Like reading a good book;

[-John-]

I cant stop playing or get back to the game soon enough.
As I stated once before; I played once but rushed through and never appreciated all there is to the game.
I have another question,this one regarding the CLS. Can I use this to set up a trader to supply energy cells to an Ore Mine while setting up another one to supply Ore to a buyer for Ore.
And if I do,,,,how do you know, it will sell for a profit and not a loss.
Thanks,
John

[Timsup2nothin]

CLS will only sell or buy for the price you set (or better). If that price isn't available the CLS will sit on standby until it is. So as long as the prices you set are profitable there will be profits. Using an ore mine as an example, every unit of ore produced consumes six e-cells, so as long as your ore price is more than six times your e-cell price there will be profit...eventually.

The problem is that you have to pay for the inventory that will accumulate in your mine, and the setup you describe will likely accumulate inventory until the mine is full. You might want to check out the guide in my sig to see just how powerful CLS transports can be and get some ideas.

[-John-]

Thanks for your reply.
I do not own an ore mine. I have been manually trading with 2 Mercuries and flying the third Mercury myself.
I have only amassed around 3 mill credits thus far.
My plans/hope were to buy and sell from the existing stations in the game.
I appreciate any additional information you can give me and/or if what I have in mind can work without owning my own mines or power plant.
If this could work out for me; I have plans to set up another Mercury or two to buy and supply other stations with meat and agriculture products.
Thanks for your consideration,
John

[-John-]

Thanks Tim, reread your reply and now have your instructions. Thank you.
Setting up some traders now,hope they work well,lol.
John

[-John-]

Humble Trader start. I have 3 traders now and have around 3 million credits.
I have started one trader buying ecell (Power Circle);selling them in Hermans Nebulae at ore mines.
I have another buying ore in Hermans Nebulae and selling to stations in Argon Prime.
Another I have buying Cahoona Steals in Red Light and selling in Argon Prime.
Could you tell me a good price for buying Cahoona Steaks and a good price for selling them?
Should I be setting another Trader up to support the Cahoona Factory?
I know (at least I feel I should) set up another trader to sell more ecells in these other sectors Im using but Power Circle is closest to purchase ecells and it is several jumps from some of these sectors.
Thanks,
John

[Timsup2nothin]

Mastery of CLS is, IMO, the most profitable approach to trading that is available early in the game. When you have a few hundred million to put into blunt instruments there are a lot of options, but when you have a handful of ships and a couple million in cash there's none better.

The thing to remember if you set up a network to distribute ore is that you can distribute it far more efficiently than it can be used if the distribution of food and energy is left up to the AI. You can make a startling amount of income with three ships and apprentice pilots just by connecting a reliable source of food, a reliable source of energy, and a reliable source of ore to three factories, but three ships distributing ore will put themselves out of business pretty quickly.

[Nanook]

@-John-
I've combined your two CLS threads into one. Please don't start multiple threads dealing with the same topic.

[-John-]

Ok, thank you Nanook for the head up.
John

[-John-]

Timsup,could you try and talk about this more,,,The thing to remember if you set up a network to distribute ore is that you can distribute it far more efficiently than it can be used if the distribution of food and energy is left up to the AI. You can make a startling amount of income with three ships and apprentice pilots just by connecting a reliable source of food, a reliable source of energy, and a reliable source of ore to three factories, but three ships distributing ore will put themselves out of business pretty quickly.

So, if I read this correctly, I shouldnt worry about supplying the stations with ecells,food etc,,,,the AI will take care of it.
I have just set up a trader to run cahoona steaks to the 3 stations I chose in Argon Prime to sell ore at. Also was getting ready to set another trader up to run ecells to the Cahooona Bakery.
Should I just be a few traders (buying and selling ore) and not be concerned with the rest?
But, then you say three ships running ore can put them out of business quickly,
Thanks,
John

[RAVEN.myst]

-John-, note that while a low-level pilot is very limited in terms of stops made on a route (4 at start, then 6, then 10, etc), that pilot can take multiple actions (called "waypoints" weirdly enough - confusing if you're used to actually speaking English, in which "waypoint" means an itinerary stop itself, not what you do there...) at each of those, so you can squeeze a lot out of a pilot than may appear. Consequently, you can do something (which I learned from Tim here) to maximise the training of pilots while also making them profitable, here's a simplified example:

