X3 AP - not a good start

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X3 AP - not a good start

Post by Hub manager » Sat, 7. Oct 17, 06:25

took tutorial and says to shoot target

no weapons ?

is there more of this over sight to look forward to ?

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Post by RAVEN.myst » Sat, 7. Oct 17, 07:11

Some of the start scenarios don't give you weapons to begin with (I think Humble Merchant is among these), so the generic tutorial clearly overlooked this (I think the mission developers assumed that first-timers would gravitate to the more combat-oriented game-starts.) You have two options here:
1. Just leave it for the time being, and come back to it once you have bought some guns
2. If as a first-timer you want to do the whole tutorial first (not a bad idea, of course), then you can start a separate game using one of the other game starts (of the starts available before unlocking additional ones, I think ALL except Humble Merchant put you in a modestly combat-capable craft.)
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Post by Hub manager » Sat, 7. Oct 17, 07:15

RAVEN.myst wrote:Some of the start scenarios don't give you weapons to begin with (I think Humble Merchant is among these), so the generic tutorial clearly overlooked this (I think the mission developers assumed that first-timers would gravitate to the more combat-oriented game-starts.) You have two options here:
1. Just leave it for the time being, and come back to it once you have bought some guns
2. If as a first-timer you want to do the whole tutorial first (not a bad idea, of course), then you can start a separate game using one of the other game starts (of the starts available before unlocking additional ones, I think ALL except Humble Merchant put you in a modestly combat-capable craft.)
The other starts all seem to make me an enemy to someone or another.

might be a moot point though,i just tried navigating the user interface

and stopped playing :lol:

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Post by Timsup2nothin » Sat, 7. Oct 17, 07:18

Hub manager wrote:
The other starts all seem to make me an enemy to someone or another.

might be a moot point though,i just tried navigating the user interface

and stopped playing :lol:
Your loss.
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Not a DiD, so I guess it's a DiDn't, the story of my first try at AP
Part One, in progress

HEY! AP!! That's new!!!

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Post by jlehtone » Sat, 7. Oct 17, 14:20

Hub manager wrote:
RAVEN.myst wrote:2. If as a first-timer you want to do the whole tutorial first
The other starts all seem to make me an enemy to someone or another.
The idea is that you start a start where you can do the shoot tutorial and then drop that game. Then, knowing how to use a gun you can continue the unarmed game, where you eventually will find guns and enemies to shoot with those guns.
Hub manager wrote:i just tried navigating the user interface
and stopped playing :lol:
A long time ago I bought a graphics card that included some game. Without knowing a thing about it, I did install and start the game. The game started with a cutscene, where two space suits broke in and stole a small spaceship. I did form my opinion about the game and what it is about based on what I saw. Definitely not my cup of tea. I did not bother to navigate UI any more than what was necessary for finding the Quit. Immediate uninstall.

Several months later I was so bored that I reinstalled that game, despite it "obviously" being "wrong genre" for me. That time I did actually play a bit and did learn that the initial impression was all wrong. The actual gameplay was something different. A favourite genre.

Years have passed and I have now played that game (X2) and others in the serie (X3R, Xbtf, X3TC, X3AP) literally thousands of hours. Had I given up based on my initial impression (like I nearly did) ...
:facepalm:
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Post by TTD » Sat, 7. Oct 17, 17:02

totally agree ... sometimes first impressions are misleading.

I remember reading a revue of BTF
It was scathing and not encouraging.
I did not buy it, but a couple of years later I came across X2.

Wow ! that knocked the socks out of that reveiew and I waited until the X superbox, so that I could play X-BTF

But in the meantime , spent thousands of hours playing and even wrote a story tutorial ,which you can find in Creative forum,
or there is a link in the X-Superbox, if you evr get it.


If you are still reading these replies, come back to the game.
It has steep learning curve, but plenty of players here willing to help you learn the best space game of the last two decades... (i
mho).

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Post by Hub manager » Sat, 7. Oct 17, 21:10

TTD wrote:totally agree ... sometimes first impressions are misleading.

I remember reading a revue of BTF
It was scathing and not encouraging.
I did not buy it, but a couple of years later I came across X2.

