X3: Terran Conflict

[Zloth]

I've only captured ships when a quest forced me to do so - but that's just my own play style. There are some that are definitely worth it. (Probably even more so if I ever get an HQ built.)

The UTs are good 'fire and forget' money makers, particularly now that they don't wander into Xenon territory. I like a little more hands on than what they give, though, so I haven't been using them much.

 

[Thrasher]

Pretty much, I've only lost one UT so far. He was cremated by a Q, OOS. I have gotten a few messages about them being under attack, and them safely jumping away. I don't install any lasers, but do give them drones and jumpdrives. In theory, if they encounter an enemy OOS they should eject their drones and jump. Need to check the next escapee for missing drones.

 

[Thrasher]

Well, I spent some of the weekend setting up my first self-sufficient complex in the Ore Belt to get ore for the hub mission now that the Teladium part is done. I dragged SIX mines (very slowly with a Mammoth) from one end of that crazy crowded sector to the other. I got them within 4km of each other in a straight line without crashing into each other or other asteroids or factories and exploding (I only had a few mishaps requiring reloading ). This complex I set up (mainly to see if I could do it) was a major test of my patience.

http://home.wolfsburg.de/kprohrbeck...rgon,L,3;sim,Argon,L,2,64&asteroids=0;1;2;3;4

[img=http://img42.imageshack.us/img42/7161/x3screen00002.th.jpg]

I arranged most everything on a 2-d grid (mines included), except for the complex docking hub, which is set about 2 km lower than the plane of the grid. Don't want ships crashing into the complex! When I added a new row, I extended the complex hub over one row. That way as I build each row, they can be made at the max length. I didn't worry about rotating the stations to get their nodes to line up, and get less snakey connection lines. I had tried it with mines, but I couldn't get the them to rotate with the strafe keys. Probably should have used the roll keys (Q & E)?

I have 2 CLS External Community Traders shuttling Ore to the hub, and 4 CAGs selling unused intermediate products (energy, silicon wafers, and crystals). I disallow NPC trading just in case they decide to buy the Ore at max price for whatever crazy reason before is gets shipped to the hub.

 

[Zloth]

Zloth looks at Thrasher's Ore Belt complex

Zloth looks back at his Ore Belt complex

OK, you're perhaps just a LITTLE bit more organized than I am.

Tractor beams no longer rotate mines. They used to do that but the code was having issues so they just stopped the rotation completely.

 

[Thrasher]

Yours is a LOT more artistic. Nice job of sculpture, there.

Too bad about tractor beams, although I read that asteroids were harder to manage than what I found, so maybe less is more…

 

[JDR13]

I'm afraid to ask how many hours you guys have sunk into this game.

 

[Thrasher]

Well, not as many as Skyrim, but that's not saying much.

There's still not parts of the gameplay I have tried, like huge fleets of fighters and carriers, or capturing enemy ships with boarding parties, or forcing them to bailout.

I figure a couple more weeks, and all I'll have left is some grind and maybe the Treasure Hunt quest. The corporation quests are a LONG grind... May pass them up.

 

[Zloth]

Steam says 587 hours. I did a few restarts using the DDTC mod (which has several interesting new ships) which increased the playing time a good bit.

I barely touched the corporate quests. I did Final Fury but that was the only serious battle quest I did.

Thrasher have you done the Terran + Alderan quests yet?

 

[Thrasher]

I think I'll resume the Terran quests next. Haven't made it to Aldrin yet. I've postponed the Goner plot until I get a better fighter.

 

[Thrasher]

I've finished the Terran quest line (including Aldrin). Not sure what to do with Aldrin. Add a Nav satellite and a few sector traders?

Also finished the Goner quest line.

Need to finish the Final Fury quests. Also got a notification to start the New Home quests. Accepted it and promptly ignored it. Hopefully won't break it.

