Engineers Billl Turner unlock is infuriating

[ochadd]

I decided to unlock Bill Turner on Tuesday. I'm nine hours over four days into the process and have 42 units of bromellite for the second time. I spent three hours the first time getting 50 units in pristine icy rings to find out I needed an Alioth permit when attempting delivery. Tried to gain allied status via bounty hunting w/ the bromellite in my hold at a compromised nav beacon. My A rated near fully engineered Anaconda couldn't keep up after being swarmed each time. Hatch breakers eventually got 25 of the 50 units before I decided to sell what was left. I spent a full night bounty hunting to get the rank up. I visited nine different large landing pads controlled by Alioth Independants before I received the permit mission. Now I'm back out mining another 50 bromellite in my third prestine icy ring system and just left for yet another limpet refill run. In the many hours of mining I've used 368 total limpets and found two asteroids with 18% bromellite. A few with ~9%. Using 3A rated prospector controller. I also forgot to buy limpets twice before starting to mine and had to return to a system two jumps away.

This has been my worst time in the game so far. It's been so frustrating. Almost a whole week and really nothing to show for it other than the money and increase in rank from bounty hunting. I did mine 1 unit of low temperature diamonds for a whopping $57k I guess

 

[Y nt Zoidberg7]

You can synthesize limpets.

I wonder how many people grabbed 50 tons of Bromelite, then realized you needed the Alioth permit... I was one of them too lol.

 

[Bunkerkind Anni]

i just helped Malic_VR a few weeks ago, mining bromelite to unlock that engineer

took me an hour in a mining corvette to collect the 50 bromelite.

are you actually prospecting?

 

[ochadd]

I did synthesize about 12 limpets. Each synthesis makes four if I remember right. That's all the components I had

 

[ochadd]

i just helped Malic_VR a few weeks ago, mining bromelite to unlock that engineer

took me an hour in a mining corvette to collect the 50 bromelite.

are you actually prospecting?

i just helped Malic_VR a few weeks ago, mining bromelite to unlock that engineer

took me an hour in a mining corvette to collect the 50 bromelite.

are you actually prospecting?

Prospecting like crazy. Never mined an asteroid without a prospector attached. I don't mine allot but I have done it for Selene jean. Using 3A prospector controller. The way I understood it 3A was as good as higher ranked A modules. As long as they were A rated they gave the same result per asteroid.

 

[Deleted member 115407]

Yeah, aside from maybe Jameson memorial, the whole permit lock thing is just a lame time-sink.

My favorite part is - after spending all kinds of time and doing all kinds of crap to finally gain a permit, you get to the permit system and it has a star, some planets, and a space station or two. Weeeeeeeeeeee.......

 

[Bob Lighthouse]

Haha, that sucks but I'd wager we've all done similar things at some point.

I used a Python and https://inara.cz/galaxy-engineers/
My only mistake with Bill was selling my exploration data to the wrong minor faction.
Planning ahead in this game can really pay off.
Also use the engineers tab in your right UI.
It has a lot of information.

 

[Kilostream]

....hours the first time getting 50 units in pristine icy rings to find out I needed an Alioth permit when attempting delivery....

Well, when you play a game made by a company that decides it's funny to include features such as Hutton Orbital, you have to expect traps like this!
It is a reasonably well-known and common complaint, and there are people out there who did a bit of research and found out the easy way - several Youtube tutorials cover it.


Just know that what you are complaining about is not shoddy game design, or half-baked mission mechanics - it's a specific tripwire that has been set for you by FD, and they're laughing their asses off every time they read this post, or one of the many like it!

 

[Ceekay]

Got about half the bromellite from passenger missions as it was a pain to mine although I'm not sure if they still give it as a reward.

 

[Daniel Cloudsifter]

Go rescue passengers from the currently burning stations in the Pleiades. One of the things the passengers frequently give you is 3 or 4 units of bromellite. Modular terminals are popular too.

I must have sold 50-100 in the last week.

 

[CMDR Corlas]

I think the main lesson here is don't go to a CNB with cargo you want to keep. That stands alone as your primary mistake. When you go in there with cargo, you're not the hunter, you're the prey.

It's irrelevant now I guess, but for anyone else who might find themselves in a similar situation, first protect your cargo bay door with a couple of point defense that can cover it. That will help keep limpets at bay. Then fight conservatively. Don't HazRES or CNB, go to, at most, a HighRes. Pick a fight early with something you can beat quick (if it's only hars fights, then leave and come back), as System Security ships start coming in, stick close to them.

 

[Tantrumus]

Well I'm two years late to this party.... mined my 50 brom...went to plot route...damnit....grinded ally and got permit last night and fortunately only lost 8 of the 50 brom along the way out of hurrying.... so used to scanning contacts for Materials that I probably didn't see my own cargo floating there after destroying the ship that used hatch breakers (I think.)

It really does suck how cargo works ... if ya have it and have to switch gears you are really really at a disadvantage. Wish there was a paid storage or something..

LoL...

 

[Vardaugas]

I went to a Bromellite hotspot, and blew up two motherlodes or three, then I had what I needed for the unlock. The permit unlock I bought with exploration data.

Guess it's all a matter of how you do it and how much luck you have doing it.

 

[Captain Slick]

i had a load of exploration data, and got the permit by selling it at a nearby station. forgot the station, but it's nearby. as soon as i sold the data, a permit mission (delivery) showed up. insta-permit.

 

[Bob McBobblehead]

I found unlocking Lori Jameson more infuriating because I don't really do combat. It was a agonising pew pew grind so I could get some extra lightweight engineering.

 

[Chaparral]

There are bromellite cores that cough up the mineral pretty quickly after the Alioth permit. I actually find Palin the most annoying because of the precursor unlocks.