[Space Sim] X3: Reunion

[XMEN Gambit]

SH, I kind of had the same feeling when I first started playing X2. The interface is clunky, the non-piloting environments are blah, etc. It is a lot of fun once you get past the interface hassles, but you're right. The game is quite unprofessional in a number of respects.

BTW, are the keys configurable in X3? I know that was a big gripe with X2.

[Spinning Hat]

Yes, the keys are configurable per the manual.. I haven't tried to do it yet tho. I hope the Mouse sensitivity can be tweaked along with turning the inverted axes off... I HATE that in space sims.. Flight sims I'm all about real life modelling, etc, but when I'm in a space sim, up is UP not down..

[TimberWolf]

Here are starting position that can be, some how, unlocked in the game:

- Enemy of the state
- Anonymous Argon
- Boring Boron
- Pious Paranid
- Savage Split
- Teladi Trafficker
- Goner Witness
- Kha'ak Invader

Currently it is unknown what opens these to players but script writers have opened them up by changing the game registry. I think my current goal is try to unlock as many of them as possible. It would be intereting to play the Khaak Invader game.

SH: Even I had a hard time at first coming from X2 inot X3. It is better than X2 when it comes to the interface because you can use the mouse which makes it easyer. I dont really use the mouse from habbits from X2. I am still learning the shortcuts and finding new things.

[TimberWolf]

The following is from: http://forum2.egosoft.com/viewtopic.php?t=121244
(There are pictures of the selection screen for each of these that also states their difficulty level)

Enemy of the state

Name: Skam Beck - male
start sector: Ore Belt
Demeter: 2x 25mj / 2 AIRE / 126m/s / 2800 XL units / 650cr

Argon: confirmed enemy 99%
Boron: Queens nemesis 99%
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Anonymous argon

name: Judith ukada - female
start sector: argon prime
Discoverer: 1x 1mj / no lasers / 158m/s / 10 M units / 2500cr

Argon: citizen 50%
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Boring boron

name: Lar unuruur - Lar
start sector: Kindom End
octopus: 1x 1mj / no lasers / 171m/s / 5 S units / 2000cr

Argon: citzen 50%
Boron: trusted courtier 0%
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Pious paranid

name: Almanclisllol - male
start sector: paranid prime
demeter: 76% hull / 2x 1mj / no lasers / 57m/s / 2800 XL units / 3633cr

Argon: supected foe 34%
Split: creature 50%
Paranid: nomad 50%
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Savage split

name: Shoo T'mkjd - male
start sector: family pride
Jaguar: 2x 1mj / 4x APAC / 3x Dragonfly / 536m/s / 30 S units / 3633cr

Argon: confirmed enemy 98%
Split: creature 50%
Paranid: nomad 50%
Teladi: profit initiate 40%
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Teladi trafficker

name: Nopileos - male
start sector: Seizewell
Vulture: 71% hull / 1x 5mj / no lasers / 37m/s / 3520 XL units / 12693cr

Argon: citizen 30%
Paranid: unholy nomad 92%
Teladi: profit initiate 50%
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Goner witness

name: Sakurako Kalvin - male
start sector: Cloudbase south west
ranger: 1x 25mj / no lasers / 28m/s / 180 L units / 350cr

Argon: confirmed friend 0%
Boron: aquaintance 25%
Teladi: profit initiate 50%
Goner: believer 0%
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Kha'ak invader

name: Kzkkns r'kst - ?
start sector: ?Random?
fighter: 2x 25mj / 3x BKYON / 112m/s / 95 M units / 0cr
5x scout: 3x 1mj / 1x AKYON / 149m/s / 10 S units / 0cr

*Bottom Rank for all races 0%*
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------

*All TRADE and FIGHT ranks are as follows*

oppotunist 0%

harmless 0%




The following is my own words:

On another note, I wander if anyone knows if Mobile mining can be done remotely or do you have to personally do it? The reason I ask is I am considering the idea that to improve my fram rate i should remove as amny asteroids as possible and leave only the good ones behind. I would have to buy a mineral scanner, the mobile mining equipment and ships that can handle it and the ore. But if it produces as much money as polayers say then it would be more than worth the investment.

[TsN|Wildchild|xmen]

The problem with that, I heard the asteriods respawn after a period of time.

