Avarice: How the §$%/( to make all those bucks in time?!

[GermanicHeathen]

Okay, now how to, seriously?

In my non-plot game, the sector has just been sold to burnit for some 700M if memory serves. If I sold all my stuff and added up everything, I'd land at maybe 300M. How is anyone ever supposed to make all that money in time?!

(On the other hand, what for? Is there any gameplay advantage to have that sector as one's property other than seeing your name appear somewhere? )

[TheGunslinger77]

i bought it for 840M some days ago.

How to summon all those bucks? 2 words: Player Invasion (of xenon sectors)

Killing capitals and collecting loots can raise up to 50M x hour
in my experience.

What for? Well when i finally won avarice... it was a nice
sensation
Now i am slowly setting up the loops for the phq with
all the quiet after the battle...

[GermanicHeathen]

How to summon all those bucks? 2 words: Player Invasion (of xenon sectors)

Killing capitals and collecting loots can raise up to 50M x hour
in my experience.

If there was an endless supply of Ks and Js to slice up I'd agree... alas, they run out soon and don't leave that much. Killed 2 Js yesterday and made maybe 15M. Small ships don't leave anything behind besides missiles - not worth the trouble if it's not a hammerhead.

Let alone that the auction was almost over before I had a decent ship for hunting the tin cans, though I admit that can be optimized a bit (probably)

[Geek]

Xenon capital ships respawn endlessly but not always in the same Xenon sector.

[NewtSoup]

6 Distilleries
6 Wheat farms

3 XL SPPs + support for self sufficiency

20 Universe traders

These give me 5-8 million credits per game hour. Im on day 7 and avarice is currently 105 million. I have just under 300 million credits to my name. In about 60 game hours I should have netted a futher 400 million income. So that will put me in bidding range of avarice by day 10/11.

It's not hard to do.

My advice is start UT's early to build rank and cash and build booze/wheat pairs as and when you can. (with a CAG assinged to each) dont worry about the power.. let them buy it. I've done very little K hunting in my current game (the one where im building up to by avarice). I took down one on about day 3 which netted me 17 million which I used straight away to build a 2 station booze complex with a freighter attached to it.

[GermanicHeathen]

20 UTs?!

Have the game mechanics changed so drastically compared to X2? Back then I found that after about 5 UTs profits don't increase (significantly) anymore, for whatever reason (I assumed that 5 UT are enough already to use all the max profit opportunities)...

Therefore of course I didn't set up more than 5, well 6 currently, UTs in X3 too...

[Skite]

20 UTs?!

Have the game mechanics changed so drastically compared to X2? Back then I found that after about 5 UTs profits don't increase (significantly) anymore, for whatever reason (I assumed that 5 UT are enough already to use all the max profit opportunities)...

Therefore of course I didn't set up more than 5, well 6 currently, UTs in X3 too...

There are quite a number of profitable ways to get your money for avarice.

UTs are very profitable, yes, but if you get more than 20-30 (So I read), they gets unmanageable. Just too many to keep an eye on. Plus, I don't think they're trustworthy enough to be your main income. (I'll get back to this later)

To be eligible to even remotely kill Xenon sectors with little stress, you need a decent fleet. I'm not sure about the size, but I think it'll encompass at least 1 M2 and/or 1 M1.. Plus all the support. That's A LOT of financing.

So, you need to get cash for the fleet, first. As said before, UT's aren't all that because they could keep running into the same hostile ships, if you don't do something about it. (Assign patrols - costs a lot of money. Assign escorts - same deal. Clean out the sector of the attacking ships - Takes time and effort you might want to put elsewhere. Make the UT trade somewhere else and forget about this trade run - He/she'll just try it again if the opportunity arises.) Though, you could use the Satellite Limited Universal Trader, which limits your UT's - with a different single command - to only look around in sectors where you placed regular or advanced satellites. Problem is, you need to place them. (You could set a fast ship with the satellites on board to drop them off, but this still requires some effort.) Oh, and if you get more than 20, they tend to steal profit runs from each other and they can screw up the economy. (Don't know how this'll happen, exactly.) All in all, they're a nice investment to start out with when you just started the game, and keeping them will make them always net in a nice bonus income later. Course, super freighters are the best UT's, because they haul the biggest amount of freight in one go. If a SPP L or XL is stocked full, it will buy his entire cargo hold full of ecells. With about 13000 cargo space, compared to lets say a standard mercury, 4000, you can count out the profit, because when that merc would buy the 4000, the prices for the other 9000 another freighter of yours might buy have risen.
I went with the Demeter SF, FYI. I find them to be a good UT. You can get money for your first UT('s) by doing random missions. (Not the plot ones!)

