Artisan Archive

Now don't get me wrong I'm not about to say that people don't need harvesters. I'd like to say it's not nessary before you hit your main profession. You can get by pretty well harvesting on your own. For example You're crafting clothes sit on a fiberplast deposit while you craft up a couple of suits for your clients. Making some weapons or powerups you use more minerals well know where to plant yourself. And you're pretty much set. I have a nice 30 or so minuite macro for harvesting I fire up on my lowest resource before i go to bed. And when I log back in whenever that is I have something to start me off on and I'm pretty good for the day. Now I'm not saying this will work for everyone but it'll help save some cash for when you do start your trade and business is a bit slow to run the extractors.
Just my 2cr.

Mennace...

Yeah, meanwhile I let my harvesters run overnight and I get several thousand steel/ore/wind (or whatever I choose) for when I wake up. I take some to the bazaar and make a chunk of change and I take some more to the crafting stations and make a cargo bag full of quality power-ups.

Plus, I don't need to leave myself in-game to get this. Harvesters are the key if you want to stop scraping by with just enough for the day...

I was posting this as a suggestion to avoid the high cost of owning one while still "low" level in the game. Not as a must do.

Mennace...

Sounds good if your just starting out, but lets look at it from another angle:

I have 5 harvesters making the following (generalizing the numbers):

3 = low grade ore, (about 4500 per day)

1 = Steel, (about 2400 per day)

1 = Chemical, (about 2400 per day)

My harvesters cost me 3600 per day for maintenance and 3000 per day of power usage.

Now I need the power for them so I buy 2 wind generators:

2 = Wind power, (5000 per day)

The two wind gens cost me roughly 1500 credits each for maint and nothing to power so my final numbers look like this:

Maintenance cost per day for 7 harvesters = 6600

Power requirement for 5 harvesters per day = 3000

weekly cost of maintenance = 46,200

Sounds like a lot but check this out, I am only using 3000 power per day but I'm making 5000 so I have 2000 extra power per day to sell andI want it to move soI list it at 1.5 credits each which makes me 21,000 credits per week. I have also found that making harvesters is a nice way to increase my structure XP's and they seem to sell very well at 1000 each. I make 10 of them and sell them in a week for another 10,000. I make 2 small houses and sell for 10k each. I have now made 51,000 credits in a week and more than covered the maintenance cost of 46,200. I also have a nice surplus of materials I can use to make tons of other items or several more houses to make some profit.

I just did this last week, I listed the items in the bazaar and paid up my maintenance on the harvesters and then I went on vacation. I sold everything within 4 days and I came back to a handsome profit. I am not looking to be a smuggler or gunfighter, I want to be a merchant and make tons of cash but I dont have 30 hours to play every week and harvesters allow me to do just that.

But dont get me wrong,I enjoy Saturday mornings hanging out at the bank peddling my wears and I would spend 30 hours a week doing it if I had the time.

You know what...... Nevermind, I was posting as a suggestion to new Artisan who BEFORE <--key word-- they hit their main profession like Droid Engineer or Weapon smith. NOT after. So when you talk about building houses you are not the ones I was making the suggestion to.

Mennace...

I'm not a weaponsmith or droid engineer yet. True, those JUST starting out will need to sample by hand, but once you have a nice bankroll of credits and can make a harvester (2 actually - one for wind power), I say go for it.

I took your first thing as saying harvesters weren't needed, seeing as you started it off by saying "I'm not going to say you don't need them, but..." Sounded like they were an afterthought to you.

Harvesters are a GOOD thing.

I agree when you first start out you can sample, even without a macro, and get enough resources to craft up the simple items and such that you will need to make it through the first few skill boxes of your profession. Once you get to the 3rd and 4th boxes, harvesters are easier without macros.

Beware macroing as well. I think in time that's gonna get hit again. Sampling for a short time isn't a big deal. But the people who do it for hours on end are gonna get hit eventually.