Horizons Ships and Avoiding Interdiction

[mossfoot]

I know it's partly subjective depending on the skill of the pilot, but are there ships that are better/worse for avoiding interdictions than others?

I ask because I've had extremely good luck avoiding them in my Keelback - but maybe that's all it is. Luck. But at the same time it does have great rotational thrusters (just crap pitch and yaw) so maybe that's a factor? If rotational trust does have a real impact on avoiding interdictions, it might make the Keelback a good smuggling ship (though it will take more caution/skill to avoid scans at a station due to lack of speed)

 

[Chris Simon]

Well, everything that has decent SC maneuverability is nice (DBX is excellent)
Then it takes into account the relative masses of the ships and quality of the interdictor

So if small ship interdicts bigger ship and/or has low-class interdictor, it will have hard time interdicting.

Regarding to smuggling and scans, I don't know if you know that, but chaff disrupts scanners and is currently legal to use near and within the stations.

 

[mossfoot]

Well, everything that has decent SC maneuverability is nice (DBX is excellent)
Then it takes into account the relative masses of the ships and quality of the interdictor

So if small ship interdicts bigger ship and/or has low-class interdictor, it will have hard time interdicting.

Regarding to smuggling and scans, I don't know if you know that, but chaff disrupts scanners and is currently legal to use near and within the stations.

I heard chaff doesn't affect NPCs, though.

Also I've been avoiding everything from Pythons and Anacondas to Eagles and Cobras in this. Ranking from Deadly to Mostly Harmless.

Again, could be luck. Could be the AI.

 

[Chris Simon]

..or you're just that good.

I haven't noticed chaff being ineffective against NPSs. I will investigate, though. It would be bad if I lived in a lie.

 

[Birdnose]

Well, everything that has decent SC maneuverability is nice (DBX is excellent)

Funny you'd mention that. I used to find evading interdiction reasonably easy, but since the 1.5 release it's almost impossible to do in my DBX. The escape vector will often move continuously faster than my pitch speed. Other times it suddenly flickers rapidly all over the screen and I can't follow it. My wife seems to be evading them okay in her Adder, though. Maybe she's just a better pilot.

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I heard chaff doesn't affect NPCs, though.

I don't know if it affects their scans, but it does seem to affect their weapons. Their shots wander around a lot more after I chaff.

 

[The Game Colonel]

I have found in my limited time playing that my ability to escape interdiction was directly related to the NPC's skill level. If I failed to escape, the ensuing run from the NPC was exceptionally difficult...usually taking a lot of damage from well placed shots.
Out!
The Game Colonel

 

[Chris Simon]

Funny you'd mention that. I used to find evading interdiction reasonably easy, but since the 1.5 release it's almost impossible to do in my DBX. The escape vector will often move continuously faster than my pitch speed. Other times it suddenly flickers rapidly all over the screen and I can't follow it. My wife seems to be evading them okay in her Adder, though. Maybe she's just a better pilot.

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I don't know if it affects their scans, but it does seem to affect their weapons. Their shots wander around a lot more after I chaff.

Yea, the flickering thing is annoying. I hope they fix it, one day... :/

To be honest I haven't sit in my DBX for some time. Maybe something changed. The only issue might be that you are getting interdicted with something heavier. Your ship then drifts much more and tend to oversteer.
Also when you are catching the escape vector, it's best to throttle down, while once you're on target, you need to floor it to gain distance. the bigger the distance between you and the attacker, the "calmer" the escape vector is.

 

[Birdnose]

I have found in my limited time playing that my ability to escape interdiction was directly related to the NPC's skill level. If I failed to escape, the ensuing run from the NPC was exceptionally difficult...usually taking a lot of damage from well placed shots.
Out!
The Game Colonel

That makes sense. The NPC pirates have gotten far more aggressive around my home system since the patch, so that may be what I'm experiencing. I'm getting interdicted five or six times on trips where I used to get maybe one.

