who would want to buy it. (but still need to prevent trading, make it a non-trade item? or something along those lines...)

 

Some other ways to involve smugglers could be to smuggle actual players, using their ships only. People with bounties on their head, or a player with high-end contraband which would prevent the "theft" of the item but still have smugglers in action. Maybe while grouped with the smuggler they could achieve the % of chance to avoid detection. (will still have to work out a contract before hand) and this offers a few options...

 

1: The smuggled player could skip out on the payment and allow the smuggler to hunt down or hire a bh to hunt down the player for his fee, BH collects 50% of the smugglers fee from the player, so the smuggled player pays 150% of the fee - make them think twice) This would make EVERYONE involved in be hunted by bounty hunters. This bounty would be a one time hunt. cant replace them on the BH terminal.

 

2: Allow the smuggler to "turn in" the smuggled player to have a NPC scan the player with the % of avoiding the detection as they would have by them self...0-5% (based off your hidden compartment idea). (will explain why they would turn them in later...) Then this would allow the player to hire a BH on that smuggler, since they didnt have to pay the fee for the smuggler this would really cost anything extra. (this is a one time mission only, BH looses smuggler claims BH's fee, BH wins they collect bounty fee and smuggler pays the player they turned in the original fee negotiatied by the two, bank transfer) - would make them think twice of turning someone in. This could be a vise-versa effect but smuggler isnt the best player to turn in since they could have 95% avoid chance, this would apply the #1 idea too. Smuggler hires BH to kill player and collects 100% of fee plus 50% of that amount would also be paid to BH by hunted player

 

If the person who hired the smuggler breaks the deal should pay 150% to make them think twice and it gives the BHs a reason to select this mission because it would be the smugglers payment plus a bonus. I would be guessing that the payment to the BH wouldnt be higher then the contract fee (since they would be loosing out) this would add insentive for BHs to select these missions, since higher paying jedi missions would be out there.

 

The reason a smuggler would turn them into the authorities would be to avoid their own detection, since they would most likely be carrying other contraband with them. If a either of them is scanned and detected then the smuggler is then given a choice to "turn in" the other player, which would be a judgement based off what themselves are carrying and how many NPCs would they have to fight..., doing this would allow the smugglers to walk away and not be attacked/fined. They could also choose to fight with the other player to have them both escape.   

 

 

-edit-

also high-end contraband should become un-useable (still allowed to trade/sell it but timer continues) for X amount of time, 5 days maybe. This happens only if killed by the NPCs.