Greetings commanders!

Below you will find the most extensive guide to Celestial Command. It's written so that any new player should be able to understand while also being comprehensive enough to be interesting to established players.

Since Celestial Command originally only featured a game mode using orbital mechanics, that is also the game mode this guide will use. Most of the information here can also be applied to the other game mode, however.

If you have any questions or comments, please post them. I read everything and intend to keep this guide up to date for as long as Celestial Command is actively being developed.

When starting a new game, you get an interface with some settings. While most people will know how this works, I'll leave a few tips here.

• Most of these settings cannot be changed after creating your world.
  
• Below images use the multiplayer interface. The only difference with the single player interface is the additional toggle to create a public server.

First, select a game mode. There are a few notable differences, as listed below.

Aerodynamic space
This game mode is very useful for learning the game's basics without having to worry too much about crashing into something.

• This mode has friction by default, which means you need to continuously fire your engines to move forward. The amount of friction can be adjusted at setup.
  
• There are no orbits. Everything's just distributed around a central body (planet, moon, star).
  
• Asteroids and other objects are mostly static. Asteroids can be moved.

Orbital mechanics
This mode is the 'classic' Celestial Command and features a frictionless space. As such it's the more realistic, but harder to play game mode. If you've never heard of orbital mechanics before, I suggest you start by playing in aerodynamic space, learn the game, and then return to master the physics involved here.

• It's space, so no friction. Your ship will not slow down on it's own, so don't continuously burn your engines. You'll fly out of the sector (and die).
  
• You can orbit planets as well as stars, and you may crash into both (and die).
  
• Asteroids and NPCs each have their own orbit, which means they constantly in motion. Be careful not to crash into them at high speeds (and die).
  
• Asteroid fields (you can navigate to these) are an exception. These sectors are always on Aerodynamic space mode. When you're playing with orbital mechanicswith these sections are set to zero friction.
  
• Due to all the orbits involved this game mode is a bit more demanding on your computer, but should still run okay on minimum spec.

Other settings

• If you are new, tick the Sandbox option.
  
• You can set the amount of asteroids. Small asteroids are mineable, large ones are not (yet). More asteroids make the game easier in terms of resources, but may impact (multiplayer) performance.
  
• You can choose whether or not to generate space stations. Space stations impact game performance quite a bit so disabling them makes the game run better. Only disable this when using sandbox mode (or die).

Multipliers allow you to tweak the game's mechanics. If you're new to the game, leave them all at 1. Note that some of these are game mode specific.

• [Orbital mode only] Planet mass: Has a big impact on how large the gravitational pull of celestial bodies (stars, planets) is on your vessel.
  
• [Aerodynamical mode only] Density: The amount of friction. Changing this value to 0 means no friction.

A preset for an easier to navigate orbital game mode:

• Star and planet mass: 0.75
  
• Engine Thrust: 2
  
• Fuel Consumption: 0.25 (or 0 for endless flying)
  
• Reaction Wheel Torque: 2

If you want to make the orbital game mode more difficult (and perhaps more realistic) to play, you can increase the mass of stars and planets, as well as fuel consumption, while reducing engine thrust.

When you enter the game, you get a menu to choose your starter ship. With sandbox mode turned on, you can also choose to just spawn a command module and start building. If you later want to start over, you can press escape and choose "respawn".


Every ship consists of a set of modules, that each have their own function, health, weight etc.. In the below image I have outlined the core modules of a mining ship. There are quite a few. This gives you great flexibility when building your ship, but for the starting player it can be confusing.


Note that modules can have different sizes and shapes, as well as mass. Keeping a ship balanced while functional can therefore be a challenge.

Mastering camera controls can greatly help you stay alive in Celestial Command.

You can manually move the camera in the following ways:

• You can rotate/pan the camera (to see the sides and bottom of your ship etc.) by click+holding your secondary mouse button (right click for most). You can reset this view by pressing N or clicking on the right of your screen.
  
