Jon Q. Publik, or WOW is space grand!

[Jonzac]

Jon Q. Publik

Start: Anonymous Argon

Game: X3:TC with bonus pack only.

Prologe: I have not played X3 Terran Conflict at all. I only played X3: Reunion for a couple of hours although I did play X2: The Threat, but not to any type of completion. With that in mind, I plan on making my first game a Dead is Dead game. I have read several of the earlier DiDs, (Nuke-Slug for one), and I really like the play style.

Unfortunately, I died...and since dying once at the End of the Terran plot...I've died alot. So I'm not calling this a DiD, just a story, like many others. I've enjoyed chronically my steps so I will continue, but this is no longer a DiD

Rules: No using the Internet to find/print a map, look at ships, station information, etc. I plan on writing this as it comes…the character and I will both be learning about this new universe. I do remember some things from X2, which I am equating with the basic education level of someone coming from Argon…much like having to sit through US History left me with a vague understanding of World War I.

Introduction: My name is Jon Publik. Well Jon Quantana Publik, but only my mother ever used that and only when I was in trouble. Obviously, I’m from Argon Prime and like everyone else with half a brain I want to get away. I mean Prime’s OK for some, but not for me. No way I’m going to find some job in an office when there is easy money to be made up here. Everyone is making money, heck, just one small trade between stations will make more than an average person planetside would make in a year!

So, I cashed out the college fund and took a small business loan, they still think I’m going to open a dry cleaning shop next jazurra! HA! I quickly bought a Discoverer…a beat up Discoverer. Of course, I’m not dumb, I completed the mandatory flight school which dumped me in the middle of Argon Prime sector.

1- Discoverer
1 MJ Shield/0 guns

2,500 cr

[Jonzac]

Episode 1: Show me the money

Well, sitting here in space certainly isn't going to make me any money. Obviously, I'm going to have to contact a station and either pick up a quick job from them or figure out this trading thing that is making everyone rich just sitting in a spaceship.

I'm going to have to get some money quickly. I've read AATCS (Argon's All the Commonwealth Ships) from a decade ago in the school library and I'm sure guns and a better scanner are necessities. Took off to the south...how is there a "South" anyway? Fine, South! to Home of Light. I remember reading the papers that the TerraCorp HQ was there and since the on-board sector map had the South Gate in its database I could find it pretty easy.

I get there and comm the HQ and they promptly offer me a job guarding 4 TerraCorp freighters....really? Don't they have a scanner? I've no guns and while I'm tempted to bluff them, I figured that if the freighters got blown up then I lose any chance of working for them again.

Finally, got an offer to transport this Boron from the Quantum Tube factory to the Crystal Fab factory. Easy! I dock (thank goodness for a computer) and the Boron starts to complain I don't have the right ship...something about a life support extension. Life support extension? What is he talking about...whatever, I use the on-board computer to abort the mission and head back into Prime to look at the equipment dock to find out about that life support thing.

Unfortunately, I find out after half a seizura of arguing with the moron on the equipment dock about this, that the cops think that's only for moving slaves around? Really? So the whole "Argon Civilian Taxi" I see on my scanner are all slavers? pffftt!

Got back into the ship and headed West this time. I can't remember what sector is over there, I'm sure it Argon space though. I end up in Red Light, which is pretty, but I'd like to actually make some money! Contact the cattle ranch there and a Split wants me to scan asteroids for him...only I don't have a mineral scanner so that's out. Contact a Boron on another station and he wants me to build him a station...A FRICKIN STATION, is he stupid!

Frustrated, I move back into Home of Light and at a station there some split or boron or whatever, says he's working with his security police ready to crack a drug ring. He wants me to follow this Almancharst to his hidden base....and he'll pay 3,719 credits. Heck, sounds easy. Follow the guy and stay out of the way.

The whatever, gave my computer the coordinates which sent me off South to what turned out to be the Ore Belt....lots of rocks. The contact showed up 20km or so North of the gate. I head in that direction and about a minute later...he blows up!!! Before I can react I get a message that tells me I stink, I lost that guy and I'm NOT getting paid!! I can't believe it, I didn't do anything wrong and that alien is STIFFING me!

Bah! Nothing I can do about it and then I notice something shiny in the distance. I close up to it and the scanner finally shows that it's a pirate base, and one that apparently isn't going to shoot me...wonder what's on that thing?

Assets:
1- Discoverer

2,500 cr

[Jonzac]

Episode 2 - In which, I find out that red icons on my scanner are VERY scary!

Closing in on the pirate base in Ore Belt I realized its not really a base at all but some decrepit ships that have been welded together, as I dock in the hanger a voice over the speaker cries out “Ahoy matey, welcome to the pirate base.” Ahoy matey? Someone needs to stop smoked the spaceweed. I scanned through the few things they sold and I couldn’t believe my eyes...there was a life support extension! I could buy the damn thing if I only had 309 more credits! AAARRRGHHH!!

I headed back to Prime with the idea to sell my shield so that I could afford the life support and then make some money. I zipped past the Low Yield arms factory and noticed that I could be making 4,000cr per gun if I could afford to buy even one of them and deliver it to the Marine training base. Some spaced out Boron even commed me with the offer to bring him 256 units of Spaceweed! Please, if I could afford to buy that much I wouldn’t need to be taking your comm, now would I?

As I entered Argon Prime, my computer make some loud squeal, which after several seconds of alarm…turned into MORE seconds of alarm when I noticed that several pirate elites were right behind me!! I quickly moved up out of the elliptic plane and watched as a LARGE ship from the Argon military and some fighters and even Centaurs jumped all over the Elite and Nova that were foolish enough to come into Prime space. After my breathing had lowered to a somewhat normal amount, I checked my scanner to ensure that they were all dead and I noticed a crate of spacefuel had been ejected from the dying Nova. Quickly heading over I grabbed it and motored back to the pirate base. Of course, I now realized that spacefuel must be legal as you can sell it at the Marine Training base…but avoiding all patrols I jumped into Ore Belt.

AND PROMPTLY RAN INTO A PIRATE STRIKE FORCE. Two Novas and four Elites were gathered around the North gate. I caught them just as they were starting to enter the gate and I quickly went full power and headed toward the large HQ south of there. There slower ships were unable to keep up and the one M4 that jumped through had a rough surprise as I watched my scanner fill with Argon M7 and fighters.

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Now that everyone was shooting as someone that wasn’t me, I changed directions and headed to the pirate base. About half way there I noticed that the pirates were done for and I must be leading the Argon forces directly at the pirate base…whoops! I quickly landed, sold the spacefuel, bought the life support extension and a few engine tuning chips, launched and RSLG…with a whopping 9 credits to my name.

Docked up in Home of Light for a while to calm down and grab some sleep. Spent a credit on a drink at the bar while I figured out where all this easy money is. Coming up empty, I headed out to space again and quickly commed a Boron that wanted me to head to Atreus’ Cloud and bring back his ship he lost. He would pay me 2,221 credits!! Sweet, and away I went. Now I had no idea where Atreus’ Cloud was but he provided my computer with the details.

