Horizons Broken missions - info for players

[Abil Midena]

Well I've just wasted about two hours doing a safeguard cargo mission. Time ticked off, went to meet contact.

Final stage "Now go and deliver that cargo to this outpost, in your IMPERIAL CLIPPER."

Which would be fine if we could swap ships with cargo in our hold.

Scan comms works fine so long as you're targeting the right building...

Well, my screenie in the OP shows I've scanned the comms thingy, but nothing ever happened. Also, the comms thingys are in different places based on the size of the outpost, I think.

Also i have found that scooping illegal experimental chemicals and the black box missions do not update either nor can you hand them in.

I will have to try one of those and see if it does that to me as well.

Are the POC in supercruise or do I have to check out USS? If I find the POC in SC do I have to interdict or do they interdict me? One other question for planetary mission like lost pilot. When I see the deep blue circle I assume he/she is in that area, like a USS. Do I fly and try to eyeball the "item" or do I land and let my buggy do all the work? Very confusing to me.

They are in SC. They should contact you in the comms panel and then low wake. You are supposed to follow that low wake. On the downed pilot rescue (seems to bug out on timer A LOT) they are in POI as you say. I don't spend time looking outside the ship. I just land and SRV it to where I think the item is.

 

[Agrar Therenus]

Yep, tried another safeguard mission-- same result.

Go to outpost when I'm in a ship which is too big.

Can I have those four hours back FD?

 

[Judz]

Yep, tried another safeguard mission-- same result.

Go to outpost when I'm in a ship which is too big.

Can I have those four hours back FD?

Had 2 of these missions too, I did swear a bit when it was "drop them final instalment off at XXX Outpost" and I was in my Clipper (you typed Imperial Clipper...thank you). I ended up the other day going back and swapping ships to my Python. No issues for me so far regarding heat etc. No wait, I did pop an SCB and had the temp warnings go awooga awooga, I looked at the temps and they were at 250%!!! then I realised it had activated 2 banks (I forgot to disengage 1 bank) As for having your 4 hours back, I want Crimbo Day back, read post #31.

 

[Jack Schitt]

This afternoon I took one of those Human Traffic missions for the first time since release. 2 hostages to recover. Found the Wanted target in the specified system, interdicted them, shot out their cargo hatch. They dumped two canisters, one hostage and one not. I tried to scoop the hostage during combat and accidentally rammed it (totally my fault). Continued attacking the target until it exploded and got a bounty voucher.

Returned to supercruise, lo and behold there's the magically resurrected target. Not Wanted this time, so I got a fine for interdiction. Shot out the cargo hatch and the target dumped three canisters, none of them hostages. Continued attacking until it exploded, and I got a bounty for murder.

Checked the Transactions tab to see how much time I had left on the mission and the mission was gone. Not timed out, not failed. Just gone. I guess this might have happened when I killed the hostage, or more likely when I blew up the target before he'd dropped both victims, but I have no way of telling because the game gave no feedback either way.

So for my troubles I have a dead mission that may or may not have decreased my reputation with the originating faction, and an active bounty for interdiction and murder. All in the name of trying to determine just how broken the broken mission system is. (Answer: it's very broken).

I despair for anyone trying to seriously role-play this game as a squeaky-clean good guy. You are never more than an unpredictable bug away from having your reputation hammered or worse. A couple of months ago the NPC and mission subsystems were receiving polish after polish and seemed to be well on their way to being fully bug-free, albeit limited in scope. But more recently, while the scope has been widened (within the game's current limitations) it seems to have opened the floodgates to more bugs and inconsistencies than ever. What's gone wrong?

 

[Judz]

You interdicted the wrong target, right name, wrong target though. He/she was wanted, but not the mission specific ship.

 

[Jack Schitt]

You interdicted the wrong target, right name, wrong target though. He/she was wanted, but not the mission specific ship.

