It can be frustrating to go to a station and find ships you don't want there. So my idea is for there to be a new platform on the home screen of the right tab, called Ship Trader, where you can buy ships regardless of where you are. Maybe while exploring you could buy a ship and send it to a specific station. Thanks for making Elite Dangerous.
Buying ships regardless of which station you're at
- Thread starter WillDJurassicplayer
- Start date
I'd be happy to have a simple, in-game lookup tool where you can search for ships, modules, commodities, whatever.
It seems crazy to me that we have to rely on tools like Inara for basic functionality like this.
A lot of CMDRs just make Jameson Memorial their home base after they achieve Elite, since almost every module and every ship is available there.
It seems crazy to me that we have to rely on tools like Inara for basic functionality like this.
A lot of CMDRs just make Jameson Memorial their home base after they achieve Elite, since almost every module and every ship is available there.
Lestat
Banned
Trying to find what you want is part of the fun. Best way to avoid locating a ship. Do some Void Opal mining and sell it until you are Elite Trader Or do Few weeks exploration and you be Elite Explorer and you should be able to buy all your ship at the Founders station.
They're also third party sites you can use to locate the ship you want.
That actually explains a lot.
However, most people dislike unnecessarily wasting their time looking for something without any clue as to how to find it.
For once, we agree on something - the current system really is the best way to avoid locating the ship you want!
Yes. The fact that there's outfitting information only available in the journal file - items the visited station sells which can't be fitted to your current ship - makes things more difficult. Combined with the odd patterns in outfitting where a station will sell sizes 1, 2, 3, 6 and 7 - but not 4 or 5 - making it much harder to get a mental model of than the previous games' more linear "tech level" system.
As Rick6549 says, the system works fine for Colonia, where there's three or four systems out of seventy containing all the outfitting you need, so you can learn which they are very quickly.
In the main bubble it really needs some extra transparency.
I think the OP is after a way of buying ships remotely and then picking them up later. A bit like internet shopping for ships 
In case you are not aware, EDDB has you covered for most things - finding ship,parts,brokers etc. Commodity prices:
Inara is better for finding tech brokers as you can search by type - the one thing EDDB is missing at present. Also Inara is very good for tracking materials you need for engineering.
inara.cz
These amazing tools ( I didnt mention EDSM for finding places) are part of what makes ED such an amazing game - the buy in and contribution of the players. An they have evolved through open competition rather than been given by FD. I'd rather FD concentrate on the game itself and I'm really happy that folk spent the effort to provide such great tools.
In case you are not aware, EDDB has you covered for most things - finding ship,parts,brokers etc. Commodity prices:
Inara is better for finding tech brokers as you can search by type - the one thing EDDB is missing at present. Also Inara is very good for tracking materials you need for engineering.
INARA
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inara.cz
These amazing tools ( I didnt mention EDSM for finding places) are part of what makes ED such an amazing game - the buy in and contribution of the players. An they have evolved through open competition rather than been given by FD. I'd rather FD concentrate on the game itself and I'm really happy that folk spent the effort to provide such great tools.
This is where the Codex should fit in but doesn't.
If ship purchasing was more predictable, it would help:
- Power-specific ships should only be available for purchase within their respective power-controlled space (I.e. Imperial ships only available from Imperial systems).
- Top tier ships (Anaconda, T10, Cutter, Corvette) should only be available from high-tech systems. In fact, high-tech systems should sell all ships (apart from the power-specific ship rule mentioned above).
This one.
I've committed where I can get my usual ships from in the local area to-memory, but if I'm buying a ship that isn't in one of those places, I just look it up with a tool... and back in the early days when I was a noob, i just ground high-tech systems til I found it. Some of the problems are:
- Ship availability isn't tied to the faction who owns the shipyard, and perhaps economy or government... instead it seems to be instead based on the original superpower allegience... and then somewhat randomly after that.
- Tech level isn't visible in-game. It should be.
I personally don't want to see "any ship purchaseable and shippable anywhere"; strategic logistics matter a lot whether people want to acknowledge that or not... especially now we're getting FC's in the game (see my other posts where I've suggested ship transfers should be removed now we're getting FCs... but that's off-topic).
But I do think it's entirely reasonable to be able to look at a given station's details and be able to determine what ships are available from it, even if it takes a little knowledge of effects like tech level, economy and superpower effects.
It sounds like another idea to avoid playing the game. Next step would be to buy cargo regardless of where you are.
That's a reasonable comparison - recently fdev added market tools to help you trade in-game, but if you want a ship or modules then the help they give is
I was initially against the OPs suggestion - but given that the current 'solution' is 'head to Jameson / I Sola / inara / eddb' then you wouldn't be losing much from the game - and the CR sink might help drain some of the VO billions
I'm not saying that finding ships and modules in game shouldn't be improved.That's a reasonable comparison - recently fdev added market tools to help you trade in-game, but if you want a ship or modules then the help they give is
I was initially against the OPs suggestion - but given that the current 'solution' is 'head to Jameson / I Sola / inara / eddb' then you wouldn't be losing much from the game - and the CR sink might help drain some of the VO billions
I just don't think that removing localised ship markets from the game and making it something independent, would be a good move. It would remove another reason to travel anywhere, making some systems that can be special (that were special for those reasons), absolutely obsolete.
Speaking of Jameson Memorial - is just too perfect IMO. When you have every ship and module in one place, and with a discount, then buying anywhere else is pointless.
As for the discounts : there are places, where you can buy ships, weapons, modules at a discount. But somehow I feel that with mining overhaul this became more or less meaningless.
I really don't care if I can buy an Eagle 20% cheaper somewhere, anymore.
The only reasons for going after these discounts would be to lower your rebuy costs or to save some of cash to make the mining sessions last longer. But as you stated, mining have have made this a mostly moot point...
I do think that having all the stuff at Jameson Memorial should make it costs more, giving us more reasons to go around to hunt for the modules etc, giving us the option, do I want to be lazy and just pay a higher price for the convenience or do I want to go bargain hunting!
Yep, and I'd love the same thing for modules.A bit like internet shopping for ships
You can buy modules at remote stations and have them shipped to you, for the usual price and delay.
We can sell them remotely already, why not buy them remotely?
But they wouldn't be bought with discounts, just regular price.
Or have a ship parked at Shinrarta and you could tele-order from there, then add on the shipping price plus time as always.
Instant gratification isn't fast enough for some.
And heckling is the only thing left for others...
It'd be neat if there was an in-game thing where you could tell it to list unavailable modules and it'd tell you the nearest port where you could buy them. If they wanted to add some extra legwork they could make it only list stations you've visited recently or have purchased trending trade data.
The thing is even the out of game tools can't actually tell you whether the stations currently have the specific item you want even if it's listed as carrying it as an item because sometimes the station sells all they have in stock. Personally I think we should have a personal log of items that stations we have visited carry that updates for each station we visit, like a pilot might scribble in a notepad.