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I headed east through President’s End, then North through The Wall and entered The Hole. Why do they call it “The Hole”, when they should call it “The Green Mist”? Finally, I hit Atreus’ Cloud, which IS correctly named, and my computer pinged the Jaguar Hauler. I moved to within 150m and exited my Discoverer, commed the Jag and entered the activation code provided by the owner. The hull had taken quite a bit of damage and I wasn’t sure it would make it back to Home of Light. Fortunately, I was pretty good at Electronics and Hovercar repair classes in school. I fixed the more obvious issues and sent it on its way.

Then I thought...what if I am supposed to be with the ship instead of remote calling the guy? I decided I wouldn’t take the chance and I wanted to be eyeball to eyestalk if he tried to stiff me the payment. Fortunately my fears were unfounded and after it landed the owner called me and asked me to relinquish control, which I did and promptly received the 2,221 credits!!!

I headed back to Prime to sell the two Banshee missiles I picked up after the military cleaned out the pirates in Ore Belt, but apparently no one in Prime will buy them! I did pick up another job request for picking up another ship someone lost, this time in the Wall one sector over. He was even offering to pay 5,416 credits! I quickly said ok and sent his ship back to him…talk about easy money. I even paid for a duplex scanner and few more speed upgrades and now my top speed is all the way up to 207 m/s. Headed west into what turned out to be Ringo Moon, amazing how easy it is to find stuff with the expanded scanner range! No missions so I head though the South gate.

Back into Red Light, my map of the universe is starting to fill out a little more and I’m recognizing the few names I learned back in history class. Found a ship retrieval mission to Elena’s Fortune for 2,223 credits and as I headed out , I was flipping through the comm channels and another ship retrieval job popped for an amazing 27,000 credits!!!! Holy crap, the ship is in Paranid space…in Emperor’s Mines. I know that the Paranid and Argon aren’t on great terms, but it would be worth a peak right? I quickly accepted and took my computer generated route South through Cloudbase SouthWest and further south into Paranid territory…hopefully this Octopus M5 I’m getting isn’t too close to anything bad!

[ external image ]

[Vim Razz]

This is the kind of project I would have loved to do if I'd thought of it at the time. Looking forward to seeing how it turns out.

Oh, and.. uh...

Of course, I now realized that spacefuel must be legal as you can sell it at the Marine Training base

umm...

[Jonzac]

The trip to Emperor's Mines was actually anticlimactic. While the Argon and the Paranid despise each other, the Paranid authorities aren't ready to destroy every Argon out of hand. Those left me to get to the Octopus, give it a couple of repairs and send it to its owner in Red Light, and the 27,631 credits were MORE that welcome in fixing up the Discoverer.

I then headed toward Elena's Fortune to finish yet another lost ship job, when I found a quick mission to deliver 2 marines which I promptly accept. I dock at the cattle ranch and find out that I need a total of 48 free cargo space...so after wasting my time, you would think that they would give the parameters of the damn mission BEFORE someone accepted it.

After sending that Pegasus back to its owner, I stop at the Light Shield factory and pick up two more 1 MJ shields, and I feel a lot better with triple the buffer between me and the cold vacuum of space. Now, its time for guns, and after checking Argon Prime, Three Worlds, Kingdom End, Cloudbase South East...NO ONE HAS ANY IREs FOR SALE ANYWHERE!!!

I did manage a few more ship recovery missions, including one for a Discoverer for almost 10,000 credits, and by the time I finally got to Kingdom End I was so frustrated and pissed off I spent all the money I had saved for 4 IREs on a mineral scanner. I had passed by 4 different scanning mission on the way to Kingdom End so I figured if I didn't have guns I might at least make some money scanning large rocks.

Of course, as soon as I do that all the damn scanning missions dry up and I end up flying from Kingdom End all the way to Cloudbase South East before I finally get an offer to scan rocks...all that way and not one rock scanning or ship recovery mission. I truly believe my luck stinks sometimes, although the 1,254 credits per rock for 10 asteroid wasn't a bad deal at all.

Finally, my luck changed. Reminds me of a song my Uncle used to sing, "If it weren't for bad luck, I'd have no luck at all...Glooooom, despair and agony on meeeeeeee." He always did have a weird sense of humor. Chasing a ship down in Rolk's Fate and finally finding it and repairing in...its becoming a bit routine now.

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As I was done I passed a Light weapons factory that was looking for someone to scan some asteroids. On a whim, I looked at what they sold and HOLY CRAP!!!! they had 38 IREs for sale...now all I have to do is finish this scanning mission and I can buy my weapons. OUT FREAKING STANDING!!! I quickly finish the scan, buy my four guns and even have enough to spring for a Triplex scanner I found second hand at the equipment dock in Rolk's Fate.

I was giddy with excitement and as I took off I noticed a combat mission request from the Ion Cannon factory. I had been ignoring them for so long I just had to give it a try. I quickly accepted their job and they identified a Yaki M5 to "protect" them from. Protect them from an M5? I can only assume that it was attacking the docking ships and driving off business as that little thing CERTAINLY wasn't going to hurt the station. I managed to maneuver behind him and pressed the firing stud...and NOTHING happened. Mashing the trigger continued to do nothing. I peeled off, desperate to find out what was going on when I got a thank you message from the station for protecting them. Apparently, the Yaki pilot was so busy laughing at me he forgot to look where he was going and ran into the station. Serves the bastard right!

After reading the ships operating manual I found out the problem. The weapons are all installed in Group 1 by default and I had moved my weapons group indicator to Group 2 sometime in the past. Not know about any of that before hand, I tested the guns on group 1 again and they worked fine.

My Discoverer has just about all the upgrades I can give her, and after her first "kill" I thought it might be a good time to give her a name...and in a fit of misguided humor I settle on "Nameless". Pretty funny, right?

After landing on the Ion Cannon factory and collected my reward, I overheard one of the traders talking about trading in Teladi sectors. It sounded pretty good, so I decided to try and find out where they were. I tried to remember what I heard in school and I remembered that the Teladi were somewhere near Boron territory so I thought I'd head North to Menalaus' Frontier and see if I could find out anything up there.

Apparently, naming "Nameless" brought about a rush of good luck. I had taken another asteroid scanning mission there and it wanted me to start scanning two asteroids in the Northeast portion of the sector. I was heading to the second asteroid that was almost at the edge of the mapped sector when a ship popped up on the scanner. At first, I didn't pay attention to it but it was right behind the asteroid that I was supposed to scan and when I brought up the sector scan the ship was labeled different that every other ship in the sector. All the other ships' names started out with the company or government they belonged to and this Toucan Hauler did not. I pulled up to it and it was not moving and I wondered if this was some ship like the ones I pick up for others, but it had shields and wasn't damaged in anyway...it was just sitting here like some ghost ship. I ejected to get a closer look and as I got within 25 meters of the airlock I was asked if I wanted to claim the ship.

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Not looking a gift horse in the mouth, (another of my Uncle's sayings), I said yes and the ships computer registered me as the ship's owner! I quickly boarded her and found that she had 55 MJ worth of shields, could take passengers and a "Fire Bomb Launcher" in the rear turret...I don't even know what that is!

I jumped back into the Discoverer and had the Toucan follow me. I was worried that someone might come and disagree with my taking it, but I figured if I leave fast enough I might get away with it. I moved East and found the next sector was Ceo's Buckzoid. I had the hauler, newly named "Gift Horse" into the equipment dock there. I official registered it with the Teladi, so I figure I'll have some legal coverage if someone comes looking for it. I finished the asteroid scanning mission and netted 25,473 credits from it, enough to get a duplex scanner and full engine tuning for "Gift Horse".

