Empire Rank progression

--- How to gain ranks in the Empire ---

The Empire ranks are as follow, from lowest to highest.

Outsider
Serf
Master
Squire
Knight
Lord
Baron
Viscount
Count
Earl

As far as I know, you'll need to be at least Baron before you can purchase the Imperial Clipper. Some people claim they were able to purchase it at rank Master while being Allied with the station they bought it from but I can't confirm this.

Alright, let's do this.
A good way to start is to load you ship with rares/commodities or cartographic data then head to Mephifa and sell everything to the Happis station for a nice boost in influence with Empire Assembly. This step is optional but you'll still want to reach friendly status with the Empire Assembly as soon as possible to get a wider choice of missions.

Now that you reached Mephifa, go to any station and look for transport/delivery missions that involve going to Coastakal, Alacagui, Nu or Pai Dhul. If you need money, you can also take the illegal recovery missions but they can take a bit longer to complete. Influence gain missions are also a good way to progress if the commodities you need aren't too far and you got the money.
Every time you land at a station, check the bulletin board for missions between these few systems, permits or rank progression missions.
You should get a rank up mission each 5 to 10 normal missions completed.


--- Quick tips for Rank Progression missions ---

-One of the rank missions will ask you to find and deliver Combat stabilizers, this shit is super rare but luckily, the system that sells those is CD-51 102 and it shouldn't be more than 2-4 jumps from where you are.
-The rank missions to become Squire is an assassination mission, by the time you get it, you should have unlocked the permit to Achenar so head there if you need to strap some good guns to your ship or build a combat vessel, you might as well check the stations there for easy missions. The target you have to hunt is an Imperial Clipper which is pretty weak but can still put up a fight against people who aren't used to combat. To find him, head to the right system and drop in every Unidentified Signal Source you find until you encounter the target.
-Once you're done with this mission, don't sell your guns yet as the next one will involve killing pirates in a specific system. Pretty straightforward, head to the system in question, drop in Unidentified Signal Sources or wait at the Nav Beacon and start killing. You might want to equip a Kill Warrant Scanner if fighting in a system with no allegiance or government.
-The mission to Baron is to deliver 2T of Grain so you'll know you're done when you get that one.

Good luck