Welcome to the Advanced Pilot Guide!
After beginning your pilot career, you have surely progressed and bought new modules & ships in order to push your ambitions further!
It is time to optimize your adventure in order to improve your pilot’s skills.
To Begin
If it’s the first time you play Elite: Dangerous, don’t skip any step and read the Beginner Pilot – Guide.
When you start, your Sidewinder allows you to take control of your ship and understand the missions mechanics.
It will take you several hours before you can collect enough credits to buy another ship: Generally a Hauler if you are focused on exploration and trading, an Eagle if combat is your thing, or an Adder for its versatility.
Once you have one of these well equipped ships, it will surely be time to leave your secured and cozy systems in order to continue earning your credits.
Forward, to the stars!
Then, Commanders… It’s your turn to write your story in Elite: Dangerous!
You could bea…
- Fighter, Mercenary, Assassin, Bounty Hunter or even a Guardian protecting your systems;
- Pirate;
- Explorer short range, long range, surface;
- Miner;
- Trader, Smuggler, Courier;
- Space taxi with tourists and passengers ;
- Anti-Xeno Fighter;
- Play as you like, whenever you want, wherever you want, whatever you want, or create your own emergent gameplay! For example the Fuel Rats (Refueling), Medicorp (Rescue & Research), or even Iridium Wing (Escorts). These are groups that respectively refuel other players, save the lives of the pilots in escape pods and escort the explorers to safe lands, …
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Have a look at our Menu, its different options and the Toolbox!
To Progress
Now that you understand the basics of the game and own a better ship, it is time to set your next objectives and make some progress in-game!
More Credits
The only true currency in-game is Time: how much credits can you generate in 1 hour of time?
To buy your ships, modules, pay your fines, buy goods to resell them at a better price elsewhere and other expenses: credits are very important for your progress inElite: Dangerous.
I’m going to be direct, even if all activities reward you with credits, only a few playstyles are very rewarding in terms of credits.
Here are the best playstyles to make credits:
- Mining
- Go to the system Hyades Sector DB-X d1-112, Planet 2 Ring A, it has a ring of icy asteroids with three zones of diamonds superimposed. Go to the center of the three zones and mine everything around with just your prepared equipment and Mining Laser. – IMAGE
- If you have a Fleet Carrier, go farther, to the Pipe (bowl) Sector GG-Y c2 system, planet 1 Ring A for Painite – IMAGE
- If you’re looking for Tritium, WREGOE DJ-X C28-19, planet 6.
- Bounty Hunting
- Dangerous Resource Extraction Sites with the lowest possible Security and the highest possible Population. You have to play with a large ship (like an Anaconda) in order to get the biggest rewards.
- Use the filters in-game, or EDDB with the following parameters: Rings? Yes / Populated? Yes.
- Trading
- ABA Trade Routes Round Trips. Locations vary, for example if you are affiliated with Edmund Mahon of the Alliance, your profits usually have a 20% bonus. Or go to the Empire to trade Imperial Slaves.
- Use the filters in-game, or EDDB with the default parameters.
- Exploration
- Road to Riches with your own Start & End systems, or the Road to Riches presented in these List 1 and List 2 to make the most credits out of it.
Increase your Jump Range
There’s no other ways, if you want to progress in Elite: Dangerous, you have to increase your Jump Range by Modding your FSD Drives.
The first thing to do is to visit the first Engineer available: Felicity Farseer, system Deciat.
To unlock her workshop, you will need to provide her with 1 Unit of Meta-Alloy.
To do this:
- Rendez-vous in the Pleiades, around 380LY from the bubble of Sol, system Maia.
- Here, look for the planetary base “Darnielle’s Progress”. This is the only place where you can buy Meta-Alloy… however, this item is uncommon these days and the market mlight be empty.
You have to find an active Thargoids Barnacles site. - Rendez-vous in the system Pleiades Sector GH-L b8-0, and look at your left hand panel, Navigation, then head toward the Barnacles site.
You will get its location, so head down on the surface and gather your chunk of Meta-Alloy on one of the peak coming out of the ground.
You could also visit HIP 14909, a Thargoid Structure, to gather a Meta-Alloy. - Bring it back to Felicity, Deciat. Careful in Open, this is a Players Killers’s lair.
- Congrats, you have unlocked her Workshop and you can start modding your ship, here we want to mod the FSD Drive.
- You will need to increase your reputation with Felicity to craft better and higher ranks mods.
- To do this, craft multiple Rank I mods, even if it’s several times the same.
- Or sell her Exploration Data
- The mod FSD Drive “Increased Range” is our choice here, and you will need Materials.
