Bulletin board missions. What did you like? What would you like?

[Schnigel]

I was never really good at X3, but what would be nice is some normal stuff like supervising and guarding the building of a base and maybe running it for a while, maybe defend it....

I also like the idea of attacking bases ans fleets of enemies, to gain reputation.
I also like trading missions where you might have to fly through dangerous sectors. Also aquiring rare ships and bases for corporations or rich people...

[Player.]

Alright

An Escort Mission
I would like to see a mission where a supertransporter has to deliver cargo for a battle that will take place between two races (Example:Argon Vs Xenon)

This is how the mission will be:(the massage on a station)
"The Argon Federation had recently met with growing attaks by the xenon the last attak accured in Light Of Heart. we cannot take much more of this beating we need a convoy to supply a standingby fleet at Black Hole Sun. the fleet has no supply's left and need missiles and personal to asist them.

(Player accepts the mission if scans are lower then an M3 and the Ace 1st grade then he wont be able to do it)
Welcome pilot. you are intrested to help us? let us check your data.................data cunfirmed........Name: Julian Brenner Skill: Ace 1st grade.............Ship:................Argon...............Nova...........Raider. we will now give you a waypoint where to meet the feild officer of the Black Hole Sun system.

(Player recives waypoint and fly to Omycron Layre at which point an M5 follow's him)
(Player gets to Omycron Layre there he gets a message to talk to the captan of the argon M1 in the sector)

(Player talks to captan and is sent to wait near the Free Argon Traing Station). after few minutes a convoy of 3 super transporters and 10 TP ships leaves the station with 2 M6's and 10 M3's and 20M4's as an escort when the player gets close to the gate to fly to Black Hole Sun from the gate xenon ships arrive at huge numbers and the player must find a way to save 3 Transporters and 5 TP ships.

Then the player need;s to defend the sector and ge the matirial safe to the sector he was talk to get it too.

[Baleur]

-=Normal Missions=-

- An actual race, where you have to fly to a trading post, which functions as the starting location, and dock there.
Then you will hear something like "mission started", if you undock before that, the mission is failed..
If you undock after then you are on your way along with 10 other npc ships, all the same speed as your ship, heading for whatever random checkpoints (different stations, even capital ships, like within 200m?).

- Exploration missions, such as to find an artifact near a sector, where you have to either manually comm ships asking if they know anything about it, or dock in all the stations and check for a secret BBS message giving closer hints ("its in one of the soyeries"), and when in a soyery ("its near the west gate") and so on..
Could have npc ships looking for the same thing also!

-=Universe Changing missions=-

- Sector takeover mission, either for yourself, or for another race.
It would for instance spawn a npc Boron fleet, waiting near the gate to whatever system the invasion is supposed to take part in, waiting for your command.

- Actual sector renaming after that mission!! Make a list of 100 different boron/split/paranid/argon/pirate/xenon (lol the xenon names should be easy to come up with =P) and pick one randomly whenever a sector's stations have been destroyed and another race is building a station/trading post there. (just in the line of the current npc building/invasions).
Or if a player takes over it, promt for the name to be specified, will give alot more immersion and sense of property.

- The official, bigger, egosoft version of the smugglers guild missions.
Not just having to supply weapons and ships, but also getting requests for STATIONS, perhaps even by a particular race.
Such as the Paranid might want a BHEPT Forge in Trinity Sanctum, so when you have placed the forge you won't own it, but if you bought it you will get a small but steady "tax" income whenever something is bought or sold (so you would make profit both way, if someone buys BHEPT's, or sells EC's to the station etc, since the tax from either buying or selling goes to you)

[Achatos]

What really would excite me is a mission in which you have to find secret bases, hidden in asteroids for example, and that you have to destroy them. Not just by shooting on the hull of the base but in which you have to target a special energy unit or something like that, in the core of the base, so that you really need skill to do the job.

Missions like these would give the excitement of finding something secret or hard to find, AND to beard the lion in his den. Wow!

I would really love to see this in X3.

