Any bonuses available for exploration data?

Excalibrates

E
I've been out in the black for quite a few months, just heading home now with a shipload of data. I don't really keep up with every thread on this forum or Reddit, and apart from reading the PP manual I haven't been in the bubble to participate in that. Along the way I've become aware that there have been some Community Goal bonuses for returning data to specific stations, but I expect they're finished now.

Can anyone tell me if there are any ways currently to get exploration data bonuses? Can I pledge to anyone, or is there a particular station to head to? Or should I just cash in at the first available station?
 

Alex Brentnall

Alex Brentnall
If you have both:
1) A heavy duty combat trading ship like an Anaconda or a Python
2) 100mil in cash or 3 weeks spare

Then you can get a 200% bonus on data by aligning with powerplay faction Li Yong-Rui. Using the transport materials to get rank 5. Wait till the tickover and then sell at a Li Yong system. Alternatively you can get the transport materials by waiting instead of paying to lower the timer.
This obviously carries the risk that if you die you loose everything. I did it in a combat Anaconda after a 100hr trip which boosted my profit from around 66mil to 193mil credits. Since I got rank 5 for 2 weeks, then rank 4 for 1 week and so on I pretty much gained all my losses from the 100mil startup cost back and the whole venture gained me around 140mil more than I'd have got otherwise.

Again its the risk of turning the profit into 0 if you die, I would not advise in Open unless you are solid on combat as I was. I wouldn't even advise in Solo unless you are flying a Clipper/Python/Anaconda. Also Its going to rapidly become a grind if you try to rank 5 without putting in the cash as an fyi :) (500 hours gameplay if you wait for the 30min timer not including merit decay).
Otherwise there's no real bonuses except selling to permit system factions to gain influence and get said permit.
 
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Ziljan

Ziljan
Since they increased the Merit rewards for power play activity, the mail delivery sim is no longer better than mailman assassination sim for getting to rank 5. Both can be done/maintained in a matter of hours via undermining, and probably Combat Zones as well. There is not need for 100Million CR spoiling in the bank as seed money either, so unless you really love being a mailman with a target painted on your back, then it's no longer the best way to rank 5 in Sirius Corp.

Pre patch values:

Undermining Ship: 15 Merits
Undermining Cargo: 1 Merit/Ton
Combat Zone Kill: 1 Merit


Current values:

Undermining Ship: 30 Merits
Undermining Cargo: 5 Merit/Ton
Combat Zone Kill: 10 Merit

Grinding out 500 Merits/hour is fairly easy to do now. Some people have reported making several thousand Merits in a few hours of play. So comparing that to the cost of buying rank, it doesn't seem quite worth it, since grinding the Merits is pure profit, and works out to at least 2.5Million per hour, which is decent even for mid tier trading.

I think that FD is counting on people spending the excess profits on PP defense/fortification objectives once powers start losing systems from massive amounts of undermining that are bound to occur now (as per their design).
 
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drkaii

drkaii
Ziljan said:
Since they increased the Merit rewards for power play activity, the mail delivery sim is no longer better than mailman assassination sim for getting to rank 5. Both can be done/maintained in a matter of hours via undermining, and probably Combat Zones as well. There is not need for 100Million CR spoiling in the bank as seed money either, so unless you really love being a mailman with a target painted on your back, then it's no longer the best way to rank 5 in Sirius Corp.

Pre patch values:

Undermining Ship: 15 Merits
Undermining Cargo: 1 Merit/Ton
Combat Zone Kill: 1 Merit


Current values:

Undermining Ship: 30 Merits
Undermining Cargo: 5 Merit/Ton
Combat Zone Kill: 10 Merit

Grinding out 500 Merits/hour is fairly easy to do now. Some people have reported making several thousand Merits in a few hours of play. So comparing that to the cost of buying rank, it doesn't seem quite worth it, since grinding the Merits is pure profit, and works out to at least 2.5Million per hour, which is decent even for mid tier trading.

