Post your non-Cheaty tips

[Hwitvlf]

Most long time players know X3 inside and out, but every now and then I discover an interesting new was of doing something so I wonder if anyone else has tips to share.

1. When choosing what stations to buy for making money, generally weapon/shield stations are superior, because some docks and faction HQs will buy an unlimited amount weapons/shields, therefore they are not subject to the rules of supply/demand like other trade goods.

2. Jonferco HQ in Belt of Aguilar is an ideal place to sell weapons/shields. Since they don't normally stock them, you can sell an unlimited supply.

3. If you have Universal Traders and a dock, you can make some extra money by setting the dock to "Other races can trade = No", then add every weapon/shield available in the universe as a "resource". Your traders will still trade with the dock so whenever there's low-cost equipment at a factory somewhere, there's a decent chance they will buy it and sell it to your dock.

4. When pilots begin making their "bail out speech", it's common for turrets to destroy them before they actually bail. You can make them bail immediately by pressing C to contact any ship/station within range.

5. It's useful to have and Advanced Satellites in every sector, but its nearly impossible to prevent them from being destroyed. If you place a single satellite far above/below sector center, usually it will be left alone. You won't be able to see ships, but you can still see available goods in the sector and use Best Buy/Sell.

6. Some sectors have 0-Yield asteroids. If you place an Nividium mine on one of these, it will still produce Nividium. Though very slowly, it does earn some extra money.

7. If you have a tough capital ship that you don't need very often, you can use it to slowly raise your relations. Set it to "Show as enemy if enemy to me = No", and give it an "Attack All Enemies" command in a border sector. Pirates = Nopileos' Memorial, Argon = Getsu Fune, Boron = Light Water or Menelaus' Paradise etc. If a race doesn't have a border enemy sector (Terran), you can use the Hub to connect them to a Xenon/Pirate/Yaki sector. In particular, Yaki send our scavengers quickly if there are floating wares, so you can get a steady stream of ships to boost reputation.

8. If you're having trouble boosting your rep with an enemy faction, try taking Defend Station missions in a friendly adjacent sector. You can either jump through the gate before capitals enter (and defeat them in the low-rep sector) or you can comm Pirates and Yaki fighters/M8s to to surrender and they will pursue you through a gate.

[BrigandPhantos77]

The stations / factories that never stay in stock for me: Mosquito Missiles, IRE's and both 1 and 5 MJ shields. If you can make them XXL size, they are great as steady income. But will drain the region fast of resources.

[Hwitvlf]

Mosquito Missiles, IRE's and both 1 and 5 MJ shields.

Cool! I find Satellites, both Advanced and Navigation, sell very well too.

Another tip:
If you have stations producing goods, and find a Defend Factory mission on a competitor's station; well, lets just say, accidents happen! Even during a Patrol mission (at high combat rank), the turrets on a Xenon capital can make short work of most stations within range.

Along the same lines, taking Build Station missions for weapon/shield factories is beneficial. Since weapons/shields can be sold infinitely to docks, they become resource sinks which help other goods keep flowing.

If an enemy M7M has exhausted all its missiles other than boarding pods, and you are flying a boardable ship, you can unequip your shields and it should fire boarding pods at you. If you shoot the boarding pods before they make contact you can scoop up some decent marines for free. This is especially useful when boarding Rapid Response ships.

[Jimmy C]

1. When choosing what stations to buy for making money, generally weapon/shield stations are superior, because some docks and faction HQs will buy an unlimited amount weapons/shields, therefore they are not subject to the rules of supply/demand like other trade goods.

Correct. And the best product for squeezing the game for credits is the 5mj shield. It produces the most credits over time.

2. Jonferco HQ in Belt of Aguilar is an ideal place to sell weapons/shields. Since they don't normally stock them, you can sell an unlimited supply.

Were it not for the fact that it lies smack in the middle of a Xenon highway and your ships risk getting blown up with their cargo.

