*sigh* This has been frustrating almost from day one. I see people who have reset not too long ago and are already back up to the 1000s *coughBinaryMancough*

Clearly, I don't want to rank that fast, but I still have a few issues with it. Any suggestions?

Sign up for a few plastics and go into debt so you can be uber on GL, well worth it imo

So you're saying that there is no real "fast" method, other than GP spending? I refuse to believe that

Naturally, not as quickly as those who spend GP, but there must be a good system

Short Version: High Energy High Attack and farm NPCs. Try talking to Binary Man or BobdeBower. They can give you some good advice for a long term SUCCESSFUL speed rank strategy.

Or just follow Binary Man's guide to making C artifact planets from gases...
And then making them impossible to scan... That'll get you the amount of AP you need to draw all the RP needed to quickly become a high energy high attack build...
I'm still personally 1k energy away from the golden 10 energy/level minimum.... And I'm probably no where near the attack.

Can I have a link to that?

BinaryMan has an advantage that you don't. He was able to transfer most of his artifacts and credits and a lot of good planets over when he reset. So, he had a lot of resources when he started at rank 1 that nobody else ever had. Even with all that he still cannabilizes his C artifact planets (by cannabilize, I mean he sells them for artifacts so he can continue to kill npcs at a crazy rate to build more planets to sell so he can buy more artifacts and so on. When talking to him, I've said that I think it's a bad idea of selling his best resources. If I were him, I would of slowed down my npc killing to match the artifact consumption. But, I don't think he likes inactivity.)

I'm curious what rank are you?

My general advice for you to rank faster would be:
Dump as much rank points into engineers as possible (A lot of people don't make effective use of deck space. You don't always need to have everything installed all the time).
Keep your upkeep as low as possible. (Just because you've unlocked a module doesn't mean you have to install it. ) Use the credits you save to colonize more "good" planets. No point in ranking up if you have more than 10 empty planet spots.
Switch to vygold or taitherian excavator. At first it will slow down how quickly you rank up, but later on the extra hull/shield, defense,repair bots and prisoners will allow you to rank faster (and you can sell off some of the other artifacts to buy more of what you need.