From post: 169068, Topic: tid=11343, author=Busch wrote:Paul, the fulcrum torps function as designed - as a weapon of mass destruction. They do come in handy, from time to time, for the opportunistic pilot who may use them to a particular advantage.
Quite a while ago, Vice removed the 'opportunity' to make civy status increases due solely by the way of garnering game cash. 'Twas determined a 'cheat' and an unfair advantage over others, who had no clue to the possibility. And rightly so. Game cash/credits ARE a vital part of the accrual of points mix. Add in the number of kills per cycle, the amount of cash earned per cycle (100k or better), contracts/missions completed, and total game cash on hand, to name a few. Rating numbers may drop. There appear to be certain conditions in which rank/status may follow the decline, but I'm not all that sure of the cause-effect relationship. It does exist however, and may be a concern - as you've expressed. If you're doing all the best you can, I'd not worry about it. It's really hard to go backwards when you're going forwards...
Yes, I understand all that, though not what the weighting factor is between cash and contacts and kills, etc.
But what kinda gets me is that at my current credit status if I want to hire Wingmen (at least in Olympus where I am now) they are 150000 each. Sure I want them to help with Contracts, especially multi waypoint contracts, but that only part of my reasons. I'd also like to have them cause to the limitied extent that they are AI, they allow me to interact with them and kinda feel like I'm not alone in the game. (I've explained in other post why I can't reliably do MP).
But at 150000 each for say 2 wingmen I'd have to continually do combat contracts and I'm not sure even then if I wouldn't eventually go in the hole.
Combat contracts is not the major part of the game to me - the game as a whole is.
Oh well, C'est la vie.
From post: 169088, Topic: tid=11343, author=DaveK wrote:I did experiment with cash and I dropped rank when I'd dumped enough expensive equipment in deep space
For your civvy rank there are two ways: the easy one is to make $$$ - you can hit Legend in a few days; the hard one is to do it by kills and number of contracts - you may not hit Legend before you shuffle of this mortal coil!
Most people do a mix, I guess.
Sure, and that's what I am doing. Rank is not so important to me that I'm doing nothing but Pearl runs to get billions.
I've done enough to get me just over $400,000,000 (not all of that is Pearl runs but most is).
But as I said in another reply - I'm feeling hampered in the "fun" category by the 150,000 per wingman to have just 2 in a fleet, as I said not just for Contracts, but to company and all the rest.
I could live with this:
(1) 1500 - 2000 per wingman per payperiod - just for hanging around.
plus
(2) 30% - 40% of successful contracts divided amongst however many in your fleet.
From post: 169108, Topic: tid=11343, author=PaulB wrote:
[...]
But as I said in another reply - I'm feeling hampered in the "fun" category by the 150,000 per wingman to have just 2 in a fleet, as I said not just for Contracts, but to company and all the rest.
Are the 150,000 a fixed price (which I doubt) or do they depend on your overall wealth, as some kind of 'hidden taxes' or on your faction reputation to your wingmen's faction?
From post: 169108, Topic: tid=11343, author=PaulB wrote:
I could live with this:
(1) 1500 - 2000 per wingman per payperiod - just for hanging around.
plus
(2) 30% - 40% of successful contracts divided amongst however many in your fleet.
That would see fair to me - as an employer.
Paul
I always puzzled over what employers considered fair - to them.
1) Free enterprise economy, take it or leave it.
2) This can't work at all. 100 wingmen would cost the same than 2, which is of course fair - for the employer.
From post: 169112, Topic: tid=11343, author=picommander wrote:Are the 150,000 a fixed price (which I doubt) or do they depend on your overall wealth, as some kind of 'hidden taxes' or on your faction reputation to your wingmen's faction?
A number of things you can spend money on in game depends on your bank balance. When you start, constructing a station cost thousands - when you are rich it more like millions.
At the moment in my deep space profile with $9 mill (rapidly depleting and no chance of making more!!) it costs me 750 000 to deploy a fuel constructor - nearly as much as refuelling my car . If I could build a station it would cost a couple of million (but I can't - build constructors don't work beyond around 20K sectors out! (take a deploy constructor if you are going to explore the really distant system in the game!)
Such is life - our Governments super tax the wealthy (and the merely comfortable - both in RL and in Evochron! :P
Callsign: Incoming
Life is like a sewer... what you get out of it depends on what you put into it. - Bob Newhart
Hell is being in a pure platinum asteroid field... with a diamond mining beam
I'm afraid I must side with pico on this one. You picked one of the worst star systems to be your first place to "tame" ... and now you can't afford to complete the task. Half a million credits is a good amount if you're trying to settle in Orion or Pices ... but Pearl? Only crazy mercenaries will agree to hire on as your wingmen in Pearl. If I were you, I'd postpone that objective and go where you can make a couple billion doing trade runs ... then (with three or four wingmen you can afford) go back to Pearl and finish the job.
