3.0 X4 Missions Suggestions

[nickolaiproblem]

I know that the devs are thinking about new missions so I thought up some mission ideas for each category. There is some crossover ideas from previous x games.

Trade Missions

Scavenging Missions: Would honestly be a really great addition to the X4. Here what I'm thinking you can use already existing abandoned ships sprinkled around from combat. Then basically taking the making a default behavior that is basically search a 2 or 3 jump area for parts or ships to scavenge.

Transport Passengers: Where maybe a life support system like x3 had where in order to actually carry passengers you needed the refit.

Fight Missions
Sector scouting: For fast ships with that can go into xenon or khaak or other faction enemy sectors with and scan for ship deployments.

Patrol Missions: Especially if it is single and multi zone this would basically be getting payed for patrolling sectors for enemy ships

Bounty Hunting: Would be a lot of fun I know assassination missions already exist but I also like the ability to track pirates and smugglers through a couple of sectors kinda like this x3 mod http://www.xpluginmanager.co.uk/scripts ... ountyhunt/ or just simply a mission signal that reads hey this ship is pirating this sector can go ahead and kill them or capture them for us.

Escort Missions: Perhaps escort missions can be simply just mission signals where traders who need a escorting through pirate and more dangerous sectors or you could do something similar to this mod
https://www.nexusmods.com/x4foundations/mods/312

Pirate Missions: More specifically letters of marque perhaps the argon's or whatever other faction is looking for some no good pirates to disrupt shipping in an enemy sector or just destroy a few trade ships in neutral one. Pirates who accept these missions get payed per trade ship destroyed plus a little faction boost from faction that created the mission.

What missions do you guys think should be added? I'll add the best suggestions to my main list here.

[Derp]

Better integration with the simulation, less RPG-style explicit "bring me ten Xenon sphincters" quests. Players get rewarded for materially helping out factions, more so if they're close allies.

Fight:

• Integrate the Better Kill Credit mod into the base game. That should have been there from the start, I mean really. "Last hit gets all the credit" hasn't even been in grindy MMOs for years.
• Parts for mods available for sale from traders at appropriate prices. More money if you're fighting, less grinding if you're not.
• [Relation: 10+] The War Effort mission list contains a set of sectors where killing enemies of the faction will be rewarded, as in the Faction Enhancer mod but properly supported and explicitly communicated. In fact, do the Faction Enhancer mods too. There's your "invasion" missions.
• [Relation: 20+] Ship losses in faction space to enemies of the faction are reimbursed as if you'd sold them to the faction. There's your "patrol" missions, and an active encouragement to fight off invasions, even if you take losses doing so.

Build:

• Stations in faction space can be sold with a multiplier on production modules the faction needs. Rather than run that smart chips plant, sell it at a premium and use the funds to build the next thing.
• Hacking comes with rep loss, but make it possible to spot data leaks from a kilometer or so away in scan mode. I don't know why Egosoft has a "dry hump every spot of every station" fetish. It was a grind in XR, it's a grind in X4. Fixing the data leaks instead gets you decent reward credits - there's your "repairs required" missions.
• [Relation: 10+] Required to license plots in faction space.
• [Relation: 10+] Station kills count for bounty credits. Turret up that warzone station and it'll pay for itself.
• [Relation: 20+] Supplying stations with building materials has a small chance to grant you one of the blueprints used on the station. Good route for Fighters or Traders to get into building, without the hacking grind.

Trade:
Honestly this is pretty good already, although it needs to go back to 1 satellite per sector for updated trade offers.

• Bonus commission when supplying a shipyard or wharf with any resource it has a shortage of. Keeping the shipyards in operation should always be the most profitable trade.
• [Relation: 20+] Supplying shipyards or wharfs has a small chance of granting you random ship/equipment blueprints.

Think:

• Gaining reputation with one faction costs you rep with another, weighted toward reducing positive rep. You can set up shop as a neutral party, but neither faction is going to love you for it.
• Missions to shuttle around ambassadors, provide material for peace talks, blow up convoys in a particular ship model, hack stations, etc, to alter faction relations directly.

