Repair skilling in space
Once upon a time there was a ‘bug’ known as 0.0 repair skilling, in which repairers could continue to skill Vehicle Structural Engineer (VSE) even after all repair stations were fully repaired.
I have heard many people tell me that since the ‘good old days of 0.0 repair skilling’ was removed by MindArk, that skilling in space is almost non-existent.
I do not believe this – we were repair skilling on the Kronan 24/7 before they had 0.0 repair, and the Kronan still offers extensive (usually 20+ hours per day) repair skill runs. Other ships also offer various repair skilling services
So I decided, with the help of my friends, to write this tutorial on how to repair skill.
Note: Common shortenings of terms as used in space are in brackets after the words throughout the document. There is also a Glossary of acronyms used in space at the end.
1. The first thing you need to do is find an active ship. An ‘Active ship’ is one with plenty of pilots that take the ship out to the training grounds, gather mobs and take damage on the ship, so that the repair crew can skill VSE and engineering while repairing the damage. Once you have found a ship that offers a repair skill service that fits your game play and your time zone, then approach the owner to enquire the price (if any) for being added to/retained on the ship guest list.
The skills gained from vehicle repair are primarily Vehicle Structural Engineer (VSE), but also includes all the other engineering skills.
2. Once you are on the guest list you need to obtain one or more Vehicle RK-0 (L) and sufficient welding wire (ww) to use them. Best to check with the vessels owner if you are allowed to bring own equipment, or if they insist you buy all supplies on board from them.
On Kronan you may bring your own supplies, or purchase on board from the owner or authorised agents,
3. Now that you are on the guestlist (GL) of your chosen skills ship, it is time to head to the ship.
Warning: Skilling is done in the Training Grounds (TG) which is lootable PvP space. Be smart with your loot, leave it in planetary storage – Don’t feed the Pirates !!
Before going up be sure to empty both materials and mined resources tabs of your inventory. Also make sure any containers or vehicle inventories have nothing that would go into either of these tabs inside of them and check you also have no loot pills H-DNA or any other exception Mindark has made to the guidance on what is lootable.
You can then either fly up to the ship in a quad or vtol equipped with a thruster or take a summons from the owner. The summon will be received by everyone who is on the guest list (GL) if they are on the planet that the ship is docked at. If you are in a special area such as an Aakas Key Instance, Ark Underground or Hell then you will not receive the summons.
Note: Only the owner can send a summons, and only when they are on the ship and it is docked at the space station.
If you have accidentally brought lootable items to space, then you may choose to use the on-board TT machine. Alternatively if they are high value you may TP to the spacestation while ship is docked and return via TP to planet at a cost of 7ped (payable to MA).
If you decide to take the riskier option of flying back to planet (not recommended if carrying stackables) then I suggest you wait until the ship is away from the spacestation, then ask the pilot for a safe exit. Then fly to planet avoiding the area near the spacestation, and ideally either very high, or very low, to avoid the more obvious waiting places for pirates.
4. If you are a first-timer on board – switch to Force Chat and ask someone to guide you to the repair stations.
If you picked a Privateer to skill on then there are only 2 repair stations and turning around from one will let you repair the other.
If you are skilling on a Mothership (MS) you will need to ask for a tour of the ship and perhaps also spend some time exploring on your own. There are 4 repair points on a Mothership (MS) that are some distance apart from each other.
For those who would like a look at the layout of a MS, check this video made by Anny.
Once you have completed the tour or if you have been on a skill ship before, ask the pilot which repair station they would like you to be stationed at. It is best to fill stations starting at hanger (HH), then propulsion (PP), then reactor (RR), and lastly command center (CC). Stations get filled in this order so that if the pilot needs to help with repair they will have the closest stations open.
Now you will need to show some patience while the pilot begins to gather the mob ball. After damage starts you can use AutoTool to repair, but it is best to not be completely AFK while repair skilling since there is often a need to adjust repair points while the ship is in the training grounds.
While repair skilling you can either strike up a conversation in Force Chat or do something in real life while keeping an eye on your computer.
Glossary
Space Station SS
Arkadia Space Station ASS or Ark SS
Calypso Space Station CSS or Caly SS
Rocktropia Space Station RTSS or RockSS
Next Island Space Station NI SS
Cyrene Space Station CyreneSS
Training Ground TG
often prefixed with location similarly to the spacestations
Space/Atmosphere Server Border Sphere or Atmo entry
Guest List GL
Friend List FL
Command Center CC
Reactor RR
Propulsion PP
Hanger HH