The X3TC Merchant's Survival Guide Version 1.0 [Spoilers Tagged]

General discussions about the games by Egosoft including X-BTF, XT, X², X³: Reunion, X³: Terran Conflict and X³: Albion Prelude.

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phoenix-it
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The X3TC Merchant's Survival Guide Version 1.0 [Spoilers Tagged]

Post by phoenix-it » Mon, 3. Nov 08, 01:06

Introduction

Welcome to the X3 Terran Conflict Merchant's Survival Guide. I’ve seen a number of people post on the forums that they’re having trouble getting started in Terran Conflict, so I decided to share some of my experience and ideas. This guide won't take you step-by-step from pauper to tycoon, but it will teach the player some essential tools needed to establish an economic presence in the game. This is the first guide I have written for an X game, so feel free to point out any errors or omissions on my part. Also, keep in mind that this guide is a work in progress and will change as I learn new tricks.

Overview:The primary focus of this guide is on the TRADE, BUILD, and THINK components of the game. FIGHT, on the other hand, is an entirely different animal, and I’m sure I’m not alone in that assessment. There is only minimal FIGHT advice contained herein, which centers on surviving combat as opposed to engaging in it. Personally, I very much like the FIGHT element of the X games, and that is my usual focus. However, I have seen a number posts recently that basically state that the player either cannot get started, and/or cannot progress as rapidly without the FIGHT element in Terran Conflict. I immediately thought, “Hmm… I wonder if that’s actually true.” So, I decided it would be a challenge to find out. The results are the foundation for this guide.

Target Audience: Any and all players looking for economic strategies for Terran Conflict may find this guide helpful. New players may want to take it slow and avoid combat because of the steep learning curve. They may find it difficult to jump right into combat without understanding all of the various ships and weapons in the game; much less how to make the credits to buy more potent hardware. Returning players of the X series will find a different economy, in spite of the engine’s similarity to that of X3 Reunion. In fact, I am still discovering those differences myself…

Spoilers: There are no plot related spoilers in this guide. I have not initiated any of the main plots during in my current game and probably won’t for some time. This guide assumes the player has no access to plot related rewards, reputation and/or locations. Spoilers related to ships and equipment will be tagged as such and the player may highlight and read them at their own discretion. But, keep in mind that only the specifics of these things will be hidden. i.e. I might explain that you need X software from an Equipment Dock, but only the specific location of a dock that carries the product will be hidden. The game's manual explains the various types of ships and equipment available, so I do not consider them spoilers. However, if you did not read the manual, they just might be spoilers to you: You have been warned.

So, can you earn credits quickly without fighting? Absolutely!

Can you progress as rapidly without fighting? Not in my experience. But, to be fair, the general consensus is that combat missions are bugged right now and are highly exploitable by the player.

So, how much did you make in your experiment? With 1 day and 15 hours on the clock I have racked up over 40 million credits without firing a shot. My combat rank is Harmless 0%. I have about 5,000,000 credits at this point because I’ve equipped myself with a small fleet of ships and a factory. I just bought a TL; also have a TM, some Super Freighters and a handful of others. I did find a couple of bugs where I could have added about 100 million more credits to my total, but I decided not to exploit them since they’ll eventually be fixed. I don’t claim that this is anything special and others may already be doing better. But I can’t imagine myself of having done this in X3 Reunion without capturing and selling pirate ships while my UT’s were leveling up. I tried a pure TRADE game in Reunion once, and it was mind numbingly slow.


Merchant’s Survival Guide

So, you want to start slow and build your wealth and build and infrastructure before going to war with The X3 Universe? That sounds like a good plan, you’ve come to the right place.

Starting Scenario: I recommend the Humble Merchant start, which I used. It does not immediately thrust the player into a plot mission that cannot be abandoned. It also starts with very neutral notoriety so that no one dislikes you and you’re free to trade anywhere. Only Kha’ak and Xenon ships attack me on sight. Most pirates were friendly, and even the ones my ship registered as Hostile have not blinked an eye when I flew through them. Yaki were friendly and didn’t go bogey unless I was in Yaki controlled space.

First Moves: If you’re completely new, go through the flight school… Then head through the South jump gate to Argon Prime. X3R Veterans might think, “Wait, what about hitting that silicon mine?” Nah, I wouldn’t do that… Take a look around when you get to Argon Prime and you’ll see why. The economy is different, always remember that… I’ll explain more later.

Send both of your ships to the Argon Equipment dock. Once docked, sell your freighter’s 5MJ shield and change ships to your Discoverer. Buy a Duplex Scanner and Trading System Extension for your scout.

Now, send your freighter to the shipyard and sell it.

Yea, I know what you’re thinking…

New Players: “I want to be a trader, how can I trade without a freighter?”

Veterans: “Isn’t this the opposite of what we normally do? Don’t you mean sell the Disco?”

No, I mean it… Sell the freighter. Then I want you to go back to the Equipment Dock and buy a Mineral Scanner and max out your ship upgrades: Engine Tuning, Cargo Extension, and Rudder Optimization. You are of course welcome to do whatever you like, but this is what I recommend.

Veterans: “Engine Tunings? Mineral Scanner? This is not how you make money early on! WTF?!”

