Spacefly hunting! Have you tried it yet? ..SPOILERS..Updated with Video's..

[Jolly_Roger_uk]

Been in Xenon sector 534, capping a few L's and M's, Got a bit bored, So I thought I'd venture into the next sector west, the unknown sector, where you find the Falcon Sentinel.
And I found a few swarms of spaceflies, So thought I'd do a bit of capturing the little beggars, Using my Nova and the Ion D, this is what I did..

I suppose I could write this as a tutorial, since some players have probably thought about doing this, but did'nt know where to start, so here goes (nothing)...

Go into your chosen sector, where there are an abundance of roids, Try and pick a fairly safe sector if you can, cos you'll be idling about a bit, and don't wanna be caught napping by a few Pirate Nova's or such like.

Ore belt is good, The Unknown sector next to Xenon 534 is better, But if your feeling adventurous then Loomankstrats Legacy, south of Ceo's Doubt is better, but watch out for Pirates and squash mines.

Now sit in your ship, in the middle of some roids, at zero speed,
Zoom in, Twice, with the Goggles (you did buy some, did'nt you?),
Hold down the key, once zoomed, then look around at the edges of the roids.

You should eventually see a few glowing dots, moving together, around the roids, You'll see them better against the blackness of the background rather than against the grey of the roids.

Remember you must be stationary, at this time, otherwise it will make things ten times as hard, because the tiny meteorites, that you see all the time while flying, will look like spaceflies, If your stationary the spaceflies will be the only things moving in your view, and they glow too, which makes things easier.

This picture below was taken in Loomankstrats Legacy, where I viewed over 26 spaceflies in one swarm, moving together, The increased Pirate activity in this sector makes spacefly capturing, Interesting to say the least.

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v148/ ... legacy.jpg


Right, so now you've spotted your spaceflies, work out which direction their going and Intercept them, If you can, when you think your close enough (within about 1.5km) then fire your ION D, all around your front view...If your lucky..this is what you'll see.

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v148/ ... ruptor.jpg

Then you, need to target one, keep it in view...open your cargo bay... and keep hitting it with the ION D every few seconds to keep it stunned, then pick it up like normal cargo.

Then do the same thing with the rest, they may have woken up and b*ggered off, in that case, go back to the beginning and do everything again, You can usually keep a few stunned, while your picking one of them up, since they fly quite close together and the ION D will arc from one to the next, if their close enough.

Also, Don't try stunning a few, then get the ship to collect all wares in sector, because inevitably your ship will hit a roid, and then its back to the beginning, of your last save.

Incidentally Salvage insurance can come in handy here.


Here is a spacefly up close, and about to be picked up.


http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v148/ ... acefly.jpg

Then if you have enough cells, Jump to somewhere where there is a raster refinery and you should be able to sell them for 3860 credits each.
Their Illegal everywhere, except split and pirate sectors, so make sure you have enough cells on board, to get you to where you can sell them.

I picked up about 100, last night, for about 45 minutes work, gets boring after a while, but its easy credits and all profit, which can't be bad.

P.S

Sorry about the quality of the pictures, I can't use Paint shop pro to save my life.

EDITED:
Don't know how useful this is gonna be, But might help people a bit more than some badly converted pictures, So here are 2 vids I've uploaded (about 18mb each) that show me spotting and then capturing some spaceflies.

http://rapidshare.de/files/14781165/spa ... d.m2v.html

And here is the bit where I capture the little beggars.

http://rapidshare.de/files/14782212/spa ... d.m2v.html

And sorry to the Mod's about bringing life to an old thread, But I thought a couple of vids would help people more than some crappy pictures.

[CABM]

I know that spaceflies are illegel but is having a spacefly collecter illegel?

Good Guide by the way.

[Jolly_Roger_uk]

Space fly collector is not illegal.

Been scanned loads of times, and no ones said anything, so it must be ok.

[8_bit]

I always stumble across them when I least want to, like in the middle of a particularly hairy XI scrap in Eighteen Billion:

Betty: Xenon... L...

- a few moments later -

Betty: No Aim...
Betty: Alert! Incomi... Alert!... A...A..A.A.A...
Betty: Spaceflies
8_bit: WTF never mind the spaceflies, what about the...

BOOOOOOM...

[mrbadger]

I used to see them all the time in X1 and 2. I barely ever see them in X3.

Are they worth much?

[koihoshi]

I used to see them all the time in X1 and 2. I barely ever see them in X3.

Are they worth much?

Then if you have enough cells, Jump to somewhere where there is a raster refinery and you should be able to sell them for 3860 credits each.
Their Illegal everywhere, except split and pirate sectors, so make sure you have enough cells on board, to get you to where you can sell them.

I picked up about 100, last night, for about 45 minutes work, gets boring after a while, but its easy credits and all profit, which can't be bad.

[mrbadger]

I used to see them all the time in X1 and 2. I barely ever see them in X3.

Are they worth much?

Then if you have enough cells, Jump to somewhere where there is a raster refinery and you should be able to sell them for 3860 credits each.
Their Illegal everywhere, except split and pirate sectors, so make sure you have enough cells on board, to get you to where you can sell them.

I picked up about 100, last night, for about 45 minutes work, gets boring after a while, but its easy credits and all profit, which can't be bad.

Hmm, missed that. Guess I must be being a dork.

