It’ll be necessary to secure exploration equipment from either:

• Pirates (expensive)
• Kilrathi surplus (slightly less expensive)
• Stealing from ES with Cross (fun, maybe more difficult to get to)

Obviously, there’ll be some Pilgrims out there.

EDIT:

Better yet: All of the above. First you do grey ops for Monte, then he tells you you need to get exploration equipment and for that you need to become a Real Pirate, a member of the Brotherhood. So, you start attacking guild ships (much less karma if you only attack them enough for them to drop cargo, rather than destroy them). 1))

Once you get an invitation to the Brotherhood, you do a few test missions to get certification, and now you’re given a pirate transponder, and a map that includes hidden pirate bases in grey zone systems. So now you can jump to those systems and visit their bases. At their bases, they have a lot of goodies you don’t find anywhere else: Talons and Pirate Caernavens. You find maps with a lot of grey zone systems. You find treasure maps. You find phase shields and weapons only confeds have. You find ads of ship modders that can add turrets or enlarge your ship’s reactor space so you can fit a larger reactor. And also you find exploration equipment. But although there are lots of exploration equipment, jump-point detection equipment prices go through the roof, and none are available. That’s where Cross becomes the only viable idea.

• Maps
• Mapping software
• Basic planetary analysis
• Atmospheric analysis
• Soil analysis
• Life detection analysis
• Asteroid scanning
• Asteroid selection
• Asteroid retreival bot
• Space elevator kit
• Space elevator ship
• Basic prefab colony starter
• Antigraviton emitters
• Antigraviton tracking sensors
• Antigraviton flow analysis
• Jump point mapping supercomputer
• Exploration How-To books

Some of these could be Kilrathi-only things, also. Examples:

• Kilrathi gray zones only available from kat pirates
• Life detection analysis the kats might be more advanced at
• Prefab colony starter; might be a kat only thing. Obviously they’ve done more exploration than humans...

For a full discussion of maps, exploration, the Explorers Guild, and exploration technologies and upgrades, see Requirements –> Exploration Upgrades

Good choices for starting planets would be small (low grav) agricultural, so either,

• Terrel in Hom,
• Destinas in Irrulan, or
• Athos in Isaac

Isaac would probably be closest system; say, couple of jump-points North of Hyades or Tri’Pak, since it says here,

“ATHOS (in Isaac): minor planet (NAV 120) This planet is in the outer regions of the Tri-System. Is a small planet with a high population, but is not overcrowded”

At the first system off Hyades or Tri’Pak you’d probably find its planets already squatted: AWACS, pirates, corrupt Confeds using a planet to store decommisioned ships that were supposed to be mothballed, a mining corporation using slave labor... By the time you get to Isaac it’s deserted and unexplored, but you’d probably want to go on to Destinas, Irrulan:

“DESTINAS minor planet (NAV 98) Abundance of natural resources has lead to this planet producing much of the Tri-System with lumber and livestock.”

Or else you could go on to Hom and colonize Terrel and Petra to begin with, then Serca, Anhur, Crius... Or start with Anhur for canon...

“ANHURmajor planet (NAV 7) The oldest planet in the Tri-System

CRIUS major planet (NAV 4) A major medical planet. Almost all medical goods originate on this planet.

HERMES major planet (NAV 5) A seedy, greedy, low-life magnet of a planet. Although good credits can come from here.

PETRA minor planet (NAV 95) Basically a large rock or asteroid. This planet is mineral rich.

SERCA minor planet (NAV 93) A desolate planet. Mineral rich.

TERREL minor planet (NAV 122) An agricultural planet.”

The following post was in response to mkruer’s pointing out that having Burrows found the Tri-System would disagree with Tri-System history as per the info booths:

Allright, I deleted my previous post, since I got confused somehow and thought the source of the dates was the Confederation Handbook; whereas they actually came from the Privateer2 game:

• 7212BC [Karatikus, Isaac System] The Crian Megalodon, a transplanted egg laying reptile, becomes extinct.
• 212 BC Human civilization first appears on Anhur.
• 790 [Tri-System] The Irrulan, Isaac and Hom systems begin to co-exist.
• 2190 [Hephaestus, Irrulan System] The political seat of the Tri-System is moved to Hephaestus, where it will remain to this date.
• 2234 [Hephaestus, Irrulan System] A fusion powered slowship leaves for Bex to set up a colony.
• 2304 [Anhur, Hom System] A D-Drive colony ship carrying Humanists leaves for Bex. It arrives in four weeks, and successfully starts a colony.
• 2353 [Bex, Irrulan System] A fusion powered slowship from Hephaestus arrives to set up a colony, finding that the planet has been colonized for over 30 years thanks to the D-Drive.
• 2370 [Crius, Hom System] Vrootle Pigfididrin is born.
• 2490 [Tri-System] The first All-System Rugby Challenge Cup Final is held.
• 2490 [Anhur, Hom System] Anscestors of William Maddox begin a long history of military service through a number of conflicts.
• 2515 [Opulus Plaza, Hephaestus, Irrulan System] The Yovas-Clerkson family opens the Galactic Gourmet Hotel.

