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2416

Suggestions / Re: Non-zero chance of Black Market investigations should read "Minimal", not "None"

« on: November 24, 2015, 09:16:47 AM »

Black market trading will either ding you a few rep - an ignorable penalty - or it will trigger an investigation which you can go and bribe your way out of.  As a once in a blue moon event, the only potential problem I see is displaying "none" if there's a non-zero chance of investigation.

2417

General Discussion / Re: Favorite Surprises

« on: November 22, 2015, 10:00:36 PM »

My favorite surprise so far - though I don't yet have the rep to take advantage of it - is the discovery of an Independent world with a military market that can sell Conquests.

2418

Suggestions / Black Market Suspicion Indicator

« on: November 22, 2015, 07:38:08 PM »

I knew this existed, but it took me forever to find it.  I'd suggest making this more visible than buried at the bottom of a tooltip - perhaps when it's non-zero it puts nice orange letters right above the market tab?

2419

Suggestions / Easier Early Game: Letter of Marque

« on: November 22, 2015, 05:10:11 PM »

So the big thing making the early game harder is that stuff can see you farther out than you can see it.  And the big thing that makes that true is that you're running around with your transponder on.

So my suggestion is this: add to the game something that gives you a temporary authorization to have your transponder off - and on easy, give the player one of these for each major faction.  Patrols will still go investigate, but instead of dinging you some rep and demanding you turn your transponder on, they'll just go "Oh, you have a Letter of Marque from <Faction>; that will expire in another two months, but right now you're good to go."

Late game this gives you an extra thing to spend some credits on - paying 'registration fees' (because of course you're not bribing anyone); having some early-game should help with the ninja pirates from nowhere.

2420

Announcements / Re: Starsector 0.7a (Released) Patch Notes

« on: November 21, 2015, 04:18:47 PM »

Having now played a bit farther, I'm going to put myself in the "SO doesn't need a nerf" camp.  It's great when you're starting out, but I've found myself just not using it anymore as my own character skills have gotten to the point where I don't need it - and the OP cost + reduced combat time just make it not worth the price tag right now.

2421

Bug Reports & Support / Re: Join the battle, Join the battle, Join the battle...

« on: November 21, 2015, 04:15:07 PM »

Save sent!  Happy bug-fixing!

2422

Bug Reports & Support / Join the battle, Join the battle, Join the battle...

« on: November 21, 2015, 03:39:26 PM »

Tried to rescue a merchant convoy from Luddic Path raider fleet, and ran into this:

The merchant fleet was down to one critically damaged transport when I arrived.

You encounter an ongoing battle.
The Hegemony forces transmit their IFF codes, which allow you to join the battle on their side if you decide to do so.
-> selected 1. Join the battle
The Hegemony forces let the Luddic Path forces go without further incident.
-> selected 1. Join the battle
The Hegemony forces let the Luddic Path forces go without further incident.
-> selected 1. Join the battle
The Hegemony forces let the Luddic Path forces go without further incident.

Etcetera.  And every time I click "Join the battle", I get another menu option saying "Leave" - I'm up to four of them now!

Upon selecting leave, I find that the battle is still officially ongoing.  Saved the game there, behavior above is repeatable, so if you want a save demonstrating this, I can send you one.

2423

General Discussion / Re: Favorite Surprises

« on: November 21, 2015, 02:11:34 PM »

My favorite surprise was losing 15 marines in 45 marines vs 6 pirate crew boarding takeover. Friendly fire no doubt.

I managed to lose 16 marines against a one pirate crew...

Amazingly, I've had trouble finding any Luddic Path fleets - and the ones I do find are often already fighting someone else.

2424

General Discussion / Re: Share you Starsector gameplay stories!

« on: November 21, 2015, 01:55:58 PM »

So, I've been trying to get rep up with the Hegemony, because those XIV variants are shiny.  Still relatively early game; I've got a Kite (A) I found for sale somewhere and picked up because it amused me, I've got that starting bounty hunter Wolf (now handed off to a hired captain), and I've got a Sunder I picked up off a black market somewhere - cost me a rep hit, but totally worth it.  Oh, and I had a buffalo to help carry any loot.  Had.  We'll get to that.

Two 40,000cr bounties in a system; I double-check, and they're orbiting different planets.  Should be all good.  Cruise on in, ping on active so the pirate fleet will hit emergency burn and come in with low CR... And then I discover that those two bounty fleets are orbiting a planet - and that planet's moon.  Oops.  Time to retreat...

I order my two frigates to go cap points, tell the buffalo to retreat, and turn around to try and hold things off so my freighter can get away.
...Problem: The enemy deployed a good half-dozen frigates to the left side.  Which go and maul that poor buffalo.
But on the plus side, that meant I was up against just two or three frigates and a falcon flagship; they don't stand a chance against my Sunder.  Then the AI deploys a few more frigates and the other fleet's eagle flagship.  Still just meat for the grinder.

