50M/h
What is reasonable Cr/h - post your opinion!
- Thread starter rootsrat
- Start date
Can't answer that, as it doesn't account for the risk or the ship in use. Sidewinders and Vipers shouldn't be making as much as Cutters, obviously. Perhaps payment should be expressed as a percentage of the total required for the next ship - in which case you could say something like, "1 hour should equal 10% of the next ship up in your progression until mid-range, at which point each hour should be worth about 4% of the next ship up".
And there needs to be risk taken into account. Pew-pew pilots suggest that they're taking the biggest risk since there's a rebuy in the line. They're wrong. Traders are risking their rebuy, their cargo and then fines from the faction that owns the cargo - combat pilots can pick and choose targets in CZs and HiRez sites, and choose when to leave... so a good combat pilot should be at little risk of a rebuy. A standard trade might be low risk, but if you're trading into a low-sec or anarchy system you've probably got more on the line than a combat pilot.
In that sense smuggling is probably the most risky job of all... you have pirates who want the cargo hunting you, there's the risk of fines from the faction that own the cargo, fines if the security forces scan you and your ship's rebuy is on the line - as such, smuggling SHOULD offer more credits than anything else.
Lastly, there should be significant costs to using a big ship. In the previous Elite games you had to pay a crew - and that would be a good start in E-D. There was a reason only governments and globe spanning organizations like the East India Trading Company had War Galleons... the cost of running them was so darn high. Taking a Corvette, Cutter or Anaconda out of the dock should require a major investment from the Commander that requires cost up front.
Basically missions in the big ships need a total rework. They should offer millions (even hundreds of millions) as a reward, but there should be millions put in up front beyond the costs of the ship itself.
And there needs to be risk taken into account. Pew-pew pilots suggest that they're taking the biggest risk since there's a rebuy in the line. They're wrong. Traders are risking their rebuy, their cargo and then fines from the faction that owns the cargo - combat pilots can pick and choose targets in CZs and HiRez sites, and choose when to leave... so a good combat pilot should be at little risk of a rebuy. A standard trade might be low risk, but if you're trading into a low-sec or anarchy system you've probably got more on the line than a combat pilot.
In that sense smuggling is probably the most risky job of all... you have pirates who want the cargo hunting you, there's the risk of fines from the faction that own the cargo, fines if the security forces scan you and your ship's rebuy is on the line - as such, smuggling SHOULD offer more credits than anything else.
Lastly, there should be significant costs to using a big ship. In the previous Elite games you had to pay a crew - and that would be a good start in E-D. There was a reason only governments and globe spanning organizations like the East India Trading Company had War Galleons... the cost of running them was so darn high. Taking a Corvette, Cutter or Anaconda out of the dock should require a major investment from the Commander that requires cost up front.
Basically missions in the big ships need a total rework. They should offer millions (even hundreds of millions) as a reward, but there should be millions put in up front beyond the costs of the ship itself.
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100 million an hour if only allied with the factions, 200-250 with the elite bonus plus allied
Material rewards are more important than credits to me. I often find myself "working" for far less than 1 million an hour, but I've made as much as 150 million per hour at other times, when I really put my mind to it.
Nothing ha, that'll show you all. You can't complain about what you can't earn kek.
Such a question, to me, seems overly simplistic. All I want is for the payout to align with how difficult/complex the mission was. Getting paid 20m credits for a mission is fine, but not if that payout came from shooting skimmers from the safety of your ship and/or relying on a mission stacking exploit.
Heck, I have deliberately abandoned very high paid planetary scan missions (3m-4m credits) when I realised that the mission only required me to drive up & scan the data point. To be honest, getting paid that much for a milk run made me feel dirty.
IMHO, base payouts for missions should be a bit lower-on average-but then we should get multiple optional & non-optional mission wrinkles that give a very hefty boost to payouts, but at a cost of greater danger/complexity. For example, you might get a simple data courier mission for 20,000 credits......but then you get a Time & Don't Get Scanned bonus that could collectively boost the payout by a factor of 50-100. That, & more reliable follow on missions, should be the easiest way to get a big pay day.
