Jumpgate Evolution

[Stark]

Well it works fairly ingame; if you're decently fast, pirates will never kill you becasue you can land and spend $20 fixing your ship... which is why piracy isn't profitable, because it can take weeks to kill one guy and you'll get a few hundred bucks. Flash says he never owns a gun for the first year or so, since he believes a few guns is wasted trade space that DOESN'T actually let you fight effectively (since the early game guns suck so bad a specific combat ship will always massively outgun you so you're better off running). He invests in good engines + upgrades and the most efficient tank he can get, so as to reduce travel times (and avoid pirates) and increase profit.

Don't forgot to ALWAYS have a large-time loan out; the extra capital is a serious boost to trading early game.

By contrast I usually go quite heavily combat-oriented and do missions and kill people/things until I can afford the equipment erquired to do scav runs into battle zones (as early grippers are so huge there's not much profit in carrying one). Once you have money and have spent some time on space-google finding a decent shield and robot you'll never even get scratched by pirates. Just remember they'll always be staying right on the cutting edge of drive tech, so if they're faster than you without boost, start checking the market for prototype engines that can boost your speed. Remember also that the tech follows curves - new tech in prototype form is always very rare and overpriced, and as it becomes 'standard' manufacture the price drops as does the average size, until the next drive is prototyped. After several years everyone has base speeds around 800, so the game very much changes.

[phred]

It's called Evolution because it's a sort of sequel to this. You can download a copy and fly around offline to get a general idea of what they were aiming for if you want.
Basically they are trying to make a prettier version with a couple more bells and whistles on it... I think they're going to wind making a mess of it, but being a fan of the original I have to at least give it a shot.

[Flash]

Damn straight. The best start for trading is to take the trader character because they get a decent sized ship, and pick an engine and a fuel tank. Human is good, because you get an afterburner as well. When you get in game, sell everything but your engine and tank. Your guns are totally fucking worthless - get rid of them. Your gripper is likewise worthless - when you're out in space you will ideally be full, so you're not picking anything up anyway. Get rid of it. You can keep a radar if you want, but it's not necessary. Now, go to a business center, take a large time loan (lol space english), get a local trade report, and you're off. Do some quick number crunching, work out what you can afford, and what will give the best return, and start trading.

Ideally, the only free cash you should have when on a run is just enough to pay for any fuel you may need. Idle capital is wasted capital!

Just did a quick test run, and I made 1000 credits in one run on alcohol. Would have been more, but the price of alcohol had dropped by a credit when I went to sell it, costing me about 120 cr, and I got hit by a damn asteroid (factor this in, it will happen more than you'd think). It's the 24 of February, so it's been just under two months game time, and I didn't take a loan. The loans run at about 10%, 15% and 20% interest for the short, medium and long term loans respectively.

Double check any missions on offer as well - if there's a delivery mission going to the same place you are, it can be worth dumping a couple of units of cargo for the extra cash.

[Covenant]

Actually, I made a bang-up incredible start--beyond my wildest imaginations--just by taking a Human Merc and stripping the ship bare. You start with about 140 minerals, and those sell for 11 each on the starting ranger center. Then I did the mission at Earth where they sell medicine to Venus, then Equipment to Earth. But I paused to sell every bit of equipment Venus had to Earth, which was about 400 units or something absurd. I ended up with over 20k in funds, and now I got some Black Gunk so I never even worry about fuel--and I haven't even finished a quest yet.

I'm considering shopping around for a hugeass hull, buying a boatload of weapons, and just gun-jobs from now on.

[Stark]

20k will never buy you a huge hull; 20k isn't even a lot of money. Huge hulls aren't even relevant for killing since shopping around will find you really small weapons (mounting a single weapon size 30 or up is basically a waste of time) and unless you're lucky won't have the right slots you want anyway. Doing the tutorial gives you a pile of money to start, but it'll take 200-300k to outfit a ship properly to be able to do jack shit beyond the 'kill freighter' missions. Unless you just buy 4 rocket launchers, anyway...

That said, in Reboot Chards got a mission that paid him like two million bucks for doing the robot RTS thing... so he never needed to worry about money.

[Covenant]

Don't step on my dreams! It's still enough money to buy the biggest hull currently on the market, a 420+ warrior hull. It may not be big money in the future, but in the short-term it's certainly more than enough to make a step up to 'much larger than a 250 space hull' and get myself on the road.

[Covenant]

I'm actually now able to handle Dominators fairly well--three hefty frag guns, an upgraded hull with 8 soak, some shielding. What I need is some extra room so I can get a grappler and drop off dominator parts, since at the moment, I'm unable to do anything once I blow them up. I get some variety of experience, I believe, or at least rank points, but I don't know what value that is.