4. When pilots begin making their "bail out speech", it's common for turrets to destroy them before they actually bail. You can make them bail immediately by pressing C to contact any ship/station within range.

You can also set a hotkey to instantly disable turrets or just set them to missiles only when engaging fighters.

5. It's useful to have and Advanced Satellites in every sector, but its nearly impossible to prevent them from being destroyed.

It's not that bad. I do this and 80% of my sats are never bothered. The rest, I order a ship to replace them when I see some are gone.

8. If you're having trouble boosting your rep with an enemy faction, try taking Defend Station missions in a friendly adjacent sector. You can either jump through the gate before capitals enter (and defeat them in the low-rep sector) or you can comm Pirates and Yaki fighters/M8s to to surrender and they will pursue you through a gate.

Interesting. But agents are a more reliable way to boost rep.

The stations / factories that never stay in stock for me: Mosquito Missiles, IRE's and both 1 and 5 MJ shields. If you can make them XXL size, they are great as steady income. But will drain the region fast of resources.

XXL factories cannot be NPC supported, too demanding. You have to make your own closed-loop complex to support them.

[Hwitvlf]

Good to know about the 5MJ shield profits.

Interesting. But agents are a more reliable way to boost rep.

I'm playing the TC plot and the HQ (agents) isn't available for a long time! Also used this when I want to befriend a faction on whom I've been picking (looking at you Dukes). Right now, I have -120% diplomacy with a 24hour cooldown for the Yaki and a mission coming up to befriend them ;P

5. It's useful to have and Advanced Satellites ...but impossible to prevent them from being destroyed.

It's not that bad. I do this and 80% of my sats are never bothered.

What's your secret!? With the dynamic relations, I'm usually hostile with 1/3 of the universe and they destroy my satellites regularly. Also, constant yaki/pirate raider groups targeting random friendly sectors. I count 27 dead satellites since I cleared my log last, and I only have them centered in a handful of friendly sectors. I've even tried running "deploy satellite network" and the ship usually only gets about 1/3 of the universe covered before it spends all it's time replacing destroyed sats

Were it not for the fact that it lies smack in the middle of a Xenon highway and your ships risk getting blown up with their cargo.

That's true. Do you know a better sell location? I have been sending Owl Miners (sloooww) there, filled with weapons from a complex, and they haven't gotten attacked so far, but it would be a huge loss if they were. At least the Jonferco capital group patrols the Belt.

[Jimmy C]

What's your secret!? With the dynamic relations, I'm usually hostile with 1/3 of the universe and they destroy my satellites regularly.

Get all the main factions up to green-5 and they're usually stable enough long term. Certain sectors are obviously hot like Xenon and Kha'ak sectors, Pirate and Yaki core sectors, their border sectors are a tossup, some are more aggressive than others. Some Pirate core sectors can even be cleared and monitored for a good while.

That's true. Do you know a better sell location?

Check the various Docks of the factions that are friendly to you. All of them have only a limited selection of stuff. Start with the Docks nearest where your factories are located. Find the ones that don't stock what you produce.

When I made up a spreadsheet for how to deal with the output of my complex that built every piece of military gear I might equip on my ships, most of them went to the Dock in Rolk's Fate. Boron EqD has unlimited slots for medium-class ships like transports. Only the ones with gear that that dock was carrying went elsewhere. Family Whi, Ceo's Buckzoid, 3 Worlds and Spring of Belief. But that's due to where I placed my Hub Gates. Other places may be more optimal to you.

Also, you don't need Owl Miners to push this stuff. Not only are the ships slow, they take a long time to fill with the gear to sell. Check how many pieces of the gear get produced per cycle, multiply by how many cycles you feel like waiting. Multiply by the unit space and you have the size your transport needs to be, plus room for ecells and shields. Multiply the number of cycles by the cycle time and you have how long it would take to have that many pieces of gear available. It is most efficient to take all the production of a cycle to sell. Don't make your ship wait, only to take part of the next cycle.

If you're producing only a few items, you can work this out with a calculator. If you made as many different things as I did, you'll need a spreadsheet too.