Wow ! that knocked the socks out of that reveiew and I waited until the X superbox, so that I could play X-BTF

But in the meantime , spent thousands of hours playing and even wrote a story tutorial ,which you can find in Creative forum,
or there is a link in the X-Superbox, if you evr get it.


If you are still reading these replies, come back to the game.
It has steep learning curve, but plenty of players here willing to help you learn the best space game of the last two decades... (i
mho).
persevered,decided to take the interface 1 piece at a time.

added a mod to go derelict ship scrounging,found a khaak corvette,found i had a repair laser.

sat in space and jammed fire key,went out.
it repaired the ship,but i died as i went back to merc hauler,so the suits oxygen is not endless...liked that

repaired again from save,and sent it to a shipyard...

why wont they buy it ?

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Post by Alan Phipps » Sat, 7. Oct 17, 21:35

The Kha'ak Corvette is a unique trophy ship in vanilla - you only get the one, if you can find it. You cannot sell it nor reverse engineer it to make copies either.

It is a nice enough ship to fight from if you have or can find the Kyon weapons for it, but it is a risk to take near to other neutral/friendly/owned ships and stations because of its width and rotation in flight.
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Post by RAVEN.myst » Sat, 7. Oct 17, 21:41

Hub manager wrote:persevered,decided to take the interface 1 piece at a time.
Glad to hear it, and that's not only the best way to go about it, but realistically really the *only* way with X3's interface. It is not uncommon for powerful interfaces to be daunting at first - more user-friendly interfaces bury functionality under layers of abstraction, trading away power and control in favour of convenience, but ultimately whenever you want to really drive something, it takes getting to know the nitty-gritties (it's a bit like how I think about manual vs automatic transmissions, though the analogy is not entirely unflawed.)
Hub manager wrote:,found a khaak corvette,found i had a repair laser.
...
repaired again from save,and sent it to a shipyard...

why wont they buy it ?
Hmmm, I seem to vaguely recall that Kha'ak ships no longer get bought in X3AP, though I'm not sure if I'm remembering correctly - but what you say suggests that I am. The Kha'ak corvette, by the way, if equipped with its unique weapons, is actually a very strong ship. However, if you are dead-set on trying to sell as much of it as possible, you may be able to sell off its Kyon Beam Emitters at an equipment dock.


Incidentally, a word of advice:
I would recommend avoiding mods at first - applying those before getting to know the game's mechanics only means that you are likely to never truly understand them. For instance, salvaging as a means of income, especially in the early game, is a very valid and viable occupation - and doesn't require any mods, just a bit of experience with the game. Travel around some, look for places where there are battles going on (HINT: areas bordering pirate turf aren't bad, and the War Zone is very good - more in a spoiler below, in case you really want); you'll find that you can initially make a decent "living" collecting and selling dropped missiles.

Another word of advice: getting too rich too quickly in your first playthrough is just about guaranteed to do you no favours - once again, you will merely be skipping parts of the development curve without gaining crucial in-game experience.


So, here are just a couple of good scavenging locations: (Warning: this is totally a spoiler, so if you prefer to figure things out for yourself, you may want to avoid this, at least for the time being.)
Spoiler
Show
Elena's Fortune, on the eastern edge of the Argon Prime "neighbourhood", is bounded on two sides by pirate sectors leading to a fairly extensive pirate territory - often, pirate ships come in to raid and fights ensue, with casualties on both sides sometimes. If you are in the same sector when ships go 'boom', then they may drop stuff you can collect and sell. This sector is particularly handy for this, as any missiles that you collect you can sell right here at the Military Outpost. HINT: placing a NavSat or, better yet, a (more expensive) AdvSat in this sector somewhere that covers the N and S gates on the east side of the sector will allow you to keep an eye on activity here - then, if you notice pirates moving in, you can high-tail it back here and hope that something valuable drops.

