I have attempted to build a tutorial for new players of Elite Dangerous.
If you have any suggestions on content or corrections please let me know. thanks.
New Player Tutorial for Elite Dangerous
This is a tutorial for New Players coming to Elite Dangerous. I wrote it for new players to amass the skills required to survive in the Elite Dangerous universe.
Opening
Welcome to Elite Dangerous
When I started the game just over a year and a half ago. I looked for a guide or tutorial to help me gain an understanding of Elite Dangerous and really found none. The best I found was how to go to a hazardous resource site and start blowing things up. Nothing on how to fly the ships, or how to really play the game. This really did not stop me from playing and learning, but then I got to thinking what about someone who has no experience at all in games of this sort. A friend of mine saw me playing ED and has been infatuated with it since. He has no knowledge of computers, and especially games, and has been looking to purchase the game and a computer to play it on, since. So I started looking again and still found nothing. No big deal right, if you see a discrepancy fix it.
What is Elite Dangerous? A very good question. It is a simulator of what life as a pilot would be like in another 1100 years or so if we reach space of course. Yes, I know that everyone calls it a game, however, it is a simulator, not a game, no more than Microsoft Flight Simulator is. Games come with storylines and goals, Elite Dangerous has neither. The game comes from you through role-play, and the freedom to choose your own path. The simulator contains around 400 billion star systems and is as close to an accurate model, of the milky way galaxy, as they can make it. Frontier, has also gone to great lengths to provide as accurate physics as they can, while still making it playable by the average person. It is also a rough, and dangerous galaxy, that tries to kill you at every turn, just like the real galaxy would. There is no law and order in the galaxy, only what you and your guns bring. Just don’t forget to bring plenty of bullets. I would also add what it is not. There are those who would say it is a space combat game, which is defiantly false. There is just too much to choose from to be just a shooter if one looks. The creators added too much breathtaking beauty, and challenge, that it is wasted on those who only look at it as a shooter (of course that doesn’t mean it’s not fun too). What would most closely describe, the Elite Dangerous universe, is a life simulator 1100 years in the future, and you are the adventurer searching for treasure, and excitement.
Objectives:
What is the goal of this tutorial?
1. Develop a path to learn to fly and control your ship(s), and an idea of its (their) capabilities, and how to find them. Throughout this tutorial I will be focusing on just two ships, the Cobra MKIII, and the Python.
2. How to deal with crisis situations, efficiently, and effectively. Namely combat, as there are few others in the game now. I will not be teaching combat beyond nonlethal, however, the basics for combat and non-lethal are the same. But don’t lose hope, once you learn nonlethal, regular combat is easy.
3. Help you demonstrate for yourself a more efficient and reliable way of earning money, and materials in the game, beyond such boring things as farming, and grinding. I can’t count the number of times I have seen the posts on the forums, and steam of people sick and tired of farming, especially when it is so unnecessary.
4. Help you master the basics of the game. These include skills such as mining, flight assist off, trade, exploration, and teamwork in wings, just to list a few.
Section 0-1 The first step
Getting started:
{This tutorial is geared towards those who have the Horizons DLC, although you could still use it without it. Sorry about that.}
Section 1 objectives. In this part of the tutorial, the player will be able to demonstrate the understanding, and knowledge of the following.
1. Basic knowledge of a ship build, and how it can be manipulated for the role the player wishes to perform.
2. The different classes of ship modules.
3. The different roles of explorers, and how they play into the Elite Dangerous universe.
4. The advanced procedures of surveying, and how to use it for maximum profit.
5. How to identify hazardous areas, when dealing with signal sources.
6. Basic non-lethal combat techniques, and how they apply to combat.
7. Combat techniques.
8. Smuggling, both commodities, and personnel onto stations.
9. High waking (a.k.a. escape maneuver no.1)
10. Setting up notes for use later, for personal use, and planning.
First, I would recommend that you stay in the newbie area, until you have earned around 6 million credits, and gained all the knowledge offered. If you don’t feel like it, however, just get the suggested ship and the essential optional internals, and the utility mounts. You will also have to upgrade the power plant, as there will not be enough power to run everything. Everything else can be done later as you earn money. While in the newbie area I would also suggest you practice any, and all of the techniques presented herein. I'll point out that I use a lot of abbreviations in this tutorial, and when you do the in-game tutorial you will come to understand what they mean.
Note: I can’t stress enough the value of just slowing down and taking your time. There is no hurry to get everything in the universe done, and if you try too hard you will begin to make mistakes, and worse begin to go backward. I am not opposed to making mistakes, as it is one of the best ways to learn, but many mistakes are avoidable just by slowing down a little bit and thinking things through or just looking around (slow down, observe, plan, then implement). This is the best piece of advice I can give you; “the only thing you really have to do in life is pay taxes, and die. No one is in a hurry to do either of those, so why not just slow down, experience life, enjoy what is presented to you, and meet any challenges head-on.”
Let me elaborate on this. You will or have found on YouTube all kinds of videos on how to make millions of credits per hour mining, or passengers missions, or you have or will see how to go from the Sidewinder to the Anaconda in just a few hours. As for tutorials, you will see many nonsense videos on going into hazardous resource sites to learn Elite Dangerous. These are not for the beginner, or good examples of tutorials, the first group is power-play, for experienced players who already have the foundations for E.D. and are starting over. The second is a trap set up by trolls (it really isn't intentional, that was all that was available to them when they started E.D., so really they are not intentionally trolling anyone), you can’t learn anything from just jumping into combat, without at least the basic knowledge of how the ships work, and how to operate them efficiently, plus it raises your combat ranking up too fast before you yourself are ready for it. Reaching that level of skill and knowledge takes time, which you have plenty of.
I will also highly suggest that when you do make friends in Elite Dangerous as a beginner, or newbie that you do not allow yourself to fall into the trap of being "helped". There is something to be said about doing it yourself, in E.D., and it is too easy to find yourself caught in the trap of dependency. Even though the simulation is strongly supportive of unity, the only way to master it is through independence and independent action. Being too dependent on others is way too easy, speaking from experience, there is even a video on Youtube explaining it. So until it is time, I recommend you refrain from accepting too much help, or boost ups from friends. This does not mean that you shouldn't ask for help to learn something new, and there are plenty of people in the community who are willing to go out of their way to teach you. You will see when the time is right to request help, later as you read. Especially when you discover that nothing in E.D. is really free. Fly dangerously, stay safe.
Section 1-1
Your Cobra MK III:
Core Internal
Lightweight alloy armor
4A Power Plant
4A Thrusters
4D Frame Shift Drive
3D Life Support
3A Power Distributor
3D Sensors
4C Fuel Tank
Optional Internal
2X 4E Cargo Rack
4D Shield
2C Fuel Tank
2A Fuel Scoop
2H Planetary Vehicle Hanger
1I Detailed Surface Scanner
1A Collector Limpet Controller
No Weapons
(yet)
Utility Mounts
0A Frame Shift Wake Scanner
0I Heat Sink Launcher
This will cost 5.5 Mcr
With a 275,000 cr re-buy
And please make sure you give it a good name. She is, after all, going to be your good friend for this part of the tutorial, and will serve you well, long after.
This will give you a 13 ly jump range, with 11.5 ly fully laden, and all the tools necessary for the first part of the tutorial. You will also want to buy some limpets, let’s say 20 or so, for the collector. There are no weapons on this build because you will mostly be in solo for this part of the tutorial, I’ll explain later. This first part is to learn exploration, and some of the basic skills associated with ED, almost all related to ship and vehicle operation, and flight assist off. You have already learned how to use the tools while in the starting area, so I will not bother reexplaining them. You need to find a nice random star, some 300 ly from your starting point and begin your journey to it. If you want you can go further out, but if you decide to stay closer, don’t come closer than 200 ly from Sol. You’ll need some room, and to stay out of sight of the unsavory element.
The reason I have said to get the Cobra MK III is first, it is a very good ship to start with. It has the capability to be configured to any task in Elite Dangerous, and do it well. Second, it is fast and maneuverable. Third, is tradition, it is the ship that you start out with, in the original game “Elite”, back in the ’80s, and it just seemed fitting. This does not mean that you have to get it, there are still several other great ships to work with. However, you really don’t want a high re-buy this early in the game. Plus even though now you don’t have weapons on it, you will have them later, and the Cobra is a good combat ship.
Explaining the ship loadout, you have 32 tons of cargo space, and decent shields. The small extra fuel tank is just in case you overextend yourself, which does happen. When you get the planetary vehicle hanger make sure you get an SRV to go in it, it is used for surface exploration, and collecting materials on the surface. The collector limpet controller is for collecting materials in space debris, and the occasional (lost) cargo. The heat sink launcher is for when you do pick up that (lost) cargo, which will be classified as stolen and entering into stations to sell them. I will explain the procedure for smuggling later.
Section 1-2
About ship builds:
You will notice that there are 5 classes of equipment for many of the items for sale. You have classes E, D, C, B, and A, as well as some special classifications of G thru I. I will break them down for you the best I can as they pertain to player roles. Class E is the initial buy, and even though balanced is the lowest grade you can have. They are heavier and not nearly as good, however, E is a good baseline for a start, and will get you moving at least. Class D is the lightest but not as efficient, or as durable as the later ones. “D” is the go-to for combat pilots and racers who need to watch their weights for maneuverability and speed. Class C is more efficient when it comes to heat, and power usage. They are great for smugglers, who need to enter areas as quietly as possible. (hint: when you do get the Beluga, “C” rate it. It will help a lot with the overheating problems they have). Class B is more durable, what it lacks in the overall output it makes up for in taking a hit. B rating is great for trade, and mining vessels who lack in combat prowess, allowing them to take a hit to its systems buying time to run. Class A is the top of the line, balancing all the attributes of the others, but not actually exceeding them. They are really a go-to for long-range explorers and certain systems that are crucial to your role.
An example of one role is the Cobra MK III I had you build, it is set up as a hybrid survey ship (a training ship for both exploration and combat, as you will find out as you read). It has all the equipment you need for surveying as well as maneuverability, and speed to hold it’s own in a fight. If I had you build a pure survey ship the FSD, life support, sensors, and shields would have been Class C, or A adding some weight. And in a combat ship, everything but the thrusters, power plant, and distributor would be Class D, and those mentioned would have been A, and most of the optional components would be gone, releasing the weight and power they consume.
The key here is to understand that you can set up your ships for the roles you wish for them. There are many of them, and they each have unique needs. One build is not enough to allow the flexibility to pursue every role, and will completely eliminate most that the ship is able to accomplish for you. Understanding how the classification system works, and how to build is a necessary skill you must learn to maximize your advantage. Or at least, lessen their advantages.
I just wanted to point out something about this tutorial and me. Everything I tell you to do is a suggestion or recommendation. There is nothing set in stone, you have the freedom to do as you please, however, there are a few things I wanted you to look out for. Such as leveling up combat too fast, and too early. Being mostly harmless is not a bad thing for a beginner. Keep in mind as you level up, so do the NPC’s that come after you. This is why I excluded weapons on the initial Cobra MK III build, without them you are not tempted to fire on NPC pirates and learn the evasive and combat tactics much more safely, as you will learn how to do at the end of this section. As for the build itself, go into Coriolis
coriolis.io
play around with the build, and see what improvements you can make.
Section 1-3
This section is about exploration. There are three types of exploration that I know of; the first is the type I call trailblazing, just like Lewis and Clark, back in the frontier days of North America. They are the ones that go out and find the paths through the wild, untamed wilderness. The ones trying to be first to the other side. The second type of explorers are called surveyors, the ones who come behind and root out the treasures, that the trailblazers could not. They are the ones who find the veins of gold, diamonds, seek out the fertile land for farming, etc… this is what we will be playing. Just keep in mind this is a simulator, so some role-play is required. The third are the tourist guides, the ones who take tourist out on safaris, or transport folks from place to place (keep in mind, if you choose you can set up the ship or build another with passenger cabins and do this. And it can be fun in its own way, and is a good way to take a break, and make some money). There are some things that can surprise you. I’ve stumbled on one, or two myself that Frontier put in very unexpected places.
You will need a good notebook or a good spreadsheet. As you enter the systems you will need to record all the info there. Starting with the name of the system, planets, asteroid belts, characteristics of the planets, stations on and off the planets. Any details that you find important. As you read I will point out some that you should pay attention to, such as if the station carries the Python, and if it has a black market, and material traders. Many important details you will pick up on as you continue your journey. Currently, there is no way to keep notes in-game, or of tracking your findings. It has been noted many times by many Commanders, in the forums, that this is a problem, and sooner or later Frontier will have to address this issue, hopefully, sooner.