[Hwitvlf]

Check the various Docks...Find the ones that don't stock what you produce.
Also, you don't need Owl Miners to push this stuff.

I looked through the encyclopedia and the only dock I could find that bought every weapon/shield/missile AND is in a sector with a jump gate was Jonferco HQ. I do a lot of combat missions so I end up with lots random equipment; I used to go to an Argon Military Base and then a Teladi Equipment Dock to sell everything, but Jonferco is quicker and I don't have to think about it.

I use an Owl for freighting resources between stations (if they're near a gate/beacon) and also for selling equipment. My equipment complex has an XXL station for every weapon/shield/missile factory available so it fills an Owl very fast. Mobile Drills are huge! Smaller transports just make more work in this case, but usually Owls are overkill.

Other tips:
1. If you get a Retrieve Ship mission for and M6 or M7, instead of claiming the abandoned ship, you can use marines to board the ship for easy combat XP. Note that the ship will take hull damage if your marines have low Engineering skill, and thus may be too slow to reach its return point in time.

2. If you get a Retrieve Ship mission for an M7 at a station which can not dock M7s. You can complete the mission (fly the M7 near its return-station) and get your reward, then board the ship to claim it for yourself. Returned ships don't give a rep loss when boarding. Note, hostile police ships will still show up!

3. In FL, the Auto Mining command allows you to unload at ships or a dock, but not at a station. If you set the Auto Mining drop off point as a TL (Ozias or Mobile Mining Ship) and then use the Trade Distribution Run command on a TS to freight the ore from the TL to a factory, it's easy to get a fully automated mobile mining loop. Nice for clearing debris out of messy sectors like Scale Plate Green.

4. When you get a "your ship is under attack" alert, it's tempting to bring up the ship on a sector map - don't. During out-of-system combat, the game engine runs the damage calculation every time you do an action on the OOS map. If you view the sector, freighters, and other outmatched ships, will likely be destroyed before they have time to escape. Instead, check out the ship through the My Property panel.

5. During patrol missions, when an M8 appears, it's tempting to save just in case, however If you save when a missile is in flight, then reload that save, the types of missiles which were in-flight become almost impossible to shoot down. Try to make sure no missiles are flying when you save!

6. If you get a Retrieve Ship mission, but keep the ship instead of returning it, you can dock it at one of your stations in sector where Xenon frequent. Let the security forces who are looking for it appear. They will attack any Xenon or other enemies in the sector, but won't bother your ships. Free mercs! Note, don't get too many security ships waiting though, as it can bog down the frame-rate.

[Jimmy C]

I use an Owl for freighting resources between stations (if they're near a gate/beacon) and also for selling equipment. My equipment complex has an XXL station for every weapon/shield/missile factory available so it fills an Owl very fast. Mobile Drills are huge! Smaller transports just make more work in this case, but usually Owls are overkill.

The time taken is decided by the cycle time, not the quantity. For example, the PSP takes 309 minutes to produce. One XXL fab produces 20 per cycle. That's just 4000 space, something that comfortably fits in a small TS, for 5 hours of work. I have 3 such fabs and I throw in the production from a few other fabs that complete multiple cycles in 300 minutes as well, and all their production fits in an Athena.

If you get a Retrieve Ship mission for and M6 or M7, instead of claiming the abandoned ship, you can use marines to board the ship for easy combat XP. Note that the ship will take hull damage if your marines have low Engineering skill, and thus may be too slow to reach its return point in time.

2. If you get a Retrieve Ship mission for an M7 at a station which can not dock M7s. You can complete the mission (fly the M7 near its return-station) and get your reward, then board the ship to claim it for yourself. Returned ships don't give a rep loss when boarding. Note, hostile police ships will still show up!

Even without cheating, an FL game gives you 3 to 5 Jump Beacons to capture. For an M6, you can put the Beacon at the destination to allow it to quickly dock. For an M7, put the Beacon about 5km from the station, then tow it into range to trigger the mission complete flag. This also gives you time to retrieve the jumpdrive from the M7. Otherwise, the ship will jump out instead of making its way slowly to the nearest Gate and giving you the chance to board it again.