As I asked you to remember before, the Terran Conflict economy is different. In X3 Reunion, we made our starting capital by wandering from sector to sector in our freighter looking for fully stocked factories selling pricey goods at a bargain. Then we wandered around looking for a factory that needed them that was completely out of stock to get the highest return price. Later, we used satellites and jump drives to speed up this process and earn credits even faster. Both of these conditions are far less common in Terran Conflict…

Why? The AI traders have jump drives too! That’s right, they’re scanning the universe for the highest returns and have been there and gone long before you stumble upon them. If you want to buy lowest and sell highest you’re going to be stuck trading ore and energy forever. Even silicon isn’t the cash cow it used to be; far fewer factories use it now. You will find fully stocked mines and buy silicon only to find most of the near-by factories that use it are already stocked. Then you’ll be stuck with it, trudging from sector to sector trying to get it out of your hold at any price you won’t take a loss on. In fact, you’ll find that most times you see a high-return resource at a bargain that the closest consumers are already at least partially stocked. AI traders appear to be working the best possible returns over the shortest possible distances to generate the largest profits in the shortest amount of time. Sound familiar? Reminds me of a Universe Trader…

Note: Admittedly there is some speculation here on my part as to how the AI traders are working now. This is entirely based upon what I have seen in game. I’ve seen deals at 2 or more factories in a sector and jumped in only to find them long gone. I had no idea what was going on until I happened to be parked at a station and noticed a freighter undock and immediately jump; no countdown, no following the lights, just a flash and it was gone… There also appears to be a problem with the economy and some freighters are acting strangely, but that’s beyond the scope of this guide.

So, you need to get a foot in the door to get started. You’re up against well funded heavy weights that have a huge edge on you in capital and assets. Truth is, you’ll need a steel wedge and a great big hammer to do it: satellite networks, fast ships, your own TL, a mobile base, and super freighters on call are all more important than ever… Oh, and don’t forget the jump drives all around.

I’ll bet you’re wondering how you’re going to do all this with a… Disco. Jobs, Jobs… I mean Missions, Missions, Missions!


Making Credits Part I – Missions

General: Missions come in five varieties in X3 Terran Conflict; TRADE, FIGHT, BUILD, THINK, and Plot. Plot is not officially a type, but is instead a mixture of the others that follows the main Terran Conflict story line. I will be concentrating on TRADE and THINK in this section and will address BUILD in the next. I will refer to these as “sandbox missions” from time to time because they’re not plot related.

When you’re exploring a system you will see symbols next to some of the stations. These indicate that a mission is available. The symbols you’re looking for are a light bulb for THINK and a currency symbol for TRADE. When you get within 25km of the station, comm the station and see what they have. Note that you should comm every station that has a symbol no matter what it is because more than one person on board may have a mission. I have seen stations with as many as 6 people offering a mission, so check out everything. You should avoid people that have a book, blocks or especially crosshairs next to their name. The crosshairs are combat, and you’re trying to keep a low profile, remember?

Do you remember those engine tunings and mineral scanners I asked you to sell your freighter and buy? This is why… Scanners make it easier to find missions and a faster ship allows you to complete missions more quickly. Don’t worry about the freighter, you’ll be swimming in cheap freighters soon enough.

I recommend you upgrade to a Triplex Scanner as soon as possible as it has a larger range. You can find them at:
Spoiler
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Boron and Paranid Equipment Docks
Terricorp HQ in Home of Light
Most Military Outposts
Note: I also recommend you avoid any mission from a person with a company name as a suffix. These are corporate missions, which appear to be bugged at the time of this writing. You’ll only see these at the large Corporate HQ stations.

You should take missions with long deadlines (1 hour+) until you get use to doing them. Some are more difficult than others and there are some caveats to watch out for. Save your game often and keep salvage insurance on hand. Failing missions not only wastes your time, it can cost you significant notoriety loss with the government that gave you the job.

Veterans: Completing missions of any kind will raise your race notoriety faster than was ever possible in X3 Reunion. Some might argue this makes it too easy to get your hands on potent military hardware, as notoriety was the one that that kept the player in check in X3R. However, when you consider the sheer amount of hardware governments have flying around now; does it really matter if you can get destroyer in just a few days? I’m not so sure…

Now, on to the THINK and TRADE mission subtypes, the briefing titles will give you a clue as to what to look for in the list below.

Scan Asteroids: These are as simple as they look. They will always require you to scan 10 asteroids in 1-3 adjacent sectors, including the one you’re in, and report back to the mission giver.

If you find more than one of these at a time, you can take them and your scans will count for both. Note that when you scan the last rock you get a new timer to report in to the mission giver. This can work to your advantage if the mission has a short timer. To report in, you need only get within comm range of the station and talk to the person, one of the options will be “I’m delivering your scan data.”

If the sectors are large you may need a jump drive to complete them in time; especially if the mission sectors are out of order and you have to double back. While most ships can do these, an M5 is required to do the ones with the shortest timers.

The pay is very random, but appears to scale with your notoriety and security level of the sectors you are asked to scan. The highest I’ve been paid is 89,000 Cr per rock, and it was probably the easiest 900,000 credits I’ve made.

The Ship, Ship, The Ship: Some of these have really odd names don’t they? Most of these are going to involve claiming an abandoned ship and returning it to the owner. However, there is a caveat here to watch out for. Some of these will ask you to return a stolen ship, stolen being the key word. You have to hunt down and persuade the person who stole the ship to give it up. You know, my mother always said that you can get more with a kind word and a plasma thrower than you can get with just a kind word. Stolen ship missions are actually FIGHT missions in disguise, you have to shoot up the ship so they will bail out, so avoid these.

