How is station value determined?

[loubert]

So, missions that pay you for building stations for the NPC factions were changed a while ago. It used to be a flat payout for a specific set of modules, but now, the payout is determined by the overall station value, being "value + 50%". You still need to build specific modules, of course, but building just those modules will never see you reach max payout for the mission.

Before I get into the point of this post, I'd just like to say that the way this works is a little borked. A faction will pay me 11m credits for a defense station that costs a fraction of that to build, and building only what they request will see me rewarded with only a portion of the max payout. Keeping that defense station strictly a defense station (e.g. no production modules) will see it built into a massive, sprawling complex in order to reach that 11m reward. A practically impervious bulwark that you're handing to an NPC faction. To avoid that, you can stick production modules on it to increase the price - but then it's not really a defense station, is it? It's a factory with massive defenses.

Anyway, I would just like to know how station value is determined. It doesn't seem to be equal to the cost to build it, because "cost * 1.5 = reward" is overkill, I've found. You don't appear to have to spend that much to reach max payout. So I'd like to know how the station value is determined so I can calculate how much I have to spend to reach max payout.

[MopDa]

I believe station cost is determined by ammount of materials spent to build it. In ingame encyclopedia you can find which module requires how much of which material to build. This is then multiplied by (probably) average cost of that material (which can also be found in encyclopedia) and is then summarized for each module (and loadout) of station to give you a grand total [cost].

[Gimbutz]

I believe station cost is determined by ammount of materials spent to build it. In ingame encyclopedia you can find which module requires how much of which material to build. This is then multiplied by (probably) average cost of that material (which can also be found in encyclopedia) and is then summarized for each module (and loadout) of station to give you a grand total [cost].

Correct! You're getting the average market cost of the resources you used to build the station, times 1.5. The cap is just there to prevent an infinite return on investment. It's calculated from the value (see above) of the absolute worst combination of modules I could think of for each set of prerequisites (imagine slamming down a large storage module if a small one would have sufficed), times 2 to make it less likely that you accidentally hit it. You're allowed to go overboard to make more money, but within reason.