While it was getting its upgrades installed I took a job to kill a Yaki pirate that had killed the friend of this Split. He had me head out to a Silicon Mine in Family Whi to talk to his contact for the pirates location. After a long flight I docked and received the pirates location...in Seizewell. Muttering under my breath, I undock turn around and not two minutes after I undocked I got a message that my target had been killed and I wasn't getting PAID...those Split SCREWED ME AGAIN!!

Found another mission from the Split Government, this time to kill some escaped criminal farther in Split Territory. Completing the mission was much easier that I ever imagined. Warped into the Family Pride sector and quickly identified him, which was easy as a Split M5 military ship was already firing on him. I slide in on a 45 degree forward approach vector, hit all 4 IREs at 1.25km before he know I was there. The hits brought his shields down and his hull to below 70%. After rolling in on his tail I quickly fired again and destroyed him and his ship. The Split paid me, but still won't let me dock at their stations.

On the long flight back to Teladi space, I played around with the remote control of "Gift Horse". Doing that I was able to look at the sector's station and their prices, which showed the Bliss Place was out of Swamp plants and the Dream Factory was full of them. I sent the ship over there to buy what I could and sold them. Raised my universal trading license to "Trader" and netted me a pretty penny. Maybe I've turned the corner out here in space?


Assets
1 - Discover "Nameless"
1 - Toucan Hauler "Gift Horse"

69,463 Credits

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[Triaxx2]

Possibly, but I wouldn't count on it. I suspect the game is leading you on, just to make the fall that much harder.

But it's a great story. Can't wait to read more.

[Jonzac]

How do I get off this merry-go-round?

I suppose, looking back on the last few days, it’s not surprising that I feel like I'm stuck in a rut. I had hoped that my fortune would quickly rise after acquiring the Toucan, but since it cannot carry the largest cargo types I was stuck continuing to run missions for anyone and everyone I could find.

I mostly stayed out of the combat mission, as I was sitting in one of the smallest ships available. I did find several missions that required me to scan down multiple asteroids...normally a very safe job, except when you get greedy and take them starting in Elena's Fortune. The people/aliens providing this stellar opportunity to make money want you to head into the pirate infested areas to scan the asteroids down. Normally, with my ship's speed that is not a problem, but when you run into a Carrack, Brigantine and a Galleon in several sectors it gets rather "sporty".

I did manage to find some poor Boron that offered me 226,962 credits to find and return his Kestrel to him. I have to admit that I REALLY thought about trying to keep that ship and run from the law, but eventually decided that I needed the money more.

I continued to do more jobs for folks who had no real inclination to leave the station for anything, or needed a ride from one place to another. Frankly, I was bored...and confused. There must be something more that this.

My first big change was figuring out how the how second hand ship market finally worked. All I had come across from folks in the stations were either "Please find my ship" or "buy me a ship and bring it here." I was zipping this Paranid to the station he wanted and I was idling flipping through the scanner data, when I noticed a little icon highlighted next to this Demeter Hauler. On a whim I commed the guy, intending to ask what the icon meant, when he wanted to buy his ship! He offered it to me for 54,949 credits, and I know that this ship went for something like 200,000 credits or so. I quickly took him up on the deal and while the ship had only 1 MJ of shields and some hull damage from a micro asteroid, it wasn't anything I couldn't patch up.

After that I got a whole lot more interested in my scanner data I tell you what. I picked up a heavier fighter ship, a M4 Pericles Raider and a Mercury super freighter, another Vulture TS. I sold all but the Pericles and the first Demeter sending both to Cloudbase SouthWestt to the Equipment Dock and the shield and arms dealers down there. At least now I was doing odd jobs for folks with a firm goal in mind...outfit my two new ships with shields and guns.

I had managed to acquire 476,198 credits before they arrive in Cloudbase Southwest and my bank account was quickly diminished as I first had to get energy cells to deliver to the shield factory and then sit there and wait for them to build the darn things. Finding PACs and 5 Mj Shields for the Pericles was much easier. All the while I did some taxi missions that racked up about 300,000 credits or so, which allowed me to send my Demeter to the Terracorp HQ to pick up one of those Jumpdrives I'd read about. I had read the news and how it allowed ships to instantly "jump" from their location and enter a sector from the target gate. Sounded pretty easy if you ask me…wonder why EVERYONE didn’t have one?

I sent the trader under remote control to various ore stations to sell the ore, which got MUCH easier after I pulled together the cash for a "best sell locator". I can now tell the computer to search for the best price to sell whatever it is carrying. The problem of course is the fact that I can only look at whatever sector I'm currently in, or what sector my remotely piloted ships happen to be in.

I was sitting the bar at the Terracorp HQ right after I finished a convoy escort job for them, which gave me the added benefit of becoming a permanent "contract" employee for the corporation. They promised better jobs if I continued to work at impressing their bosses.

While I was sipping on a good Delaxian whiskey, I overheard two important pieces of information that provided me an insight into how to move forward in this world. The first was teh use of Advanced Sat and Nav Sats. Basically, if you place one of this Satellites in a sector you can remotely check prices and stock availability for all stations in that sector. More importantly, that best sell locator I bought for the Demeter will automatically tap into the satellite net and find the best selling price for the distance I set it for. I tried it with the Demeter buying ore in Herron's Nebula and then telling it to sell for the best price within a three sector distance...and the ship immediately headed for the Quantum Fab stations in Argon Prime that was selling for 176 credits per ore unit...and I had purchased it for 63 credits per unit. I sat in the bar and watched as my Demeter with the Pericles guarding it moved out and automatically sold the ore...and I profited by over 70,000 credits!

The second thing I found about talking to a marine in the bar. I wondered what marines did in space since you didn't fight things out with handguns in space. That's when I found that marines train for ship boarding operations. You use a transport passenger ship...like "Gift Horse" and the marines can then EVA out to take a ship whose shields are down. Of course this only worked on larger ships, like M6, M7s and larger. I promptly sent "Gift Horse" to the marine barracks in Home of Light and hired two marines....and then found out I had to train them and the marine training barracks didn't train them?

Eventually, I stumbled across the Military Outpost in Elena's Fortune and after docking looking to pick up a passenger I read their station bulleting and services board and discovered that THEY offer continuation training for marines. I sent "Gift Horse" over to them and started what will apparently be a long AND EXPENSIVE path.

1- Discoverer "Nameless" (M5)
1- Toucan Hauler "Gift Horse" (TP)
1- Demeter Hauler (TS)
1- Pericles Raider (M4)

508,467 credits

[Jonzac]

Hopefully someone is enjoying this. I am really liking the game, its so different that my limited time in X2. I've been completely pulled away from Warhammer Online while I ply the space lanes. I get truely lost and I'm still deadly afraid of red icons. I'm going to have to conquer that sooner or later

-----------------------------------------------

I decided to move out of what the maps depict as “core” Argon space and made my way up into Teladi space. I’ve heard in the bars and trade stations that the Teladi are an anything sells no questions asked group. While I’ve no real inclination to transport or sell stolen goods, I wouldn’t be averse to profiting in an area of space that won’t get me incarcerated.
As I moved north toward Kingdom’s End, I managed to find yet another asteroid scanning mission for a Teladi.

