Topic: I want it all! But... it's expensive!

[Telluric]

My empire is of course the best thing that has ever happened to this sorry excuse for a galaxy and if I can't just crush the other pathetic beings under the iron heel of my war machine I guess I'll just have to buy them out.  I've got the basics of establishing a trade route down, but...

I'm gonna need a lot of money.  My first attempts at securing funds was doing missions.  This is great if you can avoid those with negative consequences - after all, you are making friends, unlocking cool tools, and getting some bucks on the side.  But this really isn't enough money.

So, trade spice you say?  Too slow it seems.  The biggest issue is finding buyers.  I've terraformed some worlds with rarer spices and tried to build myself an empire of worlds that produce a diversity of goods.  For example, I've smashed two enemy empires whose home worlds made blue and yellow and you start off with red.  So, I've got three different massive sources of goods, but no one will give me more than a couple thousand per unit for anything.  I recently terraformed a purple spice world, but even that only rarely comes in above 7k to 10k per unit - getting 30 units per visit there.  How do I find those poor green spice addicts who will sell me their six armed grandmas for another unit of the stuff?

If you wanted to try to buy up the entire galaxy full of alien empires, how would you go about it?  Start off from designing a race if you have to, but I'd love to just hear the best advice on getting the most cash as fast as possible.  After all, I'd rather write checks than drop bombs...

[Elyanna]

Here are the spices in order from least rare to most rare (I think): red, yellow, blue, green, pink, purple.

I can find buyers paying up to 70K per unit for my purple spice. I never let it go for less than 60K.
I've found up to 16K per unit for red spice. I don't let that go for less than 10K.
Everything else is in between. Yellow can get 22K; blue I don't remember, don't sell much of that; green & pink up to 50K.
Finding buyers are tough, yeah. I hold a lot of spice while flying around doing other things. I always open up the trade screen to check prices. This helps the tediousness of spice trading.

I have about 70 mil right now, and I've bought over 20 planet busters (5 mil to 2.5 mil each) for special delivery to the Grox.

In other words: Ignore red, yellow, and possibly blue.
Search out systems with green, pink, and purple. Be patient. They're around. I have one system with three green spice planets maxed out. I pull 80 spice from this system. I also have a purple spice and a pink spice in the same area.
Also, keep an eye on what other goods are selling for. When I see a good deal of something I use often, like colonies or planet busters, I always snap it up, even if what I'm doing at the moment has nothing to do with that item. That way I don't have to go searching for them when I need them.

[artir]

Get pink and purple spice. They're worth 50+ K each

[Telluric]

I have about 70 mil right now...

Egads!  You are my idol.  I've never had more than about 3M in hand and probably have had no more than 20M in total.  Is there any pattern you can discern regarding what type of empire or world will pay the most for something?  I've got a lot of friendly neighbors who would be ideal candidates for giving me cash - I notice they sell me things a lot cheaper than my home world.  I've read on the board here that people think there is a supply/demand dynamic - if you sell a lot of something, it won't be as valuable the next time through.  Is there any way to raise demand?  Perhaps not visiting a particular world?

Has anyone noticed if particular worlds who perhaps make one thing or another like to buy something else?  Like worlds that make yellow like to buy green or something?  I've noticed that a world that produces a color doesn't want to buy more of that color and frequently a world with neighbors that make a color won't pay much for that color either...

[martyk]

Definetly purple spice is the best way to go.  I've got two planets maxed out and within 10 minutes I can get a full 99 units.  Find a good buyer and you cna make a good 7M in one transaction.  I've currently got about 30M but I'd have more if it wasn't for my reckless buying of everything in sight.

And as you said, supply and demand comes into effecct.  If you find someone buying a spice for a really high price, sell them a whole lot at once.  Don't sell them a bit and assume the price will be as good when you come by to sell them the rest.

[munchkin5]

sometimes you can find two planets right near eacj=h other that will buy each others spice fr record prices, but you can get it cheap, you can make quite a bit in couple of trasactions that way.

[Elyanna]

I have not yet found a correlation between philosophy and spice prices, though I will start paying attention to that. From what I can remember, I would guess not.

A planet will not pay much at all for spice they can produce themselves, definitely. Whether someone else in that empire makes that spice doesn't seem to affect price. I've regularly taken purple spice to my homeworld and gotten 60K for it, and the purple spice planet is only two systems away! Trading around your own planets can get good results.

I'm thinking about attempting a chart of prices of goods in relation to philosophy. For example, I've found that Force Empires sell Planet Busters 50% off. Order Empires sell embassies 50% off. And, in my game at least, shamans (Harmony philosophy) sell colonies 50% off. Of course, I also suspect that the discount relates to what Philosophy you are. I am a Shaman. So that will involve a lot of data-crunching.

Oh, one last thing. My boyfriend has said that Shamans will randomly give him money, saying that they have too much and need to be more humble. So get some Shaman allies and maybe you'll be lucky. This hasn't happened to me, but then again I've only just found another Shaman in my game.

[Spore-addict]

it is just never ending grinding.

Have 50 mil in cash and many planet busters and all sorts of stuff.

Has an small area where purple and pink is close. The most I have got is 58 k for purple spice...and still I roll cash in by the truckload.

Really the game is boring after that....

[Yannick]

Or if you don't like spicetrade grinding =


CTRL+ALT+C = MoreMoney

[Elyanna]

But then you don't get achievements, yeah? I like achievements.

[Pardan]

have you tried selling the spice to your own colonies? I find that sometimes my own colonies pays more for a different spice then what they produce there, then other empires tho. Every time I make the run to pick up the fresh spice on the planets I always check and see if they are willing to buy some of my other spice.

[Parkaboy]

I usually manage to get up to 75.000 for my purple spice. I think trader empires sell stuff cheaper to you, but religious empires pay more for your spice. Your relations with the empire probably give you a bonus, too.

[Telluric]

Oh, one last thing. My boyfriend has said that Shamans will randomly give him money, saying that they have too much and need to be more humble. So get some Shaman allies and maybe you'll be lucky. This hasn't happened to me, but then again I've only just found another Shaman in my game.

I've been given money on several occasions.  Just 10k, but it was something.  Interestingly, they didn't say this line.  They said something else, but I didn't take much note of it.  Something like "We had some spare money.  Maybe you can do something with it?"  It was very neutral in character; I didn't notice it as related to their philosophy.

I imagine it is like a lot of things - if you keep someone very happy for a very long time, they'll give you gifts.  I know that the ones who did were ones I made friends with right away, have never dropped below green, and I do a lot with them.

[Elyanna]

Interesting. I have something like 15 allies and I've never had this. Maybe I don't treat them right.

[macweirdo42]

Argh...  The real challenge is finding someone who is willing to actually pay what the spice is worth.  I'm going insane because I've got a decent supply of pink spice going, but I can't seem to find anyone willing to pay more than $15,000 for it.  Is there a trick?