The Lone Wolf's Guide to Making Money and Research

[Jimbatron]

The Lone Wolf's Guide to Making Money and Research with Gunrunning

Introduction

This is a guide designed to maximise the amount of money you can make playing on your own, and unlock the research items (without having 10m in the bank to fast track to begin with) as quickly as possible. It draws heavily on Calimeatwagons' excellent threads on these issues.

With more players to help you can potentially better this, however, speaking from personal experience you cant always rely on having skilled friends around all of the time. This is all based purely on maths of whats possible so in a sense there is very little opinion here.

Below I list some of the principles of why some activities are more profitable than others, and a schedule to make 321k per hour.

It is assumed you have a Vehicle Warehouse, and a fully upgraded Coke Factory and Bunker.

Focus on how fast you earn money, not just the total payout for the activity.

A lot of players just look at the total payout when considering what activity to do. However, its how fast you earn money that matters. Mission A might only earn half as much as Mission B, but if Mission B takes 3 times as long you will make more per hour out of mission A. Its worth keeping in mind however that for Bunker and Coke sale missions themselves are relatively short (10-15 minutes). The product takes time to produce of course, but you can be earning money doing other activities while you wait then you get a very quick an lucrative sale mission at the end albeit at a restricted frequency of how often it can be run.

Import/Export should still be the foundation of your income.

The important thing here is the frequency. Every 20 minutes you are able to sell a high end car to a specialist dealer for a net 80k, but to be conservative lets assume you take an average of 5k damage, earning 75k (experienced players using a cargobob will often be able to avoid any, although there are some missions where you will have to shoot the driver and inevitably lose some). You should use the 10-10-12 method to guarantee you only get top range cars. Expand the spoiler if you do not know what this is.

 

There are 32 different vehicle types in I/E, 10 standard, 10 mid range and 12 top range cars. If you have less than the full amount stored in your vehicle warehouse, your next vehicle source mission will always be one of the types of car that you do not currently have. For example, if you store the mid range Zentorno, you will not get another Zentorno in a source mission again unless also collect all the other 32 car types So once you have filled the warehouse with 10 standard and 10 mid range cars, you will only source one of he 12 high end vehicles from there on, provided you sell them and don't accumulate the full set.

You should buy supplies for biker businesses and gunrunning, rather than steal them!

Why is this? The first thing you need to ask, are the supplies worth the 75k it costs to buy them? Firstly, all the businesses produce more value in product than that when upgrades and sold far, so you will definitely be in the black - but why not steal them and make even more I can hear people ask? Well, the question becomes how long does it take you to steal them? If you are on your own and can only carry one crate back it can be time consuming. Then consider that every 20 minutes you can sell a high end vehicle for, as it happens, an expected 75k (as described above). So, unless you can steal all the supplies in under 20 minutes, you are better off using the time to sell a high end I/E vehicle and use the proceeds to buy supplies. This may change if you had other players to help you.

It is worth running weapons manufacturing and Coke, but not the other Biker Businesses.

A full supply bar for weapon manufacturing will produce 210k in 2 hours 20 minutes of product when sold far, in a mission that probably on average will take you 10 minutes although the frequency is low, thats the best $ per minute in the game, netting you 135k when subtracting the cost of supplies. Coke after a full supply bar after 2 hours worth 168k gross, but will more often than not require 2 vehicles and probably take you an average of 15 minutes to deliver, netting 93k when the costs of supplies are considered. However, Meth and the other businesses will net you less than 75k so for a similar amount of time you would be better off doing I/E instead as they are more lucrative than the bike delivery mission.

The schedule:

This can by played in cycles of 2 hours 30 minutes. It involves doing an I/E sale every 20 minutes, supplemented by Headhunter, which if you own a Buzzard, Savage or Hydra can easily be squeezed in. While you are doing this your Coke Factory and bunker are filling up, which can be sold at the end of the schedule for a big bonus.

