Quick guide to infinite riches... and more! - improvements in upcoming update 1.2

[DanKara]

... And now think about what you could earn with a ship delivered, that has one, a dozen or a hundreds of jump beacons in its cargo hold.
("Epic Empire" becomes simple.]

By the time you had hundreds of jump beacons, you wouldn't need to! Seeing as you'd need 20 complexes to get that many. Someone needs to test that

Why do you think this has to be tested (again)? Recollecting those Beacons yourself can be tiresome though.
Why do you think you have to order HephCorp to build (self sufficent) complexes? 20 Build-orders yes, but placing a single station (for 250K) will do. The 10Mio-Build-Fee will be lost, but thats oK IMHO.
Though, going to Xtreme-Trade I might need those 20 (or more) open complexes...

[Sovereign01]

... And now think about what you could earn with a ship delivered, that has one, a dozen or a hundreds of jump beacons in its cargo hold.
("Epic Empire" becomes simple.]

By the time you had hundreds of jump beacons, you wouldn't need to! Seeing as you'd need 20 complexes to get that many. Someone needs to test that

Why do you think this has to be tested (again)? Recollecting those Beacons yourself can be tiresome though.
Why do you think you have to order HephCorp to build (self sufficent) complexes? 20 Build-orders yes, but placing a single station (for 250K) will do. The 10Mio-Build-Fee will be lost, but thats oK IMHO.
Though, going to Xtreme-Trade I might need those 20 (or more) open complexes...

I think you just answered your own question there...

I just did this with a Dolphin and 4 beacons, it totally works! Got me 1.1 billion!

And I found that invincible Kyoto in the end, it was in Brennan's Triumph Alpha the whole time, just out of sensor range. It had been there for about 70 hours! Not sure if I need to try and lure it through the east TOA or what I should do.

UPDATE: Did the same trick and got the 2BN achievement, this time it was the Paranid wanting an M4 in 11 minutes, so I sent my Elephant to Paranid Prime Alpha where the beacon is close to the shipyard, bought a Theseus and gave it the cargo (to give it the space for all 4 jump beacons), engine and rudder enhancements. Had the Elephant bring it over and sent to the ore mine. I waited OOS in an enhanced Mako so it would dock faster then came back in once it had and raced over before turning over the ship and beaming off the beacons Basically, any ship that can carry M cargo or up will do the job, in fact if it's small enough to be carried by another ship so much the better as it means no messing around with Jumpdrives.

[Jimmy C]

It occurs to me that using Beacons for these missions is even more lucrative than expected. Beacons are M sized. They can fit into just about any ship type. Which means, for any deliver ship mission, you can stuff one or more beacons to up the reward then reclaim the beacons! I just got two mission to deliver an M4 and an M5 that let me put 6 beacons on them, immediate 1.6 billion.

And Sov updates with the same just as I was typing.

[Sovereign01]

Beacons are the gift that keeps on giving! I'm going to be going on a major binge at the shipyards, I've already bought all the blueprints I had pending

I just did it again, this time it was a Scorpion Raider they wanted, gave me enough to upgrade both of my complexes to XXL. Suddenly the lack of accessible Nividium asteroids isn't a problem anymore and my Ozias' will be used to ferry kits instead.

[Jimmy C]

Found a complication with selling beacons on these missions. It is susceptible to overflow like selling ships normally. I sold an M4 with 10 beacons onboard and I lost money instead. You can only sell 7 at a time to stay under the overflow limit. That also means all that Nividium was sold at minimum price, boo.

But that's still almost 2 billion for beacons you can retrieve!

[Sovereign01]

Found a complication with selling beacons on these missions. It is susceptible to overflow like selling ships normally. I sold an M4 with 10 beacons onboard and I lost money instead. You can only sell 7 at a time to stay under the overflow limit. That also means all that Nividium was sold at minimum price, boo.

But that's still almost 2 billion for beacons you can retrieve!

Good to know so I don't pointlessly get loads more beacons, I've only got 5 in total, one is in use in Akeela's Beacon beta, leaving 4 available for this. I think I can get by with 1.1bn a time for now, I've done this 4 times so far. Each one brings in enough credits for upgrading one 50-60 station complex to XXL, I've found Heaven's Assertion to be the best one to fetch the kits from due to the shipyard's proximity to the gate.