• You can move the camera around by click+holding your tertiary mouse button (usually this means pressing the scroll wheel). Very useful. If your mouse does not support this feature, you can swap this control and the one for rotating camera in the options menu.
  
• You can zoom into selected objects (even from far away) by selecting them and pressing T. You can also click on the right of your screen.
  
• You can align your camera's rotation with a selected object by pressing Z or by clicking on the right of your screen. To turn it off, press Z or the button again. This feature can be very useful when you are building while your ship is rotating a lot.

These buttons are all found on the right.

Whether or not navigation in Celestial Command's orbital mechanics game mode is easy to learn largely depends on your understanding of and experience with orbital mechanics. Do you also play games like Kerbal Space Program? Then you may just as well skip this section entirely. Did you just look up the words "orbital mechanics"? Keep reading!

To be in an orbit means that your ship is constantly being pulled by a planet or the sun. You, however, travel so fast that you don't fall onto the planet but miss it, only to get pulled from the other side of the planet. Orbiting is continuously falling without hitting your target.


Your default engine controls are as follows:

Additionally you have some important tools that help with navigation.

• R or - Lock rotation. Your ship will use its engines to stop unnecessary spinning of your ship while affecting its orbit as little as possible.
  
• G or - Relative velocity display. This little interface shows you the distance to any object you select as well as two vectors; one for the direction the object is in (white) and one for your current relative trajectory (yellow). Aligning the two arrows means you're flying in a straight line at your target. It also displays your speed relative to the selected object.
  
• : The stabilize orbit button, just like the lock rotation button, uses your ship's engines to make your current orbit as circular as possible. Works especially well if you're already in a pretty stable orbit and want it *perfect*.
  
• The orbital parameters window shows you detailed information of your current orbit. I will refer to it from time to time.

Smaller orbits have an important advantage: the orbital period is shorter (you make a full circle faster) meaning you can easily catch up to objects on higher trajectories.

However, to get into one you usually need to slow down. Your starting orbit determines where it's best to start with this, so first observe your orbit and check whether it's circular or (very) elliptical. You can check this by selecting your ship. Also opening the orbital parameters window ensures the orbit continues to be displayed if you deselect your ship at a later time.

If your orbit is circular, start at step 1. If it's elliptical, start at step 2.

1. Rotate your ship so it points in the direction you're travelling in, then start decellerating (this is called a retrograde burn). A clear A (apoapsis / highest orbital point) and P (periapsis / lowest point) marker should appear on your orbit.
   
2. Wait for your ship to get close to the P marker and readjust your ship's rotation so that it points towards the direction you're travelling in.
   
3. At or close to the P marker, start decellerating. Your orbit should quickly become more circular. Burn until the A/P markers disappear or start changing positions rapidly.
   
4. If needed use stabilize orbit button to fix things up further.

Steps in pictures below.
The yellow arrow corresponds to the position and rotation of your ship.


Higher orbits have a longer orbital period, meaning that objects in lower orbits will catch up and overtake you.

To get into a higher orbit you need to speed up.

Again, check if your orbit is circular or elliptical. If it's circular, start at step 1, otherwise start at step 2.

1. Rotate your ship so it points in your travelling direction, then accelerate (this is called a prograde burn). A clear A (apoapsis / highest orbital point) and P (periapsis / lowest point) marker should appear on your orbit.
   
2. Wait for your ship to approach the A marker and align your ship's rotation to the travelling direction.
   
3. At or close to the A marker, start accelerating. Your orbit should quickly become more circular. Burn until the A/P markers disappear or start changing positions rapidly.
   
4. If needed use stabilize orbit button to fix things up further.

Steps in pictures below.
The yellow arrow corresponds to the position and rotation of your ship.


There are a few things to watch out for if you want to survive while navigating the solar system:

• Escape trajectories: If your orbit is colored yellow (check orbit info) then you are escaping the sphere of influence of whatever it is you're currently orbiting. By doing so you lose contact with your ship and (presumably) lose it! Typically, aligning your ship to the travelling direction and decellerating should help.
  