The kind you are looking for asks you return an abandoned ship to the station. These are pretty simple as well; fly to the ship, claim it and order it back to the station. You’ll get a message when it arrives asking you to release control. Compensation appears to be tied to your notoriety and 150,000 credits was the highest I’ve seen, which really isn’t enough for some of the ships they asked me to retrieve.

These will become more difficult as the pay goes up, so here are some tips:
  • * When you go EVA to claim the ship, use your repair laser on it, this will make it move faster.

    * If the ship has to travel a long distance you can send it to the closest Trading Station and buy a couple of engine tunings.

    * You can also buy military transports (Class:TM) that will allow you to dock some of the ships and jump them right to their destination. TMs are available at shipyards, like any other kind of ship.

    * If the ship is too large to dock with a TM, you can send over the Navigation Command Software, Jump Drive, and Energy Cells from your fighter and jump the ship to its destination. Dock your fighter to your TM and jump in behind it. Then you can undock your fighter, chase down the ship and get your equipment back.
You’ll of course need a TM and your scout equipped with jump drives and transporters for some of these to work.
Spoiler
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Jump Drives and Transporters can be purchased at Terricorp HQ in Home of Light.
“What if I want to keep the ship, or sell it? What’s the biggest ship they’ll ask me to return?”

Well, there are consequences, and the answers to these are spoilers.
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The largest ships I have been asked to return are: Split Heavy Dragon (M6+), Paranid Nemesis (M6), Boron Thresher (M7), and a Split Cobra (M7M). The pay offered was the same as fighters and freighters, which irritated me. You want me to fetch your 30 million credit frigate for 90,000 credits? I was tempted to keep them but didn’t. Hopefully the pay for these is a bug and you’ll get more when they fix it.

If you try to keep the ship, by claiming it and abandoning the quest, you’ll lose notoriety with the race that gave you the quest. They will also dispatch police to destroy the ship.

If you claim the ship and sell it you’ll get a message saying you’ve destroyed the ship and the authorities have been notified. I assume you’re supposed to lose reputation, but I did not when I tried it, so it’s clearly bugged. Since I found this method to be exploitable, I just reloaded my save and returned the ships.
Urgent Resources Needed: You’ll find these on the rare occasion where factories are completely out of a primary resource. The AI traders fill the highest return resources quickly, so you’ll see these mostly on low margin materials like Ore and Energy. Which is fine, because factories pay big money for these missions; as much as 10X+ the highest value of the goods. So, you could actually buy the resources at their highest price and still make a ton of credits. The most I have made involved a delivery of 12,000 energy cells in 10 minutes for about 1.5 million credits.

These missions appear to be bugged, but they’re actually not, so let me explain how to complete them. First, you must be on the freighter when it makes a delivery. You cannot remotely send freighters to complete these, nor can you be on a docked with a different ship than the one that makes the delivery. You can make more than one delivery to fill the order, where the mission time allows, but you must be on that freighter each time it docks. A transporter and a docking computer on your freighter can help a lot with this. Docking Computers allow you to “instantly” dock with a station when you’re 3-5km away, just keep selecting Dock and it will happen when you’re close enough.

You won’t be “selling” the goods to the station, they’ll be taken out of your hold automatically and you’ll see a “delivery received” message. You might see requests for more resources that the station can actually house. Don’t worry about this; the station’s hopper will just be filled to the max when you complete the mission.

The highest paying missions are difficult to complete in the time given, so I have some tips. Keep some Super Freighters on call with jump drives, transporters, and docking computers installed. When you see a mission with a low time limit, don’t take the mission until you’ve got the goods on hand. Remotely send your freighters to find and collect the goods, a satellite network helps here. Don’t be afraid to pay any price for the materials as you will be getting paid many times the base value of those resources. If you see an AI freighter headed for the station with what the mission requires, comm the station and grab the mission, because it will disappear as soon as that resource is stocked.

When your freighters are loaded up with the required materials, jump the freighters in and tell them to dock at the station. You can use your transporter to jump to each freighter when it gets into docking computer range and instantly dock it. When you get the delivery received message, undock, fly away from the station and transport to the next freighter.

Some of these missions are a little different in that they are requesting illegal goods instead of station resources. They’ll warn you to avoid police in the briefing. The good thing about them as that they’re usually offering big money for a small amount of goods (800,000 Cr for 232 space weed), so you can bring them in on a fighter or fast TP. I plan to keep some Falcon Haulers stocked up with space fuel, space weed and slaves docked in a pirate sector to fill these when I get a chance. The normal dangers of smuggling still apply; if you get scanned you’ll lose notoriety and possibly be shot at.

Scan for Illegal Goods/Scan for Valuable Goods: Which one you get depends on whether you’re in a government sector or a pirate sector. You’ll need a police license to do these in government sectors and AI ships may turn hostile if you scan them in pirate sectors.