He was paying a ridiculous amount per asteroid.

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I finished that scanning tedium, raked in over 224,000 credits and continued my journey to Teladi space. After arriving in Ceo’s Buckzoid and plugging my ID code into the market database, the only mission I could find was to defend a station against attack. I accepted as I figured I could sneak up on the attacker while they were attacking the station. Last time I did that the pirate was so surprised he ran into the station itself. I scanned the target coming in, a Yaki M5, wondering again who was worried about an M5, casually lined up behind him as he was target fixated on the station...let loose with all four IREs and quickly turned him into space dust.

I docked up at the trade station and took stock of my assets. I had placed NAVSATs in all of Argon and Boron space and I was attempting to remotely control my Demeter into the best sales around. Unfortunately, I can’t really pilot “Nameless”, search the jobs market, avoid space debris, scan for pirates, AND look for deals. I had read an advertisement while staying the night in TerraCorp HQ about a freighter piloting service they offered. TerraCorp trained the pilots in basic shiphandling skills and then offered their services for hire. The pilot paid back TerraCorp, 10% for one Jazzura, for the training. I couldn’t keep up so I sent my Demeter down to TerraCorp HQ and remotely hired a pilot. Now, as I know, piloting a ship and actually finding deals are not the same. I sent him to Three World to start trading, which he did, although he didn’t really look for deals but only bought something if it was selling above the average. He also wouldn’t leave the sector he was in, and I didn’t trust him anyway so I hadn’t given him access to the NAVSAT data. I moved him up from Three World to Queen’s Space, trading at each sector until he was unable to find any more to trade in. In Queen’s Space, with its Solar Power Plants, he found many opportunities to learn his trade. I left him there while I went on my way through Teladi and Split territory looking for jobs I could finish.

Which was a bust! No one would talk to me, and if they did wanted me to kill pirates or build them stations…neither of which I was prepared to accomplish. I was very frustrated by this point so I decided to head back to Argon space to where I was more known and folks had my contact information. Best decision I made, frankly, I got to Cloudbase South West and quickly found another asteroid scanning mission into the Ore Belt.

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I quickly finished the scanning and looked over the results, millions of credits just floating here in front of me. Inspiration often hits at the strangest times. I was dodging the multitude of small rocks and out of frustration I turned my IREs on one of them, which quickly was reduced to much smaller rocks that fairly sparked with Silicon, according to my sensors. They were small enough to fit into a hold of a freighter. My poor brain then suddenly connected the dots between the small rocks and the item for sale at HQ here in Ore Belt…the ORE COLLECTOR!! It make perfect sense now, there were many of these smaller rocks just floating here for ANYONE to pick up.

I contacted the shipyard in Cloudbase South East and ordered a bare bones Mercury with 1 MJ shielding, an ore collector and the necessary software. I then sent it into the Ore Belt to collect all the free money. I had calculated that one full hold of the Mercury will cover the initial costs.
I spent some more time performing jobs for people in the area, including another ship recovery in Paranid space, finally finding their capital Paranid Prime. I looked over the shipyard there and found the ship that I want. A Helios, which is a freighter sized ship that is capable mothering four other ships while she travels. That is exactly what I need, I have the Nameless , the Pericles Raider and “Gift Horse” all spread out and if they were together in my job search I’d be able to take a lot more jobs. I landed in the shipyard…and quickly found out that the Paranid wouldn’t sell me a ship, a missile, a gun not for any amount of money.

Fighting back my irritation, I got on the comm unit to Argon Prime and found they had the same type of ship. A little slower, but with twice the shields…which suits me fine, so I quickly ordered its purchase. 438,338 for the Magnator called “Magician” that came with one 200 Mj Shield, full engine tuning, full rudder tuning, boost extension, all the fighting software, SETA, three PACs and one PRG. The ship cost me 75% of my cash, but it was worth every penny. The only downside is one that was obvious if I looked at the size of the ships, the “Gift Horse” is the same size as “Magician” and obviously can’t dock there, but my Pericles sure can!

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Assets:
1- Demeter Hauler (TS) "Hired Trader 1"
1- Toucan Hauler (TP) "Gift Horse"
1- Mercury (TS) "Rock Hound"
1- Magnetor (TM) "Magician"
1- Pericles Raider (M4)
1- Discoverer (M5) "Nameless"

852,137 credits.

[Triaxx2]

Very nice. Certainly better than my first play through of the game.

[Jonzac]

I did read Nuclear-Slugs "squiddy McSquid" before I started...its what caused me to buy the game in the first place. That, careful planning, patience and RSLG-JD makes for a longer DiD...at least in my case.

[kgkosio]

I couldn't tell how large your screen shots are, but the site does have a limit for in-line screen shots.

Great story so far.

[Jonzac]

Walking around my new ship was a feeling both of power and insignificance combined. I truly enjoyed the feeling of a stateroom, more shielding and the ability to house fighters. Insignificance as I now had a small fleet and it was still me. Oh, of course, I hired a few engineers and ship’s crew to work the Magician, but I needed help…and that made me feel insignificant. My idea, my fantasy, had the world at my fingertips. A self-made made with no help from anyone. Trying to fight and trade had driven the point home with amazing clarity, that I couldn’t do it all.

Well, my Demeter pilot, an Argon pilot whose name still escapes me, was given orders to move to Herron’s Nebula and allowed to open his operating range up to two full sectors. He’s been doing well, proving to me that while I might wish to have microcontrol over everything I own it certainly is more profitable to hire a good person and turn them loose.

Traveling to Home of Light to continue outfitting the Magician I see the second hand ship market is alive and well, a beat up Dolphin Hauler for 229,000 credits. No time like the present, and while the Dolphin is too slow for my tastes I’m sure that a little repair work and I can flip this ship for over 388,000 credits. I and a few engineers jump EVA and start welding and inspecting the Dolphin and while it takes several shifts to complete we get it in good shape. Now I send it off to the shipyard in Cloudbase SouthEast where it eventually sells for 441,586 credit. Not a bad haul for a few shifts worth of work.

Finding time, and frankly making myself sit behind my desk to go over the reports from my budding empire. One that catches my eye is the complete bust that Mercury ore collector has been. It’s been there for weeks and the computer software that I bought hasn’t picked up a single piece of ore! I had been so busy I missed it. Irritated with myself and acknowledging again that I need to pick good people to help me, I send the ship to TerraCorp HQ and hire another pilot. He’s a Boron so I send him to Queen’s Space to learn the rope, like my first pilot…DAMN, I really need to remember his name.

Got a jumpdrive for the Magician and moved up to Antigone’s Memorial to purchase that second 200 MJ shield. Now that I’ve got a total of 400 MJ of shielding, 3 PAC, 1 PRG on the ship I’m feeling a little more secure, at least I don’t have to worry about the random pirate Harrier taking me out. The jumpdrive paid for itself in one mission, a taxi mission to take a bunch of Marines to Atreus’ Cloud for 416,324 credits. Easy money with a jumpdrive, hopefully I can find more desperate suckers…I mean willing customers.

