[Space Sim] X3: Terran Conflict

[XMEN Gambit]

Would a Split M2 help you out? Bring it in after the fight starts so its weaker shields aren't such an issue, and it's pretty good for a punch, isn't it?

[TimberWolf]

Actually, any M2 would probably work if their fully loaded with PPC's in the main slots and at least one side. Since a PPC does a huge load of damage, about 64k to shields and 11k to hull per shot and have about 6km range, on top of what my current forces can do then the battle would be easy probably with no losses if I'm piloting the M2. Sadly there are two problems: First is that there aren't enough PPC's in the universe (took me a while to get the guns I have for the Deimos, which are Flack's and HEPT's mostly along with Ion Shard Rail Guns which are new to the series) to equip an M2's main guns and a side. I do have 3 PPC's already on a freighter, but to buy more each one costs about 1 million credits and I would still need 13 more. Second is money. I spent about 60 million in purchase and equipping the Deimos. I only have about 17 million now. The cheapest M2 that can be purchased is about 68 million, for an Argon Titan with only one 200 MJ shield aboard when bought. To partially equip it will add over 10 million credits into it, making the total cost closer to 80 million credits, again that's not fully equipped. That is also assuming the shields and guns are available in the universe, which I've notice most equipment docks are sitting empty.

Another option that would net me a Xenon Q which can mount 4 PPC's between two turrets. The problem with that is my marines seem to be stupid lately and usually get themselves shot before they figure which way is up (in space there is no up). Also its hard to have a Q by it self, their are usually other large ships near by. I would still have to get shields and other weapons for it but by capturing a ship, the bulk of the cost is gone. I just have to sit outside of it with my glue gun for a few hours patching it up so repairs don't cost me a credit.

Another option, one I don't like as I don't care for the Boron, is to get a Thresher (a new ship to this addition of the series) which can mount Ion Cannons (which are also new to the series) that are more powerful than the PPC when taking out shields, but weaker when taking out hull. This would help out as my Deimos has a set of guns that work better on the hull than on shields.

If fire power was truly the driving force in the decision, which its not as money is the problem, then I would run off and get my Terran rep higher to get an Osaka, their M2, which can mount the Point Singularity Projector (the most powerful weapon in the game and also one of the hardest to get). Like all Terran equipment, there are only one or two factories that make them and at this time I can't purchase any of their stations to produce my own.

Last ditch choice would still be to load up the Centaur with mass drivers and fly it in personally to widdle down the hull over time. Granted the mass driver does very little hull damage per shot but with 8 main guns firing, and then a couple of turrets, it could add up fast. Probably not fast enough as mass drivers have a very short range and the Centaur has tissue paper as shields compared to the Kyon emitters.

I use the following link for reference and information about ships and equipment in the game:
http://eng.x3tc.ru/

[XMEN Gambit]

Ah. Well, then, any chance of capping a couple? (one to sell, one to fix...)

[TimberWolf]

I don't have the equipment to cap a Capital ship at this time, let alone the properly trained boarding team.

I decided to use a prior save and try to build up my resources before trying the mission again. I have even bought up all the mass drivers in the universe for the few fully armed Argon ships I have. In my moving around the universe I have really pissed off the Paranid. So much that for a while I couldn't even dock at their stations, and right now I have a Sector Trader trapped in one of their core sectors at a station. I can no longer buy any of their equipment. Currently trying to find any means of raising my rank with them but the Pirates seems to have gotten a memo to stay away from Paranid space. Also haven't found any combat missions for them either. So I'm currently doing missions for the various Corporations, which is how I lost the standings in the first place by destroying a Paranid fleet. With any luck I will either receive some nice ships at the end of the missions or be able to buy a ship with some really big guns. Time will tell.

On another line of thought, I pulled the Claymore out of the Earth Torus to get equipped and upgraded. It is the Terran Missile Frigate. Problem is that it can only fire one type of missile. Second problem is there is only one factory for that missile. Third problem is none of the AI has been supplying it with the needed materials for it to produce anything. So I have been using one of the first captured cargo ships to bring it supplies and have docked the Claymore there to buy up all the missiles it produces until I feel like I have enough to destroy a capital ship. Last time I looked there were about 21 missiles in the cargo hold. I may want to find a capital ship for a test run to see how many missiles I need.