As for sensor arrays, they just increase your radar coverage. Nothing else. If you carry a deploy constructor, fly to the center of any sector and deploy a sensor station as a test. The coverage is always the same. The practice setting waypoints over sensor blips and jumping to their location.
From post: 169114, Topic: tid=11343, author=Marvin wrote: I'm afraid I must side with pico on this one. You picked one of the worst star systems to be your first place to "tame" ... and now you can't afford to complete the task. Half a million credits is a good amount if you're trying to settle in Orion or Pices ... but Pearl? Only crazy mercenaries will agree to hire on as your wingmen in Pearl. If I were you, I'd postpone that objective and go where you can make a couple billion doing trade runs ... then (with three or four wingmen you can afford) go back to Pearl and finish the job.
As for sensor arrays, they just increase your radar coverage. Nothing else. If you carry a deploy constructor, fly to the center of any sector and deploy a sensor station as a test. The coverage is always the same. The practice setting waypoints over sensor blips and jumping to their location.
Me settle in Pearl? It isn't me - LOL I'm not senile yet. It's Pico who is tackling Pearl. I only go there to make money trading - like most everyone else. The only place I hate as bad or worse (so far) is Thuban.
It's in Olympus I'm working at present to "up" my rating there and want to hire the Wingmen.
I have to give Pico credit for having the balls to tackle taming Pearl though - it seems like a hopeless case to me.
That's why I ask him some post back or elsewhere how he was getting contracts there. Port Oasis and Pearl Hidded won't let me have Contracts "because of my Rating" it says - and I had asked what his rankings were when he 1st went there to compare with mine - which were about the opposite of what they are for a newbie in Sapphire.
From post: 169125, Topic: tid=11343, author=PaulB wrote:
[...]
I have to give Pico credit for having the balls to tackle taming Pearl though - it seems like a hopeless case to me.
That's why I ask him some post back or elsewhere how he was getting contracts there. Port Oasis and Pearl Hidded won't let me have Contracts "because of my Rating" it says - and I had asked what his rankings were when he 1st went there to compare with mine - which were about the opposite of what they are for a newbie in Sapphire.
[Edited on 4-21-2014 by PaulB]
No it's by far not hopeless, you might have missed the part where I told you I'd built my own station there from which I do most of my contracts. I also bought a licence at Tranquility(spelling?) station, but here it's getting complicated cause it's a station right above the orbit. Lots of fun but also lots of chaos. You could buy a licence at Port Oasis though, I'm pretty sure it would do as well but your own station would be cheaper.
Pearl is now moderate to me which I think was the hardest part, since from now on I get a greater variety of contracts offered. And no, I'm not senile (yet) Just a bit stubborn sometimes. Not sure if I'll ever try to conquer Thuban though. After all I'm not a masochist, but then I'm also getting better, a little bit day by day. Who knows, maybe someday...
From post: 169128, Topic: tid=11343, author=picommander wrote:Pearl is now moderate to me which I think was the hardest part, since from now on I get a greater variety of contracts offered.
Congratulations. It's downhill from this point on. Remember, delivery contracts now count as much as combat.
From post: 169128, Topic: tid=11343, author=picommander wrote:
[...]
Which reminds me to another post, quoting myself:
"For Equip to swap out I choose the mining beam. It's cheap and often available, but I'm also having a hard time to get rid of it (small remnants of a merchant's soul I guess)."
Big fail. Of course it's NOT often available, especially if you need it...
That was double wrong and so the result is right. Right?
I didn't know that metal mining beams (and I guess all other 'specialized' mining beams as well) are able to work as cargo scoops and also doing the delivery contracts with.
From post: 169128, Topic: tid=11343, author=picommander wrote:
From post: 169125, Topic: tid=11343, author=PaulB wrote:
[...]
I have to give Pico credit for having the balls to tackle taming Pearl though - it seems like a hopeless case to me.
That's why I ask him some post back or elsewhere how he was getting contracts there. Port Oasis and Pearl Hidded won't let me have Contracts "because of my Rating" it says - and I had asked what his rankings were when he 1st went there to compare with mine - which were about the opposite of what they are for a newbie in Sapphire.
