Just to be clear, I haven't entirely run Halthor yet. I've gone a few times, and am still in the process of figuring everything out.

But I did run it yesterday. Got a blade and a battery, got some B grade stealth components and generally had a good time.

I haven't done everything in the game yet. I haven't run the contested zones in Pyro, or done the Vanduul smugglers missions. I haven't finished Project Hyperion or done the Vlaakar farm (although I am ON Project Hyperion and the Vlaakar Farm, I just haven't started them, I've completed missions 1-7). I haven't killed the giant Apex Vlaakar either. But I've been dabbling.

And thus far, I think Halthor is some of my favorite content. Its the right mix of PVE/PVP, has an interesting goal, and a valuable reward. Its peak Star Citizen (so far).

I am often critical of the game, and that's because I'm honest with myself. The game is a buggy pile of shit right now - it just is. It deserves its metacritic score of 2.9 - if anything the score should be lower. I am also flabbergasted at how its this bad after 14 years of development and a billion dollars in backer money. That's all true. I will continue to harp on that.

But I think its also worthwhile to point out what the good parts are, for other people that want to dive into this shitpile and see what all the fuss is about.

Halthor is fun. Its scary, its rewarding, its good content.

If you haven't tried it yet, and you've already bought the game, then you should try it.

If I melt my f8c, to buy other ships and melt those, so I'll have them, incase later on I want to buy them while not on sale. Will I be able to just buy the F8c from the store again while it is still on sale, or will I only be able to use the buyback token to get it again?

Kind of hard to find info, since in the past you needed the golden ticket.

I know I know, this one is going to piss a lot of people off, but read the whole post. I'm right on this, because I've seen it happen before.

Atlas

I often mention Grapeshot's 2018 masterpiece "Atlas" in conversations about Star Citizen, because its the most Star Citizen like game that's ever been made.

How similar was it? Atlas had:

• Ship combat
• PVP
• Multicrew ships
• Ships (well, land vehicles really) in ships
• Turret gunners
• Multiple non-combat stations to man on ships
• NPC crew
• FPS missions
• Deep PVE content, boss battles
• Base building
• Resource collection
• A strange kind of "server meshing", where maps were stitched together, although they used brief loading screens (which wasn't a big deal) when you transitions from server to server.

So, it was very similar. Did I mention it was a ships and seas game instead of a space sim?

Anyway, I want to focus in on the parts that are most relevant for multicrew. It, had, multicrew.

It had multicrew. Using a large ship, when the game launched, required having several people perform roles cooperatively. You had a person in charge of the rudder manning a navigator's wheel. You had at least one person on each sail. You had one person on each cannon or gun turret. It was a game that featured multicrew ships.

And it sucked.

Just like Star Citizen's multicrew sucks.

Turret gunning in Atlas was no different from Turret gunning in Star Citizen. It was terrible. It was boring as hell - you had nothing to do at all - until you got into a fight. When you got into a fight, you'd be able to fire if and only if you were lucky enough to have an enemy in your field of view, which wasn't very often (its worse with Star Citizen, since its 3D instead of 2D, you really struggle to find targets.

You go on long voyages and you man these stations where you don't do shit for 99.9% of the time you're on the ship. Its the world's most boring job. Then you get a brief 5-10 minute bit of action, and then everything is boring again.

So, Atlas, when it launched, was a lot like Star Citizen is now.

But then Atlas did something that Star Citizen hasn't done yet. Atlas... released... NPC crew.

And on my god, did it change EVERYTHING.

Ships like the Brigantine, which previously required no less than 12 living breathing people to crew, all doing incredibly boring things... suddenly became operable by just one person.

So you can guess what happened next right? Everyone loves multicrew, so everyone kept running 12 men to a boat, and no one ever used NPC crew.

=D Of course that didn't happen.

The opposite happeed. No one ever fully manned a Brigantine ever again. After NPC crew dropped, and people realized they could go off and have their own adventures, and didn't have to serve their Captains in order to sail at all... they dropped "crew life" cold. Everyone ran their owns ships.

A guild which would previously all man the same Brigantine, would instead field a whole damn fleet of Brigantines (really they'd field a wide variety of ships, but that's beside the point). NPC crew changed the game in a very positive way.

