station building strategies

[teMELEEn]

Hey,
Ive been looking into station building and I am thinking about creating my own little sector, to be precise I wanna build kind of self sustaining (to a point) complex of stations. I did my research, created one station and I think I understand that there are production chains and such, but its still more of a theory for me right now. What I plan to do:

1. find empty sector
- with mineable resources, primarily ice and ore for basic productions
- I was thinking molten archon in deVreis. It has basic mineable resources, is empty, has fast travel lanes and is fairly close to both omicron and albion

Q: will NPC traders come here from other sectors or do I have to rely on my own supply chains? I know that inside inhabited sectors NPC traders come to trade with my stations no problem.

2. start with solar array
- I understand that e cells are at the beginning of the whole chain, so thats step one

Q: how big it sohuld be? Or should I create more than one from the beginning? I can see that a lot of other stations require e cells as primary resource so I guess over production is in order?

3. start H2O additive station
- for that I need to mine ice I guess, I did not do any mining as of yet but I guess its pretty straightforward (like trading more or less). I use auto trader that should be able to se auto miners as well.

Q: Can resources (asteroids) be depleted? Can I mine whole sector dry?

4. expansion
- with these two primary resources available I guess I should be able to set up and running more stations that require water + ecells, in general

-> food production stations -> metal production stations (+ mining ore) -> higher tech stations


Does this make sense?

[Sussex]

Tbh i started by building a Hardware supplier, simply because Reinforced Metal Plating is an expenisve product and in short supply in my game. Second came fusion reactors and plasma pumps. These 3 products are the basis for any station building. I found starting with e cells and water etc just took for ever as the plates, reactors and pumps are so slowly created and so quickly bought.

In asnwer to your questions. NPCs will use your stations once your stocks are up and prices are down.
I have 1 e cell station, the rest i buy, they are not expensive and are readily available in most sectors
I guess asteroids can be depleted but not so as you would notice. In over 6 days game time played on this save, i`ve not noticed yields drop to an alarming amount yet

[teMELEEn]

Originally posted by Virusboy:

Tbh i started by building a Hardware supplier, simply because Reinforced Metal Plating is an expenisve product and in short supply in my game. Second came fusion reactors and plasma pumps. These 3 products are the basis for any station building. I found starting with e cells and water etc just took for ever as the plates, reactors and pumps are so slowly created and so quickly bought.

In asnwer to your questions. NPCs will use your stations once your stocks are up and prices are down.
I have 1 e cell station, the rest i buy, they are not expensive and are readily available in most sectors
I guess asteroids can be depleted but not so as you would notice. In over 6 days game time played on this save, i`ve not noticed yields drop to an alarming amount yet

Thx for tip. However I want to avoid hoping into the later stages of production chain, I like building stuff from the bottom :D But ill consider it of course :)

Also wanted to ask, is there a way to see what profit a station makes? Or is it just guessing?

[phoenix946]

Currently there is no estimated profit for stations (however it is a popular request) to give you a rough idea (without much math) just open the trading panel as it will display the current market price

[Mylo-s]

e-cells in OL RH, AL Asc or AL IW
H2O additives (fully extended with both water and ice refinery) in OL CC
those ones will not make you rich, but will help the economy

hardware supplier (for OL) or construction shop (in AL) are great starting mid-high tier goods and are going to make a mint. it is also a great complex station to learn how to set up your supply lines.

everything that produces steel, scanning arrays, fusion reactors and drones are the most profitable stations.

shipyards are the greatest consumers, pay attention what they need.

you may want to check this:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-COGqk-6IRU

and other videos that are related

gl&hf

[teMELEEn]

Originally posted by Mylo-s:

e-cells in OL RH, AL Asc or AL IW
H2O additives (fully extended with both water and ice refinery) in OL CC
those ones will not make you rich, but will help the economy

hardware supplier (for OL) or construction shop (in AL) are great starting mid-high tier goods and are going to make a mint. it is also a great complex station to learn how to set up your supply lines.

everything that produces steel, scanning arrays, fusion reactors and drones are the most profitable stations.

shipyards are the greatest consumers, pay attention what they need.

you may want to check this:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-COGqk-6IRU

and other videos that are related

gl&hf

thanks mate good tips. I am following your videos for some time now, I built solar array in radiant haven just yesterday :)

I m just thinking how to go about creating my own ecosystem in empty sector :) I dont have money problem so far, I have quite a lot of auto traders and big military fleet so I can make very quick cash doing bounty hunting missions :D

[Chew Ass and Kick Bubblegum]

1) Yes, NPCs will come if prices are competetive and everything is set right

2) One solar array is enough per sector. I recommend to simply build the basic one, and gradually extend it when needed (you can check how many e-cells are consumed by your stations per hour, and compare the overall number to the amount of e-cells produced per hour by your solar array)

3) Mining of ice is similar to autotrading. Get a mining ship (Sequanna is the best one for ICE), equip it with crew and some Surface collector drones (about 15-30).
If the mining process is too slow, purchase another Sequanna. If there's too much ice but not enough water in stocks, extend the station.

4) I usually just build the end-product (Reinforced metal for example), then I build stations that produce resources it needs and gradually expand the sector infrastructure.
It's nice to build stations at suitable locations too - ones that supply each other should be in the same zone. Make sure that water/energy/food are somewhere in the middle of everything.
Also use enough of freighters and protection. But, stations and freighters can defend themselves, unless they're facing Titurels or bigger threats.
Adding some Interpid Mk2 drones aboard each freighter/miner helps a lot.
Don't use fighters - their ability to dodge projectiles is useless if player isn't present in the zone, which means that they are basically worthless.
Don't use small freighters/miners, they die almost instantly and they're slow as hell. They also can't fit enough of wares in their cargo spaces, it's not worth it.


