Careers

This page is currently acting as a place holder, if you feel you can add to it please feel free to add more information.
There are multiple paths that players can take to generate money in Endless Sky, this page lists the main methods.
At the start of the game, players are given a choice of three ships, which will determine the main way of making money in the early game. These options are the Star Barge for trading and cargo delivery, the Shuttle for passenger transport, and the Sparrow for combat and mining.
== Delivery & Transport ==
Both passenger and cargo transport jobs gain money from picking up cargo or passengers from one planet, and the delivering them to their destination. These jobs are an easy and consistent way to make money. You can maximize efficiency by picking up several jobs with destinations in the same region. Rush deliveries pay more, but have a deadline that needs to be met. Bulk transport jobs become available if you have enough cargo space or bunk space available.
To take jobs, go to the Job Board tab on a planet, which will open the map where you can accept jobs.
== Trading ==
Cargo Trading is a rewarding job, if done right. Use your time to jump from one place to another, buying and selling goods for profit. Trading is a low value proposition, but very important at the start of your career. Know a good trading route and have a Drak's worth of patience? This is the job for you. After accepting any good transport missions (see above), go to the Map screen in Ports view. Click the systems on your mission route (or just nearby ones if you don't have missions) and look at the trading box on the left. Trade the commodity you can get for a low or very low price and fill your remaining cargo space with it, then go to a system who will buy it for a high or very high price and sell it there. There will always be something that can help make ends meet.
== Piracy ==
In the early game, the best way to get in good terms with pirates is by bribing them so they count as friendly ships for some time, then hang around to repair them. However, this can get your reputation with the government very low, very fast. One advantage to this method is that merchant ships will still help you unless you start attacking them. It is recommended to avoid attacking merchant ships until you have a strong fleet.
Taking out merchant ships is a very dangerous job, reserved for only the best of pilots. If you're trying to loot merchants, you need to have very high damage weapons to take them out quickly, then lure away the defense force so you can board and grab the cargo. Auto-fire is very useful to prevent destroying the target, and weapons like the Ion Cannon and Flamethrower that disable the target rather than damaging it make this strategy most effective.
After you have taken all the cargo you can, run to another system which isn't after your guts and sell it all to repeat. Playing this way with the Republic and other governments won't make you a very popular person, and may even result in you getting shot on the spot.
== Death and Destruction! ==
"The best way to earn money! Disable some weak pirate then swipe their ship from under their noses! Then amass an army to capture bigger and more awesome vessels of destruction! Or just watch your poor little ship get blown to bits!" This can be a more exciting way into the game, as you'll have more cargo space to make better money from trade routes and missions. You can take on assassination missions too, which pay well for you to take all the souls on those ships to hell.
== Anti-Piracy ==
Crippling enemy ships and selling loot is the most effective way to make money in the mid & late game. Once you've upgraded to a more powerful ship, make your way to systems within a few jumps of pirate planets. Stop firing when the targeting scan turns gray, then board them. Missile systems have a tendency to continue traveling after your fleet has stopped firing (often killing an already-disabled ship), so it's worth removing them if this is a tactic you plan to rely on. The game helpfully displays outfits and cargo in order of best price-per-ton. Click the Take button until your hold is full.
A highly efficient tactic for disabling ships is to use laser turret weapons. Any beam-type weapon mounted on a turret, such as Laser Turret, Heavy Laser Turret, Electron Turret, Sunbeam Turret, Korath Disruptor and Korath Slicer. This is because the Escort AI is highly efficient in disabling the enemy without destroying them, and stop their attacks the moment the enemy is disabled. Whereas projectile weapons require time to reach their target, and may destroy an already disabled target.
Capturing enemy ships whole can potentially pay even more, but it definitely has risks. If you plan on capturing enemy ships, make sure to hire additional crew beforehand as you need enough crew to win the fight and then fly both your flagship and the captured one back to a planet. The captured ship can then be either sold or kept. Ships can only be sold at planets or stations with a Shipyard. If you're in hostile territory, a few hits might destroy the captured ship before you get there.
Other ships will sometimes destroy disabled ships, so it can be difficult to reach disabled pirates in time before they are destroyed.
== Unfettered Hunting (Alien Species Spoilers) ==
There is a system in Hai space called Wah Ki where the Fettered and Unfettered Hai are at a stalemate. You can take advantage of this to earn money or build a fleet of powerful Hai ships. First, obtain a ship that is decently maneuverable and has enough space for about 120-160 troops armed with the best handguns and grenades you can find (you can also use nerve gas if you manage to smuggle it in). Land on the local planet (Cloudfire) to save, then take off, and fly to the edge of the system and wait for disabled ships to exit the ensuing furball. Friendly Hai ships will give you 30 thousand credits as thanks for repairing them, which is the first way to make money. The other is to wait for a hostile Unfettered Hai ship to be disabled (especially if it's a Shield Beetle or Solifuge) and board it with intent to capture.
