Looking at 1MJ shields or Space Fuel for a money making complex (X3 AP)

[Fenris321]

Playing Albion Prelude

I'm going to use the Unknown Sector off of

Spoiler

Show

Legend's Home

for a closed complex that I can ignore and just make a steady guaranteed income off of.

I haven't done this in awhile, so I'm going off memory. I remember I couldn't keep 1MJ shields in stock on another complex I had built, but after looking at Space Fuel it appears that Fuel requires less resources. I was considering Space Weed as well but from what I've read only pirates buy that and looking at the map they'd have to travel through a lot of Argon territory with the last sector being pretty heavily patrolled. So I'm thinking no on Space Weed for now. I could do a combination of Fuel and Shields I guess, since there is some ore there for the shields ... or just mine and sell off the ore.

I also have to keep in mind that the sector I chosen only has 104 Ore and 74 Silicon.

Anyone use this sector before for that purpose or have any advice about what they've been able to sell easily?

I tried using the complex calculators I've found in the stickied thread above but those are for TC and don't show the sector I'm talking about.

Thanks,


EDIT: And once again I found the answer 2 minutes after asking the question . The AP calculator is here http://www.altanetworks.com/x3/x3apocc.html

Still, if anyone has any advice I'd like to hear it

[ancienthighway]

Not just pirates, but smugglers will come for weed and fuel, and any other illegal ware for that matter.

I believe the sector in question is used in one of the plots, but I haven't reached that point yet and don't know how safe it is at that point of the plot. Something to consider. I've actually had good luck putting my pleasure palace in northeast corner of Hatikva's Faith. I've had very little problem with red pirates, the Commonwealth leaves me alone (and chances are a military expedition of some sort is flying through the area and eliminates any reds), yet the blue pirates and smugglers just keep coming.

Rather than hide a 1 mj shield factory away, why not stick it around Montalaar? At most, it's 4 jumps from sectors owned by every race. Toss in some light weapons (IRE, PAC) and optionally mosquitoes, too.

[Graaf]

Spoiler

Show

IIRC that sector gets visited by a very large enemy fleet during one of the plots

You can build the Shield Fab anywhere, you don't need to hide it in an Unknown Sector. Easier access for your customers.

As for Weed & Booze. From my experience anyone will buy that, not just pirates. It's just illegal to build those stations in most sectors.

[Bill Huntington]

I put my SF complex in there and it sold out all the time. I even brought my excess SF from Weaver's and that sold too. When I got the Gates going I put one between Legend and the Unknown.

I wanted an excess of E so I built a Silicon Complex in Aladna and set up a CLS shuttle to the Unknown. With Silicon and Ore set at the lowest prices, I could train up my Local Traders quickly. I never ran out of Silicon this way, even though the sector didn't have enough.

Some small and large fleets come into the sector as part of the main plot. They attacked my complex but not seriously. They just wanted to force me to fight. Like they needed to! The Station never even lost 1% of Shield. I didn't even put defenses in, just came when invaded and it was enough. Last I checked, I'd made $400 Mil, about 8 days into the game.

Good luck!

[Fenris321]

Didn't know about the spoiler thing, never made it that far in the plot.

The only reason for the shield fab there was just to use up some of the ore, figured they'd be worth more than selling off the ore.

I'll scout out some other areas for the complex after what you guys said. I was considering Savage Spur, but at this point in the game I haven't made up my mind on if I'm going to be friendly with the Yaki or not. Although camping the gate with laser towers and enough ships to kill off anything the Yaki send shouldn't be to hard. But that's really just an enormous project I don't feel like tackling right now and with only 50 or so million in the bank I wouldn't get to far with it at this point.

Anyway I'm off to check out other sectors. Thanks for the tips.

[Fenris321]

I put my SF complex in there and it sold out all the time. I even brought my excess SF from Weaver's and that sold too. When I got the Gates going I put one between Legend and the Unknown.

I wanted an excess of E so I built a Silicon Complex in Aladna and set up a CLS shuttle to the Unknown. With Silicon and Ore set at the lowest prices, I could train up my Local Traders quickly. I never ran out of Silicon this way, even though the sector didn't have enough.

Some small and large fleets come into the sector as part of the main plot. They attacked my complex but not seriously. They just wanted to force me to fight. Like they needed to! The Station never even lost 1% of Shield. I didn't even put defenses in, just came when invaded and it was enough. Last I checked, I'd made $400 Mil, about 8 days into the game.

Good luck!

Thanks, didn't see this till after I replied to the others. I'll keep this in mind also. Right now I'm doing mostly trading and have no combat fleet (just a bunch of Mistrals flying around) but after reading your post I'm going to strongly consider getting enough ships to defend a sector first, then build a complex.

Either that or a small fleet supply complex first, then build a fleet, then do the plots

[MarvinTheMartian]

I set up a few factories in that sector before I knew what was going to happen there so might have to write off that investment, in TC I built a huge booze complex in Weavers Tempest before I realised no one can get to it!

My advice for the safe option:
1. build a weed complex in Teladi space - it's legal there, quick and easy
2. there's another plot that makes a sector available to you that you can put whatever you want in, booze/weed is not illegal and has good "foot traffic" - use this for anything for that matter, this is going to be my retail sector

The advantage of weed and booze as you have said is that weed and booze only need 2 resources - I have a weed complex with 10 or so Bliss Place fabs and nearly always empty

[hisazul]

Well as others already said 1mj plex can be shoved anywhere really.

Space fuel... add space weed to it and put it in Senator's Badlands for super cheese mode or one sector north if you don't care about watching ships buy that fuel and weed only to get shot down by Yaki while trying to leave the sector and leaving all they bought behind lol plus extras. It's like war sector but nobody is shooting at you and you have a convenient SE station nearby to peddle junk. If you do decide to take advantage of that scheme don't try too hard to figure out how far you need your plex docking bay to be from the gate... it really doesn't matter, most ships that will be sent to buy weed/booze in that sector will be fighter class so they will get in just fine... but the Yaki that start chasing them will catch them on their way back.

Yaki will never attack you unless you are hostile to them... they aren't pirates. So it's completely safe and your plex will be well defended by them. Pirates will also get hammered down in Presidents End if they decide to take a whack at your plex.

[ancienthighway]

Surely you don't mean President's End, Argon space, for manufacturing illegal goods. Argon forces will destroy them. And I don't see the Yaki as a factor in that area as any kind of harassment of smugglers. Or is President's End in TC unique and Argon doesn't care about the sector anymore?

[hisazul]

Surely you don't mean President's End, Argon space, for manufacturing illegal goods. Argon forces will destroy them. And I don't see the Yaki as a factor in that area as any kind of harassment of smugglers. Or is President's End in TC unique and Argon doesn't care about the sector anymore?

Bah... you are correct, Senator's Badlands not President's End... Both go with political naming and for a second there I got them mixed up.