Speaking of breakage, a massive fleet of Paranid capital ships invaded Ore Belt and obliterated Plutarch Headquarters and many other stations. It was a fascinating mega space spectacle (in a sort of horrible way) to watch. There go a lot of customers for my Ore Belt complex. I hope the Paranid don't proceed to decimate all of Argon space, otherwise I'll be seriously screwed. And I hope the corporate quest line isn't broken.

In the meantime I've finished the Ore and Nividium collection missions for the Hub. Had to learn mobile mining for the Nividium, so that was fun. But I couldn't tell the difference between collectable rocks and 'roid pieces needing further breakdown. Ended up smashing a lot of them with my ship. It was faster than shooting anyway. Picking up roid pieces is good practice for piloting skills.

And now the hub needs 250,000 crystals. WTF?! So I added factories to my Antigone Ore complex to make it self-sufficient and create crystals. I've turned off the Ore and Teladium output until I get enough crystals. It looks like this now:

Antigone Complex and Pic

I am going to expand my Ore Belt complex to have 7 total crystal fabs.

Ore Belt Complex

That's 13 total with a lot of the crystal output going to energy production, but hopefully it will be enough to keep pace while I work on the other plots.

UPDATE:

I am stuck on trying to get the Ore sold from the Antigone complex. The CAGs were selling Ore and buying Energy fine before I expanded the complex. I turned them off AND removed all the complex homebase settings for the complex homebased ships, because every time I'd add another factory they would all race back to the homebase, and interfere in the complex building. Tedious and Irritating. :/

But my point was that now that my CAGs are re-homebased to my expanded complex, and are started up as sellers only, they won't sell the ore anymore. They made one trade run to sell ore, and now are stuck in standby mode. I had added energy cells to their traded wares list. Maybe they are confused since they used to buy energy and now they are asked to sell it only? Lots of fiddling around with those CAG settings. Too bad the CAG automation seems to be flakey.

Now, I've had troubles before with the trade/black lists causing CAGs to go to standby indefinitely. I wish I remembered how I got them to start up again. It had been working beautifully for the past few weeks. But now…

 

[Zloth]

Wow, I've never seen a real invasion! Well, a few big fleets cruising around outside of their territory - that normally ends up meaning that the pirate base I've been doing missions for is no longer available.

The game should rebuild the HQ, though it could be a bit before it does. Good thing your complex didn't get blasted!

250,000 crystals is the new value. It used to be much higher! Plus there weren't any large crystal fabs, only small ones. I guess Egosoft felt the pressure to dumb down the game.

Aldrin isn't much right now, but there's more to see. I think you have to finish Final Fury quest before that opens up. Did you keep that Vidar around? I love that ship. Welllll, maybe not the peach (?) colored lights but everything else is great.

Check your message log on the CAGs - sometimes they complain in there. Often times they will stop for me because I haven't got any cash in the station. They see the station is low on energy so they want to go buy some (they don't know it's producing more than it's using, they just see the level is currently low) but they can't because the cash levels are too low. But, if you've set them to ONLY sell... <shrug> Maybe there's nobody in range?

 

[Thrasher]

I checked the analysis log thing, and there were stations in range. All agreed with the station parameter readout for jump distance for the selling price. SO I am stumped. It may have to do with those percentages in the trade duties? I seem to remember screwing around with those and finally getting the CAGS to get off the stick.

I am thinking it may be related to the total complex ware volume increasing after adding factories (although none were new ore mines).

This game.... requires experimentation. I wish the English forums/FAQs were more helpful. I'll bet the German language ones are!

 

[Thrasher]

Well, I should have know better.

I started it up last night and lo and behold, my CAGs were happily trading just fine. BUG ALERT. If this game runs for too long CAG AI can get stuck. Just exit the game and restart. Standard operating practices for many PC games.

As Ore Belt was getting devastated by the Paranid, lots of loot popped out of the Argon "pinatas". Figured a few of my commodity traders on idle could collect wares in sector. Worked fine for a while, and then they instantly got wiped by crossing into the line of fire of an M1 Paranid. Dumb AI. Live and learn and reload.