 

[mossfoot]

I don't know if it affects their scans, but it does seem to affect their weapons. Their shots wander around a lot more after I chaff.

Yes, Chaff against NPCs weapons seems to be useful - thank God!

 

[CMDR Kantos Kan]

I know it's partly subjective depending on the skill of the pilot, but are there ships that are better/worse for avoiding interdictions than others?

I ask because I've had extremely good luck avoiding them in my Keelback - but maybe that's all it is. Luck. But at the same time it does have great rotational thrusters (just crap pitch and yaw) so maybe that's a factor? If rotational trust does have a real impact on avoiding interdictions, it might make the Keelback a good smuggling ship (though it will take more caution/skill to avoid scans at a station due to lack of speed)

Well, I've read plenty of stories from disgruntled players complaining about being interdicted ad nauseam. It seems to me that since flying an Anaconda and now a Cutter that I don't have this problem much. I travel to hostile systems on a regular basis and when doing those long (+200Ly) trips, I'd be interdicted maybe once, sometimes twice in one trip. Sometimes, I'm not interdicted at all.

 

[BlueFalcon]

The most important part to avoiding interdictions is to pay attention to ships on your sensors and watch for any moving to get behind you.

 

[FusionGb]

The most important part to avoiding interdictions is to pay attention to ships on your sensors and watch for any moving to get behind you.

Then what ?
What happens to me is I end up flying at min throttle in circles with the interdictor, no way to break out of that without interdiction a few seconds later. Dropping to normal space followed by a high wake can work but that hardly counts as 'avoiding' interdiction.

 

[redVENGEANCE]

For the new shadow missions, I use an A specced Clipper. I stacked 3 missions yesterday, total worth 13M credits. Boost in/out of the stations, submit to interdictions but boost away asap. Good fun good credits but lots of jumps!

 

[Banana's_Are_Good_For_You]

I usually just submit if I'm in an Asp. I dunno if it's my "subjective" skills but it's lack of lateral thrust when A-speced tends to be problematic against the smaller class ships. Then I just boost away, like most do and chaff till jump...or just kill them. Depends where I am and who they work for basically.
On the other hand, can't remember the last time I lost an interdiction when I started it and I usually run FSI with D1 or D2 at best.
This is in Solo.

 

[CMDR Kantos Kan]

Then what ?
What happens to me is I end up flying at min throttle in circles with the interdictor, no way to break out of that without interdiction a few seconds later. Dropping to normal space followed by a high wake can work but that hardly counts as 'avoiding' interdiction.

I'd like to know as well. Been flying a Python, an Anaconda and now a Cutter. I can see the little dot starting to line up behind me. I can prevent him from interdicting me right away by reducing or increasing throttle, pitching or yawing but that only delay him for a few seconds. The NPCs just seem way better pilots in supercruise, you can't get them off your tail.

 

[Chris Simon]

I'd like to know as well. Been flying a Python, an Anaconda and now a Cutter. I can see the little dot starting to line up behind me. I can prevent him from interdicting me right away by reducing or increasing throttle, pitching or yawing but that only delay him for a few seconds. The NPCs just seem way better pilots in supercruise, you can't get them off your tail.

Yes, this technique only works on hostile commanders. Because NPC doesn't get boread and leave...

 

[mossfoot]

I usually just submit if I'm in an Asp. I dunno if it's my "subjective" skills but it's lack of lateral thrust when A-speced tends to be problematic against the smaller class ships. Then I just boost away, like most do and chaff till jump...or just kill them. Depends where I am and who they work for basically.

Right, but some ships are so slow (or weak) that submitting is a bad idea, which is why I was asking whether some ships naturally evade better than others (or if it's all in my head in that regard).

I'm not sure if anyone can qualitatively answer the question, though... the best we could do is determine if ships have better roll/pitch in supercruise (as opposed to normal space) than others.