I always offloaded my Nividium to the HQ at average price -1 and traders would show up no problem, went a lot faster once I moved the HQ from the ass-end of nowhere that was the Void epsilon to the Xenon hub. Of course with the beacon exploit, the pair of Ozias' that were my mining fleet and sitting idle waiting for the roids to respawn now find use as transporting upgrade kits. Because those kits are so large even the Atmospheric Lifter can only carry one more than the Ozias.

[Jimmy C]

Good to know so I don't pointlessly get loads more beacons, I've only got 5 in total, one is in use in Akeela's Beacon beta, leaving 4 available for this.

Getting loads more beacons is always a good thing. There's just no point in putting more than 7 into a ship for those missions. If you ordered another complex, you can grab five more beacons. Then you can put them in one shipyard per race, allowing you to quickly get ships for these missions.

[Sovereign01]

Good to know so I don't pointlessly get loads more beacons, I've only got 5 in total, one is in use in Akeela's Beacon beta, leaving 4 available for this.

Getting loads more beacons is always a good thing. There's just no point in putting more than 7 into a ship for those missions. If you ordered another complex, you can grab five more beacons. Then you can put them in one shipyard per race, allowing you to quickly get ships for these missions.

I've planned out my next one which will be a huge weapons complex in Consecrated Fire beta, I just have to build the TOA first so I'll grab beacons then. I've been using the Kogarasu Maru for ferrying the smaller ships, last one was a Caiman Tanker XL so I had to use a jumpdrive installation kit.

I've applied all the XXL kits to my first complex, the one that's making chips which was long overdue.

[Sovereign01]

I've been using the duplication trick to replicate the larger lasers for M7 and M2 ships, my Mistral and Geochen-filled Ozias' have found another use besides Nividium mining and upgrade kit hauling in that regard. The Split like me enough to allow me to buy a Pteranodon and I'm taking the opportunity to unlock and buy the special ships while I have the notoriety to do so.

The duplication of the various large calibre weapons and shields using various Pirate, Split and Teladi equipment docks has had a disastrous effect on my standing with the Argon, Boron as well as Terracorp and OTAS. I realised that with my standing with OTAS now being so low (from the highs of being able to buy a Sirokos and Astraeus) that grabbing a Boreas would have no further effect so I went after the one I found in Aladna Hill that was only escorted by a couple of M3s

Turns out that the Brigantine is actually really bad at boarding operations- not only does it not send all available marines at once, but the launching point for the pods is really far back, to make sure they hit the target they need to be launched really close and even then, the long cooldown means launching manually is a no-go so you have to use the piracy command. After repeated failures I went again, using the Pteranodon for suppression with the much faster Sirokos sending the marines, did it in one without breaking sweat or any pods getting shot down.

[Jimmy C]

The Shirokos is indeed great, but I find its not efficient if the target needs more than 10 volleys to whittle its shields. For me, I use the Cobra on the Akurei or above.
Helps that I overtuned its engines to just under the Shirokos at top speed.

[Sovereign01]

The Shirokos is indeed great, but I find its not efficient if the target needs more than 10 volleys to whittle its shields. For me, I use the Cobra on the Akurei or above.
Helps that I overtuned its engines to just under the Shirokos at top speed.

I need to decide which ship I'm going to make my personal ship and apply the upgrades to it, whether it's going to be the Kogarasu Maru or a larger ship that can dock small craft. I'm toying with the idea of using an M7 or sticking with the Pteranodon. Of course the ideal choice would be the Kyoto as that thing can also dock M6 & M8s, even though it is on the slow side.

[Jimmy C]

There are a lot of upgrades in this game, though you may have to cheat a bit to find them all. I've applied all the upgrades that were found in Xenon space to my Kogarasu, top speed is now 407 m/s. Then I applied enough to get the Cobra up to 201 m/s. There's still some leftover. They'll go to either an I or the Pteranodon. Maybe give the I enough to get it over 100 m/s and give what's left to the Ptera?

[DanKara]

So... wich M7 or M2 would you suggest?

Still looking for myself.
The Boreas has lost its edge. The Tyr though good looking - I don't like the slow firing PSP. And any M2+ is to big, slow and unwieldy (the one time I took a Kyoto against multple K I rammed a jumpgate mid-fight with my back).
What's left? Good old Shark? Not.

