How to Jump Freight

Jump Freighting is the art of using a Jump Freighter to move items from place to place.

The minimum requirements to participate in Jump Freighting are:

• A character capable of piloting a Jump Freighter (Jump Drive Calibration IV minimum, V highly reccomended - Jump Fuel Conservation IV minimum)
• A Jump Freighter of your choice
• Access to a character capable of lighting an Industrial Cynosural Field - AKA a Cyno Alt
• A ship capable of lighting an Industrial Cyno
  • Never ever jump to a cyno beacon, many beacons are bubblefucked and set to public ACL access. It may be tempting, but do not cut corners. This is the #1 rule people get lazy and break: instead of using a cyno alt, they use a beacon to cut corners, and they die.
  • Characters with at least Cynosural Field Theory IV can opt to use a Venture with cargo rigs (Small Cargohold Optimization I) and modules (Expanded Cargohold II); Ventures are far easier and cheaper to replace than industrials.

Consider what you need to achieve with your Jump Freighter. Rhea uses the most fuel, but has the highest possible capacity. Nomad has the least EHP and capacity, but is the fastest and most agile. Anshar has the most EHP. Ark uses the cheapest fuel. You can check the live fuel prices here.

Your Jump Freighter pilot should be located within a PAC, one that is not within the PAC alliance. Being in a PAC gives your alt access to most TEST Alliance owned Citadels and Stations, and lets you avoid wars towards TEST and the PAC Alliance.

Even if you think you have access to a citadel/station that you haven't docked at before (or in an extended period of time), always check by attempting to dock using a cheap, expendable, ship first from a character in the same corp as your JF pilot. The citadel/station may not be configured correctly, and may not include all PACs. (Can you search for the citadel on your JF alt - check if you have access?) Always confirm this docking ability ahead of time, even if it is a blue citadel. A hostile does NOT have to be in the target local to kill you. This is especially true if you have a predictable set “route” or if they have a blue spy to watch you jump in.

It is important to note, your PAC is not going to be blue to our Allies.

Cyno alts can be in TEST, in your PAC, or a mix. This depends on what you find most convenient.

The first thing you need to do when Jump Freighting is plan your route. You will want to keep your route TO trade hubs reasonably private. This will reduce the chance of spies intercepting or interfering with you on your route. When using citadels, your route into nullsec doesn't need to be quite as opsec. You're most vulnerable when moving from lowsec to the trade hubs.

Use Dotlan's Jump Planner to work out possible routes.

An example route is as follows:

Amarr > Tastela > MH9C-S > V-3YG7

At each point in this route you will need to be able to light a cyno or have access to a friendly one and a citadel/station to dock in (Citadels are massively preferred due to the ability to tether). Note, this does not include Amarr as it is a high security system, this means you will be able to jump OUT of Amarr to Tastela, but not back to it. Cynosural fields cannot be lit in high-security space. As such, you will have to gate your Jump Freighter between the two systems. NEVER gate through low/nullsec systems in a Jump Freighter, and do your best to avoid risky highsec systems. The only gate jumps you need to take are into highsec.

Know How to Light a Cyno and generally How to Move a Capital Ship. This is *much* easier with citadels, but you should know how to light on a station if needed.

Note - Jumping to a cyno on a citadel will not immediately tether you to the citadel, and you are blocked from tether for 25 seconds after exiting invulnerability. Immediately docking is the only option to remain safe.

Use only TEST citadels. There are plenty of “freeport” citadels that hunt capitals. They can have an app that send them a text message when someone lights a cyno in their system. They log on, wait for you to jump, and then revoke your access.

Never, never, never use a beacon. Industrials are cheap. JFs are not.

There's a timing attack where a hostile fleet invite window will overwrite your own self fleet invite. Generally this is done on the undock, but there are other methods of timing.

To avoid these, join fleet *before* you undock. Always move the fleet invite window away from the center and *then* check the FC name. Any new invites will pop up in the center of the screen - they will not overwrite your existing window.

Moving from high to Nullsec is generally the safest leg of the trip, as, in theory, you should never leave tether range of a citadel throughout.

The process is as follows:

1. Ensure your Jump Freighter pilot is in fleet with your cyno alts. Add your cyno alt to your watchlist.
2. Undock your Cyno Alt and move it to your cyno position.
3. Undock your Jump Freighter.
4. Light the cynosural field, then right click the cyno character on your watchlist and select “Jump To”.
5. When your Jump Freighter has landed on grid with the target citadel/station, dock as soon as you are able. You can dock at Upwell structures immediately before your session change timer has ended. (Keeping in mind the tether issue mentioned above for citadels).