I think that FD is counting on people spending the excess profits on PP defense/fortification objectives once powers start losing systems from massive amounts of undermining that are bound to occur now (as per their design).
Click to expand...

Ziljan, is there anything you're not an expert on?

What DO you do in in real life?
 

Ziljan

Ziljan
drkaii said:
Ziljan, is there anything you're not an expert on?

What DO you do in in real life?
Click to expand...


Little bit of everything. Mostly the Cello. ;)

Edit: Seriously though, I probably DO spend way too much time thinking and reading about this game. But also it's fun, so why not? Especially with the big announcement coming up. I just can't seem to get enough info to satisfy my restless curiosity.
 
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drkaii

drkaii
I spend a lot of time thinking about this game too. It's quite a bit more than a hobby.

But why wouldn't it be? I put on a headset and I am transported to ACTUAL space. Every childhood fantasy is fulfilled.
 

Ziljan

Ziljan
drkaii said:
I put on a headset and I am transported to ACTUAL space. Every childhood fantasy is fulfilled.
Click to expand...

Waiting for the commercial reelase and a refresh of the video card lineups. But yeah, even with my trackIR setup, I know exactly what you mean.
 

Excalibrates

E
OK, many thanks for the info.

I'm combat Elite, have an A-rated combat Python and a trading 'conda, and about Cr140M in the bank so I could be well set up for this Li-Yong gig. I'd probably prefer to grind in a CZ than trade. Can anyone give me an idiot's guide to the quickest way to rank up? Which system/CZs to go to, which ships to target etc? Or let me know if I'm waaaay off the mark on this - I'm an utter noob at PP.

Cheers!
 

Ziljan

Ziljan
Excalibrates said:
OK, many thanks for the info.

I'm combat Elite, have an A-rated combat Python and a trading 'conda, and about Cr140M in the bank so I could be well set up for this Li-Yong gig. I'd probably prefer to grind in a CZ than trade. Can anyone give me an idiot's guide to the quickest way to rank up? Which system/CZs to go to, which ships to target etc? Or let me know if I'm waaaay off the mark on this - I'm an utter noob at PP.

Cheers!
Click to expand...


Unless I'm mistaken, i don't think you can benefit from CZ merits unless you are pledged to ALD or Hudson. Maybe you can side with the opposition forces in the CZs in their control systems, but I haven't heard anything yet about this possibility. And I'm about 3000LY from Sagittarius A* so i can't really check.
 

drkaii

drkaii
gooddoc said:
He's Sheldon Cooper!!
Click to expand...

Let me tell you something about Ziljan. He told me Gameplay is more important in Astronomical content in the community request list poll when it still had only our votes. Consistently from then, Gameplay has ALWAYS had one more vote than Astro Content. Only explanation? He has commanded his hoard of minions to keep an eye, join the forum and vote where necessary so his agenda gets pushed. He is an awesome, powerful and scary scary man.

Just be happy he is working with us on this matter.

They say the last thing his enemies hear is the Sonic death tune on the cello
 
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Ziljan

Ziljan
...how do you choose between two such primal instruments? I can't do it.

[video=youtube;w482tCxom64]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w482tCxom64[/video]

[video=youtube;__OSyznVDOY]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=__OSyznVDOY[/video]
 

Zelos1983

Z
Ziljan said:
Undermining Ship: 30 Merits
Undermining Cargo: 5 Merit/Ton
Combat Zone Kill: 10 Merit

Grinding out 500 Merits/hour is fairly easy to do now. Some people have reported making several thousand Merits in a few hours of play. So comparing that to the cost of buying rank, it doesn't seem quite worth it, since grinding the Merits is pure profit, and works out to at least 2.5Million per hour, which is decent even for mid tier trading.
Click to expand...

Ok, but how does that work?

As I've understood, when I sign up with a power, I get a few tons of material every half hour that I can transport somewhere else for a few merits, thus yielding a huge grind.
How can you spend money for merits?
 

