Ok, so I wanna "Get good" so I can take part in new things as they come out.

[KarmaCop]

Grind engineers. There is no need to git gud once you pigged out on all the power creep.

Yeah...with PvE, but with PvP one is simply gaining parity in terms of equipment, then the REAL learning is just beginning, as I've found to my wallet's - not to mention my ego's - displeasure.

In my first month of playing, I've come to realise this ^ plus the "billion credits in a day" should make Frontier hang their heads in shame.

Apart from that, I'm really loving this game - it just requires such a huge time investment. I'm currently out in the black getting my 5k lys, then the plan is to unlock Qwent (I based myself around Sirius for the rep while running missions & learning - up there for thinking! ) & then upgrade my G3 thrusters.

After that? Well I'll look for a compatible squadron & who knows where the solar wind will take me from there

 

[don carnage1]

I just want to point out that, as someone else suggested, no amount of money or mining is going to help players “get gud.”

The only way to survive is through good engineering. A decent pilot in a well-engineered Vulture can kill any baddie in the game (excepting Thargoids under normal circumstances.)

And to underline that point: That same Vulture pilot can kill a poorly-engineered player Anaconda without much difficulty.

All this means that materials, not money, is the great gatekeeper.

It does require some grinding and there are guides out there on Google on how to do that. But I have found that the easiest way is just to do it passively. Don’t seek out the grind or you may burn out. Let the materials come to you naturally.

Happen to see a high-grade-emission in your system? Go for it. Out exploring? Seek out some rare mineral planets on the way. Kill a big baddie? Keep some limpets handy for the debris. Does the station you’re docked at have any easy materials missions? Being allied to a faction helps a lot for that. Are you visiting a Guardian site? Plunder it for all it’s worth.

This method is slower than grinding but I find it a lot more fun than running circles in Dav’s Hope.

 

[don carnage1]

Oops double post.

 

[Sylow]

Some useful info already in this thread, although this part is wrong:

Currently - fastest in terms of return: void opal minig. Get Python, slap mining laser, charge launcher, prospector limpet, refinery, collector limpet, load ~75% of your cargo space with limpets, find pristine metallic reserves ring, search for hot spot, drop there and spend few hours flying and trying to find VO asteroid with fissures. Crack open, gather all and repeat.

So small fact check:

• Void Opal mining can give good money: true.
• Python is a good choice: true. But about any ship of Cobra size or bigger can do it.
• Suggested equipment: not suitable. Take seismic charge launcher and abrasion blaster instead.
• Metalic ring: not suitable. Go for ice rings.

On the size of the ship, it's a bit of a tradeoff. I personally use a Cobra MK IV when going rock mining. I have to return to base more often, but considering that i often only have an hour or two for gaming anyway, that works out fine for me. While the smaller ship has an easier time going in between the pieces of the cracked rock. (Any ship can do it, but it's more enjoyable in a smaller ship. )

That all being said, i think you're not in that much need of making money. You have a T9 and a Krait MK II. So a good bulk cargo carrier and one of the best allrounder ships in the game. The Krait MK II is a reasonably good choice for about any activity in the game. It can fight (and even bring a SLF), it can explore, it makes an acceptable rock miner, etc. It's an extremely versatile ship.

Now the bad news: I think you're mostly fine in terms of credits. You might perhaps want to do a bit of void opal mining to a-rate your internals, but one or another hour might already do the job. The bigger climb is engineering. If you really want to get a ship, be it the Krait MK II or any other ship to be combat suitable, you by now should do plenty of engineering. At least shields and shield boosters should be engineered.

Mind you, a stock ship can fight. Whenever FD introduces a new ship, i first take a non-engineered ship to a HazRES for an hour or two, to see how it fares, to decide if it's worth the engineering effort. I never lost a ship yet when doing that, and i make sure to attack deadly and elite enemies during that test ride. But while a non-engineered ship can fight, it sure can be an uphill battle when fighting engineered NPCs.

As you don't have that much combat experience yet, you're well advised to first stick to only lower ranked enemies and/or invest quite some effort into engineering. I really wish engineering would not be as much power creep and not as essential, but infortunately it is. I am sorry for these bad news.

And a final small sidenote: the guardian FSD booster was mentioned above. While this is a good idea for somebody who plays a lot and travels far, i would not advise this for a casual player. You have to invest quite some time and effort to get that module unlocked. This means that for a casual player that module takes a long time to pay off. If it ever does. You might be much better off sticking with just a good fuel scoop and jumping a few times more, knowing that you saved a lot of time by not grinding at guardian sites, trying to collect the right data from the pylons.