 

Time	Activity Started	Balance Change	Total
0hrs 0min	Buy Bunker supplies	-75,000	-75,000
0hrs 5min	Buy Coke supplies	-75,000	-150,000
0hrs 10min	Source I/E Vehicle		-150,000
0hrs 15min	Sell I/E Vehicle	75,000	-75,000
0hrs 20min	Headhunter	21,000	-54,000
0hrs 25min	Source I/E Vehicle		-54,000
0hrs 35min	Sell I/E Vehicle	75,000	21,000
0hrs 45min	Headhunter	21,000	42,000
0hrs 50min	Source I/E Vehicle		42,000
0hrs 55min	Sell I/E Vehicle	75,000	117,000
1hrs 0min	Headhunter	21,000	138,000
1hrs 5min	Source I/E Vehicle		138,000
1hrs 15min	Sell I/E Vehicle	75,000	213,000
1hrs 20min	Headhunter	21,000	234,000
1hrs 25min	Source I/E Vehicle		234,000
1hrs 35min	Sell I/E Vehicle	75,000	309,000
1hrs 40min	Headhunter	21,000	330,000
1hrs 45min	Source I/E Vehicle		330,000
1hrs 55min	Sell I/E Vehicle	75,000	405,000
2hrs 0min	Headhunter	21,000	426,000
2hrs 5min	Sell Coke	168,000	594,000
2hrs 20min	Sell Guns	210,000	804,000
2hrs 30min	Total		804,000

 

The total of 804k after 2.5 hours is worth 321,600 per hour - netting out property costs this will still be over a healthy 300k, although some of these can be minimised by deactivating CEO or President status where possible. As you can see, the weapons sale at the end adds a whopping 210k, but only takes 10 minutes of your actual play time. That's the real power of Gunrunning.

With 4 good players you should be able to net 380k doing Pac Standard in that time (1,250,000* 0.2 + 26,000 * 5, assuming a 40-20-20-20), so its not the best money in the game but crucially you dont need 3 good friends online. And if it takes more than 71 minutes to do Pac Standard, you're actually better off with this schedule. If you can't get in your own public lobby, you might want to sell Coke after 90 minutes instead for 124k to be guaranteed one vehicle. You should aim to re-supply in any multiples of 24 minute intervals in that case.

What about special cargo and [updated] Smugglers Run?

It depends how quickly you can get crates back as to whether this is more profitable, but according to the work of Calimeatwagon here: http://gtaforums.com/topic/857848-ceo-crate-profit-comparison/?hl=%2Bceo+%2Bcrate you would need to juggle two large warehouses and sell at $1m a time to beat this schedule and large deliveries take on the significant risk of losing the lot. I personally find I/E gives a better rate of return with only one player. However, if you're ahead of the game on the schedule you might be able to squeeze in some crate purchases and sales during the I/E cool down to bump the total per hour up a bit.

 

An added edit - I was able to squeeze into the schedule three buy missions for 3, 3, and 2 crates, with a sale of 8. However that costs 44k (18+18+8), and the sale gives you 118k, netting 74k. That's over 4 missions. So time wise, you would probably be better off supplementing your cool down with Sightseer (as in my video where I have extra time). Special Cargo crates only make sense if you are in it for the long haul, filling up a large warehouse because you need the non-linear pricing of bulk sales to kick in for it to be worth while economically.

 

Smuggler's run is simply not profitable for the Lone Wolf - as it's dependent on how many crates you can carry back and one at a time will only get you 10k of stock per mission (typically taking 10 minutes or more for me, whereas Headhunter pays twice as much in half the time). If you are flush with cash you may find the hangar useful though - especially since you can have personalised air vehicles you can spawn nearer when a Pegasus pad is not close.

 

Doomsday Heist Preps [updated]

The new heist preps can be done solo - which creates the possibility you can insert them into your schedule, some are pretty quick and can realistically be done in place of a Headhunter while you are waiting for the I/E cool down to end. You don't get paid for them of course, but you do get a big payout at the end when you complete the finale - therefore you can divide that money across the total time for all preps and setups. It all depends how quickly you can get the heist done, and on what difficulty as to what the earn rate is per hour (or 20 or 5 minutes). You can use this calculator to work out your earn rate for each heist:

 

https://drive.google.com/open?id=1KiRYIb9EKUgHeUOKJSbk1oeWRNqLsfns

 

So economically, if you expect to earn more for a heist than Headhunter per 5 minutes, it's worth replacing that in the schedule - also providing the time taken to do that prep isn't so long it can't be fitted into your I/E cool down window.

