Novice Walkthrough

The first three missions will take you only a minute or so, just do them now and start exploring the game UI afterwards.
Goal: finish the missions so you can start exploring the user interface and enter your ship
Play time: 1-2 minute

Pilot Name
1. Go to the 'Missions' screen, there will be a single mission 'Pilot name' accept it and go to your inventory
2. Select the 'Call sign' token and click 'Use', a dialog opens where you can provide your pilot name. Enter a name (you will be able to change it later after receiving another call sign token from a NPC drop) and click 'rename'. You completed your first mission! Head back to the mission screen, collect the rewards.
3. Accept all of the 5 new missions.

Now Open the daily login rewards (top row icons, second from right) and collect day 1 reward, if the online time reward is due also claim the online time reward (icon to the left from daily login rewards). From now on whenever the online time reward icon shows you that a reward can be collected do so automatically. If you logout/refresh/close browser while the online reward can be claimed the timer will reset to zero and start again.

Prepare for battle mission
1. Just go to inventory and equip the mining laser on your ship. You can double click on an item to equip/unequip it. Collect the reward, you can also collect mission rewards from the mission tab in the lower left window.
Note on ship attack capabilities: all ships have intrinsic attack points but without an equipped weapon the ship can not attack. The build in attack is added to equipped weapons!

Establish Headquarters
Go to production screen and start building the 'Operations HQ', it is currently the only building you can upgrade anyway. The mission will be completed once the building upgrade has finished. Instead waiting for the HQ building you can navigate around the base and see what's there (some of the screens are locked until you reach a certain level) or better enter your ship and continue.

Ship Scene

Enter your ship. Your ship is inside the base protection and cloak field. You can zoom in/out with the wheel button. Clicking anywhere in the sector space or minimap will set your ships destination and start moving. In order to attack NPC ships you must click on them - your ships laser weapons will auto fire provided they are in range. Being a new player without any ship upgrades nor equipment life is anything but easy. Your ship is an easy target even for the weakest npc, it can survive a handful of hits depending on the enemy damage output so either stay inside the base shield or very close to it. The ships shield energy and hull hit points will recover by 1 each second (this will increase with your level) and x5 times more if inside the base protection shield.

Early Tactics
Lure enemy ships towards the base by staying outside the base radius until they get in range. Select closest target to start attacking it. Once you start taking damage go inside base radius but stay in range so your ship continues attacking while the base gives you invincibility. Repeat procedure. Don't try going far outside or reach other stations - you just risk getting yourself killed. The destroyed npc ships drop boxes, collect them by getting near and clicking on them. You can attack at the same time while moving or collecting a box.

NPC kill drops
After collecting NPC drops (boxes), they randomly yield resources and ship parts while killing a npc yields resources and sometimes equipment. Equipment is automatically placed inside your inventory. At this stage never miss the opportunity to load the equipment into your empty ship equipment slot or replace a lower level equipment with a higher level. It really makes a difference in your ships performance. Kill npc /collect boxes as many as you can while waiting the HQ building to complete.

Secondary Tactics
NPC ships have a slightly smaller range then your ship, you can try going outside base radius and keep yourself constantly at 500-640 units distance from npc ships. That way you will be able to attack them while your ship is out of their range. Be careful not to get carried away and go too far from base. The tactical situation can change in seconds and you end up surrounded by harvester ships - the top npc hitters in Novice sector. Once surrounded by 3-4 harvesters your survival chances are same as snowball's in hell.
Free advice: always keep an eye on the minimap

HQ finished
Once HQ level 1 is completed collect the reward and start building the Neridium, Darkon, Xenolit production facilities and the Equipment recycler.
Goal: finish buildings to collect enough resources for starting HQ level 2. Side goal: try completing 'Seek & destroy Drone I' and 'Reach level 1'
Play time: 10-15 minutes
Stay near base and grind npc ships/drops. As each of the production buildings complete upgrading to level1, go to the missions screen, accept the corresponding production upgrade or item frenzy mission (for recycler finished) - they will immediately be in completed state so you can cash in rewards. Once you have enough resources start HQ level 2 upgrade. The HQ level 2 upgrade takes 50 minutes  so you can take a break, grab a coffee or just keep grinding.

