Ok, still new at this, but i've noticed a general fluctuation on the exchange of about 220-250 at the moment for dilithium to cstore points. Now I've got a metric tonne of upgrades i neeed to do my my ship adn way too little dilithium to do it with. If i were to buy dilithium from the cstore, what would be the best time to buy it? I've been told by some friends who play this religiously that the dilithium price plummets on teh exchange during sale periods (People buy cstore points when there's items on sale) and that the price could get as high as 350 dilithium per cstore point. Is this true?

I dont suppose there's a stock market trend thingi for the dilithium exchange anywhere in STO, is there?

Trends are pretty slow in it, generally. It hasn't hit 350 since FTP went live - last time it got up there was the early part of the winter lockbox event. The master keys didn't push it that high, and I don't think it's likely to get there again any time soon. It did get up to 250 for a bit after the master keys came out, but its been going down since.

Watch it tomorrow. With a new C-store item coming out there might be some more demand for points, so prices might jump a bit. It's not a big release, but it is the first shuttle with a transferable special power.

It takes real patience to get the good deals. The Odyssey/Bortas release (hinted for next month) will probably be a bigger jump than the shuttle tomorrow, but the next big surge will probably be the next time they put out a new lockbox, which could be months. You'll have to get in early to get it, too - the surge from the Cardassian boxes subsided within a couple weeks, though its still not quite down to where it was.

I believe if you want to "play the market"; you do it just like Wall Street. If you want C-points... sell high, by low.

If you 'buy' Dilithium when the price is high (250 lets say) and sell it for cryptic points when it is low (like 200 or so) you can gain C-points. Sounds boring and would take weeks.

sell your cpoints when theres a sale going on in the cstore, when its over prices will drop and let you buy cpoints at a much lower cost.

Supply and demand.

Supply of c points increase during hi-sales periods due to players trading Dil for C-points for a partial/full subsidy to buy c-store items.

This temporarily increases the price of c points due to high demand and low supply.

Vice versa for a slow period with no new content releases, oversupply of c points and no one wanting to buy and the exchange rate will drop to the low 200:1 range.

That lull is a good time to invest some dilithium to exchange to cheaper c points. Eventually after a few cycles you should have enough c store points to 'play' the market.

Oh and I find a preliminary investment works - nothing like some capital (say, $10 worth of c points) so you can have some experience as a purchaser and know how it feels like when you want / need to trade dil for more c-points when you are running low on cash. This hands on market experience is crucial for you to develop 'playing' skills

also, the hard cap prices are 50 is a low as it can go, and 500 is the max it can go.