And the point of this story, is that THE SAME THING WILL HAPPEN WITH STAR CITIZEN.

Multicrew was always a dumb idea. Handing people boring trivial shit to do in order to run a ship is not a fun experience. CIG knows this too, its why they fell flat so hard with the box stacking mechanics on the Reclaimer. That is a job meant for NPC crew. That's not a serious gameplay loop, its not something they expect to be interesting and engaging content that's going to keep people playing their game rather than say GTA6. They know it sucks, its not there for you to do, its there for an NPC to do.

They just haven't finished the NPCs yet.

Now some of you, many of you... hell who am I kidding, I know this reddit - Most of you will get the wrong idea about this.

You'll shake an angry fist at your screen and tell me that you love being a turret gunner and that multicrew is awesome. You'll pretend that playing with your friends in multiple ships rather than a single ship isn't playing with your friends at all. You'll act like I'm giving you bad news, like I just shot your dog.

But this is good news, because it means that if the game does survive, and CIG somehow works through the dumpsterfire of bugs, and they somehow either cut content or use AI to finish the game before UE6 makes the entire project obsolete... then the game will be a much better game than it is now.

Because if you ask any Atlas player if the game improved after they added NPC crew, they're going to tell you "FUCK YES it did".

Multicrew gameplay was always a shitty idea, and it deserves to die. NPC crew will kill it, if they ever manage to actually add it to the game.

I’ve tried getting into Star Citizen around 8 different times now, and every single session ends the same way.

When I first log in, my FPS is already terrible. Sometimes I can barely move. If I eventually manage to get into my ship and leave the city, I’m sitting around 20 FPS.
Then I’ll quantum travel to a bounty location, but as soon as I arrive, my ship completely stops responding. I can’t steer, throttle, or do anything. The only option is to backspace.
After that, I get stuck on an infinite loading screen. I have to Alt+F4, relaunch the game, and when I finally get back in, I’m in the Lorville medical bay with around 5 FPS. At that point I just quit because it’s completely unplayable.
I really love the idea of this game and I want to get into it, but I’ve genuinely spent more time fighting bugs and performance than actually playing.

My PC:
RTX 3070 Ti
AMD Ryzen 7 7700X
32 GB RAM
Game installed on an SSD

Can someone please tell me the best settings and optimizations I should use? I’m looking for:
Graphics settings (quality, clouds, DLSS, etc.)
NVIDIA Control Panel settings
Windows settings
Any Star Citizen config tweaks

Anything else that could help with FPS or stability
I’m honestly willing to try anything at this point because I really want to enjoy this game.

So Xenothreat is out, and I'm working on the grind for the shields, and I've been doing Gilly missions between Xenothreat missions, so I'm siting on a big chuck of aUEC.

So I have to make a choice.

I want a heavy fighter for use in PVE, specifically geared to kill Hammerheads. I have a Meteor, but find that its a bit too squishy for my tastes/skill level when it comes to farming Hammerheads. I can do it, but its not comfotable, and it takes forever.

So I want to upgrade to something that deals a bit less damage, but can brawl for longer.

I see three choices:

• Guardian MX
• Guardian
• Sentinel

I do not know which to pick.

The Sentinel I actually have used, although its been years. I remember liking it, I do not remember it being a hammerhead killer, but perhaps things have changed.

The MX seems to be the gold standard S tier PVE heavy fighter recommendation before the armor changes went in and the obscenely OP m80 dropped. Every video I watch, every thread recommends the MX over the base guardian. Shields + Extra firepower trump larger guns and agility everyone says.

The big question, is "Is that true in a post 4.8 world?".

Are four size 4s still better than 2 size 5s?

Are four size 4 deadbolts better than 2 size 5 Leonids, which I understand are better than Deadbolts? I could pull the Leonids off my Meteor, and put them on the Guardian, and see how that runs right?

The the extra shield really worth the lost maneuverability?

I'd have already pulled the trigger on the base guardian, but it seems that every source I find says that the MX is better. Is that true? Is it still better for 4.8?

