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[ConscriptFive]

First off: X3: TC is an epically massive game that's supposed to take months to get anywhere, unless you cheat somehow.  (The Albion Prelude campaign fixed this as it basically rewards you a new ship about every other mission.)

It ultimately comes down to what level of cheating is acceptable to you (via mod or foreknowledge of game quirks).  "Apricot Mapping Service" pretty much exists the mod the game into an unbalanced state.  They also link to the best game guides for the X Series.

http://apricotmappingservice.com/

The question you're specifically asking is about "capping" ships.  Apricotslice's post from 2006 is still the standard on it:
http://forum2.egosoft.com/viewtopic.php?t=136110

His Getting Started Guide is an absolute must read.
http://forum2.egosoft.com/viewtopic.php?p=1407216

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

In a nutshell, once you know where any of the derelict ships are, you're a made man.  That Toucan Hauler is a solid midgame tradeship you can get within your first hour or two of playing the game for essentially free.  I have a feeling they were supposed to be easter eggs, but then again, it almost impossible to get started without relying on them.  Wheter you consider this cheating is up to you.

After that, the community X3 Guide literally covers everything you could possibly want to know about the game (400 page pdf).
http://forum.egosoft.com/viewtopic.php?p=1571302

As for "essential" mods, be careful, because its easy to go overboard and unbalance the game.  At the very minimum though, I strongly recommend a time compression (SETA) mod.  Being able to crank up to triple or quad-digit multiplication time lapse while you're doing a long haul cruise or waiting for market prices to change, is essential to play the game without dying of boredom.  Also a mod/script to more easily tractor beam in containers will save you from some serious rage.  You said you've played X2 already, but a map (image or 3rd party app) is also a good download to have, as the final Superbox gameworld is retardedly huge as each game/expansion in the series just kept expanding the universe.

[Girlinhat]

No, I've played X3 already, just Reunion, and I'm getting into Terran Conflict now.  The map is outragious, yes.  I've considered printing it, actually.

If the custom start doesn't have any plots then that changes everything.  If I can't get a HUB/HQ with custom, then I'll just go with Argon Patron and take my Elite through and cap ships as normal.  Or I might see if I can survive the main Terran campaign.  I don't really like some of it though, just tosses stuff at you for free.  I'm all for earning my own way, just that custom start's two IREs don't really allow for much to make money on...

Although it's entirely worth noting that in Reunion, I got the Bala Gi plot for an HQ.  I never even started it, I was never settled in enough to provide resources, but I was contacted by the Boron during a game on Custom Start.

[10ebbor10]

The terran campaign shouldn't be that difficult. You get back up during most of the missions, and the given ships should be good enough to make it through the mission. It also unlocks the Terran sectors(Sure you can go there whitout permission, but then you got the ATF on your heels) and some others, where you can buy some of the best ships. The terran sectors aren't that interesting however, as they don't allow jumpdrives and the Terran economy is just rubbish(Ie, most of the stations despawn after a short while due to long delivery times).

They are quite nice looking, however. 

[Girlinhat]

Terran sectors also tend to lag me a bit because their stations/ships are always so big and graphically impressive.  Then again, I watched a youtube of someone capping the, what is it, the Deva?  No idea what it is, except that it's massive and I will train my marines endlessly to get it.

So I'll prolly just restart on Terran campaign if I can, sell excess ships, swap to Argon, try and set up some sort of wheat farm near those whiskey guys, and money should roll in from there.

[jhxmt]

For pirating Pirates (sic), you'll tend to have better luck avoiding the whole "get a pilot to bail, pull up alongside, then have it blown to smithereens by a police patrol" issue if you avoid race sectors - Core or Border.  For me this generally ends up meaning somewhere in "Pirate Alley" (south of

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Atreus' Clouds

, although given you know Reunion you'll likely know the place!)

You don't get police patrols through there (unless they're drawn through while chasing something), and military patrols are fairly sparse.  You DO get a lot of pirates, so once you start to get on their bad side this could become an issue...but then, they'll be shooting at YOU, not at their mate's ship you've just emptied out. 

It's possible to cap TSs with a Buster with IREs (although M3s are a good step up to take as soon as you can!).  Get a freight scanner - it lets you see what weapons a ship is carrying/has equipped, and you can use it in Pirate sectors with impunity.

Look for a TS that's not with an escort/in a formation (unless you're confident that you can take them out quickly...which, in an IRE-fitted Buster, is likely to be rare).  Find a solo one.  Check its cargo and weapons - make sure it doesn't have anything too nasty (particularly that would fit in a turret - you're going to be playing with its rear turret, so you don't want that to have anything too meaty in it).  If it's got less shielding than you would expect (e.g. 7mJ instead of 25mJ) then so much the better.  Unshielded, underequipped, solo TSs are what you're after.  Valuable cargo is a bonus.

