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Elite Dangerous: Horizons |OT| Just scratching the surface

Sibylus

Banned
Is there a way to show number of jumps in the galaxy map menu. I see it has some functionality to calculate fully loaded runs, but then you have to back all the way out to see number of jumps?



One Courier can bring in the better part of 1000 units per load. Don't try to kill yourself on these in an Asp Explorer.

If you're going to do something that tedious, I would recommend going out to Sothis/Ceos runs.

A cutter? Yeah, no competition there. If I let those runs sit, where do you think I'm liable to end up?

Sothis and Ceos sounds interesting. Can you describe the basics? Are there legal missions?
 

Grief.exe

Member
29104633893_348d9c21ec_o.jpg


29437982430_71aafd3b56_o.jpg

A cutter? Yeah, no competition there. If I let those runs sit, where do you think I'm liable to end up?

Sothis and Ceos sounds interesting. Can you describe the basics? Are there legal missions?

Just fit your Asp for maximum jump range and cargo, then jump out to Sothis/Ceos region. It's about ~400ly from the bubble and the two systems are one jump away from each other.

Fly between the two main stations and stack missions that have you transporting cargo back to the bubble. At the same time, you can grab data transportation missions between the two stations so you can increase your reputation. Each mission will net you about 2 million credits, try to focus on missions with lower tonnage, that way you can stack the most possible. I was averaging about 18-20 million per run.

One trick I was doing is land at the station, grab all the missions, switch to solo play, which has a different set of missions, stack all of those. Then log out for 10 minutes for the station to reset, repeat, then fly to the next station. You get more chances of stacking those 8-20 unit cargo missions to maxize your credit/unit of haul, but you're also able to stack a bunch of the data missions this way as well. I've had a few data drop offs worth 500,000+ using this method.
 

Volimar

Member
A cutter? Yeah, no competition there. If I let those runs sit, where do you think I'm liable to end up?

Sothis and Ceos sounds interesting. Can you describe the basics? Are there legal missions?

The vast majority of the big money missions are legal. There are offers to snake in supplies for good payoffs too, but I just ignore those.
 

Hambone

Member
Sitting in the top 10% for the Fed CG so far thanks to my new favorite ship... the Type-9 Heavy, aka, the Space Cow. Nothing makes you feel more like a cosmic-trucker than this slow, lumbering beast. Plus, I play in VR (Vive), and this has to be, hands-down, one of the best cockpits (or bridge?) in the game. The huge field-of-view while piloting this ship is simply amazing in VR.


Unfortunately, I'll be heading out with the Small Worlds expedition tomorrow, so I won't be able to contribute to the CG anymore.
 

Grief.exe

Member
Sitting in the top 10% for the Fed CG so far thanks to my new favorite ship... the Type-9 Heavy, aka, the Space Cow. Nothing makes you feel more like a cosmic-trucker than this slow, lumbering beast. Plus, I play in VR (Vive), and this has to be, hands-down, one of the best cockpits (or bridge?) in the game. The huge field-of-view while piloting this ship is simply amazing in VR.



Unfortunately, I'll be heading out with the Small Worlds expedition tomorrow, so I won't be able to contribute to the CG anymore.

The Type 9 is perfect for this situation too. Only need to make short trips from purchasing the goods to delivering.

Wow, I didn't know that either. You're a font of sneaky information Grief.

:)
 

Alien Bob

taken advantage of my ass
Grats! I wouldn't recommend doing Sothis runs with it though. Even though the cargo space is tempting (200T aprox.), the jump range is not so hot with the cargo full. Around 38 jumps from Sothis to the bubble.

Well, you know, if you have some connections with a decent engineer, you can drop that down to 20ish jumps no problem.
 

foamdino

Member
I just got the base Elite:Dangerous last week and have started to get the hang of docking (hate outposts, love the original coriolis stations).

I'm an Elite player from way back on the Acorn Electron and BBC Micro so I'm in love with this (now need to save up for Vive...)