[photomankc]

Fight:

• Integrate the Better Kill Credit mod into the base game. That should have been there from the start, I mean really. "Last hit gets all the credit" hasn't even been in grindy MMOs for years.
• [Relation: 10+] The War Effort mission list contains a set of sectors where killing enemies of the faction will be rewarded, as in the Faction Enhancer mod but properly supported and explicitly communicated. In fact, do the Faction Enhancer mods too. There's your "invasion" missions.
  
  Build:
  • Hacking comes with rep loss, but make it possible to spot data leaks from a kilometer or so away in scan mode. I don't know why Egosoft has a "dry hump every spot of every station" fetish. It was a grind in XR, it's a grind in X4. Fixing the data leaks instead gets you decent reward credits - there's your "repairs required" missions.
  • [Relation: 10+] Required to license plots in faction space.
    
    Think:
    • Gaining reputation with one faction costs you rep with another, weighted toward reducing positive rep. You can set up shop as a neutral party, but neither faction is going to love you for it.
    • Missions to shuttle around ambassadors, provide material for peace talks, blow up convoys in a particular ship model, hack stations, etc, to alter faction relations directly.

I mostly like your list overall and I like these items the best. For ship losses, I'm ok without complete reimbursement ("maybe you just suck at fighting") but patrol missions with payouts high enough to make it worthwhile even if fighter or three is killed would be great. Better kill credit is just about my favorite mod as it makes me WANT to help out the factions with that I and three K's rampaging around. Patrol missions with enough payout as premium on top of the kills would be even better.

[nickolaiproblem]

Fight:

• Integrate the Better Kill Credit mod into the base game. That should have been there from the start, I mean really. "Last hit gets all the credit" hasn't even been in grindy MMOs for years.
• [Relation: 10+] The War Effort mission list contains a set of sectors where killing enemies of the faction will be rewarded, as in the Faction Enhancer mod but properly supported and explicitly communicated. In fact, do the Faction Enhancer mods too. There's your "invasion" missions.
  
  Build:
  • Hacking comes with rep loss, but make it possible to spot data leaks from a kilometer or so away in scan mode. I don't know why Egosoft has a "dry hump every spot of every station" fetish. It was a grind in XR, it's a grind in X4. Fixing the data leaks instead gets you decent reward credits - there's your "repairs required" missions.
  • [Relation: 10+] Required to license plots in faction space.
    
    Think:
    • Gaining reputation with one faction costs you rep with another, weighted toward reducing positive rep. You can set up shop as a neutral party, but neither faction is going to love you for it.
    • Missions to shuttle around ambassadors, provide material for peace talks, blow up convoys in a particular ship model, hack stations, etc, to alter faction relations directly.

I mostly like your list overall and I like these items the best. For ship losses, I'm ok without complete reimbursement ("maybe you just suck at fighting") but patrol missions with payouts high enough to make it worthwhile even if fighter or three is killed would be great. Better kill credit is just about my favorite mod as it makes me WANT to help out the factions with that I and three K's rampaging around. Patrol missions with enough payout as premium on top of the kills would be even better.

My thoughts on patrol missions implementation would be something like better kill credit or similar payment method for players who don't want or have a fleet maybe they get payed for just destroying xenon ships. The higher rank you are in the fact the higher you get payed so if I fight for argon with 30+ reputation and I destroy 2 Xenon Ms then that might get 70k total or something around that. If I am a freelance pilot who isn't aligned with anyone it I get maybe 55k for the 2 Xenon M's. I would also like to see larger patrol missions for aligned and non aligned players with fleets. So that if you fight for the HOP you might get war effort patrol missions that help boost your rank in that faction and some cash as well. If you non aligned you can get payed by patrol missions as well but significantly less but with added benefit of increasing your standing.

[nickolaiproblem]

Better integration with the simulation, less RPG-style explicit "bring me ten Xenon sphincters" quests. Players get rewarded for materially helping out factions, more so if they're close allies.