[ external image ]

I continued to look for Marines through the interface of the Gift Horse and now that I purchased a bioscanner I can get a read out of their projected abilities. Those Split engineers can be very good at this kind of stuff. I hired two more candidates and started their training. I’m having them start with Mechanical training as that is the aspect of their training that lets them cut through a hull. I’ve been wondering what Marines were for and they are good for one thing only…Piracy. Oh, it’s called patriotism or vigilantism, but its piracy. Your taking something away from someone through force, and I suppose that I’m open to that option. The price of an M6, M7 or Gunne forbid an M2 is astronomical, no wonder people are looking to “acquire” one through other means. If I can get five Marines trained I might try my hand at this, although I’m not sure which target I would focus on. Hummm?

I had transferred the Ore collector and software from the Mercury to the Magician before hiring a second pilot, so while I was in Antigone I thought I might give it a try. I busted up a silicon asteroid and scooped up the pieces. Pretty slow work actually. While performing this hoover mission by the West gate, I notice a Hermes Hauler on sale for 62,900 credits. Beat to all get out, but once again, a Hermes was projected to sell at 442,000 credits at a Paranid shipyard. Left off ore collecting and started the repair procedures on the ship. Took more time than the Dolphin and a run for more wiring, but we got her fixed up and on her way to Argon Prime for sale. Went back to ore collecting and while I managed to collect 54 silicon wafers it sold for only 33,264 credits. Interesting but not worth the time commitment it incurred.

While I actually had some cash I was commed with a request to purchase and build a Boron Quantum Tube Fab in Ringo Moon. Sounded interesting and the 800,000 credit profit would have been nice. Unfortunately, the one Boron shipyard I know about doesn’t sell that station, which means me and the Magician are off to explore some more.

While I enjoy the ability the jumpdrive gives me to bypass a lot of space, I decided to slow boat over to Teladi space to look at the sector job markets. While I didn’t find anyone offering a job that interested me I did find a Split willing to sell his Pericles Raider, which I quickly snatched up and sent off for repair and outfitting. I enjoy having a matched set of M4s to protect the Magician, of course the fighting software is good, but I’m really going to have to look for pilots of Red wing and its two Pericles M4s.

Headed into Profit Share and while contacted my Argon freighter pilot giving him completely access to the NAVSAT data feed and clear instructions so he doesn’t screw it up, a Duke’s Freighter appeared on screen. Wondering why it showed up as an enemy, I flipped through the news network and found a background piece on them. They are a “private security” company that look, acts, and pillages just like pirates. Now I’ve been avoiding combat, as I have a strange aversion to dying, but I felt I needed to overcome this. I grabbed my Pericles Raider and headed over the transport started to scan him only to have the Teladi inform me that I just performed an illegal act. Soooo, headed to the trading station signed the form deputizing me into the Teladi Police. Now I can scan the transport with no repercussions…and he’s empty. No fighter drones, no missile, but I do like the ship. After attacking him, brining the shields down by trailing him from behind and in the excitement missed that the PAC in his rear turret had stripped my shields and brought my hull down to 84%. In a panic I hammered the throttle and strafing jets pulling out of the way. I call him to surrender and that Split tells me to get bent. Learning my lesson I approach from the side and start bringing the shields down. I strafe around him, and while I get hit occasionally he can’t drain my shields. Unfortunately, like all Split, he won’t leave his ship and I have to destroy it. Which gets me 1,000 credit and a nice pat on the back from the Teladi.

Brought my Pericles back, now dubbed “Dagger 1” and the second Pericles as “Dagger 2”, of course, Dagger 1 needs some work done so I and the engineers get to work. I head back to my stateroom at the end of the day and right before going to sleep I check my messages…and had one heck of a surprise. Remember that Hermes Hauler I fixed up? Well, I had an Argon collector buy it for 758,616 credits…an AMAZING 500k+ profit!!!

Assets:
1- Discoverer (M5) “Nameless”
1- Toucan Hauler (TP) “Gift Horse”
2- Pericles Raiders (M4) “Dagger 1 & 2”
1- Magnatar (TM) “Magician”
1- Demeter Hauler (TS) “Trader 1”
1- Mercury (TS) “Trader 2”

1,199,024 Credits

[Jonzac]

Woke up feeling much better about my situation and what to do next. Right now my space faring life has fallen into a predictable pattern, and while predictability can get you killed I don’t think I’ve hit that point yet. While flying around, talking to contacts in every sector looking for work can be extremely frustrating and boring, it can pay well and every step is bringing me more and more money. In fact, I’ve more money than my family has ever seen, of course, I’m paranoid that it will be gone as quickly as I’ve made it. That’s why this boring, predictable lifestyle is one that I’m going to continue for now. Careful, controlled spending and planned investment will ensure that I retain this fortune.

So what is the first thing I do? Spend 20% of my total liquid cash for a Teladi Falcon. I looked at the average selling price at the shipyard in Seizewell, and the Falcons go for around 1.9 million credits. I’m not planning to sell this ship as it can handle the Phased Repeater Gun (PRG), which will take the shield off ships quickly and maybe allow me to capture my first ship…at least that is the plan for this Falcon. Which was good as several more of the Duke’s transports were making their way through Teladi space, it is obvious that the Duke and the Teladi have come to an understanding. Unfortunately, there were no supplies in the area to allow me to outfit the Falcon.

A rather lengthy search using the NAVSAT network finally found the 200MJ shields, guns and software I needed in Antigone’s Memorial. So I put the Falcon in the bay of the Magician and jumped over there. The station even had full stocks which brought the prices down to their minimum, which was good for my cash flow. All together the Falcon cost approx 750,000 credits to buy and outfit, which dropped my available credit to below 600,000 credits. So, that means back to the “boring” job market. Hopefully, I can find some quick money for anyone who is willing to pay.

Picked up a quick scanning job that paid 60,000, which was good as my cash dropped to 54,000 credits between buying some 25MJ shields for my first trader and the capital that the traders needed for some high priced wares they were transporting.

Looks like I’m going to have to find some more 25MJ shields as my second trader, the Boron, is on strike. He won’t continue to trade at all. I’ve moved him into several different sectors and after a rather frustrating several days, I finally reviewed all my correspondence to him as I was about to fire him and didn’t want any issues with TerraCorp. Lo and behold, I found a message from him that he wanted some fight software to interface with to ensure that he stayed out of sectors with enemies. Feeling foolish I send him to Kingdom’s End to rectify the problem.

I jumped the Magician back to the border of Teladi and Split space and moved into Thuruk’s Beard where I found several more of the Duke’s transports. Scanned both of them and attempted to persuade the pilots that the ships were not worth their lives. Whatever the Duke is holding over these pilot’s head it must be bad as they both elected to go down with their ships.

Decided to stay in Split space and look for work, but all I found were assassination missions to sectors I hadn’t been in, or requests to recapture ships that were stolen…and given the fact that I haven’t been able to get any pilot to voluntarily leave their ships I decline both of those missions, which exhausts the options in Thuruk’s Beard. Traveling through unexplored Split space I still couldn’t find anything I could accomplish in the limited time the Split kept offering. They wanted the impossible done yesterday. Finally, found a ship retrieval job to find an Octopus in Family Pride for 78,043 credits, which was easy to do and my luck finally turned as I found a taxi mission for some Split marines for 130,519 credits…which sounds like a lot until you looked at the 1.1 million credit mission I turned down because I didn’t have a transport in my hip pocket.

