Removal of random abandoned ships in 2.5

[grieger]

So, I know this is a bug fix (and I think it's definitely a good thing in the long run...otherwise systems will be flooded with mine fields and abandoned ships!).

HOWEVER, I would really like to suggest (and campaign for) randomly added abandoned ships being an actual feature (not necessarily with mine fields but maybe sometimes?). And not just small/medium classed ships (yes, I know about that one in you know where).

With the battles that get waged between factions (well, in my game it's HoP vs everyone else so it's boring as hell), the AI usually just goes for total destruction (or the receiving party basically never abandons their ships). Why not have either a mix of battle wrecks that are salvageable (maybe tweaking the AI so there's a higher chance the AI will abandon a ship when they're way out gunned or their engines go) and just random abandoned ships or just have random abandoned ships of all classes?

It could be a set rule that any abandoned ship is never at 100% health and is missing a random number of components. Could be they are ALWAYS missing something like engines (to justify the abandonment and to make salvage a bit more of a challenge). There could also be random encounters tied to this (think traps set by factions like pirates or even enemy factions in a war) where claiming an abandoned ship results in ships jumping into the sector from the nearest gate.

One of things I used to love in X3 was finding those abandoned ships (granted they were fully decked out usually). And in X4, I really did love finding those abandoned ships in minefields. I figured clearing those minefields were the price to be paid to get a free ship (with random loadouts that still cost me some money to reconfigure so it wasn't like they were 100% free).

As with anything that might be controversial, if it is, there could be an option to turn off abandoned ships or a certain type (i.e. random vs battle wrecks) or make them more difficult to obtain (frequency, existing damage, etc.).

Just a thought...

[Killjaeden]

We had the "NPC's bail in NPC vs NPC fights" feature in X3TC/AP with the Xtended mod. The result was that you randomly got several millions worth of ship at random, when ships of all classes could bail.
AI's bailing in fights you are not involved in is nice (and feels logical) at first but theres no player efford involved for this reward and in the long run it feels simply unrewarding stumbling on ships worth a lot that just need picking up and selling for a high payout. It doesnt feel earned. I would recommend against it.
In that scenario you could start the game and have the unlikely event that a capitalship got abandoned and you just had to pick it up - ruining any early game gameplay just like that. It was configurable how high the bail rate was, but it always felt off. If you did action yourself / your crew you rarely got a bail. If you did nothing and came to a sector you had 2-4 ships waiting for pickup, because there was non stop fighting in that sector.
Not that the problems i mentioned are totally unsolvable... but its quite easy to get it wrong and impact the game's challenge negatively (up or down).


The abandoned ships in X3 (that are not because of player shoting them) where hand-placed objects that are always in the same space. Nothing wrong with these i feel, because its more controlled and not an infinite money source. Randomizing locations (of hand picked places) at each gamestart add a bit of mystery back after 1st play through.

[sh1pman]

event that a capitalship got abandoned and you just had to pick it up - ruining any early game gameplay just like that

Which is exactly what happened in my game. Found an abandoned Odysseus in Faulty Logic (the one with mines). No fun in that, felt like cheating.

[Imperial Good]

Pointless feature until they patch the surrender exploit. One can just park by a war zone and ask any ship that meets the bail requirements to surrender. They may jump ship, you lose no reputation and when they do you get to keep the almost fully equipped ship. For example I obtained a free Gorgon Sentinel from HOP this way just by asking it to surrender while under attack from ANT and PAR forces.

[Socratatus]

So, I know this is a bug fix (and I think it's definitely a good thing in the long run...otherwise systems will be flooded with mine fields and abandoned ships!).

HOWEVER, I would really like to suggest (and campaign for) randomly added abandoned ships being an actual feature (not necessarily with mine fields but maybe sometimes?). And not just small/medium classed ships (yes, I know about that one in you know where).

With the battles that get waged between factions (well, in my game it's HoP vs everyone else so it's boring as hell), the AI usually just goes for total destruction (or the receiving party basically never abandons their ships). Why not have either a mix of battle wrecks that are salvageable (maybe tweaking the AI so there's a higher chance the AI will abandon a ship when they're way out gunned or their engines go) and just random abandoned ships or just have random abandoned ships of all classes?