Fight:

• Integrate the Better Kill Credit mod into the base game. That should have been there from the start, I mean really. "Last hit gets all the credit" hasn't even been in grindy MMOs for years.
• Parts for mods available for sale from traders at appropriate prices. More money if you're fighting, less grinding if you're not.
• [Relation: 10+] The War Effort mission list contains a set of sectors where killing enemies of the faction will be rewarded, as in the Faction Enhancer mod but properly supported and explicitly communicated. In fact, do the Faction Enhancer mods too. There's your "invasion" missions.
• [Relation: 20+] Ship losses in faction space to enemies of the faction are reimbursed as if you'd sold them to the faction. There's your "patrol" missions, and an active encouragement to fight off invasions, even if you take losses doing so.

Build:

• Stations in faction space can be sold with a multiplier on production modules the faction needs. Rather than run that smart chips plant, sell it at a premium and use the funds to build the next thing.
• Hacking comes with rep loss, but make it possible to spot data leaks from a kilometer or so away in scan mode. I don't know why Egosoft has a "dry hump every spot of every station" fetish. It was a grind in XR, it's a grind in X4. Fixing the data leaks instead gets you decent reward credits - there's your "repairs required" missions.
• [Relation: 10+] Required to license plots in faction space.
• [Relation: 10+] Station kills count for bounty credits. Turret up that warzone station and it'll pay for itself.
• [Relation: 20+] Supplying stations with building materials has a small chance to grant you one of the blueprints used on the station. Good route for Fighters or Traders to get into building, without the hacking grind.

Trade:
Honestly this is pretty good already, although it needs to go back to 1 satellite per sector for updated trade offers.

• Bonus commission when supplying a shipyard or wharf with any resource it has a shortage of. Keeping the shipyards in operation should always be the most profitable trade.
• [Relation: 20+] Supplying shipyards or wharfs has a small chance of granting you random ship/equipment blueprints.

Think:

• Gaining reputation with one faction costs you rep with another, weighted toward reducing positive rep. You can set up shop as a neutral party, but neither faction is going to love you for it.
• Missions to shuttle around ambassadors, provide material for peace talks, blow up convoys in a particular ship model, hack stations, etc, to alter faction relations directly.

I like the ideas of some you missions I still would like to see a both bounty hunting and perhaps scavenging especially in war zones or pirate sectors. Also what about paying people per ship they destroy if their pilots and paying people who who have fleets a flat rate for patrol missions higher then what pilots might average out to be.

[Imperial Good]

[Relation: 20+] Ship losses in faction space to enemies of the faction are reimbursed as if you'd sold them to the faction. There's your "patrol" missions, and an active encouragement to fight off invasions, even if you take losses doing so.

So not only do they pay you to build their ships, they will also pay you to lose your ships... Not very well thought out.

Stations in faction space can be sold with a multiplier on production modules the faction needs. Rather than run that smart chips plant, sell it at a premium and use the funds to build the next thing.

What premium? Sure the mission gives you a bit of pocket change in return, but they still are hardly worth doing outside of early hours. When one owns self sufficient shipyard/warfs churning out over 300 million profit per hour the 4 million credits one gets from a smartchip factory is not even worth the effort. I only really do them if it is for a faction which has limited stations such as ALI, HAT or MIN.

Hacking comes with rep loss, but make it possible to spot data leaks from a kilometer or so away in scan mode. I don't know why Egosoft has a "dry hump every spot of every station" fetish. It was a grind in XR, it's a grind in X4. Fixing the data leaks instead gets you decent reward credits - there's your "repairs required" missions.

This makes no sense. Unless they spot you doing the hack they have no way to know you were responsible and hence no reason to reduce your reputation. Maybe they should be able to spot you more, but still it is hardly much of an issue. And no you do not need to scan all data leaks, with how much money warfs make you can just buy all modules you need towards middle and late game.

[Relation: 20+] Supplying stations with building materials has a small chance to grant you one of the blueprints used on the station. Good route for Fighters or Traders to get into building, without the hacking grind.

Or you just buy what you need with the excessive amounts of money the factions throw at you to build their ships. No grinding needed.