Comment pensez-vous que sera la version 1.0 de Star Citizen ?
Je me pose souvent la question, notamment par rapport aux vaisseaux et à l’argent que certains joueurs ont investi dans le jeu.
Pensez-vous qu’à la sortie de la 1.0, les joueurs qui ont acheté des vaisseaux avec de l’argent réel auront simplement un avantage au départ, mais qu’avec le temps les joueurs qui n’ont rien acheté finiront par les rattraper ? Dans ce cas, l’argent investi aujourd’hui ne servirait peut-être plus vraiment à long terme.
Ou pensez-vous que CIG prévoit un autre système ?
Personnellement, j’imagine quelque chose comme ça : à la sortie de la 1.0, tout le monde commencerait avec son vaisseau starter obtenu en achetant le jeu, tandis que ceux qui ont acheté d’autres vaisseaux avec de l’argent réel les conserveraient également.
Ensuite, tous les autres vaisseaux devraient être fabriqués grâce au système de craft, en récoltant des matériaux et les ressources nécessaires. Si un vaisseau crafté est détruit, que ce soit lors d’un crash ou d’une autre situation, il disparaîtrait définitivement et il faudrait recommencer tout le processus de fabrication en récupérant de nouveaux matériaux.
L’avantage des joueurs ayant acheté leurs vaisseaux avec de l’argent réel serait alors leur assurance à vie : même si leur vaisseau est détruit, ils pourraient le récupérer sans avoir à le recrafter. Ce serait particulièrement intéressant pour les très gros vaisseaux, qui demanderaient énormément de ressources et de temps à fabriquer.
Que pensez-vous de cette idée ? Est-ce que CIG a déjà parlé d’un système similaire, ou bien ont-ils donné des informations sur le fonctionnement prévu pour la 1.0

I got to explore Halthor with a friend. The ground sites.

We park 3 kms out, and drive in using an Ursa.

We get there, immediately we find a stealth power core, and two Military grade C shields. Not great, not terrible.

I go exploring.

I do some parkour, and get on top of a large crate. There's a box there, and two small shapes beside the box. I see that I can interact with them.

I pick up a smoothie.

I think, "why not?", and take off my helmet.

I realize immediately that CIG fucked me. The smoothie was a trap.

My character starts dying. I put my helmet back on, doesn't work. I pull out an Oxy pen, that must work in these situations right? Doesn't work.
I jump off the box, and start sprinting towards the rover, but I never even get close, I die.

The Antium Helmet is crafted, using very high tier resources. Its my second one, I lost another one in another "star citizen" incident. I'm furious. I have to go to pyro to make these, and the supply of really good materials is quite low. I hate mining.

I drive the Ursa around the building I'm checking to find the helmet. I go to get out and get it, and start dying immediately. Oh yeah, no helmet can't go outside. I run back into the Ursa, and realize I"m still dying. I jump in the bed, and it heals me a bit, but I'm still dying. I realize that the Ursa is off, so the life support is off... and run and turn it on.

Now i'm okay, but stuck in the Ursa.

My buddy brings me a helmet. Its not the helmet I need - not the expensive crafted Antium helmet, but I'll take it.

He goes to eat. I go out to find the helment.

I find it, - lucky me - but now I have a problem. I can't swap helmets. I have a helmet on, and I need to ditch that helmet and put on the good helmet.

As I'm trying to figure this out, a respawn shows up, and shoots me in the face. I die again.

I've now died twice, I know that the Ursa will run out of Medgel soon. I need to be very careful.

I run back out (the helmet my friend's gave me was on when I died, so it respawned with me), clear the mobs, and again try to get the helmet. It was in my hand when I died.

I try to position myself such that the "F" interact key is available. Its a pain in the ass, because that is just buggy as fuck.

While trying to position myself to loot the corpse, my character fell through the ground into the center of the planet. This is not something you can recover from.

That's three deaths. The Ursa is out of medgel, the helmet is lost.

Star Citizen.

EDIT: I HAVE THE HELMET, IT WAS ATTACHED TO MY BELT, IT WAS SAVED!

Given the apparent/assumed release this year, would it be worth getting a hosas set for the game?

Was considering to get a vkb set this black Friday.

Let's talk about the Xenothreat misisons. We had a few things we wanted to do.

1. Could we take a colossus bomb and throw it into the Idris
2. Board the Idris and loot the ORC-MX shoulders
3. Possibly loot the gun off the Idris
4. Finally get a hot drop into the hangar

We were able to do all of the above.