[TimberWolf]

As of today I can now dock and buy Paranid ships again. I still don't have the race relations to buy another Deimos if I wanted to. I've added plankton farm and stott mixery to my ore belt complex.

I own my own Mammoth now. Currently trying to finish the next mission for the Gonors, by bringing them supplies. I now have 3 different corporations asking me to deliver missiles which are not currently being produced due to the economy in my game, which I'm in the process of fixing without a stimulus package. I have a sector trader operating in Terran sectors working on their economy, there will be another 3 added to that later when I have the time. I have 2 Universal Traders flying around, with plans of adding more after developing the proper infrastructure for my Ore Belt complex. I miss the script in X3 that allows one ship to buy and sell goods for a station right now as I have to have one ship for each to do the same thing. Last I heard Egosoft was working on getting a script made by a player approved for release at a later date with other scripts.

Once I'm done with what I can do for the Gonors, I will use my stock of Terran missiles and kill the Kha'ak destroyer for the Final Fury mission I was stuck on prior. With hope, I should have plenty of missiles left to finish that line of missions without having to stop again. Currently have about 50 missiles on board the Claymore. Won't be able to play again till next week end, probably. Here's hoping I don't forget what I was doing when I get back to it.

[XMEN Gambit]

I miss the script in X3 that allows one ship to buy and sell goods for a station right now as I have to have one ship for each to do the same thing. Last I heard Egosoft was working on getting a script made by a player approved for release at a later date with other scripts.

Huh. Didn't realize the games were that much different.

[TimberWolf]

The games use the same graphics engine and much of the basics but they redid most of it to allow for better mission development, which worked in my opinion to make the universe actions less predictable. The CR script was origanally created by a player, not Egosoft, but it was later added to X3-R with other player scripts that Egosoft felt enhance the game the way they wanted it.

As for the playing done this weekend:

Ran across some Pirate Carraks while doing a mission for the Gonors. I did try to board one but my marines got killed before reaching it. It seems to be able to mount a weapon that just chews up my Vidar (which I use for capturing other ships) and spits it back out like gum. The Pirates apparently didn't take kindly to my attempts. Was notified shortly after my last attempt that my Station Complex and all of its Transports were under attack in Ore Belt. Crap, and I was stuck on a mission else where killing pirates and couldn't leave nor could I send my main ship as it was transporting a person for the Gonor mission that I was still working on. Ended up sending my two TM's that had any fighters aboard only to find that neither had a full load of upgraded and equipped fighters. In the end two of my transports were badly damaged and nothing else was lost.

Now I'm in the process of upgrading all those fighters I now have in Argon space and trying to find equipment for them. I have tons of weapons spread out between my various ship carriers, 4 TM's and the Deimos. I will note, that the Pirates have been going on the offensive a lot recently. I had my Vidar and Centaur caught in a battle in Elena's Fortune while they were in transit to meet up with my gathering fleet. I also had one of the TM's caught by a Pirate strike force in Midnight Star. In both cases there were Pirate Capital ships in sector.

My Marines need to get more training. So next time I will go hunting for easy pickings so they can get combat training and I can practice getting into position to get them on board the target ship faster and not loose any to turret fire. One I have several with high fighting skills then I will train those in the other skills until they are all maxed. It will be then that I try to take over an Pirate Capital ship again.

[TimberWolf]

Well I did it. Never thought I would, but I started it up last night. What is it, you say? I have become a drug dealer in the game. I build two Spaceweed stations along with the needed food source in Company Pride. Spaceweed is illegal to all races except the Teladi, which sells them at their Trading stations, and the Pirates who also love just flying around with the stuff. Sank a couple of million to get it started, but didn't play enough to start seeing it make a profit. Kind of started it on a whim as a mission I'm working on required the stuff and most places were sold out or had very little. The next time I play I may add on some Spacefuel stations to further my journey to the dark side of commerce.