[BlackRain]

I personally would like to see more war related elements, I want to have a feeling that there really is a huge war going on and tensions are rising everywhere. It would be cool to have races clash over border disputes of which a BBS news article would show up and inform you of and you could participate in a border skirmish or participate in an invasion of another sector, for instance Argon invading Emperor Mines controlled by the Paranid. The Argon would then take over the sector if they win and rebuild it with stations. Later on the Paranid might attempt to take it back. All of this would be reported by the BBS.

Of course I would also like to see the player able to take over sectors, rename them, and possibly get a Tax from the planets that inhabit the sector, based on how many people live there. Again, all of this would be reported on the BBS and also whatever race you took the sector from would try to take it back, but not just with a random fleet. They would actually prepare, send recon ships and you could also do recon yourself and the BBS would report that tensions are rising and possibly even offer Mercenaries you could hire to help defend a sector.

I would love to see actual politics involved and reported on the BBS. The races will have relations with each other, have meetings and diplomatic talks which are reported on the BBS which may or may not change relations which could lead to raised tensions and skirmishes or invasions, all reported on the BBS. Also when the player is big enough and has their own sector they could also somehow be involved in this political system through the BBS. This could work like, they have to meet with the Teladi in New income for some kind of summit, and you fly over there and either read the BBS or comm a particular person there. Then you would be asked questions or something, sort of like in the story in X2 when you are talking with ban danna. Depending on how you answer, it will determine standing or relations or maybe they are just asking you for increased business, or help on an attack with another race or defense or possibly a joint operation of some kind, defending cargo as it goes through one of your sectors or help in exploring or recon a certain sector. Or maybe they mention that they lost a ship somewhere and if you could help them locate it. This could also be done on the BBS.

[Master Merchant]

Ok I've got a few ideas so i'm going to break them up into catagories.

Combat Missions: Currently we have assassin, Hostile taxi and XI missions.
Add: Raider (attack ship X in Convoy Y to get Cargo Z), Escort (Defend Convoy X to point B), Pirate and Kha'ark Invasions, Retailation (Help Race Z kick Race C's rear end) and Station Defense/Attack.

Trade Mission: Currently have Cargo Run.
Add: Convoy (where you and X more ships + escort get X goods to station P), Inflitraction (get X marines into Station Q), Sabatoge (disable or destroy Station R), Blockade Run (same as Cargo run however theres a few ships in the way.....BIG ships),

Other: Currently have Taxi.
Add: War Missions Argon-Boron Vs Split-Paranid? Teladi versus Paranid? One race has a breakdown of communcations with another and a small (or large) war breaks out where you choose a side to fight for (pirate wars also inculded)
Rescue: Pilot X is in sector B please go pick him up his last coords are 0,1,0.
Salvage: Abandon ship in sector Y is beyond repair and the pilot has just released salvage rights for its parts (in other words get their first or blow up the b*****d that gets their first (this can also be done to station and gate wreckage [freeze dried boron anyone?].
Recon: Scout Sector G we have up loaded the nav points (nav beacons) and report any hostiles.
And the last mission (and one that hopefully doesn't show up alot but is in effect even without the player): Evac Sector L is no longer defendable and a sizable (enemy race) fleet is closing fast we are evacuating the sector and need your help. (sector will become empty after this as stations are packed up and moved to a more defendable location if the enemy race is one of the major 5 or Xenon then they claim the system, if its Kha'ark then strange items (kha'ark stations) will apper and will be a site of a retibution or war mission.

[banjaxo]

I'd like to see players who indulge in a bit of piracy being given the chance to join the Yaki.

Perhaps there would be a "test" that must be passed in order to make the grade, say destroying x number of police craft in a sector, or capturing a particular freighter.

Once a fully fledged Yaki member, there could be opportunities to rise through the ranks and the available missions would expand to include various others, such as keeping the sector patrols busy while your fellow pilots raid a station, stealing high-tech wares to order, and perhaps even destroying various sector defenses in an outlying system as a prelude to a full Yaki invasion of that sector.

The long-term rewards could be ownership of a mobile pirate base, perhaps with a view to taking more sectors and expanding the Yaki's sphere of influence, and commanding fleets of ships in mass raids etc.

