There are various ports around the place buying and selling different items. You can trade between ports to make money, and then use that to buy different upgrades for your ship. As you have discovered you can also colonise planets. If you are strong enough you can attack other people ships and planets as well.
Ore and Goods ports near each other are what you want to find for the most profit. Make sure to keep upgrading your hull as well so that you can carry more. Don't worry, it takes everyone a lot of messing around before they figure out what is going on. The best bet is actually to waste all your moves now testing out stuff and getting the feel, then in the next couple of days when you have it figured out start a new account. (just be sure to self destruct your old one when you do so)
Look around for systems with a Special port in, they allow you to buy upgrades/fighters/torpedoes for your ship. Make money trading back and forth between Ore and Goods ports (they give you the most profit) and keep upgrading your ship's hull (ups the amount of cargo you can carry). Buy an escape pod as soon as you can afford it, in case some meany attacks you. And until you have decent engines, only go to sectors you know you can return from via warp (you can see where they have warp links to by scanning them). There's a Special port in Sector 0, but you get kicked out to a random location if you are above an average tech level of 8 (so if you've just started you're fine). Bank some of your profits every so often (either at a Special or a planet there's an option to "Use IGB Banking Terminal") so you have some recovery cash if you lose the ship, plus you make interest).
Nick, has interest changed at all in the game? And TKO - keeping money stashed in the bank is a good idea. That's how Elwood beat everyone last game - compound interest.
Has the background changed? Seemed to get a lot more stars on it a few minutes back, which makes it look like static. Not keen.
Better than the old version, which tiled strangely and made it look like galactic "ghost faces" in the background!
Find a sector where two ports and linked, and also connect to a special port. Trade until you have a thousand credits, then upgrade your hull, trade until you have two thousand credits, then upgrade, then trade until you have four thousand etc etc.
Now I'm lost, and far from my planet Sabriel!!! I'll just find a special, bump my engines, and blast back to her.
It's probably not a good idea to give away the name of your homeworld. Bailey's Tip Of The Day: Invest in some warp editors, even at this stage of the game your moves should be worth more than 100,000 each if you are trading. Then if you find yourself in a situation where it is going to take you 3 or more moves to realspace back to safety you can create a warp point to 0 or a trading port you want to get to. Obviously you don't want to be using warp editors all the time because they cost a move, but at this stage each turn is valuable.
At this point in the game, it really isn't that important to have planets. I have a 'base' where I have fighters and accrue interest on my credits, but there's really no reason for me to have more than 1.
I have a warp editor. Damn thing cost 100,000 credits, which is two or three moves for me right now. How do I use it?
^^^ You use it to create a 2-way Warp Route between your sector and another, more heavily trafficked sector...then add a Space Beacon announcing your presence.
Click on Devices, select warp editor, put in the number of the sector you want to create a link to and you're set.
If players are still having trouble finding the bank, the link 'access IGB terminal' appears inside all special ports, as well as on planet option menus regardless of who owns the planet. However, sector rules can block a player from accessing the terminal.