Another location, and much more lucrative than the above, is the Terran-Argon warzone in the Omicron Lyrae region. Here, you are guaranteed to find frequent clashes between military forces of those two factions, with frequent drops of missiles and occasionally other goodies.
Good luck, and happy hunting! :)
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Post by Timsup2nothin » Sat, 7. Oct 17, 21:45

"Added a mod so I could find a ship without going through the process that would have taught me the value of it...complained about having a ship I didn't know what to do with."

I'm not trying to be rude here, but...
Trapper Tim's Guide to CLS 2

On Her Majesty's Secret Service-Dead is Dead, and he is DEAD

Not a DiD, so I guess it's a DiDn't, the story of my first try at AP
Part One, in progress

HEY! AP!! That's new!!!

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Post by jlehtone » Sun, 8. Oct 17, 12:28

Timsup2nothin wrote:"Added a mod so I could find a ship without going through the process that would have taught me the value of it
I have to disagree with that. What process?

Loitering until scanners pick up something? Does not tell about the something.

Acquiring and setting up scouts to map the X-Universe? Teaches something, but not about Kha'ak.


Nothing in X3AP explicitly teaches about the Kha'ak. They are gone. X2 the Threat was all about learning the business end of Kha'ak beam weapons. X3R had them as standard fun, and in X3TC they made a farewell tour.


One can look at the weapon stat tables (on several wiki) and see both awesome and pathetic lasers. Not all of the listed weapons are actually in the game, while others -- like the PSG -- have area effects way beyond their numeric strength. Some of that you can figure out by playing, some less so.


I can understand why a new player would use a script to more quickly find abandoned items. On the first start you have neither ingame resources (although Humble Merchant has IMHO plenty*) nor knowledge about the game mechanics. "Starting" with a little bit more resources appears to help. There is also "Cheat package" script to quickly add resources. Any resources. Having more to play with can either help or ruin the experience.

Mods, "real mods" that alter game significantly, are a different matter. Their effect is best understood by knowing the vanilla game and how the mod alters that base.


[*] I have never started the Humble, but by logic it takes only couple ingame hours to reach about same status no matter what start you use. If you know what you are doing and RNG has a bad day.
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Post by zazie » Sun, 8. Oct 17, 18:53

@ Hub manager: welcome - and do whatever you want in the beginning. The x-games are huge, difficult to learn, there are so many features (hidden in so many menues ...) that it is almost impossible to have a PERFECT start.
I therefore suggest that you take your actual game as a playing-ground in the clear perspective that you will NOT go on with this save. Makes bad decisions, losses or bad luck easier to take :)

You will be learning a lot by making mistakes - and you will want to make it better next time, with a new game. Good luck, pilot!

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Post by Timsup2nothin » Sun, 8. Oct 17, 22:47

jlehtone wrote:
Timsup2nothin wrote:"Added a mod so I could find a ship without going through the process that would have taught me the value of it
I have to disagree with that. What process?

Loitering until scanners pick up something? Does not tell about the something.

Acquiring and setting up scouts to map the X-Universe? Teaches something, but not about Kha'ak.


Nothing in X3AP explicitly teaches about the Kha'ak. They are gone. X2 the Threat was all about learning the business end of Kha'ak beam weapons. X3R had them as standard fun, and in X3TC they made a farewell tour.


One can look at the weapon stat tables (on several wiki) and see both awesome and pathetic lasers. Not all of the listed weapons are actually in the game, while others -- like the PSG -- have area effects way beyond their numeric strength. Some of that you can figure out by playing, some less so.


I can understand why a new player would use a script to more quickly find abandoned items. On the first start you have neither ingame resources (although Humble Merchant has IMHO plenty*) nor knowledge about the game mechanics. "Starting" with a little bit more resources appears to help. There is also "Cheat package" script to quickly add resources. Any resources. Having more to play with can either help or ruin the experience.

Mods, "real mods" that alter game significantly, are a different matter. Their effect is best understood by knowing the vanilla game and how the mod alters that base.


[*] I have never started the Humble, but by logic it takes only couple ingame hours to reach about same status no matter what start you use. If you know what you are doing and RNG has a bad day.
Chances are that without mods to find them that by the time the Kha'ak Corvette turns up enough time has passed that you've at least flown a variety of ships (not Kha'ak ships) and have an appreciation for what the M6 class is, generally.