One problem you might encounter is that both Hai factions love their missile spam, and while Hai Trackers don't have the best turn rate (making them likely to miss and go flying off into space if the target is moving), they have an absurdly long lifespan, have no difficulty hitting immobilized targets, and don't give a fig about your intent to capture, so make sure to board quickly before any lingering trackers hit their mark. Once captured the ship should be safe from any trackers already fired at it, but any Unfettered former-allies nearby will start firing on it anew, which is sure to disable it again or destroy it outright in its current state.
As soon as you've captured the ship, leave the system, because landing on Cloudfire again will take too long and expose your prize to enemy fire. If you have one, a Jump Drive is ideal for this since you'll already be stationary from boarding and your prize can safely follow you to the destination off-screen. Land somewhere nearby with a shipyard and/or outfitter like Makerplace in the Ula Mon system and your new ship will be ready for use or sale.
Once you have a fleet of around 12 or more Shield Beetles, you should be able to take on Unfettered ships by yourself without needing the Fettered Hai to soften them up first, especially if they're outfitted with additional Ion Cannons. Be sure to set your escorts to never use missiles (or sell off their Hai Tracker Launchers) to prevent accidental kills. Upgrade them with Wanderer and Korath tech as you are able and you should have a fleet that can take on anything in the game.
== Exile Hunting (Alien Species Spoilers) ==
Once you have a fleet powerful enough to contend with Tier 2 ships, you'll want to start raiding the Korath Exiles near the galactic core. There are several approaches to this. Rarely, a Korath Raider can be found attacking Syndicate and Pirate systems neighboring the core, and for those you won't need a Jump Drive. However, Raiders are quite powerful compared to human ships and won't hesitate to escape using their own Jump Drives when they start losing, so you'll need overwhelming force to disable them before they get the chance. Korath ships are incredibly weak to heat damage, and thus ships armed with a flamethrower can easily incapacitate a Raider and slowly whittle away at their health.
Korath Raiders can also be found (again, rarely) in the Ember Waste close to the Remnant. The Remnant sometimes offers bounty missions on Korath Raiders which can be useful if you're having trouble chasing one down. These raiders are weaker than those that spawn normally (for starters, they lack Jump Drives), but you can take your time looting them as (like all bounty ships) they persist between landings and the locals won't try to destroy them once they're disabled.
If your fleet is fully outfitted with Jump Drives, a more reliable approach is to bring the fight to the Korath's own systems. The Kashikt system is a good staging ground for raids into Exile space, as it's owned by the friendly Kor Efreti, has an outfitter, and is centrally located close to Hai, Syndicate, and (after the mid-point of their storyline) Wanderer space. You can also raid the neighboring Pirate system of Alcyone if you need Human ships or if you're just bored fighting the Korath. Your target is the Kor Fel'tar system, by way of Hesselpost and Kasikfar. Kasikfar is patrolled by a Drak Archon, and is rich in ramscoop fuel due to the star's recent supernova, making it a good place to bug out to if you start taking too much damage. Once you've reached Kor Fel'tar you'll encounter Korath Raiders and World-ships. You may also encounter Kor Mereti and Kor Sestor ships if you've completed the Wanderer storyline, so be on the lookout for those as they tend to be stronger than the Exiles' own ships.
Actually capturing Korath ships is difficult, as the Korath are very good at repelling boarders and tend to fill their ships with troops. The World-ship, in particular, is almost impossible to capture due to its massive crew size, and even if you could take one, there would be no way to bring it out of Korath space due to it lacking a Jump Drive by default. Instead, go after their outfits. The Triple Plasma Core by itself sells for five million credits apiece, and other Korath tech can be useful both for sale or for outfitting your own ships.
== Escort Missions ==
Once you've destroyed enough ships to increase your Combat Rating, you'll start seeing Escort contracts in the Mission list. Immediately after departing the planet, seek out hostile ships and stop them before they can attack the ship you're escorting. Getting an escort contract to a system where you're already heading can be like free money. Sometimes these convoys you're escorting attract some pirate attention, so fights will be more frequent.
== Bounty Hunter ==
Bounty missions are the highest-paying contracts in the game, and you can make additional money looting outfits from your targets or capturing them outright (which counts the same as destroying them). There's usually no expiration date so you can keep multiple bounties active while you're running other errands, though this can be inconvenient if multiple bounties end up in the same system or happen to show up in the middle of a more important mission (like the Free Worlds or Bactrian storylines), making things more difficult. Exclusively hunting down bounties can also be time consuming since your only clue is that the target is within two jumps of the system (3 for marauders) where you accepted the mission.
Also note that unlike regular hostiles, bounty targets will remain in orbit once disabled until you destroy or capture them even if you land or leave the system, and local defense forces will not target them. As a result, you can take all the time you need to strip the ships of useful outfits before finishing them off or replenish your crew between capture attempts. Just be sure all of the target ships are disabled or destroyed so that they can't revive each other.
== Mining ==
Mining is a very simple process, simply fire at ore asteroids (they tend to stand out) until they are destroyed, then pick up their bits and sell them. The ore appears under the "Special" section in outfitters, and fetch a fair sum of money for the patient miner. In some systems that have outfitters, Asteroid Scanners can be bought and will highlight asteroids containing valuable minerals.