I've been interested in Elite: Dangerous for quite a while now, and I'd probably be playing it right now if it weren't for one thing: everything is so damn expensive, especially when compared with the rewards. For instance, a recent video that Scott Manley did. He scanned about a dozen systems, probably more, and for several hours of work, he got... 129 kCr. That's about one decent gun for 20 hours of work. I don't know about you, but something about that just doesn't feel right. It's the same for this station building mechanic, the top three contributors to a new station get... 100 kCr. A tiny reward, compared to how much the materials would cost. Bounty hunting has some of the same problems, it's a lot of work for very little reward unless you get supremely lucky and face somebody with a very high bounty (and live to tell the tale). Add to this the fact that ships and equipment are so horrifically overpriced, and you get a system that, while it adds a *lot* of play time, it's not actually all that fun. I'm not saying that rewards need to increase, necessarily, but I am saying that the rewards need to increase in proportion to the equipment prices. I just want to fly my damn spaceships, I don't want to have to grind for weeks upon weeks to get good ones.
Stuff is too expensive and you don't get paid enough
- Thread starter ApSciLiara
- Start date
And was that through trade, exploration, or bounties?
I agree that the prices are highly inflated.
I play off an on for the last month and currently I have a total net worth of around 12 million. Most of my money is in my ASP and I am currently trading for my A class FSD (then my A power plant). I want to try deep space exploration.
I play off an on for the last month and currently I have a total net worth of around 12 million. Most of my money is in my ASP and I am currently trading for my A class FSD (then my A power plant). I want to try deep space exploration.
Lestat
Banned
Well It depends on the user setup and where they went. If it just close to the edge of civilization or just scanning around civilization that amount is about right. But if he had better equipment like Advanced discovery scanner and surface scanners and flying out where no one gone before. That seems kinda low.
Other things people can do is pick up cargo while exploration.
Other things people can do is pick up cargo while exploration.
Don't agree. The 'rewards' are well spaced. It's not a game you're intended to grind through for x hours to get to the end game.
It's not all about earning enough credits for the next ship.
Ships are expensive, weapons are expensive. Stuff is expensive. Everything takes time to afford. Welcome to the real world let alone the game world.
It's not all about earning enough credits for the next ship.
Ships are expensive, weapons are expensive. Stuff is expensive. Everything takes time to afford. Welcome to the real world let alone the game world.
Blackcompany
Banned
Absolutely agree. Prices are inflated for the sake of grind. Combat ships cost millions to purchase and outfit. Hundreds of thousands to refuel and repair. And yet, bounties grant you...a fraction of the insurance payout. Its ludicrous to think that, in real life, anyone would risk that kind of loss for the relatively small gain.
The biggest problem is Rare trading. Just did a week of this in a Type 6 and I can safely say: It needs to be removed. The whole game right now is balanced around the idea that this one (horribly boring) method of play can net you millions fairly quickly. Without this, prices for everything could be lowered. But so long as rare trades can net millions per run, the cost for everything will have to take that into account.
Much as I love the game, and I do, its built on sheer grind right now. And its turning people away. Something really needs to change and frankly, I think the cost of ships, and especially of outfitting them, needs to come down. No reason an FSD for a ship costs far, far more than the ship itself, really. Makes no logical sense.
The biggest problem is Rare trading. Just did a week of this in a Type 6 and I can safely say: It needs to be removed. The whole game right now is balanced around the idea that this one (horribly boring) method of play can net you millions fairly quickly. Without this, prices for everything could be lowered. But so long as rare trades can net millions per run, the cost for everything will have to take that into account.
Much as I love the game, and I do, its built on sheer grind right now. And its turning people away. Something really needs to change and frankly, I think the cost of ships, and especially of outfitting them, needs to come down. No reason an FSD for a ship costs far, far more than the ship itself, really. Makes no logical sense.
Viper cost around 1.5M to upgrade good enough to give a decent fight against any other ship in game. Not really expensive to get.
No need for Python or Anaconda, those are for people that spend a lot of time at Trading. It certainly is not tens of times better than your cheap Viper. This is not a game where you're supposed to rush to level 60 as fast as possible to see the actual content.
No need for Python or Anaconda, those are for people that spend a lot of time at Trading. It certainly is not tens of times better than your cheap Viper. This is not a game where you're supposed to rush to level 60 as fast as possible to see the actual content.
Trade rares for a little while. Won't take long and instructions on how to do this are in the forums.
