Fleet Carriers and YOU!
01 Nov 2023Mana Takakura
Fleet Carriers and You!Should you get a carrier? that's a question alot ask, and really it is up to the answer of another question;
What about Fleet Carriers has you interested?
They are costly, no getting around that. The more features you have active, the more upkeep costs
To get a feel for it, here's a handy calculator
[ https://cmdrs-toolbox.com/fleet-carrier-calculator ]
You can use that to see how much you will need to get started for your personal setup
What does the initial 5bil get you?
For the owner, Shipyard and Module Storage will be available from purchase
What next?
To start, you will want to activate Refueling and Repair, for those dont come standard
so for 90mil to activate those, you're at 5.09bil
OK! I have my 5.09bil! Time to Buy!
WHOOAH not so fast, don't forget to have your Upkeep costs covered too!
At this configuration, a year's upkeep will be 417mil, plus 100k credits per jump. Don't forget to have some extra so you wont have to worry about this price for a bit
And if you are looking to restock weapons, make sure to activate the Armory as well (and factor this into your upkeep)
If you are looking to make it so OTHERS can transfer and house ships, you'll need to activate the Shipyard
And if this is going to be out as an exploration rest-stop, Cartography is a big one to have on!
There are opportunities to use your FC to make money, though
Stock your shipyard with ships relevant to the area, such as at Hutton so that people with Big ships that made the journey can buy a Med or Small ship to go get their mug!
Stock up on Modules that people out on long voyages may have forgot in the bubble, like AFMU, mining gear, limpet controllers!
Stock the FC with items or ores regularly needed for engineering unlocking and set up shop near the engineer!
But what would i DO with an FC?
First, and most popular use case, is just a base of operations. I have all of my ships and modules stored on my carrier, so wherever it goes, so does all my stuff. Very handy.
Several explorers out in the black mapping unpopulated, untrafficed areas hop their FC out to the area to be their personal station. They have repair, refuel, rearm, and cartographic enabled so that they can turn in their cartography data. VERY useful!
The Taxi base is useful too. Moving out to Colonia? Shipping your ships and modules out is more expensive than buying them, but put them on your FC and jump them all out with you!
Squadron Mobile Base of Operations is my personal use case. My FC is always parked near as i can get it to the active Combat Zones that my Squadron are participating in, or nearest the Bounty Hunting spot i am active in for quick RRR
Mining Base is one of the most common uses, where you park your FC near where you are mining, and offload your ores into the FC storage, and head back out. When you are done, jump the FC to the station with the best prices for selling your ores, and ferry the cargo over for profit!
Isolation Markets are a good uses as well. This is where you stock up your ship with an active Outfitting. Have many available modules in stock and head over to near an active area, such as Crystal Shards, CGs (like the witch head nebula), or tourist destinations!
Marketing goods that arent usually sold at stations, such as meta materials, samples, etc. is another popular use of an FC. Head over to Deciat and you'll find many FCs selling Metas for near 2mil each, and people buy them, since it is convenient (no being hyperdicted, guaranteed stock, close by)
Merchant FCs park near mining areas and set up to buy the ores for under the going rate at a station, and people will take the convenience of not needing to jump their (usually low-ly-jump mining rig) far out to whatever station may be buying them for slightly more.