Right now I'm taking data delivery missions from LH3xx to whereever, then when I get to my destination seeing if there is another mission within jump range. I repeat this until I'm out of missions I can do (1 or 2 at most), then launch and self-destruct to get back to the start (yay free insurance).

I really would like to try some 'starter' combat, something possible in the free sidewinder - no interdictions, assassinations, fleet warfare etc. What is the simplest way to have a go at this (and collect v small bounties along the way)?

Right now I'm not aligned with Empire, Federation or Independent although I think I have 15% towards Federation due to the starter system I was placed in and doing the missions there. Should I align with a faction or wait until I'm a bit further along?

Finally, is it possible to trade effectively with just the 4 cargo space you start with? Are there any trade routes like in Frontier where some crazy religious group would pay you to take away precious gems which you could then sell in a capitalist system? Some back of a napkin maths makes me think that you can only really trade effectively between very different systems (agri -> advanced industrial) etc. In system trading doesn't seem like it would be worthwhile.
 

SmartBase

Member
Spent something like two months out there scanning shit and I got less credits than I would in a few days of bounty hunting. Didn't even get the Elite rank I wanted, no Jameson access for me.


Should've just stayed for the engineer grind and not miss out on those high payout CGs.
 

Reckheim

Member
For any explorers/traders out there with a single screen, try the below program. It copies any one of your current open screens and puts into the foreground even when you're playing a game.

Its perfect as you don't have to switch between screens if you're watching something.

http://ontopreplica.codeplex.com/
 

Mengy

wishes it were bannable to say mean things about Marvel
Spent something like two months out there scanning shit and I got less credits than I would in a few days of bounty hunting. Didn't even get the Elite rank I wanted, no Jameson access for me.

Should've just stayed for the engineer grind and not miss out on those high payout CGs.

LOL, welcome to exploration, the second worst way to make credits in the game! (only second to ice mining). You don't explore in Elite for credits, because it's terrible for that, no you explore because you enjoy it. If you want credits then do literally anything else and you will make them faster, and most likely have more fun doing it too.

Myself, I unfortunately actually like to explore, and that's why I have so little credits in the game too. It's not a coincidence... :(
 

Reckheim

Member
Sitting in the top 10% for the Fed CG so far thanks to my new favorite ship... the Type-9 Heavy, aka, the Space Cow. Nothing makes you feel more like a cosmic-trucker than this slow, lumbering beast. Plus, I play in VR (Vive), and this has to be, hands-down, one of the best cockpits (or bridge?) in the game. The huge field-of-view while piloting this ship is simply amazing in VR.



Unfortunately, I'll be heading out with the Small Worlds expedition tomorrow, so I won't be able to contribute to the CG anymore.

Man the Type 9 is such a beauty of a ship. I know if i bought it tho I would under utilize it.
 

SmartBase

Member
LOL, welcome to exploration, the second worst way to make credits in the game! (only second to ice mining). You don't explore in Elite for credits, because it's terrible for that, no you explore because you enjoy it. If you want credits then do literally anything else and you will make them faster, and most likely have more fun doing it too.

Myself, I unfortunately actually like to explore, and that's why I have so little credits in the game too. It's not a coincidence... :(

I knew it was shit for credits but two fucking months is a long time in a game. I still wouldn't have minded the rubbish pay if there was actually something worthwhile to see out there. I was even one of the first 100 people to get to Sagittarius A* back when the game released but at the end of the day it was just a scaled up black hole.

It's just as well since I had a busted arm and couldn't really do much else, but the end result is still disappointing. Don't think I'll be touching exploration again until payouts are increased.
 

~Cross~

Member
Yeah I mean you're connected to the server even in solo and the way the server deals with a sudden drop in connection to a client is just to stop updating all values on them.

I don't really blame you for doing it vs NPCs but in pvp it makes me sad.

All the people screaming about IMMERSION do to the instant ship transfers would collectively blow up if they decide to implement a combat logging deterrent.

And if I was in charge of Frontier I'd do it to spite all of them.
 

