Equipment dock for profitsssss

[Vegetto]

Anyone tried it? I usually wait for a wharf, but during my last playtrough ship building was heavily nerfed so 100% price for a ship meant i lost money and 150% was barely profitable. Now i started a game again and I'm wondering if it's worth trying equipment dock instead so i will get some money from repairs without heavy investment into hull parts.

Or maybe it was changed and wharfs are worth it again? I know that selling ships manually was better but I don't like the idea

[SirProsik]

Let us know how it goes. I usually only build shipyards to support my own faction because of the nerfs. As of yet never bothered with the maintenance modules since I am more interested in the building of ships as needed and the same module allows for repairs.

[eMYNOCK]

player wharfs, shipyards and equipment docks are usually part of your internal logistics... don't want to go shopping all around the network?
build it your self in a central place.

though, IF you supply your wharfs and shipyards 100% through your very own economy you simply can not lose money... simply because you have no expensesfor materials to begin with.

[Vegetto]

Originally posted by eMYNOCK:

player wharfs, shipyards and equipment docks are usually part of your internal logistics... don't want to go shopping all around the network?
build it your self in a central place.

though, IF you supply your wharfs and shipyards 100% through your very own economy you simply can not lose money... simply because you have no expensesfor materials to begin with.

That's not really the reason in my case. There are 2 things i want to do:
1. make money to finish paranid plot (last time i didn't finish their structure before fps death of the universe.
2. Try to support paranids against xenons in faulty logic. Argons destroyed HOP Eq Dock in Holy Vision so the closest system to repair S/M ships is HOP wharf in Second Contact (they went mad probably?). It looks like fine opportunity to make profits with better (closer) service than their own docks
3. Support splits against xenons in family zhin. Last timethey were in tight spot because whole Zyrath's economy is relying on this system and I had to clear family zhin, nuut and zyrath's dominion so they will be able to sustain.

Probably i will use eq dock anyway but it kinda seems not worth it to invest so much money into eq dock if i can just repair my ships on auxillary ship

[Azunai]

You don't earn any passive income from an equipment dock. AI don't use them.

If you have access to terran resources, you can make a huge amount of money from using an equipment dock to produce meson guns. The blueprints are expensive, but once you can build them, you can just get a few cheap katanas, add meson guns on your dock, then remove the guns at an NPC dock and earn millions in the process.

For a slightly less convoluted approach, you can also use the dock to fill a few boats with advanced satellites and then unequip them at an NPC wharf. You get like 60-70k per satellite and the materials to make one cost maybe 10k or so.

[trooperrob]

Would one in Avarice be worthwhile.
You can use eq docks to equip your ships with expensive kit, then downgrade to get cash, but you would have to own the blueprints. engines 3 are good!
as mentioned by azunai.
Last game with ED years ago I did make money but slowly.
Also cheaper way to get crew, but prob not as good as buying vig marines. Still working my way there in a new game.

[Aieonae]

I am still able to print Asgard for sale...

[eMYNOCK]

i counted 3 things but lets not get distracted by typing errors... lets get started.

1. make money to finish paranid plot (last time i didn't finish their structure before fps death of the universe.

for money the EQD approach is not the way to go, as said, they are more usefull if you personally want to avoid long distances when equiping your own ships... because than every available equipment you have plans for is in a central location.

2. Try to support paranids against xenons in faulty logic. Argons destroyed HOP Eq Dock in Holy Vision so the closest system to repair S/M ships is HOP wharf in Second Contact (they went mad probably?). It looks like fine opportunity to make profits with better (closer) service than their own docks

as mentioned by Daoin, the Factions will rarely use your EQDs,they will do it sometimes but it is not reliable.

3. Support splits against xenons in family zhin. Last timethey were in tight spot because whole Zyrath's economy is relying on this system and I had to clear family zhin, nuut and zyrath's dominion so they will be able to sustain.

again, same as number 2.
if you actively want to support these factions your best approach would be solidifying their economies... or... build and supply your own wharfs/shipyards that are backed by your own economy.

how ever, relating purely xenon, your best shot would be to seal their enterance gates shut by placing some basic defense stations (no admin needed) close to the gates... you can even turn those into factories or wha ever you want once the gates feel secure enough.

[Vegetto]

Thanks for responses, looks like eq docks are kinda useless for me now. I will stick to expanding industry for next few hours

[eMYNOCK]

believe me, they may come in handy... just not for the thing you had in mind right now.

as said, they serve their role as centralized equipment locations... and finalizing 10 asgards on your own EQD in relatively short notice is something... especially when you can print out 10 bare bones in no time to send them over to the EQD.

the magic behind that is:
your EQDS serve as stockpiles for upgrade wares while your ship producers can focus on building without running into shortages.

though... you'll only really notice that when you mass produce hulls.

[Vegetto]

Soooo... I didn't want to wait much more to test it. Made some money, S/M maintenence dock with one L size container + docks for traders + one solar panel, pumped in 10 millions credits.

Results for 6h:
10->13m credits
94.1% storage is filled
looks like hop isn't interested, my clients are paranids and terrans, some argons and just 3 HOP
Over all 18 transactions but 20mil credits earned from them

I think the problem was that HOP had the same services close enough to get them for free, just 3 offers from them and all ~20k credits so probably repairs. Also HOP is at war with neighbors so it can result in lack of clients.

Later on I modified my station in Heretic's end. It took a bit to fill up containers but during last 30 minutes i got 4 transactions, 3 for few hundred thousands and one for 8 mil!!!

Probably Hatikvah choice and some teladi sectors where is a lot of foreign traffic should be great. I have no idea why transactions are so big but i bet it's because of advanced satelites. Electronics is the only ware that isn't completely filled in first dock.

Over all looks like eq docks are good but positioning is the key. I think i can tell that it's worth to buy, base + starting investment is around 20 mil. It may be a great alternative for ship building but i still need to wait for results from second dock.

Edit: Please don't nerf it

[Veter]

equiptment docks can get income, but first sabotage other docks nearby, by hacking they terminals. Second it must be placed near active zones with combat actions, not matter from bandits, khaaks or xenons or even faction combat.
Third and most important rule is not build or place any production or construction modules on your equiptment dock, or it will not work as equiptment dock for AI, because they will think it is not it, and just another trade or production station because of seach scripts made by egosoft.

[Vegetto]

Originally posted by Veter:

equiptment docks can get income, but first sabotage other docks nearby, by hacking they terminals. Second it must be placed near active zones with combat actions, not matter from bandits, khaaks or xenons or even faction combat.
Third and most important rule is not build or place any production or construction modules on your equiptment dock, or it will not work as equiptment dock for AI, because they will think it is not it, and just another trade or production station because of seach scripts made by egosoft.

I agree with first part but not with second.Still testing it now and In heretic's end i have water production and salvage modules, still I get 4-10 transactions per hour for 35 mil during last 4.5 hours. I think that the main thing we need to do is to place it in unowned sectors (or owned by us), or damage dock of faction that owns area

[Dark]

Originally posted by Aieonae:

I am still able to print Asgard for sale...

This. Terran ♥♥♥♥ is easy to build and just make it from raw resources. I print ships and just sell them to NPC factions.