 

However, there's another factor worth considering. Speaking for myself, many of my heist buddies are in different time zones - and we don't have an long overlap where we can all be online together. So sometimes it's just worth clearing those Preps while you're waiting for them to come online so you can move straight on to the Setups and Finale when they arrive.

 

Let your Coke Factory and Bunker produce while you are not playing the game by leaving it running.

Setting your character to watch TV or a security monitor will avoid the idle kick. So when you're not actually playing the game, buy supplies and still leave it running at any available opportunity so your product bars fill up. In 2 hours 30 minutes come back and you'll be able to sell coke for 93k net and weapons for 135k (subtracting the cost of the supplies). The two delivery missions can be done easily in under 30 minutes. That's an effective 456k per hour of actual playing time.

 

Jamwes also posted in this thread a great way you can get a full supply bar for only 15k if you are going afk. Click here for details.

It is more economical to fast track research

It costs 225k to fast track research. However, putting all you men on research will take ~3 hours and 33 minutes to complete. Alternatively, if you put all your men on manufacturing, you will be able to produce 150k worth of product in 2 hours 30 minutes, which can be sold far for 255k (the cost a fast track), but in less than an hour required to fill the research bar. So if you're playing the game, you're much better off to put your men on manufacturing and fast track, rather than put them on research. For all items, this will save you nearly 2 full 24 hour days of playing time.

There is one circumstance however when putting your men all on research makes sense however, and that's if you keep your game running overnight (assuming you sleep for 6 hours or more), leaving your character watching the security monitor to avoid the idle kick. If you start with a full supply bar, and chose to put you men on manufacturing, you'll have 210k worth a product to sell far in the morning. However, research uses up the supply bar more slowly, taking ~5 hours 52 minutes to drain. And crucially, that will completely unlock one item, and ~64% of the next one too, costing 90k to fast track what is left. So that saves you the cost of one full fast track at 225k, plus a partial on at 135k (225k-90k). That's an effective saving of 360k by morning versus the 210k you'd have got from a manufacturing. The difference here is that manufacturing uses your supplies up quicker, and while you are asleep you obviously cant resupply!

Using a combination of funding fast tracking from weapons manufacturing, and researching over night Ive been able to unlock all the items in under 2 weeks.

 

And finally - been there, seen it done:

 

 

 

Slight variations on this, with a few extra activities added, earning 847,836 net of all expenses in 2 hours and 47 minutes, working out at 304,611 per hour. Expand the spoiler for more commentary.

 

 

 

I don't believe for one moment anyone will watch the full two and three quarter hours, but you can dip in to see how I do individual tasks. Visit the Youtube page and expand the comments for timing of activities and the varied schedule. My headhunter runs on this are quite poor IMHO. On the plus side, the I/E damage taken is minimal, often zero.

 

The main thing to note is that in practice, you should order supplies for your Coke Factory and Bunker BEFORE you do the sell mission. That way they arrive shortly after you've completed the sale and waste less time. Here I have separated them out so it's easier to see the money earned in one cycle with no overlap - but it pushed the entire schedule back by 10 minutes, as the bunker doesn't start producing until 10:27 in the video. That's important because gunrunning weapons sales are the best payout, they are only limited by the frequency you can do them, so getting started on production asap is always the priority. Here I compensate for the time delay by adding in some Sightseer and sell stolen vehicles off the street - rather than sit and wait idly at the end for the bunker to fill.

 

I'm a little unfortunate here to get stung by the wage bills for the coke factory staff, given that I'm only MC President for 15 minutes during the resupply and coke sale. Typically I'd only expect this one in every 3 or 4 cycles.

 

In only 1 of the 6 I/E steal and sales is it significantly over 20 minute window, where the car has been stolen by another thief and I do a crap job of chasing it. In one case, I do the source, headhunter, AND sightseer and get the laptop sale page with 19 seconds to wait for the cool down finish

 

.

Edited December 27, 2018 by Jimbatron

[555-We-Tip]

Very comprehensive, and as someone who plays solo, very useful. I cannot stress enough how easy and profitable Import/Export is, and your outline is simple enough to follow. Great work.