[...]
It does require some grinding and there are guides out there on Google on how to do that. But I have found that the easiest way is just to do it passively. Don’t seek out the grind or you may burn out. Let the materials come to you naturally.

[...]

This method is slower than grinding but I find it a lot more fun than running circles in Dav’s Hope.

That's a good advise on material gathering in general. It's what i also currently do. I also collect almost everything when going bounty hunting. Once i a while i fly to a base with a material trader (actually i currently do my bounty hunting tours from a base with material trader) and trade those which i get plenty off for some which i am short of.

But you have to be aware that while it's more natural for the gameplay, it also is very slow. For somebody just trying to get one ship into shape, this can feel like an eternal thing and other alternatives might be more attractive.

 

[Drelthar]

Just play, you can do (nearly) everything in a Cobra Mk3.

If you want to do something, just go do it.

 

[d8veh]

Normal mining in a T9 will get you up to 1/4 billion credits an hour when you mine in a Painite double hotspot, so it's no grind to get all the credits you need for anything. It's so simple - no skill is needed, just normal mining, which you can do while you watch TV.

The problem is that all the other stuff you mentioned is a massive time-sink. Go to Youtube and search for how to unlock all the Guardian stuff, and how to unlock all the engineers and get the stuff you need to upgrade your ship. There are lots of short-cuts, but it still takes ages to do it all.

 

[Navigare Necesse Est]

Yeah...with PvE, but with PvP one is simply gaining parity in terms of equipment, then the REAL learning is just beginning, as I've found to my wallet's - not to mention my ego's - displeasure.

In my first month of playing, I've come to realise this ^ plus the "billion credits in a day" should make Frontier hang their heads in shame.

Apart from that, I'm really loving this game - it just requires such a huge time investment. I'm currently out in the black getting my 5k lys, then the plan is to unlock Qwent (I based myself around Sirius for the rep while running missions & learning - up there for thinking! ) & then upgrade my G3 thrusters.

After that? Well I'll look for a compatible squadron & who knows where the solar wind will take me from there

Can't be bothered to grind so I can play pvp again.

 

[Slowfiddler]

This should be pinned. It is a really useful thread and contains some detailed posts - apart from the grind whinges later on. One person's grind is another person's path to success.

 

[Dillon Fallon]

Combat maaayyyy???? be viable again to make money currently? Last time I played Hi-Res sites were junk money compared to other means to play.

Potentially there's some credits to be made here. Stay away from High and even Haz Res sites as a money making activity though. I remember once I made 12 million in an hour at a compromised nav beacon, but I got really lucky with a lot of high level Anacondas and T-10s. If you're going to go the combat route, I'd stick with assassination missions. Anarchy factions pay better for killing politicians but it's better to stick with pirate assassinations until you're finding it easy to kill the Corvettes.

Honestly though, you're best using combat to mix up your gameplay so you don't get grind burn out doing the same thing.

 

[CrazyH0rse]

If you want to make a lot of credits fast. You can get about a Billon credit in a day just by farming Void Opal. Now how to set up your ships. I am still learning. I am also working on a Krait MKII for combat

Are you sure about that? Is that really possible? I have been void opal mining and it takes me about 3 hours to fill the cargo hold (128t) of my Imperial Clipper.

So what am I doing wrong? I started by exclusively looking for void opals but I decided that it was more efficient to also take Grandidierite, Alexandrite and Low Temp Diamonds.

Is it my ship? My process? My skills? Depletion?

Is this really up to date - can you say, hand on heart - that people can really get 1bn credits in 8 hours of play, TODAY?

 

[Sylow]

Honestly though, you're best using combat to mix up your gameplay so you don't get grind burn out doing the same thing.

Which is true for any activity and even any game: too much of it at once will spoil the fun. Get enough diversity into your activities and all of them remain fresh and fun for much longer.

Are you sure about that? Is that really possible? I have been void opal mining and it takes me about 3 hours to fill the cargo hold (128t) of my Imperial Clipper.

Part of it is experience on spotting the right rocks. When I started out rock mining, it took me well over an hour to fill my Cobra MK IV. When I got better spotting the right rocks from a distance, I was able to get this down to like 40 minutes. (Status of a few months ago, I didn't go rock mining since a while. ) Somebody with even more practice in spotting the rocks might still be able to shave some time off. Which means that your 128 tons clipper probably would still require me two hours to fill it up. Roughly 30% better than the rate you currently list, but quite certainly possible for you to get there with a little more practice.

