Explorers forum take on the Alien developments?

[xeeleeqax]

So I'm here or maybe there to you - 22k LY away from the bubble scanning in the core on way to Colonia. I had a long break from Elite due to my rig being fried by a 6 ear old with a cola drink. Finally got back in and decided to make a go of Elite Explorer again.
Loving the new "neutron star surf" feature, having quite a time out in the Neutron fields.

Anyways before I forget what I am posting for, I am too far away/out of touch to catch the Alien ships which people are seeing..

What do the reg explorers think of the alien developments?? Thargoids? Are things gonna get dangerous out here?

 

[iain666]

Are things gonna get dangerous out here?

There may be a modicum more danger in the medium term, but short term I doubt it and I'm not expecting it to be that great when it does arrive.

 

[Major Klutz]

IMO, still no reason to carry weapons into deep space.
All attempts to fire on the aliens have been ineffective. They can completely neutralize your ship before you even see them.
And so far they have not been a threat at all, just an inconvenient delay in travel and a loss of fuel due to to being dropped back into the system you came from after your fuel was used.

 

[varonica]

So I'm here or maybe there to you - 22k LY away from the bubble scanning in the core on way to Colonia. I had a long break from Elite due to my rig being fried by a 6 ear old with a cola drink. Finally got back in and decided to make a go of Elite Explorer again.
Loving the new "neutron star surf" feature, having quite a time out in the Neutron fields.

Anyways before I forget what I am posting for, I am too far away/out of touch to catch the Alien ships which people are seeing..

What do the reg explorers think of the alien developments?? Thargoids? Are things gonna get dangerous out here?

According to the latest info from the live stream (I didn't watch it, I read the notes) there are still things out in the black we haven't come across, the alien story is one part of the universe, there are supposedly human colonies (other than Colonia ) "out there" somewhere. Just imagine the gnashing of the teeth from all the alien hunters in the bubble if we find something 30 or 40kly away from them, it keeps me smiling

 

[xeeleeqax]

Well knowing my luck , Jaques station will have just been destroyed by Thargoids as I limp in to the system with 4% hull and a cracked canopy...

 

[[VR] optimal_909]

It will be interesting how it will play out. FDev will surely have a difficult task making the alien invasion a significant event while keeping the core everyday gameplay elements. My take on this that at first they will quickly overwhelm human forces within the bubble and basically take over with only insignificant pockets of resistance. It means you can trade, bounty hunt and stuff like that but patrol ships will be aliens with unstoppable force. At first.

I think the game will then play out in a way that humanity makes a comeback, probably over years. All this spiced up with other aliens (Guardians) and side stories like the Missing.

As for exploration getting dangerous - I think no. On the other hand I always preferred to have reasonably strong shields and thrusters - both are beneficial for planetary flights, escaping NPC interdictions upon return and who knows, perhaps alien hostility.

 

[GreyAreaUK]

Well knowing my luck , Jaques station will have just been destroyed by Thargoids as I limp in to the system with 4% hull and a cracked canopy...

I sincerely hope not, as I'm due to arrive there either tonight or tomorrow. 3,600 LY to go, and haulin' Asp

 

[Suteksio]

If I'm not mistaken Drew Wagar suggested the Formidine Rift guys that carrying weapons could be a good idea. You never know what can you unearth, even by mistake, and I think it will be the lone explorer the one to find something hidden out in the dark. Just in case I mounted some lightweight weapons in my AspX.

[video=youtube;i33DX9Wjd7E]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i33DX9Wjd7E[/video]

 

[Andrew Gaspurr]

(...) FDev will surely have a difficult task making the alien invasion a significant event while keeping the core everyday gameplay elements.

I'm not sure it's gonna be a full scale invasion like the Reapers in Mass Effect or the like. That would be too hard a stunt to pull and it would screw all established groups working in BGS and trading stuff. Plus, the process to "simulate" an invasion would be too time consuming for FDev I guess.

I think it's gonna be something of a standoff in diplomacy and force while skirmishing on a small scale because of differences in communication and culture. This would open up most lanes of gameplay, including the inescapable TCZ: Thargoid Combat Zone.

I don't like it all but I guess we just need something utterly alien and inhuman to shoot at.

 

[GreyAreaUK]

I'm not sure it's gonna be a full scale invasion like the Reapers in Mass Effect or the like. That would be too hard a stunt to pull and it would screw all established groups working in BGS and trading stuff. Plus, the process to "simulate" an invasion would be too time consuming for FDev I guess.

I think it's gonna be something of a standoff in diplomacy and force while skirmishing on a small scale because of differences in communication and culture. This would open up most lanes of gameplay, including the inescapable TCZ: Thargoid Combat Zone.

I don't like it all but I guess we just need something utterly alien and inhuman to shoot at.

My take is that it will be a war between the Thargoids and the Guardians. It will mostly take place outside the bubble (but close to it), so that we can still get to choose sides, take part in battles, have war-related missions, etc. That keeps it 100% optional.

