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[TartarusMkII]

Heya guys,

I have been following this game closely, but I have not been playing as long as many people here. I love the new update, but I am having a lot of problems with it, perhaps because I am just bad at the game. But if that is the case, I do want to ask what I am doing wrong.

I like to both fight and trade, so I build a mixed fleet. But sometimes trading is nearly impossible because if I try to fill up stock and offload it (always carrying something worth a profit at my next destination), the cargo scans of the factions -kill- me. They can sometimes erase the profit I just earned. And especially early game, if I get cargo scanned twice at the same planet, I mine as well restart the game.

I understand that some ships have shielded bays, but many ships, especially ones belonging to the modded factions, just don't have them.

What am I doing wrong? Or is it possible that cargo scans happen too often and/or are too taxing?

Thanks!

[Doom101]

once you get to friendly with a faction those cargo scans almost never happen to you if there is anyone else nearby they could go after instead. At cooperative level i've yet to be scanned by a patrol, they just assume i'm not carrying anything illegal.

But until you get to that point i'd say don't always make it a point to carry cargo, even if you go 100% trading, keep your valuables and your commodities under lock and key in a station's storage facilities, its a one time payment of 5,000 credits per station and once you start collecting some bounties ( you said your going for a mix of combat and trading) this shouldn't be a problem. Then only take your commodities out when you know where it needs to go, for example you've been stockpiling food on Jengala in the corvus system, and suddenly you get word that there is a food shortage on Asharu, you quickly rush over to your food supply and ship it all over at once ( or in a few trips if you can't carry it all) and bam, all the credits and rep, plus quite a bit of XP for the massive trade. If you move relatively quickly its unlikely a patrol would have the time to scan you before you take off and get under way. And if you have to you can try to evade the patrol because getting caught with your cargohold completely full is not a good idea even if you aren't carrying anything illegal.

And for the record i've always thought the inspections are quite harsh especially to brand new players, just the other day i started a new game ( im not anywhere remotely new to this game) and within minutes of the game starting i was being pinged by a patrol. quite harsh to immediately lose a chunk of my starting credits, and to a less experienced player that blow would cripple them.

 I've also always been against the huge fines for carrying legal goods, illegal goods i can understand but for goods that are perfectly legal that's like a cop pulling you over for driving a car that just so happens to look like one that was stolen earlier that day and when he determines you didn't steal it he arrests you anyway, honestly that makes no sense to me. I realize people are going to retort with, well the patrols are clearly corrupt and they have quotas to fulfill, and I call Bull- **** there is no way that every single officer of ANY faction is completely corrupt i'd bet even some pirates would find that.. distasteful, they'd rather take your money by killing you first. ( a more apt metaphor would be a cop pulling you over under suspicion of having alcohol in your car because you have a brown paper bag in your passenger seat, and when he pulls you over he finds out it's your lunch for work then arresting you for a DUI anyway)

( and by the way I censored myself, i'm well aware of this forum's rules about cursing, even though I swear like a sailor I will abide by the rules)


And to anyone who would argue that the fines aren't crippling for a new or less experienced player i have a friend who just redownloaded SS today after having been away from it for over a year, ( And even before that he hardly played it) and immediately he was scanned by a patrol too, and lost half of his money and had to start over because he couldn't afford to buy supplies and slowly died from one pirate fleet because his ship didn't have enough CR to keep fighting back.

[TartarusMkII]

Hey Doom thanks for the feedback!

I think the shake-downs definitely fit the lore, but perhaps the percentages themselves should be less harsh. Even that alone would not hurt new players so much but not remove it from their game.

Also, I've noticed that if I wait long enough I can re-sell stock on a station without ever moving it (a la EVE Online), but many systems in the mods, Magec included, don't really have a stable economy within its own system.

[Midnight Kitsune]

And to anyone who would argue that the fines aren't crippling for a new or less experienced player i have a friend who just redownloaded SS today after having been away from it for over a year, ( And even before that he hardly played it) and immediately he was scanned by a patrol too, and lost half of his money and had to start over because he couldn't afford to buy supplies and slowly died from one pirate fleet because his ship didn't have enough CR to keep fighting back.

This part to me is pure BS on the game's side and yet another contributor to the inverted difficulty curve

[TartarusMkII]

Yea I mean, I think it's a new system and Alex would love to rebalance it after seeing how the players are affected by it. I don't quite view it as BS. But still, yes, the game is meant to be iron man but the threats to your safety seem more rigged than anything. Like playing Call of Duty, and dying by falling off the map rather by enemy gun fire, which is what the game is about. lol.

[Doom101]

Hey Doom thanks for the feedback!

I think the shake-downs definitely fit the lore, but perhaps the percentages themselves should be less harsh. Even that alone would not hurt new players so much but not remove it from their game.

Also, I've noticed that if I wait long enough I can re-sell stock on a station without ever moving it (a la EVE Online), but many systems in the mods, Magec included, don't really have a stable economy within its own system.