You will find that I will not tell you everything, I find that it defeats the purpose of training, to give every single detail, and leave nothing for the student to discover for themselves. When you do that it leaves them without any sense of accomplishment, or satisfaction. In other words, I will give enough to get you started on the path, with a good kick in the pants.
What I want you to accomplish for yourself is to build a training bubble of up to 100 developed systems to start with. You really do not have to have that many, 40 or even 20 will do, as you are only doing this for training, not to make a life for yourself there. What a developed system is, is a system that has a human presence, with some sort of port, to land on and trade at. You will also be mapping all the undeveloped systems as well. Basically, you are surveying this area of space completely. Make sure to keep an eye on your navigation panel as well for unknown objects. If you happen to find one go to it and investigate, just be cautious when you do, there can be some unexpected trouble at some of them.
Once you reach your destination I want you to begin by honking the system, with the discovery scanner. If it has a navigation beacon, go on over to it and scan it. If not you will need to go above the star, and out of the orbital plane of the planets and activate your FSS, and scan everything, including the signal sources. Take note of the planets that have possible geographical features. You will have to make a choice, and decide if you wish to go to the signal sources first or the planets. Keep in mind that the signal sources degrade and disappear over time. (I usually choose to go for the planets first, if there is a navigation beacon in the system. And if there isn’t, I go to the signal sources first. Redoing the FSS is a hassle, while scanning the nav beacon is easy.) At the planets, you will need to do a detailed surface scan, and for ringed planets scan the rings. Then for at least the first ten or twenty systems with planets, I want you to land on all of them (just make sure you check their gravity first). Even the ones without geographical features, and break out the SRV, and do some practice driving, and surface mining. Any outcroppings you run across do not hesitate to harvest. While in the system map you may want to look at the composition of the planet. This is your first introduction to harvesting materials. Oh, don’t forget to have fun.
These were written and recorded by Astro from Down to Earth Astronomy and will explain surface mining, and the SRV. Don’t forget to like and subscribe to his channel.
Source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0xTRtyUTu3o&t=95s
Source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ewP5b76BqLc
Source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kZIiYidlhCI
Section 1-4
Continuing with planet exploration, after the first 10 to 20 systems, then you should only need to land on the ones with features. Don’t forget to scan the features with the conformation scanner as they can bring good credits for the scan. Landing on all the planets was to gain experience in landing and driving. I also suggest that you land at every station, and check them out. Get all the pertinent information from the station while there. On the way out, especially at busy stations, use the wake scanner to collect encoded materials or data from wakes. Also after the first few systems, I would like for you to start to use fa off, for landing on both the surfaces and stations, to start developing the feel for fa off flight. At the end of this section, I will post a few YouTube tutorials for fa off flight, as well as a few thoughts.
For the duration of this part of the tutorial, I would like for you to drop into all of the planetary rings, take special note of how dense they are. Try to build a system from 1-5 to rate their density. I would also recommend that you note how many and what type of hot spots they have, especially if they have any overlapping hot spots. This is all for later in the tutorial.
As I stated earlier take your time, there is no hurry. Doing a complete survey of a system takes time especially in large systems. Some systems may only take an hour if it only has a few planets, while larger systems can take many hours of flying around and checking things out. There are many players who find this fun and fulfilling, and others who just can not do it, as it is boring. But it is a necessary part of ED, so as not to be blind, to the structure of the region you are in.
Signal sources are the next topic. In reality, I do not suggest you investigate all the sites as some of them are too dangerous. The one to avoid at this time is weapons fire. This will result in combat and are hazardous until you have some weapons installed. The ones if entered you should use caution are combat aftermath, non-human signal source, and anything level 3 and over, they may result in ambush, or outright attack, however, the combat aftermath’s are very good as you may run across dropped cargo, that may be worth money. Just keep in mind that the cargo is hot (illegal), and you will have to smuggle them into a station with a black market. Anything else with a rating of 0, 1, or 2 is fine to enter at this level of the tutorial, anything higher make sure to have a destination star highlighted, just in case you need to high wake out (discussed later). The goal is to learn to use the cargo scoop to collect materials, and cargo in both flight assist on, and off. Using the collector limpets is fine and all, but you will not learn to control the ship by using it. So use the cargo scoop to collect them manually, this will go a long way in learning to control your ship. I mentioned that you should make notes of black markets, and material traders. If you find hot cargo, you will need the black markets to sell them. And you will need material traders to exchange materials when (or if) you fill them up. Both are located in the contacts list at a starport.
Section 1-5
Now comes some of the fun stuff. I do not care how cautious you try to fly, some Jack pirate is going to try to jack you. So at first, I want you to try to break free of the interdiction. Just for a while though, for practice. I would also like you to learn that if they are trying to interdict you and you are fuel scooping, just move a little closer to the star, then turn your thrusters toward the star and go zero throttle. What happens is that they must get behind you, and as they try, they get to close and burn up (popped like a popcorn kernel). But seeing as neither is exciting, I suggest you submit. Just go zero throttle and let them pull you to normal space. If there is nothing in your hold, but limpets, they will do nothing except scan you. Of course, that is not fun, is it? Your job, or goal, is to prevent them from scanning you. There are two types of basic combat, one is jousting, the second is dogfighting. Keep in mind that at first, you are unarmed, but they usually will not fire on you (and risk a bounty) unless you fire on them first (if you have no weapons that is not possible), have a cargo, or go outside ten kilometers from the interdiction site.
Jousting is where you aim the nose of your ship towards the enemy and fly past them in an effort to break their scanning process, once you are not in their scanning arc the scanner can no longer scan you and they must start over. Then turn back and do it again. In armed combat, this is used to line up the enemy and strife them as you pass. You can use fa off to rotate the ship and keep an eye on them as you pass by. And a key to the whole thing is to fly by, as close to them as possible, to make it harder for them to rotate, to keep up with the maneuver. This is generally a maneuver used by the less maneuverable ships for combat, as they usually don’t have the capabilities for dogfighting.
Dog fighting is the more advanced type of combat. The goal is to keep out of the enemy's line of fire while simultaneously, keeping yourself in the most advantageous position possible (usually behind and below). The first thing in this part of the tutorial is to go into the configuration screen and in the mouse controls turn on the mouse widget. With that turned on, it puts a dot in the center of the screen, use it as your aiming point. You will have to learn to use a combination of fa on and off to do this well, as the different characteristics of the two modes have different advantages and disadvantages. You want to learn to use as many of the advantages, of each, as possible. The key is to do this over and over again, trying out new things, until you figure it out. Try not to get caught in the trap of doing the same thing over and over again, expecting a different result, that is called insanity.
After you have gained some experience and confidence with the non-lethal combat mentioned above and can do both fairly well, purchase some weapons for your Cobra. You will want to stay away from turreted, and gimbaled. Fixed weapons will give you much higher quality practice while in combat. And don’t forget to pick up the materials, and any good cargo that your victims er, attackers have dropped. (I recommend that you get some multi-cannon and pulse lasers. The pulse lasers are for the shields and hull, while the multi-cannons are for the hull. I also suggest that you start targeting ship subsystems, primarily the power plant. Once the power plant goes the rest usually follows.)
Smuggling is the skill of getting illegal cargo and wanted passengers into a station. There are two methods of doing this. The first is to start at about two kilometers in front of the mail slot of the station, and go as fast as you can handle, not forgetting to request landing clearance, and when security commences there scan get through the mail slot and on deck as soon as possible. This is just down and dirty, beat the scan. Now the second is with a little more finesse, line up at about two or three kilometers and request docking, once you have permission start towards the mail slot at maximum legal speed (99 ms) if a scan detected is announced just before you get to the mail slot pop a heat sink, and go on through. The heat sink will break their scan, but if you do it too soon a second scan may start, so try to pop it just before you enter the mail slot. Also keep in mind that when the scan is announced you have about ten seconds before it completes, so you have a little time. This is also a skill that takes some practice, so as you enter the stations in the exercise, practice both skills, even when you don’t have contraband. Make sure to practice in both fa on and off often to gain the experience. This little game when you have illegal cargo or passengers is to just avoid paying the fine, thereby maximizing profit, and as a training tool, it is outstanding. (I forgot to mention that when you have illegal cargo or passengers on board that security will try to blow you up for some strange reason. Just saying.)
High waking is the act of jumping out of the system. In most circumstances, it is wise when you enter a system to chose a nearby system for an an emergency jump. You do this by going into the navigation screen and finding a nearby system and just highlighting it. Don’t actually select the system yet. If you are interdicted and you know that for some reason you will be attacked, just go into the navigation screen and select the highlighted system, and then initiate the jump after cool down.
Section 1-6
Flight Assist off training. My thoughts on the matter are that fa off is a necessity, not only for certain operations, but it plays a major factor in combat, especially those who figure out how to combine fa on and off, to “effect”. Fa off requires a lot of fine motions of the controller you are using, whether it is keyboard and mouse, h.o.t.a.s., joystick, or gamepad. I am not going to even suggest that you attempt to use fa off exclusively as many do, but I have learned the value of it. I also have learned that fa on exclusively is not necessarily a good thing either. The simulator seems to need both skills to balance and maximize the effectiveness of the ships. These are some excellent tutorials for FA off flight, so please enjoy them, and like and subscribe to their channels.
Moxen Wolf
www.youtube.com
Look inverted
Source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JWrvKoUJOEw
Source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=69R_4ufsNYU
Source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VLYOHn6aLpQ
Imnotanumber43
Source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QEf4ZOur5MU
I do not want you to get burned out on this part of the tutorial. So when you become bored, believe me, you will, and have earned around 150 mil cr, go on to the next stage of the tutorial, or tryout the passenger missions. Just remember that if you decide to come back I would like for you to visit the engineers and get your power plant upgraded at the very least, as I want you to up the difficulty. You should go into the weapons fire, and increase the difficulty levels you go into, to about 4 or 5. If perchance you take a break again and come back again after that, go in open and don’t restrict the levels of the USS’s.
There is one other condition I would like for you to achieve. Make friends. That means while at a port, collecting data from wakes, go out in open, and see if there are any players around. If they are try to strike up a conversation with them. Friends will help you greatly in the rest of the tutorial, especially if you can make several or even better someone who has been around awhile, and can be a mentor who will take you under their wing. I would also suggest that you look on Discord, or at the Galactic Academy and see if there are any mentors available to help you out. This is a great group and may even help you find a squadron later if you want one that is. https://discord.gg/5JqXMPu. Also, there is ED Tutorials that can help you learn much about E.D. https://www.edtutorials.com/.
Section 1 conclusion
This is the end of the first section of this tutorial. You should have a basic understanding of how the simulation works at this point, and how to establish yourself. If you have done things properly you have some reputation with various station representatives, from selling your cartography data, and cargoes, plus quite possibly some bounties. This will lead you quite well into the next section.
Summary: At this point you have;
1. Built a ship to spec, and updated your build to your preference.
2. Learned that there is profit in exploration, and the difference in the types of exploration.
3. Developed basic combat skills.
4. Learned that there is a good way to earn materials from non-farming and grinding techniques.
5. Developed flight assist off skills.
6. Learned how the SRV operates and developed the skill for surface mining on planets.
7. Gained friends, who will be invaluable in the future.
8. Learned invaluable skills for smuggling, and evasion, as well as how to “screw” with the heads of pirates.
Section 1 Reality Check!!!
I have done survey many times while playing Elite Dangerous, so I know that doing it the way prescribed is unrealistic. This is why I said that you have flexibility in play. So first I will tell you what you have if you have followed the basic outline. The Cobra MK III is one of the most versatile ships in Elite Dangerous, it can perform any task not only well but excel at it, with the ability in most builds to have a ferocious bite. It is one of two ships in-game that are like this, with the other being the Python (that is until you reach the large ships).
Just because I've focused on survey in the first section doesn't mean that is all there is to the first section. Again the Cobra is extremely versatile, and you already have cargo space, It is easy to start trade missions, or if you have friends wing trade missions. You can re-outfit for passengers, mining, or anything else for that matter (all you really have to do is pick a central system, and call it home. Then as you do your thing remember to stop when you are done, survey the new system you are in, no big deal). The real key is to build up your funds for the next section, for the next ship. The most important things in this section are to learn combat, FA off flight, evasion, to collect materials for engineering, make friends, and raise your reputation with various factions in the area. The method is not that important, just the results. So I will point out, getting ganked by pirates, and performing evasive maneuvers to prevent scans, is the best way to learn to dogfight. Flying in asteroid fields with FA off, or around a station is great for FA off training. These are examples of exploits of the sim, probably built into the simulator for that exact reason (even if not they're still there, so use them).