That's a lot of money. I'm going to start a new game this weekend, perhaps I should go a'hunting.

[yeebok]

I've gotten close to roids in Ore Belt, zoomed twice and scanned while stationary and seen nothing at all moving - I've been looking for about 30 minutes and not hada sighting yet.

I might be being overly impatient though. By 'eventually' do you mean 'after a few minutes looking closely around the place' or that they appear after you've sat still for a while ?

Great guide though, I guess others may have questions too but once you cover those sort of items (hard to know what they are 'til others try the guide) you'll have a very nice, handy doc, so thanks heaps !

[liquidthunder]

funny you should talk about these a a message came up on the bbs when i was playing earlier mensoning a swam spotted in bali gi's joy im might invest in some hunting equipment.

[Jolly_Roger_uk]

I've been to Bala Gi's Joy and as far as I can tell, there is not a single space fly in that sector.

Normally you'll have to wait less than 5 minutes to see if there are any spaceflies in the sector your in.

Just stay in one place, zoom in twice and hold the key, then use your mouse to turn your ship and view, And check around the edges of all the roids in your vicinity.

Ore belt is'nt that great for them, But that Unknown sector next to xenon 534 is definately the best I've found so far.

Now and again, when I'm flying around, I'll hear a "squelch" type noise, that is your ship hitting and killing a spacefly, I guess you'll know that some are nearby when you hear that then.

[Nyax]

I used to see them all the time in X1 and 2. I barely ever see them in X3.

That's a good trick considering there were no 'wild' spaceflies in X1

Until X2 they only existed as a tradable resource.

[Firesky1]

Seen them...never gave them much thought...this is fun and profitable.
Good Guide..Thx

[Jolly_Roger_uk]

Well, thx! for all the nice comments.

I had'nt seen a guide on capturing spaceflies before, posted on this forum, so thought I'd just put down what my experiences had been, maybe with a few hints on how people can do the same and make a tidy profit.
The only thing stopping new players doing it, Is the fact a ION D costs 240K just by its own, add the spacefly collector for another 38K or so, and then the jumpdrive, for getting back to somewhere you can sell them, without risking getting scanned and losing race rep, And you've probably spent 500K just on those upgrades.

But a few hours work, boring as it is, can yield good profits that will far outway any initial costs.

[Uzi77]

Might I just quickly add, that if your in the Unknown Sector West of X534, there is a slightly easier way of seeing the little critters. Use your Search for target button(the one which targets whatever is in front of you) and just fly around but keep your crosshair away from the asteroids and sooner or later(usually sooner) you will 'accidently' target a Spacefly, and where there's one, there's a swarm. Get within the required distance for your IonD's (1km-ish) and fire away. Then follow Jolly_Roger's instructions. Good guide by the way.

[lamkonhin]

Just to add on the topic.
Since Space Flies fly in group, if you get one in your target,
dont capture it, just fire the ion, and pick up the white dots, but not the targetted one.

Give you time to pick up the stuned ones, and you wont lost the whole group after picking a few (happen sometime)
Just go for the tagetted one again after you finish picking, and stun it, pick up everything, and repeat.
This way you can easily get the whole lot.


BTW, thanks for telling that raster buy then as well,
sometime it is differcult to find a friendly pirate base.
(what? because I steal their jobs by hunting borons? )

[Jolly_Roger_uk]

Might I just quickly add, that if your in the Unknown Sector West of X534, there is a slightly easier way of seeing the little critters. Use your Search for target button(the one which targets whatever is in front of you) and just fly around but keep your crosshair away from the asteroids and sooner or later(usually sooner) you will 'accidently' target a Spacefly, and where there's one, there's a swarm. Get within the required distance for your IonD's (1km-ish) and fire away. Then follow Jolly_Roger's instructions. Good guide by the way.

I've tried it that way, but its a bit, "hit and miss", staying still in one place and zooming in with the goggles is the best way, that I've found, But if your way works for you, then fair enough!

[Uzi77]

I've tried it that way, but its a bit, "hit and miss", staying still in one place and zooming in with the googles is the best way, that I've found, But if your way works for you, then fair enough!

Yeh, I only went hunting once, and it was by accident I found the swarm. But I did this twice and got about 30-ish, a nice profit if you just started the game, but not when you've got an M6, TL, and too many self-sustaining factories to count. Now... about that next M6....

[Tha_reaper]

good guide. maybe someone should add this to the guides in the stickies.

[Jolly_Roger_uk]

Well I'm upto about 23 milions credits (again) and have a dragon, 6 demeters, 4 Nova's and about 30 other assorted fighters + A Large double spaceweed & Dream farm complex.
So I don't really need the cash.

But I was taking a break from the killing and capping of xenons in 534, and decided to hunt down a few spaceflies, then realised that it could be quite profitable, and my only expense was time.

But since my complex pretty much takes care of itself once I drop 100,000 energy cells into it, I was just exploring new ways of making a living in this vast universe of ours (Have to keep telling myself, its only a game! its only a game). And I keep seeing so many spaceflies in loads of sectors, That I thought I might as well make a guide, of sorts.

[anima36]

i had a spacefly on my scanner once assumed it was in a crate so targetted it to go pick it up, it wasn't it was flying around i just left it but it was cool to zoom in close on it and have a good look.