A good reason for doing this is that you can sell illegal things for a really high markup as it is in high demand all over the universe. Also, if you watch who buys from your stations, follow them into a sector that declares it illegal, you can scan them and legally shoot them down, thus gaining race points with who ever owns that sector. And if your lucky they drop your goods, which you return to your factory to resell at pure profit. <evil laugh>

I need to start looking into building missile fabs as the universe seems to be sort of most missiles. Especially the one's I need for missions for the various corporations. Probably going to dedicate my time this weekend to expanding my economic empire to help rake in the credits so I can buy an M2 to kill those darn Kha'ak capital ships. Did a test run with my Terran Missile boat. It failed. Unless the Kha'ak ships where being swarmed by something taking all of the weapons fire, none of the missiles made it to the target. The firing rate was also slow so I couldn't get enough in the air at once to help out. Might need to get more missile boats or ships with missiles to swarm the target. That will be expensive as missiles are hard to come by.

[XMEN Gambit]

Also, if you watch who buys from your stations, follow them into a sector that declares it illegal, you can scan them and legally shoot them down, thus gaining race points with who ever owns that sector. And if your lucky they drop your goods, which you return to your factory to resell at pure profit. <evil laugh>

You wicked, wicked man...

[TimberWolf]

May have a problem. I tried placing my Argon Wheat Farm L and all that showed up was the docking ports. I've noticed a few other odd things but didn't think anything about them but I'm starting to think something didn't patch right. If that's true then I will have to reinstall the game and repatch it. There is a chance that my current saves might not work if the errors are corrected. We will see when I do it later, probably Friday.

[XMEN Gambit]

Does depend on what failed., but think your saves will be OK.

[TimberWolf]

Decided I couldn't wait, so I reloaded it today. Apparently the 2.1 to 2.5 patch is what failed last time. I know this as I read over the change log and don't remember seeing any of them ingame prior. Now I have some new minus and other things to learn.

Ran into a problem when trying to get my Space fuel Distillery up and running. I had added it and the wheat farm to my space weed complex so that I didn't have to get any new ships. The problem is the Teladi sent a military ship to destroy the one station out of the complex. I know this as they fly right at it and shoot the distillery almost exclusively. So I will try to set it up some where else later. For now, I'm just slowly equipping all those fighters I have laying around from captures and assigning them to TM's, which too have been captured. But for the life of me I can't find any Pirate TM's or M6's right now. They use to be as plentiful as ants, but now they appear to be endangered ships. Need to level up my boarding parties and get some more practice capturing ships so I can start getting bigger prizes.

[XMEN Gambit]

I assume laser tower defenses around your complex don't help enough?

[TimberWolf]

Well.... no. They are sending M6's and above at it and its the Teladi Government that is trying to destroy it. I tried to kill the first ship and lost two levels to me rank with them.

My solution, start again from a save prior to placing the Wheat farm and build it else where. Maybe try Argon space seeing how it and the Distillery are both Argon stations.

Also noticed a rapid increase in pirate activities all over. As well as a possible glitch. I have jumped a couple of times in my Vidar but I haven't used any energy cells. Will have to play with that some more later.

[TimberWolf]

I'm starting to play around with fleet options as my military arsenal is getting pretty big, at least compared to what I have been operating in the past. I have the Zephyrus, Magnetar, and a Caravel equipped with 4 fighters each, and the last Caravel should be getting it's last two ships shortly once I can find shields for them. Most of the fighters are captured Pirate ships. My Deimos has 4 stationed on it, two of which are personal fighters for me. I will probably be buying 2 more Cutlasses to give it 4 escorts. My Mammoth currently has 2 fighters aboard and can carry another 4 (if I remember correctly) I will probably get two more ships to add to it, leaving my two largest ships with 2 spare hanger bay slots for me to jump in when I need to or to pick up captured ships. The rate I have been capturing worth wild ships has been decreasing, mostly because they get destroyed by my Flacks. I know there are a number of Xenon ships I have been unable to claim due to too many capital ships in the area, or because I didn't have means to get the ship out of the area safely. I need to capture another TM or two for salvage operations as my current salvage TM's have 4 ships assigned to them for patrol duty.