I currently avoid these missions because I think they’re bugged. (Someone correct me if I am wrong.) Every time I have taken one of these I haven’t found a single smuggler, and you will fail the mission if you don’t find at least one. I suspect that the mission script is supposed to spawn some ships coming out of the jump gates with illegal goods, and perhaps that part isn’t working. My advice is to avoid these for now…

Taxi/Passenger/Troop Transport Needed: These missions come in three varieties. Note that you will need a Cargo Bay Life Support System to carry passengers of any kind. Some times of ships have these built in, and you must buy them separately for others. Just like the delivery missions, you must be on board the ship to pick up or deliver a person. You cannot remotely command ships to complete these missions.

“I need a fast ship to get to a meeting.” – If there is no mention of a ship class you can taxi them with your fighter. If they tell you there’s not enough room, try selling some of your jump energy. When there’s enough room they’ll board automatically. I highly recommend an M5 class ship fitted with a jump drive and a docking computer for these, as the highest paying missions will have impossibly short delivery times.

“I/We need a ride and require luxury/passenger transportation” – You’ll need a Passenger Transport (Class:TP) to complete these. Again, the fastest TP ship you can find with a jump drive and docking computer.

“Troop/Military Transport Needed” – You’ll need a Class TM ship to complete these. As always, fast and well equipped.

My ship recommendations and where to get them are spoilers.
Spoiler
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  • M5: I suggest you upgrade your Discoverer to a Discoverer Raider as soon as possible. The discoverer is on of the few scouts that can hold medium sized cargo, and therefore equip a jump drive; which is essential. The top speed of the ship is 427 m/s and can hold enough jump energy to cross 8 sectors on its own. You can buy them at the Federal Argon Shipyard in Cloud Base Southeast. You will also need a Cargo Bay Life Support, since scouts don’t have them built in. You can find these at Split Equipment Docks.

    TP: I suggest the Iguana Vanguard, as it’s the fastest TP available moving at a snappy 173 m/s. Just don’t tell your snobby passengers that the ship used to be for transporting slaves in the Split Consortium. I’m not sure if they are available at any of the new shipyards in Terran Conflict. But I can tell you that one might be offered for sale as a used ship. There is also rumored to be a derelict Iguana Vanguard somewhere in the Split sectors. Life support is already built into these ships.

    TM: I suggest the OTAS Zephyr as it’s the fastest available moving at 140 m/s. This ship also makes a great mobile base as it docks 4 fighters, has 600MJ of shielding and good turret/gun options that make it a less attractive “target”. The freight bay holds 1250 cargo, so you can load up on energy, have the ship follow you on auto jump and you’ve always got a place to dock your scout and plenty of jump energy on hand. This ship will also help with the “retrieve my abandoned ship” missions. It’s a great investment at 400,000 Cr and many of us think they actually intended to price it at 4 million credits. (More about that later…) I can’t remember if it came with life support or not, but if you’re reading this then you already know where to get it.
Ship For Sale/Used Ship Available: You find these by comm-ing ships that are flagged with a currency symbol. If you want more information about the ship, close the comm window and select the ship and then select “Info”. You’ll find these guys hanging around gates when you first enter a sector. Always open your map when you enter a sector and look for them. Also, they can occasionally be found in stations like equipment docks or shipyards. If you want to see the info on a docked ship close the comm window, then select the station, select “docked ships” and select “info” for the one that was for sale. These are time limited, so you need to act quickly if you want to buy the ship. Keep in mind that sometimes they are bugged, and you won’t get a “What are you offering?” option in the comm window. Just ignore these; I have yet to find to find, or hear of, a work around for these.

These are great for making large amounts of credits and building your personal fleet quickly. You can also obtain rare types of ships from these, so look carefully at the name and information about the ship. I’ve seen several people complain that they have lost a lot of money on these. Well, they are THINK missions, and you’ll notice the difficulty is always “???”. You are not guaranteed to get a good deal, so you have to use your noggin. Don’t be afraid to say no, sometimes they are trying to rip you off.

No need to worry, I have some tips:
  • * When you enter sectors with shipyards, look at the prices so you get a “feel” for what the various ship classes are worth. You’ll notice that Vanguards and Raiders are worth more, and Sentinels are worth the most.

    * Shipyards buy healthy, unequipped ships for about 30% below the price they are listed for sale at. So always knock 30% of the list price when considering a deal.

    * Used ships with perfect hulls are, more often than not, a rip off. Be extra careful investigating the asking price if the ship has a perfect hull. Also, don’t count on getting the installed equipment. Equipment is almost always removed when you buy the ship.

    * If the ship has hull damage it will sell for even less. Take the new price and subtract 30% to get the used price. Now, if the ship has 25% hull damage subtract 25% from the used price to get the resale value of the ship. If the selling price is below that, you can make instant money.

    * If you’re not sure about the new price of a ship, check your encyclopedia to see where it’s sold. Then, have your scout jump into that sector so you can check the price while you wait in your mobile base. Don’t leave the sector yourself because that usually resets the available missions.

    * Get your hands dirty: Go EVA and use your repair laser to maximize your profits. Most ships can be repaired in just a couple of minutes. Fighters are worth more, and take less time to repair. Freighters can be a chore, and miners seem to take the longest.

    * Beware of freighter designations. Some governments have more than one kind of Super Freighter; one that costs millions and another that’s more of a Hauler. If you’re unsure, check the ship’s info for the freight capacity.

    * Keep some of them! New Super Freighters cost millions and you might be able to use them later. So, if you’re not strapped for cash and think a ship might be useful, park it at an equipment dock. They don’t depreciate and you can always sell them later.

