Earning money

[paul_c]

...Well not real money, but the money in the game...

After a childhood fascination with an Acorn Electron (and other computers), and a fond memory of Elite, it was only a matter of time before I got into searching out an emulation or similar thing....and I'm delighted to have stumbled on Oolite!

I've been playing it the past couple of days, and I've kinda got the hang of driving the ship, docking, navigation etc. I'm not too good at combat, I always seem to lose and 9 times out of 10, end up dead (once I managed to fight/outrun them). I have added a bunch of stuff to the existing ship, mainly just to see what it does, but what I'm really after is a bigger ship.

I enjoy more the trading/courier side of the game. The prices fascinate me and I love eeking out the most profitable way to do stuff. Anyway, after searching on here and doing the Leesti-Diso trade for a bit, I went exploring and during that time, I tabulated the prices of planets/worlds as I went along. And I figured out that by choosing 2 planets, then doing a price comparison of all the items, you can see which one is the most profitable to buy-sell. And also you can quantify it, by working out the "profit per ton" by looking at the max and min (max negative..) price difference. I know the prices vary, but there is a trend there and I keep my little spreadsheet updated with the most recent prices, and keep track of the averages too. Anyway..... I stumbled upon Aona-Biramibi which offers excellent prospects of £63/ton including the "backhaul", trading computers and furs. Sometimes the price of fur varies and its worth buying liquor/wines instead but not much. I soon upgraded the cargo area to 35t so that means by round trip earns £2000+.

However.....the ship I want, costs +£100,000 or so trade in, so its going to be a boring slog to earn the money there.

So I looked at contracts - the cargo ones seem to mostly be for bigger than I can carry (and making 2 trips would not get it in time...) and the parcel ones seem alright but there's little money in it. I looked around on here and gather that once you get a good reputation, more contracts become offered but it seems to be very hit and miss - I reckon I make more money on by boring/uneventful milkrun Aona-Biramibi. Is seems like the chicken-egg situation - I need a bigger ship to make more money....but I need more money to get the bigger ship.

Also I had a spot of trouble with a contract where I had to go through a feudal state, I died 3 times (thanks auto-save!) and gave up and went round - resulting in a missed deadline for a passenger delivery. Will these dent my reputation??

Any other tips for making money quicker?

[Disembodied]

Hi Paul, welcome to the boards! As your reputation goes up, you will be offered better - often much better - contracts, with serious money up for grabs if you work your way up to it (missing deadlines will dent your reputation, yes - although I think that courier, cargo and passenger reputations are separate things). Higher prices often mean higher risks, too, so be careful, what you choose, until your ship and your skills are up to the task.

Two other ways of making good money. The easy one is first: trade in precious metals and gems, as well as cargo. The profit-per-unit isn't dramatically high (it's much better if you're buying them from Rock Hermits, although they don't usually have big volumes for sale), but you can stock up a lot of gold, platinum and gems, bought at low prices, and then cash in when you find a world offering top dollar.

The second one is not so easy, but a lot more fun: get good at combat, and start picking on pirates. The bounties aren't anything to write home about, but the profit margin on some other sucker's cargo is 100%. Pirates can often carry decent quantities of shiny things, too. Nothing like descending on an Anarchy system with an empty hold and an acquisitive nature!

You can even turn pirate yourself, and steal indiscriminately - but there's a lot more hassle. The wages of sin is death (although they do say that the hourly rate is good ...).

[Cody]

Welcome aboard, Commander! Yeah, Oolite can be tough at the start - but do persevere, especially with the parcel contracts.
If you become good enough, they can become very lucrative. I'm currently carrying parcels worth over 100,000 Cr in total.

[Smivs]

Hi, and welcome.
Accumulating wealth does take time, doesn't it? As you've found, identifying the milk-runs is the normal way, and sometimes parcel contracts and passenger contracts can work well also, but be wary of the courier work - some of the contracts look too good to be true and there is a good reason for that!
A few suggestions.
Always have a few TC spare space in the hold. Assuming you have scoops you can look for and rescue Escape Capsules which sometimes have good insurance payouts, and also grab any cargo you come across - this is essentially free money.
Also, if you plan on trading up, maybe don't spend too much upgrading the ship you have. Just get the essentials like the scoops and fuel injectors. If you largely avoid high-stress combat situations consider whether you need shield boosters and energy units. Most around here will say you do, but that cash in the bank will bring your new ship nearer.
The bigger ship will come in time, but just accept that it will take a while and enjoy the trading you are doing.
Also, as a final word, once you have the big ship and have equipped it, what then? You will be making more money than ever, faster than ever, and will find that there is a point when you have more than you know what to do with. This is a 'problem' that is often discussed around here.
My point is, the early days when you are building up your funds and sorting out your ship are among the best you will have playing this game. Enjoy it, and don't rush.
<pedantic mode> Oh, and it's Cr not £ </pedantic mode>

[ocz]

Welcome to the forum, even if I'm quite new around here, too.