I havent actually played in a long time. My computer is giving me problems with my new monitiers. The game doesn't like them.

[TimberWolf]

Just got some playing in today for the first time in a while. My adventures today began in Danna's Chance where I had found a Pirate Weapons Dealer one time, but due to a graphics crash I had to reload and couldn't get the pirate again, he remained normal the other times I scanned him. From there I went to Nopileos Memorial for the first time. I found some pirates to pick on, none of which ejected, and noticed some red down south. Looked at the radar to see some Xenon M's and N's, not many. I tried to find a station to get a quick save in but none where in sight at the time.

The Xenon ships got within 10 km's from me when I next looked at the radar to see that they had friends. Normally I would start lagging like crazy by now but I have reduced my screen resolution which allows the game to be playable longer. Looking at the radar screen I see about 2 and a half pages of red ships in my range.

First thought is I should have stopped by the Goner Temple for some Insurence. Second thought was to wipe out the first group then run. Third thought was to send my escorts east until they see the next gate and then jump there myself. Reality, as soon as the first group engaged my forces there was no hope of escape. The enemy quickly seperated my ships apart from each other until each ship was about 10 km's from the next. Each of my ships had about 7 Xenon ships attacking it, including myself. I feared that one would be destroyed because of this.

The battle raged on, Xenon ships fell to my Nova. A quick look at the sector map showed me the status of each of my ships and with great relief none of them had any serious damage to their shields. I eventually cleared the group off myself and joined in with one of my escorts to clear the next group. With disbelief I watched my indicator turn from red to blue as a Xenon M becomes a floating hunk. Shortly later another one goes silently into a drift. 2 Xenon groups later, and 50 km's from where the battle started, another Xenon ships turns blue before I realized it but it survived my extended assualt. The last Xenon battle group is attacking a frieghter near by. With my full group of escorts at my side I swarmed in and took them all out quickly with great joy as a 4th Xenon turns blue.

With a huge grin on my face, and large waves of pride, I go to each of the blue Xenon ships to claim them. One of them still has its shields and all the others have some missiles. A station finaly shows up on my radar from one of my escorts collecting wares in the system. I head off and save there. I go after a Pirate Buster roaming near by to hear another great surprise, the Split Pilot is ejecting! 5 ships in one sector, over the course of 2 hours, have their pilots eject and now are mine. YES!!!!

Currently I am in Company Pride looking for the Shipyard. It may have been destroyed because there are large groups of Xenon ships flying around attacking anything that moves. My captures are heading for the Equipment Dock there. I haven't explored Teladi space yet and plan on doing so sinse I am in the area. Also on a side note, I took a couple of quick looks at my Wheat Farm durring all of this. When I first looked at it there was about 55000 credits there but when I ended there was about 127000 credits. On a sad note, I had pirated a Split Super Frieghter in Danna's Chance but only to have it destroyed by the Xenon as it passed through Nopileos Memorial with the rest of my fleet. But since I captured 5 other ships I did not see it fit to treload and try to keep it.

*EDIT*

Here is the conclusion to this weekends events in X3, for me. I eventually got to Seizewell and have brought my captured Pirate Buster, Xenon L, 2 Xenon M's, and a Xenon N in to dock. Took a quick look and sold the M's and the N because they were so badly damaged. I then took the Pirate Buster and repaired, rearmed (it came with some weapons already), and upgraded it. This process took me to Rolk's Fate for some weapons. There I found some Pirates attacking a station and decided to attack them for some extra race points. I get over there and begin my attack on the Pirate Buster only to see it turn quickly blue with my escorts still attacking it for a couple of extra moments (the thing was almost perfect hull but after words it was at 67%). I then turned to the next target being a Pirate Harrier. Again the target turned quickly blue and my escorts didn't stop firing, still doing their attack runs even as I called them off, and destroyed it. Ticked off about loosing that other ship but I did get another Buster to add to my collection.