It's also likely that by the time you stumble across the Corvette you've already stumbled onto some of the smaller Kha'ak ships. That provides a couple things. First off, you have a chance to realize their status as something like artifact/collector's items. Secondly, you find out (probably) that arming them is problematic.

If nothing else, it takes quite a bit of playing the game before you stumble into that "aha" moment when you realize hey, there are ships just laying around!!!
Trapper Tim's Guide to CLS 2

On Her Majesty's Secret Service-Dead is Dead, and he is DEAD

Not a DiD, so I guess it's a DiDn't, the story of my first try at AP
Part One, in progress

HEY! AP!! That's new!!!

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Post by ajime » Mon, 9. Oct 17, 02:57

Timsup2nothin wrote:
jlehtone wrote:
Timsup2nothin wrote:"Added a mod so I could find a ship without going through the process that would have taught me the value of it
I have to disagree with that. What process?

Loitering until scanners pick up something? Does not tell about the something.

Acquiring and setting up scouts to map the X-Universe? Teaches something, but not about Kha'ak.


Nothing in X3AP explicitly teaches about the Kha'ak. They are gone. X2 the Threat was all about learning the business end of Kha'ak beam weapons. X3R had them as standard fun, and in X3TC they made a farewell tour.


One can look at the weapon stat tables (on several wiki) and see both awesome and pathetic lasers. Not all of the listed weapons are actually in the game, while others -- like the PSG -- have area effects way beyond their numeric strength. Some of that you can figure out by playing, some less so.


I can understand why a new player would use a script to more quickly find abandoned items. On the first start you have neither ingame resources (although Humble Merchant has IMHO plenty*) nor knowledge about the game mechanics. "Starting" with a little bit more resources appears to help. There is also "Cheat package" script to quickly add resources. Any resources. Having more to play with can either help or ruin the experience.

Mods, "real mods" that alter game significantly, are a different matter. Their effect is best understood by knowing the vanilla game and how the mod alters that base.


[*] I have never started the Humble, but by logic it takes only couple ingame hours to reach about same status no matter what start you use. If you know what you are doing and RNG has a bad day.
Chances are that without mods to find them that by the time the Kha'ak Corvette turns up enough time has passed that you've at least flown a variety of ships (not Kha'ak ships) and have an appreciation for what the M6 class is, generally.

It's also likely that by the time you stumble across the Corvette you've already stumbled onto some of the smaller Kha'ak ships. That provides a couple things. First off, you have a chance to realize their status as something like artifact/collector's items. Secondly, you find out (probably) that arming them is problematic.

If nothing else, it takes quite a bit of playing the game before you stumble into that "aha" moment when you realize hey, there are ships just laying around!!!
some people like the thrill of spoilers some people do not. they just want to see the world burn. though i normally sift through the threads to find those ships instead of installing a mod, personally its enjoyable to know of such things like an unknown sector gate off the plots in 597. :D

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Post by RAVEN.myst » Mon, 9. Oct 17, 03:50

Well, I'm with Tim: I don't think mods provide training wheels, but rather crutches - and those can only stunt development. *shrug* But then again, I AM biased against mods in general, so I'm hardly non-partisan in this regard :D

zazie wrote:I therefore suggest that you take your actual game as a playing-ground in the clear perspective that you will NOT go on with this save. Makes bad decisions, losses or bad luck easier to take :)

You will be learning a lot by making mistakes - and you will want to make it better next time, with a new game. Good luck, pilot!
Some excellent advice here, in my opinion. It's a lot like playing an RPG game: the first character is almost always a CaUFU, given that the player doesn't yet know the skill system, skill interactions, or even what the skills actually really do.
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Post by TTD » Mon, 9. Oct 17, 09:20

I agree...with survival games you spend the first hundred hours being killed multiple times for various reasons....usually lack of skill or knowledge.

But eventually, that pesky creature that kept killing you becomes no more than an annoyance compaired to other problems in the game.

In X , you learn by mistake.
You also learn from both new and old players.