Heck, I have deliberately abandoned very high paid planetary scan missions (3m-4m credits) when I realised that the mission only required me to drive up & scan the data point. To be honest, getting paid that much for a milk run made me feel dirty.
IMHO, base payouts for missions should be a bit lower-on average-but then we should get multiple optional & non-optional mission wrinkles that give a very hefty boost to payouts, but at a cost of greater danger/complexity. For example, you might get a simple data courier mission for 20,000 credits......but then you get a Time & Don't Get Scanned bonus that could collectively boost the payout by a factor of 50-100. That, & more reliable follow on missions, should be the easiest way to get a big pay day.
Greetings,
I'm changing the discussion direction a little. It will be interesting.
Reasonable is all about LEARNING the game, coming up to speed and taking advantage of the experience that a player has acquired. It is NOT about an exploit but the skills a player had figured out to make credits while others see this as exploit because they haven't figured it out. I have been seeing these posts for years. I'm tired of reading them.
With my skills since the first Beta version was introduced years ago I can start a new game and get 5 billion credits without any exploits in 100 hours. Others better than me can make even more without an exploit. Sometimes there will be an exploit but Frontier usually finds and correct them. Per my game play I'm find these out after the fact thus I never get to take advantage of them. But I know the game starting with a Sidewinder and how to get to billions of credits playing it without exploits. Maybe you should watch a few YouTube videos to improve your skills. I did. Still so many are players who don't have a clue posting so never believe anything one watches.
Elite Dangerous is all about you getting it right with a lot of details and a large learning curve. Think of golf where no matter how great you are playing the game, the competition you are up against, or who wins the 18th hole it is about you and a game you will never be perfect at. Like golf one doesn't need an exploit. The player needs time, experience and perfecting their swing which doesn't always agree with having a real life with a family, kids and a loving wife putting up with you. So playing Elite Dangerous or making that golf swing is also about who loves you at home and never forget your real priorities in life. It is just a game. That wife or girlfriend who loves you is so much more important. If you are a total nerd find a nerd gal to play the game. Then just maybe you will experience an emotion much more important than playing a game.
But beware these women are sneaky looking for their mate to have kids and you pay all their bills for the rest of your life! For some reason women really like male butts. One doesn't even have to start up a conversation to talk to them if they like your butt. They will come to you. I don't understand it either but it works.
Playing Elite Dangerous is so much simpler in life. But finding that gal who per all your faults still loves you even at your worst is a lot better than a game. You decide.
Regards
I'm changing the discussion direction a little. It will be interesting.
Reasonable is all about LEARNING the game, coming up to speed and taking advantage of the experience that a player has acquired. It is NOT about an exploit but the skills a player had figured out to make credits while others see this as exploit because they haven't figured it out. I have been seeing these posts for years. I'm tired of reading them.
With my skills since the first Beta version was introduced years ago I can start a new game and get 5 billion credits without any exploits in 100 hours. Others better than me can make even more without an exploit. Sometimes there will be an exploit but Frontier usually finds and correct them. Per my game play I'm find these out after the fact thus I never get to take advantage of them. But I know the game starting with a Sidewinder and how to get to billions of credits playing it without exploits. Maybe you should watch a few YouTube videos to improve your skills. I did. Still so many are players who don't have a clue posting so never believe anything one watches.
Elite Dangerous is all about you getting it right with a lot of details and a large learning curve. Think of golf where no matter how great you are playing the game, the competition you are up against, or who wins the 18th hole it is about you and a game you will never be perfect at. Like golf one doesn't need an exploit. The player needs time, experience and perfecting their swing which doesn't always agree with having a real life with a family, kids and a loving wife putting up with you. So playing Elite Dangerous or making that golf swing is also about who loves you at home and never forget your real priorities in life. It is just a game. That wife or girlfriend who loves you is so much more important. If you are a total nerd find a nerd gal to play the game. Then just maybe you will experience an emotion much more important than playing a game.
But beware these women are sneaky looking for their mate to have kids and you pay all their bills for the rest of your life! For some reason women really like male butts. One doesn't even have to start up a conversation to talk to them if they like your butt. They will come to you. I don't understand it either but it works.
