Newcomer / Intro Is "Elite: Dumb" actually a rank?

[Annoluce]

Hi all,
I'm Max and I play space sims since a long time (wing commander / privateer). I don't want to say I'm old. I'm differently young.
I'm scoring my first few hours in ED. I have to say this space/trade sim is stunning, and I'm really enjoying it, deeper and deeper any time I play. So I'd like to become a better player.
The problem is that I'm quite struggling to rise even few bucks. Didn't expect it to be that steep.
I play solo and I spawned in LHS 3447, like many others, a lone, god-forgotten land somewhere in the galaxy. After some 7 hours of play, I'm still stuck at a mere 10k credits. I'm quite disappointed to say the least.
So, something is wrong or I miss it or maybe I should change my strategy.

Options are:

1. Trading! I've read any possible guide/walkthroug. "Buy low, sell high". Got it. But how can I rise credits with a mere 6 tons cargo, and a 7 ly jump range, in a system where you can get maybe 100/200 credits profit per route? This way I'll get old. Even that dreamed hauler seems to be unreachable for me at the moment. Not to say that any time I jump to LHS 3447, I have to space truck for 10 minutes to reach the nearest station. Sicking!

2. Bulletin board! Just "play courier missions" they say. Got it. Ok, maybe I'm not lucky or maybe I'm in the wrong place, but missions are few and scarce, or I can't afford them, cause faction does not trust me, or they are assasination missions where I would die in one picosecond even before thinking of engaging my hardpoints... So what the heck? I have a mission to deliver slaves which should profit some 20/30k, but I can't buy them because I'm a poor man. I have a mission to deliver commodities, but I can't buy them because the closest system where they are available is beyond range of my FSD!! Missions are miserably falling over due dates and I can't do anything.

3. Combat! "Go bounty hunting, or collecting resources in extraction points or whatsoever". Got it. I did not try yet, but what can I do in my loaned, vanilla, lousy sidey against those bandits? I would probably be shattered by the first viper out there in no time. It is quite hard. I've been once reduced almost to dust from a viper that interdicted me in supercruise, and I'm quite good at stick&ruddering, that's for sure. So is that a real option for me, at this time?

I feel a growing sense of frustration.
I understand the secret is to reach "critical mass". When you have enough money, money will attract more money. The more you get, the more you can buy, the more you can outfit, the more profit you have and so on. My issue is that I'm stuck and I can't get to that critical mass.

So what? Maybe the system LHS 3447 is crap and I should move on Eravate or other systems where I can find better missions and opportunities?
Should I insist in my current system instead and wait for random missions until I get at least a hauler to trade?
Now I feel like Luke Skywalker, working hard from dawn to twilight, at minimum wage and with the nasty sensation that this time Obi Wan will never arrive.

Waiting for your noble advice, Commanders.

Max

 

[willowfan]

Make the move to Eravate, maybe your luck will change.

re bounty hunting - if you stick to taking on smaller ships, other Sideys, haulers etc you should be fine in your unmodified sidey to get a few Creds coming in, just make sure you don't take on any NPC rated above competent until you have improved the ship.

 

[mistohise]

All of your concerns are valid. It's not an easy task to get started and it'll feel like an uphill struggle until you pass certain tipping points.

1. You can sell the discovery scanner to fit another cargo rack in. Some people prefer to keep the discovery scanner so that they can use it to explore unexplored systems and get money that way, instead. Yes, this still doesn't give you a massive cargo hold, but it increases your potential.

2. If there's not suitable missions, then you probably need to move away from your starting system to a less populated area. This might take a few jumps.

3. Try combat anyway. It is hard, but at the starting point with the stock sidewinder you have nothing to lose. If you die, you'll get resurrected with a replacement sidewinder. It's better to die now than it is to die later when you're in an expensive ship. Target the smaller enemies and stay away from the "elite" pilots.

 

[streki]

Yeah, bounty hunting will bring in some fun cash if you stick to killing other sideys.

If you fit a Kill Warrant Scanner, your cash per kill ratio should increase.

Or simply do some missions....they're not massive payouts but its regular work. The number of available missions goes up after you complete a few for a particular faction (as your rep with that faction rises, they offer you more jobs)

Try to do missions exclusively for the biggest faction in any system. Usually one of the factions has way more influence that the others in that area....these are the guys to work for.

