Starsector

• Some of the best early ships are the following:
  • Lasher - Solid frigate, put two kinetic weapons in the fixed forward gun slots (Dual Autocannons/Railguns/Light Needlers if you can), a HE gun in the front turret, 2 PD guns in the side turrets, and a pair of harpoon racks on the missile slots. Give it reinforced bulkheads, max vents, and use any remaining CP on capacitors.
  • Hammerhead - In many ways its a bigger Laser in how it plays. Either go kinetic on the fixed slots and HE on the front turrets or the reverse of that (HE has better medium mount options)
  • Shepherd - A fantastic early support ship that's capable of helping against weaker enemies, especially in numbers. PD on the turret, harpoons, sabots, or (my preference) Salamanders in the missile slot.

• Remember you travel at the speed of your slowest ship, which is usually the support/cargo ships. Don't slow yourself down until you feel like your fleet is strong enough to deal with what you can no longer outrun

• The first skill of the blue skill line (Navigation) is one of the best skills in the game (among what are mostly excellent skills) and should be an early priority. +1 burn (+1 more sustained) is something no vanilla AI fleet gets so you're going to be faster than any similar fleet. The ability to jump out of a system (at a cost) anywhere or jump into one at planets is also very useful. Don't hesitate to experiment with builds, you can always respec at the cost of a story point. You get the Transverse Jump (jump anywhere) as a permanent addition to your hotbar as part of the story line regardless of whether you have Navigation or not after you complete that mission.

• Most D-mods (The damage modifications you usually see on salvaged ships) can be tolerable depending on the vessel, but some are deal breakers (mostly the ones that penalize burn speed, fuel usage, or maintenance costs). Also generally fixing up a D-mod ship to pristine isn't worth it but, but some ships are rare enough (or almost unique) that it can be worth it.

• The game in its current state has part of its story. If you don't have a direction towards it after the tutorial (or if you don't do the tutorial), just go to bars on planets and you'll eventually get an event that'll point you in the right direction. There are also some mini stories around again signposted at bar events and at planets.

• When exploring look for planets with orbital structures (little satellites or such if you zoom in), that means the planet will have ruins on it and thus be a better survey target.

• If you are surveying/derelict hunting (A very popular early game choice) the fourth skill in industry skill line (yellow) will greatly increase your gains from that. Also more Shepherds.

• Selling BPs to the black market will get you the best return but then the pirates will field those ships/weapons.

• You should be using sustained burn everywhere, except when you specifically need to maneuver or get somewhere past resistance - in which case either just turn it off or use emergency burn. You should be using the currents in hyperspace to get above 20 burn whenever they're headed in your direction since there are rewards for sustaining high speeds in hyperspace.

• If you have colonies at size 4 and above or are using AI cores or other items in industry, other factions will take interest in you. Having a colony or two on hostile planets which won't naturally grow their population can earn you some passive income and provide a free place to store your stuff and resupply (with a Waystation building) outside the core. A volcanic world with at least +2/+2 ore/rare ore is a common world to use. For the core - Penelope's Star and Tia are claimed by factions despite having no colonies in them, which means you shouldn't colonize in them until you're prepared to defend those colonies.

• For industries, the more goods you manufacture in your own faction the lower colony maintenance costs are down to 50% off. You only need one industry of any one type to feed all of your colonies if it's making as much of a good as is needed to fill demand (Example: Making 4 goods will fill all 4 good and below demands). Note that industries which are fed their precursors on the same planet cannot be trade-disrupted - Example: Mining -> Refining -> Heavy Industry/Orbital Works.

• When you decide to get size 4+ colonies it is advisable to have at least three colonies per star system, and preferable to have five to six. Five to six colonies with High Commands (upgrades Patrol Base -> Military Base -> High Command ) at size 4-5 can defend themselves against most threats without further player intervention, though with most threats you'll need to be hostile towards the faction threatening you before your autospawn system defense fleets will solve the problem themselves. You can resolve all of the colony threats on the intel screen permanently via small story lines.

• When deciding on your faction ship doctrine just go with whatever doctrine you like fighting beside in manual combat, whether that is a few high quality ships with good officers or a giant fleet of junkers whether it's composed of phase ships or carriers or normal warships. For combats not involving the player it's been balanced such that it should not matter much what doctrine you choose. Same thing with stations - just use whichever station you want to fight beside in a manual battle. Putting AI cores in stations will increase their autoresolve value and provide them with AI officers in manual combat.