Hi ! We're working on this to make sure contracts are usually possible - we can't make them always possible, because they reflect real needs and become obsolete fairly fast. The next update should make things better.

When the mission first appears there might be enough days to transport someone, but the longer you don't take it, the less likely it is to be possible.

What I've found is if you aren't going to do the mission right away, best just skip it and do a newer one later.

I usually do resource haulage missions instead of deliver, no limit time. Yeah newer VIP missions is better, just skip the older ones cuz they all have timer whether you accept those contracts or not.

Before you accept a resource haulage contract, check what company that station is under then look into diplomacy menu to see if this company has enough credits to accept your resources, also check that station they want you to deliver to see if there's enough space for certain resources. It's may be a hassle but saves headaches in long run.

When I monoploized over all companies, I only do VIP missions cuz most companies are bankrupted. It sucks that either companies or players cannot sell own (after purchased) ships or stations to invest into something else.

When you get into a new system you'll periodically see "you have x new missions" notification. It's generally best to only consider the bottom X missions in the available contracts screen, as those are the new ones that just popped up. Those will be the VIP missions with enough time and the cargo missions with enough cargo (to buy or sell respectively) at the location involved. If you wait on either, you will likely run out of time on the VIP or get to your cargo destination and not be able to sell/buy the required amount of cargo.

the nice thing about cargo missions is that (as long as you dont get into a war) they can queue up forever.

If I get a good set of trade routes going, I'll just pickup any delivery missions for systems that I have on the trade route, and eventually the automated ships will fulfill the contracts on their own.

VIP missions though, yeah. need to run them as soon as they show up, otherwise dont go back for stale ones.

I'm looking forward to the upcoming patch! sounds like a bunch of nice quality-of-life fixes on the way :D

How about when you're tasked to buy a certain amount of item X, from station Y, and deliver to station Z. You get to Z, and they have no room to buy the item you were contracted to deliver.

If you don't need the item, don't contract for it. And if you contract for an item, save at least the minimum amount of room to accept delivery. I have 3 contracts being held up and 1/2 a ship worth of materials waiting to be delivered to 3 stations that don't have the room to accept delivery.

After sitting there for 20 minutes waiting for them to open up space, I just quit the game.

That has a fix planned, I'm pretty sure, according to when I reported suggestions.

Just sell the stuff elsewhere. Eventually you can complete it, especially if you're running trader ships later.

Originally posted by Phirmware:

How about when you're tasked to buy a certain amount of item X, from station Y, and deliver to station Z. You get to Z, and they have no room to buy the item you were contracted to deliver.

If you don't need the item, don't contract for it. And if you contract for an item, save at least the minimum amount of room to accept delivery. I have 3 contracts being held up and 1/2 a ship worth of materials waiting to be delivered to 3 stations that don't have the room to accept delivery.

After sitting there for 20 minutes waiting for them to open up space, I just quit the game.

This is exactly what I was talking about. I'm glad there is a fix planned for this (crossing fingers).

Try the new beta.

Originally posted by Stranger:

Try the new beta.

I did. No change.

Still unable to deliver the contracted goods as there is no room at the specified stations. I tried all 3.

Very frustrating.

Did you try with a new contract ?

We can't retroactively remove resources from stations - that would risk breaking the economy, if most of a resource was stocked there. Not to mention it would be pretty complicated to do.

What we did is making sure stations would not keep accepting resources tied to your contract, so the problem should slowly go away, in your case, when resources are used ; and it shouldn't happen at all with a new contract.

So to wreck the economy I can just build up my own stations, then take missions from other companies, stop their resource intake, then RULE THE GALAXY! MUWHAHAHAHA!!!

Or maybe put a timer on those missions now ... ?

Well, wrecking the economy might not be the best of moves, unless you're pretty end-game and self-sufficient.

True, but it looks like it may be an unintended side effect. A timer on the missions make sense now, since they are basically paying extra to get goods sooner while blocking off the input from others.

It could be used near end game to block up opponent early economy inputs and direct them all towards your own company, at least I'd think so.

Even thematically goods delivery missions also having a timer makes sense, so there's room to wiggle with the system if needed.

I agree that a timer could be handy, but maybe a softer penalty for missing the timer? its not as severe a failure as "declared war" or "station destroyed". Maybe it is too close to 1.0 to make such a change though. Possibly something for a post 1.0 update? Expansion?

As for game breaking, once you have a sustaining trade fleet, you can block production chains by buying up resources and dumping the ones that you cant use. Just parking a ship in a sector to buy and dump things, maybe try to shut down access to Tools.

Gobbling all the H2 or CH4 production will wreck the world, as either one blocks Tool production, and the stations are initially limited to a single sector.