Pomerlaw

Member
Ship transfer will be limited to the bubble, right? I do hope so.

I would not have problems with it being instant, but delayed is still better than no transfer.
 

Grief.exe

Member
I just got the base Elite:Dangerous last week and have started to get the hang of docking (hate outposts, love the original coriolis stations).

I'm an Elite player from way back on the Acorn Electron and BBC Micro so I'm in love with this (now need to save up for Vive...)

Right now I'm taking data delivery missions from LH3xx to whereever, then when I get to my destination seeing if there is another mission within jump range. I repeat this until I'm out of missions I can do (1 or 2 at most), then launch and self-destruct to get back to the start (yay free insurance).

I really would like to try some 'starter' combat, something possible in the free sidewinder - no interdictions, assassinations, fleet warfare etc. What is the simplest way to have a go at this (and collect v small bounties along the way)?

Right now I'm not aligned with Empire, Federation or Independent although I think I have 15% towards Federation due to the starter system I was placed in and doing the missions there. Should I align with a faction or wait until I'm a bit further along?

Finally, is it possible to trade effectively with just the 4 cargo space you start with? Are there any trade routes like in Frontier where some crazy religious group would pay you to take away precious gems which you could then sell in a capitalist system? Some back of a napkin maths makes me think that you can only really trade effectively between very different systems (agri -> advanced industrial) etc. In system trading doesn't seem like it would be worthwhile.

The sidewinder doesn't have enough cargo space to trade effectively.

A good way to get started is combat, go the local nav beacon and start targeting wanted ships. The local security will help you out as well making this go faster. Turn in your bounties and collect the dosh.
 

Grief.exe

Member
This 5A fuel scoop I have on the Python is so nice.

I'm conflicted, since if I do two more Sothis/Ceos runs with the Python I would be able to afford an Anaconda.
 

golem

Member
I just got the base Elite:Dangerous last week and have started to get the hang of docking (hate outposts, love the original coriolis stations).

I'm an Elite player from way back on the Acorn Electron and BBC Micro so I'm in love with this (now need to save up for Vive...)
You can buy a docking computer. Theyre cheap!
 

Not Spaceghost

Spaceghost
This 5A fuel scoop I have on the Python is so nice.

I'm conflicted, since if I do two more Sothis/Ceos runs with the Python I would be able to afford an Anaconda.

Lmfao dang it grief.exe, you're making it really hard for me to not grab a ship with a lot of cargo and start doing sothis runs! Despite how not fun it sounds I think with a 100 cargo asp X I could probably have more than enough money to afford my FdL by the end of the weekend.

I really would like to try some 'starter' combat, something possible in the free sidewinder - no interdictions, assassinations, fleet warfare etc. What is the simplest way to have a go at this (and collect v small bounties along the way)?

Right now I'm not aligned with Empire, Federation or Independent although I think I have 15% towards Federation due to the starter system I was placed in and doing the missions there. Should I align with a faction or wait until I'm a bit further along?

Finally, is it possible to trade effectively with just the 4 cargo space you start with? Are there any trade routes like in Frontier where some crazy religious group would pay you to take away precious gems which you could then sell in a capitalist system? Some back of a napkin maths makes me think that you can only really trade effectively between very different systems (agri -> advanced industrial) etc. In system trading doesn't seem like it would be worthwhile.

For your best shot at starter combat go to a nav beacon by the main star in a high security system and just join in with whatever the cops are shooting at, Bring a kill warrant scanner if you want to reveal additional bounties on the target but only shoot if they are wanted in that system!

Also to trade effectively I would say you are gonna need a hauler or an adder which can have over 50 cargo space. They aren't that expensive.

Finally don't worry too much about aligning to the feds or imps just yet, climbing the military ranks unlocks permits for systems and certain ships though.
 

joecanada

Member
For engineering you can have one modification per module? So say you upgrade fsd to longer jumps you can't also modify it for shorter charge correct? I've got two Sothis runs full of exploration data to turn in so hopefully that helps a bit
 

Grief.exe

Member
Lmfao dang it grief.exe, you're making it really hard for me to not grab a ship with a lot of cargo and start doing sothis runs! Despite how not fun it sounds I think with a 100 cargo asp X I could probably have more than enough money to afford my FdL by the end of the weekend.