[Edited on 4-21-2014 by PaulB]
No it's by far not hopeless, you might have missed the part where I told you I'd built my own station there from which I do most of my contracts. I also bought a licence at Tranquility(spelling?) station, but here it's getting complicated cause it's a station right above the orbit. Lots of fun but also lots of chaos. You could buy a licence at Port Oasis though, I'm pretty sure it would do as well but your own station would be cheaper.
Pearl is now moderate to me which I think was the hardest part, since from now on I get a greater variety of contracts offered. And no, I'm not senile (yet) Just a bit stubborn sometimes. Not sure if I'll ever try to conquer Thuban though. After all I'm not a masochist, but then I'm also getting better, a little bit day by day. Who knows, maybe someday...
That was the 1st thing I did when I got there was buy a Port Oasis License so I'd make the most profit trading at Pearl Hidden but it would stil not allow me to do contracts.
I built my own station today - but I did not try to do any contracts - I'm not interested at this point. I'm just going to work on Olympus till I get it in the "Good" and go from there.
But I did make me another few hundred mill (650 mil or so) so I can experiment with some Wingmen - plus I brought back and Excal pak and some Exodus Missiles.
Cindy Game the an EXcal pak (Thanks again Cindy) but I made the mistake of leaving it in a hangar in another Pilot Profile instaed of taking it with me so I can't get to it now (unless I tried somethgn I think you suggested - swap it to someone in MP and get them to swap it bak in the Profile I now use.
From post: 169132, Topic: tid=11343, author=Marvin wrote:
From post: 169128, Topic: tid=11343, author=picommander wrote:Pearl is now moderate to me which I think was the hardest part, since from now on I get a greater variety of contracts offered.
Congratulations. It's downhill from this point on. Remember, delivery contracts now count as much as combat.
Delivery??? As in deliver supplies to a waiting ship???
how come it has been doing much for me in Sapphire and Olympus???
Alpha Centari is so close to Pearl (and has a similar economy) that I don't bother with Pearl. I consider it a kind of "flyover" sector. I do have a station in there, though, because even with the docking fees, I can make truckloads of money from buying local and selling to the rubes. Just have to dock fast.
From post: 169142, Topic: tid=11343, author=Nigel_Strange wrote:Alpha Centari is so close to Pearl (and has a similar economy) that I don't bother with Pearl. I consider it a kind of "flyover" sector. I do have a station in there, though, because even with the docking fees, I can make truckloads of money from buying local and selling to the rubes. Just have to dock fast.
From post: 169141, Topic: tid=11343, author=PaulB wrote:Delivery??? As in deliver supplies to a waiting ship???
how come it has been doing much for me in Sapphire and Olympus???
Check your reputation with Energy. If it's low, the delivery contracts will help bring it up. If it's the Miners you need to impress, then you can either clear away a few asteroids or tackle a group of Guild pilots (fewer than before) who are attacking the shipping lanes.
From post: 169144, Topic: tid=11343, author=Marvin wrote:
From post: 169141, Topic: tid=11343, author=PaulB wrote:Delivery??? As in deliver supplies to a waiting ship???
how come it has been doing much for me in Sapphire and Olympus???
Check your reputation with Energy. If it's low, the delivery contracts will help bring it up. If it's the Miners you need to impress, then you can either clear away a few asteroids or tackle a group of Guild pilots (fewer than before) who are attacking the shipping lanes.
I know clearing asteroids helped some - maybe delivery did some to now that I think about it.
It's my 71% in Sapphire for Navy that I can't get to budge and I've done a LOT of Retrieve and Examine for Navy.
It's in Olympus that I wasn't having much luck with Energy until a got 1% increase after doing some Navy Waypoint contracts - the Delivery didn't seem to help much unless you have to do a ton of them to have effect.
From post: 169177, Topic: tid=11343, author=PaulB wrote:It's my 71% in Sapphire for Navy that I can't get to budge and I've done a LOT of Retrieve and Examine for Navy.
Unless you somehow managed to go from Good to Fair in Sapphire, it isn't really worth the effort to improve your faction rep with the Navy.
From post: 169180, Topic: tid=11343, author=Marvin wrote:
From post: 169177, Topic: tid=11343, author=PaulB wrote:It's my 71% in Sapphire for Navy that I can't get to budge and I've done a LOT of Retrieve and Examine for Navy.
Unless you somehow managed to go from Good to Fair in Sapphire, it isn't really worth the effort to improve your faction rep with the Navy.
No, I'm Good. I've moved on to Olympus now - working on Rep there.
Unless you somehow managed to go from Good to Fair in Sapphire, it isn't really worth the effort to improve your faction rep with the Navy.