Careers

Pilots Type-9 Art Elite Dangerous — Pilots and a Type-9 art

Careers can be performed by anyone with the necessary equipment. As a commander licensed by the Pilots Federation, you are a freelancer who can pursue any activity without prior experience nor skill. Careers can involve ship and on foot activities. You can roam the galaxy without restrictions except star systems that require a permit. Change the Core Systems by supporting a faction in Powerplay, or roleplay with unscripted situations.

Combat

Main article: Combat, Thargoid Combat

Assassin

Main article: Assassin

An assassin requires flight experience and solid equipment as their targets are highly dangerous. The payout for taking down targets can be extremely rewarding, but make sure to never underestimate the enemy - their bounties are large for a reason.

Bounty Hunter

Main article: 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 wanted ships. Bounty hunters specialise in lethal, offensively-focused ships which are capable of reliably destroying their prey.

CQC Pilot

Elite-Dangerous-CQC-Championship — CQC Championship

Main article: CQC

CQC (Close Quarter Combat) is an arena combat simulation by Utopixx Entertainment. This is separate from the main galaxy. Pilots can compete in 3 game modes: Deathmatch, Team Deathmatch, and Capture the Flag. Flyable ships are the Eagle, Sidewinder, F63 Condor and the Imperial Fighter which can be customized with loadouts. CQC ranks are officially recognized by the Pilots Federation.

Mercenary

Main article: Mercenary

Ship-based mercenary work can be found at a starport's mission board, and send the player to fight at Conflict Zones and warzones. In zones with active fighting a mercenary can find near constant work.

ED Odyssey Mercenary On Foot — Mercenary

On Foot mercenary missions involve settlements at Concourses across the galaxy. Missions involving raids, infiltration, theft, and even simple repair work are available through Concourse Terminals, but commanders looking to make more credits can also accept shadier missions from recruiters. Mercenaries can also enlist with Frontline Solutions to participate in local Conflict Zones and help a faction expand its control.

Pirate

Main article: Pirate

Pirates naturally earn combat ranking by attacking and destroying other ships. The primary motivation for pirates is the cargo carried by their prey. Pirates use powerful weaponry and their fearsome reputations to encourage traders to hand over their goods. They can employ hatch-breaker limpets which, when fired at an un-shielded target, will latch onto the cargo hatch and extract cargo canisters. In addition, once shields are dropped a pirate can shoot the cargo hatch manually to damage it which has the same effect, but this requires more skill.

Xeno Hunter

Thargoid Return Battle — Thargoid battle

Main article: Xeno Hunter

A Xeno Hunter is specialized in combat vs Thargoids. All Thargoids have nearly maximum damage resistance, and require AX weapons or Guardian weapons. Thargoid Scouts are the weakest with only 77% human weapons resistance. Meanwhile, Thargoid Titans are capital ship that are best dealt with in teams. Thargoid can deal caustic damages, so the Decontamination Limpet Controller or Caustic Sink Launcher is advised. Overheating your ship can clear caustic damage, though it requires to overheat your ship to a super high temperature between 180%-220%.

Covert

Infiltrator

DataPointSettlement — Data Point at a settlement

Infiltrator jobs can be found at various mission boards and require the player to attack or covertly retrieve data packages from a target settlement. Infiltrators are often tasked with attacking a certain quantity of a specific settlement's defence drones known as skimmers, destroying settlement's power grid or obtaining a data package by scanning a settlement's data points via the data link scanner.

Though infiltrator missions offer a high reward, performing these actions is usually illegal and thus often result in a hefty fine or bounty. Since settlements appear on planets, the player will likely need an SRV. It should be noted that settlements vary in size and security level.

Exploration

Exobiologist

Tussock Ignis — An exobiologist prepares to take a sample

Main article: Exobiologist

The Exobiologist career involves discovering and cataloguing alien life forms. Exobiology is performed On Foot with a Genetic Sampler to collect samples from alien flora and fauna. The collected samples can be sold to Vista Genomics. If commanders identify an unknown species then Vista Genomics will credit them with the discovery.

Explorer

Beyond Exploration improvements — Explorer

Main article: Explorer, Sightseeing

Exploring involves finding and scanning planetary bodies. Explorers can earn credits and increase their rank by making pioneering jumps to unexplored star systems, gathering data on planets, stars and other points of interest within systems. Exploration data can be sold at the Universal Cartographics of Starport Services. The first player who sells data about a celestial body will be credited in-game with a "Discovered By" tag on the Galaxy Map. These bodies can still be mapped, albeit for a lower reward. Alternatively, explorers can go sightseeing of beautiful star systems in the Milky Way.