The Colossus Bomb
--------------------------------------------------
The first step of our plan, we would have our boys bring a few colossus bombs, they would take those bombs, and they would fly that straight into the idris, this could create the biggest explosion that the UEE has ever seen. It did not go as planned. The Cutlass was blasted back when he hit the idris, no explosion. That's when Tom, the hero, the king that was promised, decided he would ride the bomb and deliver it to the Idris. A true Johnny Silverhand moment. A true bomb factory.
It's a bomb factory... they're bombs

Boarding the Idris
--------------------------------------------------
The Idris driven by the Xenothreat holds the latest tech for Quantum Boosting^(TM) and can "jump" away from a problem. Did that stop us? NO. Why? APE TOGETHER STRONG^(TM)
The Tyilui is a dream for hot dropping. It took a few very scary scrapes to get onboard, but when we did. It was time to show out. I had done about 4 and was not able to get a successful board, but finally we did it. I had 5 novian crossbolts and a dream. That's all I needed. I stabbed a few guys, I made it to the bridge. We found the boss. Surrounded by some of the nastiest Xenothreats in the verse. It was my time to shine. The Mission was Accomplished,

The Spoils of War
--------------------------------------------------

We looted all the best, so many men taken to the polaris. So many naked men on the polaris. The Butcher Helmet. All everyone wants to talk about is the loot, the armor. I would say the best thing I got from this mission, was the memories we made along the way.

And The Butcher Helmet

First, Amenities

I watch ship reviews all the time, and people - everyone it seems - still acts like amenities are important.

So your ship has a shitter/shower. So your ship has a wine rack, or food storage, or a table. How about that pool table and chessboard?

None of that shit works. None of it works, and I've been following this game since 2016. Not only does that shit not work, but CIG would be crazy to devote development time to it given the state of the game, and how ambitious the project is in general.

Amenities should be cut. They should be ruthlessly cut.

We aren't at dog food stage yet, the game isn't really playable after 14 years of development and a billion dollars. Whether your ship has a desk should be irrelevant. You ain't gonna use it.

That pool on the 890 jump? Useless garbage.

And yet whenever I watch a ship review, people take that shit seriously.

Every review should just be honest.

Here's a bunch of wasted space on the ship which will likely never see a use in game.

When you watch a Starfarer review, and they get to the pool table room, the reviewer should be like:

"Here's a large wasted area of the ship where CIG decided to create the impression that they're going to actually bother making this shit work."

Its roleplay garbage. Treat it as roleplay garbage.

Hell, I'll go one step further.

If they spend ONE SECOND, fucking around with the functionality of the shitter/shower, then that's one development second too fucking many. The game is broken as fuck. The game's amibitious goals are five or ten years away on a game that's taken 14 years to get this far.

No ship should have a shitter shower, or kitchenette, or quiet Captains Office. No ship should have any of that, becuase none of it is gameplay relevant, and if CIG has any sense at all, none of it ever will be gameplay relevant.

This game is woefully in need of cutting content. Having you smell like ass when you enter a station is content that needs to be cut. That's the #1 thing the game needs to cut.

And taking a shit on your spaceship is the #2 thing the game needs to cut.

Secondly, Ship manufacturers.

"I really like the RSI asthetics"

No you don't. No you don't. RSI is made up bullshit. You like CIG's aesthetics. RSI was never real, MISC was never real. Drake was never real.

I fly a CIG Meteor, and a CIG Shiv and a CIG Hornet, and a CIG 100i. That's what I fly.

And its what you fly too.

Recently decided to try Hauling, bought a hauling ship, tried it out.

It seems impossible. Impossible and insane to even try.

Nearly every time I've tried to offload cargo, I wind up with a freight elevator bug. Nearly every time. Out of maybe 5 attempts, I've successfully managed to deliver cargo like once.

How can it be this bad?

I used to know players that did nothing but hauling. Hauling seems to be one of the more popular loops in the game, after ship combat missions and mining. I knew there would be bugs, but this is just fucking crazy.

Are there workarounds that everyone knows that I just don't know? I tried to change servers when I hit a freight elevator bug. I flew up a few hundred feet, and logged to menu, then came back in, and my cargo was gone and I was at the wrong station, and the missions were gone.

WTF?

Never done a Xenothreat before, anyone have a guide, any information, any hints as to how one would take advantage of whatever this thing is?

