Gaining faction standings fast
This guide explains how to quickly gain faction standings without (or at least less) the need for endless mission grinding. While this guide uses Minmatar standings as an example, the method describes here works for all factions. This guide will be particulary useful for pilots wishing to join Factional Warfare, which requires 0.5 faction standing.
COSMOS
COSMOS missions are special missions you can only do once. They are geared towards faction standings. The COSMOS missions can be found in:
- Amarr
- High Security - Araz constellation
- Low Security - Kenobanala System
- Caldari - High Security - Okkelen constellation
- Gallente - High Security - Algintal constellation
- Minmatar
- High Security - Ani constellation
- Low Security - Audesder System
Go to Nakugard, warp to 'The Glass Edge' Beacon and talk to Kraimir Mork. The other agents are level 2 and level 3 and not accessible. Mr Mork will give you the mission Gladiators - Breathing Space (1 of 2). This is a courier mission: simply bring him 150 units of oxygen. This will cost you around 25K isk from the tradehub next door. Keep in mind that it'll take 150m3 and you'll need a ship bigger than a noobship.
After completing the courier mission you'll receive part two of the chain, which involves killing some NPC pirates. I was able to do this in a severely underskilled Atron, so it should not be a real problem for any player.
After completing these missions your standings will have increased by around 0.03 points. This seems a little but as faction standings go this is a significant chunk. Now we go to the data center missions!
Data Centers
The Data Center missions are mostly missions where you hand in pirate tags (you can loot these in missions and buy them on the market). Basically, it allows you to convert isk into standing. Remember, you can talk to each agent only once! The Data Centers can be found in:
- Amarr Empire and Ammatar Mandate
- Polfaly
- Kudi
- Ferira
- Caldari State
- Ahtulaima
- Saikanen
- Kamokor
- Gallente Federate
- Abenync
- Muer
- Ekuenbiron
- Minmatar Republic
- Emolgranlan
- Arlulf
- Engosi
The system with most agents is Emolgranlan, which is also closest to Nakugard. First, talk to Rilbedar Tjar. He'll ask you to bring up a Minmatar Graduation Certificate. Do the courier trip. After completing it, you'll receive a 0.36% faction standings increase, and you will be referred to an agent in Eram: Pinala Adala. After this agent, the only missions that remain are the Keeping Crime In Check mission where you turn in pirate tags (Angel Copper Tag for example) in return for standings.
The agent in Eram Pinala Adala, offers you the five part mission chain Shaman Secrets. These are three combat and two courier missions. I was again able to do these in an underskilled Atron (Gallente Frigate). Note that for the fourth mission, you are not given an exact location to go to. Instead, you're supposed to decypher that it should be Eram IV - moon 2, based on hints given this mission and the previous one. You'll also need to shoot the neon sign to get the gate key, and you'll get a side mission which gives 0.1 points of faction standing! Read the Shaman Secrets guide (see below) for more details.
After going through all these steps (the Data Center missions excluded, but COSMOS and the certificate mission included) you should have gained around 0.17 faction standing. You can further increase this by the tag missions, regular missions, or factional warfare. When turning in tags - pay close attention to the price. For example, while copper tags (for the most easily accessible agent) cost 1.5mil each, the bronze tags (for the slightly higher quality agent) only cost around 50K. Selecting the right agent (this MAY take standings with that agent's corp) can save you a lot of ISK.