So yes, practice helps. You seem to be in between where I was when I started and where I got to when I really was into it. That being said, the mentioned billion in a day is something I also couldn't reach. I am not sure if that's possible any more.

When VO mining started out, there were some places around which offered crazy money per ton. Based on those prices, the billion per day probably were possible for a while. But at least I wouldn't be able to make that much money now, with the prices we have now. That being said, it still has an excellent money per time ratio, especially once you learned to spot the "good" rocks from a distance and know a location which pays good money while not being too far away from a good mining spot. (Due to prices changing constantly, finding the right place to sell is also one of the skills you have to develop yourself. )

 

[Lightspeed]

Ok, so what I am getting (After reading everyone's posts) iiisss...

• There's no right path nor is there a strong way to get it other than mass grinding something. Grind is the only way to get anywhere unless there's a temporary gold rush through a bug that people were able to exploit before a patch.
• Void Opals should be looked into as I've not done that.
• Combat maaayyyy???? be viable again to make money currently? Last time I played Hi-Res sites were junk money compared to other means to play.
• Space Trading in wings with T9, still top dollar
• Exploration via some kind of massive moneymaker might be a great distraction from the mass trade grind.
• I should have posted that I already have max rep with farseer and the FSD drive upgrades were pretty mandatory.

I guess... I should try the void opals when I get bored trading, then maybe grab a good exploration vessel when I want to spend an afternoon or two just... going out into the black? Could be fun, the Pleiades is the farthest I've ever been from the hub.

Would I be right in saying that the current people who have the big bucks, and who can shoot for new things as they launch, just have way more free/space time under their belts and just grinded massively over months and months and now have a giant well of cash and can enjoy the game as they like, and ultimately I must spend even more time grinding to get to this degree of freedom? That's not a slight against anyone btw, I'm asking honestly. Tempering expectations sounds like it's in order to get enjoyment out of the game long term.

In case you didn't realise, the Guardian FSD boosts your jump range in addition to anything you will have gained via Farseer

Yes, some play many hours at a stretch, the rest of us play for occasional hours. You'd think it is not possible to achieve their lofty towers playing only occasionally yet, after several years many of us have achieved Triple Elite just playing the game our way.

Since there is no end game, it honestly doesn't matter how you play, so long as you enjoy it. You are less likely to burn out that way. Some, perhaps many, full time players have burned out and moved on.

 

[Lightspeed]

Are you sure about that? Is that really possible? I have been void opal mining and it takes me about 3 hours to fill the cargo hold (128t) of my Imperial Clipper.

So what am I doing wrong? I started by exclusively looking for void opals but I decided that it was more efficient to also take Grandidierite, Alexandrite and Low Temp Diamonds.

Is it my ship? My process? My skills? Depletion?

Is this really up to date - can you say, hand on heart - that people can really get 1bn credits in 8 hours of play, TODAY?

Very unlikely. There are a lot of boasts in this forum, without substance.

 

[Sylow]

Yes, some play many hours at a stretch, the rest of us play for occasional hours. You'd think it is not possible to achieve their lofty towers playing only occasionally yet, after several years many of us have achieved Triple Elite just playing the game our way.

I fully agree. My gaming time quite often is badly split up and at odd times. My premium flight time is Friday and Saturday late at night, when my wife already went to bed and I might still have a few hours of energy left in me. Outside of those odd spots, I might only find something like 30 to 60 minutes here and there, when my wife just doen't have any ideas on what other things I would have to do.

It's been like this for some years now. Yet I also made my trade elite with VOs around Xmas, am slowly but constantly improving my combat rank (deadly, might still reach elite this year) and have reached pioneer rank a few months ago. Some people sprint to the goal. I rather go my slow but constant pace and also seem to get there. Probably while having more fun on the way.

 

[Lightspeed]

Which is true for any activity and even any game: too much of it at once will spoil the fun. Get enough diversity into your activities and all of them remain fresh and fun for much longer.



Part of it is experience on spotting the right rocks. When I started out rock mining, it took me well over an hour to fill my Cobra MK IV. When I got better spotting the right rocks from a distance, I was able to get this down to like 40 minutes. (Status of a few months ago, I didn't go rock mining since a while. ) Somebody with even more practice in spotting the rocks might still be able to shave some time off. Which means that your 128 tons clipper probably would still require me two hours to fill it up. Roughly 30% better than the rate you currently list, but quite certainly possible for you to get there with a little more practice.