We all have different game loops we like to play, and game loops we avoid. I've been playing a very short while. I like hauling, and want to get into mining and mercenary. I don't like the collect missions (e.g., Kill the Maroks), and I've no interest in piracy game play.

I see people steamed about bugs, but so far I haven't encountered many at all. I am wondering if certain game loops have more of the bugs than others. Have any of you ever collected a rough analysis of the number of bugs broken out by game play loop?

Looking at games like X4, Eve especially, but to some extend Elite Dangerous compared to SC, there is a very significant time difference to achieve economic impact. That’s probably a gross understatement, SC time cost for any economic impact is profound.

For example, in eve, I can trade across 8 stations in 30 minutes. In star citizen, im lucky if I even get to my ship in my hanger in 30 minutes. Nevermind loading and unloading cargo.

In x4, the players impact on the economy is non-existent at first, but after having a few haulers it grows, and obviously after creating a corporation it is much larger. This scales a bit for eve by multi-boxing. In both of these cases, having a broader economic impact is possible because we aren’t micromanaging every little thing our space crafts do.

With star citizen, assuming a player population of 20 or 30k, and with the insane time cost to do anything, there isn’t a real economy to establish the game on over the the space that is planned for it to occupy. It’s maybe possible with a hundred thousands of players, but that isn’t sustainable imo.

What is the end game economy here? I don’t see anything good with the time cost of doing anything in combination with the player counts we are seeing.

Out of all the news regarding Star Citizen, the Squadron 42 news is the scariest.

Is Star Citizen a scam?

That, is a hard question to answer, if you're really honest with yourself.

Because there's a lot in the game that points to "Yes".

14 years into the game's development, and the game is buggy as shit. If you merely suggest that the game be less buggy, you'll get confronted with a chorus of fans (or bots) that will shout you down and insult you. We've been trained to accept this. We've been trained to believe that the shit show you play through every day is somehow necessary.

There is no game released as a game as a service that I am aware of, that's been playable for as long as Star Citizen, and is in as bad shape as the PU currently is. I played Rust when they restarted Rust. RESTARTED, Rust. They took their existing game, and said "this ain't gonna work, we're gonna rebuild the whole thing", and restarted Rust from scratch. it was playable like 6-8 months after they started it. Early Rust was - very quickly - less buggy than Star Citizen, and the bugs tended to be less critical, within about a year of them starting that project.

14 years

Even worse, the bugs tend to be persistent. I left this game about 3 years ago, and I only came back to it recently, and the bugs that I remember are all still here. Its all the same bugs. What I expected, was to come back and there would be significant additions to the game. I expected the game to generally run pretty smoothly compared to what I was used to. I expected there to be new content, and bugs in the new content, but the old bugs I knew, I expected them to mostly be gone.

They aren't gone. They're thriving.

Very little change in the general playability of the game between 3.18 when I left, and 4.8, when I came back. More content sure, and good content - credit where credit is due - but little improvement in the general playability of the game.

14 years

I run a guild in Albion Online, and one of the guys in that guild asked me about Star Citizen recently, so I streamed my play session. He watched me do the things that we all love about Star Citizen, like seamlessly transition from a planet into space and back again. He watched me run some simple bunker missions, saw the ships in ships features, saw the FPS combat.

He wasn't impressed, because he also saw all the bugs.

He saw when navigation just wasn't working. He saw when my pulse flipped over and I had to very carefully drive with it skidding against the floor to keep from being ejected into the center of the planet. He watched, and he wasn't impressed.

And he asked me a reasonable question.

He asked "So, when they patch this game, the patches are all bug fixes right? Every patch, they must be spending all their time fixing all these bugs".

And I had to tell him no. No, the patches aren't about fixing bugs. There is some bug fixing, but the patches are mostly about adding new content. The bugs tend to persist over the course of years.

He thinks I'm insane for playing this.

14 years

This is not how development happens for any other game I can think of that is also a live service that is open to the public. I honestly don't think there's ever been as buggy a game that was played by so many. I used to think Bethesda games were buggy. Bethesda games run smoothly compared to Star Citizen.

14 years

But... as bad as all that is, Squadron 42... that says far worse about CIG and about this project.