- Materials are items you collect (they are not stored in your cargo and you won’t loose them if you die) in unknown signals, near points of interests, after you destroyed a ship, by scanning FSD low and high wakes, … so get a shopping list and check your tab “Materials” on your right hand panel, to understand where and how to collect Materials, or click the link.
- It’s your turn now!
Cutter and Corvette
Remember, bigger doesn’t necessarily mean better. But I’m not here to lecture you and tell you to choose an Anaconda.
The flagship of the Imperial fleet (Cutter) and the best of Core Dynamics Federal (Corvette) come at a great farming price.
- Buy an iCutter
- With a Python or similar, process a maximum of Data missions (sensible data and items) for the Imperial factions between the systems Mainani and Ngalinn. Be careful, for the most of them you must not be scanned by the police in order to complete the missions objectives // With an Anaconda or similar, process a maximum of Passengers Transport missions in the Imperial systems attacked by Thargoids in order to extract the survivors, though there are no missions at the moment.
- Don’t forget to do your Rank Up missions in between, doable on Imperial stations (the controlling faction, owning the station, must be affiliated with the Empire).
- Once you’ve reached the Rank of Duke, you have unlocked the Cutter.
- Outsider → Serf → Master (Imperial Courier) → Squire (ACHENAR) → Knight → Lord → Baron (Clipper, SUMMERLAND) → Viscount → Count → Earl (FACECE) → Marquis → Duke (Cutter) → Prince → King
- You will then need 208,968,450 Cr to buy a Cutter.
- Buy a fCorvette
- With a Python or similar, process a maximum of Data missions (sensible data and items) for the Federal factions between the systems Ceos and Sothis. Be careful, for the most of them you must not be scanned by the police in order to complete the missions objectives // With an Anaconda or similar, process a maximum of Passengers Transport missions in the Federal systems attacked by Thargoids in order to extract the survivors, though there are no missions at the moment.
- Don’t forget to do your Rank Up missions in between, doable on Federal stations (the controlling faction, owning the station, must be affiliated with the Federation).
- Once you’ve reached the Rank of Rear Admiral, you have unlocked the Corvette.
- Recruit→ Cadet → Midshipman (Dropship) → Petty Officer (SOL) → Chief Petty Officer (Federal Assault, VEGA & BETA HYDRI) → Warrant Officer (PLX 695) → Ensign (Gunship, ROSS 128) → Lieutenant (EXBEUR) → Lieutenant Commander → Post Commander (HORS) → Post Captain → Rear Admiral (Corvette) → Vice Amiral → Amiral
- You will then need 187,968,450 Cr to buy a Corvette.
Anti-Xeno Ship
To fight against the Thargoids, you will need special technologies from an ancient civilisation: The Guardians.
► Nothing complicated, I’ve prepared everything for you, farming sheets on a dedicated article: Tech Brokers.
► Then, read or AX Combat Guide.
The Tech Brokers sell Guardians technologies for materials that you can collect on Guardians Structures.
To Optimize
Once you have a nice sum of credits as well as several specialized ships, it’s time to optimize everything with the Engineers.
These Engineers are important characters offering diverse enhancements, called Mods, to all your ships modules.
Each of these Engineers offer different Mods and there are different ways to unlock them.
For example, Felicity Farseer is known to all pilots and you only need to bring her 1 unit of Meta-Alloy in order to gain access to her Workshop.
For other Engineers, you might first need to grind to a certain reputation with another engineer, reach a rank of Merchant in Trading, earn your reputation with a given faction or other requests to meet in order to receive an invitation. You will then have a small quest to do where the Engineer asks you to do complete this or that, reach a rank or bring a special item. This done, you unlock access to the Workshop and can start modding the modules according to the Engineer’s specialization.
You will need a large number of Materials to Mod your Modules.
Some additional support:
- MCC 686 11 b a Geological site (Selenium), site 1 to 10 advised
- OUTOTZ LS-K D8-3 B 5 A Biological site (Ytrium) 150 in 20 minutes
- OUTOTZ LS-K D8-3 B 5 C Biological site (Antimony) 150 in 20 minutes
- OUTOTZ LS-K D8-3 B 7 B Biological site (Ruthenium) 150 in 20 minutes
- HIP36601 C 1 A Biological site (Polonium) 150 in 20 minutes
- HIP36601 C 3 B Biological site (Tellurium) 150 in 20 minutes
- HIP36601 C 5 A Biological site (Technetium) 150 in 30 minutes
- The bug killer: HIP 16613 (planet 1 A) => Raw + Encoded
- Dave’s Hope: HYADES SECTOR DR-V C2-23 (planet A 5) => Manufactured + Encoded
- Jameson crash site: HIP 12099 (planet 1 B) => Encoded
Remember, you can use the Materials Trader, visible via the Services filter in the galaxy map.
Farm the higher ranks materials and then exchange them for lower ranks materials.