Current Wing of ships is:
Nova (Hidden ship)
Buster 1 (Starter)
Buster 2 (Pirate Buster captured)
Buster 3 (Pirate Buster captured)
Buster Sentinal Defender (Hidden ship)
Buster Sentinal Defender 2 (Hidden ship)
Mako Scout (Hidden ship)

I also have else where in the universe:
Pericles Vanguard (Hidden ship) as a seller at my Wheat Farm
Toucan Hauler (Hidden ship) as my UT (I think)
Iguana Vanguard (Hidden ship) as my Ecell buyer for my Wheat Farm
Xenon L (captured) waiting for repairs, upgrades, and rearming

I am currently broke in the game after refurbishing those two Busters. Before I quit last night I did a quick Assasination mission in Paranid Prime. There was an Argon Mammoth and 4 escorting Nova's. They started in Emperor Mines but that sector is too laggy for me to fight in. I had half of my escorts up in Red Light getting 5mw shields for my new Busters (I had my Sentinals escorting the new busters there). When I saw the target I called back the Sentinals and called forth the rest of my wing and sat on top of the west gate in Paranid Prime. As soon as the target entered I was on top of it with 4 AHEPT's, 2 APAC's, and 2 AIRE's along with the fire power of my Mako Scout and Buster 1.

I took the brunt of its defenses and quickly brought its shields down and then killed it. By that time my Sentinals had rejoined me and addeed their fire power to the fight. The Nova's went down quickly from the pressure of my fleet. Got little over 20000 credits for that. Now I have a fully armed band of mostly Busters (5 total) and in need of more money to bring the Xenon L up to par. It would be nice to have more than just my ship being the heavy hitter.

One thing I noticed when I was looking at the Pirate Busters, making the choice to sell or keep, was that they can mount APSG's. For crying out loud! I don't remember any of my other Busters being able to carry any PSG. Also with the change in resolutions I made I have not, I repeat NOT, had any graphical bombings or anything to cause me to stop play X3 and reboot. The worst I had was lag that I couldn't fight in but piloting wasn't impossible. I know have about 109 sectors mapped and have seen many TL's roaming around with stations in their cargo hold. All I can guess is either stations are being replaced or some sector I haven't been to a long time or never been to has been wiped out.

Once I get the Xenon L up to par and can get a real frieghter to sell for my Wheat Farm I will be flying around with 8 escorts.

[Darth Vader Voice]
With this fleet I will take over the Universe and force all to bow down to me!
[/Darth Vader Voice]

[TimberWolf]

Ok, just got done with too much playing. Need to get back to practicing for my Midterms.

I did some more exploring around the Paranid home sectors and decided for another try at the abandoned Split Momba. On my way there I ran into a Xenon invasion fleet lead by the first P I have ever seen. I gathered my escorts and attacked the P head on, killing it in less than a minute. The other Xenon fell quickly and one of the L's surrendered with 81% hull left. The next sector had some Pirates in it. I attacked them and captured yet another Buster but with 19% hull left. Needless to say I sold that Buster and the first L I captured to help raise funds to bring the new L up to par. One down side is I lost my Mako Scout durring the attack on the P. It looks like the P singled it out in the first volly and an escorting M got the final hit on it. There was no message or alart on my screen but it is recorded in the message log.

I picked up some weapons from the destroyed Pirate fleet that I found in the next sector after that. From there I captured a harrier as I went solo for the Momba. After some carefull monuvering and steady hands I got the Momba out. I was almost to the north gate when a couple of Pirates attacked it. I quickly destroyed the Falcon and then took out the Buzzard that attacked first. The Momba made it safely to the sector with the rest of my escorts when a Pirate Nova made a b-line for it. I swarmed the Pirate Nova and brought all of my ships to the Teladi Trading station and then saved.

Current Wing of ships is:
Nova (Hidden ship)
Buster 1 (Starter)
Buster 2 (Pirate Buster captured)
Buster 3 (Pirate Buster captured)
Buster Sentinal Defender (Hidden ship)
Buster Sentinal Defender 2 (Hidden ship)
Momba (Hidden ship) [Being Refitted]
L (Xenon L captured) [Under Repairs and Refit]

The Honored Dead:
Mako Scout (Hidden ship) [Destroyed In Combat With Xenon Forces]

My bank account is about 750,000 now after all of these captures and a couple of assasination missions. Once I get my combat fleet up to par I may return to my station and look into expanding it depending on the market in the area. I have watched TL's going through the Pirate sectors heading south. I have yet to see any major damage to any sectors that I have been to recently but I have seen signs of damage to places. I have run across 3 Xenon fleets, 5 Pirate fleets, but no Khaak forces this weekend.