Ya I don't want to burn myself out or trivialize the game doing it, but there are so many things to grind up in this game I will always have something to do.

Might as well grind in a Anaconda :)

They're actually not that expensive considering I can likely pull ~50 million per Sothis run in the Python. Fully loaded exploration/trading Anaconda can be had for around 160 million, Python alone will sell for around 70 million.
 

DrBo42

Member
Are heat sink launchers automatic or do you have to activate them?
It's an active.

For engineering you can have one modification per module? So say you upgrade fsd to longer jumps you can't also modify it for shorter charge correct? I've got two Sothis runs full of exploration data to turn in so hopefully that helps a bit

Correct, 1 engineered effect per module or weapon.
 

joecanada

Member
Lmfao dang it grief.exe, you're making it really hard for me to not grab a ship with a lot of cargo and start doing sothis runs! Despite how not fun it sounds I think with a 100 cargo asp X I could probably have more than enough money to afford my FdL by the end of the weekend.



For your best shot at starter combat go to a nav beacon by the main star in a high security system and just join in with whatever the cops are shooting at, Bring a kill warrant scanner if you want to reveal additional bounties on the target but only shoot if they are wanted in that system!

Also to trade effectively I would say you are gonna need a hauler or an adder which can have over 50 cargo space. They aren't that expensive.

Finally don't worry too much about aligning to the feds or imps just yet, climbing the military ranks unlocks permits for systems and certain ships though.

The Sothis run ain't that bad. Doing it in my python is kinda tedious but I just do like one or two runs per week.... It's a few hours 4-5 say, but not bad in the scope of a week. And the computer seems to pick a different route every time so I'm already like 3 levels up in exploring just from Sothis runs .

The other good thing is because you have like 10 dropoff points in the bubble you get alot of system data on various areas... Good potential bases, etc
 

Not Spaceghost

Spaceghost
The Sothis run ain't that bad. Doing it in my python is kinda tedious but I just do like one or two runs per week.... It's a few hours 4-5 say, but not bad in the scope of a week. And the computer seems to pick a different route every time so I'm already like 3 levels up in exploring just from Sothis runs .

The other good thing is because you have like 10 dropoff points in the bubble you get alot of system data on various areas... Good potential bases, etc

Ya I don't want to burn myself out or trivialize the game doing it, but there are so many things to grind up in this game I will always have something to do.

Might as well grind in a Anaconda :)

They're actually not that expensive considering I can likely pull ~50 million per Sothis run in the Python. Fully loaded exploration/trading Anaconda can be had for around 160 million, Python alone will sell for around 70 million.

So how much cargo space do you guys think is necessary to start making good profit from a sothis run? The whole gimmick is based on stacking delivery missions at sothis / ceos right, not commodity trading? I can easily get ~100 cargo space on that thing and I'm only really looking to make 60mil over the next 2 days.
 

Grief.exe

Member
It sounds like this CG building the new stations will net us a new Sothis/Ceos area since they are going to have lucrative transport missions as well.

So how much cargo space do you guys think is necessary to start making good profit from a sothis run? The whole gimmick is based on stacking delivery missions at sothis / ceos right, not commodity trading? I can easily get ~100 cargo space on that thing and I'm only really looking to make 60mil over the next 2 days.

I had 112 tons in my Asp Explorer, including a fuel scoop and shield generator. Sounds like it wouldn't be a bad idea to include a discovery scanner as well, which shouldn't really impact your total cargo anyways.

I was able to net around 18-20 million per run on cargo missions alone, not including the data missions between Sothis/Ceos.
 