Stop 1: PowerPlant, buy ECs.
Stop 2: WheatFarm, sell ECs then buy Wheat
Stop 3: CahoonaBakery or RimesFact, sell ECs, sell Wheat, buy cahoonas or rimes
Stop 4: ArgonTradingStation, sell cahoonas or rimes

In the above example, you'd use "buy half cargospace up to", to prevent a ware that won't sell right away from stopping you from doing stuff farther down the line. I left out pricing, for simplicity's sake - if you want to maximise the consistency of pilots making trips (ie. minimise downtime) at the cost of profitability, set the prices to average - you'll make small profits sometimes still, but not much; if you want to improve profits, shift the prices toward the extremes as needed (in a training route, personally, I wouldn't go past halfway in either direction, to avoid excessive downtime.) In longer routes with more factories, you can afford to start squeezing more credits out, as with added factories the odds of some factory selling cheap or buying dear improve.

By the way, you may already know this, but if you activate a CLS command at the Argon Free Trading Station in Herron's Nebula (and you can buy CLS software there, too, for that matter), then you get a pilot with some experience already - so if you want to take a shortcut on the training (and if this doesn't feel like cheating, hehehe) then this is a good way to make longer routes available to you immediately.

Mastery of CLS is, IMO, the most profitable approach to trading that is available early in the game.

In the early game, I find it invaluable because it allows setting up an automated economy without requiring any stations.

[-John-]

Thank you RAVEN.myst, you guys are great.
Guess I sort of had it,lol. I didnt think deep enough to realize you could make multiple stop for selling and buying (different products).
I need to go rethink and change my settings on my traders,I have four now and I hope thats not to much.
I also forgot about the training. Also I had already bought the CLS software in Argon Prime;live and learn,lol.
Thank you for your time,
John

[RAVEN.myst]

I didnt think deep enough to realize you could make multiple stop for selling and buying (different products).

It's easy enough to overlook this aspect - I've been playing for years, and it's only seeing some notes by Tim that made me realise/remember that I could do this, and quite (and embarrassingly! ) recently, too.

Also I had already bought the CLS software in Argon Prime;

That's ok - if you want to get one of the experienced spacefuel smuggler pilots, you can still land your CLS ship there, go into pilot settings (I think that's what it's called - the first option in the CLS menu), fire pilot, then restart the command - that will get you a new pilot, with rank between Courier (lv 2) and Cargo Messenger (lv 4). Only do this if you are willing to throw away the already spent training time, so basically only if your pilot is apprentice or courier.

Thank you for your time

You're most welcome, it's no bother at all

[jlehtone]

Referring to plain "CLS" is slightly ambiguous; there are two closely related but rather orthogonal logistics tools: Internal and External, CLS1 and CLS2.

... pilot can take multiple actions (called "waypoints" weirdly enough - confusing if you're used to actually speaking English, in which "waypoint" means an itinerary stop itself, not what you do there...) ...

1. The script originally appeared for X3R and that game had very limited UI. What you can tinker with now is much more complex, thanks to better UI tools that the script can use in X3AP. More features asks for more names and/or change of names. When you duct tape a jet engine to your tricycle, something has to stretch.

2. The author of the script is German. Translational inaccuracies are possible.

[-John-]

Thank you jlehtone for informing me. I thank the German that made the script.
Okies, I have 4 traders going. I covered as much possible with four traders and only a few way points for now.
Thought I was going to be able to move around in my little Discoverer and maybe get a life support and doing a few taxi missions;alas,looks as if I will be buying another Mercury and trading to get my credits back up. Down to about 1.5 mill now,lol.
John

[radcapricorn]

"Down to 1.5mil"? That's 1.5 million doing exactly nothing for you. Invest! Ships, stocks, upgrades, anything. Make that money make you more money!

[RAVEN.myst]

Referring to plain "CLS" is slightly ambiguous; there are two closely related but rather orthogonal logistics tools: Internal and External, CLS1 and CLS2.

True; but in some contexts the distinction isn't significant - say, when discussing pilot training levels and the freebies from Herron's Nebula FATS; or when implied by context (in which case, I'm simply being lazy heheheheh!)

2. The author of the script is German. Translational inaccuracies are possible.

Yeah, this one accounts for the incorrect use of the term "waypoint", not the other
As for point 1. - every time I go back to play X2 (admittedly, it's not often), it's quite the culture shock to reopen the documentation for those 3-digit command codes for CLS (both 1 and 2 ) and CAG. But, given the much more limited capabilities of the interfaces back then, I am still to this day most impressed at the ingenuity that went into providing that functionality

I thank the German that made the script.