Playing Elite Dangerous is so much simpler in life. But finding that gal who per all your faults still loves you even at your worst is a lot better than a game. You decide.
Regards
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For me, needing time to build up enough wealth for a big ship was never the issue.
I was happy with the progression in version 1.0.
Took ages for I had my first Conda and loved it. It felt like I deserved it.
What I didn't like however was that I had to play the game for hours on end just to afford one single rebuy if things went wrong.
Since you can already make tons compared to original release, I sometimes wonder what people really mean if they say they need more credits to afford playing.
So, at its current state, is it really about credits, or is it the rebuy cost of large ships?
Also what Marc_Hicks said, just above my post. Payouts should be reasonable.
I don't want to earn half a million by delivering a package in my sidewinder. That's just stupid.
I also don't want to get paid ten times the galactic average for a commodity run. That also doesn't make any sense.
But I DO want to get paid big time for very difficult missions. And make sure missions ARE in fact difficult or even impossible if you don't have the right 'gear'.
Mission pay-outs should never factor in things that no one would ever do in real life.
If something is a lot of work, it pays.
If something is difficult, it pays.
If something is extremely mundane, it should NOT pay much. Ever. Doesn't matter if you're high ranked, elite or made out of pure gold.
I was happy with the progression in version 1.0.
Took ages for I had my first Conda and loved it. It felt like I deserved it.
What I didn't like however was that I had to play the game for hours on end just to afford one single rebuy if things went wrong.
Since you can already make tons compared to original release, I sometimes wonder what people really mean if they say they need more credits to afford playing.
So, at its current state, is it really about credits, or is it the rebuy cost of large ships?
Also what Marc_Hicks said, just above my post. Payouts should be reasonable.
I don't want to earn half a million by delivering a package in my sidewinder. That's just stupid.
I also don't want to get paid ten times the galactic average for a commodity run. That also doesn't make any sense.
But I DO want to get paid big time for very difficult missions. And make sure missions ARE in fact difficult or even impossible if you don't have the right 'gear'.
Mission pay-outs should never factor in things that no one would ever do in real life.
If something is a lot of work, it pays.
If something is difficult, it pays.
If something is extremely mundane, it should NOT pay much. Ever. Doesn't matter if you're high ranked, elite or made out of pure gold.
OP.
CR don't necessarily determine what I do in Elite, however I wouldn't do a transport mission for 10K if there is one going to the same place for 5 million. That said, I expect something like:
I don't use exploits, gold rushes or grind.
CR don't necessarily determine what I do in Elite, however I wouldn't do a transport mission for 10K if there is one going to the same place for 5 million. That said, I expect something like:
- Sidey - ~100k per hour
- Cobra, Asp & Vulture - ~2 mil / hour
- Python+ = ~10 million + hour
I don't use exploits, gold rushes or grind.
For me, it's less about credits per hour, and more about how reasonable the rewards are for the minimum investment of time and capital, combined with the risk involved. It breaks verisimilitude when I see a reward that makes me say, "You could buy your own ship for that!"
Baseline for me has always been trading, which to me means 1000 credits/ton/hop, as a reasonable "good" trade if you're traveling from one random station to another nearby random station. Yes, you can make a lot more while trading, but not from any old random station with an equally random location. Likewise, I consider a six minute investment in time to be a reasonable time investment for a single hop run. So 10,000 credits/hour/ton of cargo space is my baseline for me.
As for the maximum profit one should be able to reasonably make, that would be either 3000 credits/ton/hop, or a 5% Return on Investment on the minimum capital investment, whichever is higher. Or if you prefer, 30,000 credits/hour/ton or cargo space.
Needless to say, combat earnings should be higher than this, due to the potential risks involved, but again the rewards should match both the risks involved, and the minimum capital investment required to accomplish the mission.