• Descending trajectories: If your orbit is colored red, then you are on a collision course with the object you're orbiting. If you do nothing you will crash your ship! If you react on time, accelerating to pull your ship past the object (+atmosphere) should save you.
  
• Asteroid rings: Every planet has a ring with asteroids roughly in the middle of it's sphere of influence. Be careful not to crash into one.

Once you have more than one ship, note that you can switch controls between them using three methods:

• If you can see your other ship, it will have a grey circle on top of it. Click that to directly assume control
  
• You can switch controls by pressing the next/previous ship buttons on the bottom left interface
  
• You can use the fleet commander interface (button on the right) to see a list of all your ships.

From the fleet commander window you can either take direct control or select the command module. With the command module selected you can rename your ship, zoom into it (hotkey: T), display orbital parameters, or take control.

Now that you're all aware about orbits and maneuvers on your current orbit, it's time to peek beyond that.

Celestial Command is a space game and space is pretty big. To see the full scope of the game, press M to go to the Map view. You will get a grey screen which displays the galaxy in which you reside.

By default you can navigate this map by scrolling (zooming) or click-dragging your middle mouse button.


Above picture shows in orange the star I am currently orbiting. Clicking this (or any other) star moves the map view from viewing the galaxy to viewing the solar system. From there you can zoom in (pictured) to find the object you currently orbit.


To leave map view, press M again.


Warning: Before you leave your starter planet, keep in mind:

• Currently only the starter planet features space stations, which are vital for trading goods and gaining reputation. If you have sandbox mode OFF, stay in your starting area until you're well supplied and prepared.
  
• Because of the above, take note of the name and location of your starting planet. You may well get lost in space otherwise.

If you still want to leave, basically there are 2 ways to get from orbiting one object to orbiting another object. You can use either a warp gate or a warp drive.


A warp gate, much like an NPC space station (see further down) is a friendly building orbiting some of the objects in your galaxy. The starting area often has more warp gates present. The easiest way to identify a warp gate is by following these steps:

1. Move your camera to a top-down view and zoom all the way out.
   
2. Hold your left ALT key to view the labels of all named objects in orbit.
   
3. The warp gates will be labeled "Warp Gate to Name + Number.

Check the names and numbers against Map Mode. Once you've decided where you'd like to go, head to the specific gate. The warp gate looks like this:

In order to make the jump, move your ship completely into the white circle (it will appear as you get close) and press J. You should see some cool effects for some seconds (depending on distance) and come out on the other end.

Warning: While warping, your ship is displayed inside a yellow circle. Do not touch the edges of this circle with your ship unless you want to die.


A warp drive is a module that you can build or purchase as an attachment to your ship. It is fairly large and power hungry and generally it is something that you unlock late in the game. Of course with sandbox mode you can just place it right away. You find it under the "Propulsion" category in the build menu.

Using a warp drive consists of a few steps:

• Configuring the drive and your ship
  
• Setting a target
  
• Navigating to the launching position
  
• Charging and warping

Configuring your warp drive means that (like a shield) you need to set the correct radius in order to use the drive. To do so, click the warp drive on your ship, and move the "Size X" slider until your ship fits inside the white circle that appears. Keep in mind that a smaller circle means less power consumption, so you want to set it just large enough. The projected power consumption is listed directly below the slider. Make sure that your ship has enough power for the jump, or it will fail to fully charge and you will not be able to jump.

To set a target, head into Map view using the M key. There will be a blue circle on your galaxy screen, this indicates the range of your warp drive. Any object (star, planet, asteroid section, black hole, moon, etc.) within this circle can be reached using your warp drive, giving it far greater flexibility than the warp gates that point to only one location. Click a star to see the objects orbiting it and then select your target with a left click on the object you'd like to warp to. You will get a notification indicating that your target has been set.