 

[Zloth]

Capt: Plot a course for that mosquito missile, sub-private!

Sub-private: But sir! That will take us into the path of Paranid fleet!

Capt: Master Thrasher DEMANDS this of us! You are demoted!

Sub-sub-private: I don't care sir, I don't want to die!

Capt: Son, do you think Master Thrasher would ask us to do something like this if he wasn't confident of our success?

Sub-sub-private: I suppose not sir but…

Capt: Or perhaps you think that Master Thrasher, the man that has built a small empire from one trading ship and one unarmed scout in just one month, has somehow not noticed the capital ships blazing away at each other?

Sub-sub-private: Of course not, sir!

Capt: Then plot that course, man! If Master Thrasher says to gather goods in the whole sector then, by my mother's big cahoonas recipe, that's what we're going to do!

Sub-sub-private: YES SIR! Our faith will be our s….

Loud explosion then fade to black

 

[Thrasher]

LOL! Great!

You know, if you want to get things done right, sometimes you just have to do (it) yourself. It gives me something to do while my Mammoth gets into position to drag another Silicon mine underneath the genocide happening above it.

I feel like I should get involved, but I am playing a pacifist as much as possible. Besides I have no capital ships!

I do have to say that the Vidar you get as part of the Terran plot is one sweet ship, but not nearly enough!

 

[Thrasher]

OK, I finished the Final Fury missions. I had some fun building up Terran rep too so I could buy and outfit an Osaka battleship. I've got about 1.2 billions credits now. Odd that you can't fire an Osakas weapons unless you jump into one of its 8 turrets. Anyway 24 Point Singularity Projectors and 24 Starburst Shockwave Generators made quick work of the Khaak fighters, corvettes, battleships, stations and anything else that wandered into the line of fire.. It is a lumbering monster.

Still waiting on crystals for the Hub. It is terribly slow. I use most of the crystal output for 2 XL solar power plant resources in each self-contained complex. 3 CAGs at each complex sell a ton of extra energy cells. Only have 1 CLS2 at each complex delivering about 150 crystals per trip.

 

[Zloth]

Crystals already? Uhoh. I need to get back into this game. You're catching up to me pretty fast!

So what sectors did you connect with the HUB?

P.S. One of my complexes is called "The Crystal Palace." Now you know why.

 

[Thrasher]

haha. Yes, it's a bitch getting those crystals.

I have one complex in Antigone Memorial, so I hooked up the first set of gates between Antigone and Power Circle.

If I ever get the crystals, I read that the second gate pair can be linked. I am thinking either between Heretics End and Asteroid Belt to get greater access to the Terran sectors, or between Patriarch's Conclusion and Heaven's Assertion to greatly shorten the distance to the far bottom right part of the universe.

How about yourself? Where did you connect them?

 

[Zloth]

I had my first complex in the Red Light (the Red Light District complex) and Cloudbase SW. That complex turned out to be puny but the gate was close to Ore Belt to work out very nicely when it was time to do ore and silicon.

I've got another big complex in Mines of Fortune (the Mines of Moria complex) so my second link is between Mines of Fortune and Shareholder's Fortune.

I'm not sure what I'll do with the third. I expect it will depend on where I drop my HQ. (Assuming I don't just plop that down in the HUB sector.)

 

[Thrasher]

Hey, so I finished the Treasure Hunt and New Home plots (spent about $400M for the latter's "reward"), about to start the Aldrin plot, and am still only halfway to getting all the crystals. Somehow, I think the Hub plot will be the last (or next to last) to finish.

Spent a lot of time with the Sudoku puzzle, and outfitting reward ships like the Griffon, Xperimental Shuttle, and the required TM for the New Home plot. Not sure what I'll use the TM (Yaki Chokaro) for again…