[ash-274]

I would amend that you can use the monitor/AFK trick to convert $75,000 of supplies into nearly 2 complete researched items over 7 hours (while you sleep).

$75k (plus roughly $20,000 in daily utility costs) beats nearly $450,000 in Fast-Tracking. You can't play while you sleep anyway.

[Jimbatron]

I would amend that you can use the monitor/AFK trick to convert $75,000 of supplies into nearly 2 complete researched items over 7 hours (while you sleep).

$75k (plus roughly $20,000 in daily utility costs) beats nearly $450,000 in Fast-Tracking. You can't play while you sleep anyway.

 

Yep, indeed, That's what I said in the penultimate paragraph (my op may be suffering from a bit of TLDR). If you're awake to re-supply, it's more economical to manufacture and fast track. But if you've left the game running whilst asleep, it's better to research. That's because manufacturing makes more money per minute than research saves in fast tracking whilst you have supplies, but research uses up your supply bar at a slower rate and gives you more total value at the end (albeit about 2 and a half hours later), so if you're afk for 6 hours and can't resupply in that time it works out better.

Edited June 27, 2017 by Jimbatron

[Gray-Hand]

That timetable is far too optimistic. You won't complete 6 Headhunter missions all in 5 minutes, same with stealing I/E vehicles. Things go wrong on those missions, and at least 20% of the time you will have a time blow out. Particularly now that public solo sessions are difficult to arrange.

 

Having said that, the schedule of activities you have set down is a good one and I'm going to give it a try. I'd add 30 minutes to an hour for the length of time it would take a decent player to get through it all.

Edited June 27, 2017 by Gray-Hand

[Cant-B-Faded]

Two thumbs way up in the air.

[Lonely-Martin]

Fine stuff. This should be helpful to many...

[Jammsbro]

I like that you've laid it all out in a schedule. I am going to do this tomorrow.

 

 

Nice work mate.

[P4DR0N3]

Very well done. Thank you to the author and contributors.

Edited June 28, 2017 by P4DR0N3

[CH14R1]

I would amend that you can use the monitor/AFK trick to convert $75,000 of supplies into nearly 2 complete researched items over 7 hours (while you sleep).

$75k (plus roughly $20,000 in daily utility costs) beats nearly $450,000 in Fast-Tracking. You can't play while you sleep anyway.

But isn't 20k each 48 minutes (a ingame day)? In 7 hours it would sum up 175k + 75k which will cost 250 for 2 researched items. Still cheaper but not that lot. Edited June 28, 2017 by TH14G0

[gtafan26]

Because you took the time to type all that out, I am going to take the time to say, great job, this hopefully should help a lot of new players to the solo side.

 

Three thumps up

[ash-274]

 

I would amend that you can use the monitor/AFK trick to convert $75,000 of supplies into nearly 2 complete researched items over 7 hours (while you sleep).

$75k (plus roughly $20,000 in daily utility costs) beats nearly $450,000 in Fast-Tracking. You can't play while you sleep anyway.

But isn't 20k each 48 minutes (a ingame day)? In 7 hours it would sum up 175k + 75k which will cost 250 for 2 researched items. Still cheaper but not that lot.

 

No. You get charged about $2100 per game day (48 real minutes), depending on how many properties you own and of what type. The Yacht is the biggest drain at $1000 in fees per game day. $100 per garage (excluding the Office and Clubhouse garages), $75 per residential property (excluding Office/MC/Bunker/Yacht spawn points), and $300 for the Assistant.

 

As long as you are monitor-watching AFK while not a member of an organization you won't pay the Bunker staff or your MC-business' staff. Otherwise, you face up to $9400 for the Bunker and the amounts for Biker businesses vary.

 

My $20,000 is an estimate from 7 hours' worth of game-days

[CobraX]

Nice guide. When I do solo work, I do a combination of vehicle import/export/headhunter/sightseer while my bunker staff is fully set to research.