Now you need to navigate to the correct spot in order to actually make the jump you've selected. Leave map view, move your camera to a top down view and zoom all the way out. You will see a curved, yellow line. In order to jump, you need to move your ship outside of the yellow line, into the area I've colored orange in the picture below. Once you're in the right place, the curved line turns green.

Once you're in that area, zoom in to your ship to find two orange lines coming out of it. Your warp drive needs to be pointed into the general direction of those two lines. Once you've done this correctly, the lines should turn green. You should now have something like this:


Press jump. The warp drive should start to charge, your power levels will drop and a blueish effect appears around your ship. Then the rest of the jump works just like with the warp gate.

Your starter ship, and almost any design you can come up with, will have some storage room. The most critical things to have stored are power, fuel, and food. Your stores of these vital resources are tracked in the top right interface:



To see where exactly your items are stored, you may press F on your keyboard, or click this button on your left interface: . Both actions toggle your inventory view. You may need to zoom in (scroll) to see your storage per module. Example:



With inventory view you can move or remove stored items. In the above example, if you want to move some hydrogen, you click one of the blue H2 icons and drag it to where you want it to go. Hold shift while dragging if you only want to move a specific amount. When you start dragging, you will also see a red trash can in the bottom of the screen. Drag it there to delete the item. This cannot be undone. Holding shift does not work when deleting.

As shown in inventory view, you can store stuff in a few ways:

• Fuel Tanks: These only hold fuels, such as Hydrogen, Oxygen, and Xenon. Fuel tanks are labeled LC (liquid container) in the build menu. LCs can hold one fuel at a time. Engines can only use fuel stored in LCs, so you always need LCs if you want your ship to move on its own.
  
• Power storages: These hold power. Period.
  
• Ore Containers: These hold unrefined ores (and ice). In the build menu they have names that start with OC (ore container). An OC holds on type of ore at a time. These are very efficient containers for mining ships.
  
• General Containers: They can hold anything except power. In the build menu they have names that start with GC (general container) Engines cannot access GCs. GCs are a great allround storage solution.

Here's a list of item (types):

• Power
  
• Food
  
• Fuels
  • Hydrogen - Used in chemical engines (E and E-CHM types).
  • Oxygen - Used in E-CHM chemical engines.
  • Xenon - Used in ION engines. Obtained using the gas collector module.
• Ice - Used in fuel generators to generate hydrogen and oxygen.
  
• Ores - You mine these from asteroids
  • Iron ore
  • Titanium ore
  • Carbon ore
  • Cobalt ore
  • Silicon ore
  • Copper ore
  • Silver ore
  • Lithium ore
  • Uranium ore
  • Niobium ore
• Refined materials - Produced in an ore refinery module.
  • Carbon
  • Cobalt
  • Silicon
  • Copper
  • Silver
  • Lithium
  • Enriched Uranium
  • Niobium
  • Steel
  • Titanium Alloy
• Half fabricates - Procued in a production module. Broken variants of these exist as well in damaged modules, and can be reclaimed from debris using a cargo gate.
  • Prefabricated frames
  • Steel plates
  • Generic components
  • Photovoltaic Cells
  • Uranium fuel cells
  • Gunpowder
  • Heavy Frames
  • Titanium Plates
  • Tube Systems
  • Actuators
  • Reactive Engine Components
  • Power Cells
  • Computers
  • Electrical Wire Components
  • Nuclear Reactor components
  • Industrial Robotics
  • Electric Generator Components
  • Capacitators
  • Sensors
  • Super-conductors
  • Warp Coils
  • Particle Emitters
• Weaponry
  • Ammo
  • Light Missiles
  • Heavy Torpedoes
• Science Data
  • Alpha
  • Beta
  • Gamma

Personally this is the thing I love about CC the most: Tweaking your ship! Basically you have a few choices on how to get started:

• On sandbox mode you can build anything anywhere anytime with no cost.
  
