Print

Please login or register.
1 Hour 1 Day 1 Week 1 Month Forever
Login with username, password and session length

[Rez]

IMO, the frigate imbalance is important, but you're right that your fleet shouldn't have performed so badly, particularly if some of the enemy's were (D) or shuttle types.  Don't sell Talons short.  Vulcans are decent in numbers and if those talons weren't getting destroyed rapidly, the DPS would add up.

It is a huge pain to get a custom fleet in vanilla and that makes designing fleets and ships a drag.  That's a big reason I like Uomoz.

snip

I think there's some work on the skill sets in the near future.  Hopefully leadership will have effects on things like morale (good idea!) and combat readiness.  It's a pretty requested thing for leadership to have bonuses to carrier groups and fighters.  Maybe perks for allowing you to become a grand admiral, commanding several separate fleets, or a primary fleet and supporting squadrons.  There's that whole industry skill set to be developed too.  Now that there's a real economy, that sort of work has meaning.

Some of the kinds of interactions you're talking about (a merchant fleet surrendering to a fast pirate fleet) are ready to be done and just need doing.  Basically, the framework is there and is used for (every)things, but Alex has been focused on other stuff.  Designing an economic system is harder than doing some if or else trees for surrendering/exploring/salvaging, after all.  Some mods have delved into that stuff more than vanilla and the system seems to have versatility.

[Girlinhat]

Anyone suggest mods?  Pros and cons and whatnot?

[Aklyon]

Anyone suggest mods?  Pros and cons and whatnot?

Bit hard to do so at the moment, most of what I'd suggest isn't updated yet. I like the Mayorate and Shadowyards a bit, though the Lillith is not particularly durable in AI hands alone and I haven't tried Scy or Citadel. LazyLib updated as well but thats a utility.
Also I tend to get Shadowyards mixed up with Blackrock and wonder why I can't find a Nevermore in whats clearly the wrong station, dang words.
I doubt SS+ will be back for a heck of awhile either, considering how much .65a must have affected it.

[Majestic7]

I do have 2 ships already. A well-rounded destroyer and a regular frigate. I think I'm just going to invest in skills and technologies (if there is any) that makes my ships faster. The other issue is to find pirates that are weaker that my ships... there are either huge fleets or no pirates at all. So I don't really know what to do (same problem for me in every other sandbox too at the beginning )

Money buys you more/better ships (duh) and the best ways to make money are:
1) Watch the news, take food to places with food shortages from habitable planets.
2) Smuggle drugs or other contraband from places with a lot available to places without much at all. Beware - if you deliver large cargoes at once, the chances of there being an investigation finding you guilty later are high.
3) Keep an eye on bounties - both generic bounties and those set for specific fleets.

Salvage gets you very little money, experience is the main gain from fighting. Sometimes, with luck, you might be able to board and take over whole ships. Again, this is worth little money unless you fix them completely, which eats supplies etc. In my opinion, speed is the key to victories. With a fast fleet you can choose where and how to fight. Spend points on navigation and buy tugs if you have slower ships. If you can't find anything you can handle to fight, you can try luring large enemy fleets into engaging other fleets, then pick up the scraps afterwards.

[Flying Dice]

By far the best way to make money is to sell cheaply bought/pirated food to places with shortages, though this can also hurt your reputation.

What I'd recommend is to start off with bounties -- you can take them with 2-3 ships up until around the 100k marker, and they're reliable cash. One way to deal with larger fleets is to first engage with nothing but your own ship, kill and damage as many enemies as possible, and then bug out and retreat before you take hull damage. After that, they'll pursue and you can engage with your other ships and a full load of ammunition.

Once you've got a decently kitted out personal ship and a small fleet (and "has a large fleet" bounties are too risky), pick a faction and start pirating from them. Personally I go after the Church, since they have large trade fleets, small patrols, are enemies of the Tri-Tachs (which means a reputation bonus for hitting their traders in TT space), and are right next door to TT space for you to sell off prizes and loot. Hitting trade fleets isn't always consistent, but it's got the biggest payoffs; I've gotten trade goods worth 150k+ from a single attack. You'll obviously want to pick up an Atlas ASAP to ferry around your loot.

Also, if you're really hard-up for cash, time your approaches to JPs and stations/planets to avoid local patrols, which means a lower risk of being fined/having to evade fines and take the rep hit. Note that paying fines will boost your rep if it's not very high, though.

[Aklyon]

You also want a tug to haul the Atlas around while it hauls everything else and slows down your burnspeed.

[Flying Dice]

Yep. Until you get some points into the skill that increases burn speeds, anyhow. That's one of the nice points of preying on large convoys: they're slow as all get-out.

[rumpel]

Thanks for your advice, guys!

[Blaze]

So I picked up the game awhile ago and I'm hooked.

I've reached level 40, but I'm still using the same old Wolf that I started with, though I swapped the forward beam with a pulse laser. As it stands I've just focused on killing pirates (and there's a lot of them). I haven't touched the other factions so I'm pretty much friendly/cooperative with everyone (except pirates).