Ah. Is "Mission Target" supposed to appear for these missions then? I've only seen that in the generic "kill x pirates / civilians / authority" missions. That would make some sense, although I'm still left wondering

• Was it coincidence that the first canister dropped was a hostage? Is every other ship out there piloted by a kidnapper? I don't think I've ever seen a hostage dropped before taking this mission.
  
  
• What are the chances of three NPCs (the target and the two I destroyed) in the same system having the same name? Staggering odds, or is this itself a bug caused by the mission code?
  
  
• What caused the mission to drop off the Transactions tab if I hadn't interacted with the actual target?

I might give this one another go while keeping an eye out for the "Mission Target" text.

 

[Abil Midena]

Ah. Is "Mission Target" supposed to appear for these missions then? I've only seen that in the generic "kill x pirates / civilians / authority" missions. That would make some sense, although I'm still left wondering

• Was it coincidence that the first canister dropped was a hostage? Is every other ship out there piloted by a kidnapper? I don't think I've ever seen a hostage dropped before taking this mission.
• What are the chances of three NPCs (the target and the two I destroyed) in the same system having the same name? Staggering odds, or is this itself a bug caused by the mission code?
• What caused the mission to drop off the Transactions tab if I hadn't interacted with the actual target?

I might give this one another go while keeping an eye out for the "Mission Target" text.

Good luck.

Last night, I took 7 or 8 missions from one station, all from the same minor faction. I took them over about 30 mins as I was sitting at the station, not logging or mode swapping or whatever, just waiting. I took them from only one faction because I'm trying to boost their influence. I think 2 of them were the same type, but to different locations. All of them had timers of at least 2 hrs.

The first time I entered HS as I left the point of origin, 2 missions failed (not the 2 of the same type). I made a delivery. Went to SC. A third one failed. This happened in a time span of about 10 min.

The three that failed were: deliver to a planetary outpost, find salvage on a planet, and one scan a data point at a planetary outpost.

All I learned from that was don't take more than 2 or 3 missions at a time. I guess. I dunno anymore.

 

[Jack Schitt]

Just tried another one of these Human Traffic missions. Every time I saw a Wanted NPC with the same name as the mission target, I interdicted them and pummelled their cargo hatch slowly until they blew up. Every time I saw an NPC with the same name as the mission target, but not Wanted, I dropped from supercruise and re-entered it after the cooldown, all except for one occasion when I instead logged out to the main menu and had a sandwich. I doubt that's pertinent but I like to be thorough with my descriptions.

I saw the "target" a total of seven times. I twice interdicted him and blew him up (no cargo dropped), and once followed him via low wake to Shinrarta Dezhra where he sat outside in a Type 7 doing nothing for five minutes. When I gave up waiting for him to do something and jumped to supercruise, he had beaten me to it and was already flying around in a Sidewinder. Nice trick.

In those seven interactions, he was Wanted twice and Clean five times. He flew two Sidewinders, two Type 6s, a Keelback, a Type 7 and a Cobra. He was affiliated with the Dark Wheel four times and the Pilots' Federation three times, the last time in a wing of 2.

At no time did I see "Mission Target" highlighted for any of his incarnations.

I may give this a go again tomorrow if I have time, and if so I'll fit a cargo scanner and perhaps some limpets so I can see if any of these targets' Gallifreyan regenerations is carrying the hostage(s) I seek. But for now my conclusion remains the same. Missions, or at the very least the Human Traffic missions, are broken, broken, absolutely brimming over with brokeability.

 

[tasev1]

I share your pains....same issue here. There are a lot of good missions I want to take and can't because of the broken structure.

 

[Judz]

I have never actually completed 1 of these missions, they disappear from my transaction tab. And you should by some hatch breakers, lower the shields then pop 1. Human Traffic are broke and so it seems are the Abducted missions. I went to the specified system, the target would be there between 22:10 and 22:40, the mission ends after 4h:30m (ehhh?) Anyway A target ship showed up, he was clean, so I interdicted anyway, got a 300Cr bounty put on me and got added to the systems naughty list, another target turned up as wanted, interdicted him also and he just dropped Rebel Transmissions, 1 Hostage (*sweeps 2 fingers* this isn't the Hostage your looking for) and a black box which I took for recompense on what I thought would be a knackered mission. After 22:45 I saw no more ships with the target name so I just landed, sold my cargo and went to bed. I have 9 hours left to try and complete a Human Traffic mission. Lets see if this is a fail as well.

