Newcomer / Intro Making Profit Exploring

[Dewar]

There have been systems within 20 or 30 light years of my starting area that are "unknown." Most have given me around 2000 credits or so, which I assume is because they have been explored before by other players. Moving out a little further (but still well within easy travel distance of my spawn) I scanned a system and it was worth 10k. I'm unsure if there was something specifically valuable there that made the price higher than usual, or if I was lucky enough to find a system that no one had scanned yet. Is there any way to tell if I'm the first person to scan a system and sell the data? Is there any setting on the map that can give me a clue what systems might be worth more than others?

Thanks in advance.

 

[Camio]

There have been systems within 20 or 30 light years of my starting area that are "unknown." Most have given me around 2000 credits or so, which I assume is because they have been explored before by other players. Moving out a little further (but still well within easy travel distance of my spawn) I scanned a system and it was worth 10k. I'm unsure if there was something specifically valuable there that made the price higher than usual, or if I was lucky enough to find a system that no one had scanned yet. Is there any way to tell if I'm the first person to scan a system and sell the data? Is there any setting on the map that can give me a clue what systems might be worth more than others?

Thanks in advance.

Certain stellar bodies in unexplored systems give better payouts. Stuff like Metal-dense planets, or Earth-Like worlds will give big payouts, along with black holes (I believe, don't quote me on that), among other things.
You should also keep in mind that (again, not 100% sure on this) taking the data further away from the scanned system will give bigger payouts. The logic behind this is that systems further out don't have the data, where as ones near it do, and won't want it as much/at all.

 

[InfiniteGremlins]

The big factors on payout are the number and significance of the discovered objects in the system. Just an ordinary star will payout about 100-200 credits, a system with lots of object will pay more.

Doing detailed scans (getting close to an "unknown" object, facing it, and waiting for the spinning scanning indicator to finish) gets you a lot more. Depending on how valuable the thing you scanned was, you can regularly get 1000s for systems.

I have not noticed much difference in price between different purchasing systems, as long as I was selling at least 20 light years away from where I scanned.

I have also not noticed a difference for being the first to scan the data, mostly because I'm not aware of any indicator that you were the first. In-fiction, I believe that part of the reason for this is that the navigation charts need to be periodically updated, since everything is moving.

Checking system data prices used to give a good preview of how much stations would pay for an updated survey. I don't know if it still does.

 

[Camio]

I have not noticed much difference in price between different purchasing systems, as long as I was selling at least 20 light years away from where I scanned.

Yeah, I might be getting confused with the rare commodities, though I thought they sort of acted the same in that regard.