Money-Making Question!

Commodity trading is painfully slow in its basic form, you need to deal in rare's or in bulk with a T7 upwards
You are not equipped to do CZ missions, come back to that another time when you are ready

With that out the way what would I do in your position? a couple of options come to mind...
- Sell the Keelback and get an A rated Viper and do some RES farming
- Look at long distance trading/smuggling missions between the outer systems and the bubble (needs to be researched as much has changed in v2.2)
- get a Cobra then aim to buy an Asp Explorer as my next ship
- look into passenger missions FDev seems to be strongly incentivizing players to do this atm so plan ahead to give that a shot
 
Commodity trading is painfully slow in its basic form, you need to deal in rare's or in bulk with a T7 upwards
You are not equipped to do CZ missions, come back to that another time when you are ready

With that out the way what would I do in your position? a couple of options come to mind...
- Sell the Keelback and get an A rated Viper and do some RES farming
- Look at long distance trading/smuggling missions between the outer systems and the bubble (needs to be researched as much has changed in v2.2)
- get a Cobra then aim to buy an Asp Explorer as my next ship
- look into passenger missions FDev seems to be strongly incentivizing players to do this atm so plan ahead to give that a shot

Thanks for the heads up! I'm keeping well away from the Combat Zonea for now. I'll come back with a Cutter one day!

So, you're not the first to recommend a A-Rated Viper.

A few questions real quick about this;

Firstly, and most noobly.. What does A-Rated actually mean? Are you referring to the modules? Like say, a tier 5 module slot, 5A module would mean rated-A yes? So a Rated-A ship would have all modules of class A?

Secondly, how much would it actually cost. As I mentioned, I am just shy of 10mill assets. If I sell my Keelback, I have around 9 million to play with, but that's my rebuy also. And I WILL NOT fly without being able to cover my rebuy at least twice.
 
Find yourself a home system with all of the things you need. At least 1 good station, res sites, etc. A black market within 1 jump is a bonus too. Work the BGS. Pick a minor faction, get allied and most importantly get that faction into the top dog spot. Eventually you end up with multiple places (because of your minor faction) to spawn high paying missions all within a jump or two.
This is what I did and when I feel like stacking 20 missions I can easily take in 40m in a couple hours with skimmers and 20-30 for 100lyish cargo journeys.
 
I want to second the suggestion for rare trades. Here is a description with a couple of links: https://www.themittani.com/features/getting-started-rare-trading-elite-dangerous

You can keep your current ship because you'll need some help fighting off the pirates that come for your "tasty cargo" (and when that's Lavian Brandy, it truest is). I think rates may be an excellent way to experience SLF the way Fd probably intended it, that being defensively.

If the long journeys start to get to you and the SLF aren't as helpful as one might hope for, then consider an asp
 
Thanks for the heads up! I'm keeping well away from the Combat Zonea for now. I'll come back with a Cutter one day!

So, you're not the first to recommend a A-Rated Viper.

A few questions real quick about this;

Firstly, and most noobly.. What does A-Rated actually mean? Are you referring to the modules? Like say, a tier 5 module slot, 5A module would mean rated-A yes? So a Rated-A ship would have all modules of class A?

Secondly, how much would it actually cost. As I mentioned, I am just shy of 10mill assets. If I sell my Keelback, I have around 9 million to play with, but that's my rebuy also. And I WILL NOT fly without being able to cover my rebuy at least twice.

A-rated means having the best module for its class.

For example if your ship has grade 5 thrusters, than A5 would be considered A-rated , and if all your modules are A, then your entire ship is A rated
 
To be honest, the Keelback is not a good ship to make money, more like an interesting toy to have around.

-You can make a few drops into CG's. They only pay once a week, but they are a steady income, most of the time making just a few drops will make you several millions without having to grind. Plus they are a lot of fun in open.
-You can make nice credits by taking passenger missions. Even a Type-6 is more than enough. Has a lot of compartments, good jump range, and is fast enough to evade scans if needed.
-You can take regular missions when the payout bug is fixed.
-You can have an advanced discovery scanner and scan systems as you move along doing your stuff, the scans will add to the income.
-You can do long hauls from frontier systems, they are no longer instant riches buttons, but they still pay very decent credits, you can double your current cash in a trip or two.
 
Sounds like you are learning by doing. You've learned that the Keelback should not be used for bounty hunting, for one. :)

Just keep doing missions in one system, to raise your rep so you get paid better.

Rares trading has been mentioned, and was very important to my early game.

Trading non-rares requires more cargo space to become profitable.

Skimmer destruction missions can be good paying, but in most cases you will end up with a bounty on your head, which mean NPC bounty hunters will harass you everywhere. I don't recommend them for newcomers.

Take your time, enjoy the process. It's not a race after all.
 
Greetings Commanders!

Let me get this out of the way first;
This is not a "Err merrr gerd! Thay nerf'd sothis, wahhhh!" thread. So, please, do read on.

I think I've kind of dug myself into a hole and I am struggling to get out!

I was doing okay money-wise for someone that hasn't got all that much experience with the game. I currently hold about 10 million in assets (I know, not much, I'm working on it).

The problem I am having, is breaking the 10 million ball. I can't seem to gain any decent rep' with the Empire, or money for that matter. I sank almost every dollar I have into a Keelback (shut up, I know..) purely because it can house a fighter, and I want that experience. It's fun and everything, but I struggling to get anywhere. I can't seem to net any decent, worthy income from trading random commodities I buy cheap. Which in turn, I don't have a great deal of cargo space either. Being in a Keelback and all. I found a few missions that all had the same goal, "go to a CZ, kill a boat load of these guys and we will give you 500K a mission".. I thought, that's not a bad idea, I'll stack 4-5 of those and make a little bit in money. I got there, the second I opened fire, I was obliterated by every ship in the area. Not even the guys on my side could help me, literally, within seconds, every hostile ship turned on me.