 

[Trafalgar Law]

I may give this a go again tomorrow if I have time, and if so I'll fit a cargo scanner and perhaps some limpets so I can see if any of these targets' Gallifreyan regenerations is carrying the hostage(s) I seek. But for now my conclusion remains the same. Missions, or at the very least the Human Traffic missions, are broken, broken, absolutely brimming over with brokeability.

Don't bother. The cargo scan makes no difference. I'm pretty sure the problem is that they're not being flagged as the mission target and so aren't generating the mission specific cargo.

 

[Marc_Hicks]

Yep, these missions need to be fixed quick smart.

 

[Flak]

Glad I found this thread! Have been trying to complete Human Traffic for the past few hours with no luck

What I've found:

• Your target appears in Supercruise, but may NOT be Wanted. If this is the case, drop down to normal space, then back to Supercruise to get him to spawn again.
• Your target always seems to 'spawn in' close to your location on entering Supercruise (or within a very short time).
• Your target can appear in many different ships - I had a Hauler, Cobra MK III, Asp and Asp Explorer for the same mission.
• You can kill your target in normal space and you still find him again in Supercruise when you re-enter.
• I used limpets to extract cargo from him and he dropped multiple cargo types including 'HOSTAGE'.
• No matter how many extractions you make, you never see a 'HOSTAGE (MISSION SPECIFIC)' - at least I never did in about 20 hostages I scooped.
• None of the hostages counted towards my mission - mission text still showed '0/1' in the panel on the left.

Conclusion : this mission is broken or we are doing something wrong. If we are doing something wrong, then the game should make it more obvious how to complete these missions.

On the bright side, I've now tried using limpets and interdictions which I've never tried before. Had fun doing it even though I couldn't complete the mission

 

[Trafalgar Law]

Conclusion : this mission is broken or we are doing something wrong. If we are doing something wrong, then the game should make it more obvious how to complete these missions.

I'm really not sure what we could possibly be doing wrong. I've tried cargo scanning the target, k-scanning the target, interdicting it, following it to it's destination, hatch breakers, shooting out the hatch and shooting out it's engines. I even tried killing the target, (although in fairness I didn't really expect that to work, however it didn't even cause the mission to fail). My only conclusion is that the mission is hopelessly bugged

 

[Flak]

I'm really not sure what we could possibly be doing wrong. I've tried cargo scanning the target, k-scanning the target, interdicting it, following it to it's destination, hatch breakers, shooting out the hatch and shooting out it's engines. I even tried killing the target, (although in fairness I didn't really expect that to work, however it didn't even cause the mission to fail). My only conclusion is that the mission is hopelessly bugged

Is it possible that there could be multiple targets with the same name, and we need to find the 'right' one? Maybe we've been attacking the wrong targets?

I honestly don't think that's the answer, and that the missions are indeed bugged, but just exploring the possibility that we are doing something wrong somehow. In either case, something needs to change in the game to get this working how players expect it to work

 

[Trafalgar Law]

Is it possible that there could be multiple targets with the same name, and we need to find the 'right' one? Maybe we've been attacking the wrong targets?

I honestly don't think that's the answer, and that the missions are indeed bugged, but just exploring the possibility that we are doing something wrong somehow. In either case, something needs to change in the game to get this working how players expect it to work

As I said earlier I'm pretty sure the problem is that they're not being flagged as the mission target. I've come across this before with other missions e.g. while on a 'kill pirates' mission, I killed a wing of ships marked 'pirate' as their minor faction, but not marked as a mission target and they didn't count towards the mission even though I was in the correct system etc.
.
p.s. that bug has now been fixed and 'pirates' count for the missions.