I did a fly through Argon Prime for the first time in a long time. I have noticed that there is a station missing and that the Titan that normally hangs around there is gone. Maybe Argon Prime was attacked or maybe the Titan was sent to another sector and the station was destroyed by the GOD engine. I don't know but if there are any real fleets with capital ships out there, I don't think I can handle them. I have about 10 Unknown missiles sitting in my Nova's cargo hold waiting for just a case.

How is everyone's games going?

[TimberWolf]

I had my first game crash last night. I am not talking about the picture freezing and hearing the game still running. I am talking about the game actually froze and then crashed to desktop.

What happend prior: I did a run into LooManckstrat's Legacy to head south after doing two runs into Xenon Sector 347 that ended with my death. During the trip across LooMancks' I had two small battles but when I reached the south gate I found a never ending flow of Pirate ships. After about an hour I had a Falcon and a Falcon Vanguard floating around waiting to be picked up. But the battle wasn't going to end any time soon and my frame rate was not healthy by any means, about 1 frame per second. When I noticed I had lost most of my ships I decieded to reload.

When I reloaded I decided to head north towards the other Xenon Sectors where I haven't explored. In Montalaar I cought a Teladi with Spaceweed and demanded him to drop it, over and over. There were 3 pages of 87 units of space week floating around. With out thinking I got everything I had in the area (7 ships not including my already full Nova) to start picking them up to sell at the nearby Teladi Trading stations. I had a Falcon I recently capture maxed out in cargo, no shields, aslo out there picking them up. When pirates showed up in the adjoining sector I went to clean it out so my other ships can pass through safely. The pirates dropped many weapons and kept coming. I then bought an Argon TP but when I looked to see how much weed was left there was only 2 crates left even though no one was shooting them and I had a unit keeping an eye over them. Shortly after that was when the crash happend. At least it saved me from the blunder of buying a ship that I didn't need when, if I had thought it through, my UT could have been called over to do it for me. Going to have to see if I can get that Teladi transport next time I play next weekend.

[XMEN Iceman]

Cool stuff...I love reading this.

[TsN|Wildchild|xmen]

I stopped playing it when I got my new moniters, go figure. I just haven't had time to commit to it for the other stuff I am working on at the moment.

When last I played, I had saved it right before going on a Xenon invasion mission, then I upgraded and had serious problems. What is my problem? The mission I accepted is to go and stop a Xenon invasion fleet from tearing apart one of the boron sectors. Cool, no problem. On my way there, it's like three sectors away. In the sector right before the one I have to get into a Khaak invasion fleet pops up and wipes out everything. They block the gates so I can't escape and if I jump I loose rep for not helping in the mission. I thought I could fight it out and did destroy all five Khaak clusters, which totals to about 60 of their cluster ships? There are twelve of those things in a cluster right? I don't know but there were a lot of them.

Which only leaves the three Khaak destroyers, and a few stray Xenon ships and three pirate ships who are seriously in the wrong place at the wrong time. The pirates start shooting the Xenon and the Khaak destroyed all of them before i could get there. it was pretty cool.

With one destroyer at the gate I need to go through and the other two destroying everything I tried to sneak past the one at the gate. No dice. I tried sneaking behind on of the Destroyers and park where I have read people are exploiting their engine blind spot. No dice. The other destroyer has angle and destroys me, but does hit the other destroyer which was nice. I tried playing shadow games to make both ship destroy each other, and I thought it was going to work as I evaded their shots, but alas I couldn't last forever and got hit once and blew apart. They did take each others shields down a good bit though so it is worth trying with multiple ships if I could get them there in time.

At last count, lets see if I can remember all my ships. All of them are on the other side of the universe, literally. The closest one is close to six or seven sectors away. I was on a mission to get the last few free ships so I set my others up to trade and guard. They can't make it in time with having to jump, find more energy cells, jump again, and I think limp one sector to the one I'm in.