I'd don't know what Scott was doing wrong.
I took a 2000Lyr trip in an Asp on Saturday and with a break for lunch and stopping to get drinks, I played for three or four hours, sight-seeing; visiting nebulas and found a black hole. When I got back from my 4000Lyr round-trip, I sold my Cartographic data for 900,000CR. Not as much as I could make in a Lakon 9 or Anaconda over the same time period, but hardly chump-change.
Last night I was playing combat in a Viper at Nijotec and was making 50,000CR every 10 minutes. Went back to Daley Plant to hand in bonds and reload.
I'd love to have larger payouts, but claiming they are too paltry and not enough to buy upgrades simply isn't the case. Just my Asp trip alone would have bought a Cobra with 500K to spare.
If you've reached Cobra level, you should be able to make a million easy in a short timespan. If you want to do it with exploration (and you can), use a long-range Adder which costs around 2.8M - a much cheaper option than the 6M Cr Asp.
EDIT: having checked Scott's video - the 129K was the first page of data! He edited the video at that point, so you didn't see what he made in total. When he resumed the video he had 4.3M Cr. Since he says he was exploring for 12 hours from 07:07 to 20:34, he made 2.1M Cr. I didn't see if he had a detailed scanner, but that may be why he made so little over time, because 2.1M isn't much for 12 hours IMO.
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No they're not. They cost appropriately for what you are buying. An F16 cost between 14 and 19 million dollars, an F22 around 678 million. A python, anaconda etc. are arguably far larger weapons platforms than a modern day F22.
Try a bad landing in an F22 and see how much it costs you.
If you don't consider yourself good enough to take on a bounty for fear of damage to you ship then you shouldn't be doing the bounty.
Bounty hunting is not intended to be a huge money earner.
If you think about it purely as a grind to gain credits and bigger ships then you are losing out of what Elite is.
Obviously the FSD you get with the ship doesn't but, if you want a better FSD then there's no reason why not to believe it would cost more than the bare cost of the ship
The only element of this on which I agree is that bounties aren't large enough. But I come at that from the perspective that destroying someone's ship should carry a fine equal to the value of the ship, not some paltry few thousand credits. It's not to do with how much bounty hunters earn but, rather, that there should be more risk involved in destroying a ship belonging to a "clean" person.
If you're the first to locate a new Earth-like planet, the reward should be in the hundreds of millions.
It should be a really huge event with a payout to match. There just isn't anything in the game that will ever make you enough money to buy the best ships, other than trading. Which is deadly boring.
Why not have some 'lottery winner' rare rewards?
It should be a really huge event with a payout to match. There just isn't anything in the game that will ever make you enough money to buy the best ships, other than trading. Which is deadly boring.
Why not have some 'lottery winner' rare rewards?
Bounty hunting can be very rewarding, especially when you start out and what's more... it is great fun.
A good run in an extraction site can give you between 15 and 30k per Cobra pirate. Sidewinders are mostly between 2k and 7k. I ran into an Asp that was worth more than 60k the other day. All these ships are doable in an (upgraded) Sidewinder. Between 200k and 300k total per run is very much possible.
Is a run an eight hour day for you? I find that I am lucky to find a 1k to 8k bounty every 20 minutes, and vipers are out of most eagles and sidewinders league. The result is a game with very few rewards for a combat orientated player. After the player gets a viper he might be able to start eliminating other Vipers for larger bounties, but I have been to 6 or 7 extraction sites without seeing a single pirate. I currently see a Viper with a wanted status every two hours or so if I am lucky.
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Really? Just go to nav beacons? I got 70 000 in 10 minutes. Shieldless wanted dropships that fly like Idiots and scream ''I don't want to die!'' when you shoot at them.
Trading is even better, and a complete milkrun. Piracy is a joke.
I have pretty much more money than I can spen, despite actively trying to not earn money. I think earning money is... not too slow, no, but too easy.
Grats. It is funny to see how many people claim to knock down 70k ships every 10 minutes. You can't even find high level wanted ships that frequently. There is so much down time just flying navigation to navigation beacon. Then sometimes theres not even any wanted ships. Other times you have to compete against other players for the kill. Other times they shoot into hyperspace. Then theres many of us who don't even have the ship to take out well modded vipers. There is also variations from system to system in how frequently ships spawn. People claiming 70k every 10 minutes, or implying it, are just people hoping to aquire some kind of recognition from other players at being good at a game that is 3 months away from not even being relevant.
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