 

[Angus]

Just tried another one of these Human Traffic missions. Every time I saw a Wanted NPC with the same name as the mission target, I interdicted them and pummelled their cargo hatch slowly until they blew up. Every time I saw an NPC with the same name as the mission target, but not Wanted, I dropped from supercruise and re-entered it after the cooldown, all except for one occasion when I instead logged out to the main menu and had a sandwich. I doubt that's pertinent but I like to be thorough with my descriptions.

Lightweight! What was in the sandwiches?!

 

[Jack Schitt]

• Your target appears in Supercruise, but may NOT be Wanted. If this is the case, drop down to normal space, then back to Supercruise to get him to spawn again.
• Your target always seems to 'spawn in' close to your location on entering Supercruise (or within a very short time).
• Your target can appear in many different ships - I had a Hauler, Cobra MK III, Asp and Asp Explorer for the same mission.
• You can kill your target in normal space and you still find him again in Supercruise when you re-enter.
• I used limpets to extract cargo from him and he dropped multiple cargo types including 'HOSTAGE'.
• No matter how many extractions you make, you never see a 'HOSTAGE (MISSION SPECIFIC)' - at least I never did in about 20 hostages I scooped.
• None of the hostages counted towards my mission - mission text still showed '0/1' in the panel on the left.

Yep, that pretty much gels with everyone else's experience. Part of the problem with these bugs is that, despite the simplicity of the mission system, the number of ways you can go about trying to complete any given task is surprisingly high. Do you interdict the target in supercruise or wait to find them in a USS? Do you "persuade" them to drop cargo by stripping their hull, or use limpets? Do you wait for targets marked as Mission Specific, or collect anything that matches in the hope of getting lucky? If you're trying to "respawn" the target do you do it by logging off? Or dropping to normal space? Or jumping to another system and back?

Without any knowledge of what's causing the problem most of us end up trying all of these things, even though they're almost certainly irrelevant, and all of which take time. Time away from actually enjoying the game. Sometimes I think the Support people lose sight of that. Most of us don't mind reporting specific bugs but that's not out primary reason for firing up the game. We're not in beta any more.

Don't bother. The cargo scan makes no difference. I'm pretty sure the problem is that they're not being flagged as the mission target and so aren't generating the mission specific cargo.

That might well be it. Depending on how the game is structured internally I can see how a simple flag not getting set could account for pretty much all of what we're seeing. The repeating NPC name, the lack of mission specific cargo, the inconsistent criminal status, the mission not completing even with the correct cargo. I bet you're right. I bet it's a single flag.

Not sure about the early time-outs though. That seems to be happening across mission types so it might be something else.

Lightweight! What was in the sandwiches?!

Tuna and sweetcorn, but before you judge me I was just using leftovers. I'm normally a bacon and egg toastie person.

 

[Alderius]

I haven't bought Horizons yet, I've been perusing the various forum threads to get a feel for whether it's ready. Although there are many positive posts, the overall impression I get is that it's too broken to bother with. Sure, landing on planets sounds cool and a buggy option would be neat, but after that wears off in a few hours it's really the missions that drive ongoing play. IMO, the core game mechanics are the only thing that mostly work, like flying a ship, docking, mining, FSD, interdiction etc. Missions prior to 1.5/2.0 weren't terribly varied, but the update seems to have provided all kinds of new and interesting mission options that just don't work. In that case, not worth the upgrade.
I hope the majority of bugs get worked out, maybe I'll see you planetside some time in the future.

Best of luck!
CMDR Alderius

 

[zj951]

Did two different "retrieve experimental chemicals" from two different places. Tried to hand them in but the cargo was not recognised
Also did a recovery of a hostage, only to have the mission disappear before I could hand him over.

same here for "retrieve experimental chemicals" - retrieved once from wreckage in target system, returned with one cargo - not recognised, so discarded and tried again - same thing happened...sigh.