The reason I am saying this is because I remembered when I was surveying a system, and it was a big one (ten main planets and almost thirty smaller ones orbiting them). To survey the entire system took me almost eight hours, and that was before I started on signal sources. If a new player runs across one of those systems the community may lose that player☠, to sheer boredom. Point is, there is more to the first section of the tutorial than just exploration. Just use your imagination.
Section 2 trade and wings
This section is about trade, and operating in wings. Trade is not on the top list for many players, as they believe there are more exciting, and lucrative ways to earn money. In some ways they are right, but for a pirate to interdict someone to steal their goods, there must be someone with goods to waylay. As that someone, you should make their “re-buy” a joyous event. (if you can that is. LOL).
Seriously there are ways to make trade fun, and not so tedious. I am going to attempt to explain them in this section.
Section 2 objectives. In this part of the tutorial, the player will be able to demonstrate the understanding, and knowledge of the following.
1. Engineer a ship for the role intended.
2. Basic and advanced trade
3. The difference in the types of trading, and how to maximize profit.
4. Team play in wings, and how to maximize security, and profit as a team.
5. The value of trade missions, and how they can be used to maximize profit, in both solo and wing.
6. The value of observing the states of systems, and factions in the systems.
Section 2-1
As stated I would suggest that you earn about 150 Mcr before starting, because that is how much it will cost to buy and build, plus a re-buy, for the ship I am suggesting.
Suggested load-out Python #1;
Core Internal
Military Grade Composite armor
7B Power Plant
6B Thrusters
5B Frame Shift Drive
4D Life Support
7A Power Distributor
6D Sensors
Optional Internal
3x 6E Cargo Racks
5A Shield Generator
5E Cargo Rack
4D Hull Reinforcement Package
3D Module Reinforcement Package
3E Cargo Rack
1E Advanced Docking Computer
1E Super-cruise Assist
Hard Points
Yep, full set if you please, all fixed weapons (locked, cocked, and ready to rock).
Utility Mounts
0I Heat Sink Launcher
2x 0A Shield Booster
0I Point Defense
Don’t forget an awesome name.
Here is the build in Coriolis for your reference.
coriolis.io
Section 2-2
As stated prior the Python is not a requirement, it is just a recommendation, but it holds everything you will need and has both good defense, offense, and plenty of optional internal slots.
A few things of note;
Military Grade Composite armor, you are doing trade, as such, that means you are not here for combat. The armor is so that when the shields go down (and they will) you can take a punch or three before you jump out. The Hull reinforcement package, and Module reinforcement package, are there again like the armor, to buy you some time to jump out. They are not necessary if you want to add some more cargo capacity, I just strongly recommend them, for a while anyway.
3x 6E Cargo racks, you can get a 6A shield generator if you want, but you will lose some cargo capacity by doing so. (Hey, you’re a trader, maximizing profit is the name of the game, and the extra armor is there to help with that).
You will want to choose fixed weapons, primarily for training, they also pack a better punch, in case you have to use them. What’s more, is you will become better at combat if you learn to use fixed weapons first.
You may have noticed, the fuel scoop is missing on this build. That was not a mistake, a fuel scoop is not necessary for trade, even while doing trade missions, as few routes are long. So you can just stop at the destination station and buy fuel. There is an exception, and that is when you are using your trade python, as a relay with your mining ship. Markets for mined cargo can be quite far from mining areas. I also recommend a fuel scoop for the trip to Deciat. Just store it at a station when you are done with it, to be recalled when you need it.
The Point Defense will attempt to shoot down a hatch breaker limpet if one is sent to break into your cargo hatch. I do not know if it matters, but I try to place it on the bottom of the ship as close to the cargo hatch as possible.
Now, as for the supercruise assist, and the advanced docking computer. You already spent most of the first section learning how to land, and fly the ship, in both FA on and off, the baby steps are over. However, if you choose you can replace them with something else. Also, you can just turn them off in the ship panel, no big deal, as a matter of fact, if you are smuggling it is a good idea to turn off the advanced docking computer for that operation anyway, because it will prevent you from launching a heat sink, and is way too slow.
Okay why two pythons. Well, the first one is as stated a trade ship with teeth, the second is going to be a mining ship in the next section, and unless you continuously stop and trade out equipment, your miner has little offense and defense. So what we do is park the trade ship at a nearby station, and when the mining ship is full, go to the station and swap out ships. This increases efficiency and maximizes defense. The only thing better is to have a guard following you to help fight off bandits, and pirates.
Section 2-3
First things first I want you to establish a baseline by doing two cargo runs. It doesn’t matter the cargoes just grab a load from where you are at, and deliver it to where ever, then do the same thing at your destination. This is only a test of the ship, and to gain a baseline for comparison. By now you have gotten the invite from Felicity Farseer, primarily for all the exploration you’ve done. Head to Maia to buy a Meta-alloy. Then to Deciat, don’t go directly to Farseer inc. just yet, go to Garay Terminal first to have your Sidewinder, and Cobra shipped out to you. Felicity has high-performance thrusters, and it makes the Sidewinder (well, any of the small ships) one of the funnest ships in the game, especially for a newbie on a budget. Now take the Python to Farseer inc. There are so many tutorials out there on how and what to engineer I will not even try to tell you how to engineer, but I will give some guidelines to cut through some of the B.S. and give you an idea of how to engineer for roles. If you followed the first section of this tutorial, you should have enough materials to upgrade everything in the Python, and the Sidewinder. When you bring over the Sidewinder first get the high-performance thrusters installed, then engineer them. Then go out and have fun with it. If you have enough go ahead and upgrade the Cobra MKIII, if not, try to at least engineer the power plant. Make sure that you differentiate the roles for each ship, as they are not built for the same roles.
Now go back to the location you started at a do those same cargo runs, and see the difference. While you are on your way to Maia, and on the way back from Deciat, try to practice the interdiction training in the Python (just don’t forget you are armed now, and your re-buy is much higher. Do not try to do the training from Maia to Deciat, you have a meta-alloy in your cargo hold, and every pirate out there knows it [they seem to have some sort of psychic ability or at least a spy on Maia]. They will try to destroy you to prevent you from reaching your destination, so high wake your butt out at the first opportunity). The training is something that you will want to practice in every new ship you get, just so you can learn their capabilities, and how they handle.
Section 2-4
Okay like builds there are several engineering mods that have a great impact on the roles we play. Even though many players say that some of the mods are useless, they aren’t. These people are just not using them in the right roles. For traders and miners, the mods for beefing up our module defenses can really increase their survival rate, and some can prove to make us more efficient. Look and plan carefully before you jump into engineering to see what can be the most useful to you.
There is a tool you can use to help you decide what, and how you want to engineer the ship. ( https://coriolis.io/ ) Don’t be afraid to create the build and test out different engineering configurations in Coriolis before you waste materials at the engineers. I already said that there are so many reviews and tutorials about engineering on youtube that it is ridiculous but don’t fall into the trap, and just follow them, you should figure out what you need, and want for yourself.
In short it is essential to set up the engineering, just like the build, to the role you are playing in that ship. And don’t be afraid to set it up your way. I will also point out that no two players are alike, as such one player will have the ship set up for their style of flying, while another will have a completely different setup for theirs. So not only the role but flying style as well.
I will attempt to explain some of the engineering types, or more correctly categorize them for there roles. I believe it would be more beneficial to categorize their roles, than trying to explain each and every one. I also will not try to cover everything to give you an opportunity to figure it out yourself.
So starting with armor. The key ones are heavy-duty and lightweight, the other three are highly specialized, and only useful if you know what your opponents are using. Heavy-duty is good for traders, and miners who are vulnerable to attack and are burdened with heavy loads anyway. The extra armor can buy extra time, in some cases, to high wake out of the situation. Now lightweight, on the other hand, is handy for those who need to lighten their ship for speed and maneuverability or to minimize weight for long-range jumping. Combateers, racers, and some long-range explorers need the advantage they give.
Power plants. Starting with armored, which is useful for miners, and traders. In any ship, the power plant is the most critical system, and when it is destroyed, so are you. traders and miners who are vulnerable to attack should consider this to protect their assets and profit. Low emissions are great for smugglers, assassins, and the Beluga. It can lower the heat generated by the ship lowering your chances of being spotted by security, or your enemy. As for the Beluga, it has an overheating problem anyway, as you will find out when you can purchase one. Lastly is overcharged, this is an all-around good choice, used by just about everyone. It increases the power output of the ship, providing enough to power just about any ship build.
The FSD. You have faster boot sequence, in E.D. I do not know of any reason to have this. There are no situations where you will have to use a fast boot sequence (there are no scouting missions where you have to be in silent running or where you need to shut down for any reason). Increased range, will give you better jump ranges as it suggests. And shielded will gives some protection to the FSD if the hull is breached. Either is great for just about any build, even traders, it is a matter in this case of personal taste.
Thrusters. There is clean which will give you lower thermal, as well as a little speed. Again great for the Beluga. Dirty gives even more speed but increases heat and power usage. And reinforced is great for traders, if the thrusters are hit it is hard to get up enough speed to jump. Dirty is the go-to for most players, but depending on your personal preferences, clean is good also.
I am going to hold off here as this is going to get too long, but it does give enough for you to see the pattern. You will notice that I did not touch any of the experimental at all. Just read them carefully, and if you have any questions just go online, to Coriolis, or to ED tutorials, or the Galactic Academy. They are really well equipped to help you more than I can in a written tutorial. (really, it would take a book to explain everything properly).
Section 2-5
I had asked that you try to make friends, and if you had, you have a tool to help you earn money, as well as mutual support. However, you will want to do some trade missions solo just to learn the ropes. Yes, the prime goal of this tutorial is to use missions to earn money, not simple trade. Like exploration, there are several types of traders. We are looking at the contractor. These are the ones who scour the mission boards to find good missions and earn their way. The ones doing simple trading are basic truckers, sometimes called freelancers.
As stated above find a few missions and do them, just for the moment stay away from wing missions. I have done wing missions solo, but this means that you have to make several trips, and every time the risk increases for interdiction. Plus while on a mission the difficulty of the pirates and bandits increases, especially in wing missions. Look at the rank requirements for the missions, the higher it is the more dangerous the bad guys are. That doesn’t mean that you can’t take the mission, just more risk. You want to get your reputation for the various factions to increase, and as they do, so does the availability of better higher paying missions. Once you have several factions, friendly or allied, it’s time to call your friends. Hopefully, they have also increased their reps as well. Time to start to make some real money.
In wing missions, what happens is that everyone in the wing accepts the same mission, and then you can share it with one another. What this means is that the reward for the mission increases, by however many people is in the wing. So a wing mission with a payout of 5 million, you can earn as much as 20 million (actually it is a bit more because as you are sharing the mission between you, you also get a percentage of there take). As there are up to four players in a wing, and each accepts and shares with the others. This also makes the mission easier as the load is shared. Now, how do I see the best way to run a wing mission, and why. The first thing to do is to establish who has the shortest jump range. That person becomes the point and is the first to jump. Everyone locks on to that person and when they jump you just follow in their high wake. Everyone tries to stick together, rather than go independent to the mission destination. If one is interdicted just lock on to them and drop into their instance, and provide fire support for them. Four sets of guns are better than one in any situation. I ran into situations where none would cooperate like this, and as a result, we lost one section of the cargo, simply because no one could reach in time to help (yes, it was a player who ganked him. Filthy %$&@ pirate. LOL). Therefore we failed the mission, with a hefty fine each. If the group would have stayed together, we may have been able to provide support for him. ‘nuff said.
The goal of this is to learn about missions and wings, as well as cooperation among players to obtain your goals, and mutual defense (and get rich). Nothing fancy, or complicated.
A special note: if you are invited to participate. Go ahead and join your friends to earn bonds in combat zones. There is nothing wrong with that, and you could earn the invite from the engineer Tod McQuinn. Just make sure you stay close to your companions so they can watch your back. I would also suggest you take the cobra, it has a lower rebuy.
Section 2-6
Let’s have a look at some of the trade mission types. The sourcing mission, are common, as you are tasked with finding a commodity and bringing it back to the station. However you must absorb the cost of the commodity which lowers the profit margin, and even sometimes gives a negative balance. Although in a wing mission it isn’t bad at all. Commodity delivery missions are also common, and all that is necessary is to deliver the product to the receiving station. Usually are higher paying, but also more of them have hostile opponents, and fines for failure. Be careful to look at the ranking, and if they have hostile tags. Last is cargo retrieval, I have only done one of these. The price was good, and they only wanted two items collected, but it was heavily guarded. Check the rankings, on that one I was way out of my league, but I barely managed to complete it.