    * Don’t EVER by a used TM. They are always priced at 1-4 million credits used, when they sell for a few hundred thousand new. (This is one of the reasons many people think the price is incorrect at shipyards.)

    * Don’t be afraid to buy an over priced ship if it is a rare type. While this has not happened for me yet, I suspect it’s possible. This might be the only other way to get Advanced, Enhanced, or Prototype versions of ships outside of capturing.
I’m going to list some of the deals I have gotten to show you how lucrative it can be: I picked up a Caiman Super Freighter for 280K, repaired and sold for 900K. Argon Nova I bought for 41K was repaired and sold for 1 million. I picked up two Nova Sentinels for 160K and 250K respectively. I repaired both of them and they sold for 1.5 million each.

I have yet to see a Corvette or larger ship for sale used. I’ll update this guide if I see that, but I suspect that the mission won’t spawn ships you don’t currently have the money to buy.

Covert Ops/Meeting Details: I have only done one of these. Basically, the player is asked to follow a ship and record the goings on and report back to the mission giver. If you get to close, or you lose the ship, you fail. I stayed about 10 km behind the whole time and stopped when he approached a jump gate, then caught up with him on the other side. The mission wasn’t difficult, but was uneventful and very time consuming. If you want to do these, you’ll probably need an M5 and a high tolerance for boredom. Personally, I have better things to do...

Warez Delivery/Courier Needed: Basically you need to pick up some non-commodity freight from one station and deliver it to another within a very short amount of time. The pay being offered is quite lucrative ranging from hundreds of thousands to several million for the shortest timers.

I see a lot of people saying these are “Impossible” on the forums, and I’m here to tell you that they’re not. And, in fact, I have yet to fail one…

How? Well, they are probably the most difficult THINK missions that exist in the sandbox game. But THINKing, is your key to competing them. You must be on the ball to complete these. You have to use every trick that exists in the game to minimize your flight time. There are a lot of these tricks and, if you put your mind to it, you can get places in a very short amount of time with the right plan and the right equipment. Think of these as doing Kessel Run from Star Wars.

That said… I have some tips for doing the seemingly impossible missions with very short timers:
  • * You need to pick the right ship based on the cargo. Most of these non-commodity wares are a cargo type (S) and have a volume of 1. The exception to this is Radio Active Waste, which is cargo type (XL) and requires a freighter. I have been declining those until I can find a really fast freighter. If the mission has a small number of wares (1-20), you need an M5. If the number is around 100, you’ll need an M4. These should be the fastest available ships in their class, but will need to fit medium (M) sized cargo.

    * You need to plan your route. The mission briefing will show both of the involved stations, make sure you can see both of them on your maps. If you cannot get from a station to the jump gate leading to the other station, or from one station to the other should the stations be in the same sector, in less than ten seconds; you will need to use your jump drive. You should always jump to the gate closest to the station you’re trying to reach.

    * You need the right equipment. You should have maxed your engine tunings, cargo extension and rudder optimizations on the ship you’re using. (Remember me asking you to do that in the beginning?) You will also need a docking computer, boost extension and jump drive. The jump drive is a medium size cargo, which is why you needed a ship that can carry (M) cargo. You will need to have enough jump energy for 2.5 jumps on board. The energy to jump to the destination, the energy to jump back to the source station, and enough for an in-sector jump should you have picked the wrong gate during one of them.

    * Save your game before accepting the mission and don’t use SETA during these missions. Sometimes your ship just won’t be fast enough, and SETA can really mess you up when you’ve only got 5 minutes on the clock.

    * You must be 100% ready before accepting the mission. You should already have everything you need on board and know exactly where you’re going. Your mission tracker should also be set to track this mission if you have more than one active.

    * I’ll tell you how I do them… I start a jump drive sequence towards the gate that is closest to my destination. Then I comm the station and accept the mission. As soon as I am out of the gate I fire my boost extension and head towards the first station. When I am 4 km away I begin repeatedly issuing the dock command to that the docking computer will fire and instant dock when I get in range. As soon as I see the “wares loaded” message I undock, thrust in a random direction and start a jump sequence back to the source station. I come out of the gate, boost towards the station and start issuing the dock command again. It really is amazing how fast you can get from A to B this way.
The most lucrative one of these I have completed had a 3 minute timer and paid almost 2 million credits. I completed it with 30 seconds to spare, so there is a little slack, but not much.

My recommended ships are in the spoiler below…
Spoiler
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I find the Argon Discoverer Raider best for M5 missions and the Boron Mako Raider best for M4 missions.
This concludes Part One of this guide. Feel free to point out any errors on my part and I’ll update accordingly. Also, tell me if you found this helpful, I’d really like to know!


Making Credits Part II – Build

So you’ve done lots of missions and have a small fleet at your disposal. You’ve got the hammer and the wedge and you’re ready to start your empire… Well, I’m sorry, but you’ll have to wait just a bit longer for me to finish this. I just got my TL myself and need time to try the various ideas I have come up with to see how they pan out.

So, check back soon…


- Phoenix
Last edited by phoenix-it on Mon, 3. Nov 08, 01:50, edited 4 times in total.

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Post by phoenix-it » Mon, 3. Nov 08, 01:07

<Reserved>

In case I bounce off a post limit in part two. If this can't happen, let me know and delete this reservation.