Your calculations on the pacific standard heist are a bit off though. It is still my preferred way of making money in the game. Basically you'll earn this if you're not the host:

- 5 setup rounds x (I believe) $26,130 = $130,650 - $4,000 (skip trip during 1 setup round) = $126,650
- 1 finale (assuming 40/20/20/20) = $250,000
- elite challenge = $100,000

Total: $476,650

Let's say you lose some money by getting hit while carrying the money. That would still give you around $450,000 in about 1 hour, which easily beats any other money making method out there. But yeah, you need 4 (capable) people for that.

[SHADOW OPS]

I only play with friends but nice work. Very informative.

[flexcreator]

Nice tips. Especially about the Fast Track

 

That timetable is far too optimistic. You won't complete 6 Headhunter missions all in 5 minutes, same with stealing I/E vehicles.

 

Well, most of the Headhunter missions can be completed in LESS than 5 minutes, so you can consider 5 as an average. Personally, I complete all my Headhunter jobs in the city under 3 minutes (the desert takes longer time, but still... 5 minutes is more than enough if you have an air vehicle).

 

Stealing vehicles is more inconsistent, but again some of the sourcing jobs can be completed in less than 5 minutes (especially, if you are a Cargobob user)

 

You should buy supplies for biker businesses and gunrunning, rather than steal them!

Why is this? The first thing you need to ask, are the supplies worth the 75k it costs to buy them? Firstly, all the businesses produce more value in product than that when upgrades and sold far, so you will be in the black – but why not steal them and make even more I can hear people ask? Well, the question becomes how long does it take you to steal them? If you are on your own and can only carry one crate back it can be time consuming. Then consider that every 20 minutes you can sell a high end vehicle for, as it happens, an expected 75k (as described above). So, unless you can steal all the supplies in under 20 minutes, you are better off using the time to sell a high end I/E vehicle and use the proceeds to buy supplies. This may change if you had other players to help you.

 

I would agree on Coke, but disagree on Gunrunning. In my experience the Gunrunning stealing missions are more easier than the MC ones (except maybe the Merryweather HQ)

 

For example, take a look at this picture:

 

 

 

 

 

 

In this case I was able to deliver supplies even before alerting other players. The whole job took less than two minutes. I'm pretty sure similar results can be achieved using a Buzzard (you can still catch supplies in the air).

 

Even ift the crate is dropped - no big deal, just land on it and take off (similar as with Special Cargo)

 

The ground stealing missions are also easy to complete, since

1) You can use Cargobob for a Van

2) You can use Cargobob for a Tank (yes, It can be done solo)

3) Other vehicles are too heavy to be lifted (Insurgent and APC; Technical is impossible to lift using a Cargobob - I've tested) but pretty fast on the ground.

4) Some of the missions are very close to the bunker (if it's located in the Senora desert, of course)

[GTAnger]

I still spam the heist finale glitch with buzzard which gives me an easy 2.5mil per hour.

 

0/70/15/15 cuts...

 

But I've also got heroin/coke/weed and weapons all on the side.

[Len Dogg 666]

Nice, this model also can be expanded to group activities. I have at least 4 highly reliable players who are on most of the time I play, I increase th I/E sales to 4 a time and have the MC Coke Buisness and Gunrunning Bunker active, profits are healthy to say the least.

[Jimbatron]

Thanks for the positive feedback guys, I hope this is helpful to many.

 

That timetable is far too optimistic. You won't complete 6 Headhunter missions all in 5 minutes, same with stealing I/E vehicles. Things go wrong on those missions, and at least 20% of the time you will have a time blow out. Particularly now that public solo sessions are difficult to arrange.

Having said that, the schedule of activities you have set down is a good one and I'm going to give it a try. I'd add 30 minutes to an hour for the length of time it would take a decent player to get through it all.

 

This does depend on the player, however a few things. There is some slack in the schedule if you can steal and sell and I/E car for 5 minutes each way, you actually have 10 minutes to complete Headhunter. Or you can do Sightseer for similar money (although my average time is better for Headhunter).

 

Tips for Headhunter:

1) As flexcreator below has shown, it can be done in 1 minute with a jet (! although my best is a little under 2), and that is the best vehicle simply due to the speed you can reach each target.

2) With a jet, get good with the cannons as you can blow the armoured vehicles up in one pass. Flying in hover mode when you reach the target may make this easier to begin with.