Indeed!

alas,looks as if I will be buying another Mercury and trading to get my credits back up.

Oh, freighters are the lifeblood of an eXonomy - in a typical game, in the middle phase I tend to have a handful of fighting ships and several DOZEN freighters - those are your bread-winners, unless you go heavy on the combat missions (I don't, as I dislike the magic-spawning of bad guys just to accommodate the player's bloodlust - I prefer to find my combat in plots and naturally "in the wild") - so "getting another Mercury" is not only not a bad thing, it's in fact a good thing.
To get your CLS2s raking in money nicely, just make sure you're supplying energy, food, and ore in parallel (which, from what I remember of your posts, you are already doing, pretty much) - this keeps all wares in supply and therefore being consumed, generating more demand (if any one leg of that tripod is missing, the factory stalls, therefore no longer consuming the other two resources, and thus not buying.)

Good fortune!

[Timsup2nothin]

Timsup,could you try and talk about this more,,,The thing to remember if you set up a network to distribute ore is that you can distribute it far more efficiently than it can be used if the distribution of food and energy is left up to the AI. You can make a startling amount of income with three ships and apprentice pilots just by connecting a reliable source of food, a reliable source of energy, and a reliable source of ore to three factories, but three ships distributing ore will put themselves out of business pretty quickly.

So, if I read this correctly, I shouldnt worry about supplying the stations with ecells,food etc,,,,the AI will take care of it.
I have just set up a trader to run cahoona steaks to the 3 stations I chose in Argon Prime to sell ore at. Also was getting ready to set another trader up to run ecells to the Cahooona Bakery.
Should I just be a few traders (buying and selling ore) and not be concerned with the rest?
But, then you say three ships running ore can put them out of business quickly,
Thanks,
John

Apparently I made that unclear, because you got the exact opposite of what I meant. Your distribution of ore will be so much more efficient than the NPC distribution of energy and food that your customers will very quickly have all the ore they need and be waiting for energy and or food.

To account for how much more efficient your distribution is you really have to supply all of their needs and keep your customers running.

That's why the very simple three ship operation supply all the needs of three factories works, as long as you can find really reliable supplies. By supplying all their needs it keeps them running, which keeps them buying all three of your products.

[Timsup2nothin]

"Down to 1.5mil"? That's 1.5 million doing exactly nothing for you. Invest! Ships, stocks, upgrades, anything. Make that money make you more money!

I approve this message.

[jlehtone]

"Down to 1.5mil"? That's 1.5 million doing exactly nothing for you. Invest! Ships, stocks, upgrades, anything. Make that money make you more money!

While the principle is very sound, I must ask: what does the (starting MORT/CLS2) trade fleet pay its purchases with?

As long as the traders do use player's account, that account needs to have some cash in it. One can obviously estimate the "worst case scenario": all freighters want to do their most expensive purchase simultaneously.

Then again, a full load of ECells or Wafers does not require as much cash (and reputation) as High Tech trading.

[RAVEN.myst]

"Down to 1.5mil"? That's 1.5 million doing exactly nothing for you. Invest! Ships, stocks, upgrades, anything. Make that money make you more money!

I, too, agree. I remember watching StarCraft (I forget whether first or second) and there being a function for an alert (I forget its name, it was something almost cutesy) that showed when a player had too much unspent, idle, stagnant capital.

That being said:

While the principle is very sound, I must ask: what does the (starting MORT/CLS2) trade fleet pay its purchases with?

As long as the traders do use player's account, that account needs to have some cash in it. One can obviously estimate the "worst case scenario": all freighters want to do their most expensive purchase simultaneously.

This is also very true. Additionally, there's also another advantage to keeping a reserve: emergency or spur-of-the-moment expenses/purchases, especially ones that may only be available for a limited time. Such as repairing a damaged ship, or being able to afford a cheap second-hand ship, or being able to accept and fulfil a station construction mission, or hacking a station's IFF status, or buying asteroid prospector's data, to name just a few. This buffer obviously grows as one's game progresses, and becomes easier to maintain - in the late early game, if I have under 10kk I'm broke; in the mid-game if I don't have 20kk to spend I feel skint; in the late game, I generally keep 100kk or more in loose change knocking around. In the early game, however, deciding whether to reserve or commit funds can be tricky...