Squadron 42

Originally said to release in 2016 - literally a decade ago - Squadron 42 is still vaporware.

Unlike the PU, Squadron 42 has none of the excuses that people use to defend the PU.

• Squadron 42 is single player, so no networking, server meshing, PES... development is vastly simplified for it.
• Squadron 42 shares assets with the PU, using the same fucking engine. The two games share assets. This should dramatically shorten the development time for Squadron 42.
• CIG has claimed that its prioritizing Squadron 42 over the PU for years now. That's the project getting the bulk of the work, and its still... just whispers and a few YouTube videos.

Squadron 42 looks like a failed project to me. It will release, at best, 11 years after its initial release target. Except, I very much question if it will ever release.

The problem with releasing Squadron 42

If Squadron 42 is a hit, then CIG will have shipped their first hit game. It will be a tremendous boon to CIG. It will establish them as a top developer, and do much to dissipate the cloud of doubt surrounding them as a company, and around the PU as a product.

If Squadron 42 is a a failure.

• CIG publicly fails to produce a decent single player game experience, despite huge investment.
• The PU will be seen as a dead game walking.
• Tremendous amounts of bad press will attack their already well scarred brand.

The whole project and company, might collapse quickly as backers pull funding due to a loss of faith in CIG's ability to develop a compelling game.

So, releasing Squadron 42 might well destroy CIG.

14 years

Take all this together. All of it together.

• The game is single player
• The game shares assets and code with the PU
• The game is the priority at CIG
• Single player games are vastly easier to engineer than multiplayer games
• Squadron 42 was initially scheduled to release in 2016
• Squadron 42 will not release until - at earliest - 2027
• Squadron 42 was said to be in the polishing phase 2-3 years ago.

It ain't coming out.

I don't think they're going to release it, not now, not anytime soon, probably not ever. So much risk for them, so little to gain, so much pointing towards them being unable to ship. I don't think its coming.

Where's the marketing campaign? If we're really about a year from release, where is the ads? Where is the hype, the build up? The interviews... I'm not seeing it. Its not coming.

And that, is very bad news for Star Citizen fans.

I'm here, I'm playing the game, I'm trying out all the game's loops, trying to judge it. I'm playing it to judge it. I'm not playing the PU for the enjoyment of the PU. The PU is too buggy to be properly enjoyed. Other games don't have me crashing and losing large chunks of time on a daily basis. Other games are delivering complete games, with end games rather than what can best be described as a co-op PVE experience with the occasional outside chance of PVP. Games like Mortal Online 2 or Albion Online are much better than Star Citizen. They aren't nearly as **promising** as Star Citizen, but they're much better, in their current state, than the PU.

Maybe I'm wrong. Maybe I'm incredibly wrong, and SQ42 will release next year and it will be the game that vindicates CIG and Chris Roberts. Maybe it will be the hit that they need it to be. I hope it is. I'm invested. I not only bought ships and gadgets to play the game, I've also invested a great deal of time learning it. Maybe Squadron 42 is ready to go...

But I'm not foolish enough to believe that's likely.

And if Squadron 42 is a lemon, what chance does the PU have?

PSA: there is a new crafting dupe in the wild! Some crafters have caught on and are selling duped crafted items with high stats for 20m-100m.

A spectrum post is up by Dark-Poet, the same player who brought the duping to light in 4.6 that led to the complete wipe and reset of the economy while fixing the previous item dupes.
I have faith that CIG will fix this in 4.9 but I just want players to be aware. There may be a crafted items reset coming.

I just started playing again after a multi-year hiatus like 3 weeks ago, and I've had to figure out which ships to buy from an almost clean slate of ships, and I made some mistakes. For instance, I wound up buying a Meteor and then went and bought a Shiv, and while the Meteor is an absolutely fantastic ship, I didn't really need both a Meteor and a Shiv so early. I'd have been much better off if I'd just bought the Shiv and skipped the Meteor.

Ships are expensive, so buying the wrong ships... when you're broke, it really hurts. Here's my guide for how to spend your first 20 million in game. This will get you access to the game's core loops for relatively cheap.

First Ship Recommendation: Buccaneer - 1.6 mil

The buccaneer is dirt cheap, and whether you've got a mustang or an aurora, its a significant upgrade for your PVE ship combat capabilities.