Given the new more in-depth character creation process i think if a player goes for non-iron mode, and an easier start maybe tariffs on trade and fines on inspections should be cut in half, maybe not so drastic but definitely by some %.

Also don't get me wrong i LOVE The new interactions with patrols its just I find that the likely-hood of 100% of a given faction's officers being corrupt and trying to line their pockets ( or their quotas) by less than legal means unlikely.

[CopperCoyote]

Once my rep with a faction is high enough to buy from their military screen (welcoming i think?) I like to bait out the scans by just waiting around with most of my ships stored and nearly no supplies. This is critically important once you start doing big runs with an atlas or more. The only downside is they sometimes still catch you once you've jumped to hyperspace. Because apparently they don't talk to each other. The rep needs to be welcoming because below that they'll still try and shake you down after you've bought your goodies.

Another thing you can do if you're outside twice their ping ripple range is run to a station that faction doesn't own and then drop all your ships and supplies there. You have to be as fast or faster than them of course. If you're ever within twice the ripple range they'll see your shenanigans though, and be angry at you.

I really hate how tolls interact with rep. Dodge a toll? -3 points! Pay a toll of 867? 1 point for you. Pay a toll of 60K? Still 1 point for you. Obscene. I think the toll goodwill maxes out at 25 too. So you're not even getting rep gain from it by the time you're having to pay as much in tolls as you did on the tariffs for your cargo in the first place. I wish paying your tolls could get you up to 100 rep so you had a way to get there as a pure trader. Also as your rep grows you get fewer shake-downs so it would have a soft cap of around 80 (i think that's when cooperative starts).

Sometimes I just don't care about the rep hit. I can't seem to get it above 50 as a trader any way so i might as well not keep it maxed so i can grind it back up once their logistics fails them and i feed half the planet for a few months.


In short tolls make me angry, and inclined to be extra fraudulent.

[PrinzMegahertz]

I agree that the scans are a bad idea the way they are implemented right now.

I have been playing star sector for a pretty long time and regularly come back to see what is new. Even though I have lot's of experience, I struggle to make a profit in the current version.

Two things I don't like about scans:

- If I understand it correctly, you get scanned once per faction after you enter a system. This makes exploration traveling between system rather unappealing.

- As it was already pointed out, the sales taxes in combination with scan taxes for legal goods makes trade completely unattractive, especially combined with the high costs in supply and fuel.

What I would like:
- Scans should only result in fines, if illegal goods are detected

I also think that the amount of supplies needed to regain combat readiness after battle are absurdly high. I often find that fighting pirates when no bounty is offered does not result in profit. Most of the times, the loot you get from fighting is just enough to cover the repair costs + the costs for supplies and fuel used to hunt the pirate fleet. If there are no pirates in your system and you need to travel between systems, the scans make this an unprofitable route to take.

Maybe there should be a tax reduction skill in the logistics skill tree.

[bills6693]

I have been sitting at 100% reputation with hemegony and still get scanned semi-regularly by them. And by tri-tach who I also stay v friendly with because they sell the ships I want (occasionally).

Yeah the frequency has gone down but its still being done to me. I agree it is very annoying, especially when I've been hauling food with an atlas back to my base stocked up for a food shortage.

[SafariJohn]

Heh, if your fleet is a certain size or above it becomes too big to be scanned, so you automatically fail. It's a bug, but it's still amusing to me, since I'm always travelling with 20+ ships.

The tolls didn't really bother me early game. Admittedly I knew about them in advance, but I just treated them like necessary bribes and worked it into my budget. Doing a trade run? Well, keep 5-8,000 in cash so you can pay off the patrols.

And if you don't have the money, -3 rep isn't a big deal.

The system does seem wonky, though.

[Megas]

Even with 100 reputation, I still get pinged enough by toll trolls at the most inconvenient times.

I like to be able to build my own self-sustaining faction/empire so that I no longer need to rely on their graces and play good subject.  Bounty hunting deserter fleets is rewarding enough that I do not need to fight anyone else, but I still want to be able to rub out the competition and eliminate factions from the game one-by-one.

[Nori]

Yeah I really don't like them either. I usually just take the rep hit by dodging them. Sometimes that isn't a option though.

I can think of two things that would make it more bearable.
1. They should ignore smaller fleets. If I have a single ship, or say just a couple frigates just leave me alone.
2. Please put in a cooldown! I get scanned by Hegemony and then literally a day later (1-2 minutes) I get scanned by the Independents... WHY do they hate me so much!

[frogbones]

Pinged about three days out from a planet hauling cargo to it. I let them scan pay the toll.

Continue to planet, (now just two days out) then the fleet that JUST pinged me, PINGS ME! I just forked over 8765 credits!! They didn't even get enough distance for me to avoid

I just force close game leave it for a day or two....pisses me off.

[TartarusMkII]

Yea, it's a cool function, but clearly not working as well as it could be.

[Debido]

Only 8750 credits? That's chicken feed. Patrol scan fees aren't that bad, i've never gone broke because of them, and in most cases I just out run them,