The First 15 Minutes
In the first 15 minutes the player learns to evaluate a suggestion, understand risk, confirm an action, and compare the forecast with the result, rather than trying to get rich in a single trip.
What It Is and Why
The goal is not to get rich in a single trip, but to learn to evaluate a suggestion, understand risk, confirm an action, and compare the forecast with the result.
How to Start
- Get a company report. A new company starts in Earth orbit at Earth Orbital Exchange, system Sol, with 10,000 CR and one free Courier with 16 units of fuel in the tank. The deputy's first briefing opens with a welcome to Earth orbit.
- Take the First Corporate License. You choose the path yourself: trade or mining. The server remembers the stage, and it never picks the path for you.
- Trade path. Buy Cradle Ore at Earth Orbital Exchange, fly to the Lunar Logistics Relay and sell it there. Cradle Ore is a training commodity of the game: it is sold only in Sol.
- Mining path. Mine 8 units on the Cradle Scrap Belt.
- Explicitly confirm each action. Until you agree, nothing is bought and the ship does not depart.
- Fly out of the training systems. Training ends when your ship docks outside Sol and Pioneer: at Helios Port, or at Proxima Anchorage in Alpha Centauri, the first interstellar dock.
Example
This is the starting world as it was measured on November 8. Prices change, so your numbers may differ.
| Trade path | Mining path | |
|---|---|---|
| What you do | Cradle Ore: Earth Orbital Exchange → Lunar Logistics Relay | 8 Cradle Ore from the Cradle Scrap Belt |
| Estimate while under way | 48 | 8 |
| Ledger fact after the sale | 60 | 8 |
| Cash afterwards | 10,060 | 10,008 |
The estimate and the ledger fact are two different numbers: while the ship is in transit or on the belt, the profit is only an estimate.
The two measured ways out of Sol:
| Destination | Game distance | Risk | Courier hours | Fuel from the tank |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Helios Port | 8 | 0.12 | 4 | 8 |
| Proxima Anchorage | 8 | 0.28 | 4 | 8 |
Proxima Anchorage is a fictional dock in the real Alpha Centauri system, 4.25 light years away. The jump there is a fictional FTL drive: light years are not the voyage time. The dock has no market yet, so Cradle Ore cannot be sold there.
Limits and Risks
Profit is not guaranteed. While the ship is in transit, other companies can buy up the same bid, and part of the cargo will stay in the hold.
Common Mistakes
- Treating the profit estimate as money already earned.
- Buying the first line of the list without asking yourself whether you actually need this trip.
- Forgetting that purchased goods sit in a specific port, not in a shared galactic warehouse.
What's Next
More about trips in the article on one-time delegation, and about prices in the article on interstation arbitrage.
Checked against the game server code: 2026-11-08. Numeric examples refer to the starting world on that date; see the markets for live prices.