Hub plot will be the death of me

firestorm79 · Post by **firestorm79** » Thu, 1. Aug 13, 10:37

OMG...

I am just starting off on this plot and I am up to the bit where I have to supply the hub with computer parts and 400 chips... The chips took aggges to get because my two chip plants just wasn't producing them fast enough...

I just decided to look at the walkthrough, and O M G... 400k sillicon?!? 75k micro chips?!??

I think I will be a grandfather by the end of this plot line...

Any comments guys? Please someone tell me it is not as bad as it looks...

Rive · Post by **Rive** » Thu, 1. Aug 13, 10:40

It is not as bad as it looks...

Really. Just set up the supply chain and forget the plot for a while. It'll take care of itself.

sndle9 · Post by **sndle9** » Thu, 1. Aug 13, 10:47

Yes its quite a challenge. Most players treat it as a long term project while doing other things but it is possible to complete it from a standing start in under 4 game days.

No actual cheating, but heavy Nvidium mining required for the building capital (considered an exploit by some, including me).

The couple of hundred Crystal fabs with all the supporting factories you would have built make you a lot of money once you have finished too.

firestorm79 · Post by **firestorm79** » Thu, 1. Aug 13, 10:58

which sector did you guys use to set up as your 'home sector' when offered the first alignment? I notice that the guides say that it ought to be somewhere with high ore yields and well defended... any suggestions?

sndle9 · Post by **sndle9** » Thu, 1. Aug 13, 11:14

I use Savage Spur because of the massive resource potential both there and nearby but I'm friends with both the Yaki and Paranid.

ALien8ed · Post by **ALien8ed** » Thu, 1. Aug 13, 11:37

It does seem quite daunting at first but as mentioned it's definately not as bad as it looks. Once you get the foundations down the rest will take care of itself.

From memory i used Ore Belt and once everything was in place and automated via CLS ect. it was just a matter of time.

Stick with it, the sense of accomplishment upon completion is worth it...

vr01 · Post by **vr01** » Thu, 1. Aug 13, 11:44

It used to be 250K chips

so I'd say you're getting off easy by only having to get 75K

firestorm79 · Post by **firestorm79** » Thu, 1. Aug 13, 11:51

vr01 wrote:It used to be 250K chips so I'd say you're getting off easy by only having to get 75K

Infekted · Post by **Infekted** » Thu, 1. Aug 13, 11:55

Most of it can be bought from NPCs in a vaguely reasonable time. Microchips would be the main exception. You'll be wanting to build some Chip factories. It's good tho, they make a ton of credits when you're done with the plot.

firestorm79 · Post by **firestorm79** » Thu, 1. Aug 13, 12:19

Infekted wrote:Most of it can be bought from NPCs in a vaguely reasonable time.

that's good to know... as I heard that the teladianium foundries become obsolete after all the stations become saturated with it...

p.s. what DO you guys do with defunct factories? blow them up? I've given up on my booze factory in the unknown sector next to zyarth's domain because of the frequent xenon presence... I've lost one too many TSs...

Hemmingfish · Post by **Hemmingfish** » Thu, 1. Aug 13, 12:26

In the very long term they can be used as banks. Otherwise I just leave them around because there's no upkeep involved if they're not selling anything.

Infekted · Post by **Infekted** » Thu, 1. Aug 13, 12:35

You don't need to build teladianium, you can buy it all. But if you do build some, then contrary to popular opinion then it sells reasonably well. Not in massive amounts and isn't a great profit maker. But there's no need to blow them up. Just set some CAGs to buy energy and sell the Teladianium, transfer all profit above a stock amount to your account, then forget about em.

ajax34i · Post by **ajax34i** » Thu, 1. Aug 13, 13:53

I bought the stuff from NPCs, using CLS2 pilots (External Logistics) with "generate waypoints" to find all the stations that sold each thing needed at each stage of the plot.

Microchips took forever, but Silicon is plentiful.

Required a lot of cash though. But if you have a number of sector or universe traders also doing their job, it evens out.

EmperorJon · Post by **EmperorJon** » Thu, 1. Aug 13, 14:14

Just build self sufficient chip complexes everywhere.

One game I had complexes in (I think...):

Ore Belt
Mines of Fortune
Unknown Sector Aka. Avarice
Savage Spur
Barren Shores
Antigone Memorial
Tkr's Deprivation

Maybe more, but I had somewhere near 250 chip plants by the end.
(To be honest it ruined the game for me, because once the plot was finished and I was no longer gathering all the chips up I found I was getting millions of credits every few minutes from sales...)

Post by **Nanook** » Thu, 1. Aug 13, 18:54

The only complexes you need are for the microchips. Even with 30-40 chip plants running, it will take longer to produce the 75k chips than it will to gather all the other resources from the NPC's combined. So by the time your chip plants will have churned out the 75K microchips, you'll easily have completed all the other stages.

The most cost-effective way I've found to complete the Hub plot is to start building the chip plants early and often, since it will take a while to gather the funds. Meanwhile, have a few CAG's/CLS freighters running around buying up the other resources, generally in order of need.

I used complexes of only the Chip Plants with no supporting factories and gathered the needed resources from the NPC's. Not only does this save a lot of money and building time, it also greatly increases your trading reputation over time which gives you much higher paying non-combat missions, especially NPC build and taxi missions. It's an easy way to fund the purchase of the chip plants as well as the other resources.

I generally speed up the ore and silicon parts with fleets of mobile miners. That makes the cost of gathering the ore/silicon dirt cheap, so to speak.

Imgran · Post by **Imgran** » Thu, 1. Aug 13, 19:22

firestorm79 wrote:which sector did you guys use to set up as your 'home sector' when offered the first alignment? I notice that the guides say that it ought to be somewhere with high ore yields and well defended... any suggestions?

I used Akeela's Beacon/Legend/s Home. Several mines within 3 jumps and it's protected well enough by the garrison at Aladna Hill. Also nice because I already had several plexes nearby.

Timsup2nothin · Post by **Timsup2nothin** » Thu, 1. Aug 13, 20:59

firestorm79 wrote:what DO you guys do with defunct factories? blow them up? I've given up on my booze factory in the unknown sector next to zyarth's domain because of the frequent xenon presence... I've lost one too many TSs...

Set buy price of wheat to maximum and turn on trade with races.

Then you can supply wheat and other bio at huge profits all over the universe because the NPC bio haulers will all be setting off on their quest for the holy grail. It won't cost you anything, because no NPC bio haulers will actually survive to get there. You can make doubly sure of that by posting a small defense force with everyone set to enemy just in case someone gets lucky. Little rep hit, but it won't happen very often.

If you max out e-cell price it will draw energy haulers too, but it isn't as effective because of the limited range of price. Plus it will draw them in from SPPs in split space where they don't have to pass through the Xenon sectors so more will actually arrive.

Imgran · Post by **Imgran** » Thu, 1. Aug 13, 21:09

... not to be attempted if you're using Universal Traders though. Either they'll tank you up at a net loss, or they'll die too.

Timsup2nothin · Post by **Timsup2nothin** » Thu, 1. Aug 13, 21:41

Imgran wrote:... not to be attempted if you're using Universal Traders though. Either they'll tank you up at a net loss, or they'll die too.

Reason number 17,261 to avoid using universal traders.

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Hub plot will be the death of me

Hub plot will be the death of me