You will also want to look at the status of the system, and the various factions in the system. The system itself may be in a boom, however, there may be a faction in the system or station that may be in one of the other states, such as pestilence, plague, war, and others. So check them out to see what they may need. This is where you may find sourcing missions. In boom or investment systems you may find delivery missions, as they may have a surplus and another system may have an urgent need. Of course, if you are in a wing, you have the advantage of being able to look in multiple places at once.
Section 2 Conclusion
If you find yourself alone, your friends are not online, or just want to zen out, I would suggest just doing some basic trade. No real goal just pickup a commodity here, and selling it there, in an aimless manner. You will not earn any big money but it can be fulfilling (just don’t forget to check the mission board before selling, they may have a sourcing mission for it). If you have the money, you should try out some other ships as well, just keep in mind for the next part of the tutorial you will need another 150 Mcr.
Summary: as a student you have;
1. Taken a ship or three out and engineered them to the roles you have built them for, and your personal preference.
2. Performed basic and advanced trade.
3. Performed the different types of trade and hopefully made good money from them.
4. Learned the value of trade missions and the value of wings.
5. Learned the value of observing the system states, as well as the states of the factions in those systems you are trading in, to ascertain the most lucrative trading mission sources within those systems, and for planning.
Section 3 mining
Objectives. In this part of the tutorial, the player will be able to demonstrate the understanding, and knowledge of the following.
1. Fundamentals of how to set up an exclusive role ship build.
2. The types of mining.
3. Value of mission-based mining.
4. How to utilize two ships to maximize safety and security.
5. Wing mining, and wing mission mining.
6. PVP training in a wing.
I had mentioned that you should pick up a second python.
Suggested loadout for Python #2
Core Internal
Lightweight alloy armor
7A Power Plant
6A Thrusters
5D Frame Shift Drive
4D Life Support
7A Power Distributor
6D Sensors
Optional Internal
3x 6E Cargo Racks
5A Collector limpet controller
5A Collector limpet controller
4A Shield Generator
3A Refinery
3A Collector limpet controller
1I Detailed surface scanner
1A Prospector limpet controller
Weapons
2B Seismic charge launcher
1D Abrasion blaster
2B Sub-surface displacement missile
2X 2D Mining lasers
Utility Mounts
0A Pulse wave analyzer
2x 0A Shield Booster
0I Point Defense
Don’t forget to name it.
Here is the build in Coriolis for your reference, and to play around with. https://coriolis.io/outfit/python?c...==.Aw18RQ==..EweloBhBmUA5QFMCGBzANokICMF8hRFA
This will cost you around 142 Mcr, with a re-buy of 7.1 Mcr.
Section 3-1
This is a fully dedicated mining build. It is not set up for defense or offense, just mining. So I will do some explaining so you will have some understanding of it. First, everything has been, made lightweight, this is so it can be as maneuverable as possible in the asteroid fields. If possible try to get the thrusters engineered, to provide even more maneuverability. You will not need long-range jumping in this build because your trade ship will be close by to handle commodity trading. But if you want, go ahead and engineer the FSD, just in case you can’t park next door. The most important items in the core internals are the thrusters, and power distributor. The P.D. is an absolute necessity to drive the mining lasers. In the optional internals, you have cargo space for days, and the ability to control more limpets than you can supply with rocks (hint, hint). A shield in case you bump into a roid (if you want, you can downgrade it to conserve some weight). There is nothing in the internals that are not an absolute necessity for mining. In the hardpoints are all the tools for a full mining expedition.
To many mining is boring, but a necessary part of E.D. However there are some things to spice it up, and unfortunately, we have to go through the boring to get to the spicy. First, there are a few types of mining you should be aware of. Number one is the freelance miner, the ones who just go out and mine whatever and bring it to a station for sale. They usually have several things in the cargo holds and sell to multiple stations. You will see mostly the NPC’s doing this, most players avoid doing this as the profit is not as high. Of course, I am going to show you how to maximize the profits of this method, but it is still not nearly as high as the others, but not as bad as other players make it out to be either. Number two is targeted mining or power mining. This is where you go out and target such things as low-temperature diamonds, or painite and fill your hold with only them to bring back for sale. This is usually the top tear mining for profits, earning as much a 200Mcr to 250Mcr per hour, done right. Number three are the contract miners, when you look on the mission boards you will sometimes see mining missions. Some of them are straight-up mining for something such as water. Well, look at the payouts. They are normally much more than the product sales for normally (by as much as 50 times on occasion), and if you have friends and do a wing mission just like in trade, those profits are much higher. Also, contract and freelance mining can be combined to effect, therefore maximizing your profits.
Special note: Something new that just came out, as I was writing this, is that Frontier has boosted sub-surface mining, if only a bit, hopefully, this is permanent. It is now possible to make a better profit from this form of mining. This is fitting as it is the mining process that requires the most skill.
The next thing I want to bring up is to watch for gold rushes, Frontier does setup gold rushes in E.D. Periodically. The last one lasted almost a year, where they had void opals, low-temperature diamonds, painite, and a few others boosted for a time. It was finally shut down in January 2020, after the update.
Section 3-2
Stage 1
I would like you to select a system you have mapped with a good ringed planet. The ring(s) should be moderately dense, meaning some room to fly. Do not worry about hot spots, as a matter of fact, stay away from a hot spot for this part. Go in and just start mining, just limit yourself to 3 or 4 types of cargo. If you were paying attention to the mission boards previously, you may have noticed that there are several mining missions. So when you are mining this way try to remember what you saw more commonly on the mission boards, and focus on three or four of those. When your hold is full go to where you left your trade ship and swap. Don’t worry the cargo will transfer over when you do. Start selling, but not outright, check the mission boards and accept the mining missions from the factions who have missions for what you have just mined, usually for far more than a direct sell would be. As stated it is profitable, but not greatly so. If very lucky you may be able to clear about 100 Mcr depending on what you were mining, but not by much. If unlucky you could still clear as much as 30 Mcr to 40 Mcr for a full load in the Python. Most choose not to operate this way, as the profit margin is too low. However there is the challenge of making money the harder way, and for some of us, this is more zen, or for relaxation. No pressure to make 200 M every run, or to max out every minute. I also just want you to try it out to see the difference between power playing and casual playing. Because next is a bit of power playing.
I want you to locate the densest ringed planet you have recorded, which has a hot spot, and if possible an overlapping hot spot. Preferably a hot spot with something like low-temperature diamonds, in other words, something expensive. The trick with the dense rings is a secret I am about to share with you. (In E.D. the rings are randomly generated with a range of percentages for minerals. So if the ring has a 5% frequency of LTD’s, the hot spot will have a greater instance of the mineral. Well since the ring is denser what that means is that the asteroids being closer together will have more instances of LTD’s within a smaller radius. So you will not have to travel as far to find the next asteroid with whatever you are searching for. Instead of just credits per hour, you are looking at credits per square kilometer, meaning that efficiency is increased, thereby increasing the potential credits per hour. It still works better if there is a double, or triple hot spot in a dense ring as the distance to travel is reduced further, thereby increasing the mining time, and decreasing the time searching for potential asteroids, thereby increasing efficiency.) Yeah, even I got dizzy explaining that. If you choose to mine LTD’s just remember that you may have to travel a great distance to sell them at a good price, of course, that is true of any of the minerals, or metals (and don’t forget to equip a fuel scoop to your trade ship). This is the power play method of mining and can bring as much as 250Mcr per hour. Personally, I find this boring, it is just hurry up and get it, with no soul behind it. However, it can be fun, like on many of the YouTube videos and streams, where several Commanders are playing against one another, in a race to see who can get the most in the shortest amount of time, or within an hour. Usually over bragging rights.
I will explain the procedure for mining with this ship.
1. First you will use your pulse wave to locate potential roids. They will show up as orange or yellow in the distance. The brighter the yellow the higher the possibility of something good (like a core). Of course, that doesn’t mean that it’s what you are looking for.
2. Once you have found a potential target, send in a prospector limpet. Note what is available in composition, see if it has a core deposit, then go to the nav screen to contacts, and see what type of subsurface and surface deposits it has. An important note I will add, I have only once run across an asteroid with all four types of deposits, it is a rare occurrence.
3. Use your mining lasers first, and deplete it, then abrasion blaster for the surface deposits if any. Then the subsurface displacement missile on the subsurface deposits, you can crack it with the seismic charge launcher, and use the abrasion blaster to knock off the deposits. (Even though you can surface mine it even after core mining, the seismic charge launcher will destroy the subsurface, and surface deposits. Causing a loss of an unknown amount of materials.)
4. Rinse, repeat…
Section 3-3
Stage 2
This stage involves getting together with your friends, and associates. Very few will go for the freelance mining stated above, and some will be willing to do contract mining, but most are game for targeted mining if there is a market for it. There really isn’t much to say in this section, except it is advisable for wings to stay together, while trading, and mining. Like in the trade section, stay together for mutual support and protection. And try to do some of the wing mining missions, especially if you come across some of the higher paying ones, sometimes you will do them and gain more credits per hour than you could if you were doing target mining. Yes if you have four ships going after osmium, 76 tons, for 10Mcr per member, you can get 42Mcr in 20 to 30 minutes, if you already know where to get osmium and it’s close by, that is.
Stage 3
“Spice”. This is what friends are best for. Try to start out by having one of your friends in a hybrid combat build with cargo space and collector limpets. That way they will be able to make a profit while standing guard. (in ED this is not really necessary as once you drop into the instance, the initial pirates pop up, do their thing, then disappear. Just think of it as role-playing. Plus if one of the miners must jump out for some reason {“sigh”, to buy limpets}, or has a logging episode “mauve cobra”, you have security on standby when they come back.) After about 20 or 30 minutes, it is time for a break. Everyone in your group has mining lasers so, why not train in combat with them. (there’s nothing wrong with a little horseplay in the middle of an asteroid field, in the void of space. “that’s also why the word dangerous is in the name”) With a security ship, you will be in little danger of interference. Just set some rules, when a member loses one ring of shields they are out, no collisions, etc… Think of this as PVP combat training. The NPC pilots are one thing, but when going against another player things change, and it is important to know what. Plus while playing, you can be coached by any mentors in the group and your fellow players. It is also just plain fun. As for your security guy, while you and the rest are mining they can send out collectors while you are laser mining, so they can fill there hold as well (make sure you tip the bodyguard, “wash there back, and they’ll wash yours” that sort of thing. And well, nothing is free.
Stage 4
With your friends what you will want to do is call your Cobra MK III (or favorite combatant) to a nearby station with your trade ship, and they should do the same by bringing a combat ship as well. What you will want to do is as two of your friends fly support, you and another mine, in a “hazardous resource site”. The trick to this is to fly on the edge of the resource site, and mine, while your support team engages anyone who tries to attack you. The good thing about this is that you can get elevated amounts of ores from the “hasres” asteroids (the last time I did this it was 3X the amount). Once you have filled up your hold, swap out for your trade ship, and sell, while the support ships provide escort. Once finished you, and the other miner swap roles with your support group, so they can mine their fill.
Section 3 Conclusion and Notes
That being said, we are at the conclusion of the tutorial itself.
Summary for section 3: as a student you have;
1. Learned the difference between the different types of mining.
2. Gained the knowledge of how to maximize profit, with freelance mining, targeted mining, and contract mining.
3. The value of wing mining.
4. Practiced PVP combat in a safe environment, with a guardian.
A little about myself. I am a retired military veteran, and for a little more than half of my military career, I was an instructor (yeah, went to school and everything). I have written many student and instructor guides in my career. However, this is not the same format as a standard guide if anyone noticed. And has many of my personal thoughts throughout, and has left much for the player to discover for themselves (something a real student guide would not do). Personally, I do not play games online, or in general, however, I really like simulators, such as flight simulators, space simulators, as well as others. E.D. is somewhat unique to me because it is also an MMO, something I have never played before. As an instructor I had a huge problem understanding, why it is there is no proper tutorial for E.D. As stated in the beginning, I saw this as a problem and am trying to correct it. I also know that there will be many players out there who will actively go after this (flaming) and say it is a waste of time, however, it is what it is. A way to prepare new players, and help them develop the skills and knowledge to survive in the E.D. universe. Let the newer players decide whether or not they want to follow it.