Spoiler

Show

If you do the plot missions, you'll run into problems with getting demeter super freighters not far off the beginning![/spoilers]
You might want to get cycrow's guild scripts, they're a nice place to start with for getting a starting fund!


When you have about... 15 million credits (I need a confirmation on this) you can buy your first factory complex. Someone figured out that out of all non-weapon complexes, weed and booze factories make the best return on investment. 'Course, complexes are more efficient, because you could plant a wheat farm onto the weed distillery, so the entire complex only has energy cells as resources to worry about. (Booze facts need bliss places.)
But once you build this and it has stocked up enough resources/mid-resources, it'll always be sold out if placed well. Once you've set up one, you might want to consider getting a TL, because you get a nice return on investment in forms of combat and further factory placing.

Once you've placed a few, you have gone through some time and should already have noticed your income keeps getting bigger and bigger.
-
At the moment, I've got about 7 UT's running with 3 in sector training, and I got my first weed/booze complex just set up. Trying to get it stocked up, but two of my first four (left-overs) freighters set up to buy ecells at best price died. CAGs are a better choice, I think. Although those 7 UT's and some missions already netted me enough cash to even get to this point.
I'm quite far from getting a fleet (and thus being able to take on Xenon Sectors) but I'm enjoying the time between.
-

Hope this helps!

[Gothsheep]

'Course, complexes are more efficient, because you could plant a wheat farm onto the weed distillery, so the entire complex only has energy cells as resources to worry about. (Booze facts need bliss places.)

Hope this helps!

You have that backwards. Bliss Places, which produce Spaceweed, require Dream Farms, that make swamp plant. Space Fuel Distilleries require Wheat Farms.

[laplace]

Just my two cents.

If you play the game without SETA overnight/when at work, no amount of UT's is unmanageable (provided you can accept an occasional reload ). Ingame day 9. Avarice is at 500m credits. UT fleet has grown to count 50. The plot station these are assigned to has amassed over 1B credits.

Shooting stuff is by far the easiest and quickest way to make money.

Complexes are generally gigantic moneysinks, and can take days or weeks ingame to make a profit. Depending on their size. After all, every station produces at a set pace.

[jlehtone]

If you play the game overnight/when at work (== let game run and do nothing)
...
Shooting stuff is by far the easiest and quickest way to make money.

From which follows that letting the game run by itself losess profitsss. Game runs X hours alone and UT/factories make Y credits, or you play actively X hours in which you make Z credits yourself and the UT/factories make at least Y credits. Doing all of Fight/Trade/Build/Think simultaneously yields much more than trying only one approach.

[teladianium]

How to summon all those bucks? 2 words: Player Invasion (of xenon sectors)

Killing capitals and collecting loots can raise up to 50M x hour
in my experience

worked for me, I first saw the BBS message about game day 7 when I had about 200 mill, by game day 11 I had 700+ mill and I was mainly doing Xenon sector clearances with some assassinations on the side to break the monotony.

The Xenon don't always respawn in the same sector quickly but an extended tour of X596 and the hop back to check the others seemed to give me a steady supply of M2 / M1.

[Skite]

'Course, complexes are more efficient, because you could plant a wheat farm onto the weed distillery, so the entire complex only has energy cells as resources to worry about. (Booze facts need bliss places.)

Hope this helps!

You have that backwards. Bliss Places, which produce Spaceweed, require Dream Farms, that make swamp plant. Space Fuel Distilleries require Wheat Farms.

Yes, this is what I meant, sorry.