The problem is that small ships have an almost absurdly high ROI given the capital involved, primarily so players will be willing to take risks and learn from their mistakes without being forced into the starting Sidewinder every time. Larger ships have a lower ROI, primarily because by the time you get into the larger ships, you shouldn't be making costly mistakes anymore, so your ROI can be lower as a result. Since most mission rewards need to be ship and pilot blind, a reward that is balanced for smaller ships and newer pilots is pocket change to larger ships and experienced pilots, while missions that that are balanced towards the latter group allows newer pilots to essentially skip over the "tutorial levels," and make their mistakes in ships they lack the skills to maintain.
Baseline for me has always been trading, which to me means 1000 credits/ton/hop, as a reasonable "good" trade if you're traveling from one random station to another nearby random station. Yes, you can make a lot more while trading, but not from any old random station with an equally random location. Likewise, I consider a six minute investment in time to be a reasonable time investment for a single hop run. So 10,000 credits/hour/ton of cargo space is my baseline for me.
As for the maximum profit one should be able to reasonably make, that would be either 3000 credits/ton/hop, or a 5% Return on Investment on the minimum capital investment, whichever is higher. Or if you prefer, 30,000 credits/hour/ton or cargo space.
Needless to say, combat earnings should be higher than this, due to the potential risks involved, but again the rewards should match both the risks involved, and the minimum capital investment required to accomplish the mission.
The problem is that small ships have an almost absurdly high ROI given the capital involved, primarily so players will be willing to take risks and learn from their mistakes without being forced into the starting Sidewinder every time. Larger ships have a lower ROI, primarily because by the time you get into the larger ships, you shouldn't be making costly mistakes anymore, so your ROI can be lower as a result. Since most mission rewards need to be ship and pilot blind, a reward that is balanced for smaller ships and newer pilots is pocket change to larger ships and experienced pilots, while missions that that are balanced towards the latter group allows newer pilots to essentially skip over the "tutorial levels," and make their mistakes in ships they lack the skills to maintain.
Funny enough, I've had 5 rebuys total, and none since 3301 (2015). Always makes me wonder what kind of madness other Commanders are up to in the game and why.
Do you just boost into everything whenever you possibly can or something?
Personally, I enjoy Buckyball Racing and occasionally indulge in PvP. Oddly enough, when I indulge in highly risky entertainments, I think, “I’m willing to lose 2 million, and I’ll need 6 rebuys to participate. How much ship can I lose for that amount?” I’m very much a proponent of the “Don’t fly what you can’t afford to lose” school of thought.
NOT Unlimited, precisely because it IS supposed to be a game!
Whatever you can make without logging in and out. There's no reason to hold anyone to any arbitrary number - if they're willing to do the work, they should be compensated for it. It only becomes "unreasonable" when people are logging in and out over and over because they were able to find one short-range mission paying 5m credits and now feel entitled to 19 more.
Beginning of the game, sidewinder: 10k/hour
Very early game, eagle/hauler: 30-50k/hour
Early game, cobra: 100k/hour
Mid game, AspX: 1 million/hour
Mid/late game, Python, higher combat/trade/exploration rank and getting higher navy ranks: 10 million/hour
Late game, Anaconda with duke/rear-admiral and dangerous/deadly rank: 20-50 million/hour
End game: fully engineered fleet of cutters etc, admiral/king, x3 Elite: 100-200 million per hour....why hold back the endgame?
I’m at what I would consider “endgame” now. 1500 hours, 20 G5 engineered ships, many billions in the bank. I like credits still - give me some crazy wing missions paying 100 million plus “destroy the enemy fleet” stuff that I can unleash my ships on. Would be fun.
Very early game, eagle/hauler: 30-50k/hour
Early game, cobra: 100k/hour
Mid game, AspX: 1 million/hour
Mid/late game, Python, higher combat/trade/exploration rank and getting higher navy ranks: 10 million/hour
Late game, Anaconda with duke/rear-admiral and dangerous/deadly rank: 20-50 million/hour
End game: fully engineered fleet of cutters etc, admiral/king, x3 Elite: 100-200 million per hour....why hold back the endgame?
I’m at what I would consider “endgame” now. 1500 hours, 20 G5 engineered ships, many billions in the bank. I like credits still - give me some crazy wing missions paying 100 million plus “destroy the enemy fleet” stuff that I can unleash my ships on. Would be fun.