It could be a set rule that any abandoned ship is never at 100% health and is missing a random number of components. Could be they are ALWAYS missing something like engines (to justify the abandonment and to make salvage a bit more of a challenge). There could also be random encounters tied to this (think traps set by factions like pirates or even enemy factions in a war) where claiming an abandoned ship results in ships jumping into the sector from the nearest gate.

One of things I used to love in X3 was finding those abandoned ships (granted they were fully decked out usually). And in X4, I really did love finding those abandoned ships in minefields. I figured clearing those minefields were the price to be paid to get a free ship (with random loadouts that still cost me some money to reconfigure so it wasn't like they were 100% free).

As with anything that might be controversial, if it is, there could be an option to turn off abandoned ships or a certain type (i.e. random vs battle wrecks) or make them more difficult to obtain (frequency, existing damage, etc.).

Just a thought...

Doesn`t seem like a bad idea at all.

[Cyron43]

So, I know this is a bug fix (and I think it's definitely a good thing in the long run...otherwise systems will be flooded with mine fields and abandoned ships!).

HOWEVER, I would really like to suggest (and campaign for) randomly added abandoned ships being an actual feature (not necessarily with mine fields but maybe sometimes?). And not just small/medium classed ships (yes, I know about that one in you know where).

With the battles that get waged between factions (well, in my game it's HoP vs everyone else so it's boring as hell), the AI usually just goes for total destruction (or the receiving party basically never abandons their ships). Why not have either a mix of battle wrecks that are salvageable (maybe tweaking the AI so there's a higher chance the AI will abandon a ship when they're way out gunned or their engines go) and just random abandoned ships or just have random abandoned ships of all classes?

It could be a set rule that any abandoned ship is never at 100% health and is missing a random number of components. Could be they are ALWAYS missing something like engines (to justify the abandonment and to make salvage a bit more of a challenge). There could also be random encounters tied to this (think traps set by factions like pirates or even enemy factions in a war) where claiming an abandoned ship results in ships jumping into the sector from the nearest gate.

One of things I used to love in X3 was finding those abandoned ships (granted they were fully decked out usually). And in X4, I really did love finding those abandoned ships in minefields. I figured clearing those minefields were the price to be paid to get a free ship (with random loadouts that still cost me some money to reconfigure so it wasn't like they were 100% free).

As with anything that might be controversial, if it is, there could be an option to turn off abandoned ships or a certain type (i.e. random vs battle wrecks) or make them more difficult to obtain (frequency, existing damage, etc.).

Just a thought...

Yeah I'd like that too. In fact I'm playing a new save for a couple of weeks now where I make money by claiming abandoned ships, transport them with a Nomad to a shipyard for upgrades and finally selling them. It's a whole different gameplay and it's fun. I don't care if others yell "cheating". This is no multiplayer game and I have the freedom to play in whichever way I like.
In addition to that I'd also like to salvage those ship wrecks in the asteroid fields for resources.

[bradfordvs]

Hello. If I remember correctly, for X3TC\AP, I thought there was a mod that allowed the AI to claim abandoned ships. Perhaps if the scripting will allow for it, either ES or modders can add a similar feature to X4. Personally, I like the idea of ship crews bailing under the right circumstances. However, I think having salvage operations undertaken by the AI would add some needed variety and balance to the game--as well as a natural solution to the problem of abandoned ships floating about.

[Nort The Fragrent]

This is a topic I have tried to initiate in other posts, but it fell flat. Not sure why!

In any kind of skirmish there will be different levels of disabled ships for some reason or an other. Namely that most disabled ships are not a complete wreck. And thus have good salvage opportunities. Keeping them around for longer seems more realistic, so the scavenges can go to work on them in there ( soon to be introduced salvage ships. ) Thats my wish by the way…

We could have our own salvage ships equiped with all the necessary components to pick up the spoils. Little drones could may be brake down those glowing ember hull’s for its resources. Or if the ship is less damaged it could be towed back to our shipyard and be rebuilt. Or if hardly damaged at all it just needs a kick start and the poor crew giving us a handsome reward for our timely help.

