Scrap is worth nothing until it is sold.
That sounds obvious, and crews break it every day: they walk past good items to hold out for better, or they leave a haul on the ship unsold because they are going back out anyway.
The quota does not care what you found. It cares what you sold.
The daily cycle is the deadline
The quota is a daily target, and the day has a fixed length. Whatever has not been sold by the time the clock runs out does not count, and if the total falls short, the run is over.
So every selling decision is really a question about time:
Does this item need to be sold today to keep the quota on track?
If yes, it goes to the counter now, not tomorrow. A guaranteed small payment beats a possible larger one that arrives after the deadline.
What to sell immediately
- Anything high value and light. These are pure profit, and they are the items that make a quota comfortable in one trip.
- Anything you are holding at the end of a trip. Loot in your hands is loot that can be dropped in a chase.
- Anything that is filling a slot you need. If your hands are full and the next item you want needs a free hand, the lower one goes.
What is worth thinking about
- Heavy high-value items. A 155-credit bar at 77 pounds is a great sale and a terrible carry. Selling it is not the question; getting it back in one piece is.
- Items with a use. The shovel-equivalent scrap weapons can be sold or swung. If the crew is fighting its way out, a 35-credit knife that weighs nothing is cheaper as a weapon than as a payment.
- Junk you picked up to fill space. If it was worth carrying at 14 credits per pound, sell it. If it was worth carrying because your hands were empty, it is a rounding error either way.
What not to do
- Do not save scrap for a bigger day. There is no bonus for a large single sale. The quota is a running total against a deadline, and a haul sitting on the ship is exposed to exactly the same death as a haul in your hands.
- Do not leave scrap on the ship unsold at the end of a day. Sell, then plan tomorrow with money instead of inventory.
- Do not chase one more item when the quota is already clear. Once the number is met, the remaining hours are better spent on the cheapest possible safety, not on more loot to lose.
Selling as a crew decision
One player should own the counter. In a four-person crew that is usually the ship player, who is already at the terminal.
That player’s job is to know two numbers: what the quota still needs, and what is currently on the ship. When the crew calls in loaded, the answer comes back immediately — sell it and go again, or keep it and push for more.
Crews without that call end up with loot sitting on the ship while everyone argues about whether it is enough.
The habit that pays
Sell every trip, every time, and treat the quota as a number you reduce on purpose rather than a number you hope to hit.
A crew that sells constantly never faces the late-day panic run. A crew that saves for a big payday spends the last hour of every cycle carrying everything it owns through a dark facility.
Related guides
- Quota guide — how the daily target works.
- How to make money fast — earning in trips rather than hauls.
- How to recover from a bad run — what to do when the number is not going to be met.