I just killed off a pirate attack fleet with several destroyers and that brought me up to 350,000 credits; is it time to upgrade to a destroyer?

I've been able to kill enforcers with just primaries, but I have 4 reaper missiles (Dual singles with 5 in missiles) that practically wreck everything. Occasionally I buy a bomber wing or two if I enter a system with lots of big fleets which I send to banzai enemy capital ships. I end up having to sell or suicide them into fleets since they can't enter hyperspace without a carrier; and there's no way I'm going to drag one of those around.

[jocan2003]

So I picked up the game awhile ago and I'm hooked.

I've reached level 40, but I'm still using the same old Wolf that I started with, though I swapped the forward beam with a pulse laser. As it stands I've just focused on killing pirates (and there's a lot of them). I haven't touched the other factions so I'm pretty much friendly/cooperative with everyone (except pirates).

I just killed off a pirate attack fleet with several destroyers and that brought me up to 350,000 credits; is it time to upgrade to a destroyer?

I've been able to kill enforcers with just primaries, but I have 4 reaper missiles (Dual singles with 5 in missiles) that practically wreck everything. Occasionally I buy a bomber wing or two if I enter a system with lots of big fleets which I send to banzai enemy capital ships. I end up having to sell or suicide them into fleets since they can't enter hyperspace without a carrier; and there's no way I'm going to drag one of those around.

Ever played excellerin? i loved the fact you had your own private station where you could mothball and stash ships. Maybe one day we wil be able to setup station for our own uses.

[Fikes]

Level 40 and no destroyers? Wow. I MIGHT be level 30 and I run around with a cruiser and several destroyers as well as some frigates, one of which has a hanger.

I am trying to keep my max burn at 6. My cruiser can go that fast with my skills and a tug. Tri and Heg love me, but the church hates me.

[Nelia Hawk]

So I picked up the game awhile ago and I'm hooked.

I've reached level 40, but I'm still using the same old Wolf that I started with, though I swapped the forward beam with a pulse laser. As it stands I've just focused on killing pirates (and there's a lot of them). I haven't touched the other factions so I'm pretty much friendly/cooperative with everyone (except pirates).

I just killed off a pirate attack fleet with several destroyers and that brought me up to 350,000 credits; is it time to upgrade to a destroyer?

I've been able to kill enforcers with just primaries, but I have 4 reaper missiles (Dual singles with 5 in missiles) that practically wreck everything. Occasionally I buy a bomber wing or two if I enter a system with lots of big fleets which I send to banzai enemy capital ships. I end up having to sell or suicide them into fleets since they can't enter hyperspace without a carrier; and there's no way I'm going to drag one of those around.

Ever played excellerin? i loved the fact you had your own private station where you could mothball and stash ships. Maybe one day we wil be able to setup station for our own uses.

there is actually a station already where you can store ships/cargo. you just cant build it yourself where you want.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Corvus system, planet asharu, the abandoned terraforming station

[Blaze]

Is it just me or is boarding a total crapshot?

If I do hard docking they self-destruct, I lose the entire boarding party as well as most of my ship.
If I launch from a distance they usually speed off.

And even if I am successful I rarely get the ship and always lose at least 1 marine; even if it's 20 marines vs 3 crew. Not to mention marines are ridiculously expensive and eat up supplies.

[Fikes]

Is it just me or is boarding a total crapshot?

If I do hard docking they self-destruct, I lose the entire boarding party as well as most of my ship.
If I launch from a distance they usually speed off.

And even if I am successful I rarely get the ship and always lose at least 1 marine; even if it's 20 marines vs 3 crew. Not to mention marines are ridiculously expensive and eat up supplies.

Unless I really really want the ship, I always blow it up for just that reason. If I really want it I'll send a frigate over to it to hard dock.

[Greiger]

Yea I find boarding to usually not be worth it.  You may be able to make some good money from it if you set yourself up specifically for it, but there seems to be easier ways to do it.

You need a large ship for the hard docking to minimize the damage if they do self destruct, possibly two (ships that are larger than the target seem to take far less damage from self destruct when hard docked and multiple ships seem to significantly reduce marine losses), you will probably still take some marine losses, since if you send in overwelming numbers the enemy is more likely to self destruct, but if you send in fewer you will take losses, and then if you do manage to take the ship you have to have a hold full of supplies to be able to fix the ship up to a profitable point.

At least those are my findings from attempting to take ships. 

Kinda wish enemy ships would just surrender when they can't outrun you and are clearly outmatched.  Seems kinda silly when that lone buffalo is trying to flee from 3 wolf frigates and a Falcon when it doesn't have a prayer to get anywhere near the map edge.  I'd love to the choice to take a surrendered freighter or simply loot the holds and the weapons, and release the ship and crew for a slightly lower rep hit. (sure you stole the cargo, but you left the crew alive and the ship intact enough to reach port)