Ship buildup
Goal: finish HQ level 2 and collect protocol level III equipment 
Play time: 50 minutes - 2 hours
As you complete missions accept new open missions, giving priority to collect boxes, kill harvesters and kill elite npc missions. Now is all about grinding npcs and collecting equipment.
General equipment rules

• After replacing lower tier equipment with better versions dismantle the unequipped pieces - never sell them as you will need ship parts more than you realize
• protocol level III is the highest equipment tier you can get in the Novice sector, if obtained and if resources allow you upgrade them to level 1
• once you obtain a Laser beam, replace the mining laser, although not a good weapon to speed up grinding you can afford to make an exception and upgrade it to level 1 or even 2
• it is good to keep a second highest tier equipment piece of each slot type in inventory - the goal is to have them ready after buying a new ship that has more equipment slots than the Hornet

You are still in the grinding and building up ship/production stage
Goal: finish Neridium, Darkon, Xenolit buildings level 2, reach player level 3 have at least 3 pieces of protocol level III equipment

Play time: 1-2 hours
As soon as you have enough resources start Neridium production upgrade and then Darkon followed by Xenolit (in that order). After those are enqueued, start upgrading protocol level III equipment (if you have any). You will notice that after having Defense protocol III upgraded to level 1 and a Laser beam equipped, the lower level npcs are no threat to you anymore. In fact no single npc ship except the Elite Harvester can inflict serious damage before you can kill it. You still can get easily destroyed if facing a swarm though.

Tactics
While still staying closer to base radius engage single enemy ships or hit from safe distance multiple ships. Note that elite versions of enemy ships have a guaranteed equipment drop so never miss the opportunity to hunt them down - even if it costs you some time and shield points.

If resources allow you and you started all production building upgrades start the HQ level 3 building. Now is a good time to search for an opportunity to finish the scout navpoints and dock to Trader HQ missions. Watch the minimap and when a window without many npcs opens, go to the navpoint destination (marked with brown circle on minimap). As soon as you reach the navpoint turn back or to the closest base. Repeat with second navpoint and Trader HQ base.

Once you dock to the Trader HQ you will obtain a 'guild application token'. Accept the 'join a trader guild' mission, use the guild token and pick a guild to join. The guild choice has no impact on your gameplay, there is no better or worse guild. If you have friends among members of a certain guild join the same guild as in later game stages PVP between guilds becomes an option.

By now you should be player level 3, have defense protocol III level 1+, Laser beam level 1, hull, evasion, accuracy items equipped - the higher tier the better. Buildings: Drone CC lvl 0, Robotic assembly line lvl 0, equipment recycler lvl 1 all other buildings lvl 2 or +. Ideally HQ building level 3 started. If this is not the case you did not follow this tutorial  . 

Again, if you have any protocol III equipment be free to upgrade them to level 1 or +.


Trading and "the big missions"

Goal: accumulate enough resources and ship parts to buy and upgrade a new ship
Play time: 30min- 1h depends on your current ship, equipment and luck

Joining a guild opens up guild missions and trading goods. Guild missions can be distinguished from intro missions by the guild icon next to them. Careful, do not accept any guild missions yet, they can only be completed outside the Novice sector and we are far from finished here!
Hint: you can stop any time now to have a coffee, go for a walk or return the next morning.

