Careers

Players can take on a number of basic roles within the universe.

They can become traders, smugglers, explorers, bounty hunters and pirates. This information is not final; there may be more (miners?) and it may be possible to carry out two roles that have similar requirements. It has been stated that roles are defined by the player's ship and how it is configured, rather than by customizing their character (and therefore creating a class system).

Although the following roles have existed in previous games, Frontier Developments have stated that game progression is possible in any of these roles and they will be balanced so that no one role gives an advantage.

Bounty Hunter

Space is a rough place and there are plenty of pirates in the anarchy systems who need to be retired. The bounty hunter takes advantage of the in-game bounty system, earning credits and combat rank for destroying pirate ships. Bounties can be set either by the game itself or by other players. Bounty hunters will specialize in lethal, offensively-focused ships which will be capable of reliably destroying their pirate prey.

Any player who attacks a ship in a controlled zone (e.g. Federation jurisdiction) will get a bounty on their head. You will not get bounties in conflict zones, because it is war and you are expected to attack in those areas (after choosing a side). Any other player can collect such a bounty by killing the player. NPC's will also spawn with random bounties on their heads. Your ship scanner will tell you if your selected target is "Clean" or if there is a warrant for their destruction. An additional "Kill warrant Scanner" may increase bounty profit by revealing other infractions not revealed during a basic scan.

Bulletin Boards also offer missions to kill specific NPC's (possibly also notorious players?). Named NPC's can be found by looking into "Unidentified signals" until you find them. Missions to kill NPC's can net as much as 173,000 Cr. You can also get missions to go kill "6 people in ... star system", where you can just go to a navigation beacon and shoot things down.

Courier

Bulletin Boards at space stations will often offer missions that doesn't require any cargo space; you are just asked to deliver a message or a small item to a different station. For example, communist systems can have missions to deliver a stack of comics to a federation system "to open up their minds for the truth". Federation systems in turn will offer similar missions to spread propaganda to independent systems. You can also be asked to transport historical artifacts etc. More money is paid to far destinations, and the risk involved.

Explorer

Although exploration was a component of previous games, there was no way to progress in any meaningful way by exploration alone. In Elite:Dangerous, players will have the opportunity to earn income and gain reputation by making pioneering jumps into unexplored systems, and gathering data on planets, stars and other points of interest within systems.

Your reward will differ depending on how much information you contribute. For example, one station may know about all the planets in a star system, but not have specific information on the planet surface. If you equip your ship with a surface scanner, you can then sell this complimentary information for a small price. If you are able to explore a star system where no data has been reported before, and you collect all data on planet names and also surface information etc, then you will get a much bigger reward. **Speculation** It seems currently that many players can report the same star system information. In this case, the first player to report it will get a big sum, and subsequent reports will be paid a smaller sum (for corroborating the data), until it's down to zero value and you will not be able to sell the information. **End speculation**

Pirate

Pirates will naturally earn combat ranking by attacking and destroying other ships. Their primary motivation will be the precious cargo carried by their prey, although new game mechanics (such as the ability to affect politics and supply and demand of commodities) will add an extra dimension to those who are willing to have a price on their head. Pirates will use powerful weaponry and fearsome reputations to encourage traders to hand over their goods.

When playing as a pirate, you should target the cargo hatch of the ship you are attacking. If you manage to hit it, it will open and spill the cargo. There are also special cargo hatch disruptors you can equip on your ship, which sends up a robot to break open the cargo hatch and eject cargo. For desperate pirates, you can bring the ship down to 5-6 % health, where the NPC/Player will often dump cargo to buy time for a jump to hyperspace. During those times, cheap cargo will usually be jettisoned first (if you are attacked by a pirate, you can choose to jettison specific cargo in the right menu), so it will pay off to hold off on destructing the ship even if the first things to tumble out are crap items.

Smuggler

Smugglers are like traders. However while they buy a given good where it is legal they sell it where it is illegal, on the black market. Smugglers have to use stealth, cunning and special equipment to outwit the Police and sometimes military authorities, especially around stations, to sell their goods at a profit while escaping fines and a criminal record. Smuggler can also be a special case of couriers, where you transport items which are forbidden.  

Trader

In its simplest form, trading is simply buying goods on the Commodities Market in one location and selling them at another, the difference in price is the profit. Trading links to a dynamic background economy simulation based on player activity, which will result in changes in prices and volumes of goods in different systems over time, and even the colonization of new systems.

Traders are well-advised to keep some cash in reserve! If by any chance you lose your ship - whether down to piracy or simply a docking accident - your cargo isn't insured. For this reason prudent traders never spend more than 50% or 60% of the credits on any one cargo. No matter how tempting it can be to stuff your hold with every last bit of gold or Progenitor Cells you can get your hands on, it isn't worth the risk of losing all of your working capital at once.

Traders in less-safe systems will rely on armor, shields and weapons to dissuade pirates from attacking them, or to buy enough time to make an escape. If you have a lot of space, you can carry a small amount of cheap items to jettison if you are attacked. That can buy you time for a jump to hyperspace.

Bulletin Boards will often offer a special reward for some specific items. So when you arrive with a cargo, you should check the bulletin board first to see if you can make a higher profit that way.

The galaxy map offers tools to track existing trade routes where high supply from one system is sent by NPC's to a high demand in another system. But it is also possible to discover your own trade routes outside of this. By heavy trading, you can "bleed a system dry" so that they go from high supply to low or no supply, or contrarywise lower demand from high to low. Thus, you can never be entirely sure that a trade route will stay as a stable income.

Mining

Main article: Mining

In Beta 3 Mining was added as one of the main features of the update. Unlike other games Mining in Elite: Dangerous is very manual and consists of chipping off pieces of asteroids for then to scoop them up and refine them. This is time consuming, but with the right technique it can be just as profitable as other roles or professions.