Ships Are the NPC ship setups known?

[Morbad]

Well just today (and many times before) I fought a random hazres-pirate that peppered me with all kinds of experimental effects: trajectory disruption, shield bypass, thermal something... I'm used to NPCs having one of these effects, but this one had a lot of them all in one. And iirc it wasn't even an Elite but "just" Deadly. (Might be mistaken though)

Phasing would be unusual in a HAZ Res, but certainly not indicative of cheating, and could be explained by a mission target following you into the location.

Trajectory disruption and thermal attack are innate properties of stock (unEngineered) rail guns and plasma accelerators. Even harmless NPCs can have these.

And on the other hand, I have seen a few yt videos about engineering where it was explicitly stated for some experimentals that they don't work on NPCs. Most of them were things like TLB (because AI just immediately reacquires you) but it also concerned a few other effects, I think.

NPCs effectively retarget instantly. Just like fire-at-will turrets and just like as most experienced CMDRs can. Anyone can reflexively hit target highest threat, or target under reticle.

Even in PvP before TLB even had a cooldown, the only real effect of TLB was to interrupt subsystem targetting (something NPCs cannot do anyway, they always target the center of their target) and missile locks (which works normally against NPCs, as far as I can tell).

I'm not aware of any effect that NPCs are categorically immune to, even if they're behavior (which is possible for CMDRs) makes most of them trivial (because most are trivial to most CMDRs with proper loadouts, module priorities, and tactics).

You don't get it...don't you? It's not about equipments that differs from the player ones, it's about how they are coded but from your bible I understand one simple thing, you overstimate yourself..it's typical in this forum you are not alone, you think you are part of some unknown elite egomania can have these effects, enjoy your wisdom!

The OP was talking about loadouts were they not? Regardless, the same assertion that there isn't any significant cheating going on also applies to their behaviors. There is virtually nothing NPCs do that we cannot, and many things we do that they cannot.

Do you have any examples of NPC behavior or piloting that cannot be duplicated, or improved upon, by a CMDR? I certainly haven't seen anything like this in my considerable amount of game time, nor have I heard of any credible reports of such behavior, beyond the odd bug, or well known impenitence issues when transitioning between instances. Perhaps I'm wrong, and your experience more broad, or your powers of deduction are more acute than mine. If so, please enlighten me.

It's not just my capabilities I'm talking about, it's everyone's, even yours, if you get past the assumption NPCs are somehow doing something you cannot. The assertion that I'm somehow a victim of my ego, when you're here telling us things contrary to virtually everything SJA has posted, and all experimental observation, is pretty damn hypocritical.

 

[Morbad]

They do sometimes seem to be equipped with station like reverb lasers. But it's not something I am prepared to spend time trying to prove.

This is not in dispute and something that is easy to prove by getting into a fight with ATR:

Source: https://youtu.be/PL9Jtpp4FzQ?t=375

The obvious one where they jump away with sub 10% hull, and interdict you 30 seconds later with full ammo, shields, and hull, and often enough a different load out, is because it's actually a different NPC with the same name generated by whatever mission you are doing. That is annoying and should maybe be looked at. If you send them packing they should just stay gone, or come back still messed up but maybe simulate a reboot so they can be at 50% shields.

Yep, persistence from instance to instance is very iffy. From experiments, I do think it's intended that they retain the state they were previously in, but it often doesn't work, which suggests it is a bug.

An example of when it does work:

Source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d286irXwmX8

NPC Anaconda clearly retained the damage I had dealt to it, while the FDL didn't immediately reenter SC.

NPC do ignore heat for the most part, not because it does no damage, though it is fairly trivial, or because they are operating on differing rules, but because they just don't seem to care. They pop heatsinks almost at random if they are equipped with them.

They shouldn't care. CMDR's don't because in the current state of the game heat cannot hurt them. It's why half the CMDRs I've run into in hostile circumstances in the last year were thermal conduit boats...they know that they can last through a 20 minute fight being at 160% heat for half the fight with minimal consequences.