Fly dangerously, stay safe.
CMDR Emerald Hawk
If you have any suggestions on content or corrections please let me know. thanks.
New Player Tutorial for Elite Dangerous
This is a tutorial for New Players coming to Elite Dangerous. I wrote it for new players to amass the skills required to survive in the Elite Dangerous universe.
Opening
Welcome to Elite Dangerous
When I started the game just over a year and a half ago. I looked for a guide or tutorial to help me gain an understanding of Elite Dangerous and really found none. The best I found was how to go to a hazardous resource site and start blowing things up. Nothing on how to fly the ships, or how to really play the game. This really did not stop me from playing and learning, but then I got to thinking what about someone who has no experience at all in games of this sort. A friend of mine saw me playing ED and has been infatuated with it since. He has no knowledge of computers, and especially games, and has been looking to purchase the game and a computer to play it on, since. So I started looking again and still found nothing. No big deal right, if you see a discrepancy fix it.
What is Elite Dangerous? A very good question. It is a simulator of what life as a pilot would be like in another 1100 years or so if we reach space of course. Yes, I know that everyone calls it a game, however, it is a simulator, not a game, no more than Microsoft Flight Simulator is. Games come with storylines and goals, Elite Dangerous has neither. The game comes from you through role-play, and the freedom to choose your own path. The simulator contains around 400 billion star systems and is as close to an accurate model, of the milky way galaxy, as they can make it. Frontier, has also gone to great lengths to provide as accurate physics as they can, while still making it playable by the average person. It is also a rough, and dangerous galaxy, that tries to kill you at every turn, just like the real galaxy would. There is no law and order in the galaxy, only what you and your guns bring. Just don’t forget to bring plenty of bullets. I would also add what it is not. There are those who would say it is a space combat game, which is defiantly false. There is just too much to choose from to be just a shooter if one looks. The creators added too much breathtaking beauty, and challenge, that it is wasted on those who only look at it as a shooter (of course that doesn’t mean it’s not fun too). What would most closely describe, the Elite Dangerous universe, is a life simulator 1100 years in the future, and you are the adventurer searching for treasure, and excitement.
Objectives:
What is the goal of this tutorial?
1. Develop a path to learn to fly and control your ship(s), and an idea of its (their) capabilities, and how to find them. Throughout this tutorial I will be focusing on just two ships, the Cobra MKIII, and the Python.
2. How to deal with crisis situations, efficiently, and effectively. Namely combat, as there are few others in the game now. I will not be teaching combat beyond nonlethal, however, the basics for combat and non-lethal are the same. But don’t lose hope, once you learn nonlethal, regular combat is easy.
3. Help you demonstrate for yourself a more efficient and reliable way of earning money, and materials in the game, beyond such boring things as farming, and grinding. I can’t count the number of times I have seen the posts on the forums, and steam of people sick and tired of farming, especially when it is so unnecessary.
4. Help you master the basics of the game. These include skills such as mining, flight assist off, trade, exploration, and teamwork in wings, just to list a few.
Section 0-1 The first step
Getting started:
{This tutorial is geared towards those who have the Horizons DLC, although you could still use it without it. Sorry about that.}
Section 1 objectives. In this part of the tutorial, the player will be able to demonstrate the understanding, and knowledge of the following.
1. Basic knowledge of a ship build, and how it can be manipulated for the role the player wishes to perform.
2. The different classes of ship modules.
3. The different roles of explorers, and how they play into the Elite Dangerous universe.
4. The advanced procedures of surveying, and how to use it for maximum profit.
5. How to identify hazardous areas, when dealing with signal sources.
6. Basic non-lethal combat techniques, and how they apply to combat.
7. Combat techniques.
8. Smuggling, both commodities, and personnel onto stations.
9. High waking (a.k.a. escape maneuver no.1)
10. Setting up notes for use later, for personal use, and planning.
First, I would recommend that you stay in the newbie area, until you have earned around 6 million credits, and gained all the knowledge offered. If you don’t feel like it, however, just get the suggested ship and the essential optional internals, and the utility mounts. You will also have to upgrade the power plant, as there will not be enough power to run everything. Everything else can be done later as you earn money. While in the newbie area I would also suggest you practice any, and all of the techniques presented herein. I'll point out that I use a lot of abbreviations in this tutorial, and when you do the in-game tutorial you will come to understand what they mean.
Note: I can’t stress enough the value of just slowing down and taking your time. There is no hurry to get everything in the universe done, and if you try too hard you will begin to make mistakes, and worse begin to go backward. I am not opposed to making mistakes, as it is one of the best ways to learn, but many mistakes are avoidable just by slowing down a little bit and thinking things through or just looking around (slow down, observe, plan, then implement). This is the best piece of advice I can give you; “the only thing you really have to do in life is pay taxes, and die. No one is in a hurry to do either of those, so why not just slow down, experience life, enjoy what is presented to you, and meet any challenges head-on.”
Let me elaborate on this. You will or have found on YouTube all kinds of videos on how to make millions of credits per hour mining, or passengers missions, or you have or will see how to go from the Sidewinder to the Anaconda in just a few hours. As for tutorials, you will see many nonsense videos on going into hazardous resource sites to learn Elite Dangerous. These are not for the beginner, or good examples of tutorials, the first group is power-play, for experienced players who already have the foundations for E.D. and are starting over. The second is a trap set up by trolls (it really isn't intentional, that was all that was available to them when they started E.D., so really they are not intentionally trolling anyone), you can’t learn anything from just jumping into combat, without at least the basic knowledge of how the ships work, and how to operate them efficiently, plus it raises your combat ranking up too fast before you yourself are ready for it. Reaching that level of skill and knowledge takes time, which you have plenty of.
I will also highly suggest that when you do make friends in Elite Dangerous as a beginner, or newbie that you do not allow yourself to fall into the trap of being "helped". There is something to be said about doing it yourself, in E.D., and it is too easy to find yourself caught in the trap of dependency. Even though the simulation is strongly supportive of unity, the only way to master it is through independence and independent action. Being too dependent on others is way too easy, speaking from experience, there is even a video on Youtube explaining it. So until it is time, I recommend you refrain from accepting too much help, or boost ups from friends. This does not mean that you shouldn't ask for help to learn something new, and there are plenty of people in the community who are willing to go out of their way to teach you. You will see when the time is right to request help, later as you read. Especially when you discover that nothing in E.D. is really free. Fly dangerously, stay safe.
Section 1-1
Your Cobra MK III:
Core Internal
Lightweight alloy armor
4A Power Plant
4A Thrusters
4D Frame Shift Drive
3D Life Support
3A Power Distributor
3D Sensors
4C Fuel Tank
Optional Internal
2X 4E Cargo Rack
4D Shield
2C Fuel Tank
2A Fuel Scoop
2H Planetary Vehicle Hanger
1I Detailed Surface Scanner
1A Collector Limpet Controller
No Weapons
(yet)
Utility Mounts
0A Frame Shift Wake Scanner
0I Heat Sink Launcher
This will cost 5.5 Mcr
With a 275,000 cr re-buy
And please make sure you give it a good name. She is, after all, going to be your good friend for this part of the tutorial, and will serve you well, long after.
This will give you a 13 ly jump range, with 11.5 ly fully laden, and all the tools necessary for the first part of the tutorial. You will also want to buy some limpets, let’s say 20 or so, for the collector. There are no weapons on this build because you will mostly be in solo for this part of the tutorial, I’ll explain later. This first part is to learn exploration, and some of the basic skills associated with ED, almost all related to ship and vehicle operation, and flight assist off. You have already learned how to use the tools while in the starting area, so I will not bother reexplaining them. You need to find a nice random star, some 300 ly from your starting point and begin your journey to it. If you want you can go further out, but if you decide to stay closer, don’t come closer than 200 ly from Sol. You’ll need some room, and to stay out of sight of the unsavory element.
The reason I have said to get the Cobra MK III is first, it is a very good ship to start with. It has the capability to be configured to any task in Elite Dangerous, and do it well. Second, it is fast and maneuverable. Third, is tradition, it is the ship that you start out with, in the original game “Elite”, back in the ’80s, and it just seemed fitting. This does not mean that you have to get it, there are still several other great ships to work with. However, you really don’t want a high re-buy this early in the game. Plus even though now you don’t have weapons on it, you will have them later, and the Cobra is a good combat ship.
Explaining the ship loadout, you have 32 tons of cargo space, and decent shields. The small extra fuel tank is just in case you overextend yourself, which does happen. When you get the planetary vehicle hanger make sure you get an SRV to go in it, it is used for surface exploration, and collecting materials on the surface. The collector limpet controller is for collecting materials in space debris, and the occasional (lost) cargo. The heat sink launcher is for when you do pick up that (lost) cargo, which will be classified as stolen and entering into stations to sell them. I will explain the procedure for smuggling later.
Section 1-2
About ship builds:
You will notice that there are 5 classes of equipment for many of the items for sale. You have classes E, D, C, B, and A, as well as some special classifications of G thru I. I will break them down for you the best I can as they pertain to player roles. Class E is the initial buy, and even though balanced is the lowest grade you can have. They are heavier and not nearly as good, however, E is a good baseline for a start, and will get you moving at least. Class D is the lightest but not as efficient, or as durable as the later ones. “D” is the go-to for combat pilots and racers who need to watch their weights for maneuverability and speed. Class C is more efficient when it comes to heat, and power usage. They are great for smugglers, who need to enter areas as quietly as possible. (hint: when you do get the Beluga, “C” rate it. It will help a lot with the overheating problems they have). Class B is more durable, what it lacks in the overall output it makes up for in taking a hit. B rating is great for trade, and mining vessels who lack in combat prowess, allowing them to take a hit to its systems buying time to run. Class A is the top of the line, balancing all the attributes of the others, but not actually exceeding them. They are really a go-to for long-range explorers and certain systems that are crucial to your role.
An example of one role is the Cobra MK III I had you build, it is set up as a hybrid survey ship (a training ship for both exploration and combat, as you will find out as you read). It has all the equipment you need for surveying as well as maneuverability, and speed to hold it’s own in a fight. If I had you build a pure survey ship the FSD, life support, sensors, and shields would have been Class C, or A adding some weight. And in a combat ship, everything but the thrusters, power plant, and distributor would be Class D, and those mentioned would have been A, and most of the optional components would be gone, releasing the weight and power they consume.
The key here is to understand that you can set up your ships for the roles you wish for them. There are many of them, and they each have unique needs. One build is not enough to allow the flexibility to pursue every role, and will completely eliminate most that the ship is able to accomplish for you. Understanding how the classification system works, and how to build is a necessary skill you must learn to maximize your advantage. Or at least, lessen their advantages.
I just wanted to point out something about this tutorial and me. Everything I tell you to do is a suggestion or recommendation. There is nothing set in stone, you have the freedom to do as you please, however, there are a few things I wanted you to look out for. Such as leveling up combat too fast, and too early. Being mostly harmless is not a bad thing for a beginner. Keep in mind as you level up, so do the NPC’s that come after you. This is why I excluded weapons on the initial Cobra MK III build, without them you are not tempted to fire on NPC pirates and learn the evasive and combat tactics much more safely, as you will learn how to do at the end of this section. As for the build itself, go into Coriolis
Coriolis EDCD Edition
A ship builder, outfitting and comparison tool for Elite Dangerous
coriolis.io
play around with the build, and see what improvements you can make.
Section 1-3
This section is about exploration. There are three types of exploration that I know of; the first is the type I call trailblazing, just like Lewis and Clark, back in the frontier days of North America. They are the ones that go out and find the paths through the wild, untamed wilderness. The ones trying to be first to the other side. The second type of explorers are called surveyors, the ones who come behind and root out the treasures, that the trailblazers could not. They are the ones who find the veins of gold, diamonds, seek out the fertile land for farming, etc… this is what we will be playing. Just keep in mind this is a simulator, so some role-play is required. The third are the tourist guides, the ones who take tourist out on safaris, or transport folks from place to place (keep in mind, if you choose you can set up the ship or build another with passenger cabins and do this. And it can be fun in its own way, and is a good way to take a break, and make some money). There are some things that can surprise you. I’ve stumbled on one, or two myself that Frontier put in very unexpected places.
You will need a good notebook or a good spreadsheet. As you enter the systems you will need to record all the info there. Starting with the name of the system, planets, asteroid belts, characteristics of the planets, stations on and off the planets. Any details that you find important. As you read I will point out some that you should pay attention to, such as if the station carries the Python, and if it has a black market, and material traders. Many important details you will pick up on as you continue your journey. Currently, there is no way to keep notes in-game, or of tracking your findings. It has been noted many times by many Commanders, in the forums, that this is a problem, and sooner or later Frontier will have to address this issue, hopefully, sooner.
