Complete reference to timed missions and modes

The game server uses UTC+0, aka Greenwich Mean Time. I recommend enabling the "Server time" setting in Options > Game to always see it in the hangar.
This guide mostly uses whole hours in the 24-hour system.

I'm using the in-game categories of "contracts" (hourglass) and "tasks" (diamond thingy), or "missions" to refer to both.

For all missions with multiple variants, the variant can be changed by cancelling it. This resets your progress!

Every day at 00, the server refreshes the following:

• Daily x2 bonus (x3 on Mondays) for the first victory in the 3 central modes
  
• Daily purple loot (iridium) for the first victory in all non-conquest modes (visible in Store > Bonuses)
  
• Patrol task (small passive income of credits)
  
• Special bounty contract from the paid Battle Pass (70 GS for 3 victories, available for 30 days)
  
• Diminishing xenochip rewards, see Battle Pass section.

The following regular tasks refresh every 20 hours:

• Two victories: 5 Xeno/Mono
  
• 800 efficiency in two PvP battles while in a squad: 10 Xeno/Mono
  
• Selectable 5/10 Mono tasks for Sector Conquest
  
• Selectable Mono/Xeno/Xeno tasks for Portals
  
• Three random tasks giving 5 xenochips. The 10 xenochip bonus task refreshes immediately.
  
• Three random tasks giving raw ores. Can be rerolled using the X button once every server day (24-hour refresh).

This cycle effectively repeats every 5 days. On average, you can complete these tasks 1.2 times a day.

Random tasks that appear at 00-06-12-18 and last for 24 hours. Very small amount of credits, don't worry about these.

Most of these appear at 3n+1 hours (01-04-07-10-13-16-19-22), with some occasional exceptions. There seems to be some loose cycle, but I haven't documented it yet. All of these last for 6 hours.
Possible rewards:

• Up to 1m credits
  
• Up to 50k XP for the ship you complete it with
  
• Up to 30 raw ores
  
• 2-5 Xeno/Mono (these often appear at the mentioned weird hours and are more difficult)

There are three different Special Operation missions:

• Alien Destroyer (ranks 7-17), 3x purple loot (less if outposts get destroyed!)
  
• Defiler (ranks 10-17), 2x purple loot
  
• Return to Eden (ranks 13-17), 3x purple loot

These rotate on a weekly schedule:

• Monday: Eden
  
• Tuesday: Destroyer
  
• Wednesday: Defiler
  
• Thursday: Eden
  
• Friday: Defiler
  
• Saturday: Destroyer
  
• Sunday: Destroyer > Defiler > Eden > ...

Within each day, the mode is available during the even hours. Raid leaders usually assemble groups in the 5-10 minutes before it starts. The main place for this is the trade chat, look for "co" (Russian abbreviation). Look for other guides on ship builds, in short: Good seed-chips are required for dealing meaningful damage, take a support ship if you want to be useful without a specialized build.

There is a selectable task to win an Operation, which allows you to buy one of three rare resource containers for 100 iridium (once). This refreshes on every odd hour.

The server refresh at 00 has an exploitable bug: If you log in before the refresh and complete the Operation that starts at 00, collecting the purple loot apparently does not "claim" the daily bonus. Then, simply relog and you can get it again! This does not work at the start and end of Sunday, probably due to the special rotation of all three Operations.

The Battle > Missions menu has a 2-hour rotation of PvE missions that you can queue for without a group. Every hour, you may get a 1-hour contract to complete one of these at a certain minimum level, rewarding 5-150 iridium depending on the level. This is random, but all players get the same contracts.

Additionally, there are two rotating synthetic polycrystal tasks (Dangerous: 1 synth for level 30, Deadly: 2 synth for level 60). These last for 20 hours and refresh 9/19 hours after the 20-hour cycle above.

If you can't complete these, look for group leaders in trade chat. Keywords: "ирис" (slang for iridium), "30/60", etc.

Most of the Open Space sectors can be claimed by corporations, giving rare rewards and free warps for corp members. Every star system has a fixed ship rank range (7-9 or 10-17) and a fixed daily time slot (04/13/18/20). You can see these on the sector map with the button in the bottom right.

The special "Shining" system works similarly, but only allows tech tree ships with "esports" modules (anti-P2W). There are eight "portal" sectors which give rewards, but can't be entered normally.

Conquest battles are only available for the first 50 minutes of the hour, after which the sector ownership changes are processed.

Tournaments are not something I'm familiar with, but you can see the conditions in the Battle menu.

Brawls are unusual game modes (including seasonal events), available for 1 hour starting at 01/09/15/17/19/21.

For the last several years, this has been the main release method for new high-rank ships. The format is usually the same:

A chapter runs for 90 days, but only the first stage is available for the first ~45 days. During the second stage, there is a simultaneous bonus chapter with another ship (UMC Archives), and the xenochip rewards from missions are increased. Chapters have 41 stages (30 for UMC Archives), and each stage requires 100 xenochips to buy. The exclusive ship parts and some other rewards can be obtained for free, but most rewards require the paid license (DLC).

Xenochips are obtained from all missions with the icon, as well as some bonus tasks (see 20-hour cycle). The amount of xenochips starts at 25 and rapidly decreases down to 1 for every completed mission (maximum total is about 150 per day). While multiple chapters are available, the reward starts at 50, 41, 33, 25... (total is about 270). Be careful to not complete too many missions at once, as there is a storage limit of 300.

With the last stage of a chapter (41), you unlock containers in the shop that cost 100 xenochips each. These offers remain until the battle pass ends.

These are mostly based on Russian holidays, and last for a few days before/after them. Most come with exclusive achievements and bundles of cosmetics.

• Game's birthday: 1st February
  
• Valentine's Day: 14th February
  
• Defender of the Motherland Day: 23th February
  
• Women's Day: 8th March
  
• April Fool's Day: 1st April (Paper Conflict brawl, Papa Crab available)
  
• Cosmonautics Day: 12th April (Endeavour and Spiral parts available)
  
• Victory Day: 9th May
  
• Knowledge Day: 1st September (many achievements)
  
• Halloween: 31st October (MEM Inquisitor and Black Ghost available)
  
• Christmas / New Year: 24th December - 14th January (Old New Year)