I've been playing it the past couple of days, and I've kinda got the hang of driving the ship, docking, navigation etc.[...]

On that note. Docking Computers. Chances are you already bought one, but in case you didn't...do it! You'll save so much real world time, simply by pressing shift+c.

[...]I'm not too good at combat, I always seem to lose and 9 times out of 10, end up dead (once I managed to fight/outrun them).[...]

Question: Do you play only using the keyboard? It definitely sounds like you do. Maybe you want to play it hardcore style, as authentically as possible, but if you're really having such a hard time killing those guys, you should consider using a joystick/gamepad. At first I tried using the keyboard controls alone and it was a mess. Now I play oolite with a  PS2-like usb-gamepad (Mine is a Saitek P580) I bought for around 12€? years ago. MUCH BETTER. (My cobraMKIII with a standard Laser vs. 1xFer-de-Lance 2xSidewinder 1xMamba? It takes some time, but is no problem. Only missles are a problem. But with an ECM, no sweat there anymore.) You should consider getting an inexpensive one, too. Somewhere from around the block. Just make sure it has at least one, better two analog sticks and a d-pad.
In my case I configured the left stick for pitching and yawing, and rolling on the horizontal axis of the right one. (Would love to put accelerating/breaking on that one too, but it matches speed to the position of the stick. Da horror. It's on the d-pad instead.) Just saying, I worked wonders for me.

[...] - I reckon I make more money on by boring/uneventful milkrun Aona-Biramibi. [...]

Jupp, that's the fastest way to make money to max outfit your ship IMO. Just don't bother buying the military shield upgrade. (Again just my opinion.) Much more expensive than the regular one and adds the same amount of shield power. That alone wouldn't be so bad, but it's also the first thing to break and it costs a fortune to repair. And in the next big fight it just breaks again. Really. What a rip off. I want my money back.

Any other tips for making money quicker?

Well, you could try some well balanced OXPs (expension packs). They are made by fans for fans. You'll find new things to earn money under the category "activities". Some examples, though I didn't try all of those: [wiki]Mining Contracts OXP[/wiki], [wiki]New Cargoes[/wiki], [wiki]Taxi Galactica[/wiki]. I took a liking to [wiki]Towbar[/wiki] though I think it's (a tiny bit) too unbalanced, as you can make money really quick. And about the cargo space you wanted. [wiki]HyperCargo OXP[/wiki]. I didn't test it.

Another thing I should mention. Install OXPs with moderation. Pick only a few or your gameplay experience might become a mess.

[Cody]

Docking Computers. Chances are you already bought one, but in case you didn't...do it! You'll save so much real world time, simply by pressing ctrl+c.

If you can dock manually, you don't need a docking computer (insta-docking costs in-game time, btw) - an aft laser would be more useful.

... the first thing to break and it costs a fortune to repair. And in the next big fight it just breaks again. Really. What a rip off. I want my money back.

<chuckles>

[Norby]

Welcome Paul!

You perform well imho so I can help a little only: there are some advices in the [wiki]Oolite FAQ[/wiki]. It is a good idea to play with the core game first, but when you decide to install some OXPs then we will give you many more advice (as ocz ninja'd me), just ask about a specific one.

[paul_c]

Yeah I bought the docking computer. If I'm on a milkrun, I just use it. If I'm on a parcel run and running late, I'll manually do it since it seems to save so much game time (not real time though). I kinda have the knack for quick docking, getting the station identified and requesting docking clearance straight away (from about 20km out), then doing a "short final" by doing a precision turn in between the navigation buoy and the station - if it goes well, I've done one or two at full speed too, otherwise a little slower just as I'm coming in for a final adjustment. Only had one bonk so far. I guess a bigger ship needs to be more precise? Or is it just the same to dock?

Did have an awkward scenario where I ran out of clearance time with about 4 metres to go - slammed the brakes on!!!

I'll try a few more parcel runs and courier jobs, I seem to have always muddled up the passenger runs and been late. I'll also research the route for dodgy planets a bit more carefully too!!!

[Amah]

basically all what the others say.

Been a cargo hauler up until recently, and had a Griff Ophidian (which is an oxp/oxz expansion ship). It's slower than the cobby, but has a bigger cargo hold (65t iirc). With a Advanced Navigational Array you can get the quickest route, to be in time. Without OXPs I usuallly upgraded to a python.