You will find that I will not tell you everything, I find that it defeats the purpose of training, to give every single detail, and leave nothing for the student to discover for themselves. When you do that it leaves them without any sense of accomplishment, or satisfaction. In other words, I will give enough to get you started on the path, with a good kick in the pants.
What I want you to accomplish for yourself is to build a training bubble of up to 100 developed systems to start with. You really do not have to have that many, 40 or even 20 will do, as you are only doing this for training, not to make a life for yourself there. What a developed system is, is a system that has a human presence, with some sort of port, to land on and trade at. You will also be mapping all the undeveloped systems as well. Basically, you are surveying this area of space completely. Make sure to keep an eye on your navigation panel as well for unknown objects. If you happen to find one go to it and investigate, just be cautious when you do, there can be some unexpected trouble at some of them.
Once you reach your destination I want you to begin by honking the system, with the discovery scanner. If it has a navigation beacon, go on over to it and scan it. If not you will need to go above the star, and out of the orbital plane of the planets and activate your FSS, and scan everything, including the signal sources. Take note of the planets that have possible geographical features. You will have to make a choice, and decide if you wish to go to the signal sources first or the planets. Keep in mind that the signal sources degrade and disappear over time. (I usually choose to go for the planets first, if there is a navigation beacon in the system. And if there isn’t, I go to the signal sources first. Redoing the FSS is a hassle, while scanning the nav beacon is easy.) At the planets, you will need to do a detailed surface scan, and for ringed planets scan the rings. Then for at least the first ten or twenty systems with planets, I want you to land on all of them (just make sure you check their gravity first). Even the ones without geographical features, and break out the SRV, and do some practice driving, and surface mining. Any outcroppings you run across do not hesitate to harvest. While in the system map you may want to look at the composition of the planet. This is your first introduction to harvesting materials. Oh, don’t forget to have fun.
These were written and recorded by Astro from Down to Earth Astronomy and will explain surface mining, and the SRV. Don’t forget to like and subscribe to his channel.
Section 1-4
Continuing with planet exploration, after the first 10 to 20 systems, then you should only need to land on the ones with features. Don’t forget to scan the features with the conformation scanner as they can bring good credits for the scan. Landing on all the planets was to gain experience in landing and driving. I also suggest that you land at every station, and check them out. Get all the pertinent information from the station while there. On the way out, especially at busy stations, use the wake scanner to collect encoded materials or data from wakes. Also after the first few systems, I would like for you to start to use fa off, for landing on both the surfaces and stations, to start developing the feel for fa off flight. At the end of this section, I will post a few YouTube tutorials for fa off flight, as well as a few thoughts.
For the duration of this part of the tutorial, I would like for you to drop into all of the planetary rings, take special note of how dense they are. Try to build a system from 1-5 to rate their density. I would also recommend that you note how many and what type of hot spots they have, especially if they have any overlapping hot spots. This is all for later in the tutorial.
As I stated earlier take your time, there is no hurry. Doing a complete survey of a system takes time especially in large systems. Some systems may only take an hour if it only has a few planets, while larger systems can take many hours of flying around and checking things out. There are many players who find this fun and fulfilling, and others who just can not do it, as it is boring. But it is a necessary part of ED, so as not to be blind, to the structure of the region you are in.
Signal sources are the next topic. In reality, I do not suggest you investigate all the sites as some of them are too dangerous. The one to avoid at this time is weapons fire. This will result in combat and are hazardous until you have some weapons installed. The ones if entered you should use caution are combat aftermath, non-human signal source, and anything level 3 and over, they may result in ambush, or outright attack, however, the combat aftermath’s are very good as you may run across dropped cargo, that may be worth money. Just keep in mind that the cargo is hot (illegal), and you will have to smuggle them into a station with a black market. Anything else with a rating of 0, 1, or 2 is fine to enter at this level of the tutorial, anything higher make sure to have a destination star highlighted, just in case you need to high wake out (discussed later). The goal is to learn to use the cargo scoop to collect materials, and cargo in both flight assist on, and off. Using the collector limpets is fine and all, but you will not learn to control the ship by using it. So use the cargo scoop to collect them manually, this will go a long way in learning to control your ship. I mentioned that you should make notes of black markets, and material traders. If you find hot cargo, you will need the black markets to sell them. And you will need material traders to exchange materials when (or if) you fill them up. Both are located in the contacts list at a starport.
Section 1-5
Now comes some of the fun stuff. I do not care how cautious you try to fly, some Jack pirate is going to try to jack you. So at first, I want you to try to break free of the interdiction. Just for a while though, for practice. I would also like you to learn that if they are trying to interdict you and you are fuel scooping, just move a little closer to the star, then turn your thrusters toward the star and go zero throttle. What happens is that they must get behind you, and as they try, they get to close and burn up (popped like a popcorn kernel). But seeing as neither is exciting, I suggest you submit. Just go zero throttle and let them pull you to normal space. If there is nothing in your hold, but limpets, they will do nothing except scan you. Of course, that is not fun, is it? Your job, or goal, is to prevent them from scanning you. There are two types of basic combat, one is jousting, the second is dogfighting. Keep in mind that at first, you are unarmed, but they usually will not fire on you (and risk a bounty) unless you fire on them first (if you have no weapons that is not possible), have a cargo, or go outside ten kilometers from the interdiction site.
Jousting is where you aim the nose of your ship towards the enemy and fly past them in an effort to break their scanning process, once you are not in their scanning arc the scanner can no longer scan you and they must start over. Then turn back and do it again. In armed combat, this is used to line up the enemy and strife them as you pass. You can use fa off to rotate the ship and keep an eye on them as you pass by. And a key to the whole thing is to fly by, as close to them as possible, to make it harder for them to rotate, to keep up with the maneuver. This is generally a maneuver used by the less maneuverable ships for combat, as they usually don’t have the capabilities for dogfighting.
Dog fighting is the more advanced type of combat. The goal is to keep out of the enemy's line of fire while simultaneously, keeping yourself in the most advantageous position possible (usually behind and below). The first thing in this part of the tutorial is to go into the configuration screen and in the mouse controls turn on the mouse widget. With that turned on, it puts a dot in the center of the screen, use it as your aiming point. You will have to learn to use a combination of fa on and off to do this well, as the different characteristics of the two modes have different advantages and disadvantages. You want to learn to use as many of the advantages, of each, as possible. The key is to do this over and over again, trying out new things, until you figure it out. Try not to get caught in the trap of doing the same thing over and over again, expecting a different result, that is called insanity.
After you have gained some experience and confidence with the non-lethal combat mentioned above and can do both fairly well, purchase some weapons for your Cobra. You will want to stay away from turreted, and gimbaled. Fixed weapons will give you much higher quality practice while in combat. And don’t forget to pick up the materials, and any good cargo that your victims er, attackers have dropped. (I recommend that you get some multi-cannon and pulse lasers. The pulse lasers are for the shields and hull, while the multi-cannons are for the hull. I also suggest that you start targeting ship subsystems, primarily the power plant. Once the power plant goes the rest usually follows.)
Smuggling is the skill of getting illegal cargo and wanted passengers into a station. There are two methods of doing this. The first is to start at about two kilometers in front of the mail slot of the station, and go as fast as you can handle, not forgetting to request landing clearance, and when security commences there scan get through the mail slot and on deck as soon as possible. This is just down and dirty, beat the scan. Now the second is with a little more finesse, line up at about two or three kilometers and request docking, once you have permission start towards the mail slot at maximum legal speed (99 ms) if a scan detected is announced just before you get to the mail slot pop a heat sink, and go on through. The heat sink will break their scan, but if you do it too soon a second scan may start, so try to pop it just before you enter the mail slot. Also keep in mind that when the scan is announced you have about ten seconds before it completes, so you have a little time. This is also a skill that takes some practice, so as you enter the stations in the exercise, practice both skills, even when you don’t have contraband. Make sure to practice in both fa on and off often to gain the experience. This little game when you have illegal cargo or passengers is to just avoid paying the fine, thereby maximizing profit, and as a training tool, it is outstanding. (I forgot to mention that when you have illegal cargo or passengers on board that security will try to blow you up for some strange reason. Just saying.)
High waking is the act of jumping out of the system. In most circumstances, it is wise when you enter a system to chose a nearby system for an an emergency jump. You do this by going into the navigation screen and finding a nearby system and just highlighting it. Don’t actually select the system yet. If you are interdicted and you know that for some reason you will be attacked, just go into the navigation screen and select the highlighted system, and then initiate the jump after cool down.
Section 1-6
Flight Assist off training. My thoughts on the matter are that fa off is a necessity, not only for certain operations, but it plays a major factor in combat, especially those who figure out how to combine fa on and off, to “effect”. Fa off requires a lot of fine motions of the controller you are using, whether it is keyboard and mouse, h.o.t.a.s., joystick, or gamepad. I am not going to even suggest that you attempt to use fa off exclusively as many do, but I have learned the value of it. I also have learned that fa on exclusively is not necessarily a good thing either. The simulator seems to need both skills to balance and maximize the effectiveness of the ships. These are some excellent tutorials for FA off flight, so please enjoy them, and like and subscribe to their channels.
Moxen Wolf
Moxen Wolf
www.youtube.com
Look inverted
Imnotanumber43
I do not want you to get burned out on this part of the tutorial. So when you become bored, believe me, you will, and have earned around 150 mil cr, go on to the next stage of the tutorial, or tryout the passenger missions. Just remember that if you decide to come back I would like for you to visit the engineers and get your power plant upgraded at the very least, as I want you to up the difficulty. You should go into the weapons fire, and increase the difficulty levels you go into, to about 4 or 5. If perchance you take a break again and come back again after that, go in open and don’t restrict the levels of the USS’s.
There is one other condition I would like for you to achieve. Make friends. That means while at a port, collecting data from wakes, go out in open, and see if there are any players around. If they are try to strike up a conversation with them. Friends will help you greatly in the rest of the tutorial, especially if you can make several or even better someone who has been around awhile, and can be a mentor who will take you under their wing. I would also suggest that you look on Discord, or at the Galactic Academy and see if there are any mentors available to help you out. This is a great group and may even help you find a squadron later if you want one that is. https://discord.gg/5JqXMPu. Also, there is ED Tutorials that can help you learn much about E.D. https://www.edtutorials.com/.
Section 1 conclusion
This is the end of the first section of this tutorial. You should have a basic understanding of how the simulation works at this point, and how to establish yourself. If you have done things properly you have some reputation with various station representatives, from selling your cartography data, and cargoes, plus quite possibly some bounties. This will lead you quite well into the next section.
Summary: At this point you have;
1. Built a ship to spec, and updated your build to your preference.
2. Learned that there is profit in exploration, and the difference in the types of exploration.
3. Developed basic combat skills.
4. Learned that there is a good way to earn materials from non-farming and grinding techniques.
5. Developed flight assist off skills.
6. Learned how the SRV operates and developed the skill for surface mining on planets.
7. Gained friends, who will be invaluable in the future.
8. Learned invaluable skills for smuggling, and evasion, as well as how to “screw” with the heads of pirates.
Section 1 Reality Check!!!
I have done survey many times while playing Elite Dangerous, so I know that doing it the way prescribed is unrealistic. This is why I said that you have flexibility in play. So first I will tell you what you have if you have followed the basic outline. The Cobra MK III is one of the most versatile ships in Elite Dangerous, it can perform any task not only well but excel at it, with the ability in most builds to have a ferocious bite. It is one of two ships in-game that are like this, with the other being the Python (that is until you reach the large ships).
Just because I've focused on survey in the first section doesn't mean that is all there is to the first section. Again the Cobra is extremely versatile, and you already have cargo space, It is easy to start trade missions, or if you have friends wing trade missions. You can re-outfit for passengers, mining, or anything else for that matter (all you really have to do is pick a central system, and call it home. Then as you do your thing remember to stop when you are done, survey the new system you are in, no big deal). The real key is to build up your funds for the next section, for the next ship. The most important things in this section are to learn combat, FA off flight, evasion, to collect materials for engineering, make friends, and raise your reputation with various factions in the area. The method is not that important, just the results. So I will point out, getting ganked by pirates, and performing evasive maneuvers to prevent scans, is the best way to learn to dogfight. Flying in asteroid fields with FA off, or around a station is great for FA off training. These are examples of exploits of the sim, probably built into the simulator for that exact reason (even if not they're still there, so use them).
