Exploration is almost lucrative?

[GrillMonkey]

I took a break after coming back from the Distant Worlds expedition. I remember back then I had made a trip out to the core and back with some honking and some full system scans and made around 20 million credits.

I came back to elite when 2.4 dropped and reset my save. I've worked myself up to a DBX, filled up with transport missions to Colonia and set off. I'm 10klys out and stopped at one of the bases en-route. My data for that 10klys was over 40 million with one system worth 8 million on it's own!

When did it change? Has the amount of credits to get Elite been changed too or is it much easier?

 

[Henkka77]

Exploration payouts were buffed in 2.3.

https://forums.frontier.co.uk/showthread.php/339546-2-3-exploration-payouts-visual-guide

 

[Major Klutz]

I did some math on my last trip.
I just got back from an 83 hour trip to the southern edge. I Crossed the formidine rift, visited the Zurara, went to the very edge at Aiconk RS-U d2-0 and meandered slowly back in the outer arm until the patch hit.
I left on the 23rd of May and returned on October 1st, ~4 months
Pre Departure, Played Time: 1W 6D 14H 42M (326 hours) , Profits from Exploration: 151,608,766
On Return, Played Time: 2W 3D 1H 18M (409H) (+83H) , Profits from Exploration: 253,886,849 (+102,278,083)

That works out to only ~1.2mil per hour. Not much when compared to what you can earn in the bubble. Still, better than what it was before 2.3

... Has the amount of credits to get Elite been changed too or is it much easier?

I believe it was increased to be in line with what it was before and also because you can gain exploration credits from doing passenger missions now which can be quite lucrative.
My 253,886,849 credits from Exploration has put me at 79% thru Pioneer

 

[LP Garnell]

When did it change? Has the amount of credits to get Elite been changed too or is it much easier?

My take on post 2.3 payout scheme, based on my experience/bunch of data collected. YMMV.

https://forums.frontier.co.uk/showthread.php/364942-Confusion-on-Exploration-rank?p=5737416#post5737416

And yes, it can be quite lucrative. For various reasons, I tend to focus on terraformable candidate planets. Just came back from a 68 day, 60000 LY, 3200+ system voyage. Sold 65 screens of cartographic data.

Total payout was 1.44 Billion.

 

[Major Klutz]

... Total payout was 1.44 Billion.

How many hours did you spend playing during that 68 days? What's your credits per hour?

I'm not able to follow that link for some reason. Update: the link was malformed. https// instead of https://

 

[Aura Lorell]

How many hours did you spend playing during that 68 days? What's your credits per hour?

It's probably in the post you linked but I'm not able to follow that link for some reason. Update: the link was malformed. https// instead of https://

If you use the habitable zone calculator (either by Jackie Silver or the one on EDD) then you can focus on terraformable HMC with surgical precision. They are very common and with WWs and ELWs the pay can go easily above one million credits per system. Not much time required.

 

[LP Garnell]

How many hours did you spend playing during that 68 days? What's your credits per hour?

I'm not able to follow that link for some reason. Update: the link was malformed. https// instead of https://

Link fixed.

With a nod to Aura, EDD's habital zone calculator is what I use, and is essential. Believe they embedded Jackie Silvers code.

Credits per hour varies a great deal. A good hour will net 5-7M, a bad one can be 500k or less.

It's easy to get one system under you belt, but to consistently find hundreds or thousands in a timely fashion, you develop you own methodologies.

 

[Cdr Voorheez]

To be honest if you start breaking down exploration into credits earned per Ly travelled per time played etc you are doing it entirely wrong in my opinion.
It's not about the credits. It's about being out there. But that's just me. I'm a bit of a purist.
If you want a real earner 2.4 now offers exploration with passenger mission options which can net in real terms tens of millions more than straight line exploration. That's probably now the lucrative fast cash methodology ref Exploration. If that's what you want of course. Personally detest the passengers I take out. Way too fragile

 

[Henkka77]

To be honest if you start breaking down exploration into credits earned per Ly travelled per time played etc you are doing it entirely wrong in my opinion.
It's not about the credits. It's about being out there. But that's just me. I'm a bit of a purist.

This.

 

[Aura Lorell]

To be honest if you start breaking down exploration into credits earned per Ly travelled per time played etc you are doing it entirely wrong in my opinion.
It's not about the credits. It's about being out there. But that's just me. I'm a bit of a purist.
If you want a real earner 2.4 now offers exploration with passenger mission options which can net in real terms tens of millions more than straight line exploration. That's probably now the lucrative fast cash methodology ref Exploration. If that's what you want of course. Personally detest the passengers I take out. Way too fragile

I only took a long-run passenger mission once and did a couple passenger ferrying in the bubble before I realised it wasn't for me. I also don't explore for credits, couldn't care less. But knowing how to do things like earn money from exploration, is good. There are many people who want to do it for credits and that's fine. It's not wrong. It's just different. All ways to do this are equally valid.

 

[duckofdeath]

...one system worth 8 million on it's own!

You could have a had a whopping record breaker right there had you used Yong-Rui. 8 million x3 would take it well beyond the previous known record payout for a single system.
Still a really nice find! I don't think I have any systems in my current data hold worth more than 6-7 million.

 

[Allitnil]

You could have a had a whopping record breaker right there had you used Yong-Rui. 8 million x3 would take it well beyond the previous known record payout for a single system.

The record is 139 million plus change...

(Zulu Romeo's initial discovery of Sag A* before the payout was massively nerfed!)

 

[duckofdeath]

That was part of the race to elite thing in the olden days, though.

 

[marx]

The record is 139 million plus change...

(Zulu Romeo's initial discovery of Sag A* before the payout was massively nerfed!)

Not really nerfed, more like fixed. The payout's dependent on body mass, and somebody at Frontier forgot that Sag. A* shouldn't use the same calculation as black holes, as it's a supermassive black hole - and the end result was that it had a supermassive payout as well

Personally, I don't mind that exploration earning are at least competitive now. I'd explore anyway, but getting good amounts of credits for doing so is a very nice bonus.

 

[LP Garnell]

To be honest if you start breaking down exploration into credits earned per Ly travelled per time played etc you are doing it entirely wrong in my opinion.
It's not about the credits. It's about being out there. But that's just me. I'm a bit of a purist.

Those were just my casual observations because ED Discovery has them readily available. My main mission was looking for odd systems and especially unique combinations of terraformable candidates. Secondary, but only by a little, was data collection for analysis. Economics was a byproduct (left the bubble with 2.4B already).

 

[Cdr Voorheez]

Just a personal opinion Cmdr. I'm not trying to offend nor agitate here. Just simply adding my perception of travel v time v monetary output.

 

[duckofdeath]

We're all allowed to have them.
That said, exploration is a good income source if you do what you'd do for any other good income source; Grind! Grind! Grind! And do that with a maximised plan.
For example, my secondary is currently out to get that Elite rank on the way to a hopeful ironman Elite. I overestimated my jump capability on my un-engineered Asp when I picked passenger missions. Long story short, I'm guesstimating from experience that I've made around 400 million on maps during the last 24 hours game time. My only problem is, I'm barely halfway past the out-trip to my passenger destination, so I've already resorted to buckyballing past M class systems... I'm not abandoning those passenger missions even though it no longer makes any financial sense for me to complete them! \o/

 

[osser]

My 18 month trip netted me 1.54 Billion
425 pages of data
Most of it was pre 2.3 though

Gearing my asp up to go out again in Nov.
Gonna be fun.