Returning to High Sec can be more dangerous than High to Null, as generally you will have to gate your Jump Freighter from a lowsec midpoint to your High Sec destination. This exposes your slow, untanked Jump Freighter to potential gankers.

To avoid danger, the following precautions can be taken:

• Fit Reinforced Bulkheads to increase tank and Inertial Stabilizers to reduce align time, this gives gankers less time to engage
• Carry less than ~1 Billion ISK when moving high volume items. The less you carry, the better. A 9 billion ISK jump freighter is already a tempting killmail. Don't be afraid to use high-sec freight services.
• Never autopilot. Autopilot drops you off 10km from the gate, leaving you to burn slowly.
• Have a Cyno alt at the ready within range of your route so you can jump to it in an emergency (such as finding 20 catalysts waiting while you hold your gate cloak).

• Amarr: Ark (275,625 m³ )
• Caldari: Rhea (294,375 m³ )
• Gallente: Anshar (281,250 m³ )
• Minmatar: Nomad (270,000 m³ )

Since you need freighter IV to fly a Jump Freighter and they get 5% cargo per freighter level, the numbers are actually:

• Amarr: Ark (330,750 m³ )
• Caldari: Rhea (353,250 m³ )
• Gallente: Anshar (337,500 m³ )
• Minmatar: Nomad (324,000 m³ )

Running a jump freighter is not dangerous when you follow the rules. If you break the rules, you will eventually die. Follow them and you will live forever.

1. Always jump from friendly citadel to friendly citadel when in 0.0 or low-sec. Do not use mid-point locations that are not a citadel. Either cyno from a high-sec station directly to a null/low friendly citadel, from a null-sec friendly citadel to a low-sec friendly citadel, or between null-sec blue citadels.
2. Scout ahead. Always scout the 0.5, 0.6, etc. high-sec systems when carrying big cargo, too. If there is a big suicide gank fleet full of hurricanes waiting, you should probably not jump through.
3. Always prescout citadels. You must make fucking sure there aren't bad guys at a friendly citadel. Jump Freighters are invincible when jumping between systems, but only if the pilot is paying attention.
4. Make a good cynosural spot bookmark. The spot needs to be located so that you are sure a jump freighter that cynos in will not bounce the citadel model and be ejected into space. Give some space between your cyno boat and the citadel in question.
5. Very important: when going back to highsec, always set your waypoint for the destination high-sec system and turn on autopilot as you are mid-warp to the gate. That way if you lag and bounce off your exit gate (or tab out of EVE) your autopilot will save you. It's insurance against laziness and accidentally bumping off the stargate.
6. Never fly a TEST character into high-sec, even if it is just a single jump. Always swap the ship to a high-sec character in the low-sec citadel. It's really cumbersome, but if you don't want to die these are the things you do.
7. Double-wrap your cargo. Place your freight inside a container, then inside a courier contract to your hauling character. Cargo scanners are unable to view into the container.
8. Other Tips
   1. ORE Expanded Cargoholds are necessary for reaching the desired high capacity of a Jump Freighter. While Expanded Cargohold II is acceptable, faction expanders are highly favorable to push out the desired performance from your Jump Freighter.
   2. Use Jump Drive Economizers to reduce fuel consumption when carrying small loads. Experimental Jump Drive Economizers are the most common and cost-efficient.
   3. Some stations are terrible for jump freighting (such as Sansha stations); there may be barely any room for a cyno, or the undock is immediately out of docking range (“Kickout stations”). Avoid them at all costs, and use Citadels whenever possible.

• If flown correctly, the jump freighter should never be in a situation in null-sec or low-sec that doesnt let it immediately dock or jump.
• Never align toward a highsec gate if someone is flying at you or acting threateningly.
• When leaving Jita and carrying something valuable, jump directly out to a low-sec system rather than using any gates (if possible).
• Cyno chains: You need alts and lots of them. Cyno characters take about seven days to train. Position as many cyno characters as required at each step in the trip and light them as soon as your jump freighter can to jump to the next position.
  • Freighters, Industrials, and Jump Freighters all receive a 90% reduction in effective Jump Fatigue calculation range. This results in favorably low red timers and enables jump freighters to continuously jump without accruing a large red timer.
• Generally, you should always be docked, in dock range, or in warp to a gate or citadel.
• Add your cyno character to watchlist and jump from rightclicking them, not your ship or capacitor's “Jump To” box. Many a goon has lost a titan jumping to bait beacons.