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I was planning a complex in one of the pirate sectors when I realised something. Most pirate sectors that have both main asteroid types in them are adjacent to main race sectors, so anyone who wants goods needing ore to make can still come get them.

However, for sectors like Olmancketslat's Treaty, Lost Order and (most significantly) Gaian Star, reaching those systems requires NPC traders to transit two other pirate sectors to reach. In the case of the latter two it's particularly bad because of the distance between the north and west gates in Maelstrom; thus pirates are going to be the main consumers of whatever I produce.

Because of the abundance of ore and relative scarcity of silicon in GS I'd be better off making stuff that only needs ore and funneling what silicon there is into crystals for energy. Question is, what do pirates buy that require ore to make?

I haven't tried it myself, but undercover pirates are set up to buy Squash, Tracker, and Ion mines. They tend to either buy Squash only, or both Ion and Tracker. At a quick count, 160 pirates buy Ion/Tracker, 155 buy Squash, with 35 of those being overlapped.

Duke's Dangerous Goods transporters buy Ion only, but there are only 20 of those on a comparatively longer respawn time. Duke's Freight transporters most buy mundane stuff plus space fuel and space weed, and while their list includes raw Ore, it's probably not worth bothering with that since there is so much competition in the galaxy.

So, maybe try a mix of 1/4 Tracker, 1/4 Ion, 1/2 Squash.

Profit per investment will be lower than space fuel, though not drastically. Glancing at Xadrian, it looks to be about 1/3 less profit.

Buyers don't have jump drives. You do. Just make whatever and ship it out.

SirNukes wrote:I haven't tried it myself, but undercover pirates are set up to buy Squash, Tracker, and Ion mines. They tend to either buy Squash only, or both Ion and Tracker. At a quick count, 160 pirates buy Ion/Tracker, 155 buy Squash, with 35 of those being overlapped.

Duke's Dangerous Goods transporters buy Ion only, but there are only 20 of those on a comparatively longer respawn time. Duke's Freight transporters most buy mundane stuff plus space fuel and space weed, and while their list includes raw Ore, it's probably not worth bothering with that since there is so much competition in the galaxy.

So, maybe try a mix of 1/4 Tracker, 1/4 Ion, 1/2 Squash.

Profit per investment will be lower than space fuel, though not drastically. Glancing at Xadrian, it looks to be about 1/3 less profit.

Interesting idea, none of the complexes I've put together in the past have built mines so this will be something new to try. How did you get those numbers for how many pirates buy that stuff?

Yeah, Xadrian is great like that- I haven't made any complexes without it!

Sovereign01 wrote:How did you get those numbers for how many pirates buy that stuff?

They are in the Jobs file, which can be conveniently viewed with the X3 Editor.