The reason I am saying this is because I remembered when I was surveying a system, and it was a big one (ten main planets and almost thirty smaller ones orbiting them). To survey the entire system took me almost eight hours, and that was before I started on signal sources. If a new player runs across one of those systems the community may lose that player☠, to sheer boredom. Point is, there is more to the first section of the tutorial than just exploration. Just use your imagination.
Section 2 trade and wings
This section is about trade, and operating in wings. Trade is not on the top list for many players, as they believe there are more exciting, and lucrative ways to earn money. In some ways they are right, but for a pirate to interdict someone to steal their goods, there must be someone with goods to waylay. As that someone, you should make their “re-buy” a joyous event. (if you can that is. LOL).
Seriously there are ways to make trade fun, and not so tedious. I am going to attempt to explain them in this section.
Section 2 objectives. In this part of the tutorial, the player will be able to demonstrate the understanding, and knowledge of the following.
1. Engineer a ship for the role intended.
2. Basic and advanced trade
3. The difference in the types of trading, and how to maximize profit.
4. Team play in wings, and how to maximize security, and profit as a team.
5. The value of trade missions, and how they can be used to maximize profit, in both solo and wing.
6. The value of observing the states of systems, and factions in the systems.
Section 2-1
As stated I would suggest that you earn about 150 Mcr before starting, because that is how much it will cost to buy and build, plus a re-buy, for the ship I am suggesting.
Suggested load-out Python #1;
Core Internal
Military Grade Composite armor
7B Power Plant
6B Thrusters
5B Frame Shift Drive
4D Life Support
7A Power Distributor
6D Sensors
Optional Internal
3x 6E Cargo Racks
5A Shield Generator
5E Cargo Rack
4D Hull Reinforcement Package
3D Module Reinforcement Package
3E Cargo Rack
1E Advanced Docking Computer
1E Super-cruise Assist
Hard Points
Yep, full set if you please, all fixed weapons (locked, cocked, and ready to rock).
Utility Mounts
0I Heat Sink Launcher
2x 0A Shield Booster
0I Point Defense
Don’t forget an awesome name.
Here is the build in Coriolis for your reference.
Coriolis EDCD Edition
A ship builder, outfitting and comparison tool for Elite Dangerous
coriolis.io
Section 2-2
As stated prior the Python is not a requirement, it is just a recommendation, but it holds everything you will need and has both good defense, offense, and plenty of optional internal slots.
A few things of note;
Military Grade Composite armor, you are doing trade, as such, that means you are not here for combat. The armor is so that when the shields go down (and they will) you can take a punch or three before you jump out. The Hull reinforcement package, and Module reinforcement package, are there again like the armor, to buy you some time to jump out. They are not necessary if you want to add some more cargo capacity, I just strongly recommend them, for a while anyway.
3x 6E Cargo racks, you can get a 6A shield generator if you want, but you will lose some cargo capacity by doing so. (Hey, you’re a trader, maximizing profit is the name of the game, and the extra armor is there to help with that).
You will want to choose fixed weapons, primarily for training, they also pack a better punch, in case you have to use them. What’s more, is you will become better at combat if you learn to use fixed weapons first.
You may have noticed, the fuel scoop is missing on this build. That was not a mistake, a fuel scoop is not necessary for trade, even while doing trade missions, as few routes are long. So you can just stop at the destination station and buy fuel. There is an exception, and that is when you are using your trade python, as a relay with your mining ship. Markets for mined cargo can be quite far from mining areas. I also recommend a fuel scoop for the trip to Deciat. Just store it at a station when you are done with it, to be recalled when you need it.
The Point Defense will attempt to shoot down a hatch breaker limpet if one is sent to break into your cargo hatch. I do not know if it matters, but I try to place it on the bottom of the ship as close to the cargo hatch as possible.
Now, as for the supercruise assist, and the advanced docking computer. You already spent most of the first section learning how to land, and fly the ship, in both FA on and off, the baby steps are over. However, if you choose you can replace them with something else. Also, you can just turn them off in the ship panel, no big deal, as a matter of fact, if you are smuggling it is a good idea to turn off the advanced docking computer for that operation anyway, because it will prevent you from launching a heat sink, and is way too slow.
Okay why two pythons. Well, the first one is as stated a trade ship with teeth, the second is going to be a mining ship in the next section, and unless you continuously stop and trade out equipment, your miner has little offense and defense. So what we do is park the trade ship at a nearby station, and when the mining ship is full, go to the station and swap out ships. This increases efficiency and maximizes defense. The only thing better is to have a guard following you to help fight off bandits, and pirates.
Section 2-3
First things first I want you to establish a baseline by doing two cargo runs. It doesn’t matter the cargoes just grab a load from where you are at, and deliver it to where ever, then do the same thing at your destination. This is only a test of the ship, and to gain a baseline for comparison. By now you have gotten the invite from Felicity Farseer, primarily for all the exploration you’ve done. Head to Maia to buy a Meta-alloy. Then to Deciat, don’t go directly to Farseer inc. just yet, go to Garay Terminal first to have your Sidewinder, and Cobra shipped out to you. Felicity has high-performance thrusters, and it makes the Sidewinder (well, any of the small ships) one of the funnest ships in the game, especially for a newbie on a budget. Now take the Python to Farseer inc. There are so many tutorials out there on how and what to engineer I will not even try to tell you how to engineer, but I will give some guidelines to cut through some of the B.S. and give you an idea of how to engineer for roles. If you followed the first section of this tutorial, you should have enough materials to upgrade everything in the Python, and the Sidewinder. When you bring over the Sidewinder first get the high-performance thrusters installed, then engineer them. Then go out and have fun with it. If you have enough go ahead and upgrade the Cobra MKIII, if not, try to at least engineer the power plant. Make sure that you differentiate the roles for each ship, as they are not built for the same roles.
Now go back to the location you started at a do those same cargo runs, and see the difference. While you are on your way to Maia, and on the way back from Deciat, try to practice the interdiction training in the Python (just don’t forget you are armed now, and your re-buy is much higher. Do not try to do the training from Maia to Deciat, you have a meta-alloy in your cargo hold, and every pirate out there knows it [they seem to have some sort of psychic ability or at least a spy on Maia]. They will try to destroy you to prevent you from reaching your destination, so high wake your butt out at the first opportunity). The training is something that you will want to practice in every new ship you get, just so you can learn their capabilities, and how they handle.
Section 2-4
Okay like builds there are several engineering mods that have a great impact on the roles we play. Even though many players say that some of the mods are useless, they aren’t. These people are just not using them in the right roles. For traders and miners, the mods for beefing up our module defenses can really increase their survival rate, and some can prove to make us more efficient. Look and plan carefully before you jump into engineering to see what can be the most useful to you.
There is a tool you can use to help you decide what, and how you want to engineer the ship. ( https://coriolis.io/ ) Don’t be afraid to create the build and test out different engineering configurations in Coriolis before you waste materials at the engineers. I already said that there are so many reviews and tutorials about engineering on youtube that it is ridiculous but don’t fall into the trap, and just follow them, you should figure out what you need, and want for yourself.
In short it is essential to set up the engineering, just like the build, to the role you are playing in that ship. And don’t be afraid to set it up your way. I will also point out that no two players are alike, as such one player will have the ship set up for their style of flying, while another will have a completely different setup for theirs. So not only the role but flying style as well.
I will attempt to explain some of the engineering types, or more correctly categorize them for there roles. I believe it would be more beneficial to categorize their roles, than trying to explain each and every one. I also will not try to cover everything to give you an opportunity to figure it out yourself.
So starting with armor. The key ones are heavy-duty and lightweight, the other three are highly specialized, and only useful if you know what your opponents are using. Heavy-duty is good for traders, and miners who are vulnerable to attack and are burdened with heavy loads anyway. The extra armor can buy extra time, in some cases, to high wake out of the situation. Now lightweight, on the other hand, is handy for those who need to lighten their ship for speed and maneuverability or to minimize weight for long-range jumping. Combateers, racers, and some long-range explorers need the advantage they give.
Power plants. Starting with armored, which is useful for miners, and traders. In any ship, the power plant is the most critical system, and when it is destroyed, so are you. traders and miners who are vulnerable to attack should consider this to protect their assets and profit. Low emissions are great for smugglers, assassins, and the Beluga. It can lower the heat generated by the ship lowering your chances of being spotted by security, or your enemy. As for the Beluga, it has an overheating problem anyway, as you will find out when you can purchase one. Lastly is overcharged, this is an all-around good choice, used by just about everyone. It increases the power output of the ship, providing enough to power just about any ship build.
The FSD. You have faster boot sequence, in E.D. I do not know of any reason to have this. There are no situations where you will have to use a fast boot sequence (there are no scouting missions where you have to be in silent running or where you need to shut down for any reason). Increased range, will give you better jump ranges as it suggests. And shielded will gives some protection to the FSD if the hull is breached. Either is great for just about any build, even traders, it is a matter in this case of personal taste.
Thrusters. There is clean which will give you lower thermal, as well as a little speed. Again great for the Beluga. Dirty gives even more speed but increases heat and power usage. And reinforced is great for traders, if the thrusters are hit it is hard to get up enough speed to jump. Dirty is the go-to for most players, but depending on your personal preferences, clean is good also.
I am going to hold off here as this is going to get too long, but it does give enough for you to see the pattern. You will notice that I did not touch any of the experimental at all. Just read them carefully, and if you have any questions just go online, to Coriolis, or to ED tutorials, or the Galactic Academy. They are really well equipped to help you more than I can in a written tutorial. (really, it would take a book to explain everything properly).
Section 2-5
I had asked that you try to make friends, and if you had, you have a tool to help you earn money, as well as mutual support. However, you will want to do some trade missions solo just to learn the ropes. Yes, the prime goal of this tutorial is to use missions to earn money, not simple trade. Like exploration, there are several types of traders. We are looking at the contractor. These are the ones who scour the mission boards to find good missions and earn their way. The ones doing simple trading are basic truckers, sometimes called freelancers.
As stated above find a few missions and do them, just for the moment stay away from wing missions. I have done wing missions solo, but this means that you have to make several trips, and every time the risk increases for interdiction. Plus while on a mission the difficulty of the pirates and bandits increases, especially in wing missions. Look at the rank requirements for the missions, the higher it is the more dangerous the bad guys are. That doesn’t mean that you can’t take the mission, just more risk. You want to get your reputation for the various factions to increase, and as they do, so does the availability of better higher paying missions. Once you have several factions, friendly or allied, it’s time to call your friends. Hopefully, they have also increased their reps as well. Time to start to make some real money.
In wing missions, what happens is that everyone in the wing accepts the same mission, and then you can share it with one another. What this means is that the reward for the mission increases, by however many people is in the wing. So a wing mission with a payout of 5 million, you can earn as much as 20 million (actually it is a bit more because as you are sharing the mission between you, you also get a percentage of there take). As there are up to four players in a wing, and each accepts and shares with the others. This also makes the mission easier as the load is shared. Now, how do I see the best way to run a wing mission, and why. The first thing to do is to establish who has the shortest jump range. That person becomes the point and is the first to jump. Everyone locks on to that person and when they jump you just follow in their high wake. Everyone tries to stick together, rather than go independent to the mission destination. If one is interdicted just lock on to them and drop into their instance, and provide fire support for them. Four sets of guns are better than one in any situation. I ran into situations where none would cooperate like this, and as a result, we lost one section of the cargo, simply because no one could reach in time to help (yes, it was a player who ganked him. Filthy %$&@ pirate. LOL). Therefore we failed the mission, with a hefty fine each. If the group would have stayed together, we may have been able to provide support for him. ‘nuff said.
The goal of this is to learn about missions and wings, as well as cooperation among players to obtain your goals, and mutual defense (and get rich). Nothing fancy, or complicated.
A special note: if you are invited to participate. Go ahead and join your friends to earn bonds in combat zones. There is nothing wrong with that, and you could earn the invite from the engineer Tod McQuinn. Just make sure you stay close to your companions so they can watch your back. I would also suggest you take the cobra, it has a lower rebuy.
Section 2-6
Let’s have a look at some of the trade mission types. The sourcing mission, are common, as you are tasked with finding a commodity and bringing it back to the station. However you must absorb the cost of the commodity which lowers the profit margin, and even sometimes gives a negative balance. Although in a wing mission it isn’t bad at all. Commodity delivery missions are also common, and all that is necessary is to deliver the product to the receiving station. Usually are higher paying, but also more of them have hostile opponents, and fines for failure. Be careful to look at the ranking, and if they have hostile tags. Last is cargo retrieval, I have only done one of these. The price was good, and they only wanted two items collected, but it was heavily guarded. Check the rankings, on that one I was way out of my league, but I barely managed to complete it.