For dealing with the police, put a beacon on top of a station that can dock an M7 OOS. After you've recaptured the ship, order it there and dock. The police can't appear on top of the station, that gives you time to extract the ship later and repair it for sale or use.

5. During patrol missions, when an M8 appears, it's tempting to save just in case, however If you save when a missile is in flight, then reload that save, the types of missiles which were in-flight become almost impossible to shoot down. Try to make sure no missiles are flying when you save!

Why do you say they're impossible to shot down? I know missiles sometimes go crazy and just fly in circles around their targets but I don't think that consistently happens when a game is saved while missiles are in flight.

[Hwitvlf]

My equipment complex has an XXL station for every weapon/shield/missile factory available so it fills an Owl very fast.

The time taken is decided by the cycle time, not the quantity. For example, the PSP takes 309 minutes to produce. One XXL fab produces 20 per cycle. That's just 4000 space, something that comfortably fits in a small TS, for 5 hours of work. I have 3 such fabs and I throw in the production from a few other fabs that complete multiple cycles in 300 minutes as well, and all their production fits in an Athena.

Yep, for a PSP factory, any TS will do. Long cycle products take up very little storage/minute, but my complex produces EVERY shield/weapon/missile which has a factory available. Storage needed per 30 minutes is much higher for short/cycle products: Mobile Drill = 2,000, Mosquito = 10,000, Dragonfly = 2,200 etc. I don't want the factories to sit idle, so I park an Owl Miner there to transfer off products regularly. I haven't timed it, but I'd say it fills a full Owl in about 30 minutes, quicker with SETA.

For dealing with the police, put a beacon on top of a station that can dock an M7 OOS. After you've recaptured the ship, order it there and dock. The police can't appear on top of the station, that gives you time to extract the ship later and repair it for sale or use.

Another option (which I consider a little cheaty) is to use take the ship to an unfocused jump drive sector. When the police show up, jump away.

Why do you say they're impossible to shot down? I know missiles sometimes go crazy and just fly in circles around their targets but I don't think that consistently happens when a game is saved while missiles are in flight.

I don't mean when missiles circle their target without impact. I mean that they become almost impossible to hit with weapon fire. You can target them and shoot at them, but most shots will miss. This has been present in the X3 engine from old days. I've heard other people say it breaks the in-flight missile's hitbox, but I don't know if that's accurate.

[BrigandPhantos77]

The stations / factories that never stay in stock for me: Mosquito Missiles, IRE's and both 1 and 5 MJ shields. If you can make them XXL size, they are great as steady income. But will drain the region fast of resources.

XXL factories cannot be NPC supported, too demanding. You have to make your own closed-loop complex to support them.

Depends where you place it. And thats why you build a complex to supply at least the food.

Unseen Domain > Unknown Sector

Mosquito Missile Factory XXL for me, started with about 20 million credits in its account. When I looked at it again, it was at the limit I set of 500 million.

It was the Mosquito Missile Factory with XXL Cattle Ranch and Cahoona Bakery. Set the energy sell buy price to 17 I think.... and it had 3 Ore Mines I set up to feed itself with. It never stopped production for me, though had to pause because it was at max supply on the missiles.

I similarly made a microchip complex in Great Reef alpha the same way, but with Bofu. It got stunted once in a while needing silicon, but I usually fixed that problem with a mobile mining fleet. And it rarely stopped like that.

You just have to build smart sometimes. Ceo's Doubt is doable for large factories as well. The 2 XL SPP are great there. (As long as the god engine don't take them out.)

[BrigandPhantos77]

Good to know about the 5MJ shield profits.

Yea its great if you want profits, sucks if you use M4's that can't use the 25's. NPCs will clean out the factory, all your equipment docks, the spacelab (if you fail to set to storage. ) All the ones I listed will all sell out constantly at the average price.