Volimar

Member
So how much cargo space do you guys think is necessary to start making good profit from a sothis run? The whole gimmick is based on stacking delivery missions at sothis / ceos right, not commodity trading? I can easily get ~100 cargo space on that thing and I'm only really looking to make 60mil over the next 2 days.


It depends on how strict you are with your stacking. The smaller amounts give the largest proportional payouts, but you have to have a lot of patience to fill your hold with those missions. With 100 cargo space you could make 60 million in 3-4 runs. Plus you make decent money doing the data runs between sothis and ceos while you stack. You need to do those anyway to gain favor with the factions to get the better missions.
 

Not Spaceghost

Spaceghost
I had 112 tons in my Asp Explorer, including a fuel scoop and shield generator. Sounds like it wouldn't be a bad idea to include a discovery scanner as well, which shouldn't really impact your total cargo anyways.

I was able to net around 18-20 million per run on cargo missions alone, not including the data missions between Sothis/Ceos.

It depends on how strict you are with your stacking. The smaller amounts give the largest proportional payouts, but you have to have a lot of patience to fill your hold with those missions. With 100 cargo space you could make 60 million in 3-4 runs. Plus you make decent money doing the data runs between sothis and ceos while you stack. You need to do those anyway to gain favor with the factions to get the better missions.

Alright that doesn't sound bad, how long would you say an average run is? From what I gather what you do is go to sothis stack delivery missions, then go to ceos and do the same thing? Do you get any return missions, or after you do all your deliveries do you have to manually plot a course to return?
 

Grief.exe

Member
Alright that doesn't sound bad, how long would you say an average run is? From what I gather what you do is go to sothis stack delivery missions, then go to ceos and do the same thing? Do you get any return missions, or after you do all your deliveries do you have to manually plot a course to return?

  • I actually never timed it, probably 2-3 hours total.
  • Go back in forth between Sothis and Ceos, stacking data delivery and bubble delivery missions. I usually ignore data delivery missions to Sothis mining station.
  • I never grab any return missions, they aren't very lucrative for some reason.

Here's a post I made earlier for a strategy on mission stacking.

Just fit your Asp for maximum jump range and cargo, then jump out to Sothis/Ceos region. It's about ~400ly from the bubble and the two systems are one jump away from each other.

Fly between the two main stations and stack missions that have you transporting cargo back to the bubble. At the same time, you can grab data transportation missions between the two stations so you can increase your reputation. Each mission will net you about 2 million credits, try to focus on missions with lower tonnage, that way you can stack the most possible. I was averaging about 18-20 million per run.

One trick I was doing is land at the station, grab all the missions, switch to solo play, which has a different set of missions, stack all of those. Then log out for 10 minutes for the station to reset, repeat, then fly to the next station. You get more chances of stacking those 8-20 unit cargo missions to maxize your credit/unit of haul, but you're also able to stack a bunch of the data missions this way as well. I've had a few data drop offs worth 500,000+ using this method.
 

Volimar

Member
Sothis mining can give good missions too. Sadly they don't have space for my Conda to land.


You don't even have to log out for 10 minutes really. I fly to Ceos, grab missions, switch to solo, grab missions, fly to Newholm, grab missions, switch to private group (or open if you're not part of a group), grab missions, fly to Ceos, etc. They reset in that time, at least for me.
 

Saganator

Member
Alright that doesn't sound bad, how long would you say an average run is? From what I gather what you do is go to sothis stack delivery missions, then go to ceos and do the same thing? Do you get any return missions, or after you do all your deliveries do you have to manually plot a course to return?

Kinda depends. I swear sometimes it takes longer to stack the missions than it does to make the actual run. What you do is go to either Sothis or Ceos, get long distance trade missions that look good (low cargo required, high payout), as well as any data delivery missions you have for the other system (Ceos or Sothis), when you have your missions, log out and then back in. There should be more missions to choose from. I do this until I have a nice chunk of data delivery missions and then go to the other system, turn in data delivery missions, get more missions and repeat until my cargo is filled up.
 