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Post by esd » Mon, 3. Nov 08, 01:13

phoenix-it wrote:<Reserved>

In case I bounce off a post limit in part two. If this can't happen, let me know and delete this reservation.
In the case of guides, I think we can allow this :)

I also very nearly moved this to the spoiler forum, but you've done a good job of keeping what spoilers there are, protected from accidental viewing.

Good guide :)
esd's Guides: X² Loops - X³ MORTs

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Post by phoenix-it » Mon, 3. Nov 08, 01:18

esd wrote:
phoenix-it wrote:<Reserved>

In case I bounce off a post limit in part two. If this can't happen, let me know and delete this reservation.
In the case of guides, I think we can allow this :)

I also very nearly moved this to the spoiler forum, but you've done a good job of keeping what spoilers there are, protected from accidental viewing.

Good guide :)
Thank you! :)

I tried to put the dividing line for spoilers at this point -> Is it mentioned in the manual? Missions and ships are, but not where they reside, etc. Additionally, I didn't think the sandbox missions and tips to completing them were spoiler worthy. If anyone suggests that any of this is TMI, I'll go back and hide a few more things.

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Post by GCU Grey Area » Mon, 3. Nov 08, 02:15

:thumb_up: Excellent & informative guide. Very well written. Only minor thing I would quibble is the ship recommendations.
Spoiler
Show
Personally prefer the Teladi Kestrel for M5 missions & the Split Boa for anything needing a TM - these ships are marginally faster than Discoverer & Zephyr (respectively) for missions where speed really counts

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Post by Tiedyeguy » Mon, 3. Nov 08, 02:26

Very nice guide. I am somewhat of an X-Vet but you did a good job providing insight as to what constitutes a "good" mission and some nice tricks to completing the tougher ones.

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Post by Creston » Mon, 3. Nov 08, 02:54

Great work Phoenix! I was very interested in this guide since I wrote one myself for X2.

I was a bit curious when you said that you'd still buy low and sell high on pricey goods in Reunion. In my experience, it was FAR more profitable in Reunion to buy low and sell for average (to equipment docks) as a weapons trader. Ofcourse, this does require you to have considerable capital to haul all this stuff around. I'd always feel just a BIT vulnerable with 20 million worth of guns in my hold :)

Anyways, thanks for all the hard work!

Edit : Btw, you don't need a TM to deliver the Military Troops anywhere. They'll hop on board your fighter without any problems. I've delivered tons of troops in my M6.

Creston

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Post by phoenix-it » Mon, 3. Nov 08, 03:58

Creston wrote:Great work Phoenix! I was very interested in this guide since I wrote one myself for X2.

I was a bit curious when you said that you'd still buy low and sell high on pricey goods in Reunion. In my experience, it was FAR more profitable in Reunion to buy low and sell for average (to equipment docks) as a weapons trader. Ofcourse, this does require you to have considerable capital to haul all this stuff around. I'd always feel just a BIT vulnerable with 20 million worth of guns in my hold :)

Anyways, thanks for all the hard work!

Edit : Btw, you don't need a TM to deliver the Military Troops anywhere. They'll hop on board your fighter without any problems. I've delivered tons of troops in my M6.

Creston
My first X game was X3R. But, when I was talking about buy low and sell high I meant in the beginning. Silicon/Bio/Food was the staple trading until you built some notoriety and wealth.

However, in TC the AI traders seem to have snapped all those deals up before you get to them. The only thing I can find at a bargain are goods that are low margin, like ore and energy. If you do find a higher margin item cheap, you usually find the closest sectors that use the product are stocked, hence why the AI traders didn't grab it.

For Instance: When I started the game I couldn't find Argnu Beef, meatsteaks or wheat cheap at any station. When I finally did find it at a bargain, there were no factories that needed it that were anywhere near empty. Silicon is the same way, I found some for 232, expecting to find waiting factories that would pay me 700+, only the FEW that did use silicon were already full. As I moved around I noticed that this went on to include bogas, plankton, etc. And you can FORGET high-tech and weapons, they're gone before the factory is even selling at the cheapest price.

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Post by phoenix-it » Mon, 3. Nov 08, 05:19

GCU Grey Area wrote::thumb_up: Excellent & informative guide. Very well written. Only minor thing I would quibble is the ship recommendations.
Thanks! I haven't tried all the ships yet... I add them to the guide later.

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Post by bassism » Mon, 3. Nov 08, 06:32

Thanks for the nice, well written guide.
I just started a new game after getting bored with all the fighting, and came to some of the same conclusions as you once I started playing with the think missions. But you've brought quite a few useful little tidbits.
I also never realized that the AI traders are using jump drives now. That goes a pretty long way towards explaining why the economy feels broken.

Selling the freighter and keeping the Disco is a neat idea though.... I like that.

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Post by MeatBag » Mon, 3. Nov 08, 12:13

Hey nice guide :thumb_up:

Just a question, what about the "Deliver ship" missions??
You know, the ones where they ask you to give them an Argon M5 or a Paranid TS etc
I've never really been sure if they are worth buying from a shipyard to deliver


BTW the "scan illegal goods" i have found three smugglers once. I scanned them... But still failed the mission :?

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Post by jlehtone » Mon, 3. Nov 08, 16:54

Nicely written. :thumb_up:

Some might feel that they still learn a bit too much about the sandbox, but those chaps hardly visit threads titled "guide" anyway. I think it is important to clarify the usual cases where the user thinks that there is a bug, while there is not. In ideal world that would decrease the amount of false bug reports in the tech support forum, and leave more time for the Devs to work on the real bugs (which naturally should be reported there).