You will also want to look at the status of the system, and the various factions in the system. The system itself may be in a boom, however, there may be a faction in the system or station that may be in one of the other states, such as pestilence, plague, war, and others. So check them out to see what they may need. This is where you may find sourcing missions. In boom or investment systems you may find delivery missions, as they may have a surplus and another system may have an urgent need. Of course, if you are in a wing, you have the advantage of being able to look in multiple places at once.
Section 2 Conclusion
If you find yourself alone, your friends are not online, or just want to zen out, I would suggest just doing some basic trade. No real goal just pickup a commodity here, and selling it there, in an aimless manner. You will not earn any big money but it can be fulfilling (just don’t forget to check the mission board before selling, they may have a sourcing mission for it). If you have the money, you should try out some other ships as well, just keep in mind for the next part of the tutorial you will need another 150 Mcr.
Summary: as a student you have;
1. Taken a ship or three out and engineered them to the roles you have built them for, and your personal preference.
2. Performed basic and advanced trade.
3. Performed the different types of trade and hopefully made good money from them.
4. Learned the value of trade missions and the value of wings.
5. Learned the value of observing the system states, as well as the states of the factions in those systems you are trading in, to ascertain the most lucrative trading mission sources within those systems, and for planning.
Section 3 mining
Objectives. In this part of the tutorial, the player will be able to demonstrate the understanding, and knowledge of the following.
1. Fundamentals of how to set up an exclusive role ship build.
2. The types of mining.
3. Value of mission-based mining.
4. How to utilize two ships to maximize safety and security.
5. Wing mining, and wing mission mining.
6. PVP training in a wing.
I had mentioned that you should pick up a second python.
Suggested loadout for Python #2
Core Internal
Lightweight alloy armor
7A Power Plant
6A Thrusters
5D Frame Shift Drive
4D Life Support
7A Power Distributor
6D Sensors
Optional Internal
3x 6E Cargo Racks
5A Collector limpet controller
5A Collector limpet controller
4A Shield Generator
3A Refinery
3A Collector limpet controller
1I Detailed surface scanner
1A Prospector limpet controller
Weapons
2B Seismic charge launcher
1D Abrasion blaster
2B Sub-surface displacement missile
2X 2D Mining lasers
Utility Mounts
0A Pulse wave analyzer
2x 0A Shield Booster
0I Point Defense
Don’t forget to name it.
Here is the build in Coriolis for your reference, and to play around with. https://coriolis.io/outfit/python?c...==.Aw18RQ==..EweloBhBmUA5QFMCGBzANokICMF8hRFA
This will cost you around 142 Mcr, with a re-buy of 7.1 Mcr.
Section 3-1
This is a fully dedicated mining build. It is not set up for defense or offense, just mining. So I will do some explaining so you will have some understanding of it. First, everything has been, made lightweight, this is so it can be as maneuverable as possible in the asteroid fields. If possible try to get the thrusters engineered, to provide even more maneuverability. You will not need long-range jumping in this build because your trade ship will be close by to handle commodity trading. But if you want, go ahead and engineer the FSD, just in case you can’t park next door. The most important items in the core internals are the thrusters, and power distributor. The P.D. is an absolute necessity to drive the mining lasers. In the optional internals, you have cargo space for days, and the ability to control more limpets than you can supply with rocks (hint, hint). A shield in case you bump into a roid (if you want, you can downgrade it to conserve some weight). There is nothing in the internals that are not an absolute necessity for mining. In the hardpoints are all the tools for a full mining expedition.
To many mining is boring, but a necessary part of E.D. However there are some things to spice it up, and unfortunately, we have to go through the boring to get to the spicy. First, there are a few types of mining you should be aware of. Number one is the freelance miner, the ones who just go out and mine whatever and bring it to a station for sale. They usually have several things in the cargo holds and sell to multiple stations. You will see mostly the NPC’s doing this, most players avoid doing this as the profit is not as high. Of course, I am going to show you how to maximize the profits of this method, but it is still not nearly as high as the others, but not as bad as other players make it out to be either. Number two is targeted mining or power mining. This is where you go out and target such things as low-temperature diamonds, or painite and fill your hold with only them to bring back for sale. This is usually the top tear mining for profits, earning as much a 200Mcr to 250Mcr per hour, done right. Number three are the contract miners, when you look on the mission boards you will sometimes see mining missions. Some of them are straight-up mining for something such as water. Well, look at the payouts. They are normally much more than the product sales for normally (by as much as 50 times on occasion), and if you have friends and do a wing mission just like in trade, those profits are much higher. Also, contract and freelance mining can be combined to effect, therefore maximizing your profits.
Special note: Something new that just came out, as I was writing this, is that Frontier has boosted sub-surface mining, if only a bit, hopefully, this is permanent. It is now possible to make a better profit from this form of mining. This is fitting as it is the mining process that requires the most skill.
The next thing I want to bring up is to watch for gold rushes, Frontier does setup gold rushes in E.D. Periodically. The last one lasted almost a year, where they had void opals, low-temperature diamonds, painite, and a few others boosted for a time. It was finally shut down in January 2020, after the update.
Section 3-2
Stage 1
I would like you to select a system you have mapped with a good ringed planet. The ring(s) should be moderately dense, meaning some room to fly. Do not worry about hot spots, as a matter of fact, stay away from a hot spot for this part. Go in and just start mining, just limit yourself to 3 or 4 types of cargo. If you were paying attention to the mission boards previously, you may have noticed that there are several mining missions. So when you are mining this way try to remember what you saw more commonly on the mission boards, and focus on three or four of those. When your hold is full go to where you left your trade ship and swap. Don’t worry the cargo will transfer over when you do. Start selling, but not outright, check the mission boards and accept the mining missions from the factions who have missions for what you have just mined, usually for far more than a direct sell would be. As stated it is profitable, but not greatly so. If very lucky you may be able to clear about 100 Mcr depending on what you were mining, but not by much. If unlucky you could still clear as much as 30 Mcr to 40 Mcr for a full load in the Python. Most choose not to operate this way, as the profit margin is too low. However there is the challenge of making money the harder way, and for some of us, this is more zen, or for relaxation. No pressure to make 200 M every run, or to max out every minute. I also just want you to try it out to see the difference between power playing and casual playing. Because next is a bit of power playing.
I want you to locate the densest ringed planet you have recorded, which has a hot spot, and if possible an overlapping hot spot. Preferably a hot spot with something like low-temperature diamonds, in other words, something expensive. The trick with the dense rings is a secret I am about to share with you. (In E.D. the rings are randomly generated with a range of percentages for minerals. So if the ring has a 5% frequency of LTD’s, the hot spot will have a greater instance of the mineral. Well since the ring is denser what that means is that the asteroids being closer together will have more instances of LTD’s within a smaller radius. So you will not have to travel as far to find the next asteroid with whatever you are searching for. Instead of just credits per hour, you are looking at credits per square kilometer, meaning that efficiency is increased, thereby increasing the potential credits per hour. It still works better if there is a double, or triple hot spot in a dense ring as the distance to travel is reduced further, thereby increasing the mining time, and decreasing the time searching for potential asteroids, thereby increasing efficiency.) Yeah, even I got dizzy explaining that. If you choose to mine LTD’s just remember that you may have to travel a great distance to sell them at a good price, of course, that is true of any of the minerals, or metals (and don’t forget to equip a fuel scoop to your trade ship). This is the power play method of mining and can bring as much as 250Mcr per hour. Personally, I find this boring, it is just hurry up and get it, with no soul behind it. However, it can be fun, like on many of the YouTube videos and streams, where several Commanders are playing against one another, in a race to see who can get the most in the shortest amount of time, or within an hour. Usually over bragging rights.
I will explain the procedure for mining with this ship.
1. First you will use your pulse wave to locate potential roids. They will show up as orange or yellow in the distance. The brighter the yellow the higher the possibility of something good (like a core). Of course, that doesn’t mean that it’s what you are looking for.
2. Once you have found a potential target, send in a prospector limpet. Note what is available in composition, see if it has a core deposit, then go to the nav screen to contacts, and see what type of subsurface and surface deposits it has. An important note I will add, I have only once run across an asteroid with all four types of deposits, it is a rare occurrence.
3. Use your mining lasers first, and deplete it, then abrasion blaster for the surface deposits if any. Then the subsurface displacement missile on the subsurface deposits, you can crack it with the seismic charge launcher, and use the abrasion blaster to knock off the deposits. (Even though you can surface mine it even after core mining, the seismic charge launcher will destroy the subsurface, and surface deposits. Causing a loss of an unknown amount of materials.)
4. Rinse, repeat…
Section 3-3
Stage 2
This stage involves getting together with your friends, and associates. Very few will go for the freelance mining stated above, and some will be willing to do contract mining, but most are game for targeted mining if there is a market for it. There really isn’t much to say in this section, except it is advisable for wings to stay together, while trading, and mining. Like in the trade section, stay together for mutual support and protection. And try to do some of the wing mining missions, especially if you come across some of the higher paying ones, sometimes you will do them and gain more credits per hour than you could if you were doing target mining. Yes if you have four ships going after osmium, 76 tons, for 10Mcr per member, you can get 42Mcr in 20 to 30 minutes, if you already know where to get osmium and it’s close by, that is.
Stage 3
“Spice”. This is what friends are best for. Try to start out by having one of your friends in a hybrid combat build with cargo space and collector limpets. That way they will be able to make a profit while standing guard. (in ED this is not really necessary as once you drop into the instance, the initial pirates pop up, do their thing, then disappear. Just think of it as role-playing. Plus if one of the miners must jump out for some reason {“sigh”, to buy limpets}, or has a logging episode “mauve cobra”, you have security on standby when they come back.) After about 20 or 30 minutes, it is time for a break. Everyone in your group has mining lasers so, why not train in combat with them. (there’s nothing wrong with a little horseplay in the middle of an asteroid field, in the void of space. “that’s also why the word dangerous is in the name”) With a security ship, you will be in little danger of interference. Just set some rules, when a member loses one ring of shields they are out, no collisions, etc… Think of this as PVP combat training. The NPC pilots are one thing, but when going against another player things change, and it is important to know what. Plus while playing, you can be coached by any mentors in the group and your fellow players. It is also just plain fun. As for your security guy, while you and the rest are mining they can send out collectors while you are laser mining, so they can fill there hold as well (make sure you tip the bodyguard, “wash there back, and they’ll wash yours” that sort of thing. And well, nothing is free.
Stage 4
With your friends what you will want to do is call your Cobra MK III (or favorite combatant) to a nearby station with your trade ship, and they should do the same by bringing a combat ship as well. What you will want to do is as two of your friends fly support, you and another mine, in a “hazardous resource site”. The trick to this is to fly on the edge of the resource site, and mine, while your support team engages anyone who tries to attack you. The good thing about this is that you can get elevated amounts of ores from the “hasres” asteroids (the last time I did this it was 3X the amount). Once you have filled up your hold, swap out for your trade ship, and sell, while the support ships provide escort. Once finished you, and the other miner swap roles with your support group, so they can mine their fill.
Section 3 Conclusion and Notes
That being said, we are at the conclusion of the tutorial itself.
Summary for section 3: as a student you have;
1. Learned the difference between the different types of mining.
2. Gained the knowledge of how to maximize profit, with freelance mining, targeted mining, and contract mining.
3. The value of wing mining.
4. Practiced PVP combat in a safe environment, with a guardian.
A little about myself. I am a retired military veteran, and for a little more than half of my military career, I was an instructor (yeah, went to school and everything). I have written many student and instructor guides in my career. However, this is not the same format as a standard guide if anyone noticed. And has many of my personal thoughts throughout, and has left much for the player to discover for themselves (something a real student guide would not do). Personally, I do not play games online, or in general, however, I really like simulators, such as flight simulators, space simulators, as well as others. E.D. is somewhat unique to me because it is also an MMO, something I have never played before. As an instructor I had a huge problem understanding, why it is there is no proper tutorial for E.D. As stated in the beginning, I saw this as a problem and am trying to correct it. I also know that there will be many players out there who will actively go after this (flaming) and say it is a waste of time, however, it is what it is. A way to prepare new players, and help them develop the skills and knowledge to survive in the E.D. universe. Let the newer players decide whether or not they want to follow it.
Fly dangerously, stay safe.
CMDR Emerald Hawk
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