How about a Hospital ship to give those poor red’s a bandage, ! And by helping them we get a Faction increase, so we can eventually enter their red zones as fiends. You could use this ploy to get closer for an attack, or to build a long lasting relationship to get the universe to a peaceful state and we could all sit round the burning fire having a sing song. (Thats wishful thinking, but could be a good thing in todays violent gaming world ),,, ( show that piece is possible ).

For those of you who are hell bent on killing, you can still go of like Viking’s of old and live in your burning universe. But there are those of us who would like the opportunity to play the game with peace in mind. Doing our best to bring peace. A long road that can be quite fulfilling if that is what floats your boat. ( and why not ) It would be much harder than going around killing everything, more challenging, and more rewarding.

A peaceful conclusion to a game is a far better thing for our young people of this real world. Showing them that war’s are nothing but death, and misery.
I believe there would be less real world violence if games had a more peaceful %.

[Cyron43]

This is a topic I have tried to initiate in other posts, but it fell flat. Not sure why!

In any kind of skirmish there will be different levels of disabled ships for some reason or an other. Namely that most disabled ships are not a complete wreck. And thus have good salvage opportunities. Keeping them around for longer seems more realistic, so the scavenges can go to work on them in there ( soon to be introduced salvage ships. ) Thats my wish by the way…

We could have our own salvage ships equiped with all the necessary components to pick up the spoils. Little drones could may be brake down those glowing ember hull’s for its resources. Or if the ship is less damaged it could be towed back to our shipyard and be rebuilt. Or if hardly damaged at all it just needs a kick start and the poor crew giving us a handsome reward for our timely help.

How about a Hospital ship to give those poor red’s a bandage, ! And by helping them we get a Faction increase, so we can eventually enter their red zones as fiends. You could use this ploy to get closer for an attack, or to build a long lasting relationship to get the universe to a peaceful state and we could all sit round the burning fire having a sing song. (Thats wishful thinking, but could be a good thing in todays violent gaming world ),,, ( show that piece is possible ).

For those of you who are hell bent on killing, you can still go of like Viking’s of old and live in your burning universe. But there are those of us who would like the opportunity to play the game with peace in mind. Doing our best to bring peace. A long road that can be quite fulfilling if that is what floats your boat. ( and why not ) It would be much harder than going around killing everything, more challenging, and more rewarding.

A peaceful conclusion to a game is a far better thing for our young people of this real world. Showing them that war’s are nothing but death, and misery.
I believe there would be less real world violence if games had a more peaceful %.

I wish I could give your comment a BIG LIKE! All this reminds me of Star Citizen where players can make use of salvage ships, tow ships and even hospital ships. <3
I so wish we had these in X4.

[Lazerath]

In the original X3 or X3 Terran Conflict there was a mod called Xtensions I believe that allowed you to:

-Tractor beam and tow damaged ships
-Own Salvage Ship(S) (don’t remember if it was one ship or different ones for different factions)
-Salvage or Claim Ships (salvage destroyed ship wrecks or stations, don’t remember if it was both or just one of them)

You could even tow stations and asteroids, it was a blast!!!

The pirate factions were bad ass too! I think some of the moders were hired by egosoft too if memory is correct... hmmm yeah I think they helped with X3:TC

Cheers!

Edit: Typo

[Nanook]

FYI, the tractor beam was part of the vanilla X3 games, not a mod. And it could be used to tow both damaged ships and stations. Asteroids could only be towed if they had a mine built on them, making them stations. Unfortunately, the TB disappeared with the X3 games and hasn't made an appearance in either in XR or X4.

[Cyron43]

I hope Egosoft adds something to that regards in X4.
I wish we could give Likes here ( @Nanook, @Lazerath ).

[chew-ie]

FYI, the tractor beam was part of the vanilla X3 games, not a mod. And it could be used to tow both damaged ships and stations. Asteroids could only be towed if they had a mine built on them, making them stations. Unfortunately, the TB disappeared with the X3 games and hasn't made an appearance in either in XR or X4.

Using the tractor beam to tow a certain derelict nemesis through enemy territory was the most intense & best mission within the series

[FearMunchies]

FYI, the tractor beam was part of the vanilla X3 games, not a mod. And it could be used to tow both damaged ships and stations. Asteroids could only be towed if they had a mine built on them, making them stations. Unfortunately, the TB disappeared with the X3 games and hasn't made an appearance in either in XR or X4.