So yes, practice helps. You seem to be in between where I was when I started and where I got to when I really was into it. That being said, the mentioned billion in a day is something I also couldn't reach. I am not sure if that's possible any more.

When VO mining started out, there were some places around which offered crazy money per ton. Based on those prices, the billion per day probably were possible for a while. But at least I wouldn't be able to make that much money now, with the prices we have now. That being said, it still has an excellent money per time ratio, especially once you learned to spot the "good" rocks from a distance and know a location which pays good money while not being too far away from a good mining spot. (Due to prices changing constantly, finding the right place to sell is also one of the skills you have to develop yourself. )

It is possible to use external databases, such as EDDB or INARA (can't find the specific pages to link to at present*) which identify the markets purchasing void opals, or other commodities, for the highest prices to maximise profit from your labouring.

*EDIT INARA has a page where you enter the commodity at right, and select the Best Sell tab .... you may have to travel a good distance to sell the opals at top notch prices, so it can be risky. Risk ---> reward.

 

[Sylow]

It is possible to use external databases, such as EDDB or INARA (can't find the specific pages to link to at present) which identify the markets purchasing void opals, or other commodities, for the highest prices to maximise profit from your labouring.

It's what I do. Just like many others, which in turn in the problem: while EDDB provides good data, it also makes sure that excellent prices at any place it lists won't remain that way for too long. It gets spotted, players fill the demand, prices drop.

I know that when I did VO mining, I was informed about a place with better prices by my squadron. EDDB did not list the prices (price status there was like "30 days ago"), prices were much higher than anywhere else. But information likes to travel. A few days later it seemed like anybody knew about the place, it was listed on EDDB and prices dropped by over 50%.

So yes, EDDB easily allows you to find a good place to sell. But the real gems are rarely there and if they are, they quickly suffer from many players profiting from them.

 

[Dillon Fallon]

Very unlikely. There are a lot of boasts in this forum, without substance.

I'd imagine a significant number of the credit per hour boasts are from before the fix to the multiple void opal fragment bug when you hit a chunk with more than one abrasion blaster at a time.

I'd say about 50 million an hour if you find a market selling at 1.6 million per void opal is reasonable for a casual miner in a hot spot who knows what a core rock looks like.

 

[Codger]

I think you have plenty of suggestions already, OP, but I'll add mine.

First and foremost, stop comparing yourself to anyone else. This game has no end point. There will always be players richer than you. Who cares. What matters is whether you are having fun!

It's fine to have goals and work towards them, of course, but if you find yourself "grinding" and it's feeling like work, then you need to switch it up. Otherwise you'll burn out and quit.

There are so many activities available -- many types of missions, bounty hunting, CGs, exploration, mining, salvage, etc. Do them all. Figure out what you like. Everything will earn money, over time, so find what you enjoy and do that.

On my last restart (about a month ago -- I have an alt account so I can restart with a new CMDR now and then), all I did was Exploration for a while. Exploration payouts are big now, and I very quickly had enough money to move up from my Sidewinder to a Keelback. I took the Keelback mining. After a few hours I moved up to a Krait Phantom. Then I quit because I was getting too far along, and I want that account to be in the early stages

My point is that you can progress many ways. Yes, it takes time, but isn't that reason for games? To spend time, enjoyable time?

 

[Nadreck]

There are several ways of making money nowadays. Passenger sightseeing missions from Robigo Mines to Sirius Atmospherics are still good for around 100m/hr, and you can also go for manufactured materials as a reward and get plenty of G5's to trade for what you need.

As an added bonus, one of the three factions is Imperial and one is the Sirius Corporation. So you soon qualify for the Sirius permit and gain Imperial ranks with no additional effort.

 

[Sylow]

I'd say about 50 million an hour if you find a market selling at 1.6 million per void opal is reasonable for a casual miner in a hot spot who knows what a core rock looks like.

Sounds about right. I think I ended up at a little over 70 million per hour, but that was during Xmas/new year vacations, where I was able to invest more time and wasn't really playing casually for two weeks.

But still I stick to what many others have said: Now I have plenty of big ships in my fleet. And 700 millions of cash with nothing to really spend it on. Yet I still fly my Krait MK II, while my really expensive ships are stored away and collect dust. Credits are only important if you want a specific ship. Anything beyond the ship and a few rebuys has no meaning.