Long term players like those above and myself , tend to think we know as
much about he game as we can...then some new player,with a fresh view on the game, comes in and discovers something that we have all overlooked !

we never really stop learning in this game.
Experimentation is a good key for gaining new knowledge

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Post by jlehtone » Mon, 9. Oct 17, 16:52

Timsup2nothin wrote:If nothing else, it takes quite a bit of playing the game before you stumble into that "aha" moment when you realize hey, there are ships just laying around!!!
That is a fair point. There are definitely opportunities for moments of relevation, that are preemptively denied from you, if you acquire foreknowledge by other means.


The game stores 13 saves locally (Documents\Egosoft\X3AP\save). 10 explicit saves and 3 autosaves. Autosave occurs when you dock to a Station (but can be disabled). Explicit save is possible both while docked (free of charge) and in space (consumes one Goner insurance). Goner Temple sells insurance vouchers.

I, for example, make explicit save occasionally, round robin to all 10 slots. When I reach the 10th, I copy entire folder away. Therefore, I effectively never overwrite any of my explicit saves. (Quite pointless though, for I forget what all those saves have.) :oops:

I do backups manually, but there is a Savegame Manager by mrbadger https://forum.egosoft.com/viewtopic.php?t=249129
A tool to do file copying more coherently, with some metadata.


When seeing a risky mission, I tend to dock at nearest Station to create a autosave before taking the mission. It is up to me to decide whether I want to resort to reloading the save.

I do recall once rerunning the same mission in several different ways, evaluating approaches. In the end, reloaded the save one more time and never took the mission.


There is the Dead is Dead (DiD, aka ironman) play style where one never reloads. One Start uses Steam to enforce that. Needless to say, Steam can fail -> Game Over. Game can crash -> Game Over. That big Boron enters from the Gate right after you -> lethal collision -> Game Over. A plot Mission puts you where you don't know the proper tactic -> Game Over.

In other words, the DiD style requires extensive knowledge of the game, careful planning, nerves of steel, and some luck. Not for beginners. Not for my patience either. I do salute those, who dare.
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Post by Timsup2nothin » Mon, 9. Oct 17, 17:09

jlehtone wrote: In other words, the DiD style requires extensive knowledge of the game, careful planning, nerves of steel, and some luck. Not for beginners. Not for my patience either. I do salute those, who dare.
The other thing required by DiD style is not trying crazy things, which makes it not my style. I end most sessions by docking at a station, then taking off on something that by all appearances is suicidal. Usually, it is...but hey, I was done playing anyway.
Trapper Tim's Guide to CLS 2

On Her Majesty's Secret Service-Dead is Dead, and he is DEAD

Not a DiD, so I guess it's a DiDn't, the story of my first try at AP
Part One, in progress

HEY! AP!! That's new!!!

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Post by Hub manager » Mon, 9. Oct 17, 17:15

This is a single player game isnt it ?

and there is no way anyone has played this game without google or off site sites filled with tips and tricks.
I also installed the better collector mod,because of the spinning ship bug.

2 mods made this game playable,because without them most newcomers would take one look at the complexity and just move on.

Personally i play games for fun,if they become a chore i dont bother,theres enough stress in the real world to deal with :lol:

If any developers happen to read this may i suggest hiding 90% of the UI menus until the player actually needs them,only triggering when the player starts to explore a different aspect of the game,like station building etc.because that menu system appearing all at once is horrible for the first timer.

When i start a game more complex than point and shoot i print off the key list,this one ran my printer out of ink :D

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Post by Alan Phipps » Mon, 9. Oct 17, 17:44

".. and there is no way anyone has played this game without google or off site sites filled with tips and tricks. ... 2 mods made this game playable ... "

Some of us bought it and started playing it on release date (and also true for its predecessors using that engine) - there were no tricks, tips or mods then! Thousands of players did indeed play lengthy vanilla games and thoroughly enjoyed doing so. :)

I can't see the devs reworking the UI on a game & engine this old. Some of us are quite used to it the way it is now - warts and all.

Remember that perceptions of the 'goodness' of a UI and gameplay change significantly over time as new game engines, APIs and system capabilities come out and allow comparisons to be made between the older and newer gaming environments.
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