No Man’s Sky – Capitalism Guide

This guide will teach you how to make as much money as possible with no regard for barriers such as physics, the interstellar policing force, and simple morals.

Guide to Capitalism

All credit goes to TheHoundOfGreys!

Getting Started

Here are some simple tips to get started:

• Freighters. You’ll need one to get anywhere for this. The expanded cargohold and the possibilities for a mobile base mean you won’t be tethered down anywhere so you can seek new opportunity elsewhere.
• Ships. You’ll want a good ship for scouting out valuable systems, and for encountering NPC fleets for frigates to recruit. I recommend interceptors simply because of the fuel economy, as well as enhanced combat capabilities, but you’ll also want a solar-class ship to actually get the interceptor as well as scout out due to the sail’s increased fuel economy. You want to spend the least amount of time possible gathering fuel and the most time getting rich.
• Good Multi-tools. For when you do have to gather fuel or resources, you want to do it as efficiently as possible. You’ll also want better weapons for eliminating sentinels for… various different reasons.
• Language. A good way to get some starting capital is talking with aliens. If you can understand the aliens (or reading the description of their actions) you can practice talking with them, and if the word somehow relates to either of the two text-boxes you’ll be rewarded with money or nanites.
• Maps. You can find a ton of good loot, new ships, and even upgrades at wrecks of freighters or crash landed starships. You could even trade out the ships you find for even more money and ships. You can also explore secure buildings for more schematics for even more money.

Freighters and Why They’re Your Best Friends

Freighters don’t just offer a mobile base. They offer space for docking spare ships and an even more important ability. Frigate expeditions provide a ton of valuable loot. 3 Cryo Chambers sell for 1,000,000 units. Unfortunately, you need to spend money (roughly 60m for a brand new freighter and a new fleet, or even less if you defend a fleet from pirates) to get anywhere with this method. However, you get access to exotic materials like Hot Ice for free! You can also add a trade terminal for ease of selling these resources.

Sentinels and Why You Should Hate Them

Ah, sentinels. You either hate them, or you get the Aeron-Scourge title. No one likes them. Except Laylaps. We like that one. In any case, sentinels are the interstellar policing force formed by the Atlas. In the most recent update, corrupted sentinels can be found in dissonant systems, and you can get rare interceptor class ships there. But more annoyingly, and more importantly, they guard resources. Planets with either aggressive sentinels or high alert sentinels guard valuable resources, such as gravitino orbs. Sadly, harvesting these will cause the sentinels to aggro and attempt to neutralize you. There are two options: hide or fight. My other guide goes into better detail on these, but you can take this opportunity to eliminate a walker (5 star wanted level) and find a sentinel hive. Once you eliminate the guards and the pillars, you can deactivate all sentinels on the planet. Take this opportunity to gather ALL of the nearby orbs and other fantastic resources. Use a trade rocket to quickly send up to resources and allow even longer collection periods. Use the AI Minotaur to protect you, if you have the friendly sentinel mission completed.

Piracy, Smuggling and Other Crimes

Stealing is easy in NMS. Just shoot at the cargo pods and don’t let anything shoot at you. You can purchase illegal goods in outlaw systems (marked with a skull) and bring them into other systems to sell for money. Use an interceptor, which has a built-in cargo scan blocker, to smuggle even more goods in without the sentinels catching on and destroying you. Problem is, other things want to do this as well… but, shooting them down will raise standing and give loot such as starshield batteries.

Nexus Missions

The Nexus has several missions players can cooperate to complete. These give quicksilver and various valuable resources for trading and getting unique cosmetics. The cosmetics are fun and all (I’m guilty of enjoying customization a bit) but we want the money. You can get anything from Living Glass to Dreadnought AIs (used to get interceptors). Units are also an alternative reward, which is also good. There’s also the fact that sometimes you can keep any mission requirements (like fossils).

“It Belongs in The Market”

You may have noticed planets that have natural grave sites. These contain fossils ranging in value from 100k to 1m. All you need is a Terrain Manipulator and maybe an Exocraft if you want to speed it up a little bit. There are other things you can find underground such as relics. Not much to say other than this is a great way to get some starting money, although it’s a little touch and go.

Expeditions

Expeditions aren’t just good fun and give great rewards. They also give you good phase rewards and once you’ve completed the expedition, the save reverts to a normal game and you keep everything you gathered. If instead you want to just have a save without anything you may have gathered, just delete the expedition save. Simple.

Conclusion

Well dear reader, hopefully you are not woefully screwed at gathering money. Just, uh, don’t poke the walker with a mining laser.