Alex Brentnall

Alex Brentnall
Zelos1983 said:
Ok, but how does that work?

As I've understood, when I sign up with a power, I get a few tons of material every half hour that I can transport somewhere else for a few merits, thus yielding a huge grind.
How can you spend money for merits?
Click to expand...

You can pay to remove the 30 minute timer. It's 100,000 per batch of 10 so runs to 100mil for the 10,000 materials you need for rank 5. This makes it quite easy to transport 450T at a time in an Anaconda meaning it takes about 23 trips to get rank 5. For me that was about 6 hours which I did in one Wednesday afternoon just before the Thursday morning update. - Max efficiency ;)

I don't know about the combat side with undermining and so on, best asking Ziljan for that.
 

Ziljan

Ziljan
Zelos1983 said:
Ok, but how does that work?

As I've understood, when I sign up with a power, I get a few tons of material every half hour that I can transport somewhere else for a few merits, thus yielding a huge grind.
How can you spend money for merits?
Click to expand...

Check the power play menu in the Nav Panel. If you are pledged to Sirius Corp, and go to a foreign powers screen, you will see a tab with a list of their control systems. If you select a control system, it will tell you how to undermine that system in the middle of that screen (but only after you have pledged to a competing power). Usually, you undermine by killing ships that are hauling power play cargo for that power. When you travel to that system, the targets will be labeled as either private system security or delivery agents of that specific power. When you kill either target type you will now accrue 30 merits which you can verify under your transactions tab on your Nav Panel. In order to cash in those merits however, you need to travel back to your own control system and go to your power contact, and verify the kills via the missions screen. This is like turning in a normal mission at a station, but instead of doing it through the bulletin board, you do it through the contacts menu.

You do not spend any money to do this, except in repairs and ammunition. The only way to spend money to gain ranks in PP is by Fortification. This is basically just a mail delivery simulation. You get packages to deliver to various stations, which are limited to a certain quantity per hour based on your rank. You can pay to speed up the process by skipping the timer for each package at a cost of 10,000 CR per package. This adds up to 100M CR to gain rank 5. And then a maintenance amount based on how quickly rank degrades. They modified the decay formula recently though, so I couldn't tell you the exact amount you need to grind each week, but at most it's 50M CR to rebuy rank 5 every week.

ninja'd
 
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Ydiss

Ydiss
I'd personally not risk the data if you've spent months accumulating it, just for more credits.

I haven't died since gamma but still... I've come close a couple times and if I had months of data riding on it...

Whatever your gain, you can make that money simply by doing combat CGs and in a fraction of the time it'll take to do PP for the 200% boost. And when you consider that 200% is still divided by those months you took to get the data...

But each to their own :) if money is your only goal and you don't care about the exploration data then it's cool but it's still faster to make money through CGs and you'll keep all that data and first discoveries.

For me, the data is more important. If there's an exploration CG on when I finally get back, I'll head there to hand in but otherwise I'm docking at the first station I find, no messing.
 
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Zelos1983

Z
Personally, I don't want to get into combat missions with unsold data. So the 2nd option would be the only one for me:

Ziljan said:
The only way to spend money to gain ranks in PP is by Fortification. This is basically just a mail delivery simulation. You get packages to deliver to various stations, which are limited to a certain quantity per hour based on your rank. You can pay to speed up the process by skipping the timer for each package at a cost of 10,000 CR per package. This adds up to 100M CR to gain rank 5. And then a maintenance amount based on how quickly rank degrades. They modified the decay formula recently though, so I couldn't tell you the exact amount you need to grind each week, but at most it's 50M CR to rebuy rank 5 every week.
Click to expand...

So with my T9 (500t cargo), I have to do 20 delivery missions, with the break-even occuring at 100 Million worth of exploration data?

Edit: @Excalibrates, could you please change the thread title before I get eyecancer? thanks ;-).
 
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