I’m still having problems with my second trader, he’s stuck in neutral sitting at the trading station in Queen’s Space. If he doesn’t get it together soon, I’m kicking him out the airlock with no EVA suit and that Boron can swim home through space.

Cruising though Rolk’s Fate I picked up a ship recovery mission…or so I thought. Turned out it was a ship recapture mission in Family Whi. Given my track record I was a little upset I hadn’t read the fine print. I decided I’d give it a shot and headed that way. Found the M5 and lined up behind it and spanked the PRGs, it quickly lost its shield and I switched to the single IRE on board. I hit the IRE and the shock of losing his shields caused the pirate to bail out of the ship. Amazing, I actually captured a ship! Followed up that success with a quick radioactive material shipment for 90,000 credits.

Bit off more that I could chew with a ship retrieval mission to bring back an Iguana. Found the ship easily enough, but it was very damaged and it was a sector short as time ran out. Since the police were already on the trail of the ship I docked it in the nearest station and quickly hired this Argon teenager to short circuit the ID panel until I could arraign a way to get the ship out of there.
The second hand ship market finally got active again and I picked up a Vulture for 20,000 credits and since we were in Home of Opportunity the shipyard and equipment dock were close by to outfit the Vulture with shields and a hired Teladi pilot to start trading in the local area, which coincided nicely with my second trader finally getting a grip on the trading software and making progress..or maybe the 25MJ shield I had him buy finally convince him it was OK to actually undock.

Home of Opportunity is just that, another Vulture was offered for 79,000 credits. I just had this one move into the shipyard for now until my cash reserve gets high enough to pay for the needed upgrades. I continued to search Teladi and Split space and was cruising through Scale Plate Green with a small wing of pirates showed up on the gravitar. It was a group of two Buzzards and one Elite. Decided to try again to convince one of them to donate their ship, I hopped into the Falcon. I closed in on the wing and quickly destroyed the two Buzzards. I figured that reducing my limited attention span to one target instead of three was a prudent move. The Elite had pulled away and the maneuvered for a high closure rate shot, which resulted in a face full of PRG for him. The almost instantaneous loss of his shields and 30% of his hull was enough for him to reach for the eject handles and I now captured my first pirate ship. The Elite is nice and if I can get it outfitted it will match well with Dagger 1 and 2.

I was moving in to Shareholder Profit with the intention to dock and perform some needed light maintenance on the Magician and the Falcon. I docked at the station and was finishing my paperwork, the most important of which was to allow my second trader the authority to expand his trade route one sector out from Queen’s Space. I was just closing my message queue when a new announcement came over for a taxi job. 12 Teladi needed transport to the Dream Factory in Teladi Gain, normally I say away from the weed smokers, but they were offering 570,174 credit for the job, and the money was sitting in escrow now. I quickly accepted, ushered them into the Magician and quickly moved them to their destination…sometimes it is better to be lucky than good. The Dream Factory was nice so I stayed docked there, and right before taking a few days off I ordered a Kestral through the dockyards at Seizewell. I needed a REALLY fast ship for those times when it was too chancy to risk the Magician.

Assets:
1-Falcon “Falcon 1” - M3
2-Pericles Raider “Dagger 1 & 2” M4
1-Elite M4
1-Kestral “Fast Courier” M5
1-Discover “Nameless” M5
1-Magnatar “Magician” TM
1-Demeter “Trader 1” TS
1-Mercury “Trader 2” TS
1-Vulture “Trader 3” TS
1-Vulture TS
1-Toucan Hauler “Gift Horse” TP
1-Iguana TP

1,442,492 Credits

[Jonzac]

It’s obviously going to be a great few days, karma has finally broken my way, or perhaps my perseverance has finally paid off. I was searching the new sector of Patriarch Keep when I came to a Teladi station that needed 15 marines moved to Profit Center Alpha for an amazing total of 1.1 million credits. The only problem is I have no idea how far way Profit Center Alpha is, although the Teladi has programmed in the way as you enter each sector. Hopefully, it is only one sector away, but of course it sure isn’t. I enter Two Grand and the South Gate is over 100km away and there is no way that I can slowboat the Magician that far. I push the throttles up in resignation and after 40km, I jumped out of my chair and started swearing, I could jump into the Fast Courier and bring the gates into the gravitar scope and then order them to micro jump in sector. The Kestral screamed out of the hanger and I was able to easily scan the gate coordinates and feed them to the astrocomputer in the Magician. It made the jump into Profit Center Alpha and we hit the factory with two minutes to spare.

The large influx of cash opened up a lot of possibilities, but before I could really sit down and figure out a plan I was commed and offered another mission to move marines from Profit Center to Two Grand for 430,000 credits. I’m not sure what all these marines are planning to do, but I’ll be more than happy to move them for you at these prices. Once things slow down I really need to figure out what I need and want to do. Although, I do remember a message I got right when left Argon Prime, something about meeting Terrans in Omnicron Lyre. Its close by so I trundle on over there, exploring the sectors in between. I get there and comm the contact that was in the message and he points me to the Argon escort leader. I let him know that I need to get a few items to be mission ready and I hit the equipment dock to grab what I need. I finally get everything installed and head out to the escort leader and he lets me know that the Terran ambassador and her escort have jump out and I should come back another time to try again. Well crap, if it was that time sensitive then they should have said so.

Headed back into Teladi space I found a Caimen Super Freighter on sale for 92,000 credits. It’s a nice pickup as its as fast as my other smaller freighters. This is an important factor as I just was informed that my first hired trader was lost in Bala Ji to a pirate Carrack, now what he was doing in Bala Ji and why he didn’t just jump out I don’t know.

Well after scouting out most of the sectors around Scale Green Plate and I decided to get into Fast Courier and try and cross the Xenon sector 234 or whatever just South of Scale Green Plate. I kick the Kestral in the butt and swing wide around the three Qs that are on the gravitar. I easily bypass the Xenon and end up in a Teladi neighborhood, Eighteen Billion. I jump Magician over and park it in the Military Outpost while I explore the surrounding area. I managed to find an asteroid scanning gig that netted 252,425 credits in total. This is a welcome income to offset the attack of stupid my first trader got himself in.

I have noticed that there are a lot of Duke’s ships in the Teladi core sector of Ianamus Zura. Looking at the Duke’s history, I decided that I’m not in favor of “private security firms” which sounds and looks a lot like “pirate.”

I started Nameless over to TerraCorp HQ to grab a jumpdrive for the new Caimen SF. I hired a new pilot from the Teladi trading mercantile corporation for the Caiman and have him start trading in the Ore Belt…when Nameless dropped off the jumpdrive. The Ore Belt seems like a good place for him to start with the available e-cells and ore to sell, and it proved true or maybe the Teladi just make better traders than Boron.

I brought out the recently dubbed “Falcon 1” and started thinning out the Duke’s freighter stream. I go behind a Hermes and after stripping the shields convinced him not only to dump his e-cells into space but eventually he bailed out leaving me his ship, which I was able to sell to the Teladi for 261,000 credits. Just finished claiming the Hermes next to the West gate when an Elite and a Harrier jumped in, fortunately the 400MJ shielding the Falcon holds allowed me to survive the initial onslaught and snatch the Harrier out of space with the combined fire of six PRGs. I pulled two of the PRGs offline and pummeled the Elite, quickly stripping its shields. The PRG doesn’t do a whole lot of hull damage at a time so I dropped to one PRG but couldn’t convince the pirate that his life was worth more than his ship and destroyed him.