I tried bounty hunting. It was a great source of income when I started, as I was aiming for hundreds of thousands. Not millions. Anything worth taking down, can and will annihilate me.

I tried smuggling Imperial Slaves over to Federation space and sell them on the Black Market. I made a daunting 50K on near 100ton worth of Slaves.

Now, I could sell my Keelback, buy something else.. That's all well and good, but it doesn't fix my problem of actually getting somewhere. Am I going to have to grind 1K missions with the Empire to open up better jobs or something? Somebody please give me some advice!

I'm not looking for a Sothis type deal, I don't want to make 500mill in a couple hours. I want something that will in the end, make me feel as though I've earned it. But I also don't want 15K rewards either.. I'm well beyond that point.

Sorry for the wall of text, and if you actually read it, thank you.. if you can give me some tangible advice, I thank you again!
I will not shut up - I ran a Keelback for quite a long time, and still do when I need to move cargo to smaller pads. It's a great ship. Sort of the Brinks of space. And I know the 10m wall you speak of as well. So, here's a few options:

1. If you have Horizons, fit an SRV bay, pick a planet, and go salvaging. Nerve Agents, Platinum and Gold are fairly regular finds, and legal salvage. Fill your hold full and sell these - nothing beats the profit margin on free cargo.

2. If you don't, pick a few rare commodities and plot yourself a good trading loop that ends in a fairly distant system and run around in circles making potentially obscene profits.

3. Pack up and move on - pick another system at least 100 Ly away and start fresh in a new collection of systems running missions. Yes, the first bunch will suck and have terrible payouts until you build some local rep and inf.

You'll get there, really, you will.
 
Try Cemiess, has 5 or 6 empire factions. Stack missions. You will acquire some good mats/commodities for a cracking modded Cobra from Felicity Farseer while ranking up. Hopefully FD are going to sort out the new appalling mission board payments soon!

Another recommend for jumping into a CG for a week. Or if you have time head over to Walters' one the now and drop a few loads of coffee. A healthy reward for little effort.
 

Deleted member 38366

D
Keelback is the core problem basically.
I'd rather recommend a Cobra Mk.III or Type-6, both are solid long-range Mission runners or Rares Traders.

Bulk trading doesn't really pay off until we're talking Type-7/Python type amounts of Cargo.

If you insist on keeping the Fighter on the Keelback, that'll block some 32tons of your extremely precious limited Cargo capacity.
Witout the Fighter, one could arguably make the Keelback a basic but solid small Mining Rig.
Good Credits are to me made even in fairly small Ships if you're Mining in a Pristine Metallic spot, in small Ships even more if you can satisfy any Mining Missions.
 
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Thank you all for clearing things up and giving me a route to take. I greatly appreciate it!

Sounds like you are learning by doing. You've learned that the Keelback should not be used for bounty hunting, for one. :)

Just keep doing missions in one system, to raise your rep so you get paid better.

Rares trading has been mentioned, and was very important to my early game.

Trading non-rares requires more cargo space to become profitable.

Skimmer destruction missions can be good paying, but in most cases you will end up with a bounty on your head, which mean NPC bounty hunters will harass you everywhere. I don't recommend them for newcomers.

Take your time, enjoy the process. It's not a race after all.

I was reading about Skimmer missions, and decided against it when the "caution, probably end up with a bounty" popped up. The last thing I need is another reason to be blown up, haha!

And I totally agree with the last part! I'm not looking for something that is going to set me up for my initial goal in a couple of hours. That's why I stayed far away from Sothis pre-2.2. I am enjoying my journey, but needed some advice on which way to turn my ship.

I am going to look into trading out the Keelback though. We have had a good few weeks together, but it's not a ship that'll get me to my next milestone unfortunately. I may look into a Viper until I can setup an Asp or something.

Thank you all, again!
 
Go to a boom system with a metal rich or matalic major or pristine reserves system in its neighborhood.
Mine for Osmium, Presadymium, Samarium and platinum, palladium and pianite of course.
Sell the later 3 directly and use the first three to claim mining missions.
 
Go to a boom system with a metal rich or matalic major or pristine reserves system in its neighborhood.
Mine for Osmium, Presadymium, Samarium and platinum, palladium and pianite of course.
Sell the later 3 directly and use the first three to claim mining missions.

Mining and then taking relevant missions to punt it has been kicked into touch in 2.2, no?
 
I will not shut up - I ran a Keelback for quite a long time, and still do when I need to move cargo to smaller pads. It's a great ship. Sort of the Brinks of space. And I know the 10m wall you speak of as well. So, here's a few options:

1. If you have Horizons, fit an SRV bay, pick a planet, and go salvaging. Nerve Agents, Platinum and Gold are fairly regular finds, and legal salvage. Fill your hold full and sell these - nothing beats the profit margin on free cargo.

2. If you don't, pick a few rare commodities and plot yourself a good trading loop that ends in a fairly distant system and run around in circles making potentially obscene profits.

3. Pack up and move on - pick another system at least 100 Ly away and start fresh in a new collection of systems running missions. Yes, the first bunch will suck and have terrible payouts until you build some local rep and inf.

You'll get there, really, you will.

Thank you for laying out some options! I do indeed have Horizons, I didn't know you could salvage planets actually, might give this a shot!

To be honest, I love my Keelback. There is something about her that I love, I don't know what it is, it's something though. I will invest in another down the track, when I can afford to completely deck one out. But for now, I will need to part ways I think.
 
Troutman, the crackle of a ViperIII after throttling back is one of the most outstanding pieces of sound in the game! Enjoy! But I still recommend the Cobra. :)
 
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