 

[Deleted member 110222]

IMO, still no reason to carry weapons into deep space.
All attempts to fire on the aliens have been ineffective. They can completely neutralize your ship before you even see them.
And so far they have not been a threat at all, just an inconvenient delay in travel and a loss of fuel due to to being dropped back into the system you came from after your fuel was used.

The aliens are trying to kill us depleting fuel!

Those dastardly bugs...

 

[dynamicbob]

A couple of things i role play, ive just left in a exploraconda on another trip, this time all the way to beagle and a lot of time until 2.3 on the other side of sag A.

On way out i have 128 tonnes cargo so all large data caches will be picked up so the lost data is returned to somewhere in humanity to be anayzlied

I remain on the lookout for lost colonies or other deep space content including gysers, volcanic vents and other things

Its taken 2 years for the thargoid storyline to get to where it is and they are only within 300ly of maia presently

Until we get more reports from someone in deep space over new content / encounters / POIs-Signal sources perhaps 2.3 might be interesting, for now i carry a defensive setup of weaponry and some shielding

Only to be used as a means of last resort, i carry a full compliment of sciencetific reseearch scanners and a fighter for additional scouting / company / defensive firepower

Like the formidine rift mystery if something new appears it may be on a sector by sector basis and that is how im attempting to conduct my search currently

There may be other alien races either active or long since dead that we may find out there, there could be more guardians (so to quote remain alert but not alarmed) and until something changes the search goes on

 

[GreyAreaUK]

The aliens are trying to kill us depleting fuel!

Those dastardly bugs...

Spoiler

(apologies, image was larger than expected)

 

[dynamicbob]

id be in favour of studying their technology to find weaknesses and counters for it. Before direct confrontation until we know we can down and capture them or craft.

As well as finding signs of their bases of operations ( maia is one) but there has to be deep space locations and in such a larage galaxy we may be facing multiple alien types etc, both hyperspace dwelling and not

But each to their own, someone will shoot at them we can only prepare for that eventuality

 

[marx]

To be fair, the best defense is not getting hit in the first place, and if you encounter hostiles, you might want to run away instead of fighting. What we do know now is that the alien ships can do roughly 500 m/s forward speed, so if you want to make sure that you can survive such an encounter, you'll want to make sure your ship can reach that speed. The thing is, very few ships can do that and still have a >40 ly jump range. Explorer Couriers can, and Asp Explorers can almost reach that speed (while still having that high jump range), but I'm not sure what else.

Of course, given that the aliens currently appear in a very small area, such encounters are easily avoided.


As for the alien encounters and how they were discovered: personally, I'm a bit disappointed. We were deliberately given no hints as to where they might originally be located, and FD have said that Thargoid encounters have been in game since release. They have obviously not been around the Pleiades since release though, so we've yet to find where else they'd appear. Basically, we only discovered them now because FD wouldn't wait around more for us to find them, and made the encounters start to happen in the most obvious place. Of course, with the signs of increasing alien presence in the Pleiades, this made sense - but still, I would have preferred if we first found them somewhere deep in the black, as opposed to the bubble's backyard.
But hey, what's done is done. And the encounters and the ships themselves are very well done, so personally I am looking forward to where this all will go.

 

[[VR] optimal_909]

A couple of things i role play, ive just left in a exploraconda on another trip, this time all the way to beagle and a lot of time until 2.3 on the other side of sag A.

On way out i have 128 tonnes cargo so all large data caches will be picked up so the lost data is returned to somewhere in humanity to be anayzlied

Good luck with your trip, but don't expect any human POI after 5-10kly out from the bubble.

 

[Andrew Gaspurr]

There's actually quite a few crashed Nav Beacons well outside 10kly. Seems like eons ago there was a race of sentient, space faring Nav Beaconoids seeding the galaxy with their Nav Beacony eggs that hatch millennia later when everybody else suspect them to be nothing more than... crashed Nav Beacons? Oh no!!!!1111

 

[Genar-Hofoen]

I've been scoffed at many times by a few of my fellow explorers, for suggesting they no longer should fly paper ships.

Winter is coming folks. Be prepared. I am. Are you?

Engineered, exploring, and prepped for anything...

 

[marx]

Well, the first snowflakes of winter are here, but if the pacing is anything to go by, we still have plenty of time to be prepared. Frontier have been warning us for a long time.
And a nice side-effect of being prepared is that you're also prepared for hostile human encounters, be they NPC-s or PC-s.

 

[Genar-Hofoen]

Well, the first snowflakes of winter are here, but if the pacing is anything to go by, we still have plenty of time to be prepared. Frontier have been warning us for a long time.
And a nice side-effect of being prepared is that you're also prepared for hostile human encounters, be they NPC-s or PC-s.

Exactly. That Cutter is more than enough to survive - at least long enough to Brave Sir Robin