Frontier, please enlighten me? Player feedback welcome.

I'm sitting with 3.2 billion credits and around 7 billion in assets, yet suddenly as I creep towards the minimum fee for a Fleet Carrier, it dawns on me just what the investment entails. 1000 tritium limit per full tank, allowing for around 3500 light years worth of travel, right? Tritium must either be mined or purchased, which both require substantial investment in their own right. Then there's taking the journey into the unknown, which might involve roughly 100 jumps depending on how far I want to go and in whichever direction. How does one guarantee their fuel supply, unless they are willing to splash millions, if not billions purchasing tritium and clogging up their free cargo space or just happen to know systems with ice planets they could spend a great many hours manually working to source and mine the stuff?

Shouldn't there be a much better solution to fueling your Carrier when there's already an upkeep cost to consider? They seem like an extremely heavy time and duty sink.

Any feedback on players who find them to be profitable enough to sustain without so much grind attached to them?

Thanks.
 
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If you aim to use your FC for exploration, you'll soon realize that upkeep is peanuts compared to what you'll be spending on fuel.

In the first couple weeks there was abundant cheap tritium, great times, you could fill your entire cargo bay with 25000 tons of Tritium for about 90/100 million credits which was perfectly reasonable. Then a couple patches ago FD realized there were too many players enjoying the game in their carriers and made cheap Tritium extremely scarce, which resulted in the cost of filling the hold with tritium to rise to almost 1 billion credits.

It's crap, but if you've been following the game you'll know there's always some kind of "fun tax" that has to be paid.

The good news is that once you finally filled the hold (34 roundtrips in a T-9 cargo barge) and you're a billion credits lighter, the carrier can go around 55 thousand ly before the fun tax must be paid again.
 
They seem like an extremely heavy time and duty sink.

As almost everything ED past reaching M-sized ship. It's fast and fun till you get Python/Krait size level and want to go further. Suddenly ships go into hundreds of Millions, outfitting single one can eat a Billion, on top of unlocking requirements. Then we have engineering and material gathering to actually use that engineering. When you're bored with Engineers you have Guardian stuff. After months of play, unlocks you can finally enjoy the "meta" - you have dream ship bought, outfitted and engineered.

And then FC arrive.

At first it was brokenly OP with all that cheap and easily accesable fuel. Now it's just broken with recent "fix". ince FDEVs acknowledged it's a bit of a problem we can expect some tweak. Give them some time, will see how it works.
 
I'm sitting with 3.2 billion credits and around 7 billion in assets, yet suddenly as I creep towards the minimum fee for a Fleet Carrier, it dawns on me just what the investment entails. 1000 tritium limit per full tank, allowing for around 3500 light years worth of travel, right? Tritium must either be mined or purchased, which both require substantial investment in their own right. Then there's taking the journey into the unknown, which might involve roughly 100 jumps depending on how far I want to go and in whichever direction. How does one guarantee their fuel supply, unless they are willing to splash millions, if not billions purchasing tritium and clogging up their free cargo space or just happen to know systems with ice planets they could spend a great many hours manually working to source and mine the stuff?

Shouldn't there be a much better solution to fueling your Carrier when there's already an upkeep cost to consider? They seem like an extremely heavy time and duty sink.

Any feedback on players who find them to be profitable enough to sustain without so much grind attached to them?

Thanks.
I don't think FRONTIER are listening here, certainly not communicating.

Exploration should soon be fixed...

In terms of financing.
I've made around 1.5 billion hauling Tritium even since the patch 3 meltdown - just keeping an eye on the markets with EDDB.
And also been able to make around .75 billion with missions and other income as I've been ranking up with minor factions in the same time.
All from the comfort of a toasty Carrier - aided with the 20,000t or so of commodity storage.

Get one, you'll love it and if you use your head you can make money with and for it.
 
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Fueling a FC is going to be fixed. It may not be as easy as buying 10,000 tons at 4k per ton, but it is getting fixed to some degree.

If you want to jump them like mad, then it will be expensive. If you want to jump and truly explore/map things.....then your cost will be offset by the discovery payouts.

Like others have stated, a carrier is a convenience, not requirement.

Once mining is fixed, Tritium will be a time sink and aggravation more than a real concern.
 
I know it’s broken, and it should be fixed, but from a role play/BGS perspective it kind of makes sense.

Fleet Carriers are released to civilian pilots for the first time, hundreds (thousands?) are purchased.
Suddenly Tritium becomes THE most sought after element in the galaxy.
Yes it runs out, yes the price increases ten-fold. That would happen.
Supply and demand in effect right there
 
If you aim to use your FC for exploration, you'll soon realize that upkeep is peanuts compared to what you'll be spending on fuel.
Exactly this.
I was worried about the upkeep before trying the FC, but since the second beta I realized that Tritium mining is the real pain.
Many suggestions were made but no players feedback was considered.
Tritium is the parking brake of my FC. I'm not playing the game since 6 weeks mostly because of this, and the lack of new meaningful contents of course.
 