Solar Power Plants are a nice investment if you built in the right place as well.

If your gonna automate anything along Xenon ally east, thats black hole sun to grand exchange, put a capital fleet to intercept them in Grand Exchange Beta. That's where they cross through mostly, though sometimes they will start at Black Hole Sun.

[BrigandPhantos77]

At least the Jonferco capital group patrols the Belt.

That actually breaks after a while. I can't say when it does, I just know that Jonferco's fleet get's stuck near the shipyard in Omicron Lyrae alpha. Its inevitable Mr. Ander... lol... It happens no matter what. At least to me on every play, but I am still on vanilla.

[Jimmy C]

I don't want the factories to sit idle, so I park an Owl Miner there to transfer off products regularly. I haven't timed it, but I'd say it fills a full Owl in about 30 minutes, quicker with SETA.

I make an automated pipeline. TS carry products to my main Dock, where they unload them to sorters that fill up bins that serve as my equipment stockpiles. Then the sorters put the products on the Dock's "shelves" where they are taken by sellers that fill up with the items and take them to a dock to sell. This keeps my stockpiles topped up and sell the excesses without tying up docking ports on the complex.

Stuff that's sold directly, like 5mj shields, I do it like you do too. Seller fills up at the complex and takes it to the dock for sale directly.

Another option (which I consider a little cheaty) is to use take the ship to an unfocused jump drive sector. When the police show up, jump away.

I did that in AP too. But that's not an option in vanilla FL. That needs to be mentioned.

I mean that they become almost impossible to hit with weapon fire. You can target them and shoot at them, but most shots will miss. This has been present in the X3 engine from old days. I've heard other people say it breaks the in-flight missile's hitbox, but I don't know if that's accurate.

Interesting. I don't think I've run into a situation where I'm sure I'm hitting a missile with my shots but it isn't dying. I also fire mosquitoes at them, but you know. Is that affected too?

[Hwitvlf]

Then the sorters put the products on the Dock's "shelves" where they are taken by sellers that fill up with the items and take them to a dock to sell.

Is there a way to automate selling weapons to a dock which doesn't normally stock that weapon? For example, will an auto-seller sell PSPs to a Teladi Equipment dock? When I've tried to automate selling from XXL factories in the past, sellers would saturate available sell-points and then go idle till some inventories go down.

...take the ship to an unfocused jump drive sector. When the police show up, jump away.

I did that in AP too. But that's not an option in vanilla FL. That needs to be mentioned.

Thank you for clarifying. I guess the UFJD was added in the unofficial patch. Been so long since I've played the official I'd forgotten!

Another fun way I tried getting rid of the police ships is to place a dock near the North gate in Xenon 023 and park the claimed ship there. The Xenon don't bother the station OOS and generally don' t patrol in front of the North gate, but they will go after the police ships when they show up.

Interesting. I don't think I've run into a situation where I'm sure I'm hitting a missile with my shots but it isn't dying. I also fire mosquitoes at them, but you know. Is that affected too?

I think they can still be hit by missiles, but I never paid attention. Would you mind testing this? Send a capital to a sector with a RR M7M and save when it's torpedoes are in flight. Reload, and see if your capital's turrets can shoot them down. It's possible that the issue is hardware related, but I've experienced it across several PCs.

[Jimmy C]

Is there a way to automate selling weapons to a dock which doesn't normally stock that weapon? For example, will an auto-seller sell PSPs to a Teladi Equipment dock?

That's exactly what I'm doing. Trade Distribution doesn't care that the Dock doesn't stock the weapon that it's trying to sell. It's thanks to TD that huge complexes that produce 5mj shields can just automatically push all their production into Docks that don't stock them.

I think they can still be hit by missiles, but I never paid attention. Would you mind testing this? Send a capital to a sector with a RR M7M and save when it's torpedoes are in flight. Reload, and see if your capital's turrets can shoot them down. It's possible that the issue is hardware related, but I've experienced it across several PCs.

