Outpost
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Outposts are space stations built by alliances of capsuleers in their sovereign 0.0 space. The building of an outpost is one of the pinnacles of manufacturing and logistical prowess, comparable in scope to building a Titan supercapital. While they do not have as many facilities as a regular station located in empire space, Outposts are a major upgrade from running operations out of a collection of starbases.
At the present time, there are four types of outposts available; Amarr Factory Outpost, Caldari Research Outpost, Gallente Administration Outpost, Minmatar Service Outpost. All Outposts provide the Market, Science & Industry, Repair Shop, Medical, Ship Fitting, Bounty Office and Insurance Office services, in addition to their unique faction specialisations.
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Types of Outpost
Amarr Factory Outpost
| Amarr | Amarr Factory Outpost
Corporation offices: 4 Outpost specific upgrades:
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Caldari Research Outpost
| Caldari | Caldari Research Outpost
Corporation offices: 8 Outpost specific upgrades:
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Gallente Administrative Outpost
| Gallente | Gallente Administration Outpost
Corporation offices: 24 Manufacturing (booster/other) slots: 10/4 Research (ME / PE / Copy / Invention) slots: 2/2/1/1 Outpost specific upgrades:
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Minmatar Service Outpost
| Minmatar | Minmatar Service Outpost
Corporation offices: 6 Outpost specific upgrades:
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For further information on each of these, please read their descriptions found on the ingame market. 2d EveMaps contains information on outpost types through the universe.
Creating an Outpost
To start with, you will need the appropriate skills.
An Outpost Construction Platform blueprint need to be purchased that corresponds to the outpost you want to build. Blueprint originals can be purchased from the source for 1.8 billion isk, or blueprint copies can be obtained for significantly less from other capsuleers.
The construction platform is built out of smaller components. You'll need to purchase these off the market.
Example of manufacturing requirements. Minmatar Service Outpost Platform
| Component | Qty (perfect) | Price per |
|---|---|---|
| Station Construction Parts | 11 | 20.2M |
| Station Hangar Array | 11 | 35.4M |
| Station Storage Bay | 11 | 20.2M |
| Station Factory | 22 | 83.5M |
| Station Repair Facility | 11 | 86M |
| Station Reprocessing Plant | 110 | 86.1M |
| Station Docking Bay | 11 | 76M |
| Station Medical Center | 11 | 50.6M |
| Station Office Center | 88 | 79.9M |
| Station Mission Network | 11 | 65.2M |
Total price: 22.229B
Once you have assembled the Outpost Construction Platform in your manufacturing station of choice, you need to haul the platform to the system. It is quite large (750,000 m3) so you will need a freighter to do this. Fuelling the outpost requires millions of m3 worth of minerals and components, and as such a freighter is recommended for this task as well.
Deploying an Outpost
To deploy an outpost, you need to be in an alliance and have sovereignty over the system where you want to deploy the outpost. There cannot be any other stations or outposts already in the system.
At the destination system, travel to the planet you wish your outpost to reside at and select the 'Launch for Corp' option. Note that the undock ramp of the station will point in direction dependent on the outpost type (Amarr (E), Gallente (N), Minmatar(W), Caldari (N)). The Caldari one is clearly not as intended and is either a bug or the kick out was changed at some point. It's been like this for at least 5 years though.
Once in space you will need to anchor it before you can add the supplies. If you don't have sovereignty or if any of the other requirements are not met, you will be informed at this point. Once anchored, you can start loading in the required materials. These can be found by clicking "show info" on the construction platform and clicking the 'Material Requirements' tab. Loading in the materials can take time and requires around four trips with an average freighter.
Example of construction requirements.