That'd do for me

[theKettle]

A few ideas:

Dodgy/illegal missions, like 'providing' a series of ships ('we need 3 Mercury supertankers, a couple of Nova Raiders and a Caiman of any sort within 3 days'). Allow the player to provide ships he already owns or has legally bought, but obviously it would be much cheaper to capture ships, as the reward would be rather less than the cost of the ships. And maybe once you've done a few of that type of mission, you'd be able to buy ships from them cheaper than the usual shipyard costs (ie, ones that others have captured).

Another mission might be from a station owner who's having trouble selling his goods because there's too much competition, perhaps you could help things out a bit? (i.e. destroy a couple of the other rival factories in the area).

On the other side of the law, you could get a police mission to help uncover a smuggling ring, by scanning all ships going through a sector to find the smugglers, then carefully follow them without arousing their suspicion (by getting too close) to find the source and destination bases.

Racing missions would be fun, especially ones navigating through asteroid belts, or even through the interior of asteroids themselves. All the more fun if the other racers aren't perfect, but occasionally crash themselves. Or another spin on that idea: you could be piloting a small, weaponless craft, while they (pirates) are chasing you (maybe you're transfering some important cargo, or something). You need to lose them in the asteroid field through your superior flying skills. After all, Julian is supposed to be a hotshot pilot!

[TheHermanator]

What did I like?

Although my favourites would be assassinations and Xenon invasions, i would have to say that i just like doing missions, whatever they may be.


What would I like to see?

Well, previous posts have already covered my wishes (so i won't repeat them here) except for one: MORE! And not just the elaborate ones, but also the basic "bread and butter" variety. I would like to be able to fly from station to station, knowing that there would be at least one BBS mission waiting for me, even if it was fairly basic.

[Flashfire]

I would like to see TREASURE MAP missions:

1) Buy a map for a random amount of credits

2) Coordinates for treasure supplied in XYZ

3) Treasure could be an free empty ship, cargo pod, nothing at all or a pirate ambush. All randomly generated.

Above all, higher frequency of BBS missions. Finding a BBS mission to do is rare and not a good source of income.

[marty101]

How about a nod to one of the missions you used to get in Elite where you have to track down a prototype ship which has been stolen. If I remember correctly you had to follow a string of clues leading you to the sector the ship was in.

[Lorric]

[Off topic part removed - Graphil]

How about missions that don't need to be solved right away (such as most do now, i.e. transport someone, go kill someone, take this freight somewhere). Like "If you happen to get to Omicron Lyrae, dock at Cahoona Bakery M alpha and talk to Jako Bleepneck, he might have some missions for you"

Also, in case you transported someone from X to Y, and they say that they will contact you next time they need to go somewhere, they actually might do just that. So the in-game person remembers your good service and sends you a message asking for transport again. You could accept or decline in your log. That'd be nice. This would require you to make it clear when you have a new message in your log.

[Chips]

What did I like - the variety of the plot missions...
What was fun? - being a gunner, flying through an asteroid to spy on someone, rescuing people from bases etc. If those types of things could be incorporated, that would be terrific. Indeed, CLOSE SECTOR FLYING (ie asteroid, through base as fast as possible, through the city etc).

Most have been said, but some others

[Think] (or trade!?)
Prospecting mission... scan asteroids within a certain sector radius, with regards to a corp/miner starting up new operation or needing a new area for mobile mining possibilities. Obviously asteroids may harbour pirates and other low life, to make it more interesting.

[Think?]
Negotiate missions - from one base, they want something or some resource. You have to find a base that supplies said resource, speak to the boss on board (or person on board) and negotiate some form of deal for them. Alternatively, they are competative and have been marauding each other/sabotaging each other, and wish to stop this.
Options include insults as well as persuasion techniques, with possiblity of failing and succeeding dependant upon what you say. Obviously would need variety of options, otherwise would prove simply formulaic. Preferably some knowledge of how the races take comments etc to help win em over - ie "could go buy from boron/split/paranid then" - Teladi will be hostile to one or two, but compliant to one of the responses and agree to supply).
It may not be possible to create teh routes, but it would be variety.

