Oolite Bulletins

ralph_hh wrote:

I always experienced the starting phase of the game as extremely boring. While you are still not so well equipped, you tend to avoid fights completely, mostly be diving perpendicular to the main spacelances after a hyperjump.

That's maybe why it's boring! The game does now allow players to survive early pirate encounters: there's no need to go off-lane. I've found this process to be very entertaining (albeit in a different way from combat - but you can learn a lot of core flying skills that come in handy later, when you can start to put up a fight). Simply swerving around the lane is always going to seem a bit dull.

Which is not to say that I don't agree with you about better starting options!

ralph_hh wrote:

gave my Cobra MKIII a 100t cargo bay. That accelerates things a bit.

Alternatives: the "Hauler" start in [wiki]Start Choices[/wiki] or a [wiki]Miner Cobra[/wiki] is available instantly at Lave.

ralph_hh wrote:

start with a fast small, cheap ship but enough money to fill its belly.

Sounds like when you sell your starter ship for a Cobra Mark I asap and you will get back enough money to buy the most important combat equipments also. Your Cobra3 worth 107000 Cr in a replace so you can choose from cheap ships, for example a D.T.T. Wraith leave 7000 Cr for equipments and cargo.

Speaking of starting choices, I've got a variation on the "Fast Start" option which I'm tentatively calling "Modern Start". Essentially I'm giving the player these pieces of equipment:

• Fuel injectors
• Fuel scoops
• Scanner targeting enhancement

The logic being, these items would appear to be standard issue in other space-type games (*cough* e:d *cough*), so it seems reasonable to include them as a starting option.

Is it worth it, do you think?

Many thanks for the replies so far!

Last night, I finally earned enough money to do a ship upgrade to a Python. It already had docking computers and a large cargo bay option, but not the witchdrive so the first few trips were gingerly done, and only part-full hold due to the lack of money! Asset rich, cash poor.....

But I was able to earn money at a much quicker rate, and soon done a few upgrades especially witch drive. For some reason the advanced navigation thing's not worked when I changed ship, I might need to fiddle with the files to try fix this (I did buy it again). Since then I've done another parcel run and the number of cargo contracts available (due to the hold size) is much greater, if not the profit from doing so.

The gems/precious metals trade is a really good idea - I keep a spreadsheet of prices for all the places I've visited (I know they vary, but there's a trend etc) and I know the average, max and min prices for these. I've found you can only sell up to 127kg/127g at a time. So, on my travels if I see a good price I "sell", and.....makes sense... "If you're not selling I'm buying". Doesn't matter if its an above average price, since I can afford it, even 1 Cr/kg profit is still profit with no downside.

I've all but given up on passenger contracts - has anyone made these profitable? They always seem to cause issues and never really bring useful money in.

Now I'm off to further analyse the prices, to see if a 4-way eg rich-rich-poor-poor run can make more profit than say rich-poor-rich-poor.

paul_c wrote:

For some reason the advanced navigation thing's not worked when I changed ship

There are equipments which portable between ships, others are not, you must buy these again.

I think worth to mention at your stage that the main station is not the only place where you can trade in a system, even in the core game.

Norby wrote:

paul_c wrote:

For some reason the advanced navigation thing's not worked when I changed ship

There are equipments which portable between ships, others are not, you must buy these again.

I think worth to mention at your stage that the main station is not the only place where you can trade in a system, even in the core game.

Yeah I bought it again but its not working the same. In the galactic chart thing (button 6) I had lines between all the planets in some kind of map, I don't have this any more even after I bought it again?

I've heard about them....they're like little rock things you can dock at? How do you find them and where are they?

paul_c wrote:

I've heard about them....they're like little rock things you can dock at? How do you find them and where are they?

Keep an eye out for miners – usually small ships, in amongst a bunch of asteroids. Laser flashes that don't seem to be combat-related are often miners, shooting the rocks into chunks and scooping them up. If you spot one, there will be a Rock Hermit nearby. They are based inside large asteroids, and they'll be flagged on your scanner as a Rock Hermit, not an asteroid (if you've got Random Ship Names installed, they'll have a name, too). Mining is thirsty work, by the way ...