Minmatar Service Outpost Platform
| Component | Quantity |
|---|---|
| Tritanium | 387,522,911 |
| Pyerite | 32,293,575 |
| Mexallon | 6,055,045 |
| Isogen | 1,211,009 |
| Nocxium | 252,293 |
| Zydrine | 54,062 |
| Megacyte | 11,826 |
| Carbon | 5,587 |
| Construction Blocks | 155,649 |
| Coolant | 12,489 |
| Electronic Parts | 19,871 |
| Hydrogen Batteries | 23,574 |
| Mechanical Parts | 16,876 |
| Miniature Electronics | 7,465 |
| Oxygen | 25,468 |
| Robotics | 12,499 |
| Silicate Glass | 8,846 |
| Silicon | 5,489 |
| Super Conductors | 897 |
| Synthetic Oil | 17,874 |
| Enriched Uranium | 3,511 |
| Plutonium | 1,844 |
Once you have gathered the materials, load them into the platform through the 'access resources' window, then click 'build'.
The building process can take up to 24 hours; in all cases it won't be completed before the next downtime period is over; as a result of this, outposts are almost always deployed by alliances during the last minutes before downtime. Once built, the outpost will appear globally within the system through a standard station icon in your overview and the right click menu.
Building an outpost is no easy task, but once completed, it can not be destroyed. Note that the outpost is still conquerable, so it can be taken by your opponents, as theirs can be conquered by you.
Upgrading an Outpost
Upgrading an outpost requires anchoring a Upgrade platform. Installing an upgrade is a two stage process. First the upgrade platform must be brought online, then the improvement platform. Both stages need a downtime to complete, so this is a minimum two day procedure.
Both the upgrade platform and the improvement platforms look and operate like the original outpost egg. Unlike outpost platforms which must be built from blueprints, these eggs can be bought directly from NPCs. Both eggs will need to be filled with a list of goods. Once filled, they come online after downtime.
There are three levels of Upgrade Platform; Foundation, Pedestal and Monument.
- No prerequisites
- Requires a Foundation Upgrade Platform
- Requires a Pedestal Upgrade platform
On each level Upgrade Platform you can fit the following:
- Foundation Upgrade: one Basic Outpost Upgrade
- Pedestal Upgrade: an Intermediate Outpost Upgrade and a second Basic Outpost Upgrade
- Monument Upgrade: an Advanced Outpost Upgrade, a second Intermediate Outpost Upgrade, and a third Basic Outpost Upgrade
That means an Outpost can have a maximum of 6 upgrades.
Each level of Outpost Upgrade requires the previous level of the upgrade.
For example, in order to install a Minmatar Advanced Outpost Refinery Platform, you must have already installed the Minmatar Basic Outpost Refinery Platform and the Minmatar Outpost Refinery Platform.
So be sure to plan your wanted upgrades BEFORE installing the first one.
Each Outpost Upgrade consists of either an upgrade to refining, manufacturing, offices or Science & industry. These are split into the 4 different races:
- Amarr Improvement Platforms
- Caldari Improvement Platforms
- Gallente Improvement Platforms
- Minmatar Improvement Platforms
Station Management
The Station Management button can be found in the bottom-right corner of the screen when docked in an outpost which is owned by a corp in which you are either CEO, director or have the Station Manager role. It is broken into several tabs.
Station Details
This lets you define basic settings, such as:
- Name. This is the name of the station, which will be displayed in the station, in space and on the map
- Description. This is a short piece of text which other players will see when they perform a Show Info on your station
- Docking cost per volume. This is the base amount of ISK per cubic meter that will be charged to anyone docking at your station
- Office Rental Cost. This is the monthly rental cost for an office in the station
- Reprocessing Stations Take. For stations with a refinery, this sets the tax rate on reprocessing. This percentage of all refined minerals will be diverted to the specified hangar
- Reprocessing Output. This specifies which of the owning Corporation's office hangars the tax minerals will be diverted to.
- Reinforced Mode Exit Time. This option specified the desired reinforcement mode exit time for the station.
There is also a button at the bottom of this screen marked Transfer Ownership. This allows you to seamlessly transfer the station to another Corporation in your Alliance.
Service Access Control
This allows you to specify who can and can't use the various services. For each service there are five options.