As of a couple of days ago, here was what was listed as Property Owned:

Ships: 63
Advanced Discoverer: 1
Advanced Eclipse: 1
Blastclaw: 2
Blastclaw Protorype: 2
Buster Sentinel: 1
Caiman Miner: 1
Caravel: 2
Claymore: 1
Cutlass: 2
Deimos: 1
Discoverer: 1
Dolphin: 1
Dolphin Super Freighter: 1
Enhanced Jaguar: 1
Enhanced Pericles: 1
Express: 1
Iguana: 1
L: 5
M: 1
Magnetar: 1
Mako Raider: 1
Mamba: 1
Mammoth: 1
Mercury: 4
Nova: 1
Nova Raider: 1
Nova Vanguard: 1
Perseus: 1
Pirate Centaur: 1
Pirate Elite: 1
Pirate Nova: 3
Pirate Nova Raider: 3
Rapier: 2
Sabre: 1
Scabbard: 2
Scimitar: 1
Scorpion Raider: 1
Skate Prototype: 1
Toucan Hauler: 1
Truelight Seeker: 1
Vidar: 1
Vulture Super Freighter: 1
Zephyrus: 1
Idle Marines: 44

I have only added a couple of fighter to that list since then through captures and one from picking up one of the freebies. I have almost completely drained the Universe of 25MW shields getting many fighters equipped so that they can be assigned to a TM and sent out on patrols. I have lost a freighter to Pirate activities and currently have my Centuar filling in till the Pirates settle down again.

I'm currently torn between 3 choices. First, I have enough money that I could get a Titan and probably get a decent loadout for it and use it to make more money and get more salvage off of enemy capital ships. Second, I have enough money to buy another 1 or 2 M7's and equip them and use them in the same way as in the first choice and still have the option of redeploying them to handle trouble areas with a TM for support as needed, allowing for greater flexibility. Option three, to build more stations and increase my hourly income to allow for both of the previous options to be done at a much later date.

On the other hand, I have started the HUB missions which point more towards option 3. The first mission requires 400 Microchips to be delivered. At this time I have only been able to locate less than 100. Microchips are produced one at a time and there are not many chip factories. I've been looking around for an area that already has the needed supplies so all I have to do is plop down some chip factories and in a few game days I should have all I need. But then the problem becomes what happens to the factories. I need to make sure there is a market for them. I also know that a later missions will require Ore, Silicon, and Crystals in large amounts. So if I want to do the missions in short time, I should start building the factories that will produce the needed materials now before it is asked of me to deliver them. Once the HUB is fully activated I know I will be able to change gate connections to various parts of the universe which would allow me to connect by complexes like never before. The are 3 sets of gates in the HUB, meaning I can replace 3 different gate connections in the standard gate network. I could setup ore and silicon mines in Ore Belt now and when I get the ability to change the first gate sets connections, I could have it take the place of Ore Belts North gate to Home of Light (meaning you will now have to fly through the HUB to get to Home of Light from Ore Belt). Then once I get the next gate pair activated I could connect them to anywhere in the universe, now making those sectors only 2 jumps away from Ore Belt and Home of Light. Then do the same with the last pair. Once this is done I could have it so that the farthest reaches of the universe are now next door neighbors. But that is a long way away.

*EDIT*

I found my new best friend in the game, the Incendiary Bomb Launcher! I don't think I've seen a station that produces them but I have been getting a couple off the Pirate capital ships lately. Didn't know what they were using to take my shields down so fast and was going through all the salvage I had collected. Noticed that the Deimos could equip them on the left and right sides only. So I put them on one side and went for a spin inside the HUB where Xenon are regulars. The Xenon Q dropped faster and with less energy used with those two guns compared to my 8 main guns combined.

With that, I decided to give the Operation Final Fury a try again (remember I couldn't finish this prior because of the Kha'ak M2 at the end). Well, as soon as I jump into the sector I'm surrounded by fighters and corvets belonging to the Kha'ak. In a short distance is not only an M2 but also an M1. Crap. Between the fighters and the Corvets already on top of me, I can't get far enough away before me shields fail to string them out. The AI mercenaries that are there to help me are worthless. Well, I guess I will either have to get a bunch of M7's together, some with flacks all around, others with these Incendiary Bomb Launchers (as soon as I can find a station that produces them), or get myself an M2 with PPC's and Flacks.

On another note, I have constructed the Spacefuel Distillary in a pirate sector, which I'm claiming as my own (sector Gunne's Crusade). I have begun building another complex in the same sector which will help produce the needed supplies for the future HUB missions. I was able to scrounge up 400 Computer components and now I need 500 Microchips. So far I have found only 20 in the universe. Once I get the new complex running, I will start adding the needed stations to produce what I can't find. I have decided that as soon as I can realign the first pair they will connect to this sector as it is turning into my Home Base with most of my fleet massing there.

Well, time for bed. Stayed up way to late playing.