Gaining reputation with one faction costs you rep with another, weighted toward reducing positive rep. You can set up shop as a neutral party, but neither faction is going to love you for it.

Not very realistic. It is fairly common for both sides of a conflict to like a third neutral party, especially if that party is supplying them both with weapons.

[sakuramboo]

Scavenging Missions: Would honestly be a really great addition to the X4. Here what I'm thinking you can use already existing abandoned ships sprinkled around from combat. Then basically taking the making a default behavior that is basically search a 2 or 3 jump area for parts or ships to scavenge.

This is something I would be very interested in seeing. Picture this for an impossible rated mission...

Someone from Argon space wants to hire someone to reclaim some items. He had a transport ship travel through an area with a high amount of Xenon. They attacked the ship and now it's wrecked. He wants you to find the debris and get the contents of a locked box that might be there. You go there, you need to exit your ship and in your space suit find the box in the debris. Get the item, but right after you get it, you get notified if incoming Xenon ships. You double time it back your your ship and you have the choice of either trying to escape them, or fight them.

inb4 this is strikingly similar to first episode of Firefly

Or, even expand on it. You get there only to find no locked box, but a xenon ship flying away with it. So, you need to follow it but it docks on a station. You need to dock on the same station and need to find the ship in the docks, there's no one there, so you need to run onto their ship, find the item, and make it back to your ship without them knowing.

[Derp]

[Relation: 20+] Ship losses in faction space to enemies of the faction are reimbursed as if you'd sold them to the faction. There's your "patrol" missions, and an active encouragement to fight off invasions, even if you take losses doing so.

So not only do they pay you to build their ships, they will also pay you to lose your ships... Not very well thought out.

Stations in faction space can be sold with a multiplier on production modules the faction needs. Rather than run that smart chips plant, sell it at a premium and use the funds to build the next thing.

What premium? Sure the mission gives you a bit of pocket change in return, but they still are hardly worth doing outside of early hours. When one owns self sufficient shipyard/warfs churning out over 300 million profit per hour the 4 million credits one gets from a smartchip factory is not even worth the effort. I only really do them if it is for a faction which has limited stations such as ALI, HAT or MIN.

Hacking comes with rep loss, but make it possible to spot data leaks from a kilometer or so away in scan mode. I don't know why Egosoft has a "dry hump every spot of every station" fetish. It was a grind in XR, it's a grind in X4. Fixing the data leaks instead gets you decent reward credits - there's your "repairs required" missions.

This makes no sense. Unless they spot you doing the hack they have no way to know you were responsible and hence no reason to reduce your reputation. Maybe they should be able to spot you more, but still it is hardly much of an issue. And no you do not need to scan all data leaks, with how much money warfs make you can just buy all modules you need towards middle and late game.

[Relation: 20+] Supplying stations with building materials has a small chance to grant you one of the blueprints used on the station. Good route for Fighters or Traders to get into building, without the hacking grind.

Or you just buy what you need with the excessive amounts of money the factions throw at you to build their ships. No grinding needed.

Gaining reputation with one faction costs you rep with another, weighted toward reducing positive rep. You can set up shop as a neutral party, but neither faction is going to love you for it.

Not very realistic. It is fairly common for both sides of a conflict to like a third neutral party, especially if that party is supplying them both with weapons.

All of your responses seem to be made with the assumption that the player already has a fully stocked wharf printing money for them, at which point it's pretty much game over, isn't it? Nuke the Xenon, betray the Patriarch, rule the galaxy as uncle and goat, etc. Assume that isn't always the case.

[nickolaiproblem]

Scavenging Missions: Would honestly be a really great addition to the X4. Here what I'm thinking you can use already existing abandoned ships sprinkled around from combat. Then basically taking the making a default behavior that is basically search a 2 or 3 jump area for parts or ships to scavenge.

This is something I would be very interested in seeing. Picture this for an impossible rated mission...