Even when heat based attacks were a threat, NPCs still didn't care, because they are there as flying pinatas...fodder for CMDRs to shoot down, and they have extremely poor self-preservation behavior, even if they do occasionally run.

My favorite NPC cheat that was certainly a bug was the one where their PA had a fire rate on par with a MC. It mattered not how good your shields were or how skilled you were. If they pulled the trigger, you died. I am sure you could find video of that if you look around.

That was a good one, and one of the few that made them more threatening, but yeah, clearly a bug and one that was quickly corrected.

 

[SergMx]

NPCs effectively retarget instantly. Just like fire-at-will turrets and just like as most experienced CMDRs can. Anyone can reflexively hit target highest threat, or target under reticle.

+1, Right. Why complicate the program code and make instantaneous energy switching. It's easier to make a complete filling of the pips, it seems to me.

 

[Morbad]

Why complicate the program code and make instantaneous energy switching. It's easier to make a complete filling of the pips, it seems to me.

Not quite sure what you're saying here.

SJA has stated that NPCs have the same distributor pip setup we do, and simulate pip management to varying degrees of competence. The goal, of course, is for them to play by the same constraints players are under, to simulate human piloting, within the constraints of what can be programmed...and the heavy handed capping of NPC difficulty at dunce level by Frontier doctrine (I may complain about NPC AI a lot, but I don't blame SJA or any of the other programmers, I know their hands are tied).

https://forums.frontier.co.uk/threads/2-1-beta-4-ai-still-too-overpowered.250442/post-3889817

https://forums.frontier.co.uk/threads/so-called-improved-ai.247046/post-3852962

 

[Oytis57]

Do you have any examples of NPC behavior or piloting that cannot be duplicated, or improved upon, by a CMDR

Yes I've seen puny Eagles spam SCBs like confetti one after the other (why beyond any heatsinks they may have had on board), your Eagle would be fried in the meantime, I've seen Eagles with more shields and Hull than an Engineered Medium, I've seen a full loaded badly mauled T 7 (with litle left of Drives) boost away faster than my 620 Phantom and so on, now from 1 to 10 how much you are boring? I'd say 11 Bye and thanks for the entertainement. (there would be even more examples)

 

[Morbad]

Yes I've seen puny Eagles spam SCBs like confetti one after the other (why beyond any heatsinks they may have had on board), your Eagle would be fried in the meantime

Tiny SCBs have low thermal loads and it takes protracted exposure to high temps to damage critical systems enough to induce malfunctions or destroy them. There is no number of SCBs that I could cram into a well-built Eagle that would fry it beyond usability, even if it had no heatsinks at all.

I've seen Eagles with more shields and Hull than an Engineered Medium,

I've flown Eagles with more shields and hull than most Engineered mediums.

I've seen a full loaded badly mauled T 7 (with litle left of Drives) boost away faster than my 620 Phantom and so on, now from 1 to 10 how much you are boring?

You don't have a 620 phantom and there are a few possible explanations for a damaged T-7 being able to outpace what you've got. If it's drives were malfunctioning or destroyed it would cease to bleed velocity normally and a collision, or force shell, could push it well past normal maximum velocity. It could also have been a one off bug. Of course, the most likely explanation is that you are mistaken.

 

[Ian Doncaster]

NPC do ignore heat for the most part, not because it does no damage, though it is fairly trivial, or because they are operating on differing rules, but because they just don't seem to care. They pop heatsinks almost at random if they are equipped with them.

The "not caring" is I think the really important part. Even when heat damage was much more significant:

NPC: ah, my heat is over 100%, that's unfortunate [takes some minor module damage, then explodes for unrelated reasons]
Player: aaargh! my heat is over 100% panic panic panic panic [too busy with panic to notice that they've only taken about 3% module damage]

 

[Northpin]

Phasing would be unusual in a HAZ Res, but certainly not indicative of cheating, and could be explained by a mission target following you into the location.

