NUKLEAR-SLUG wrote:...Ideally my next move would be to attempt to capture a TL as that would probably give me the greatest benefit in terms of cash-making potential. I quite fancy an Elephant as a first TL as they're quite flexible. The tricky bit will be finding one suitably exposed that I can make a play for it....
If you want a somewhat easier job of it, go for a 'casino', 'arena' or 'hospital ship'. Those are just unarmed TL's. They do have a GJ or so of shielding, but likely not much in the way of internal defenses. And just think of all those passengers waiting to be turned into mercs.
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NUKLEAR-SLUG wrote:...Ideally my next move would be to attempt to capture a TL as that would probably give me the greatest benefit in terms of cash-making potential. I quite fancy an Elephant as a first TL as they're quite flexible. The tricky bit will be finding one suitably exposed that I can make a play for it....
If you want a somewhat easier job of it, go for a 'casino', 'arena' or 'hospital ship'. Those are just unarmed TL's. They do have a GJ or so of shielding, but likely not much in the way of internal defenses. And just think of all those passengers waiting to be turned into mercs.
Great story so far Slug. One thing that did make me wonder if I missed something is that you've had an Express on the books since page 19. In your last update it's been commissioned "Carjacker". I went back and checked your entries, but I couldn't find mention of it. Was it just an uninteresting cap you didn't add while Operation: 'Ooh, look! Shiny!' was gearing up, or does it have an neat story behind it? Keep up the good work.
In my game (and i went there near asap for cargo life support) there was
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A pirate base, a merc station and a plasma burst generator fab.
And the Terran plot spawns and *extra* base.
But it may be random, or getting blasted from time to time. I would change squidy's politic on *only merc bases* since GOD rarely decides to spawn them I would go for pirate bases/pirate anarchy ports, they seem to have the same abilities (at least in my game).
IPG is just for keeping the shields down on a ship with strong shield generators and avoiding the fried marine via ION-D scenario.
In my game when the marines were about to make contact my ION-D's could not lower the shields fast enough. Of course i could just switch to CIG's but that's not the point.
If anyone is interested in what Ion Shard Rails do, they drain weapon energy. I noticed this one time when I was under heavy ISR fire that my weapons recharged much slower than they did before I was taking fire (and even in some cases were actually draining when normally in a similar situation they would keep charging).
So I guess in a sense they do wreak havoc on weapon systems if you are in a fight that is so close every unit of energy is crucial.
As for Ion Pulse Generators, they are essential for capping if you don't have boarding pods. Why? They reduce the speed of whatever ship they hit. So let us recap on what is what.
Ion Disruptors: Drain shields
Ion Shard Railguns: Drain Weapons Energy
Ion Pulse Generator: Drain Speed
Ion Cannon: Erm...all 3? I dunno I have only used them one.
The slowing effect is temporary from what I've seen, and it seems to only do about 20-30 m/s in speed reduction. Could be that I was only using 2 at the time trying to cap a Ryu, but when it gets borderline on the shields it will start doing a bit of hull damage so you need to be careful. Ion-Ds do almost no hull damage, but wreak the weapons. I've been trying to cap Ryus to get some IBLs, however I hadn't taken into account the fact that they will fry the weapons. What combat rank do they start dropping IBLs, or is it just my bad luck so far?
Dunno but to me it seems that you still get random things even if you cap a ship. Capped a pirate Heavy Hydra after blowing up every system upgrade and with some weapons (1x hept, 1x pbe and 4x cig) still intact. After boarding finished I got no weapons and a triplex scanner.
Well my trip thru the split sectors was educational. My belief that they don't like me was somewhat confirmed and it gave 'Thunderchild' a chance to show what she can do. I do like having ION-D as a turret option all around as it gives me an impenetrable EM shield from missiles and believe me the Split certainly weren't shy about lobbing warheads my way. Big ones, small ones, they really weren't fussed.
I'm also liking the PBG. I've only got the two so far that I was lucky enough to capture along with a Blastclaw but they seem to make good turret weapons. I'm actually quite pleased the HCP didn't load a couple of those into his turrets and fry my face off when I was busy capturing him. He did have three in his cargo bay at the time so the option was definitely there. I guess he didn't qualify for the HCP captaincy due to his smarts.
Add to that the high speed and heavy shielding and all in all I'm very pleased with the performance. If I had to pick one fault tho it would be the slightly small cargo bay. Fully loaded with equipment, weapons and enough missiles to Base Delta Zero a small moon it does leave a limited amount of room for fuel, but then that's what tankers are for right?
Anyways, I found what I'm looking for on my way thru. Having given it some thought I've come to the conclusion I'm unlikely to encounter an Elephant alone outside Split territory unless the RNG gods are smiling upon me and we all know they hate me with a passion. Consequently I'm currently in the early planning stages of Operation: 'Dude, Where's My Car??' which will entail the audacious heist of a Split Elephant from their core sectors, right under the noses of sector security. Should be fun!
Scale Plate Green is suprisingly intact, I was half expecting it to be crawling with Xenon but it seems not. In fact now that I think about I'm fairly sure I've seen a grand total of exactly three xenon craft since day one. In my book that doesn't exactly make them the 'Menace to civilization' that I keep hearing about. Personally I think they just have bad PR. Passing thru Omicron Lyrae some bloke in the local Trading station comms me. Apparently I look like the kind of guy that likes babysitting important dignitaries. Sorry, no. I'm busy, maybe another time. Unless you're paying of course? No? Sod off then..
Into treasure Chest and I decide to pay the Goners a visit. They're a bit of a loopy bunch this lot but I could pick up some salvage insurance while I'm passing, that's always useful. Except I can't because the mad buggers have dismantled their equipment dock and used the parts to build half a temple. Who builds half a temple without checking you've got enough parts to build the other half? Goners that's who. Seems they'ld like me to help them out and unlike the Argon guy they know how to appeal to my better nature and they'll pay me for the privelige. These are the kind of guys I can deal with and hey, lucky me, they want Ore and silicon and I just so happen to have a small Ore/Silicon complex back in Presidents End. How cool is that?
I organise a couple freighters to deliver what they want and meantime head on down to Maelstrom to get me some Mercs. I don't really like this area, far too big and pea-soupy. It also seems to be fairly pirate-active as there's two Carracks and a Galleon in the area. They aren't pleased to see me either and try chasing me but they're easy enough to outrun. On the plus side tho if the pirates are alive and thriving this can only be good for me. Dropping thru into Gaian Star I head into the sector and finally at the end of my long, tiresome journey find sweet, sweet FA.. Well there's a Pirate base there but that's not what I'm looking for. How tiresome.
Ok, so this avenue of investigation was a bust. Seems I must look elsewhere. Meantime I'm in the area so I might as well make the Boron guy happy. Heading back to Grand Exchange I call in my Support-Hauler and tool up. If I'm going to venture into Xenon territory I'm going in loaded for bear..
glad to hear the split are getting what they deserve
I'm currently in their space on a plot mission so have to play nice but I feel some of their ships coming my way in the near future. maybe even try my hand at this boarding malarky
I would go for pirate bases/pirate anarchy ports, they seem to have the same abilities (at least in my game).