I'm not sure if I'd classify "Trade missions" as "trading" though. If I would, I could call Assassination a "trade run" as well. You do invest in resources (weapons) and deliver the product (death) for which you get paid. The product is about as tangible as in "trade missions". Thus, almost "regular" trade. ;)

On the other hand, even the "resource shortage" mission is more like getting paid for delivery, rather than "buy low, sell high" of traditional trading. Overall, the missions seem to be the main focus of the X3TC, and the trade&build is more to provide wares for your empire. Nevertheless, using the "shooting required" as distinction between "trade" and "fight" is quite reasonable.


It is nice to hear that the tricks that work on X3R missions pretty much are valid for X3TC too.
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Post by Painman » Mon, 3. Nov 08, 17:29

This is excellent. :idea: Almost makes me want to restart!

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Post by phoenix-it » Mon, 3. Nov 08, 17:35

bassism wrote:Thanks for the nice, well written guide.
I just started a new game after getting bored with all the fighting, and came to some of the same conclusions as you once I started playing with the think missions. But you've brought quite a few useful little tidbits.
I also never realized that the AI traders are using jump drives now. That goes a pretty long way towards explaining why the economy feels broken.

Selling the freighter and keeping the Disco is a neat idea though.... I like that.
Well, the economy isn't "broken" per se... I actually started a thread about the economic weirdness last week.

The problem is the AI traders are looking for the highest returns, which means top end goods get traded FIRST. This is why energy and ore seem to sit there in factories hardly bought while factories in the very next sector sit there completely empty.

I believe the AI traders are just not interested with the other deals floating around and that this is why the economy feels broken. What I think will happen eventually is: As those top end deals become scarce, the AI traders will start moving low margin goods. THEN the economy will start to move, but I still believe things will bounce back and fourth as tech factories start producing and then stalling from a lack of resources. The problem is, none of us have been playing the game long enough for this to happen yet... Of course, I could be wrong and the problem could actually be caused by coding somewhere. Only time will tell...

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Post by phoenix-it » Mon, 3. Nov 08, 17:40

MeatBag wrote:Hey nice guide :thumb_up:

Just a question, what about the "Deliver ship" missions??
You know, the ones where they ask you to give them an Argon M5 or a Paranid TS etc
I've never really been sure if they are worth buying from a shipyard to deliver


BTW the "scan illegal goods" i have found three smugglers once. I scanned them... But still failed the mission :?
Thanks for reminding me! I forgot about that one... I'll put this in the guide proper later. But for now:

Can you make money buying the ship new? Most of the time, no... Take the new price of the ship from the shipyard and subtract 30% to get the used price. Add the amount they're offering to the used price and if that's higher, than the NEW price of the ship, you'll make money.

I find that, unless I have one I bought used sitting at a dock, most of these are break even.

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Post by phoenix-it » Mon, 3. Nov 08, 18:37

jlehtone wrote:Nicely written. :thumb_up:

Some might feel that they still learn a bit too much about the sandbox, but those chaps hardly visit threads titled "guide" anyway. I think it is important to clarify the usual cases where the user thinks that there is a bug, while there is not. In ideal world that would decrease the amount of false bug reports in the tech support forum, and leave more time for the Devs to work on the real bugs (which naturally should be reported there).
So are you saying I did a good job of point out those things that aren't broken and that you just have to do them a certain way? Or are you saying that I should put some more "this is not broken because" messages in there?

I'm also thinking of maybe putting the TIPS in spoilers. Some people might just want to know how to properly complete the mission without the tips on how to beat the clock.
jlehtone wrote:I'm not sure if I'd classify "Trade missions" as "trading" though. If I would, I could call Assassination a "trade run" as well. You do invest in resources (weapons) and deliver the product (death) for which you get paid. The product is about as tangible as in "trade missions". Thus, almost "regular" trade. ;)
Yes... As I progress, I am finding that traditional trading and factory building are not nearly as lucrative as continuing to do various missions.

For example: I can buy and build a medium wheat farm for around 350,000 credits. I can add freighters to that, let's say I got them cheap and just added shields, 250,000 for both. Now, I have to wait for my 600,000 credit investment to pay for itself, and then churn out free credits.

-Or-

I can get a contract from a Teladi to build an ammunition factory for... 1,600,000 credits free and clear above the cost of the station.

So, as I think about part two, I think the guide's focus will be changing. Instead of "do missions to get your foot in the door trading" it might become "do missions to become a manufacturing tycoon".
jlehtone wrote:On the other hand, even the "resource shortage" mission is more like getting paid for delivery, rather than "buy low, sell high" of traditional trading. Overall, the missions seem to be the main focus of the X3TC, and the trade&build is more to provide wares for your empire. Nevertheless, using the "shooting required" as distinction between "trade" and "fight" is quite reasonable.


It is nice to hear that the tricks that work on X3R missions pretty much are valid for X3TC too.
Imagine having huge production complexes of your own churning out masses of goods. You've got a legion of super freighters selling those goods for you automatically. They jump to an unlimited range to sell your wares to whoever is buying, and refuel themselves automatically. (I haven't actually tried autojump + trade commands yet...)

