Newcomer / Intro How to make new SCO drive more accessible for new cmdrs?

[Martind Forlon]

Imo for regular use of the new SCO drives (allows boost in supercruise at the cost of fuel consumption and heat generation) as they are now is absolutely necessary to get guardian FSD booster first. I remember that there was a ferry which each week jumped there and then back. Is that still a thing? And have anyone knowledge how in detail it work? (i.e. for example how long will ferry stay in guardian space before jump back)

Using google I found this info, not sure if it is still valid: https://elite-dangerous.fandom.com/wiki/The_Conduit_(Megaship)

... there are mentioned 2 ferry megaships, it is about one jump into guardian space and second back with servers weekly maintenance?

... my another question is, is there any ingame info which may remind (new) players about this ferry service?

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EDIT (with tips posted below):

• some ships have decent jump range even with C grade FSD like T7, Cobra mk III, Diamondback Explorer
• weekly (Thursday) ferry to Guardian area is still ongoing from/to Zende system (megaships The Conduit / Sadler's Song stationed at Zende A1 planet orbit; destination: Synuefe EN-H d11-96)

Technical info about SCO drives fuel and speed: https://forums.frontier.co.uk/threads/measured-sco-fuel-hour-and-speed-rates.624525/

 

[GroG79]

The guardian sites are not that far out.

I am unsure what a new cmdr will discover first:

• that the fsdb exists
• that the guardian taxi service exists
• that ranking up rebuys cause they are new is more helpful than gaining jumprange

 

[Dillon Fallon]

What would probably be of use is looking into ships that can manage with a C rated jump range initially. A Cobra mk3, for example, will still get 12-13 ly range with a 4C FSD. That's never getting you around the bubble in any great speed, but that's perfectly serviceable for short range mission hopping- which is what I've been using the SCO FSDs for.

Something else to look into is the T-7. It's possible to have a build that will jump 11ly while carrying 256t of cargo without putting much thought in to it. Again, perfectly fine for short range trade runs.

I'd agree that unlocking the FSD boosters is something everyone should be doing at some point, but I do think the compromise with the jump range can be made livable with until then if you're careful with your build.

 

[Ashnak]

is absolutely necessary to get guardian FSD booster first

Depends on what you want to use them for - and at which point in your CMDR's career. The ~11 ly @Dillon Fallon just mentioned right now (probably... although some would regard this as a challenge) won't let you win a Buckyball race, but would let you reach the vast majority, if not all, of the inhabited systems in the Bubble.

Regarding those Guardian toys - the closest sites are ~700 ly from Sol, and even an unengineered DBX can reach 35 ly jump range, a Dolphin 30 ly - and either is fine for tackling the Guardian sites. At a rough guesstimate, that's around 20 minutes of jonking - or correspondingly longer if you stop and collect some data for Cartographics and Bio scans. If you own a carrier, you wait longer for the jump slot - if you even can get some parking space in the target system. Engineered, you're looking at 60/50 ly, say ~15 jumps in a Dolphin at 45 seconds per jump, that's less than 12 minutes. DBX will do it in ~12 jumps, but would need ~1 minute per jump due to worse heat handlilng and the smaller scoop.

On a practical note, if I wanted to hitch a ride to anywhere, I'd drop into the Fleet Carrier Owners Club Discord and check out the scheduled jumps or ask for a ride. The two megaships that are doing the Guardian sites service are also listed there under carrier-trips-live -> Bubble>Guardian sites. Next departure is on 7th of May, 0700 UTC, from Zende to Synuefe EN-H d11-96 . Usually, in the past (haven't logged in for half a year or so), the information should be available ingame from the Megaship if you scan it.

 

[Planewalker]

Next departure is on 7th of May, 0700 UTC, from Zende to Synuefe EN-H d11-96 . Usually, in the past (haven't logged in for half a year or so), the information should be available ingame from the Megaship if you scan it.

Scanning the megaship and then the uplink does indeed provide an itinerary.

It is also correct that the ferries travel between those two systems.

They switch places on thursdays during maintenance.

Traveled with them a couple of months back.

 

[metatheurgist]

Whatever happened to the scheduled megaship that used to jump between guardian space and the bubble?

 

[aRJay]

Whatever happened to the scheduled megaship that used to jump between guardian space and the bubble?

Apparently nothing.

 

[CMDR Saigon]

I did use the schedule megaship some three, four years ago...it was lovely and on time...it was still working then. Not sure if they have closed the service since due to lack of customers and fierce competition from Brewer's FC leasing service.

 

[Martind Forlon]

Nice tips above, thx! Below confirmed that ferry service is still working, next jump info is announced immediately once you leave hyperspace near magaship. This ship is not scannable, travel itinerary is available when you dock. Onboard is also nice bar, cheers!

 

[Martind Forlon]

Regarding SCO drives: is there any particular pattern which station types can have those drives in outfitting? ... I admit that I used lazy way, aka Inara search, but still would be nice to know how to find selling points reliably via game only. (without Shinrata tip ofc )

 

[aRJay]

I think the suggestion elseforum was High Population High Tech and only in the bubble currently.

You could of course reverse engineer the Inara search results to spot the common factors.

 

[Planewalker]

This ship is not scannable, travel itinerary is available when you dock.

Yea i had been doing scanning missions around that time so got them mixed up, my bad. x)
AFAIR there are a couple of other ferries around the bubble too; i think one used to fly to the pleiades.

It is quite the cruise indeed. -good to hear you had a nice trip and cool pictures. .