It’s certainly felt like a long time coming, but Elite Dangerous will soon bring the much-anticipated fleet carrier spaceship type to the internet spaceship sandbox.
For those eager to work towards their new carriers, one should bear in mind that these things are perhaps not easy to get and sound even harder to keep: The initial purchase price for one of these titanic spacecraft is 5 billion credits, and after that players will need to maintain weekly running costs, which include wear and tear maintenance, crew wages, and a new fuel source needed for these megaships known as Tritium. Failure to meet these costs and exceeding a debt threshold could end with the carrier being decommissioned and sold for parts.
That said, fleet carriers can be expanded to provide features to other players like repair docks, refuelling stations, and shipyards among other features, and carrier owners can impose tariffs on traded goods. These massive ships will also feature 16 landing pads of various sizes for players to utilize right from the start, as well as a beefy jump range of 500 light years.
Elite Dangerous will have its first open beta of these new ships on April 7th for PC players, and then a second open beta in May for PC and consoles, culminating in a final launch of these new ships sometime in June of this year. Ahead of all of this will be a livestream from the devs at 1:00 p.m. EDT on April 2nd, which will premiere gameplay, offer more information about customization options, and take questions from the community.
