PI Plexing Planet Setup [P2-P4] – Cosmic Sanitation Squad

“Quick” step-by-step list
to set up a P2-P4 Manufacturing planet.

this post is part of “PI for Plex” where we aim to use PI to pay for Omega.

Skills:

the Skill Command Center Upgrades Must be at level 4 to start,
Level 5 is required to make this profitable, but the setup can be started to generate some income already with Level 4.

also the skills Interplanetary Consolidation should be at least at level 4
Customs Code Expertise Skill is curtail for this to work in highsec!

best train the skills in this order, so you can start setting things up once you are surpassed Command Center Upgrades 4:

Command Center Upgrades 1
Command Center Upgrades 2
Command Center Upgrades 3
Customs Code Expertise 1
Customs Code Expertise 2
Command Center Upgrades 4 – [Start the setup process below once this skill is completed]
Interplanetary Consolidation 1
Customs Code Expertise 3
Interplanetary Consolidation 2
Interplanetary Consolidation 3
Interplanetary Consolidation 4
Customs Code Expertise 4
Command Center Upgrades 5
Customs Code Expertise 5
Interplanetary Consolidation 5 (not really required (it is more profitable to have an additional character with level 4 while training time will be the same)

Money

You will need about 2.5 Billion isk in total to finance the initial setup.
this includes materials for 4 Days (so the majority of those funds will come back to you and can be re-used to buy new materials)

here is a Ledger of a Solo Toon doing “just PI”

Ship

a Standard Epithal will do if doing this in highsec, make sure the Gallente Hauler skill is at least on Level 3 (Level 4 is better) so you can carry enough raw materials to supply 3 Planets.
if you are advanced an fly a DST, then this ship is not really required, just don’t be stupid and use a Nereus, Tayra or a Mammoth, since some of those materials are extremely valuable.
you can use a Squall but its pretty much pointless, since the Epithal can haul just as much for 10% of its price, the only viable upgrades would be a Torrent (2x cargo) or the Avalanche (100x cargo).
being able to do the MWD-Cloak trick is ABSOLUTLY CRUITIAL!! even in highsec! (the epithal can do it just fine)

Planet Setup

This post is based on our Perimeter Base, so we will refer to planets and installations in that system.

you will need:

1 Barren Command Center (81156 ISK*) (one planet will be Temperate)
5760 Miniature Electronics (83.12 Million ISK*)
5760 Construction Blocks (64.57 Million ISK*)
5760 Livestock (69 Million ISK*)
5760 Viral Agent (86.98 Million ISK*)
11520 Water (6.45 Million ISK*)

the Materials listed above are good for 4 days of production on a single planet.

Bring the materials and the Command Center to Perimeter
warp to our POS or our Astrahus (do not dock)
right Click on Perimeter I (Barren) and select “View Planetary Industry”
place the Command Center anywhere on the planet and Upgrade it immediately to the highest Power upgrade you can give it.
Click Submit to make it permanent
place 3 High Tech Factories and 4 Launchpads first
(tipp: if you not do them one after another the ID’s will not in sequence, this will come in handy later, so place like 1 Factory, then one launchpad, then another factory .. and so on)
then place 2 rows with 6 Advanced Industry Facilities

it does not really matter how they are placed, just make sure they are as close to each other as possible
Link all structures together
now comes the “clicky part” open the first High Tech Production plant, Select Sterile Conduits and Click Install
next click on the Launchpad next to it then click “Create route”
repeat the stop above with the other 2 High Tech Factories, make sure they use a different Launchpad (this is to preserve space as the output materials are quite large)
once completed it will look like the picture below, the animation will visualize how the output materials will flow to each of the pads
Install ALL the Advanced Factories (6 for Vaccines and 6 for Smartfab Units)
have ALL of them route to the one Launchpad that does not get finished materials
once completed all facilities should have a yellow and a red ring indicating that all facilities have outputs set up.
we can already set up some Inputs as materials produces locally will be used
since we routed all to a single launchpad, this is very easy done, click on the launchpad you chose to park the manufacturing outputs and click to “Routes”

we are only interested in INCOMMING routes for Vaccines and Smartfab Units!
click on a incomming router for Vaccines, then Create Route then click a High Tech Facility, then “Create route”
repeat this step for all the high tech facilities and for both Vaccines and Smartbab Units.
sadly there is no visual indication if that has ben done properly as there is still one material missing to complete the setup for Hightech.
to do this we need to fly to the Customs Office and deliver the materials in order to create the rest of the material routes.
but first open a Notepad, make a new Note where you note down the pad ID’a and the materials .. this way it is not required to open PI later and the chore can be done completely blindly.
to get the id, just click on a Launchpad, it ID will show in the title.
use the launchpad you used to send the materials trough for the water, the rest does not matter, its just important that the same pad is used for materials.

“technically” one could mix materials on porpose (providing more than, and recreate the routes (essentially creating duplicate routes) then it would not matter where the materials are dropped to.
Warp to Customs and drop ALL the materials in the Customs office
IMMIDEATLY Warp away, to our POS or Astrahus but do not dock! you need to be in space to do the transfers.
open PI again
click on the first launchpad select the material you transfered in and click “Create route”, select one of the factories and click “create”
repeat this step for each factory and launchpad once completed the Advanced factories will turn Yellow, indicating that they do have all materials in order to work.
finally route the Water to the High tech Factories
once that is done all factories should be yellow, indicating operation.
Thats it. now go do something else, and in less than 4 days time, buy the materials again, fly to customs and drop them in the designated Pads, and pick up the finished materials, fly to a market and put in sell orders at the current sell price for about 2 weeks.