3) If you don't have a jet, then a savage is the next best option for missile reload time, failing that the buzzard

4) If you are not good with the cannons, do not fire you missiles at the armoured vehicles as soon as you get a lock-on. Wait until it stops at a junction, then fire. While you'll wait maybe a few seconds more, you will then score a direct hit, two of which will disable the vehicle. Otherwise, if it's moving the vehicle will take only splash damage and speed up - and you'll probably waste a minute chasing it.

5) Don't, whatever you do, kill the police. 2 stars in an aerial vehicle you can pretty much ignore. 3 is a pain, helicopters are a distraction you don't need.

 

Following this, even using a buzzard for spawn convenience if I can't get to a jet delivery location quickly, it never takes me more than three minutes.

 

Nice guide.

Your calculations on the pacific standard heist are a bit off though.

 

That's fair especially if you can do the Elite Challenge every time (as I imagine people who complete for the Leaderboards, can do the basic time in their sleep). Although I've done the Elite Challenge myself for the t-shirt, I've never had 3 friends online who can do it in a chilled out session - it's one we have to be a bit psyched up for as we don't attempt the elite time regularly enough! I'd imagine the majority of players might find this tricky - if you can do it though, it's a winner all the way.

 

I would agree on Coke, but disagree on Gunrunning. In my experience the Gunrunning stealing missions are more easier than the MC ones (except maybe the Merryweather HQ)

 

Indeed. Gunrunning supplies are definitely quicker, if only for the CEO's ability to call a buzzard on the spot. But then it depends on the player. If you can steal a full supply bar quicker than you can do an I/E sale and deliver, then absolutely you should not buy them. I have smoke tree road bunker, and a couple of the missions (trucks and helicopters) that spawn near, I can do in under two minutes (ignoring the FMV or technical spawned and using one of my Pegasus air vehicles). However, my own average was around 25 minutes to fill it because some of the missions take longer. This said, while the above routine is my starting point, I do deviate from it some times to sacrifice a few dollars per hour just to break up the monotony! And the new supply missions I think are quite good.

 

Also as some people have said they don't play on their own, I suspect with just two people the majority will find it quicker and more economical to steal the supplies - I certainly would.

 

But what I would encourage on anyone, is to think "can I do an I/E steal and delivery faster than I can steal a full supply bar". The answer depends on the player, but there's no definitive argument that buying or stealing is universal better. The right approach is to consider whether you can earn the 75k through another method faster than you steal them. I/E is a good benchmark for me because it's about the same money, easy and consistent to pull off.

Edited June 28, 2017 by Jimbatron

[Hécate-II]

Nice tips. Especially about the Fast Track

 

That timetable is far too optimistic. You won't complete 6 Headhunter missions all in 5 minutes, same with stealing I/E vehicles.

 

Well, most of the Headhunter missions can be completed in LESS than 5 minutes, so you can consider 5 as an average. Personally, I complete all my Headhunter jobs in the city under 3 minutes (the desert takes longer time, but still... 5 minutes is more than enough if you have an air vehicle).

 

Stealing vehicles is more inconsistent, but again some of the sourcing jobs can be completed in less than 5 minutes (especially, if you are a Cargobob user)

 

 

 

I would agree on Coke, but disagree on Gunrunning. In my experience the Gunrunning stealing missions are more easier than the MC ones (except maybe the Merryweather HQ)

 

For example, take a look at this picture:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

In this case I was able to deliver supplies even before alerting other players. The whole job took less than two minutes. I'm pretty sure similar results can be achieved using a Buzzard (you can still catch supplies in the air).

 

Even ift the crate is dropped - no big deal, just land on it and take off (similar as with Special Cargo)

 

 

 

Extensively using Savage for pretty everything-actually there is a big discount*(not jet for me):

 

Headhunter can be done in 1.50 to 2min averagely if played in the city.

 

Regarding the GR supplying missions with blow-up-trucks-or-helicos, its max 5 min if you're confronted to the most remote variation(like when trucks spawn in El Burro Heights or near Vespucci), other variations like Calafia or El Gordo can be done 2 or 3 min. Really, sometimes I landed Savage at my bunker, and the signal wasn't even launched, I did the supplying mission in about 1m30secondes or something. Thats when NPC helicos spawn near my bunker.