My "Rigel IV" wasn't equipped too much, just the neccessary, ANA, Fuel injectors which I bought before a docking computer, a forward beam laser and some ecm hardheads to play grumpy badger if pirates pestered. Later I always had around 10t of textiles or food for dumping cargo if neccessary.

The first cargo runs were less profitable than the usual milkruns, but if you continue and climb up the reputation ladder, you'll eventually get to quite profitable cargoruns. The only caveat is you have to have money to make more.
One funny thing is, if you climb high enough, the less cargo space you need, because all/most offerings of the real profitable runs I had was Gems, Gold and Platinum. The best one I was on was all across galaxy 1. I called it the "Gem-Trail", when offered additional Gem transports again and again to my final destination earning more than 200k credits.

In general: avoid the main lane, use injectors to flee or if you can't shake off a pirate keep him busy with a missile, always in mind that if you loose cargo or equipment it's a loss of profits,

If you like to make your life as a trader a bit easier maybe following oxps/oxzs might be for you: Torus to sun (to save some time) and variable masslock (you can avoid some extra trouble) is quite nice. I like stations for extra planets to have some alternative docking possibilities.

If you like to add some spice, I whole heartily recommend: smugglers.oxp

oh, and welcome aboard.

[phkb]

Would love to put accelerating/breaking on that one too, but it matches speed to the position of the stick.

I've got speed mapped on the stick. I'm using an Logitech F310 Gamepad with the Logitech Profiler software and have it mapped like this:



The only issue I find is that I need to fully depress the throttle stick up and down after launching for the first time. After that I'm good to go.

[paul_c]

Has anyone ever done the sums (and of course, a bit of guessing since prices aren't stable) whether a 2-hop "round robin" style trip or perhaps even 3+ hops round trip, would eeek out even more profit than 1 1/2 or 2 milkruns? I suspect not, but it would be interesting analysis to try find these.

I have been collecting price information as I've done my "tour" of the galaxy (1), now I have a lot of data (but still loads not even visited) and a bunch of analysis to do. On a simple level, I've been able to look at the price info and determine, for example, "which is best Entizadi --> Qucerere --> Aona or Entizadi --> Leleer --> Aona" style questions based on a simple 1 hop trip.

Could get quite interesting, or complicated, if I get the bigger ship with a hold I can't completely fill in one milkrun (due to supply) but a round robin or multi-drop trip means I can keep the hold full and profits up. I guess with a little hold (35t) its always worth selling when you see a half decent price and filling the hold again for another bit of profit on another run?

[Cody]

I guess with a little hold (35t) its always worth selling when you see a half decent price and filling the hold again for another bit of profit on another run?

I fly a Cobra Mk III (always have), and I have strict buy/sell numbers for gems and metal (which I tend to accumulate as I do my courier work).
With main cargo, if trading is your business, then you do what comes naturally... make a profit, buy a larger ship, make more profit.

[paul_c]

Yeah, was thinking ahead and with a massive hold, the trading becomes a double-edged sword becuase as well as the profit, there's supply to think about. So, you might do a trip where you alternate between 2x (say) industrial planets, buying and buying computers (in readiness for a trip to an ag planet to sell them) BUT with the spare hold space in between the two slightly different industrial worlds, you're filling it with more marginal stuff and trading between those just to keep the coins coming in. Once you've bought all the computers you can, its off to an ag world to flog them and buy furs. But you'd alternate between two of these, to build up the furs and also trade more marginally using the free space.

Food for thought.....

[ClymAngus]

The vector maps have spaceways on them. We tried (oooo god it was years ago now) to string together profitable routes through each system.
Worth a download if you haven't already.

Welcome to da boards.

[ralph_hh]

I've started a couple of Jamesons, both within Elite on a C64 and Oolite nowadays.

I like the fighting Business as well as contract work, I like in game and OXP generated missions such as from Random Hits. But 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. I end up doing milkruns for what it seems an eternity, until I'm finally rich enough to iron-ass my ship. Only then I start doing missions, trade contracts etc. while enjoying the thrill that an occasional visit of an anarchy system would produce.

There is an OXP that introduces some extra cargo - it's not working on my PC, so eventually with my third or so Oolite Jameson I edited the config.plist override and gave my Cobra MKIII a 100t cargo bay. That accelerates things a bit. Later on it does not affect game balance any more, since a 350kg Gold courier contract or various parcels in your luggage do not need that much space anyway.

In the Game you start with a ship worth 1/4 million credits, while you do not have enough money to fill its space with cargo worth more than 1000Cr. (what was the starting value)?
Actually, a more realistic approach to that game would be to start with a fast small, cheap ship but enough money to fill its belly. Then after a while you may expand the cargo bay, expand into a larger trade ship, and only after you made your fortune, you trade in that money for a Fighter that you are then able to equip properly. One can do this alternative start by save file editing.