Someone from Argon space wants to hire someone to reclaim some items. He had a transport ship travel through an area with a high amount of Xenon. They attacked the ship and now it's wrecked. He wants you to find the debris and get the contents of a locked box that might be there. You go there, you need to exit your ship and in your space suit find the box in the debris. Get the item, but right after you get it, you get notified if incoming Xenon ships. You double time it back your your ship and you have the choice of either trying to escape them, or fight them.

inb4 this is strikingly similar to first episode of Firefly

Or, even expand on it. You get there only to find no locked box, but a xenon ship flying away with it. So, you need to follow it but it docks on a station. You need to dock on the same station and need to find the ship in the docks, there's no one there, so you need to run onto their ship, find the item, and make it back to your ship without them knowing.

While cool thats seems like a more complex mission chain what I want is closer to a abandoned ship mission or find escape pods or a black box kind of missions not necessarily a major mission chain.

[sakuramboo]

Scavenging Missions: Would honestly be a really great addition to the X4. Here what I'm thinking you can use already existing abandoned ships sprinkled around from combat. Then basically taking the making a default behavior that is basically search a 2 or 3 jump area for parts or ships to scavenge.

This is something I would be very interested in seeing. Picture this for an impossible rated mission...

Someone from Argon space wants to hire someone to reclaim some items. He had a transport ship travel through an area with a high amount of Xenon. They attacked the ship and now it's wrecked. He wants you to find the debris and get the contents of a locked box that might be there. You go there, you need to exit your ship and in your space suit find the box in the debris. Get the item, but right after you get it, you get notified if incoming Xenon ships. You double time it back your your ship and you have the choice of either trying to escape them, or fight them.

inb4 this is strikingly similar to first episode of Firefly

Or, even expand on it. You get there only to find no locked box, but a xenon ship flying away with it. So, you need to follow it but it docks on a station. You need to dock on the same station and need to find the ship in the docks, there's no one there, so you need to run onto their ship, find the item, and make it back to your ship without them knowing.

While cool thats seems like a more complex mission chain what I want is closer to a abandoned ship mission or find escape pods or a black box kind of missions not necessarily a major mission chain.

That's why it would be an impossible difficulty.

For easy, it could be picking up some escape pod or black box only.

But, yeah, I like the idea of being hired for scavenger jobs.

[nickolaiproblem]

[Relation: 20+] Ship losses in faction space to enemies of the faction are reimbursed as if you'd sold them to the faction. There's your "patrol" missions, and an active encouragement to fight off invasions, even if you take losses doing so.

So not only do they pay you to build their ships, they will also pay you to lose your ships... Not very well thought out.

Stations in faction space can be sold with a multiplier on production modules the faction needs. Rather than run that smart chips plant, sell it at a premium and use the funds to build the next thing.

What premium? Sure the mission gives you a bit of pocket change in return, but they still are hardly worth doing outside of early hours. When one owns self sufficient shipyard/warfs churning out over 300 million profit per hour the 4 million credits one gets from a smartchip factory is not even worth the effort. I only really do them if it is for a faction which has limited stations such as ALI, HAT or MIN.

Hacking comes with rep loss, but make it possible to spot data leaks from a kilometer or so away in scan mode. I don't know why Egosoft has a "dry hump every spot of every station" fetish. It was a grind in XR, it's a grind in X4. Fixing the data leaks instead gets you decent reward credits - there's your "repairs required" missions.

This makes no sense. Unless they spot you doing the hack they have no way to know you were responsible and hence no reason to reduce your reputation. Maybe they should be able to spot you more, but still it is hardly much of an issue. And no you do not need to scan all data leaks, with how much money warfs make you can just buy all modules you need towards middle and late game.

[Relation: 20+] Supplying stations with building materials has a small chance to grant you one of the blueprints used on the station. Good route for Fighters or Traders to get into building, without the hacking grind.

Or you just buy what you need with the excessive amounts of money the factions throw at you to build their ships. No grinding needed.

Gaining reputation with one faction costs you rep with another, weighted toward reducing positive rep. You can set up shop as a neutral party, but neither faction is going to love you for it.

Not very realistic. It is fairly common for both sides of a conflict to like a third neutral party, especially if that party is supplying them both with weapons.