• You can build/demolish/repair stuff yourself using the engineering modules.
  
• You can buy and sell modules as well as repair your ship at a space station's shipyard. If you don't have an engineering module AND you are not playing in sandbox mode, then you need to get your ship into a shipyard in order to build. See the Shipyard section on how to do this.

When you're near a shipyard it's possible to use the move tool to rearrange the modules of your ship. It's a very cost effective way of redesigning your ship! Steps:

1. Get inside the space station's shipyard
   
2. left click (a part of) the shipyard so you select it
   
3. In the bottom left, click the move tool button.

You should now see a message indicating that the move tool has been enabled. Use drag-drop to rearrange modules.


You can open a build menu using the following methods:

• Press B on your keyboard.
  
• Click your Engineering Module and choose the "Build menu" option.
  
• Click the Build button in the bottom left of the screen: .

You then should get a rather large menu with a lot of different modules you could potentially build. What you build is entirely up to you. If you're not in sandbox mode, some modules will be locked until you do the necessary research (see later section).

To build a new module, select one from the build menu. The preview of the new module will follow your mouse. While in this state, you can rotate modules by pressing A or D (45 degrees in either direction) or SHIFT + A or D (90 degrees in either direction). Place the module by moving it to the desired place (it should snap into place) and clicking. Cancel placement by right clicking.


In order to truly be a commander, you will need a fleet, not just one ship. Shipbuilding in orbital mode can be a bit challenging however.

In order to build a new ship you will need to place a command module that is not attached to your own ship (since a ship can only have 1). A few techniques you can use to prevent your ship from wandering off while you're still building it.

• Grab something heavy (space station), detach the grabber (and replace it on your ship). Now you have a safe anchoring point (the old grabber) to build from.
  
• Another approach is to dock/grab the space station, build your new ship attached to your old one. Then detach and quickly place a cockpit to turn your new creation from a bunch of debris to a ship.
  
• Loose modules won't float away as quickly from space stations in high orbits, as opposed to the ones close to planets. If you don't have a grabber I recommend building new stuff at the outer stations to prevent losing modules and money.

Modules can get damaged. You may collide with stuff or get shot (or shoot yourself...). It happens, and I'm not judging you. There are two ways to fix stuff:

• Space stations have a repair functionality. For a small fee they will fix your broken and battered vessel.
  
• Engineering modules are able to repair as well. To repair (or finish building) something, click your engineering module, then right click the damaged module. Assuming you have the resources it will get going.

Damage in CC works slightly different compared to most games. To build modules, you need a set of parts. Taking damage means that these parts break. Hovering over a damaged module will show you which parts are present, functional and broken alike.

Example:

This mining laser is damaged. All tube systems, capacitors and steel plates are broken. To repair the module you would need to remove the broken parts, and replace them with functional counterparts.

That means that to repair with an engineering module you will need storage space for the broken parts, as well as power and parts to do the actual repairing.


There are 3 ways to remove a module and regain their building resources:

• Select the module you wish to be removed and press X.
  
• There's also a teeny tiny "deconstruct" button in the bottom left of your screen.
  
• Select your engineering module, then CTRL-right click the module you want to see removed.

You can give your engineering module multiple tasks to perform. To do this, use shift-right click (constructing/repairing) or ctrl-shift-right click (deconstructing/salvaging). To make the queue visible, select your engineering module.

Keep in mind that the engineering module works sequentially. It will perform tasks in the order you give them. If the first task cannot be carried out, it stops working. It will not perform the next task in a queue until the current task is completed.

It's usually easy to tell if there's a problem with an engineering module: You will see an orange danger sign on the engineering module. Hover your mouse over it to see what's wrong. Basically there are three possibilities:

• You're out of power for the module to operate.
  
• You're out of (specific) resources to build/repair the current module.
  
• You're out of storage room (when deconstructing / salvaging).