Anyways, I say “screw them!”

Why? Because they are unrelated historic trivia that was trown into the game for no reason whatsoever. Having Burrows found Anhur in no way breaks Privateer2 as a game, which, to me, is what really matters, as far as canon is concerned.

And you can tell how seriously Origin though about those dates, that they say they discovered the “Crian Megalodon” in Karatikus. I wonder if they found many “Karatikan Microlodons” in Crius... space faring dinos... Not to speak of the fact that they have humans evolve in the Tri-System independently of Earth humans... Hey, maybe it’s that Pan-Spermia theory now includes Pan-Ovula...

And you can tell how seriously Chris Roberts takes canon, from the movie.. So why shoud we have to go out of our way not to contradict even the slightest detail. Screw them, and screw the Crian Retros.

Then spiritplumber suggests the Tri-System-ers might have decided to rewrite their own history, so in the next post I come up with a retcon to make history rewriting happen:

“War is NOT acceptable. History, the way it is, is not ‘educational’, it subliminally teaches children that ‘war happens’ as if it were a fact one must learn to accept. It is as if a violent criminal was allowed to tell children true crime stories like entertainment. Telling our children of the crimes we’ve commited as a society is a social crime itself. The facts be damned! Truth be damned! It’s more important to allow our future generations to be, once and for all, free of this yoke, of this self-perpetuating cycle of evil.

I know why some of you are having reservations as you hear me speak to you: It is because you feel guilt.

Well I am no prophet. I am no saviour. And I haven’t been sent from some parallel universe to come and forgive you. And I would not know how. And you probably don’t know how to forgive yourselves.

But if you cannot feel, I beg of you to at least think:

Are you in any way responsible for the Kilrathi atrocities, or the Terran atrocities, or the Border World atrocities? Are you responsible for the Retros, or the Pirates? You know what the answer is, NO. Yet you cannot say it to yourself; you cannot feel it. THAT, I say to you is the true essence of the perpetuity of evil. Once we know, as humans, of our own “dark side”, we may not embrace it; but yet we can’t let go either.

It is as if you got a line of credit and made the mistake to borrow and borrow and borrow. And now you cannot pay. Your income is not enough to even cover the interest that keeps accumulating. And everybody tells you that you MUST pay what you owe. But you cannot. But you MUST. But you cannot.

So what I say to you may sound simplistic or escapist, but before you reject it I beg you consider what the alternative may be. It is time that we default on our Historical Debt. It is time we say, NO I will NOT pay for the heinous crimes of my ancestors. I cannot pay and will not pay; and my children will not even know of this debt. If my heart cannot be free; at least the hearts of our future generations will.

Perhaps Humanity will one day discover the Ambrosia of True Forgiveness. But I say to you, in the meantime, the Beer of Forgetfulness is the much lesser of two evils.”

Excerpt form a speech by St. Bex, 2671. CLASSIFIED

As of this writing, I think the easiest way to deal with the Tri-System is to have it partly populated by Pilgrim refugees, already. For some canon respect we could have them have first established in Anhur, Hom system, and later Crius and Karaticus, say. This would leave us Isaac and Irrulan systems, plus some planets in Hom to take, plus many space stations we could build. When we first settle in Athos, Isaac, we get attacked by Pilgrim ships, but after we destroy that wave of attackers, they send a peace delegation, and they are willing to live with us as long as we don’t reveal the way into the Tri-System from Tri’Pak, and as long as we play along with their history revisionism.

After Athos, we establish a colony in Destinas, Irrulan; and soon after in Hephestus, also in Irrulan. Notice that according to canon, the capital of the Tri-System moves from Anhur to Hephestus. Revisionism will push the date back, eventually, but it actually happens some time after we move in, once we’re well establish and become the major economic power in the Tri-System.

Spiritplumber wrote:

This will require a HUGE overhaul of the upgrades system, and will have to happen in concert with Vegastrike...

Re retcon: Thanks for considering my idea! I would vote that the “retcon” was in fact estabilished by the Pilgrims as a way of saying “we lost a war, okay, we’ll be the bigger persons and not let our kids grow up with a grudge”. One member of the peace delegation, maybe one who happens to be very very very old, explains it to the player.

Chuck_starchaser wrote:

Real pirate bases could just be a new base type, and these things could be part of its standard stock.

Thank YOU, for the idea.

Yeah, that sounds better. I still think the gospel of St. Bex I wrote rocks, and I’d like to keep it as a marketing gimmick for the retcon, if nothing else. Maybe the first delegation that meet us just give us the classified gospel to read. But later, an older and wiser pilgrim might come around and put it in the more honest perspective for us.