Charted jump routes (charted both ways) generate a flat, what was it 100k payment (I'm at work -no books). I would say the owner of the ship who bears the burden of loss gets the lion share. Crew get 1% (I'm basing that off similar numbers from admiralty courts condemning contraband or confiscating a ship) so each crewman gets 10k (of course AD says they only get 1/2 of that due to cost of living expenses and taxes and etc).  So if the chart 5-6 routes on their expedition they'll walk away with 25k to 60k depending on whether the GM is a stickler for cost of living rule

What would the reward for having surveyed a whole system be? How much work is that? An environmentalist can analyze an ecosystem in 100 IIRC. Make the navigator/astronomer spend 100 hours to analyze the system and produce a report? What constitutes an adequate survey?

Astrographic survey of the system: X%

Ecosystem analysis of 1 ecosystem on habitable (up to 3 possible) Y%

Asteroid samples Z%

Orbital maps and scans of planetary bodies W%

If their survey percentage adds up to 100% or more the get 100k if less then they get that percentage of 100k.

Bonus for finding sapient species

Bonus for laying ground work for friendly trade relations

Maybe for this activity the crew/survey team get more of the award although the ship owner should still get a big chunk.

Just to be clear, a small recon team of mostly scientists is supposed to make first contact with a new species and establish trade relations with them for a "bonus"? 

When do they learn the language and culture enough to determine what will make a good trade deal?

Where do the keep all the trade goods they will be trading or at least using as examples to trade with?

Are they doing a secret deal with the leadership or elites and not destroying the culture of the world when they find out they are not alone?

What does the UPF think of lone megacorps exploiting new races and signing trade deals with them excluding everyone else including the UPF?

If you are a megacorp are you really going to trust a "contracted" team to do everything in your best interest instead of a dedicated team of your own employees who can spend time analyzing the reports from the recon team and going in fully prepared for the long term negotiations it would take to open up trade with a new race?

In the other game I am poking at... (Star Probe) the exploration ship is granted $ from backers to explore, and over the course of the game based on what happens will make & loose money, there is even a financial review due every 3 years IIRC. Now this is for a huge ship more or less doing the Star Trek thing with a huge crew that has the needed specialists on board to do it all.

On a smaller scale I would think goals would be more modest. There would probably be a Primary Goal but with a few lesser ones. So maybe the Primary is simply maping a safe route, or securing a faster route (so sort of safe passage deal for the company), it could be finding minerals or a specific mineral, find civilizations the specialists might be able to open trade with, find planets that are good for colonization, look for Sathar, look for pirates, look for a missing ship, and so on. Note I am not saying the crew of the ship needs to do everything... just find, get in, get out, don’t make waves, stake first right claims for the contracting party with authorities. 

Once the government, the investors, or Mega Corp have their “rights” secured than that party would send appropriate forces to do what ever and the contracted crew would have fulfilled their contract which probably is enough cash to keep them “prospecting” but not enough to normally get rich. Wild Cat operations would be the crew working without a contract and thus no back up and hopefully finding something they can sell. So the Wild Cat groups are running a bigger risk hoping for a bigger pay out.

Having someone backing your activities should have some perks... one backers probably have a clue in general where your going, so if you send a distress call I think the Ref should take into account that help will be forth coming but added to the expeditions bill... Wild Cat folks are doing it all alone, no one is listening for them, expecting a check in and so on... so help might never come or if it does could be way late and might cause the Wild Cat operation to loose claims of ownership or might not be help at all.

Privateers VS Pirates is sort of similar... in reality these guys do the same thing, pillage, plunder, kill for profit specific targets but one has legal backing and protection from an entity capable of offering protection in certain locals where as the other label has no such protections... basically all the targets call their attackers Pirates while backing their own Privateers and Official Security. Basically who has safe port and passage where versus none. A sort of grey area, but any Privateer can become Pirates by everyone’s standards if they do not follow the rules or contract they operate under. Thus a Privateer ship will get assistance from it’s backers but a true Pirate ship is it’s own thing and has no such backing except what it creates, thus Pirate Fleets which traditionally arise when there are no more sanctioned jobs for Privateer ships. Note Privateers often seem to get a cut of the loot and ships they seize aka salvage rights to sell or keep ships or weapons, this way they can build a fleet to harass whom ever their employer wants, ships generally get renamed. 

How Earth was colonized and explored by various parties in the past is a real good example of what would occur in space. 

Which brings us to “the flag” issue or staking a claim. Generally once powerful anyone’s discovers there is something of interest in location X they start considering how to gain control of or access to location X. There are a variety of ways this is achieved but one major one as we all know is sending someone out there and just claiming the place as theirs even if someone is already there. Thus I am pretty sure this pattern would repeat. So in my mind besides paperwork, contracts and so on... there would be a physical thing left or done to a location that would give ownership rights to a company and government regardless of what the natives think. Space Flag/Claim Stake device.

I agree in principal with you. They should be using probes, drones, long range scanners, space based telescopes and other scanning devices. But the lore mentions all the ships and crews lost while exploring the Frontier. Maybe it is a cultural thing to like boldly go where no Yazirian has ever gone before.

Of course they could use all the technology at their disposal but you still send live beings at some point and space is still pretty dangerous.

I agree with that explanation totally. BUT I have another one.

The above explanation works in a unified cohesive Frontier where all are working for the greater good.

We ain't got that comrade.

In an ultra competitive Frontier with Megacorps, bigcorps, smallcorps, corps and various planetary governments and independent parties are all vying for a very limited resource, livable planets. Great rewards do not come without great risks. Of course a Megacorp would never cut corners on the rumor another Megacorp was about to scoop them.

Think of the California Gold Rush. Thousands came on the rumor of finding a huge strike. We will never know how many died alone and in groups seeking gold in out of the way places others were not looking we will never know. 

The difference is less than you think. First other beings had already found habitable planets so they know they are out there. Next the area they were going to is untamed wilderness. Most of these people did not know much about living on the American Frontier. Yes other people were there but only if you went to the mining camps. We are discussing those who went out into the wilderness looking for new areas to dig. 

We have agreed they would go into areas that some unwomanned probes had already explored but the gold miners did not have unwomanned probes. They just struck out into the wild.

Then there is another thought I had that explains the lost ships, why no one can get home and so on... when we look at the Frontier map it is plane 0 very 2D, we got clouds all around it, very much expanded in Zebs pretty color version. What if there are space clouds above and below not shown on the map for visual clarity reasons... what if the Frontier is basically a bubble of clear space... just a thought.

I think long range space probes are a very good idea... and depending on type can really add to the game.