CAG / CLS Question for TC gah

[JJRSC]

I've been reading a lot of the CLS materials out there, thanks, haven't been able to find as much on CAG... even in the stickies; anyway, what I would really like to do is set up a CAG or CLS pilot (or more) to pick up Crystals at my Crystal Fab and then just look to sell them for the best price, like a Universal Trader would (they all have jumpdrives and all the pilots are Logisticians), except they would come back to my station when they run out, get more Crystals and then set out again. Is there any way to do this?

Or, if not, what plan would you recommend? Thanks again. Like I said, I've been reading a lot of this material but haven't been able to figure out how to do this...

[Timsup2nothin]

CAG is easier to set up, but I'll leave that to someone who uses them more than me because I'm not too up on their fueling issues.

CLS...

first, provide a fuel tank...any lame little freighter with a single waypoint at your complex loading e-cells, max cargo.

Then grab your logistician and set up:

add ship, fuel tank, refuel
add station, complex, load crystals, max cargo
generate waypoints, range 50, sell crystals 1900, max cargo
generate waypoints, range 50, sell crystals 1850, max cargo

keep going until you hit a price you don't want to sell for.

Make sure you set this guy up with plenty of fuel, and don't use a really huge freighter. You want him to make maybe three sales tops before he comes back to refuel and reload, because the thing you absolutely do NOT want is for him to wind up stuck somewhere with no fuel.

[JJRSC]

Oh, okay, this is like your spiffkin example except now it's buying instead of selling - it's just starting to sink in now, duh. All of the CLS /CAG stuff is actually quite a bit of information to digest, at least for me, but I'm slowly getting it. Thanks again for your help!

[ajax34i]

Use CAG, it's actually what it's designed for.

Set the CAG homebase at Crystal Fab.

Set its duties to Seller, set Crystals as the only trade material.

Set max range = how far away you want it to jump to sell
Set jump fuel = 2x the above so it has enough fuel to return

Blacklist any sectors you don't want it to enter.

Click Go.

The price is controlled from the Crystal Fab's administration; whatever you set the Fab to will be followed by the CAG. He'll try to get the best deals as long as it obeys the price limit. He'll go sell and come back to refuel and pick up more crystals to sell. If there are no buyers he will sit at the crystal fab until there are.

You can also set up minimum stock and minimum cargo quantities, so that he doesn't try to sell if your fab is below 10% for example, or if it can't load up the cargo hold. That way it doesn't run around with 1 crystal trying to sell it, using up fuel.

Remember to set up a CAG to buy ecells for the fab, it'll run out faster than normal if the traders are taking ecells from it for fuel.

[hisazul]

The problem with CAG is that retarded first rank where it can't sell anything from a plex. Which forces you to set up some redundant CLS first to get past the first rank and then set up CAG.
Haven't had any other issues with CAGs. Their set up is very straight forward and only trading settings (% of resources/products/cargo) can be confusing rest is very straight forward and mostly automated.

CLS on the other hand... need too much baby sitting. Slightest hiccup in its way points and it starts the bloating process and later you find out that its cargo is full of stuff which it just drags around.

Admittedly my hatred towards CLS is probably just as big of a problem... After running into bloating problem repeatedly while having to deal with limitations of specific ranks and number of way points I just abandoned CLS and said screw it.

Guess I'm one of those people that actually likes STs and UTs. They are simple... but they are also fully automated. Just give them range and you are DONE. If they can't find any place to make profit within their range or sell what they have(someone beat them to it) they will just sit in standby until they can get rid of their cargo and then they just resume their work. They don't just stop and cry to you that need you to do their job for them... and then pay them for it too.

[Sinxar]

Apparently it is a little know fact, but you can just hire your CAG/CLS guys at the trade station in herrons nebula. Just hire/fire until you get a cargo messager (usually takes 1- 5 tries). That way he can even use jump drives right out of the gate and no training circuit needed. Works for Reunion, TC and AP.

[Timsup2nothin]

Use CAG, it's actually what it's designed for.

This is a basic truth.

The CLS setup I provided will basically make a CLS work almost as well as a CAG (only almost because it works 'best deal' in increments of price where the CAG will find the best deal based on a single credit price differential.

The reason I use CLS instead of CAG is because of the added capability to adjust price based on inventory.

I set my CLS with a series of 'unload up to' commands in between the various 'generate waypoints' commands. It loads, then checks for the best price I have set, maybe the next couple prices that I think are very good...then has an 'unload up to' that is maybe 25% the station capacity before it moves on to the next lower price. So if I'm under a quarter on station inventory I only sell for the highest prices. Then I'll set up the next few generate waypoints prices and add another 'unload up to' set at half the capacity and so on...all the way down to the last rounds that are after an 'unload up to' that is like 90% capacity and priced lower than I'd normally be willing to take...but will since I am nearly full and don't want production to stop.

CAG, if you set the price limiter high, will just let the station fill up and stop. If you set it low it will look for the best deals it can find, which is great, but it doesn't have the ability to say 'the only available deals are just barely okay, let's just wait'.