Alternatively, you can buy a [wiki]Rock Hermit Locator[/wiki], but this does take the art out of spotting them (and some would say makes it too easy to make money).

Disembodied wrote:

... you can buy a [wiki]Rock Hermit Locator[/wiki], but this does take the art out of spotting them (and some would say makes it too easy to make money).

Not much money to be made from rock hermits these days, I'm afraid.

phkb wrote:

... these items would appear to be standard issue in other space-type games (*cough* e:d *cough*), so it seems reasonable to include them...

What next... community goals, powerplay?

paul_c wrote:

Yeah I bought it again but its not working the same. In the galactic chart thing (button 6) I had lines between all the planets in some kind of map, I don't have this any more even after I bought it again?

Probably stating the obvious here, but did you try pressing Shift+6 to cycle trhough the ANA modes?

another_commander wrote:

paul_c wrote:

Yeah I bought it again but its not working the same. In the galactic chart thing (button 6) I had lines between all the planets in some kind of map, I don't have this any more even after I bought it again?

Probably stating the obvious here, but did you try pressing Shift+6 to cycle trhough the ANA modes?

Yay! Its fixed, I thought it was something I'd (not) done. Now I can plan my routes a bit better rather than guessing etc.

Things are going okay. I haven't worked out how to analyse a 4-stop round trip thing but I suspect it will never be as profitable as 2x milkruns because of the margins, I'll ponder over the spreadsheet later. For now, I've taken on a bunch of contracts and seeing a bit of the galaxy, I'm focusing on cargo and parcels, not bothering with passenger ones for now. It gets a little complex but I've been able to take on up to 4 contracts at once, and using any excess hold space to do a little trading en route. And the precious metals and gemstones keeps rolling in a little too.

paul_c wrote:

they're like little rock things you can dock at? How do you find them and where are they?

These are a bit out of law places so do not wondering why the positions are not so public. There are not so much explorer mission in the game, but this is one. The visual seach is not easy but possible, for example the main station is often visible as a dot right from the witchpoint (where ships arrive after hyperjump).

Thinking further, there are two places in every systems for permanent asteroid fields (and therefore Rock Hermits): the L4 and L5 stable Lagrange points works as gravitational traps, the rocks in these are called to Trojans. A nice OXP idea imho.

Cody wrote:

What next... community goals, powerplay?

Oooh, now there's an idea!

Cargo contracts don't vary the deposit or profit ANY for different reputations, so the only difference is whether you get precious metal contracts.

Gold/Plat/Gem contracts usually sees max profit bonus, so they are far more profitable than their maximum price differences could be.
You'll NEVER get max profit bonus on any TC contract hauled by a Boa 2 or smaller.

I tried to change that in my Cargo Contracts Mod...but that is broken right now due to market changes in Oolite v1.82.
I HOPE to release a semi-working fix for it before the end of the year...

Switeck wrote:

Cargo contracts don't vary the deposit or profit ANY for different reputations, so the only difference is whether you get precious metal contracts.

Gold/Plat/Gem contracts usually sees max profit bonus, so they are far more profitable than their maximum price differences could be.
You'll NEVER get max profit bonus on any TC contract hauled by a Boa 2 or smaller.

I tried to change that in my Cargo Contracts Mod...but that is broken right now due to market changes in Oolite v1.82.
I HOPE to release a semi-working fix for it before the end of the year...

Yeah whatever I did regarding previous contracts/reputation, has worked, because I'm now being offered loads of high-paying ones. Unfortunately I'm committed to a cross-galazy trip but once these have been fulfilled, I can wind my way back with gold and gems etc. Gets a bit head-scratching when you have 6x contracts at once.....but at least I've stopped worrying about making a couple of Cr per ton on milkruns!

paul_c wrote:

Gets a bit head-scratching when you have 6x contracts at once...

Aye... and when the clock's running down!