Effect

Member
Finally. In a Li Yong-Rui system right now and I can actually afford a Python when I factor in trading in my FAS. The problem is I can only afford it. Need to grind a bit more to get a buffer so I can actually afford the insurance. Almost there.
 

Not Spaceghost

Spaceghost
Was on my way to sothis to begin the shennanigans when I drop out of warp have my heat warning blaring all over the place so I jam the throttle and fly away. When I spun around to see what was up I saw this majestic site.

0D23926238EF429F3D9995E25CC910EE12BB80F0
 

Mengy

wishes it were bannable to say mean things about Marvel
I just spent two hours blasting cargo ships to pieces in an anarchy Nav beacon looking for chemical manipulators, and I only got one for all of that time and destruction. I wish these things were easier to find.
 

Grief.exe

Member
So the best bet is to take that Sothis exploration data and sell them at an Engineer's location to gain rep?

Thinking about doing two more Sothis runs and just getting a Conda.

I just spent two hours blasting cargo ships to pieces in an anarchy Nav beacon looking for chemical manipulators, and I only got one for all of that time and destruction. I wish these things were easier to find.

Is that for an engineers upgrade?
 

Mr. Bad Example

Neo Member
I'm considering Sothis-ing my way up to an Anaconda, and I was wondering--when you can't land out at outposts any more, does the mission system automatically rule out any destinations without a large-enough landing pad, or is this another one of those "Pay close attention or you're screwed" situations?
 

Volimar

Member
I'm considering Sothis-ing my way up to an Anaconda, and I was wondering--when you can't land out at outposts any more, does the mission system automatically rule out any destinations without a large-enough landing pad, or is this another one of those "Pay close attention or you're screwed" situations?

Those missions will be listed under Unavailable and the reason given is "Ship too large".
 

Pomerlaw

Member
My favorite discovered planet, real close from the bubble. I just love the green color, I wonder if it's pretty rare? It's the only one I have seen.

C50HPB7.jpg


And the brighest moon I have ever seen.

udmhng2.png
 

Not Spaceghost

Spaceghost
Alright this aint bad, just finished my first sothis run and made 14,7mil, I wasn't even being particularly selective with missions and I didn't really stack very hard (I only did one pass through each game mode to check for missions at each station),

But I must say, I'm impressed. I can only imagine how much more this will pay out as my rep increases. Since when I started stacking each was ~1m and by the time I handed out my data deliveries the missions were worth closer to 3.3mil.
 

Mengy

wishes it were bannable to say mean things about Marvel
Is that for an engineers upgrade?

Yeah, for the level 5 FSD mod. I'm modding my Python and Courier with at least +40% jump distance each. My Asp has +43% on it now, I'd like to get that a bit further too.
 

joecanada

Member
So the best bet is to take that Sothis exploration data and sell them at an Engineer's location to gain rep?

Thinking about doing two more Sothis runs and just getting a Conda.



Is that for an engineers upgrade?
I don't think you get a ton of engineering rep for exploration but I guess depending what you value. For example say you turn in 100k of exploration data to farsseer and you gain 20% rep, would that be more valuable to you or earning your exploration rank... As I'm not sure you'd get credit for both ? Maybe someone can confirm....

I saw a video where dude turned in maybe 50k and he only got maybe 1-2%


Alright this aint bad, just finished my first sothis run and made 14,7mil, I wasn't even being particularly selective with missions and I didn't really stack very hard (I only did one pass through each game mode to check for missions at each station),

But I must say, I'm impressed. I can only imagine how much more this will pay out as my rep increases. Since when I started stacking each was ~1m and by the time I handed out my data deliveries the missions were worth closer to 3.3mil.

Ya I try to stick to about 8-10 tonnes/ million $. But of course after refreshing a few times you may not be so picky lol.

Also keep an eye out for Sothis to ceos missions which can pay up to 3 million as you are stacking.

Also I'd just like to say again I find Sothis mining much better than other locations... I've stacked the whole run there without leaving before. Just logging in and out , open and solo . But this may not be true just feels that way and another poster here stated same.
 
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