Shilka
Hardcore
In this topic I will post some rare trading goods routes. In general hauling rare trading goods is good for making (relatively) quick credits in the early/medium stages of the game. Once you have a large trading vessle at your disposal, rare trading goods become less interesting as you can make more credits by finding a good regular trading route.
Rare trading goods are commodities that are specific to a certain station. They are only available to buy at that certain station, and can be sold anywhere else (unless they are a banned substance at the station where you want to sell them).
Rare goods are always sparcely available, so don't be surprised a station has only a stock of 2. The maximum of rare goods stock lies around 18, be happy if you can get 10-12. If you can only buy a stock of 2, it might be a plan to wait for a few minutes to see if more comes available. However, the game looks at a certain threshold for that rare trading good in your inventory, reach this threshold and no new goods will come available. This number, as well as the maximum stock is different per rare trading good, so usually if you manage to buy a stock of 5+ it's wise to move on immediately.
The selling price of rare goods increases with distance from the station where you bought them, in general they are best sold 130-160 lighyears from it's origin. Selling them at shorter distance will yield much less profit, selling them further away won't increase price much further anymore. Usually a profit per ton of 12,000 - 15,000 credits is what you're looking for as a selling point.
If a rare good is banned at the station where you try to sell it (it won't show up in the commodities market screen), you can still sell it at the black market (provided there is one). Entering a station with rare trading goods that are within a banned goods range for that station (for example drugs) will never get you a fine/wanted status.
Keep in mind that proceedings can vary wildly, especially on shorter routes. I you have 5 stations in a row that only have 2 goods in stock you'll abviously make much less money then when they all have 10+ stocks.
You'll be hauling long distances, so make sure you have a maximum sized fuel tank. Also buy the best frameshift drive you can afford to minimize the amount of jumps you'll have to make inbetween stations, and make sure your electrical systems match to prevent overheating from making repeated FSD jumps. You can opt for (temporarily) stripping your ship of unnecesary weight, but I'd advise to keep your shields because hauling rare trade goods will make you an interesting target for pirates, both NPC and human.
When setting up a route to the next station in the galaxy map, make sure to set up the routefinder to use fastest route, not economical, or it will take you way too much time to travel. Only use economical routing if you can't make it on your fueltank, but even then it's better to use fastest route, and study the galaxy map to note a fuel stop en route.
Buying prices of rare trade goods vary from a few hundred to well over 8,000 credits per ton, so make sure to have enough money to initiate the trade run (and always leave enough spare to cover your insurance costs at all times of course)
At a station listed, buy any rare trade goods available. They will be highlighted in a lighter orange/yellow color in the commodities market list. Check if any of the tradegoods you already have aboard have reached the advised selling point (profit per ton). I will post this advised selling point for each trade route. Sell when applicable. Then use the galaxy map to plot a route to the next station in the list.
At the end of each trade route you'll always have some rare trade commodities left that haven't reach the advised selling point yet. You then have 4 options:
Note that for some income on the side, if you have a discovery scanner, you can easily do system scans on route inbetween stations on the fly to have some extra generated income from exploration, and if you have the time you can also check for valuable planets/stars to do a detailed scan. Though exploration doesn't pay as much per hour as trading, it can be a welcoming change of pace at times, and you'll be passing heaps of unknown systems on the way anyway.
Posted rare trading goods routes will always follow the following manner of listing:
System name (distance to this system from the previous system in lightyears) - Station name (distance from system entry point to station in lightseconds)
I won't bother with posting the names of all the rare goods, you'll always have to buy the only rare commodity listed that is on stock, usually, but not always, it will have the system name in it's name (like in the Vega system you can buy Vega Slimweed)
Any further recommendations I will post per route that I post
What are rare trading goods?:
Rare trading goods are commodities that are specific to a certain station. They are only available to buy at that certain station, and can be sold anywhere else (unless they are a banned substance at the station where you want to sell them).
Rare goods are always sparcely available, so don't be surprised a station has only a stock of 2. The maximum of rare goods stock lies around 18, be happy if you can get 10-12. If you can only buy a stock of 2, it might be a plan to wait for a few minutes to see if more comes available. However, the game looks at a certain threshold for that rare trading good in your inventory, reach this threshold and no new goods will come available. This number, as well as the maximum stock is different per rare trading good, so usually if you manage to buy a stock of 5+ it's wise to move on immediately.
The selling price of rare goods increases with distance from the station where you bought them, in general they are best sold 130-160 lighyears from it's origin. Selling them at shorter distance will yield much less profit, selling them further away won't increase price much further anymore. Usually a profit per ton of 12,000 - 15,000 credits is what you're looking for as a selling point.
If a rare good is banned at the station where you try to sell it (it won't show up in the commodities market screen), you can still sell it at the black market (provided there is one). Entering a station with rare trading goods that are within a banned goods range for that station (for example drugs) will never get you a fine/wanted status.
Keep in mind that proceedings can vary wildly, especially on shorter routes. I you have 5 stations in a row that only have 2 goods in stock you'll abviously make much less money then when they all have 10+ stocks.
General recommendations for hauling rare goods:
You'll be hauling long distances, so make sure you have a maximum sized fuel tank. Also buy the best frameshift drive you can afford to minimize the amount of jumps you'll have to make inbetween stations, and make sure your electrical systems match to prevent overheating from making repeated FSD jumps. You can opt for (temporarily) stripping your ship of unnecesary weight, but I'd advise to keep your shields because hauling rare trade goods will make you an interesting target for pirates, both NPC and human.
When setting up a route to the next station in the galaxy map, make sure to set up the routefinder to use fastest route, not economical, or it will take you way too much time to travel. Only use economical routing if you can't make it on your fueltank, but even then it's better to use fastest route, and study the galaxy map to note a fuel stop en route.
Buying prices of rare trade goods vary from a few hundred to well over 8,000 credits per ton, so make sure to have enough money to initiate the trade run (and always leave enough spare to cover your insurance costs at all times of course)
General instructions for using the posted trade routes:
At a station listed, buy any rare trade goods available. They will be highlighted in a lighter orange/yellow color in the commodities market list. Check if any of the tradegoods you already have aboard have reached the advised selling point (profit per ton). I will post this advised selling point for each trade route. Sell when applicable. Then use the galaxy map to plot a route to the next station in the list.
At the end of each trade route you'll always have some rare trade commodities left that haven't reach the advised selling point yet. You then have 4 options:
- Sell them at the end point at reduced profit
- Travel to your 'homebase'/preferred system and sell them there, in particular at a station with a faction that you want to improve your standing with
- Travel to a random system a couple hundred lightyears away to sell at maximum profit
- Start doing the traderoute in reversed order and sell at adviced selling point
Note that for some income on the side, if you have a discovery scanner, you can easily do system scans on route inbetween stations on the fly to have some extra generated income from exploration, and if you have the time you can also check for valuable planets/stars to do a detailed scan. Though exploration doesn't pay as much per hour as trading, it can be a welcoming change of pace at times, and you'll be passing heaps of unknown systems on the way anyway.
Posted rare trading goods routes will always follow the following manner of listing:
System name (distance to this system from the previous system in lightyears) - Station name (distance from system entry point to station in lightseconds)
I won't bother with posting the names of all the rare goods, you'll always have to buy the only rare commodity listed that is on stock, usually, but not always, it will have the system name in it's name (like in the Vega system you can buy Vega Slimweed)
Any further recommendations I will post per route that I post
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