[ivak]

Good stuff so far; keep it coming.

I enter Two Grand and the South Gate is over 100km away and there is no way that I can slowboat the Magician that far. I push the throttles up in resignation and after 40km, I jumped out of my chair and started swearing, I could jump into the Fast Courier and bring the gates into the gravitar scope and then order them to micro jump in sector...

Just a small tip here: if you target a gate, highlighted by the mission (yup, just turn your ship toward it and press 't'), it will become visible on your sector map and you can jump to it instantly.

[Jonzac]

Hum. New information there that will be very useful...if I only knew that trick a couple of days ago I wouldn't have blown a 1.5M credit taxi run

[Jonzac]

I’m pissed, thoroughly and royally pissed off at myself and the Xenon. My beautiful ship Nameless was lost through a combination of my inattention and Xenon aggression. I was using it to remotely scout sectors when I sent it through the North Gate of Black Hole Sun…which happens to be a Xenon sector. I wasn’t watching it all that closely and the automatic notification didn’t even have time to kick in before the flying toasters fried my poor ship. The annoying part of this…I was just thinking about storing that ship in Argon Prime for the museum that will be built about my life after I’m rich and famous. Now that most important piece of history is lost.

Fortune however, not only takes away on one hand…but gives on the other. I found a Falcon Vanguard that I bought for 79,000 credits. After I repaired the gaping holes in the hull, it sold for 1,413,655 credits…not a bad haul. This windfall was quickly followed by a Teladi that wanted me to transport 8 people from Rolk’s Legacy to Third Redemption for a total of 1,361,000 credits. While I didn’t have the sectors mapped out yet the speed of the Kestral allowed me to surge ahead and map jump coordinates for the Magician.

Fortune again smiled as I located a Tractor Beam factory that had several in stock. I had been looking for this item as I’ve heard they can move whole factories into close proximity to each other to connect into large production complexes. Third Redemption also provided a nice 3rd or 4th hand ship, a Dolphin for only 39,000 credits. I’ll fix it up for use with my factory when I decide what to buy and where to put it.

I continued to map this new area when I found yet another desperate soul who needed me to transport some marines from Rhy’s Crusade to Rhy’s Desire, which was perhaps the easiest 1,366,276 credits I’ve ever made.

Boy, I’ll tell you what the second hand ship market out here on the fringes of space is amazing. I found a Caimen Super Freighter for 22,900 credits and a Nova Raider for 998,000 credits. The Nova is nice as it is the fast version and it can mount Ion Disruptors, which will be crucial for any boarding attempts I may make in the future. Continued to work the job market in the area of Rhy’s Desire and found several asteroid scanning missions that were a quick 171,000 and 156,000 credits in the Kestral.

Finally decided to sell the Pirate Elite that I had sitting around, didn’t really need it and the 395,000 credits I got for it certainly didn’t hurt. Followed up that ship sale with a Hermes Hauler that I had been contracted to retrieve, I’d finally found the ship but there was no way I was going to get it home in time…so I quickly sold it and pretended ignorance to the Paranid that had contracted me.

I was finally rounding the “corner” of space and approaching the scanned Paranid area of space just south of Argon Prime. I had come to the realization that I needed to cozy up to the Paranid to buy 25Mj shields. The Argon’s have a factory, but its poor management means that it always out of stock. The factory in Paranid space has stock, but they don’t like me enough to sell them to me, the cocky three-eyed snakes. So, in the interest of my pocketbook, I agreed to “guard” some stations. The guard duty was against roaming Ka’ack M’s and N’s, pretty easily actually. The time was well spent as I was also able to buy, repair and sell some second hand ships in Paranid Prime.

Went West from Empire’s Edge and discovered with the Yaki live. Now fortunately they didn’t see me as a threat when I entered Savage Spur…but the random Pirate there did. Now the weird thing was the Yaki generally get along with pirates, but not in their home territory. They quickly annihilated the pirate patrol. As I ran around scooping up missiles, an anomaly on my scanner caught my attention. I had picked up the faint power signatures of an Enhanced Pericles and when I closed on it and scanned the ship, it showed no owner…exactly the same thing as my Toucan Hauler. I quickly donned my EVA suit, moved to the ship and entered my claim code into the computer. This is a nice ship, four 5 Mj shields, PACs, good speed…I just found the lead ship for Red Wing. Christened the ship “Dagger Lead” and sent it to the Paranid equipment dock for a few more upgrads and then to Magician to meet up with the rest of Red Wing.

I moved South through the enormous amount of asteroids in Savage Spur and into Ocracone’s
Storm. I puttered my way South and was flabbergasted to see a Yaki M2 Destroyer in the sector. I thought only the five races could afford and build such a piece of machinery…apparently I was wrong. Especially, when I noticed they have their own TL class ship as well. The explanation was not long in coming when I spotted a shipyard on the scanner. Given the Yaki seem to like me, I docked there for a small rest cycle. The facilities were amazing in the shipyard, the other races might want to start thinking about the Yaki threat…sooner rather than later.

Assets:
1-Falcon “Falcon 1”
1-Nova Raider
2-Pericles Raider (Dagger 1 & 2)
1-Enhanced Pericles (Dagger Lead)
1-Kestral (Fast Courier)
1-Harrier Hauler (TSA Scanner) (designed for asteroid/sector exploration)
1-Magnatar (Magician)
1-Mercury (Trader 2)
2-Vulture (Trader 3 & 4)
1-Mercury Super Freightor (Trader 5)
1-Caiman Super Freightor (Trader 6)
1- Mercury (Trader 7)
1-Dolphin
1-Toucan Hauler (Gift Horse)
1-Iguana

2,802,221 Credits.

[Jonzac]

Paranids, good Gunner I hate Paranids. Oh, I’ll do their jobs and take their credits, but I don’t like’em and I don’t think I ever will. I did grit my teeth and took a couple of station defense missions that were pretty easy in the Nova, especially when the dumb Xenon’s programming wouldn’t retarget me until I was able to get behind them and open up with HEPT fire.

More missions in Paranid space picked up a Discoverer Hauler in Preacher’s Void and returned it to Empires’ End for 641,106 credits. Thought I had hit the jackpot when I got a ship retrieval mission to return a Falcon Hauler only one sector away from Empires’ End…of course I forgot to read the fine print, again. I had to capture the ship. Easy enough, I line up behind it strip the shields and slowly hit the ship all the while asking him to surrender. He’s complaining about losing shields when he explodes in my face, thanks to the local cops who decided to “help” me with the bad guy. I get a whopping 22,000 credits instead of the almost one million I would have gotten…thanks guys. I end up in Paranid Prime defending a station against a fearsome armada of Yaki ships that consist of one M4. After “saving “ the station the Paranid love me and I’m able to buy 25 Mj shields…and the 25Mj shield factory. AMEN, let’s get the flak out of here.