The Buccaneer is absolute fire right now. Due to the fact that deadbolts are king, and that it has a size 4, the Buccaneer can shred targets and get out before taking much damage. Its the best thing around for Gilly missions #4 #5 and #6 for under 2 million.

Total so far: 1.6 mil

Second Ship Recommendation: Shiv - 5.5 mil

That's right, we're skipping the Cutty Black entirely. The shiv is just a better ship. About the same cargo capacity, much better guns and combat capabilities. Its the king of starter ships. It can do everything, will replace your Buccaneer and any starter ship style haulers you already own for most content. You can put vehicles in it, you can haul a fair amount of cargo in it. If you buy a Cutty Black, you'll eventually wind up with a Shiv anyway, and it will have been wasted money.

Now, note that this isn't a Corsair. A lot of people really love the Corsair, I prefer smaller ships. Smaller ships are less noticeable, stealthier, better suited for a single person, and are better for PVP since turn rates matters so much in this game. If you really have your heart on a Corsair, if you absolutely need a big ass ship, get a Corsair, but I recommend the Shiv instead.

I just think its better to spend your time learning how to really fly, than flying a big dumb potato ship that isn't going to teach you much about how to PVP. Even the Shiv is really big for PVP, but its more relevant to you than a Corsair.

If you're a crazy person and are playing what is clearly intended to be a cut-throat PVP game with no intention of getting into PVP, then a Freelancer Max is a cheaper alternative to either the Shiv or the Corsair, with more cargo.

Total so far: 7.1 mil

Third Ship Recommendation: Prospector - 2.9 mil

Like it or not, mining is a big part of the game right now. The Golem is signfiicantly inferior to the Prospector, and the Mole is both incredibly expensive and is a three man ship anyway. This means you're going to be getting a Prospector sooner or later. Without it, you can't get into crafting, and you're probably going to want to get into crafting.

Maybe one day, a game economy will be added to Star Citizen, until then, you're going to have to go out and get your own ore if you want good stuff.

Total So far: 10 million

Forth Ship Recommendation: Cutlass Red - 2.8 mil

If you bought a Corsair or Freelancer Max, then you can replace this with a Nursa, but at this point the big hole in your fleet in terms of capability is the ability to respawn at a far off location, and the Cutlass Red fills this role. Buy an STV with it, and you can park a little ways off outside of turret ranges and drive into bunkers and ground based complexes. If Bikes don't routinely eject you into the center of a planet as they do me, then you can buy multiple pulses, so that you don't have to walk several kilometers if you die.

If you went with the Shiv like I recommend, then you can outfit the Cutty Red with disruptors, allowing you to steal ship components for super cheap and leave them on there since you won't be using this for ship to ship combat. Now you have an easy option for getting decent components!

Total so far: 13 mil

Fifth and final ship: The Hermes - 7.1 mil

At this point, you've got the ability to do most gameplay loops outside of refueling and salvage. You can make decent money doing Gilly missions, and due to the Cutty Red you can begin collecting for Wikelo using a mobile respawn point to make that, ya know, not incredibly painful.

What you need, is a faster way to make money than Gilly missions.

To make more money, you're going to want to take contracts out in Pyro, and that means that you have a problem. People routinely sit at stations, often in an Eclipse, and scan people down and blow their shit up if they have cargo for funsies.

That's not ideal.

So you need a plan for that, and the Hermes has a plan for that.

The plan with the Hermes is to move out of your hangar, and quickly hit 1200 m/s in Nav mode, and nope the fuck out of the station in nav mode until you've left everything behind.

Give them no time to scan you, ensure that they can't chase you unless they're in an interceptor (which isn't usually the case). Just disappear into the void before you're even noticed.

That's the plan with the Hermes.

You also get 288 SCU of hauling capacity.

Now my only regret with picking the Hermes, is it means that if you went Shiv, and then Cutty Red, you don't have the ability to run a Nursa, and the Nursa is really, really good. You can't fit a Nursa in a Hermes either, so now you've got two haulers, and no ability to fit a Nursa. Not ideal, but you do have a Cutty Red, so you can make due. If you really want a Nursa, you can pick a different hauler than the Hermes, but if you do make sure you have a plan for surviving murderhobos in Pyro, because they're definitely out there.

Total: 20 mil