Life always gets in the way, but slightly belatedly here is the detailed list of the missions:
1. Capture all types of Xenon ships
Xenon fighter ships, despite being machines, do sometimes bail (but I wonder, where do their pilots go!?).
Alternatively, you could dock at the Xenon shipyard and buy any of the ship types. Alas, you can't communicate with it to request docking clearance. But could you hack your way in?
There are no P's or Q's in X2, so the only ships are the fighters, N, M and L, and the two capital ships, the J and the K. J's and K's spawn from the shipyard and also in Xenon taxi and invasion missions. The J's and K's that spawn from the shipyard and the ones that appear in invasions cannot be captured. However, one of the best things about X2 is that they saved the best ship in the game til last:
Once you get to, I think, Ace of Aces 1st grade, you can capture the K's in Xenon taxi missions. The K is as fast and manoeuvrable as a fighter but has PPC weapons that can destroy any target in seconds. They are the perfect ship for assassination missions, and for jumping around the galaxy.
2. Somehow stop the Xenon shipyard from re-spawning
In X2, regular stations don't re-spawn if they are destroyed, but shipyards and trading stations do. So, if you blow up the shipyard, it just returns several game hours later. You'd think there would be something you could do about it? Is there? Maybe, you could sign a peace treaty with the Xenon? They would remove the shipyard from X472, if we give them, oh I don't know, Paranid Prime!? If not, X472 does make for a fun mini game. When the shipyard re-appears, it brings with it all the Xenon capital ships, all at once. That's about 15-25 K's and maybe another 10-15 J's. Once you've got your own K, you can jump in and have fun wiping them out (again).
3. Increase your Goner rank to Protector of the Goners
As I mentioned, I don't think this one can be done. In principle, you could spend all your money buying salvage insurances, but it doesn't look like that works in practice. Perhaps, you could station a large fleet of capital ships around the Goner Temple, and simply imagine that you are a "Protector of the Goners". In a simlar way, there is no PHQ in X2, but if you build an equipment dock, you can pretend it's your PHQ.
4. Win the lottery
In X2, lottery tickets appear quite frequently at space stations. They are relatively cheap and the game keeps track of the number that you've bought and the number of jackpots you've won. It is one of the statistics that is uploaded if you use the Uplink facility to upload a save game. I hope Uplink still works because I still haven't uploaded my game yet!
Lottery tickets in X2 have something like 8 numbers, so the odds of winning are pretty small, and that's assuming winning has actually been programmed into the game. My game says Lottery jackpots won: 0
5. Enter the argon rally
There are lots of varied bulletin board entries in X2. You stop reading them after a while, but they help make the universe more believable. One of the transport missions offered involves delivering components for the Argon rally. The message says that if you deliver the parts in good time, you may have a chance of getting a wildcard entry to the rally. The mission requires a TS, which are my least favourite ship, so I can't even remember ever doing this mission. However, I think you just get the standard "Thanks for making good time" message at the end. I don't think anyone has got anything different, or have they? Have you managed to enter the rally?
6. Find the UFO base
There are UFOs flying from sector to sector in X2. You can follow them, but you can't communicate with them. You can, however, blow them up, and you lose Goner reputation for doing so. Perhaps, that's because nobody knows anything about them and we have never found their homeworld or base. Maybe you could be the first to make contact?
7. Land on a planet (or fly into a star)
You certainly can get very close to planets, but you just bounce off the atmosphere when you get too close. Unlike the original Elite, you can't buy a fuel scoop in X2, and it doesn't look like you get anywhere nearer to stars when you fly towards them. There are 137 sectors in X2 though, so perhaps one of those has a secret planet that you can land on?
8. Complete one of the fast taxi missions.
These missions are fun, and they are one of the most lucrative missions in the game. All you really need is a Pegasus and some good judgement about how fast you can get from A to B.
The mission is to transport someone to deliver documents or to win a bet. The mission challenges you to travel from one station to another, usually one or two sectors away. The first mission is always either one or two sectors away. If the destination is one sector away, you get 6 mizuras to complete it. 11 mizuras, if it is two. If you are successful, you get paid handsomely and are offered the chance to earn even more money by accepting another challenge. Beware though, each new challenge reduces the amount of time allocated to complete it. The distance varies much more too, if the destination is in the same sector, it is very easy. If not, you'll likely need a carrier ship of some kind to jump you to the destination sector. If you keep accepting the challenges, the amount of time drops randomly, eventually down to 3, 2, and then finally to 1 mizura. 2 mizura challenges can be done if the destination station is near a gate. 1 mizura challenges are almost always impossible. Eventually, you just won't make it in time. Unless you're the Doctor and you have a Tardis?
9. Find Susie (or Susie's parents)
I'm not sure how many X games Susie has been in, but she first appeared in X2. Her parents need to pick her up from the Casino, but it seems that they never get that message. Can you find them and reunite Susie with her parents?
10. Take over an unknown enemy sector
Combat in X2 works in mysterious ways. If you are "in sector", the AI is not very clever and capital ships rarely damage each other very much. OOS is quite different, and it has two modes of operation. 1. If you are watching a remote sector, each round of combat takes place every five seconds or so. Hits do a reasonable amount of random damage. When ships first encounter each other, the fastest ship gets first shot. This is often enough to determine the winner, but sometimes the dice rolls can go against you, so it's wise to save your game before doing assassination missions OOS. 2. If you are not watching the sector, each round of movement and combat is a "big round", and happens every thirty seconds or so. This means that capital ships can, and do, one shot kill each other. A group of M6s can kill an M2 in this way too. Finally, there is one more thing to bear in mind: a hostile spawning ship always gets the first shot.
The last point is important because the Khaak constantly spawn in the unknown enemy sectors. In principle, this means that you can't hold an unknown enemy sector because you'd always be losing ships when Khaak destroyers and carriers spawn on top of them. I have to say that this is only my theory though, I haven't tried it out in practice. I do know that it is possible to hold the middle of an unknown enemy sector, because the Khaak only spawn around the edges. I think I might try to see if I can actually do this in my game, at least to hold enough of the sector to build a few stations and mines in it. Has anyone else had any luck doing this?