[Think/Fight] (Pirate)
Negotiate with patrols of police (bribe if possible, options once more on when to bribe, too early - hostile, too late - hostile, just right = success) to allow a known criminal leave their airspace/allow a consignment of space weed through. Success will mean okay mission, failure will mean you have to fight (hostile) police/navy in area to allow bloke through. failure of fighting the police during mission (if incapable of bribe) = death.

[Think]
Open ended FIND SUZY mission, characters on some bases may hold information as to where she is... put it all together (after accepting mission at one base) - find her, get paid a handsome reward. Failure doesn't occur, if more than a few "days" pass, you fail automatically, but no negative rep etc. Once found, ship her home (cargo).

[Fight] (pirate)
Free the don! Engage military escort and personal carrier carrying a pirate don, once all escorts are down, and transport damaged... hail to get them to drop the don, whom you then pick up. Life support system needed Time limit to mission once you attack, else help arrives for the military...

[Robbidoux]

Ok I liked Assasination missions and Xenon missions.

So the kind of mission I`d like to see would be based around an assasination mission along the following lines,

Being asked to assasinate a Crime cartel leader,Pirate leader,Family leader etc. This can be asked by a Government Family leader or even pirates wanting to even the score.

Once you jump into sector you must destroy the target and escorts,if any escape the sector they can send for help from their own forces as well as launching there own attacks on your ships factorys or interests.The escorts should be fairly strong and include docked M5`s which can launch and run for help once attacked.

This should mean you have too plan a comprehensive ambush involving several of your own Ships,Lasertowers and Squash mines instead of completing the mission on your own in an M3!.

If you mess up the ambush there are real effects on your empire as the faction you just attacked starts attacking you,this means you also have to have sufficient forces too defend your own factorys universe traders etc.

The faction strength should be random from say a station with 10 fighters in another sector to several stations with access to capital ships which could cause your empire serious problems.

Payment could be in,Money
A big increase in race relations small cash payments
A prize of a one of a kind ship
A capital ship or corvette
A new kind of ship or weapon

Obviously the prize should be reflected in how difficult the mission was.

PS JUST TO MAKE IT INTERESTING ONCE YOU ACCEPT THE MISSION THE GAME CAN NOT BE SAVED TILL TARGET IS DEAD OR FACTION IS DESTROYED.

[X-Warrior B AS]

What I would find interesting:

* Strings of missions. This means it's not over once you've done the mission, but you get a followup instead (could be voluntary or not, depending on what it is). So basically a whole series, like the 'Stoertebeker' mission XT had.
* Often with the current missions, when you've succesfully done it, you get the message "If I ever need something done again, I'll make sure to contact you". Need I even say it ? I guess I will anyway: make them actually contact you every now and then (might make you a busy man eventually, but that's what reputation gets you )
* AI people that contact you, instead of you getting the mission on the BBS (but no spamming).
* Missions that reflect the actual situation in the Universe. Has been mentioned before I believe.

[Crawling Chaos]

Anyone remember the rescue mission in Elite where you recieve an SOS from a ship stuck in a system with a sun that is about to go supernova. An expansion on that would be pretty cool with various outcomes depending on your approach, actions and time. Maybe you physically rescue people but maybe the ship holds too many for you to rescue alone. Maybe you can boost SOS signal somehow, or alert nearby stations or ships to help. Perhaps bring supplies so the crew can attempt to affect repairs in time to get the ship a safe distance, maybe you have to go EVA to make some kind of repair to the ship yourself. Maybe pirates have heard the SOS and are moving in for the kill, or perhaps you are a pirate and intend on extorting credits/goods for your help or at least not to attack. Maybe a combination of all these things and more.

[Ecthelion]

Wow, lots of great ideas.

Things I liked:
Assassination missions, invasions. Just like everyone else.

Things I would like to see:
Higher quantity of missions, and more types. I liked most of the suggestions others had. Just use the ones by Dioltas As Dia, and that will be enough for an addon. That was a very long list, and made it hard to think of new ideas.