 

Missions involving vehicles generally takes me about 10min, but I get 30k worth of supplies. Time to reach Water and Power location, blow stuff, get the cargobob to lift the van etc...

 

I'm not suggesting to peoples to buy Savage, but well... 900k currently

 

Edited June 28, 2017 by Hécate-II

[fryday]

is there a way to save the cargobob from despawning, when you do sell missions in I/E?

 

when you take on a buying/stealing car Mission inside the Office ist no Problem, by landing on tghe Roof,

 

but what about the despawning, when you have to enter the car-storage for doing the sell-Mission?

[SlobbishBoozer]

Thanks so much for this, this is gold.

[Hellbendzor]

Hehe... That's a nice grindprocedure for sure... Nice...

[flexcreator]

is there a way to save the cargobob from despawning, when you do sell missions in I/E?

 

Owning it?

It can be randombly blown up sometimes, but in most cases it remains where I left it before entering the vehicle warehouse

[Lonely-Martin]

Nice tips. Especially about the Fast Track

 

That timetable is far too optimistic. You won't complete 6 Headhunter missions all in 5 minutes, same with stealing I/E vehicles.

 

Well, most of the Headhunter missions can be completed in LESS than 5 minutes, so you can consider 5 as an average. Personally, I complete all my Headhunter jobs in the city under 3 minutes (the desert takes longer time, but still... 5 minutes is more than enough if you have an air vehicle).

 

Stealing vehicles is more inconsistent, but again some of the sourcing jobs can be completed in less than 5 minutes (especially, if you are a Cargobob user)

 

You should buy supplies for biker businesses and gunrunning, rather than steal them!

 

Why is this? The first thing you need to ask, are the supplies worth the 75k it costs to buy them? Firstly, all the businesses produce more value in product than that when upgrades and sold far, so you will be in the black – but why not steal them and make even more I can hear people ask? Well, the question becomes how long does it take you to steal them? If you are on your own and can only carry one crate back it can be time consuming. Then consider that every 20 minutes you can sell a high end vehicle for, as it happens, an expected 75k (as described above). So, unless you can steal all the supplies in under 20 minutes, you are better off using the time to sell a high end I/E vehicle and use the proceeds to buy supplies. This may change if you had other players to help you.

 

I would agree on Coke, but disagree on Gunrunning. In my experience the Gunrunning stealing missions are more easier than the MC ones (except maybe the Merryweather HQ)

 

For example, take a look at this picture:

 

 

 

 

 

 

In this case I was able to deliver supplies even before alerting other players. The whole job took less than two minutes. I'm pretty sure similar results can be achieved using a Buzzard (you can still catch supplies in the air).

 

Even ift the crate is dropped - no big deal, just land on it and take off (similar as with Special Cargo)

 

The ground stealing missions are also easy to complete, since

1) You can use Cargobob for a Van

2) You can use Cargobob for a Tank (yes, It can be done solo)

3) Other vehicles are too heavy to be lifted (Insurgent and APC; Technical is impossible to lift using a Cargobob - I've tested) but pretty fast on the ground.

4) Some of the missions are very close to the bunker (if it's located in the Senora desert, of course)

I agree with all of this dude... And for me too now, the MC businesses are just a doddle now, naturally, after many runs of each job, but a Buzzard.Hydra and knowledge, after a while players will find themselves running these things quicker and quicker to the point, like you showed in the picture, with all that and some confidence in the game, map knowledge, it just gets easier, quicker, and then people look to rally maximise revenue... Of course, the drive in a slower van can halt the time a little, but the solo packages in a heli soon see the average times even out...

 

Yeah man, this thread, coming so quickly has an awful lot of good stuff here for new AND experienced players to use as a guide/starting point... Not just for gunrunning too...

[Rafae]

Sometimes even with Headhunter between car source/sales it's still not enough to bypass the cool down timer completely

 

I would say add a crate run in between not just out of a profitability standpoint but to help pass the timer quicker and have some crates to sell afterwards for even a bigger profit. The cost of buying three crates offset by doing Headhunter of course.