(For playerships I prefer the NMMC TP+ (Geochen? ugly but functional and speedy) and the Maru - both at 230 speed, never more.)

[Jimmy C]

So... wich M7 or M2 would you suggest?

For what purpose? In direct combat, I find that anything too big for the Koga or Hyperion, any M2 will do if you feel like taking the target apart by yourself. If you want to cheese it, OOS M7M volleys are instantaneous.

[Sovereign01]

So... wich M7 or M2 would you suggest?

For what purpose? In direct combat, I find that anything too big for the Koga or Hyperion, any M2 will do if you feel like taking the target apart by yourself. If you want to cheese it, OOS M7M volleys are instantaneous.

It shows how balanced the M7 class is when you look at the stats for the ones with hangars and realise most of them suck in at least one area, not least because most of them cannot mount IBLs in the forward battery hurting their effectiveness against other capital ships, the only one with a hangar that can is the Shrike.

The Argon Cerberus & Griffon Raider trade stats, the former has greater shield and laser capacity/recharge/number of guns but the latter has better shield regeneration and is faster but cannot mount IBLs anywhere.
The OTAS Astraeus has good shields, can use Plasma Beam & Gauss Cannons but has an incredibly tiny cargo bay.
The Split Panther Raider has the smallest laser generator, second weakest shields and third smallest cargo bay, cannot use IBLs, but has the largest hangar and is the second-fastest.
The Yaki Akurei if it's not last it's second last in terms of shields, lasers and hangar size.
The Paranid Deimos can mount PSGs, has a good laser generator and is well-shielded but is one of the slowest.
The Teladi Shrike is well-shielded but has one of the smallest laser generators, can mount IBLs up front, Gauss Cannons on the sides and the largest cargo bay but is the slowest.

The M2s only have 4 options with hangars and 2 of them are Terran so it's either Boron or Split with very different loadouts.

[BrigandPhantos77]

So... wich M7 or M2 would you suggest?

For what purpose? In direct combat, I find that anything too big for the Koga or Hyperion, any M2 will do if you feel like taking the target apart by yourself. If you want to cheese it, OOS M7M volleys are instantaneous.

Any bomber is also great OOS. The Tomahawks are 3rd place for highest damage overall. When a J appears, I send my bomber. Then command it to fly in the opposite direction of the J while ordering missile barrages.

So I decided to test the combat effectiveness of "in-system" combat on Hatikavahs Faith with my fleet, just to see what would happen. The fleet consisted of Megalodon, Titan, Cobra and Kraken, and me personally in a Thresher. Opposing force: Brigantine, Condor, Mobile Pirate Station x 2. So I launched a barrage from both the Kraken and Cobra. One at each of the opposing capital ships. Over 200 flail missiles launched simultaneous from each missile frigate. This is the first time I ever saw my system go into sudden death lag. Kind of amusing. When I looked at both ships both were now into hull damage. After the missile strike's finish my titan was getting close enough to hit the Brigantine with it's front firing arc. It didn't last long. So I turned my attention to my Kraken and decided to take my chances of capping the Condor. So I ordered a barrage of "boarding pods" loaded with marines. Next I hear is "heading to the target". I look and the marines were beginning a space walk from 15 km away from the condor. Then I see the missiles. So instead of firing boarding pods, it actually fired a swarm of hammer torpedoes at the Condor. That didn't end well. lol.... Condor went from 80% hull to exploding in less than 3.1 seconds as all the torpedoes hit there mark. *(%%$^$$ was my verbal remark. Probably more like "you **** **** piece of "bleep" *** h*** AI not firing your *** ***** correct beep beep beep" you get the point.

Sooo..... I am swiftly coming to the conclusion that everything has been changed to make these operations as frustrating as possible. Thankfully I did save before starting the operation so I can retry again. Teladi should not be donating M1s too the pirates. I will take it from them.

Me thinks the software was designed by a Teladi buzzard? And me thinks that buzzard is following the rules of acquisition.