 

[Hilight]

Hi Annoluce. Welcome to Elite....I know it can be pretty hard at the beginning but I promise it gets better and easier as you get a better hand at things. I'm primarily a trader, so that's what I'll see if I can help you with. The biggest single thing that has helped me along is one of the 3rd party trading tools that can make it easier to find good routes. Here is a link to the one that I use:

https://forums.frontier.co.uk/showthread.php?t=76081&highlight=SLOPEY'S

 

[willowfan]

with the stock sidewinder you have nothing to lose. If you die, you'll get resurrected with a replacement sidewinder. It's better to die now than it is to die later when you're in an expensive ship.

This is worth repeating. If your unmodified ship gets destroyed, the worst consequence will be losing any bounties you have not cashed in yet. So go nuts in combat, find your limits.

 

[VIPER2207]

Hey Max =)

i started last weekend, in the same system you did if i remember correctly.
At first, i had the same thoughts about the Hauler being a ship that seemed somehow unreachable. Now, after maybe 15-20 hours of playing (don't have time to play on weekdays, sadly), i'm sitting in a Lakon Type 6 Freighter, with something around 2 million credits spare, working towards the next bigger thing. I took the "classic" trader way. Sidewinder -> Hauler -> Cobra -> Lakon T6. At the beginning, it seemed to progress incredibly slow, but once you have enough money to completely fill your cargo space, it speeds up like crazy. I used the Sidewinder for trading until i got a Hauler, tuned it a little, and moved out of the start region with it, searching an area with higher profits. If you know what you are looking for, it's pretty easy. Trading is not a very exciting way to earn money, but it's a good way to get started in my opinion.

I also tried bounty hunting, i think that could also be an option at the beginning, i could kill the most targets that came across. Sadly, i have the "bounty-transaction-not-showing-up-bug", so i can't earn any money with bunty-hunting in open play.

If you want to, send me a PM here and we can do some flights together on the weekend, i think we could both profit from it, since we are both new players... there's definetely something you could learn from me about finding good trade routes, and i guess there is something i could learn from you

 

[Annoluce]

Thanks everyone for your answers. Highly appreciate you took the time to write down some advices.
I'll persevere. The more a lady is difficult to conquer, the more valuable she is ;-)
I'll also definitely give the bounty shooting a try. Whether I'll be sitting in a Lakon swimming in gold or in a Viper blasting ships, well only time will answer.

But for the moment: what is in your opinion the best upgrade for the sidewinder? I was thinking about FSD/power (to increase range), maybe lasers gimballed if I go hunting.

 

[Deathbane]

power distributor. Id argue its the most vital bit of kit in any ship.

 

[Annoluce]

Hey Viper! It would be indeed nice to fly together. Is that possible? It is possible to chat (via teamspeak or something like that)?
I'll be glad to send you a PM as soon as I undesrtand how to do it :-D

Hey Max =)

i started last weekend, in the same system you did if i remember correctly.
At first, i had the same thoughts about the Hauler being a ship that seemed somehow unreachable. Now, after maybe 15-20 hours of playing (don't have time to play on weekdays, sadly), i'm sitting in a Lakon Type 6 Freighter, with something around 2 million credits spare, working towards the next bigger thing. I took the "classic" trader way. Sidewinder -> Hauler -> Cobra -> Lakon T6. At the beginning, it seemed to progress incredibly slow, but once you have enough money to completely fill your cargo space, it speeds up like crazy. I used the Sidewinder for trading until i got a Hauler, tuned it a little, and moved out of the start region with it, searching an area with higher profits. If you know what you are looking for, it's pretty easy. Trading is not a very exciting way to earn money, but it's a good way to get started in my opinion.

I also tried bounty hunting, i think that could also be an option at the beginning, i could kill the most targets that came across. Sadly, i have the "bounty-transaction-not-showing-up-bug", so i can't earn any money with bunty-hunting in open play.

If you want to, send me a PM here and we can do some flights together on the weekend, i think we could both profit from it, since we are both new players... there's definetely something you could learn from me about finding good trade routes, and i guess there is something i could learn from you

 

[sjwk]

I started off with a disadvantage right off the bat - in the form of a 500Cr fine from my first attempt at docking, where I was trying to land in the wrong bay (in the training, only one bay was 'lit up', so I assumed - wrongly - that the only bay I could see marked was where I was heading for...). I nearly wiped my save and restarted, but shrugged and persevered. The first system I jumped to (and I thought I started in LHS3447 too), I was able to get something like 15k of exploration data within 5 minutes, so just had to travel 20Ly to cash it in, along with a few other smaller amounts.

That gave me some seed money, did some trading and few courier missions which netted me a few thousand each, but also spent time exploring any system I jumped into. Might not be much, but a few thousand here and there all helped.