Grab a taxi mission from Paranid Prime to Cloudbase SouthWest for 310,404 credits and after I drop off my passengers I get a comm from some Paranid who wants me to bring him a “untainted” Paranid M5. He’s willing to pay the ship cost plus 701,747 credits for delivery. Well, never one to turn down good credits from complete idiots. I order the M5, jump the Magician down there to gather it up, jump back and deliver the ship. Some people/aliens have more money than sense I say.

After docking the Magician in Argon Prime’s shipyard and getting a good nights sleep, I decided to take the plunge and I ordered a 1 Mj Shield Factory that I placed in the NorthWest quadrant of Argon Prime. Its right along the trade route, about 7 km above to with a big “BUY MORE” sign. I assign my Dolphin to the station and hire a pilot to gather resources for the factory. The equipment dock is always out of them and if I buy the resources at average prices I should make about 24,000 credits per production cycle. It will take a while to break even on the investment, but I’ve come to the realization that it’s not total cash that matters, but total cash velocity. Basically, the most important thing is how FAST the money is made, not how MUCH you happen to have at any one time. That’s why even though my traders cost a minimum of 750,000 credits each, it’s more important to have them bringing in the money even if it may take 100 runs to pay for their costs the speed at which they bring in cash is as important.

I’ve decided to look into the Terran opportunity that was commed to me when I first hit the spacelanes. My traders and station could use the time to create a bit of a warchest for me and maybe I can gain access to the Terran sectors before a lot of my competitors. I tried it once before but futzed around enough that I missed the convoy escorting the Terrans.

Jumping to Omnicron Lyrae I located the Argon escort and sent my approval to join their patrol. I transferred over to the Nova and sent the Magician to the Equipment Dock for safekeeping. Following the Terran Scabbard and hearing the conversation between the Terran and Argon pilots shows that a rather unease truce exists between “brothers”. I wonder why they mistrust each other so? I would have thought the Terrans would bond well with the Argon based on race given they haven’t had a lot of alien contact. We moved the convoy North to Circle of Labour and was attacked by a pirate Buster and Harrier. I quickly destroyed the Harrier, pretty easy to do with 4 HEPTs firing at him. The Buster’s pilot decided that space was more forgiving than my HEPT fire and abandoned ship. I quickly claimed his ship and sent it to the shipyard in Omnicron Lyrae. We jumping into Heretic’s End and were halfway to the Orbital station the Terrans own there when we were jumped by an attack wing of 4 Xenon Ms. Rather easy to handle, which explains the measily 5,000 credits I received, although the 71,000 for the Buster made up for that.

I finished the mission for the Terrans and discovered that all the activity made me miss several comm calls. I had Fast Courier dropping satellites in the southern sectors and apparently it was perforated by kyon fire in Great Trench…which sucks. More importantly, my seventh trader in a Mercury was also killed in the Ore Belt in a major Ka’ack attack. I pulled up the scanning reading from my NAVSAT and there were a total of 20-30 Ka’ack fighters there, left over from two or three clusters that jumped in. The Argon’s were quick on stamping them out, but not before they decimated the local traders.

1,644,034 credits.

[Scion Drakhar]

Just read the whole thread in one go. It's always interesting to get that 'just starting' perspective again, when the whole game is potential.

Don't be too hard on the private security, though. I mean, aren't you just as bad when you're stealing their ships?

What would Chief "Jonzac" Greyson say?

[Jonzac]

*Message Log--YTMZD-40--Owner: Jon Q. Publik*


Ok, it’s been a long several days and I’ve had little time to update the ship’s log, company files and personal issues. So in an effort to lay this down I’ll layout what happened in my personal log and then transfer all the business related stuff to the company sheets later.

I had performed a quick escort mission for the Argons to the edge of Terran space and my performance against the Xenon had garnered the Terrans attention. They offered me a job to meet a Terran patrol and patrol several of their sectors. Now normally I try and avoid these jobs that require me to put myself in any amount of danger, but I wanted access to Terran space and their industry. The trade routes hadn’t been open that long and if I could get the right contacts now, I might be able to even beat most of the Teladi there for the trade routes.

I headed in the Nova with the Magician trailing, as I jumped into their sectors the first thing that struck me was the size of their damn stations. I mean their Orbital Defenses were easily five times the size of anything I’ve ever seen. While they may build big, some things never change. Apparently, one of them lost a Rapier, an M5 in Uranus 3…after the fit of laughing stopped and I apologized for the communication problems I had experienced, I took him up on the offer. Easy job really and the Rapier looks like a nice ship. In fact, all the Terran ships look mean. I gave their M7 type a passive scan and it hold five 1 Gj shields with some powerful anti-capital ship weaponry.

I got to some sector, Saturn or Neptune I think, and started the patrol. Their central defense identified an incursion one sector over and we headed that way. We hit their “orbital accelerators” and immediately saw five Xenon Ms and Ns. We started taking them on when another six jumped in…and this is why I hate these jobs. We got an emergency call about some kind of “jump beacon” they Xenon were using for a jump target. I fired a dragonfly missile at it, destroying it and that seemed to cut off their reinforcements. The Terrans mopped up the rest and I got a M and 2 Ns.

As the last of the Xenon were gone their Central Defense called over the open channel that the Xenon had hit, and deep scanned some research facility in “Mars” and they were headed toward the “Oort Cloud” and wanted my patrol to head there and stop them. We did, but the drone was fast and ahead of us. I followed it and saw it meet up next to another one of those jump beacons…and an Argon Nova, which jumped out before I got there. We had another Xenon wave in this sector and another in Neptune were we finished our patrol…which took almost a whole day to complete. I was worn out. I was given authorization to a sector called Saturn and docked at a research station there and gave them my sensor data…after carefully scrubbing it of all Commonwealth data.

The next day they asked me to fly to the Asteroid Belt, aptly named that sector is, and meet with some Major General Rai Ishiyama. Apparently, the Terrans have TWO militaries, the normal one and this ATF that focuses on Xenon specifically. Met the General and he wanted me to head to Commonwealth space and check things out. These ATF idiots actually think that the Argon military is “encouraging” the Xenon. If they had any idea about how much we’ve lost fighting the Xenon they would think that, but whatever. I really need the government contact and this Ishiyama is fairly high up in the government…I think. They even give me a free M5, one of their Rapiers, which I have to fly and pick up. Of course, after I take that soja I get commed to meet the General again and the price of that ship is laid on me.

I had to fly, without jumping since the Terrans don’t use jumpgates in their home sectors, to get that Rapier I was able to catch up on the business side of things. The pilot of my Dolphin just didn’t seem to get that I wanted him to BUY resources for the 1 MJ shield factory and he’d just sit there and tell me that everything was alright. I fired him and the next guy pointed out that my instructions to him placed all the needed factory resources on the “blacklist” which prevented him from buying them. After counting to ten and thinking dark thoughts at the first pilot, I changed the computer setting from “blacklist” to “tradable” and he headed out. I was also getting tired of constantly checking my personal wallet to see what my traders had been doing, so I gave the factory account one million credits and assigned all my traders to that station and told them to get their trade purchases approved by the station manager. This has allowed me to stabilize my account and removed their access, which makes me feel a whole lot better.


*End Log-- YTMZD-40--Owner: Jon Q. Publik*


Actually Scion, I just like to think of it as an authorized and deputized drug raid.