Have I been playing the game wrong?

[thedavid]

I want to ask this question because recently I decided to start a new character and instead of playing my usual way, I would play according to the way it seems everyone else says they play the game.

My normal way of playing the game is to do everything myself. I want to fly the ship. I want to shoot the guns. I want to be there and do it. I get frustrated with how far behind my faction is compared to all the other factions. I don't have enough time to grind rep and save money to claim a neutral sector before another faction can get in there before me. However, recently I discovered a nice method to easily and reliably take sector ownership away from another faction. With new knowledge it was time to go back to the beginning and maybe this time not stress about who owns what sector since I can just take them later if I want them.

So I started a new Terran Cadet. I did essential work and then I got lucky with a station mission that gave me enough cash to get the police license. So I grabbed the police license and then headed for Getsu Fune. That big Xenon K with no shields came through the gate and I got lucky to get the last hit on him so that got me 600,000. In Getsu Fune I claimed a 20X plot and then I saw that the Xenon were building a station. I sniped SE deliveries but it wasn't enough to prevent the first module from completing. Once it was complete I slaughtered Xenon station traffic until the Terrans and Antigone came to blow up the station.

I went back to the Asteroid Belt and unlocked the shady merchant in the bar. I dumped all my illegal inventory items on him and that netted me some millions. I started construction of my first stations and then went into SETA mode.

Normally I never use SETA. It is anathema. But everyone else seems to swear by SETA. Maybe I've been missing out. So I parked myself on a station. I had been playing for less than an hour at this point and I was ready to just let the game play itself apparently.

Normally I hardly ever look at the map. I'm not a map guy. I'm a fly the ship and get it done myself guy. Maybe that's why I like Timelines and everyone doesn't. But anyway. Raibu is sitting in the pilot seat with SETA on while I look at the map and play the game like a RTS.

Rapidly I was able to save up enough money for production modules so I got those and then went back into SETA while they were under construction. Then I had enough for the wharf and so I started that and then just watched as all my M size mining ships raced across the map.

And man it was boring.

I left the game like that and checked on it after sleeping and then working the next day. Raibu is still chilling in his Kukri. I hadn't lost any ships yet. I have a rule that if I lose a ship or any of my employees die then I am required to start over.

Anyway, my wharf was build and it already had enough resources to build 90 plus Falx. So I set it to build 100. Then I sold all 100 to the Terrans for a little over 25 Million each. That was over two billion in the bank. And my guy is still chilling in SETA right now.

I noticed that HOP has invaded Getsu Fune so now there are Xenon stations, Terran stations, Antigone stations, and Holy Order stations, along with my station all in Getsu Fune. I haven't been to any other sectors yet so I don't know what is happening on the rest of the map.

As fun as it may be to order up a bunch of ships and sell them for a huge payout, I do find this style of gameplay very boring. I'd rather be flying my ships myself and be out there doing something instead of just watching numbers on the map. There are free ships out there that I can go claim. There are factions I can go build rep with. There are story missions to do.

But my goal is to have a huge fleet with many Asgards and many defense stations all set up in Getsu Fune before I do Defenders of Sol. So now I looking to go home after work and get my shipyard built so I can finally build my Syns and Asgards and then have access to the rest of the jump gate network. Then I'll see how many sectors are left for me to claim and how many times I have to do my secret thing to cheese sector ownership.

[vvvvvvvv]

I want to ask this question because recently I decided to start a new character and instead of playing my usual way, I would play according to the way it seems everyone else says they play the game.

My normal way of playing the game is to do everything myself.

It is a sandbox. The right way to play is whatever is fun for you.

While I do play the game RTS style often, if that is not fun for you, then it is a wrong way to play.

I also do not recommend using SETA to amass money. It is only worth it when you're waiting for construction to finish. Money can be earned through other means.

[LameFox]

There isn't really a "wrong" way to play because there isn't really a particular point or goal. You just do whatever you feel like.

Probably you see more people playing the management side because people who find that boring just don't have that much reason to choose X4. This is a game where a lot of the design does assume you will be doing things at scale, with your own stations and AI subordinates, and so it attracts people who want to do that. It also has to make some trade-offs in the complexity of its single-ship play. Activities like mining and trading and salvaging have to be simple enough for the AI to perform them, even while all the background simulation goes on, and easy enough for the production chains to keep running. So people who purely want to spend their time in that sort of in-person activity probably tend to look for games which focus on fleshing out those things. This is a game for the sort of people who would play Freelancer and Homeworld and wish they could smash them together.