Still not rolling in money, but upgraded the Sidewinder, now have a Viper as my general ship and bought an Adder as a larger capacity second ship last night to do some larger capacity trade runs. So far I've not really established any sort of permanent home, I'm just roaming across the galaxy, exploring, fighting if I think I can take them on with my twin-pulse lasers (some of the USS points have a single 'wanted' ship and several police ships so I join in and claim the bounty)

 

[Andovar]

Hey Viper! It would be indeed nice to fly together. Is that possible? It is possible to chat (via teamspeak or something like that)?

To chat in-game, you have to have a commander targeted. Then press 2 to bring up the comms menu. From there you can text chat, voice chat, add to friend list, etc. If you add them to your friends list, then you can chat anytime. (without having to see them or have them targeted)
You can try and fly together, but there's no guarantee you'll end up in the same instance. The upcoming Wings update is supposed to address all the grouping issues.

 

[TheThingIs]

I've had Elite 2 weeks now and have amassed around 12m cr so don't get disheartened. What I did was to make about 10k or so, then I bought a fuel scoop and headed off to the nearest planet that had rares in. Just search the forum for rare trading and you'll get the idea of it.

 

[cmdr lowest]

smuggle your way up to a hauler and then trade your way up to the next ship...

...and try to get out of LHS3447. horrible system. takes forever to get anywhere.

 

[Bragash]

When I started (LHS 3447 too) the system was so full of players that I quickly decided to just leg it to another corner of space. I put a fuel scoop in my sidey, plotted a route to "anywhere but here" and explored the systems on my way to freedom. After a few hours (and a few visits to stations to sell the exploration data) I found a nice system and had almost enough money from exploration to buy a nice little Adder, which I liked more than the Hauler. After that, it wasn't too long to the Cobra, and then a Type 6 for rares trading.

I'm sitting on a nice amount of credits and will continue to stock up on credits until I can savely (insurance) fly a bigger ship. Oh, and I kept the Cobra as a fallback option in case something goes horribly wrong and because I like the ship.

 

[willowfan]

Power Plant and Power distributor should always be the bits upgraded first in any ship.

 

[Big_Boss_77]

OP,
I seem to be saying this on several posts recently...but have you considered trying to mine? It's not fun, it's not glamorous, but if you do it right, it can get you enough credits to move up to something more entertaining. I was in the same boat you were, bounced around going from 3k cr job to 438 cr (yes, four hundred and thirty eight measly credits for a 17ly trip). I finally scrounged enough to buy a mining laser and a cheap one bin refinery. Farm the shiny, sell the shiny, look around for more shiny, wash rinse repeat. A bit of advice though, go to metallic rings, not asteroid clusters. Odds are a lot better in the rings. But if you can handle the slight monotony of shooting rocks with lasers and scooping up the crumbs, it can be lucrative.

 

[YDS55]

Make the move to Eravate, maybe your luck will change.

re bounty hunting - if you stick to taking on smaller ships, other Sideys, haulers etc you should be fine in your unmodified sidey to get a few Creds coming in, just make sure you don't take on any NPC rated above competent until you have improved the ship.

Well if you manage to kill a guy with a higher rank than you, then your own rank will go up quicker.

 

[Tazcada]

smuggle your way up to a hauler and then trade your way up to the next ship...

...and try to get out of LHS3447. horrible system. takes forever to get anywhere.

No kidding. First thing I did was get as far away from the starter system as possible (at the time that wasn't that far), but what I found was that if you can find a reasonable system with agriculture to base at (read The Harmless' Guide to the Galaxy for suggestions) you can make okay credits fairly quickly, and move up in rankings and ships as well.

I did find that I got interdicted more in my hauler than in an Adder, and even fewer in a Cobra, so upgrading ships is well worthwhile... and the bounties you get from killing interdicting ships is pleasant as well

 

[Cobramk3]

Hi, I too have only been playing for a couple of weeks and have lost my ship a number times. But I was experimenting with what would be the best way for me to play, tried a bit of trading, doing missions and a bit of bounty hunting - sadly, not too good at the "killing" game lol. Anyways, I restarted a new game 2 nights ago and yes I spawned in LHS3447 again - I think this will always be my starting point if save cleared. After finding virtually nothing to do (yet again no missions available lol), I headed over to Potriti where I've been using as a base, doing missions collecting "Black Boxes" and "Rebel Transmissions". While it's not the most exciting job, I've already accrued over 65k worth of credits and I've only played approx 6hrs over the last 2 nights. Not a bad start to my new career. What I will say though, is that while it may take a while to build up that bank balance, I intend to take my time and enjoy every thing about this game. It is Awesome. So, to all those who have been having problems making a little money, get yourselves over to Potriti. They need you!!!