Mining

Miner

Main article: Miner

Mining involves using various specialised tools to locate resource-rich asteroids, extracting and refining various raw minerals and metals from those asteroids, and then selling the collected commodities for the highest possible profit. Although more time-consuming and manual than simple trading, the number of tools available to miners allow for a more custom approach to the task, and massive profits can be earned depending on what mineral is collected and where it is sold.

Salvager

Main article: Salvager

A salvager is a career to retrieve commodities (items) found in space, at salvageable wrecks or on celestial bodies (planets, moons). Whether retrieving an item is legal or not can be seen by the GUI text that appears when targeting it - either "Legal Salvage" or "Illegal Salvage".

Cargo that a player both jettisons and abandons becomes legal salvage, whereas cargo that is only jettisoned is considered illegal salvage for everyone but them. Cargo that is marked as stolen can only be jettisoned.

Multiplayer

Main article: Multiplayer

Multicrew

Main article: Multicrew

Players can serve as crew members on each others' ships, instantly transferring to a secondary bridge position via drop-in, drop-out matchmaking, accessible via an option on the Comms panel. Some ship types can have up to 3 people in Multicrew, controlling either the Helm (Piloting), Gunner (turreted weapons), or Fighter con (two ship launched fighters).

Powerplay

Elite-Dangerous-Hero-Connected-Artwork — Powerplay

Main article: Powerplay

Pledge allegiance to a Power to be their acting force in the galaxy. Spread their influence, and expand their territory. Compete with other commanders for control of star systems to change the governments, market economy and local laws. Gain monetary and other rewards for supporting the Power.

Trading

Smuggler

Orbis-Station-Planet-Type-6 — Smuggler Type-6

Main article: Smuggler

Smugglers are similar to traders except that they sell goods 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. Smugglers can also be a special class of couriers, where the player is asked to transport forbidden items.

Trader

Type-9-Heavy-Coriolis-Station — Trader with a Type-9 Heavy

Main article: Trader

Trading is the act of buying commodities at a low price and selling them for a higher price. In Elite: Dangerous the Galaxy Map can help traders determine profitable trade routes by providing purchasable market data as well as displaying NPC trade routes and economy types. Hauling cargo around the galaxy attracts pirates. Pirates are a hazard depending on the star system.

Transportation

Courier

Main article: Courier

A Starport Mission Board usually offers missions that require little or no cargo space and can be an easy (albeit low) source of income. Missions that require no cargo space will be marked with one horizontal arrow pointing right whereas courier missions that require some cargo space are marked with a cargo container and an arrow pointing to the right. Missions that have two horizontal arrows going left and right require you to buy the stated cargo and return to the port with it. Accepted missions can be turned in (completed) by travelling to the mission's destination and using the starport mission board there.

Passenger Carrier

Beluga-Liner-Planetary-Ring — Space tourism with a Beluga liner

Main article: Passenger Carrier

Passenger Carriers are similar to Traders except they transport paying passengers instead of cargo. Passenger contracts operate in a similar manner to mission board contracts. Ships that are equipped with Passenger Cabins may pick up passengers in the Passenger Lounge available at many stations. There are two main types of passenger contracts: VIP and non-VIP (bulk).

Search and Rescue

Station Attack interior — An Anaconda inside a damaged station

Main article: Search and Rescue

The Search and Rescue career concerns providing assistance in emergency situations. Certain Legal Salvage items, such as escape pods (occupied or damaged), "black box" flight recorders, and personal effects, can be turned in to a station's Search and Rescue Agent contact for a reward. Damaged stations offer passenger missions to evacuate refugees to the nearest Rescue Vessel, and Rescue Vessels offer missions to salvage items from inside damaged stations.

Utility

Support

Cobra-Repair-Limpet — Cobra MkII and a repair limpet

Support is an informal career in which one player aids another by refueling their ship or repairing its hull. This can be accomplished with Fuel Transfer Limpets for refuels, Repair Limpets for hull repairs and Beam Lasers engineered with Regeneration Sequence to restore shields. While this career does not guarantee any monetary reward, it can be an interesting and entertaining pursuit on its own. Many explorers often find themselves in need of fuel or repairs while wandering the far reaches of the galaxy, and combat ships can benefit from hull repairs both during and after a battle. Various player groups are dedicated to supporting other commanders, including the Fuel Rats. In AX Conflict zones you can support people with Decontamination limpets to remove caustic chemicals off a ship's hull.

Videos

Elite Dangerous - We Are Elite (cinematic) -unofficial-