[thedavid]

Yeah, I appreciate that X4 has RTS elements. I like that I understand exactly how and why everything works. With a game like Elite Dangerous, you're just flying a ship around for no reason, and mining gold for no reason, and collecting bio data for no reason. There isn't this sense of connectedness of everything working a certain way because that's how it works and there being a reason for it to be that way. With X4, I know why it is that way so I can see ahead to know I need to do a certain thing to get a certain outcome many hours later.

And I don't just fly a single ship. I do always have my organization. But I automate it and then leave it to take care of itself while I go do something fun. Elite Dangerous doesn't have passive income.

(Plus Elite is an online game, which is anathema)

Anyway, thanks for the relies. After work I'll see how things are going in the game and maybe see if I want to continue with it.

[jlehtone]

The only thing that you might have "done wrong" was to suspect that you have done something wrong. That was not in the game.

The only flavour of SETA that I cheese is called "Pause" ...

I have a rule that if I lose a ship or any of my employees die then I am required to start over.

Cool.
To everyone in the company:
One of our colleagues has passed away (due to old age).
Our company policy is: "if one, then all". I thank you all for your service now that we all will die.
Self Destruct in 2..1..

[EGO_Aut]

Don't do everything yourself, you need personnel to efficiently supply your factories, or to give you combat support, reconnaissance etc.

[Targ Collective]

You can play X4 as a management sim, or you can go around doing things yourself. SETA really is for management sim style gameplay, for skipping progression blocks vis-a-vis station construction, funding, and supply levels.

Relying on SETA to play the game for you is, indeed, boring. The problem is how you are using it.

SETA is for when you have a station or fleet to build, or Terraforming to do I'll grant you, and you need credits or resources to do it, you don't want to wait, and you don't want to do anything in the game for now. It's a convenience tool at its best if you have spare time you don't want to use for anything else.

Let's say there's a decent cooked meal to make, eat and clean up, and for whatever reason you can leave the game running. Save in case of disaster, and SETA.

Let's say you have some mega station to construct. (I have some you can use!) Wihout SETA construction times can top twenty four hours. If you assign your manager and trade and mining fleet ahead of time, and the miners all have resources in range, you can SETA overnight - ideally in a low performance cost sector - and wake up to a completed station, full resources, and a tidy profit.

I repeat: When you have a station or fleet to build, or Terraforming to do, and you need credits or resources to do it, you don't want to wait, and you don't want to do anything in the game for now. Don't try and replace actual gameplay with SETA. That will, indeed, be boring. Just use it for when you're away from the game, or for when you're impatient for your organisation to complete some major objective.

Back in the X3 days, I would use SETA all the time and indeed HQ ship build times were even balanced to expect it. Now the game is balanced around never needing SETA at all, although i feel station construction times would benefit from economy of scale for construction times. i suspect performance reasons are part of why. SETA does not replace actual gameplay. If you want to have fun, have fun. SETA is for when you'd rather wait than do, and wait faster so you can do faster. That's the key to using this.

[Targ Collective]

I'd like to add that starting over every time an employee dies is, frankly, ridiculous. Whatever your reasons, these are digital actors, as immortal and mortal as the data that comprises them. No-one's going to say 2-1=1 is murder. Among other things, you'll lock out any ships and fleet dispositions that are uncertain to win. That's all the S and M class ships and practically all the L and XL ships too. I am surprised you find that fun, but you must really value your homebrew challenges, I guess. Please don't think I'm attacking your choices; you have every right to them. But i wouldn't be able to tolerate that and am surprised you can. If you have a 'no digital deaths' rule then that's actually kind of awesome, and you enjoying this game is awesome too, but it's odd to see those things coincide.

[thedavid]

Yeah I admit Perma death for all my people is a bit much but I just can't tolerate losing my hand picked people. So I don't ever do M size mining except in Saturn 2. If I lose a mining ship, that's it. If I board a ship and one of the marines die then nope. We are going to back up and try that again.

I've tried to ease up on it. So recently if I lose a ship but I can rescue everyone who was on it then I'll be ok. I use combat ships as traders so if there is pirate harassment the pirates die. Every time I get a comm that one of my pilots was asked to drop their cargo I will blow up a Scale Plate station.

I also do a lot of min max type stuff to squeeze out of every story mission the maximum amount of reward. I've done all of them dozens of times. I always set everything to maximum efficiency so that money only comes in and never goes out. I've tried to lighten up on that to. Maybe I can loosen my grip on my hard earned credits so that not 100% of all research materials have to locally produced.

I guess the main thing is I don't do percentages. I will not shrug my shoulders that .001% of my workforce was reduced. For me that number was a worker with a name who I hired. So I'm going to wipe out whatever faction killed them and then I will examine my set up so that the same thing can never happen ever again.

