Probably Stolen Station Factions: Reputation and Customer Groups

Two community references, built from the game's data, list the same six tracks. Lower Levels and Upper Levels reflect the station's divided population. Security represents the station's law enforcement.

Black Market, Revolution and the Sector 13 Cartel cover the station's less official power structures. The official store description mentions navigating faction loyalties, which matches this structure. Check the faction panel in your game for the current list and standing.

Many named groups walk through your door without being reputation tracks. Tourists are a customer type, and Update 049 notes that some products, such as Premium Spring Water, are not accepted by non-Upper Level customers and tourists. That is a buying rule, not a separate faction.

Wild's Network is a service you buy upgrades from, including the October 19 aquaculture equipment. Counting it as a faction would inflate the total. Keep the six tracks separate from the people and services you trade with.

Reputation shapes the encounters you see and the opportunities on offer. The developer's patch notes give a few concrete examples. In Update 049, the Thief's stock started scaling with your Black Market reputation.

An August playtest patch kept the janitorial service available at −40 Black Market reputation, but at double the cost. These examples show that standing affects both what you can buy and what it costs. Exact point values for most actions are not documented in a current-build source.

Security handles inspections, investigations and arrests. Several Update 049 fixes changed how that works. The security officer now visits the morning after an investigation completes, and the sentence is decided when they arrive rather than when the case closes.

That means a record lowered into fine territory, whether by a fixer or by nightly decay, no longer results in an arrest. Security also can no longer arrest you over a fine you can afford to pay. These changes reward keeping your record low.

During the playtest, players could farm Security reputation by putting contraband in the display case and then hiding it in the smuggler bay to pass an inspection. The developer closed this in patch 48.3.12. A cleared inspection caused by displaying contraband no longer grants Security reputation.

Older videos may still show this trick. Do not treat inspection exploits from the playtest as a dependable reputation strategy today.

How hard you bargain feeds into reputation. Update 049 made buy-side and sell-side bargains independent, so a bargain in one direction no longer affects reputation gains in the other. The bargain panel now shows a per-direction reputation multiplier.

The same patch fixed a bug where the Diplomatic perk amplified reputation losses as well as gains. If your build predates that patch, results may differ. We do not publish a universal discount formula for raising standing.

Augs are people controlled through rogue AI implants, and you deal with them at the counter. Update 049 removed a reputation loss that happened when you offered an Aug mislabeled items. That was treated as a bug rather than a faction mechanic.

Identifying Augs is its own skill, covered in the Augs guide. The consequences for missing them depend on difficulty.

The developer's 1.0 preview promises completed storylines for several existing NPCs and expanded backstories for characters on the wanted list. After launch, a main storyline expansion is planned that will affect the station and the ending. Faction relationships may become more important as that content arrives.

None of this is confirmed for the Demo. We will add release-build observations once 1.0 is out.

Demo restrictions can limit which routes and encounters you see. Do not assume all six faction storylines are fully accessible there. A missing encounter in the Demo is not proof that it does not exist in 1.0.

Inspect the actual faction panel and the consequences shown by current encounters. Record the build number when you note a reputation change.

How many factions are in Probably Stolen? Community system references list six reputation tracks: Lower Levels, Upper Levels, Security, Black Market, Revolution and the Sector 13 Cartel.

Are tourists a faction? No. Tourists are a customer type, and Wild's Network is a service. Neither is a reputation track.

What does Black Market reputation do? One confirmed effect is that the Thief's stock scales with it. At −40, the janitorial service stays available but costs double.

Can I farm Security reputation with inspections? Not anymore. Patch 48.3.12 stopped cleared inspections from granting Security reputation after displaying contraband.

Decide early which groups matter to your business and avoid needlessly angering the rest. Selling contraband can pay well, but Security reputation and inspections are the cost. Black Market standing affects services and certain sellers.

Keep notes on which actions change which track in your run. Until a current-build source documents exact values, your own observations are the most reliable guide.