Then, when you run across the guy asking for 12,000 meatsteaks in 15 minutes and offering to pay 5 million credits you can load that up right from your complex on to 3 super freighters and fill that order.

I have some ideas about using trading stations to do this early on. Seeing as how bio/food factories will sit there full until the local tech factories get enough energy to burn through their stock. There may be a buy-and-hold process there that is quite lucrative.

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Post by jlehtone » Mon, 3. Nov 08, 20:27

phoenix-it wrote:So are you saying I did a good job ...
Yes. :)
I'm also thinking of maybe putting the TIPS in spoilers.
That is probably polite.
Imagine having huge production complexes of your own churning out masses of goods. ... Then, when you run across the guy asking for 12,000 meatsteaks in 15 minutes and offering to pay 5 million credits you can load that up right from your complex on to 3 super freighters and fill that order.
That is exactly what I do in my X3R game now, except that no customer ever requests quantity that large. But that implies the empire to be there. Not the stage when the door is still almost closed.


Tip: Rather than posting three comments in a row, you can use the Edit button to add to the latest post. That is more polite on fora.
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Post by random50 » Mon, 3. Nov 08, 20:42

phoenix-it wrote: I believe the AI traders are just not interested with the other deals floating around and that this is why the economy feels broken. What I think will happen eventually is: As those top end deals become scarce, the AI traders will start moving low margin goods. THEN the economy will start to move
That makes sense. In my game, every station in Omicron Lyrae was sitting bereft of ore, silicon and e-cells despite them being available at rock bottom one sector away. Since I had a ship camped at the Advanced Sat factory there, I bought a superfreighter to restock. I was too slow with the silicon (but managed to sell it nearby). By the time I'd got the ecells, not only was the sat factory full of them, but so was every single factory in the neighboring sectors!

Trading is going to be harder, I think. Not that this is a bad thing (with X3R you could effectively build any factory you liked and be certain of buying at minimum and selling at maximum)

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Post by phoenix-it » Mon, 3. Nov 08, 23:53

jlehtone wrote:That is exactly what I do in my X3R game now, except that no customer ever requests quantity that large. But that implies the empire to be there. Not the stage when the door is still almost closed.
Actually, you can pull this off early on in TC... Just not as easily as if you had your own empire.

Look for a sector with factories completely bereft of energy cells, one will probably have a "Resources Needed" mission. Send one or two of those super freighters you bought used at a discount to some solar power plants... Buy the required amount, jump the freighters in and accept the mission. Dock the freighters 1 at a time personally and you'll make a ton of credits.
random50 wrote:That makes sense. In my game, every station in Omicron Lyrae was sitting bereft of ore, silicon and e-cells despite them being available at rock bottom one sector away. Since I had a ship camped at the Advanced Sat factory there, I bought a superfreighter to restock. I was too slow with the silicon (but managed to sell it nearby). By the time I'd got the ecells, not only was the sat factory full of them, but so was every single factory in the neighboring sectors!

Trading is going to be harder, I think. Not that this is a bad thing (with X3R you could effectively build any factory you liked and be certain of buying at minimum and selling at maximum)
What's interesting is that once the high price goods start being produced again those same freighters will probably stop supplying low margin goods. If this goes down like I am thinking, the markets will oscillate; which is why I mentioned the using a Trading Station early on (before you have massive complexes) to play a buy-and-hold strategy. When the factories start to run low on low margin goods again, because the traders have switched back to trading the more profitable tech, you'll have a stock to take advantage of the the high prices the tech factories will be paying for food.

Yes, trading IS harder, which is why we are seeing a buzz about secondary resources. It's hard to sell anything produced at locations local to it's production. But, to be fair, trading manually, or with UTs outperformed factories in profits in X3R. (Unless you were running closed loops...) There was something wrong with the idea that factories were not your most profitable investment.

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Post by Mav'r'ck » Tue, 4. Nov 08, 00:12

Great guide phoenix...

Just a quick point though, missions and combat can never and will never sub for a good trading empire.

The point is with trading that all of it - stations, UTs, MORTS - happens in the background. Whatever you are doing is not hampered by trading.

Also trading still makes absolute fortunes...I've gone about empire building in a very backwards way as I am not touching UTs and stations until the UT bug is fixed, and I can get the commercial agent script...may even wait for the first bonus pack (actually, I must confess I'm really quite annoyed that the BP wasn't simply incorporated into the game, seems odd to me actually remove huge numbers of features from the final versions of X3 only to inevitably put them back in but anyhoo).

Back on topic, this has led me to ESD's guide on MORTs (see guides sticky) and a couple of Mistrals. In the short time I've had them, I've been amazed at how much money I've made, and this is with no satellites, no real planning or effort, and no high tech goods.

If I were really dedicated, even new TC style mission rewards wouldn't compare to a good nose for profit, a comprehensive satellite network and maybe 10 MORTS - 15-20 UTs. It also occurs that combat missions would become even more of an earner if you can afford a decent fleet before you start taking them.

Basically it's just to say if trading was your thing in X3, there's no reason why it shouldn't be now, and I'm sure some of the new sectors will have significant shortages in one thing or another...and this is coming from a very much combat orientated pilot.

Deals do go quickly, but I would think this makes even more fun potential for the committed trader as there would be real value in, as you also describe, a variety of trading ships for different goods.

Still, once again a fantastic guide on an original subject, much appreciated!

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