I'll see what I can do. I've had quite a few experiences in Empire's Edge where I'm trying to force a bail that gets missiled before I can claim it. I reload and try to shoot down the missile. I, of course, fire a mosquito as well. Not always sure if the missile had been fired before I saved.

[Hwitvlf]

Trade Distribution doesn't care that the Dock doesn't stock the weapon that it's trying to sell.

Thanks for this info! I had tried Trade Distribution for selling to docks before and thought the ships were just dropping the wares off for free. I dug further since you pointed it out and realized that the ships dropping off wares were selling, but sending the funds to their homebase so the transactions weren't showing up under Empire Management > Account Transactions, only under the homebase transactions. That's a great tool! The freighter still won't sell more than the dock can hold in one transaction, but it seems to work to enter multiple 'Dump All' commands for the same dock.

[Jimmy C]

The freighter still won't sell more than the dock can hold in one transaction, but it seems to work to enter multiple 'Dump All' commands for the same dock.

It does sell everything. I use Unload and Wait commands. It just seems to take a while between each "push" of items to the Dock.

[BrigandPhantos77]

Nividium Loop

If you use 1 mining fleet, the respawns should be able to keep up with you. Any more and you'll be waiting.

Spoiler just contains the asteroid locations for Nividium.

Spoiler

Show

Locations of respawnable asteroids
Void (alpha x 2, and the 2 initial sectors; really small yields these 2)
Holy Vision (Both gate sectors)
Perpetual Sin (3 rocks)
Unclaimed Sector past the Xenon Sector connected to Getsu Fune. (3 rocks)
Loose rock locations -
Brennan's Triumph (all 4 sectors have a supply of it that regenerates over time.) Don't go here obviously if they are hostile to you.
Shareholder's Fortune
There's probably more, just use the survey debris in locations with quantities of it.

The setup is expensive for this. You'll need an Ozias and 10 mining ships. The Owls from PTNI Headquarters (*Not the teladi shipyard) are perfect.
I keep the last 2 slots for a runner and energy cell tanker. For my purpose I use an Athena as the runner and either a Snotra or the Sturgeon heavy tanker for energy cells.

Send the fleet through each of the sectors mentioned and automate just Nividium mining.

For proper selling of the mineral you will need to set up the Spacelab with roughly 4K to 6K in quantity of Nividium. I set it as a sale item (product). Now here is the trick. You need to use the barter within 3 external sectors of the Spacelab. The quantities may be small after a while as you fill the demand generated. Using this method you can sell the Nividium to barter merchants at "MAX" price. One cleaned out sector of Nividium can net you between 300 million to 700 million per clearing. Once it's all sold expect your Spacelab to sell it's supply out. (Make sure NPC ships can't buy while you are bartering. If that supply vanishes, so will all the barter orders.

This is literally the highest credit grossing method I have found outside of setting up factories. And this is not a bug, but legit gameplay.

Note: Consus is a decent automated mining ship as well.

[BrigandPhantos77]

Capturing Ships - Duke's Vengeance

If your friendly with Duke's, probably don't do this. But this is probably the easiest method of filling the Spacelab with materials for building.

The Zeus can be boarded easy enough using missile frigates if you set it up correctly. And the Zeus recycles for a decent amount of materials. 2 recycled should be enough to build more than half the other capital ships. I have yet to lose a marine during the boarding here. And I do all my combat training here.

It also sells for an easy 54 million per ship minimum in the neighboring sector. (repair with an M7D it first)

Just make sure to take out all the corvettes within 50 KM of you before doing this, as they will likely try to reach you. You can also acquire every commonwealth M7M in this system with little effort. You can also target all in system ships using the owned ships menu on the Dukes HQ. Thank you Egosoft...

[Jimmy C]

It also sells for an easy 54 million per ship minimum in the neighboring sector.

There is no way a Zeus sells for only 54 million. I can sell Brigantines and Galleons at 60 million. Check your reputation with the faction you're selling to. Always sell to the highest.