You can set the engineering module to another task by selecting the engineering module, and then (building/repairing) right clicking the module or (deconstructing) ctrl-right clicking the module.

To reset the building queue altogether, select the engineering module and choose "stop tasks".

This is a space station (the pic may not show it but they are large):

There are several ways to interact with them:

• You can dock your ship to them.
  
• You can trade goods.
  
• You can purchase or sell modules.
  
• They can repair damaged parts of your ship.
  
• You can view, accept and complete missions at space stations.

In short, you need to work with space stations in order to survive early in the game.

There are many different space stations, which can be subdivided into a few categories:

Factories
This is the bulk of the space stations. There are 22 subtypes:

• Prefabricated frames factory
  
• Steel plates factory
  
• Generic components fact...
  
• Photovoltaic cells fa....
  
• Uranium fuel cells f....(you get the idea, they all end in factory)
  
• Gunpowder
  
• Heavy frames
  
• Titanium plates
  
• Tube systems
  
• Actuators
  
• Reactive engine components
  
• Power cells
  
• Computers
  
• Electrical wire components
  
• Nuclear reactor components
  
• Industrial robotics
  
• electric generator components
  
• Capacitators
  
• Sensors
  
• Super-conductors
  
• Warp coils
  
• Particle emitters
  
• Ammo
  
• Light missiles
  
• Heavy torpedoes

All these factories trade in the component type they're named after, as well as in the materials required to produce them. For example, a gunpowder factory will be happy to buy oxygen, hydrogen and carbon ore from you (because you need those to produce gunpowder).

Shipyards
These stations are where you modify/expand your ship for as long as you don't have an engineering module. It will buy any halffabricate needed to produce modules, as well as hydrogen, oxygen and food.

Trading stations
These will buy/sell just about anything they can get.

Fuel stations
Just that. Use these stations to buy/sell fuel.

Mining/Industrial stations
There are two types of industrial stations:

• Mining station
  
• Ore refinery

What they do is pretty self explanatory. Mining stations are more common, but don't all handle the same types of ore. To check this, select the station and hit "Trade" on the top of the screen.

You can find stations in the starting area (if you're unfamiliar with the green icons, hold Left-ALT to show ship labels to quickly identify the station types), as well as in other systems. Use your map (hotkey M) to get a list of stations per system.

Shipyard space stations allow you to buy and sell modules (parts of your ship) when docked. If you don't have an engineering module, this is the only way you will be able to improve your ship. Unless of course you're on sandbox mode, then you can just hit B and start building anywhere ;-)

When clicking the shipyard button you get the build menu. The main difference here is that instead of using parts, you're buying modules with CR.

If you are not using sandbox mode, you will see far fewer modules at first. You need to unlock the rest through research.

Unlocking new modules requires research. To research, you need to collect science data, and then process this data using a research module.

You can collect data by

• Completing missions will reward you science data.
  
• Scanning planets using the Orbital Scanner module (OSM). You need to point this thing at whatever you're orbiting (planet, star etc) at relatively close range for it to work. Select the OSM to see the max. range (white circle around planet), data availability and scanning progress. Scanning starts automatically once you're pointed at the object while within range.
  
• Scanning debris using the Scanning module. Point this thing at any debris you encounter, select the scanner (check that the debris is in range) and then right click the debris. From there, there is 50% random chance that you get useful data.

Once you have data, as well as a research module, open the research window by clicking on the right panel. From there choose what you'd like to research and the research module will start processing data. You need quite a bit of power for this.

Being able to dock to other ships, such as NPC space stations, is essential to your survival in Celestial Command. You need to be docked in order to transfer goods and crew members (from/to stations or your own ships).


Docking consists of a few "simple" steps.

• You need to open your docking ports.
  
• You need to carefully get close to a space station.
  
• You need to send a docking request to the space station, so it will open a docking port for you.
  
• You need to align one of your docking ports with theirs. Preferably without collisions as these will damage or destroy your ship.