I know it’s broken, and it should be fixed, but from a role play/BGS perspective it kind of makes sense.

Fleet Carriers are released to civilian pilots for the first time, hundreds (thousands?) are purchased.
Suddenly Tritium becomes THE most sought after element in the galaxy.
Yes it runs out, yes the price increases ten-fold. That would happen.
Supply and demand in effect right there
Meaney Dock CD-27 5409 4,405 -90 % 47,720 M 4 mins
West City CD-27 5409 4,413 -90 % 62,680 M 2 mins
Shipton Terminal CD-27 5409 4,438 -90 % 77,963 M 7 mins
 
I know it’s broken, and it should be fixed, but from a role play/BGS perspective it kind of makes sense.
No it doesn't.
Fuel cost and refuelling has always been a negligible activity in ED.
Why does it suddenly became the main issue with the latest content?
Refuelling a FC should be something fun and quick. It could've been the chance to introduce a new and fun gameloop.
But FDEV believe that FUN = GRIND so here we are again.
 
Ive filled my stock of Tritium twice since Sunday (with help the second time from other Cmdrs) but I have only 1000 in my deposit a bug cost me all of it, the second fill cost me 800,000,000 , and I didnt give a fig (only my lost rares from cargo) , now Im "stuck" like a lot of other FC,s not because I dont want to leave the Bubble but I cant unless im prepared to mine every 1000 T used and given the uncertainty of mining now (which I enjoy) that isnt happening yet.
 

Deleted member 38366

D
A note on Players thinking about taking a Carrier out into Deep Space :

  • make a plan!
  • crunch some numbers (Fuel/Finances), don't just aimlessly blast into the void with a Carrier
  • plan your Ships and Equipment, make sure everything is covered (a few guys ended up in trouble simply lacking specific Equipment and deeply regretted not taking something onboard)

Recommendations for things to get straight before Departure :
  • max. Range/Endurance calculations (Tritium) vs. intended position in Galaxy
  • Point-of-no-Return (Fuel) vs. Alternates (nearest Tritium Supply sources to intended area of Operations)
  • cost calculation (Carrier Services, Tritium load and purchase location, Upkeep vs. intended activities and payouts)
  • Mining Plan (fallback Options to i.e. mining Tritium in Deep Space, Mining Ship builds, a map of documented Tritium Double Hotspots)
  • any homework left to do? Engineering, Ship Retrofitting for Deep Space Operations, stock of Mats sufficient?.Carrier has Remote WorkShop but you still need the Mats...

Doing this and spending some time with planning it/thinking it through will ensure the experience doesn't end in a disaster and prevent problems popping up many thousand LY out.
With a full tank of Tritium, solid Ships and Equipment onboard and a solid plan in the pocket, the experience should be the best it can be.
 
I know it’s broken, and it should be fixed, but from a role play/BGS perspective it kind of makes sense.

Fleet Carriers are released to civilian pilots for the first time, hundreds (thousands?) are purchased.
Suddenly Tritium becomes THE most sought after element in the galaxy.
Yes it runs out, yes the price increases ten-fold. That would happen.
Supply and demand in effect right there

Retconning bugs ftw :D
 
I’m not confident FD will fix much at all concerning refuelling. It seems they have plumped for an excessive grind over something that might be fun.
 
It's always funny to see mining lovers and/or pro miners telling to people to mine.
BUT
Even if you like to mine, i'm happy for you, that's not the case for everyone...
Like it has said soooo many times there is a simple way to make everyone happy:
Making tritium scoopable ONLY in the main FC tank with a replenish time depending on star type (for deep space exploration we only have access to the first star if not visited).
Maybe ONE star type to make it more restrictive.
The ratio should be slow to still make tritium the fastest way to replenish and it will constraint people that want to jump often to use tritium often.
Limiting it at why not 4-6 jumps max per week.
The DSSA services will stay for explorers the fastest way to get fuel and the rest of players that HATE mining (i hate mining and i'm not alone) could either buy tritium from DSSA carriers to travel fast or just wait until main tank is replenished and explore during this time: like that explorers don't have to waste their time in mining instead of exploring.
Just to be clear: lot of time we see people say "you can buy tritium in colonia or in bubble". BUT why an explorer should follow a path that has already be discovered 😕 .
It's a non-sense. What if someone want to go for example in Tenebrae ?
Finding a solution for every FC activities is better to just make happy the miners that have already been pleased since FC update with 4 stupid patches (and we already have the 4th patch notes).
 
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