 

Basically the exact schedule you listed after buying coke and bunker supplies but before Headhunter, squeeze one three crate run and then Headhunter right after before the source and sell. If you repeat this after selling every car (20 min cool down timer between selling each car which starts as soon as the export mission initiates, so realistically you'll have 15 minutes before selling the next car) then you'll be able to finish sourcing the next car at nearly the same time the cool down timer is up.

 

Doing only Headhunters between selling and sourcing won't bypass the timer quick enough as you'll be left with ~5 mins after the sell, Headhunter and then source. Each one takes about 5 mins respectively, adding up to 15 mins and leaving you with 5 before selling the next car. This is where a crate run may come in useful/handy. Other than that, I fully agree with your methods as I've been doing nearly the same, just with meth on the side too.

[Jo1{er]

Excellent article. Ive fast tracked all unlocks just because I had the money. Most players have a hard time understanding buy supplies over stealing them. Thats the pay dirt of your post. And as far as legit game play....I/E cars is where its at. 800k in 2.5 hours is about what I make. I figure 45 days Im back where I was before buying gunnrunning.

 

Excellect post!

[Skeve613]

That timetable is far too optimistic. You won't complete 6 Headhunter missions all in 5 minutes, same with stealing I/E vehicles. Things go wrong on those missions, and at least 20% of the time you will have a time blow out. Particularly now that public solo sessions are difficult to arrange.

 

Having said that, the schedule of activities you have set down is a good one and I'm going to give it a try. I'd add 30 minutes to an hour for the length of time it would take a decent player to get through it all.

 

I usually average around 3 min per Headhunter, in the city at least, so in my experience my time saved on average makes up for the inevitable occasional time where I accidentally crash the Buzzard/Hydra - of course, a crash also costs more time if it was in the CEO Buzzard, because this means you can't call it in instantly, whereas crashing a Pegasus one lets you call the CEO one in right next to you and keep going, losing only a minute or so at most.

 

For I/E on the other hand, I absolutely agree, because unlike HH there are far more possible variations on the mission, and some of them are very easy while some are quite difficult and/or time consuming. I'd be interested to see any data that has been collected on what the average time to complete I/E missions in general is, since I'd expect some sizable variance but would also expect the shorter and longer missions to balance each other out in the overall picture.

[CobraX]

Nice guide.

 

Your calculations on the pacific standard heist are a bit off though.

 

That's fair especially if you can do the Elite Challenge every time (as I imagine people who complete for the Leaderboards, can do the basic time in their sleep). Although I've done the Elite Challenge myself for the t-shirt, I've never had 3 friends online who can do it in a chilled out session - it's one we have to be a bit psyched up for as we don't attempt the elite time regularly enough! I'd imagine the majority of players might find this tricky - if you can do it though, it's a winner all the way.

 

If you have 4 people who are experienced and who all stick to the plan, getting elite is actually pretty easy. The actual total payout almost never drops below $1,200,000 when I do the Pacific Standard heist with a few friends, which earns me at least $466,650. On top of that I find that doing the Pacific Standard heist over and over again feels less like grinding than doing vehicle import/export and headhunter/sightseer over and over again (read: time goes by faster).

Edited June 28, 2017 by CobraX

[LucasMolina99]

Which is the top to have just 1 vehicle when selling? Is it measure in crates or in money? How do I know how many crates I have

Which is the top to have just 1 vehicle when selling? Is it measure in crates or in money? How do I know how many crates I have

[ash-274]

Which is the top to have just 1 vehicle when selling?

Is it measure in crates or in money?

How do I know how many crates I have

Some say that if it shows you have $175,000 then you're safe for only one vehicle, but I would suggest lower, to be safe. I was selling when the inventory hit $133,000 but I'm pressing higher lately just to try and reduce the number of sales missions I have to make.

 

It's measured in money, specifically the short-distance selling price. Sell for the long-distance price for 50% more cash, assuming the longer drive in the same amount of time isn't a problem for you considering how hostile the lobby is and how far your bunker is from southern points in the city.

 

You can go over to that part of your bunker and look, but it really doesn't matter and the game doesn't show it in units of product you currently possess. They do give you the (useless) stat of how many units you've produced from the beginning. The number of "crates" in your bunker also doesn't correspond to what vehicle you will get to deliver or what it will look like in the vehicle.