For optimal performance accepting the next chunk of missions takes a bit of planning. You should accept the following missions in bulk: 

• The great purge + Cargo box collector + ideally the Elite Hunt or
• Food profit run + Ore profit run + Components profit run + ideally The Elite Hunt

This means you need to have room in your missions list to accept two or three mission as a combo. Why? Because doing the purge - killing npcs - causes them to drop boxes that are needed for the box collector mission or, the profit run missions allow you to run in a clockwise manner from base to base and complete them. The elite hunt is important because elite npcs are quite rare and while traveling from base to base or hunting npcs it would be a waste to encounter and kill an elite without having this mission in progress!

Important: if you do the profit run missions, note that your ship velocity decreases proportional with loaded cargo. Loading max cargo capacity reduces your ships velocity to 2/3 (66%) of nominal speed, this leaves you more vulnerable as approaching harvesters gets very hard to evade. If you do the profit run missions, don't collect boxes as you are to slow due to the cargo load. Just go in a straight line from base to base and finish the trading.
The minimap is your best friend now - constantly keep an eye on it. You can switch to the tactical view as it is more zoomed out than the sector view and even displays the npc types. Still, the minimap displays the whole visible range while the tactical view only a part of it.


New ship
Having completed all standard missions except the 'jump gate' it is time to buy a new ship.

Goal: buy a new ship, start upgrading it to level 1 and jump out of the Novice sector.
Play time: 0min - ?h depending on your current resources, ship, and luck

Buy now you should be level 4, have equipment: Laser beam lvl 1, hull plates, defense protocol, auto targeting protocol and evasion protocol all III upgraded to lvl 1 or +, more then enough ore for any ship. All missions but 'jump gate' completed.
If you miss the required credits just travel in a straight line between Traders HQ and Meissa N2 mining base, buy the most expensive ore on the mining base - usually Xenolit isotope and sell it on Traders HQ, return empty to mining station and repeat until enough credits. While loaded don't waste time on collecting boxes, on the way back without cargo you can afford to make small detours to collect boxes.

What ship to buy?
While you have the choice between 3 new ships, the Europa Frigate being the best ship is hardly the best choice. The Falcon hunter and Delta bomber cost roughly the same, have the same number of equipment slots except that the Falcon is much faster while the Delta can carry more cargo. With the starting amount of diamonds both ships can be upgraded to level 2. The Europa frigate has 3 laser slots which is a huge combat advantage but costs 30 diamonds, after buying it you want have enough diamonds left even for level 1 upgrade. Each ship level upgrade makes its stats 20% better so that matters quite a lot.

After choosing your next ship buy it. Don't worry about your current equipment as it will be transferred onto the new ship. Buying a new ship will auto sell the old ship but will preserve all your equipment and inventory. The sell price is much lower than the buy price, so constantly swapping ships is quite costly.
If you miss resources or ship parts for upgrading your ship just stay in the Novice sector and grind until you can afford it.

After buying a new ship the Novice sector npcs are ridiculously easy to kill but after jumping to the next sector you will encounter much stronger enemies that will hit you much harder. Therefore you should stay in the Novice sector until you can equip all available equipment slots with protocol III lvl 1+ preferably lvl 3-5 items and have your ship upgraded to at least level 1.


About weapon mechanics

Lasers
It is important to understand that the ships built in attack points get added to each laser weapon. This means the more weapons you can equip the more you gain from ships built-in attack points. Increased attack points from having multiple lasers in addition to the fire cool down almost two times shorter then the npc weapon cool down leaves you hitting the npcs twice as hard as with a single weapon. Therefor the single laser slot is the main reason why upgrading the Hornet is a bad idea.

Missiles
Missiles are the main damage dealers but they require a missile launcher that gets available only outside the Novice sector. If you collect a missile blueprint just use it, those are meant to be consumed giving the Robotic assembly line ability to produce the missiles. Once consumed the ability stays and if collecting another blueprint of same type there is no use for except selling it. While in Novice sector we have upgraded the assembly line only to level 1 to get the assembly mission completed, but missile production requires also the assembly line to be upgraded to level 4. If you have enough resources you might start upgrading the assembly line now.

Happy hunting