All of your responses seem to be made with the assumption that the player already has a fully stocked wharf printing money for them, at which point it's pretty much game over, isn't it? Nuke the Xenon, betray the Patriarch, rule the galaxy as uncle and goat, etc. Assume that isn't always the case.

So were all of your suggestions from standpoint of new players?

[Derp]

So were all of your suggestions from standpoint of new players?

Between "new game" and "personal shipyard," yes. Otherwise it's like balancing fighter combat with "just send one of your destroyers."

[Nifhtyeq]

So were all of your suggestions from standpoint of new players?

Between "new game" and "personal shipyard," yes. Otherwise it's like balancing fighter combat with "just send one of your destroyers."

Mission wise what's is the best way to keep late game players on their toes?

[Nifhtyeq]

I've added letters of maque what does everyone think about more pirate missions?

[Imperial Good]

I've added letters of maque what does everyone think about more pirate missions?

Pirate mechanics need a complete overhaul. They should not be constantly given free ships like they are currently. Additionally HAT needs mercenary missions.

[Nifhtyeq]

I've added letters of maque what does everyone think about more pirate missions?

Pirate mechanics need a complete overhaul. They should not be constantly given free ships like they are currently. Additionally HAT needs mercenary missions.

What kinda of Merc missions?

[Imperial Good]

What kinda of Merc missions?

Seeing how HAT is neutral to everyone, then the missions they offer could have special mechanics involved.

For example you have to assassinate targets for/against various factions on behalf of HAT except if you kill just that target you do not suffer a reputation loss for doing so. There might be more than 1 victim, eg an entire fleet, but as long as you limit damage only to those you do not lose rep. The logic behind this is that you are acting as a private military contractor being employed by one of the factions to achieve some purpose, and hence the other faction views the action as being committed by the hiring faction and not by you.

Seeing how close they are to a Xenon sector, some of them could be related to attacking xenon installations or ranking up xenon kills.

The of course there would be escort or defend station work where you have to help fight back assaults on a station, again with similar rep logic as with assassinations except only applying while nearby the objective.

[Nifhtyeq]

What kinda of Merc missions?

Seeing how HAT is neutral to everyone, then the missions they offer could have special mechanics involved.

For example you have to assassinate targets for/against various factions on behalf of HAT except if you kill just that target you do not suffer a reputation loss for doing so. There might be more than 1 victim, eg an entire fleet, but as long as you limit damage only to those you do not lose rep. The logic behind this is that you are acting as a private military contractor being employed by one of the factions to achieve some purpose, and hence the other faction views the action as being committed by the hiring faction and not by you.

Seeing how close they are to a Xenon sector, some of them could be related to attacking xenon installations or ranking up xenon kills.

The of course there would be escort or defend station work where you have to help fight back assaults on a station, again with similar rep logic as with assassinations except only applying while nearby the objective.

Some of missions could exist for all the factions especially the defense missions. I would also like to see smuggling missions where you have to space weed and other drugs.

[Derp]

So were all of your suggestions from standpoint of new players?

Between "new game" and "personal shipyard," yes. Otherwise it's like balancing fighter combat with "just send one of your destroyers."

Mission wise what's is the best way to keep late game players on their toes?

Partly the rep loss I mentioned. I'd also suggest making rep a requirement for factions to build ships, the same as buying them from the faction. Not being able to sell arms to both sides of a war (which is very rare and frowned upon in reality, no matter how loudly people protest otherwise) means taking sides is inevitable, or sticking with Teladi and being able to trade freely but not build the pricier ships.

Beyond that, once a player can indefinitely make their own ships what can possibly "keep them on their toes?" Some unforeseen existential danger to the entire map, a la the ROR mod, I guess. Maybe a DLC Kha'ak invasion/economy? They're not very much of a threat atm. Random swarms streaming out of those "inactive" gates everywhere and murdering everything on the way to nividium-rich sectors would make a nice splash.

[burger1]

HOP missions are different than regular missions. Some of the mission idea suggestions seem to be implemented already. HOP is like a space terrorist organization.

Warfs are only really unbalanced if you sell ships to HOP. All the other factions don't seem to buy much under normal circumstances it seems.