• When you first start the game, you will name your ship.Your ship is a unique name.

  • The goal. The Imperium has opened its frontier to chartered traders. You start as a Vagrant with one Freetrader and a few thousand credits. Your aim is to rise through the ranks of nobility to Imperial Paragon and become the most powerful Baron in the galaxy. Your objectives:
    • Build a fortune: trade between ports to grow your credits. Net worth, which counts your credits, cargo, ship, fighters and planets, is the main measure of success.
    • Earn your title: gain experience by trading, haggling, exploring, colonizing and fighting to climb the peerage from Vagrant through Knight, Baron and Duke to Imperial Paragon.
    • Explore the frontier: chart the galaxy to find the best trade routes, unclaimed planets and hidden discoveries.
    • Build an empire: claim or seed planets, settle them with colonists, and fortify them with bastions so they produce wealth and fighters for you.
    • Command the spacelanes: upgrade your ship, deploy fighters to hold territory, and defeat pirates, alien fleets and rival Barons.
    • Rise with allies: join or found a team to share planets and defenses and climb the team rankings together.

    The Rankings show who leads the galaxy in net worth, experience and combat, and which team is strongest. You have 15 turns a day, so plan carefully: the best Barons make every turn count.

  • Turns. You get 15 turns per day. Each warp costs 1, docking at a port costs 1, and each attack costs 1. Trading while docked is free.

  • Trading. Port classes show what a port Buys and Sells, in the order Ferrium Ore, Biostock, Machinery. A SBB port sells ferrium ore and buys biostock and machinery. Buy where a port sells, and sell where another port buys. Well-stocked ports sell cheaply; ports with strong demand pay the most.

  • Haggling. Enter your own price per unit when trading. Offer a little better than the listed price and the port may accept, which earns extra experience. Push too hard and it will stop haggling with you for an hour.

  • Aurelia and the Imperial Drydock. The Aurelian Armory in Aurelia (sector 1) sells holds, fighters and shields; Aurelia Prime, the Crown World in the same sector, supplies colonists. The Imperial Drydock also sells ships and Worldseeds. The Imperial Gazette gives its location.

  • Exploring. Your sensors sweep every neighbouring sector as you arrive, showing its port, planets and any hostile fighters before you jump. The first time you visit a sector beyond the Imperial Core you earn experience and may find salvage, a credit cache, abandoned fighters or an old survey beacon, or run into a pirate ambush. Survey drones and nebula charts from the Armory or Drydock put more of the galaxy on your map.

  • Using the Computer. Your ship's Computer is your best tool for making every turn count.
    • Plot a course: enter any sector number to see the shortest route, how many turns it will take, and the ports along the way. You can also click any sector on the Galaxy Map to plot a course there.
    • Engage autopilot: flies the plotted course one warp at a time, collecting discoveries as it goes. It stops if you run out of turns or come under attack.
    • Port finder: choose "buy" or "sell" and a commodity to list the nearest charted ports that deal in it, with their stock, price and distance in warps.
    • Known ports: every port in charted space with its current prices and distance, which is ideal for spotting trade routes.
    • Deployed fighters: where your fighters are stationed across the galaxy.

    Finding a trade route: use the Port finder to locate a nearby port that sells a commodity cheaply, then one close to it that buys the same commodity at a high price. Two ports a single warp apart that buy and sell opposite goods (for example SBB and BSS) let you trade in both directions, earning a profit on every leg for just a few turns.

  • Planets. Claim an empty planet or create one with a Worldseed. Drop off colonists and they will produce commodities and fighters every hour. Build a bastion for a Vault and stronger defenses.

  • Danger. The Imperial Core (sectors 1-10) is safe. Beyond it, alien fleets and other pilots' fighters will attack you. If your ship is destroyed, you return to Aurelia in a new ship and cannot fly until tomorrow.