I have a few ideas I don't think have suggested. Also, for these and any new missions, having the player informed about them by a normal message would allow for more flexibility. The BBS system is good, but some missions would work better if they started "on the fly."

Rogue station:
The player discovers while docked at a station that it is illegally run (this would probably be done by a message). After a certain amount of time, several transports would leave with the station's freight and the station personnel and try to escape the authorities. The player would be tasked with scanning the departing freighters, and forcing the ones carrying the cargo to drop their freight, or to capture them with the freight intact. After all the remaining freight is dropped or aboard captured transports, the local government's police would arrive to confiscate it. Transports that the player captured would be transferred to police control. The player would be rewarded and get a rep boost based on the amount of freight that was returned (if one of the transports were captured or destroyed, some of its cargo could be lost, like normally occurs). The station personnel would be included in the "freight," as well as any pilots that ejected, so they would all count towards the reward.

*ADDED*
Doomed ship:
A TS/TP/TL/M6/M1/M2 has a powercore that's about to blow. Unfortunately there's not enough time to save the ship. The player has to save as many of the crew as possible, before the time runs out and the ship blows up. My thinking is that the mission would make the ship your property, but through fancy scripting (maybe like what happens in the plot missions) you can't do anything with it besides transfer cargo. Whatever ship(s) you use to pick up the crew would need to have life support, givine the player more incentive for having that upgrade. Also, the player would get a large faction reputation decrease if the doomed ship's equipment/freight was taken while a single person remained onboard. After the entire crew was saved, the player could take the equipment with no repurcussions. I think there should be no monetary reward, as this is a "humane" mission, but the player would get a large reputation increase. You would have to take the survivors to a nearby station to get the reward. If you sold them as slaves or somehow "lost" them, you would get the same reputation hit. A cool twist would be to give the ship a shockwave when it blew up, thus making it a bit dangerous to stick around until the last second.

[DJ Aitch]

I really enjoy the Xenon invasion missions and some of the BBS content added by scripters such as the people offering to overtune your ship or buy your stations off you.

I would like to see a mission where the BBS tells you that a strange signal has been recieved from an unknown sector and they would like you to investigate. On getting there you could find anything...khaak...xenon...abandoned ship...suzy.

I think it would also be good to have a second hand ship seller on the BBS who would offer ships slightly damaged for various prices but the buyer wouldn't know what equipment they contained - kind of a gamble.

I really enjoy the blackjack on the bulletin board - how about some other games such as Texas hold 'em or you could call it Ianamus hold 'em.

That's about all the things I can think of right now.

[Brainman]

Trade Cartels

If player begins to make huge profit over the compitition in certain trade goods then it stands to reason they compitition may fight back.

Example BBS Entry

"The Argon Prime Energy and Power Cartel has reported record losses but CEO Ben Dover has declared that they will take any and all measures required to insure that the shareholders and great people of Argon enjoy there fabulous products"-

- Attack on SPP Alpha in Argon Prime by unknown teladi raider
- Attack on SPP Bravo in Home of Light by Unknown Boron raider
- Your TS Silicon Transport for SPP Bravo was destoyed

Now your choice defense or offense

Defense: Run em out of business - sell for cheaper keeping them idles so they cant sell there goods. "If stations idle for xx time then cartel war finished"

Offense: Hire counter raiders / Assasin missions or station busters that come available when this occurs (to save race relations)
Or do it yourself and knock this guy out.

BBS Bulletin
"The Demise of CEO Ben Dover has prompted the energy commision to reconsider its aggresive stance and to take a more long term approach in its future marketing strategy"

To get this to display you would have to find out when he will be in a ship (run pirate missions to get information)
To hire raiders you will need a contact
(additional unsavory misions)
Or take the hit in race relations and take matters in your own hands

Welcome to the world of High Finance - Its deadly and dangerous

[Jimbo007]

[Non BBS missions stuff removed - Graphil]

BBS missions that informed u of either a small or large scale event unfolding, that happened even if u dont accept.... to me that makes the world a LOT more alive and believeable!!

Thats me spent for now

Great Topic btw