Get behind the TS, match its speed, and CHECK YOUR SECTOR MAP.  You don't want to be surprised by anything hostile or nasty creeping up on you while you're occupied.  If you've got missiles, work out which warhead(s) will take out its shields.  Hit it with those first.  If you're lucky, it might not even turn hostile at this point.  If it does, never mind, it was going to happen anyway.  If you haven't got missiles, just start hammering it with your IREs.  Hopefully they do more damage than the shield regenerates*.

Then just keep hammering (gently) away at the hull.  If the hull gets down too low, it might be better for you to comm the ship and try to apologise, rather than blow it up.  The 'Pirate' faction does actually have a reputation meter, like the races, but it's not visible.  If that gets down too low, you'll start seeing a lot more 'red' pirates than 'blue' pirates - which then makes capping them more tricky.

ApricotSlice's guide is, as ConscriptFive said, still the watchword to go by.  DelRay's guide (afraid I don't have a link handy) is still also valid, though deals much more with boarding ops rather than capping.

Hope some of that's useful! 

--------
* This is one problem with attacking an 'undershielded' ship - the smaller shields will regenerate faster, percentage-wise.  This only really becomes an issue once you start boarding stuff with marines (e.g. M6s), because you need to keep the shields under a certain percentage value.  Not an issue for capping TSs or smaller ships.

[Girlinhat]

I already know how to cap pirate ships   What I'm not familiar with is traditional piracy, harassing main-nation cargo ships for fun and profit.

[jhxmt]

I already know how to cap pirate ships   What I'm not familiar with is traditional piracy, harassing main-nation cargo ships for fun and profit.

D'oh, that was one hell of a misread on my part, sorry!

Well...uh...at least the "Pirate Alley" part of my post still applies!    Less police interference.

[10ebbor10]

Terran sectors also tend to lag me a bit because their stations/ships are always so big and graphically impressive.  Then again, I watched a youtube of someone capping the, what is it, the Deva?  No idea what it is, except that it's massive and I will train my marines endlessly to get it.

So I'll prolly just restart on Terran campaign if I can, sell excess ships, swap to Argon, try and set up some sort of wheat farm near those whiskey guys, and money should roll in from there.

The Deca, I think.  it's nothing more than a trophy though, it has no real weaponry and is extremely slow.

If you want to go for money, I suggest taking the argon merchant start. It still allows you to do the Terran plot, and you start in a much easier point. The Terran plot involves a lot of flying around. If you manage to complete the Terran campaing, you should be set; You'll have a decent corvette, an M5, M4 and a transport.

[Girlinhat]

By "transport" do you mean "freighter" or "carrier"?

[10ebbor10]

By "transport" do you mean "freighter" or "carrier"?

A freighter. I don't think there are any M1 class starts.

You get a small freighter and thousand credits(Or was it 10.000?). And you start in a sector with plenty of opportunities. It should be easy to make 100 k in a short time. The official manual has an example in 12 runs.

[Girlinhat]

TC adds the TM, military transports that can usually mount 4 fighters, so it wouldn't surprise me a whole great deal if you got one.

[10ebbor10]

TC adds the TM, military transports that can usually mount 4 fighters, so it wouldn't surprise me a whole great deal if you got one.

There are no TM starts. The best start there's is an M3 or an M6 start. The M6 isn't availble from start however, an the M3 starts with you being shot at from all directions.

[Girlinhat]

Anyways, started a Terran start, since it runs a bit better.  Terran stations still seem to cause drag when I look at them.  Regardless though, any good mod suggestions and/or where to get them?  In Reunion I particularly liked Bail Extension to modify bailout rates, Salvage Claim Software that worked like SOS but isn't illegal (because I died SO MANY times in my suit!), Racial Response Fleets so that two little pirate ships wouldn't be able to destroy a whole station, jumpdrive kits for remote installation, and a generic cheat menu, mainly to give myself the salvage software and to deal with small issues.  Like I left it on overnight SETA and came back to find 8 Kha'ak destroyers and some Xenon capitals in Argon Prime.  I did a little cheating to delete some of the Kha'ak clusters because the scouts cause lag.  Also I consider the vanilla ship claiming to be rather flawed, so being able to claim ships while still sitting in my ship just makes sense.

[Shades]

Like I left it on overnight SETA and came back to find 8 Kha'ak destroyers and some Xenon capitals in Argon Prime.

If your going to do this you might want to grab a mod that fixes the terrain economy because otherwise it's likely everything in those systems has shutdown and vanished. The other way is to set a few trader ships with mk iii trade software to sector trade around them and keep them running.

Also I consider the vanilla ship claiming to be rather flawed, so being able to claim ships while still sitting in my ship just makes sense.

The vanilla ship claiming thing is totally broken imo.

[10ebbor10]

These mods are officially supported, and will not register your game as cheating. I think this was included in the X superbox, not sure.