[MarStrMind]

Other self-imposed rules you could adhere to if you want to spice up your challenge:

- Travel only be anomaly. No gates. No accelerators. No Highways.
- If you die for whatever reason, you need to permanently delete your save (and by that I mean, even being unable to restore it with data restore utilities). So kind of like the Hardcore mode in NMS or WoW
- You do everything by yourself (as outlined in this thread already)
- Only use low loadouts
- Only use Mk1 for everything in your ships
- Do not research teleportation with Boso (I actually never do that anyways)
- Do not research any mods with Boso (Chassis, Weapon, etc)
- Do not craft any items
- Play without SETA

The list could go on but I leave it at that

[Targ Collective]

People like you are why there are permadeath and superhard game difficulties. You're all monsters spoiling things for the rest of us. Go play AI War Fleet Command, or get a job in disaster relief.

I'm unaware of how claiming sectors without stations is even *possible*. Do you mean turn them neutral? is this a HQ warping thing?

[jlehtone]

SETA is for when you have a station or fleet to build, or Terraforming to do I'll grant you, and you need credits or resources to do it, you don't want to wait, and you don't want to do anything in the game for now. It's a convenience tool at its best if you have spare time you don't want to use for anything else.

I always set everything to maximum efficiency
...
I will examine my set up so that the same thing can never happen ever again.

We have a tendency to optimize. Something. For example effort, time, fun, etc. (Time could be RL or ingame.)
When we optimize multiple variables, they are rarely independent. Even with one var the task may not be trivial.

The most "efficient" way to have a station/fleet -- time-wise -- is to have it from start. With S&M or Budgeted start.
However, that costs effort (and RL time), particularly the first time you figure out how to do it.

One could argue that SETA AFK does not maximize ingame efficiency, while it may reduce RL effort/time.

We can choose what we optimize. That is the main point.

I'm unaware of how claiming sectors without stations is even *possible*. Do you mean turn them neutral? is this a HQ warping thing?

Claiming a sector does require a station (module) and HQ is a station. The strain of spice that @MarStrMind has is not our problem.

[MarStrMind]

Claiming a sector does require a station (module) and HQ is a station. The strain of spice that @MarStrMind has is not our problem.

Maybe I like to do impossible challenges and thinking out of the box

[ezra-r]

if it helps you, I never ever play with SETA, it's a cheaters tool imo.

[vvvvvvvv]

I'd like to add that starting over every time an employee dies is, frankly, ridiculous. Whatever your reasons, these are digital actors, as

Nah. I can see the point here.

I'm absolutely not a fan of human meatgrinder approach X4 has taken and would prefer to have my robot fleet from x3. Because while it is a digital actor, the game simulates a world where that actor is a real person with family and friends. So sending that person towards certain death is not a thing a normal human would do for fun. The best example of that issue is "shipyard for all". You make a shipyard with all resources, and allow ALL factions to buy ships from there. Naturally, those factions are often enemies with each other. So they buy ships, fight right outside of the docks. But the pilots and crews for those ships come from the habitats you built. So as a player, you basically... lure in a guy with food and medicine without even paying anything, make him a pilot, get him killed, and toss his ship with pilot's still warm corpse into garbage compactor. In the name of credits, and you do it hundreds of times... per hour. That's probably beyond rimworld level.

And yes, losing a hand-picked NPC hurts a lot.

[Submarine]

I dont have any rules about how I play, I just do what I feel like.

Usually that is moral good roleplay trying to beat back the Xenon.

Moral is not ubiquitously lawful because there are so many jurisdictions with different laws and I tend to play an outsider but I avoid fights with police. I like capturing pirate ships who assault my traders and impose my own law and do adv sat trading for cash when I have built enough capital.

I have made stations but rarely. This play through I am trying to build a basic refinery for the minimum possible cash so I am manually ordering the buying of components. I will SETA if I am waiting for deliveries etc but have never left the game running for in game riches as I try to be energy conscious in the real world.

[Targ Collective]

So as a player, you basically... lure in a guy with food and medicine without even paying anything, make him a pilot, get him killed, and toss his ship with pilot's still warm corpse into garbage compactor. In the name of credits, and you do it hundreds of times... per hour. That's probably beyond rimworld level.

And yes, losing a hand-picked NPC hurts a lot.

It's not quite as bad as that, as the NPC customers provide their own crew. I'm not kidding - if you Livestream you'll see their ships have the correct racial crew. Stations only use crew for the player's ships (not clear on whether they charge themselves from their own shipyards).

[Daemonjax]

Seems like a false choice.

You can do stuff yourself (via teleporting) while you do all the other stuff. Don't just SETA the time away.