You know the "alternate" mission resolutions you randomly get offered for some missions? Like... instead of killing the assassination target, go after that cop instead? Instead of taking those tourists to their destination... sell them into slavery here? Usually they pay a little better, and usually come with negative influence, rep and other BGS effects for doing it this way.
Usually, they get offered at pretty inopportune moments, and need a major deviation from your planned journey, for not much in the way of additional reward. Basically, you can't know when you'll get one, so you.
Most missions have a "fail" condition which is functionally similar. Take a passenger mission, scrape the wall so they get annoyed, "fail" (not abandon) the mission, similar happens (sans the credits). Delivery missions have a "partial" completion, where your reward is reduced, you can't choose a reward option and you'll get a small fine for the lost goods.
But if you take a delivery mission and just plan to steal all the goods, well, unlike the random scenario where you deliver it to some pirates instead which has -inf, -eco, -rep and a reward... taking all the mission depot goods and abandoning the mission just kinda whacks you with a fine and whatever you got for the goods
So...
A better way could be to simply allow most missions to be completed in a way that goes against the mission provider. It doesn't need to be offered, it can just be done, then the mission "turned in" as a failure. Note failure is important, rather than just abandoning, as abandoning does not carry the same BGS effects a failure does. Looking at mission types in-turn...
I can't think of viable alternatives for the following:
- Source, Donation, Mining, Massacre (unless they changed massacre mechanics to something that isn't arbitrary kill quotas), Surface Scan/Powerplant destruction (can't really do an alternate without targeting a specific other faction), courier, megaship... and I haven't thought about Odyssey.
Although there are viable alternatives for those ones, there's nothing that can be done "generally" in a the game as it currently stands, unlike the examples above.
Usually, they get offered at pretty inopportune moments, and need a major deviation from your planned journey, for not much in the way of additional reward. Basically, you can't know when you'll get one, so you.
Most missions have a "fail" condition which is functionally similar. Take a passenger mission, scrape the wall so they get annoyed, "fail" (not abandon) the mission, similar happens (sans the credits). Delivery missions have a "partial" completion, where your reward is reduced, you can't choose a reward option and you'll get a small fine for the lost goods.
But if you take a delivery mission and just plan to steal all the goods, well, unlike the random scenario where you deliver it to some pirates instead which has -inf, -eco, -rep and a reward... taking all the mission depot goods and abandoning the mission just kinda whacks you with a fine and whatever you got for the goods
So...
A better way could be to simply allow most missions to be completed in a way that goes against the mission provider. It doesn't need to be offered, it can just be done, then the mission "turned in" as a failure. Note failure is important, rather than just abandoning, as abandoning does not carry the same BGS effects a failure does. Looking at mission types in-turn...
- Delivery; instead, sell mission cargo on the black market, then turn it in when no further goods are available at the depot (per partial completion rules)
- Assassinations; at the mission USS there's usually a hapless trader or similar. Instead of getting auto-aggro from the pirate, just wait til you pick your target... take out the "innocents" and then turn in the mission.
- Salvage; turn it in at a search and rescue instead (or BM, if illegal)
- Hijack; Sell on market or BM, or just outright kill the target instead of hatchbreaking them (this sort of works already)
- Passengers; Sell to BM as slaves
I can't think of viable alternatives for the following:
- Source, Donation, Mining, Massacre (unless they changed massacre mechanics to something that isn't arbitrary kill quotas), Surface Scan/Powerplant destruction (can't really do an alternate without targeting a specific other faction), courier, megaship... and I haven't thought about Odyssey.
Although there are viable alternatives for those ones, there's nothing that can be done "generally" in a the game as it currently stands, unlike the examples above.