Toucan Hauler x 1 - manual trader (free ship)
Iguanna Vanguard x 1 (free ship)
Buster Sentinel x 2 (free ship)
Harrier Sentinel x 1 (free ship)
Falcon Sentinel x 1 (free ship)
Buzzard Hauler x 1 (free ship)
Argon Buster (Starter) - I still use this ship.
Teladi Falcon x 2
Pirate Falcon x 3
Pirate Buster S x 4
Pirate Buster M x 9
Mercury Hauler x 2 - 1) manual trader, 2) ST
Xenon L x 2
Xenon N x 1
Harrier x 2 (I want to say Teladi but I don't remember) I use these as scout ships to scan sectors before sending in my traders.

[TimberWolf]

Wildchild, you still having problems with the new monitors?

How is everyone doing in their games? I haven't touched either X game in weeks because I started getting caught up in Diablo2 again and been busy.

[TimberWolf]

As of last night, I had captured 2 Pirate Nova's, 1 Pirate Falcon, 1 Pirate Harrier and tons of space weed. I sold one of the Novas and the Harrier. Still working on selling the tons of space weed. All ships are fully armed, except the Mamba which needs a Mass driver, but the Nova, L, and Falcon need 25MW shields which the Split currently won't sell to me. So I am trying to pick fights with any pirates that are passing through their sectors.

My Current Escort Wing Contains:
Buster (Starter)
Buster (Capture)
Buster (Capture)
Buster Sentinel (Found)
Buster Sentinel (Found)
Nova (Capture)
Falcon (Capture)
L (Capture)
Mamba (Found)

Last looked, I had about 1.5 million credits. Once I get these shields for my ships I will look into how my Wheat farm is doing and see what economic holes I can plug up in that area. My hope is to put either a space fuel or space weed station in a loop in Menelaus Frontier. Trying to use that as my strong hold to expand from into surrounding systems and also allow me to defend it with my fighters which I will soon be dropping off in the area. The Nova, Falcon, and mayby both Buster Sentinels will be put on sector defence in Menelaus Frontier when I get back there.

Game clock says about 2 days and 11 hours played, with SETA used for transit.

[XMEN Gambit]

Should be able to get 25MW somewhere other than Split. After all, the Split believe in only minimal shielding to begin with.

[TimberWolf]

Well, the problem is that 25MW shield stations are limited to the Split only. It was like this in X2 as well but race relations didn't prevent you from buyinig their goods. I had seen another 25MW station some where else in the universe but I can't find it now. It may have been destroyed either by the GOD engine or some thing.

I have about 30 sectors that I have not mapped out yet. Some of the Boron and Paranid space in the south are yet to be mapped along with those two new sectors in the Pirate region (seen the gates but haven't traveled there), and the north east quadrent of the universe. There are a couple of other sectors scattered that I haven't explored. Part of the reason was that the last time I was near them I wasn't in any condition to really explore with my single ship. Now I have the resources to map out the sectors quickly but I can't pass through any Xenon sectors or Loo Manckstrat's Legacy/Mi Tons Refuge without having serious problems or complete loss of ships.

This is finals week at school. So no playing at all of X3 or X2 this weekend. Also I am going home without my computer so I can't play at all during my week and a half break. But I will continue to prowl the boards on my Dads computer.

*EDIT*

Decided to play a little X3 last night. My Pirate hunts in Split sectors was turning up with nothing since I can't scan for Pirate frieghters and no pirate ships were flying through. I decided to look into my station and add a BoGas station to it. It looked like there was a high demand for it in the area, especially the Flower farms in the neighboring Teladi sector. So I built my first complex, making sure there was a lot of distance between the stations to make sure they don't have problems.

Problem, I don't have any real freighters survicing the stations. I have a TP buying energy cells and a Pericles (M4) selling Wheat. When I get my fighters back there, they were left in Split space, I will set one of them to sell the BoGas. But I need to make a lot of money to buy a real transport to buy energy cells in mass. I currently have less than half a million credits.

Another thing I have noticed, I have had great success in capping ships when I have my excorts (5 ships) with me compaired to when they are not around. Give you an idea, I was able to capture about 7 ships near Anarchy Base with my escorts protecting me. Now that I am flying alone near Elena's Fortune I can't get anyone to bail. My plan is that the next time I play my escorts will rejoin me and go pirate hunting around a Pirate base that is red to me. Once I get the money I maybe able to outfit them with jump drives.

[TimberWolf]

Got back from spring break yesterday. I didn't have my computer with me at all and my parents internet connection sucks (Roadrunner in a farm town).

How is everyone doing in their games?