You can open your docking ports by clicking them and clicking the "Toggle docking" button. Your docking port's lights should turn blue - that means the port's open. There's no real harm in keeping them open for now.

To send a docking request, click the space station you wish to dock to. A "Request Docking" button appears on the top of your screen. Once you click that the space station will open one of its ports (check which one turns blue) for two minutes. If the space station opened the wrong port (blasted bureaucrats!) just click "Request Docking" again while the counter is running to have the station open another docking port. The open port can be recognized both by the blue lamp on the port as well as bright blinking lights in front of it, as pictured.


And then comes the tricky part. You need to carefully align one of your docking ports with whichever port turned blue. There is only a small room for error, you need to be precise with this.

Once you are successfully docked (congratulations :D) you will hear a clear sound and the two ships are attached. The docking port lights will have turned green. Keep in mind that docking ports will break if one ship starts accelerating rapidly while docked. If you intend to drag/push/tug another ship, attach a grabber as well.


If you want to undock again, click your docking port and press the "Toggle docking" button again. Your port will turn red and you're free to move out.

If you are not in sandbox mode, you need to trade. It is the only way to get food in the early game, as the hydroponics module is very expensive to build and you will run out of your initial food supplies long before you collect the required materials. To trade, you need to dock to a space station. However, you can already check their supplies, demands and prices long before that. It's a good idea to check before visiting as not every station has every material on sale.


Every space station has its own trade panel, which can be opened by selecting a space station and choosing the "Trade" button at the top of the screen.


Please note that you'll never run into an NPC station with a trade panel like this, it's just to show the different things you may run into.

• Supply: How much you can buy of a specific resource. For example, this station has only 263 t Hydrogen available for you to buy.
  
• Buy price: What you pay in CR per unit of a specific resource.
  
• Buy price percentage: This shows whether this station is cheap or expensive relative to other stations trading this resource. A green percentage means the station is relatively cheap, indicating it's a good place to buy supplies to sell elsewhere. A red percentage means this station is a relatively expensive place to buy the resource.
  
• Demand: How much you can sell of a specific resource. As a general tip: Supply and Demand always add up to the station's maximum storage capacity.
  
• Sell price: What you earn in CR per unit when selling this resource to the station.
  
• Sell price percentage: Similar to buy price percentage, this displays whether the price is relatively high or low compared to other stations. A green percentage means you get a relatively good price if you sell your goods here. Red means you could easily get more elsewhere.
  
• Demand ratio: A graphical display of how much supplies a station has per resource. A full bar means the station's fully stocked on this resource (and actually corresponds to a low demand.

Finding a good deal:
Generally if availability is high, you can buy for cheap. If availability is low, you can sell at a high price. So your goal as a trader is to find a station that will sell you an item cheaply, and another station (within your range) that will pay well to buy that same item.

Please note that these prices update every minute!


Now that you've found a good deal, it's time to close it. To trade with a space station, you need to be docked to it (see previous section on how to accomplish that), then open the trade panel of the station you are docked to and press either the BUY or SELL button of the resource you're interested in. You then get a slider which allows you to determine how much you want to buy or sell.

NPC space stations will occasionally offer missions. You can check if a space station has any missions available by selecting it and choosing the "Missions" button at the top of the screen. You can choose to accept these missions for as long as they are available. You do not need to be docked to the station for this. You will receive a notification when new missions become available.

Accepted missions, as well as your progress on your missions, can be reviewed by clicking the following button on the right of your screen:
A typical mission looks like this:


The "Show" button will select the target on your map. You may need to zoom out to see it. That way you can figure out where your target is exactly. To complete a mission, make sure all bullet points in the mission statement are green.

I guess this game can get pretty complicated! This guide has become far larger than I intended, and there still is much more to discover.

I hope you enjoyed reading through this and I hope it helped you in some way. If you have any feedback, please contact me. I will try to keep this guide up to date with future updates.