CAPTAIN'S LOG: Newborn in the Galaxy
(An entry for new pilots from the eyes of a new pilot)
(An entry for new pilots from the eyes of a new pilot)
I have a Sidewinder.
It is a really small ship, albeit agile which can be handy. Doing "fetch" missions feels like KTR (kill ten rats) but I'm getting familiar with the controls.
I tried to kill a pirate. Can't do it without any upgrades at all. But I've decided not to upgrade this junk and go for my next ship.
[note: I got the hang on landing easy enough. Approach half speed and hit the landing gear before the opening slit. I wonder who designed this as a DVD tray -and why..
I hear people praise the Hauler. I tried it for a few hours. What a crappy pile of metal!
I got an Adder. Ooohh I got an Adder!!!I can't express how happy I am with this ship.
It's very agile, has 2 S hardpoints and 1 M, a bunch of inside slots and nice visibility.
The cockpit seems a bit like a Toyota Yaris -plastic and un-impressive. But flying it, feels ...right.
I have switched the "fetch"missions to retrieve cargo and blackboxes. A bit risky carrying illicit cargo all the time, but pays better.
I noticed the Adder has also a very nice jump range. So I decide to try rare goods trading 160 ly away and buy a fuel scoop. On the way I plan to scan systems and sell the data upon my arrival.
[note: white and blue "suns"(stars) seem smaller but the 'burn' is farther away. |Turn away from them as soon as the jump is over!
Rare goods do have great profit margins. The problem is they're never in quantities enough to be considered lucrative from my viewpoint. I made barely 90k after a 25 systems run. I think I'll try it again later when I have an Asp.
Kokojawa is a weird area... Everybody asking for slaves on my way here, and there are plenty here.
Made a bit over 30k just from exploration data. Now doing some small-time trading.
I have the money for a Viper, but I'll do some patience to get a Cobra. Compartments seem better.
I got the Cobra mkIII or II or whatever...
I heard sooo many things about this vessel. -I'm not impressed.
I have to admit, I hate the flatness ofit. It looks like a broken arrow-tip. I guess it's alright, but it just doesn't remind me of a starship
Stripped it from shields and weapons.Got bigger cargo racks and a bigger fuel scoop.
I found a loop trade route and I'm dealing weapons on 1 run and slaves on the return. 4 jumps run.
This is fast money and escaping the security officers is fun!
[note: Everything happens in Supercruise in the game. You find cargo and blacboxes there, you get interdicted but have a chance to escape it, and you circumvent planets obscuring your jump point if you are in supercruise. Faster way to do everything really. If I fall in normal space with security around, someone will scan me most of the times and give me a fine.Even then, my slave-trading pays better, but I doubt I'll get any faction love this way. The Alliance already hates me. Independents..mm so and so.
The Cobra is a disappointment afterall.... Fitting guns on it and the systems needed for bounty hunting (warrant scanner, chaff, bigger shield generator, shield shell bank) is just too temperature-taxing on this ship. I managed to balance it but still overheats like crazy. Beam lasers are a no-no!
Jump range has dropped to ridiculous 7,8 ly and I can't find a station with higher components.
I also fly it worse. For some unreasonable reason, I seem to bump on the station's entrance bars all the time! Even getting out of the station I once almost lost the ship crashing on the exit walls..!
It's so narrow -I have no idea how I manage this. But I have decided I don't like the Cobra.
I did 1 more long run to an Imperial system, about 180 ly away. Same thing, scanning systems on the go.I'm hoping to start fresh on a system that doesn't see me as a slave trader and raise my faction rank there. Eventually get the Imperial Clipper maybe. I like that ship.
Upon arrival, I was hardpressed to decide what to do next.
I lean towards selling my Cobra and equipment for a Type6 but everywhere I read or videos I see on Youtube show Cobra as the better ship of this range...
Sod it! I want to trade bigger and this won't do. So I won't do fights or exploring for a bit.
Wow! The T6 is a big bus with steel walls of coolness attached all around it! If Snake Plisken (Escape from New York) could fly out on a spaceship, he would do it in aT6!!!
I'm also amazed at how easily I fly it.I expected it slower, heavier and non-responsive.
I realize I fly it much better than the Cobra. I must be the 1st pilot to say so I bet...
I'm tempted to mount weapons and stuff on it and go out pirate-hunting. But, nah
Ok, so I have to think like a trader...A professional one at that. I found 2 web tools to assist me:
http://www.elitetradingtool.co.uk/
http://eddb.io/
At 1st, I just use one for finding routes and the other to find commodities when missions pay well at the stations. For a day it goes well, it just bothers me that I go back and forth mechanically because someone told me so....
I took an hour looking at the http://eddb.io/ and the way they think things through. I dunno how they drill data, and the way they combine it, but it seems to me they are wrong on many cases.
I state I'm at system X -station Z and they send me to trade several systems away on a 20 ly trip.
I don't have 20 ly jump, I have 12 ly on the T6 loaded. They don't care, they find no route for my speccs. Really? Surely someone sells and someone buys closer to me. -We don't care about that, we look for better routes. Sod it. I have to do some studying to be a good trader.