- Min Standing: this is the minimum derived standing required to use the service
- Min Character Security: this is the minimum corp-to-character (from the corp owning the station) standing required to use it
- Max Character Security: this is the maximum corp-to-character standing allowed to use it
- Min Corporation Security: this is the minimum corp-to-corp standing required to use it
- Max Corporation Security: this is the maximum corp-to-corp standing allowed to use it
To set a minimum threshold for access to a particular service, simply defining Min Standing at the threshold value is the easiest solution.
Cost Modifiers
This tab allows you to modify the costs of various services, including refining and docking, based on standings. Generally the standing used is corp-to-corp, but in the case of certain services such as refining, it's corp-to-character instead.
The owner of the outpost can tax things like refining yield. The owner can also give a discount to friendly corporations based on their corp to corp standing. Please note that the tax discount per standing point is calculated as a percentage of the base tax percentage, hence if the base tax is 50% then a 2% discount per point will reduce the tax for a corporation with a standing of +5 by 10%, or 5 of 50%, and therefore they would pay 45%.
Clone Contracts
This tab lists all Corporations who have medical clones at the station. You can revoke all Clone Contracts belonging to members of that corp, or view all individuals who have a Clone Contract there and revoke them individually. This is standard practice when conquering a station. Note that it is not possible to remove jump clones installed at the station.
Offices
This tab lists all the office slots in your station, and for those being rented, the name of the renting corp, the rental period and amount they are being billed. Each slot has a Publically Available checkbox; when unticked, nobody can rent this slot. This allows you to reserve any number of slots you choose. If you untick a slot which is currently being rented, the renting corp will be ejected at the end of their billing cycle
Conquering Outposts
It is possible to conquer outposts by force, but it is not a trivial matter. Outposts are vulnerable at all times when the station owner does not possess sovereignty over the system it is located in, but it is more complicated when sovereignty enters the play.
When the station owner possesses sovereignty over the system it is located in, it will be invulnerable to attacks unless the following condition is fulfilled:
- If Sovereignty Blockade Units (SBUs) are anchored and onlined at more than 50% of the stargates in the system, then the station will become vulnerable to attack.
However, the protection provided by sovereignty does not end there, as stations will also have a dual reinforcement mode to stem off attackers. This dual reinforcement mode mechanic works as follows:
- Once an outpost reaches 25% shield hitpoints, it goes into reinforcement mode. During reinforcement mode, the station is invulnerable to attacks and cannot be remotely repaired. It will come out of reinforcement mode at 0% shield hitpoints.
- Once an outpost reaches 50% armor hitpoints, it goes into its second reinforcement mode. It will come out of reinforcement mode at 25% armor hitpoints.
Once an outpost reaches 0% structure hitpoints, the ownership of the station changes over to the corporation which the last player to damage the station belongs to. At this point, the new owner will have to repair the station in order to prevent it from being taken over again, and ideally obtain sovereignty in order to receive the protection detailed above. More information on outpost/sovereignty warfare can be found in the Sovereignty (Mechanics) article.
A few minutes after a station is captured, its Structure and Armor hitpoints will be healed completely. When a station is invulnerable, it is possible to target it, but not to damage it. This way the station can be repaired, while it is invulnerable. A station will transition from a vulnerable state to invulnerable sate when all of the following conditions are fulfilled:
- The station owners alliance holds Sovereignty in the system. Corporation does not matter.
- Online SBUs exist at less 51% or more of the gates in the system. (2 gate systems require 2 online SBUs)
Attacking Services
Outpost services can be attacked and disabled independently of the outpost itself. They are always vulnerable, and sovereignty has no effect. Services appear in space at the same location as the Outpost itself, and can be targetted and shot at as usual. When they reach structure damage, they are disabled and will not function until repaired by remote structure/armor repairers and shield boosters in the normal way. When they reach 50% shield, they become active again. The different services have different numbers of hitpoints, and services cannot be completely destroyed.
See Also
- Outpost upgrades
- Sovereignty guide
- Cold War - expansion that introduced outposts
- ISS Borealis Outpost (Player corporation)
