Merchant

Merchant Trade Ratios:
Resources	Ratio
Ore » Hydrogen	2.5 : 1
Ore » Crystal	2.5 : 1.5
Crystal » Hydrogen	1.5 : 1

A Merchant is the fastest and easiest way to exchange resources in the galaxy. He is hired at the Store page. When called, he allows you to trade resources from any one planet. His exchange rates are shown in the table to the right.

Notes

• The Merchant is a one-time use item.
• To use the Merchant, you first purchase his services from the Store. Once you have done that, he will remain with you until you make a trade. You can then trade from any planet you wish. Simply select that planet, then use him.
• The resources will be deposited on the same planet they are traded from. The Merchant will not sell you more resources than you have storage on that planet for, however, so if you are purchasing large amounts, you may need to build up your warehouse or Hydrogen Storage tank first.
• If you hire the Trade merchant to make a trade, and find that you have "too much" already in your warehouse or tank to fit in what you want to buy, but do have the space if it were less full - it's easy. Open a second window and send out a fleet loaded with what you are trying to buy, to make the room needed. Then REFRESH the other window with the trade request, and the trade is still there, but now you have the room. Then make the trade! Then recall the mission. Easy as pie.
• Trades cannot be made on moons.
• Trades can be made on the Hephaestus Class Attack Platform. The Hephaestus behaves as a combination of all three types of storage with a capacity of 1 billion (1,000,000,000) units each. Thus, up to 2.5 billion Ore can be traded for 1 billion Hydro. Again, in order to free up space to make the largest possible trade, excess target resource should be removed temporarily (usually with a harvest mission, as if this were a resource save mission from a planet).