Using the tractor beam to tow a certain derelict nemesis through enemy territory was the most intense & best mission within the series

It was the Hyperion M7... not a Nemesis M6 lol.

[Lazerath]

FYI, the tractor beam was part of the vanilla X3 games, not a mod. And it could be used to tow both damaged ships and stations. Asteroids could only be towed if they had a mine built on them, making them stations. Unfortunately, the TB disappeared with the X3 games and hasn't made an appearance in either in XR or X4.

Thanks for clearing it up! It was a long time ago and spent so much time playing both vanilla and modded games kinda messes up the memory for me!

Still it was a blast!

[chew-ie]

FYI, the tractor beam was part of the vanilla X3 games, not a mod. And it could be used to tow both damaged ships and stations. Asteroids could only be towed if they had a mine built on them, making them stations. Unfortunately, the TB disappeared with the X3 games and hasn't made an appearance in either in XR or X4.

Using the tractor beam to tow a certain derelict nemesis through enemy territory was the most intense & best mission within the series

It was the Hyperion M7... not a Nemesis M6 lol.

Right, remembered the details wrong - but I always used the Nemesis to tow the M7. Due to the heavy damage to the Nemesis, this always was a long way back. Very satisfying once the job was done. Fully repaired M6 & the Hyperion

[Faustov]

The removal of these spurious ships is becoming a priority for me.

I was cheerfully doing missions and stuff until I noticed my stations' fleets begun disappearing. I looked through the log to see who attacked them to possibly empower the local defences in such sectors, but there was no mention about them.

I started flying around until I noticed a red print "your ship XYZ has been destroyed". I happened to be in the same sector and saw the ship flying by a moment ago, so I quickly looked where it "died" and noticed there are 5 heavily mined abandoned ships around the headquatters of my destroyed ship.

Conclusion is simple - there are now so many mines in my universe that they are a threat to my fleet.

I wonder if game devs considered this scenario when deciding not to clean up abandoned ships in the 2.5 patch.

[Socratatus]

All the Devs should do is make abandoned ships more RARE, not remove them altogether.

The problem with some of you is you`re only thinking from the point of view of people with huge fleets. Some of us don`t play like that (at least not me). For now I like to keep small and simple. Finding an abandoned ship at least once per campiagn run would add a little something to this kind of gameplay.

You`re all in danger of ruining the game for others by making it too narrow-minded to ONE Style of gameplay.

[Faustov]

All the Devs should do is make abandoned ships more RARE, not remove them altogether.

The problem with some of you is you`re only thinking from the point of view of people with huge fleets. Some of us don`t play like that (at least not me). For now I like to keep small and simple. Finding an abandoned ship at least once per campiagn run would add a little something to this kind of gameplay.

You`re all in danger of ruining the game for others by making it too narrow-minded to ONE Style of gameplay.

I am not sure what you're talking about, but I have 10-20 abandoned ships in multiple sectors now. I'd have to spend a few days cleaning them up and I don't have that much time in life reserved for leisure, nor would I identify this particular activity as such!

[radcapricorn]

All the Devs should do is make abandoned ships more RARE, not remove them altogether.

The problem with some of you is you`re only thinking from the point of view of people with huge fleets. Some of us don`t play like that (at least not me). For now I like to keep small and simple. Finding an abandoned ship at least once per campiagn run would add a little something to this kind of gameplay.

You`re all in danger of ruining the game for others by making it too narrow-minded to ONE Style of gameplay.

On the contrary. This is exactly for people who start small and prefer to earn their keep. Having craptons of free ships dumped at you at every corner is precisely the opposite of that approach. Those ships are bugs, nothing more. Maybe you just didn't encounter it, but once you joined any guild, those "mission" ships started to literally crap up every sector. It wasn't "one ship per campaign". It was several ships per sector visited, with a chance of piling up every time a new mission was generated. They even created navigation hazards, being spawned together with their minefields in high-traffic lanes.

There are "rare" pre-placed abandoned ships in the game already, which fits your narrative quite nicely. There's even a...

Spoiler

Show

destroyer, for crying out loud.

Moreover, making small ships bail is also significantly easier than it was in previous games, so that's always an option. Now, if only boarding wasn't a complete mess...

The free ship fest has to go.