[DanKara]

... So instead of firing boarding pods, it actually fired a swarm of hammer torpedoes at the Condor. That didn't end well. lol.... Condor went from 80% hull to exploding in less than 3.1 seconds as all the torpedoes hit there mark. *(%%$^$$ was my verbal remark. Probably more like "you **** **** piece of "bleep" *** h*** AI not firing your *** ***** correct beep beep beep" you get the point.

Hehe ... I feel you. When I do something stupid (sorry mean suboptimal) like that I most likely need a break to calm myself.

I never considered anything ammunition- or missile-based as of good use for me. The infrastructure and/or logistics involved isn't quite the thing for me (jumpfuel gives me enough trouble already). So for now I am eyeing a Titan or Odysseus or Python for personal use (against multiple M2/M1). For everything else I''ll stay in the Maru...

[BrigandPhantos77]

Nividium Selling Update!!!!

Soo this never entered my mind previously, but I discovered a better way to offload Nividium than the PHQ. And you will make a 50% more than selling it at the PHQ.

My PHQ is located in Greef Reef Alpha, which is fine and dandy. No problems getting most of the mineral traders to come. Sorry Split / Paranid, those Military Hydra's keep blowing you up.

It dawned on me last night while per-rusing the bartering menu at the Boron Trade Station in Dark Waters. Merchants "BUY" nividium too.

And the price they offer changes based upon quantity being sold. Meaning if you give them the amount they want, you can get 24k per unit instead of 16k at PHQ. You'll have to search for these guys at different trading stations, but selling 4000 units net me about 100 million credits. Directly into my account instead of through the PHQ.

[Sovereign01]

It's probably just as well that I have the beacon exploit available as a source of credits as the Nividium asteroids have stopped respawning. My mining ships still find use for weapon duplicating, though currently the Boron hate me so I can't duplicate their ion weapons just yet even though I do have the plans for the Ion Cannon factory. In fact they hate me so much I thought "what the hell" and boarded one of the two Megalodons they had stationed in Rolk's legacy, given it couldn't get any worse. I'll probably grab the second before trying to rebuild my notoriety, once some more marines train. I had to bring along 5 maxed ones last time otherwise the 10 normal ones would get wiped out if they went by themselves, the extra experience is wasted on those with 100 combat. Still, I'm in no hurry

[BrigandPhantos77]

It's probably just as well that I have the beacon exploit available as a source of credits as the Nividium asteroids have stopped respawning. My mining ships still find use for weapon duplicating, though currently the Boron hate me so I can't duplicate their ion weapons just yet even though I do have the plans for the Ion Cannon factory. In fact they hate me so much I thought "what the hell" and boarded one of the two Megalodons they had stationed in Rolk's legacy, given it couldn't get any worse. I'll probably grab the second before trying to rebuild my notoriety, once some more marines train. I had to bring along 5 maxed ones last time otherwise the 10 normal ones would get wiped out if they went by themselves, the extra experience is wasted on those with 100 combat. Still, I'm in no hurry

They'll respawn eventually. They just respawn quicker if you pop them personally. I've depleted Unclaimed Sector near Getsu Fune twice only ever having used automated mining. Perpetual Sin was different. Broke 2 with Hornet Missiles, the last was done automated. It also was the last and took forever to respawn unlike the 1st 2. But it did eventually.

I'm still getting the hang of boarding operations. I got my eye on Hatikvahs Faith still. Kraken loaded with 28 marines fully trained (except combat). A Cobra waiting for it's compliment (18 with 10 to go) as well. 37 personnel awaiting completion of training at my own Marine Training Barracks. And 40+ in Aladna Hill undergoing training as well. Yea I got a ton and I am dragging my feet in the process. Hoping to have lot's of spare marines.

What did you use to take the Mega? I'm thinking of jumping into the Kraken personally to take my next 2 targets. I successfully acquired/borrowed from Terracorp the Jump Drive Installation Kits for my docks. Took 4 tries to get.

Soooo I must have gotten really lucky with that station. All the merchants are only asking for 1 Nividium now. This is gonna be more of a pain than I thought. Wish they weren't soo random. But "meh" oh well. On the flip side, I have seen a lot wanting 1 focus crystal and 1 quantum processor. Keeping fingers crossed that I will see those for sale at one. If even just 1 at a time, that would leave hope. And every (faction) station at least has bartering. Wish me luck.