I open 'Systems' and start looking at supply and demand on the stations near me. Something is wrong... I have a headache and I'm still nowhere near a pattern I can use.
I switch back in game, empty my head....
- I need to find a trade-route that uses the pricey commodities so I have more profit margin.
- I decide on metals (Palladium, Gold) and I'm looking at a nice return-route good.. Medicines, Legal drugs, technology... seem to have some nice price stuff that when a station has a need of metals, it also has a supply of those. HA! Pattern discovered.
- I need a station that says "refinery and extraction economy dependent". That will be the metals source of trading.
- I also need a station that says "Industrial economy"
- I need a station that says" Agricultural economy"
- All 3 must be close to the system's star (sun) where I jump to so I don't waste time supercruising to reach them.
Time to test it.
My T6 has 92 tons capacity. But my credit isn't too much. I'll start with whatever I can and see how it goes....
I get Palladium from LTT-305/Lefschetz-something station and sell it to Zelano /Mueller.
I get Marine equipment from Zelano/Mueller and sell it to Zelano /Shavyrin.
I get Tobacco from Zelano /Shavyrin and return to sell it to LTT 305 /Lefschetz.
100k run.
I keep doing this as much as I can.Getting bored and sloppy.
[note: do NOT afk during supercruise! I had a small Sidewinder interdict me and was bashing his little pulse lasers against my class 4 shields by the time I got back. Chances are, I could be away for another hour or so and still he wouldn't have taken the T6 down. But what if he was a better pirate?
I have about 3m now (including the cost of my T6 and components equipped) and I'm thinking I need some fun breaks.
I thought to try a Viper. Seems like most pirates and security ships use it. Supposed to be combat ship,fast and worthy...
I equip it with best I can afford for pirate hunting. I go out and deploy HPs... Everything shuts down and I'm gasping for air! Back inside to change gear... 2ndTry.. Same thing! Again, I give up my best choices for guns and shields and arrange best I can the modules so my usage covers the needs.
Best I can do is 102%. Seems ok..(?)One last try.. Can't work. Systems closing down and the HP's are unusable. @#!$ this, I sell the damn ship and whoever likes it can use it
You'll never guess.
I bought a new Adder, again, equipped it with 1 class 3 railgun on M hardpoint and 2 gimballed multicannons on the sides. A warrant scanner. Shields, power, engine, shield shells..all class C or D.
A detailed surface scanner and a D3 jumper. A relatively nice fuel scoop too.
Started from my system and followed a random route jumping systems.
I jump to the system's star,supercruise a bit and scan the bigger, closer, planets, at the same time I check out energy wakes and unidentified signals. I kill ships with 'wanted' tag and /or warrant on their heads. And then I jump to next system....
I covered like 12 systems like that so far. Great fun! I also made about 240k in bounties. In like 4 hours.
Not as much as trading, but it's a good fun alternative. Maybe if I do the bounty missions (150k+ each) would be more profitable, but I think those bandits are mostly elites in Anacondas or Asps, or Cobras.. Whatever, Elites anyway. I don't think I can target my Adder's Railgun well enough yet to do those. Maybe later in a better ship.
For now, I'll stick to my trade route for money and take a brake here and there to stir the waters in my Adder. I call it "Black Adder" in tribute to black humor anywhere in the world and the T6 I call it "Plisken's Bus".
Today I equipped the T6 with mininglaser and refinery. Went to an asteroid belt. Again I cursed the video guys! The refinery has 3 slots to place ores to be refined.Each material type takes 1 slot.
And it adds a % (about 20%) per floating ore you scoop in. But those ores often have 2 materials mixed in (example: Bauxite and Coltan). When you have:
slot1: Lepidolite 60% | slot2: Rutile40% | slot3: Coltan 20%
The new fragment adds 2 materials that block your scoop, till you assign them to refine. If I refine the Coltan I still need to drop the Bauxite. I do it. The next rock I mine on gives Bauxite again.
I end up tossing away the materials I mine and keep 2 slots occupied with Lepidolite and Rutile HOPING I'll find another rock that gives them. When I finally manage to collect100% of a material -I have 1 Coltan in cargo... -.- this!I spent 2 hours scooping up crap and arranging refinery to end up with 4 in total(!) cargo of minerals!!!!
In the same time I would have made 400k trading. N e v e r A g a i n mining! Not until they tweak it so that we get more cargo out of what we scoop.
CAPTAIN'S LOG Supplemental
I'm really tempted to try the Vulture but I still need to keep my T6 until I can buy an Asp and equip it properly. This means many days of trading and the Vulture would have no way to compensate that profits unless I could do heavy bounty hunting or piracy...
But -despite what the guys in videos show- you can't always find the next bounty fast enough to make it count and more often you'll spend hours hopping around looking at signals
So I'll stick with my current ships fora while (maybe switch the Adder's railgun with a fixed beam) and work my way there...
PS. Some words are glued together. Sorry for that, I fixed all I could see in a sweep. It seems Open Office copy -paste here has this glitch.
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