And then those frigates from up north start to trickle back in, but only one or two at a time.  End result: total victory, all at the cost of one buffalo.  Not quite what I'd had in mind, but it kinda worked... and I got three levels out of it, so I'm reasonably happy.

2425

Announcements / Re: Starsector 0.7a (Released) Patch Notes

« on: November 21, 2015, 01:28:10 AM »

The one thing I'd request if you're looking at nerfing SO some is that the nerf not be tied to out of combat performance.  I do not want another thing like the old augmented engines where I'm encouraged to swap hull mods in and out depending on whether I'm planning on trading or bounty hunting or whatever else.

Reduced CR recovery rate sounds good.
Some reduction in SO bonuses once peak performance runs out would probably also be good.

2426

Bug Reports & Support / Re: 0.7a crash after helping allies win a battle

« on: November 19, 2015, 03:35:05 PM »

I guess the question, then, is what would cause fleet goals to change / reset mid-fight?  Might that happen if, of two allied fleets, the bigger one took enough casualties to change who owns the goal?

For those who've seen this, do you have any guesses as to how the fight went for the various fleets involved?

2427

General Discussion / Re: Stuck at work! Someone please shots of the new ships/redone ship art!

« on: November 19, 2015, 12:54:51 PM »

Ooh, I really like the new Dominator and that 14th battlegroup Onslaught skin.

Though, okay, the fade from mid-tech grey-brown to low-tech red on the Dominator does seem a bit odd - it kinda looks like it just flew through a cloud of grey-brown paint.  Still a vast improvement, though!  Looks much less 2D now.

2428

Modding / Re: Spriters judgement thread [non-sprite art allowed]

« on: November 12, 2015, 04:55:26 PM »

The upper fighter bay doesn't read as a fighter bay anymore - the illuminated section is too close a color match to the hull next to it, and it looks like it's just a curved panel rather than an inset with light spilling out.

2429

General Discussion / Re: Starsector Ship Tiers

« on: November 10, 2015, 11:13:03 AM »

Flagship Paragon is more dangerous than flagship Onslaught.

Strongly disagree.  A flagship Paragon is too slow and doesn't have the range - aside from its lances which don't do hard flux and are easily dodged or blocked by other enemy ships.  It may be harder to kill with reaper swarm, but it's much less dangerous, and it's much easier to kill with long range non-missile weapons.  Essentially any decent cruiser can take down a Paragon - I wouldn't hesitate to engage one with even just a Falcon, let alone the stronger cruisers like Eagle, Apogee, or Dominator.

A flagship Onslaught, by contrast, has superior range and mobility; it is difficult to disengage and vent flux, and the Onslaught is durable enough that - reaper spam from an Aurora or Doom aside - you need to lure it into making multiple mistakes before you can take it out.  It is possible to kill one one-on-one with a Dominator (or Eagle or Apogee, though the Apogee would be especially difficult due to its lack of a mobility system), but you need to play absolutely perfectly; any mistake and the Onslaught will just rip you to pieces.

2430

General Discussion / Re: Starsector Ship Tiers

« on: November 10, 2015, 09:32:15 AM »

The Apogee is, imo, still a clear tier 2 cruiser.  Yes, the firing arcs are a bit awkward.  Yes, it's got weapon slots that are often not worth filling.  And yes, it can still take on entire fleets solo, thanks to its exceptional shield strength and good range.  It hasn't lost anything from ballistics getting unlimited ammo - all that change accomplished is to make low and mid tech cruisers actually be competitive; it didn't make the Apogee any worse.

My personal suggestion is to mount an autopulse laser and heavy blasters.  What you put in the rest of its mounts doesn't even matter most of the time - you can leave the rest empty and be fine.  Approach a target, hit it with the autopulse to drive up flux, and then while that's regenerating, turn broadside to get a heavy blaster closer to the target; you can outrange an eagle's main guns like that, and the flux costs are negligible for an Apogee.

It won't let you (reliably) take on an enemy flagship Onslaught with full combat skills - but then again, of the other cruisers, only the Doom can do that, and it's almost cripplingly-overspecialized.  (Speaking of: Why is the Doom listed at tier 2?  It's a clear t3 ship - very good at what it does, but only mediocre outside of that specialty.)  And that's the only thing the Apogee can't deal with - it has a bit of trouble with swarms of frigates and fighters, but it can still reliably win such fights with a bit of practice; the key is to be careful in choosing when you go for kills, versus when you just plink a target with one or two heavy blaster hits to make it back off.  Oh, and to prioritize broadswords - a few heavy blaster hits will take them out, but you have to actually make sure you do that or their machine guns will shred your shields.