Keep on mind, that in DeVries, there's no demand for high-tech wares so you'll have to sell them manually to Omicron/Albion.
Watch out for the Teladi sectors - there are Pirate Maurauder phoenixes, and those will attack any freighters (they ignore reputation state).
Use high-skilled specialists on-board of each station, to greatly increase amount of products produced from the same amount of resources.

Also, if stations are in the same zone, and have enough of cargolifters aboard (and everything is set right), they can trade without using any ships - instead, the cargolifters will travel from station to station and deliver the drones without using any freighters for distribution.

[teMELEEn]

Originally posted by Scimitar101:

1) Yes, NPCs will come if prices are competetive and everything is set right

2) One solar array is enough per sector. I recommend to simply build the basic one, and gradually extend it when needed (you can check how many e-cells are consumed by your stations per hour, and compare the overall number to the amount of e-cells produced per hour by your solar array)

3) Mining of ice is similar to autotrading. Get a mining ship (Sequanna is the best one for ICE), equip it with crew and some Surface collector drones (about 15-30).
If the mining process is too slow, purchase another Sequanna. If there's too much ice but not enough water in stocks, extend the station.

4) I usually just build the end-product (Reinforced metal for example), then I build stations that produce resources it needs and gradually expand the sector infrastructure.
It's nice to build stations at suitable locations too - ones that supply each other should be in the same zone. Make sure that water/energy/food are somewhere in the middle of everything.
Also use enough of freighters and protection. But, stations and freighters can defend themselves, unless they're facing Titurels or bigger threats.
Adding some Interpid Mk2 drones aboard each freighter/miner helps a lot.
Don't use fighters - their ability to dodge projectiles is useless if player isn't present in the zone, which means that they are basically worthless.
Don't use small freighters/miners, they die almost instantly and they're slow as hell. They also can't fit enough of wares in their cargo spaces, it's not worth it.


Keep on mind, that in DeVries, there's no demand for high-tech wares so you'll have to sell them manually to Omicron/Albion.
Watch out for the Teladi sectors - there are Pirate Maurauder phoenixes, and those will attack any freighters (they ignore reputation state).
Use high-skilled specialists on-board of each station, to greatly increase amount of products produced from the same amount of resources.

Also, if stations are in the same zone, and have enough of cargolifters aboard (and everything is set right), they can trade without using any ships - instead, the cargolifters will travel from station to station and deliver the drones without using any freighters for distribution.

thanks, great tips! I want to ask one thing tough regarding the demands - they are all cluster related for NPCs? Meaning station in deVeris will only trade with npcs that stay in deVeris?

Also howbout universal trader from autotrader mod - could this solve the issue? Im not too worried for safety, I use exclusively heavy freighters, currently I own about 12 titurels :D

[Chew Ass and Kick Bubblegum]

There are mods that allow you to use galaxy-wide trading. Currently, there's only cluster-wide trading. Same applies to NPCs, except for a few free-roaming vessels, but those are not enough to interest you.
Not sure if the mods work in the current version, don't use them myself.

[Mylo-s]

NPCs trade galaxy wide, but there are only small numbers.

Galaxytraders (autotraders) jump straight to their destination and therefore minimise any risks of being attacked by pirates / xenon. I have not lost a single one in my current playthrough.

As Scimitar101 says, get galaxywide trading mod, but make sure it is compatible with the autotrader mod. I am not big fan of micromanagement, so I just leave things to NPCs and to my galaxytraders.

[teMELEEn]

Originally posted by Mylo-s:

NPCs trade galaxy wide, but there are only small numbers.

Galaxytraders (autotraders) jump straight to their destination and therefore minimise any risks of being attacked by pirates / xenon. I have not lost a single one in my current playthrough.

As Scimitar101 says, get galaxywide trading mod, but make sure it is compatible with the autotrader mod. I am not big fan of micromanagement, so I just leave things to NPCs and to my galaxytraders.

my thinking exactly. Also wanted to ask - how many cluster traders per cluster (roughly) do you recommend? I am about to promote mine so im thinking if I having everyone sector trader promoted to cluster trader in OL makes sense (I have one sector trader in every sector in OL and AL)..

[Lupo]

I strongly recommend a drone producing factory, not only they sell very well, but sorts out the problem of equipping drones for your ships, nothing like having a Trade ship full of cargolifters, construction drones etc and send it to transfer drones to that "new acquired" Titurel.

[Chew Ass and Kick Bubblegum]

Yup, drones & weapons are a good thing to build in DeVries or Maelstorm.
There isn't that much demand for those in the universe, I think, but if you produce them yourself you'll cut-off many expences.
Same goes for Fusion reactors and Reinforced metal. If you produce those, you're pretty much building stations for free using own materials.

For money printing stations, you'll have to get lots of trade agents (or use my custom tool that gives them to you) and watch the market for a while.
Generally, Reinforced Metal is always profitable, there isn't enough of supply anywhere.
But other resources may vary between savegames. Many players have energy & water crysis in Omicron Lyrae - well, I don't. But there's massive Narcotics demand everywhere I go.

[darkone264]

ship tec fabs drones and RMP stations are money makers the rest are support stations which can make money