Yes, this. I never seen phasing in a haz res, but i've seem mission targets dropping in my instance - they currently do this

Yes I've seen puny Eagles spam SCBs like confetti one after the other (why beyond any heatsinks they may have had on board), your Eagle would be fried in the meantime, I've seen Eagles with more shields and Hull than an Engineered Medium, I've seen a full loaded badly mauled T 7 (with litle left of Drives) boost away faster than my 620 Phantom and so on, now from 1 to 10 how much you are boring? I'd say 11 Bye and thanks for the entertainement. (there would be even more examples)

Ofc you do, don't you?
Even when devs confirm it or players with many thousands of hours spent in the game corroborate evidence that point to the fact that NPC do not cheat
Nothing you say cannot be explained in one way or another without asking "what sorcery is this?" then resorting to the universal explanation of "i lost, they must be cheating".

 

[Agony_Aunt]

Don't NPCs also like, totally ignore heat build up as well? So yeah, they kinda cheat, if not in better equipment then in ignoring entire mechanics.

They are affected by heat, they just don't give a damn about it. They will happily cook their own ships or be cooked by you and continue like it doesn't matter. And it doesn't. They are there for a single fight, they don't have to consider long term issues.

 

[Rubbernuke]

ATR have G5 LR (bursts I believe) that have reverb as a special effect. They also have prismatics and a lot of HRPs. Some ATR I suspect also have Containment Missiles (Grom Bombs / Grompedoes) or missiles with FSD disruption experimentals.

Spec Ops have enzyme missile racks, phasing and a shedload of HRP along with prismatics too.

I've had Wing assassin missions for pirate lords have two or three Vultures set with phasing (but not spec ops level armour or shields)- I forget what the FDL has (I've seen Imp Hammers which were fun to see).

 

[Morbad]

I just put a pair of A2 SCBs (the hottest ones likely to be placed on an Eagle) on a stock, E-rated Eagle, except for the 2B PP which was needed to power the SCBs.

Dumping all eight charges them all in fairly rapid succession resulted in a whopping ~32 damage to the hull (two-thirds the hull on a stock eagle, which has the lowest hull integrity in the game, but would be almost nothing with even a pair of HRPs), a single thruster malfunction, one power distributor malfunction, and one pulse laser malfunction. The only one of the stock E rated modules below 50% was life support (39%) and thrusters were at 74%.

That an NPC would have eight class-2 SCB charges on an Eagle is extremely unlikely, but even if it did, it could pop them all and you'd probably never notice any ill effects as an observer, unless you were watching it's modules.

If it had even a single heatsink, or a more efficient A rated power plant, or more durable modules--let alone any combination of these--the effects on the ship would have been completely negligible, even for the pilot.

C'mon let it go, if you really feel so bad I'll declare "you win" so your pride and honor are safe! Please don't reply I've wasted already too much time.

Once you cease to perpetuate ignorant misinformation, then I'll let it go. These asinine assertions that NPCs are cheating where they are clearly not are getting tiresome and do everyone a disservice.

 

[stetson harrison]

However resistant to damage you think an NPC Eagle can be, CMDRs can do just as well, or better.

This is my CMDR's iEagle, which has exactly the same defensive options as the vanilla Eagle:

Coriolis EDCD Edition

A ship builder, outfitting and comparison tool for Elite Dangerous

s.orbis.zone

Spoiler

The Super Turbo Turkey Puncher can take quite a beating with it's 1.3k hull and 50% resists, but even NPCs too low of a rank to be flying Engineered vessels can still have 1k hull HRP bricks with reactive armor.

Off-topic, but I want to build one of these - looks like a lot of fun. Any particular reason not to use Enhanced Performance Thrusters?

 

[Morbad]

Here:

Source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CN0kSP8oVfw


Flying is painful as my normal controls aren't plugged in and I'm using the default keybinds, which I am totally unfamiliar with, but it was enough to buy and test an Eagle at the nearest starport.

If it takes 100+ seconds of continual heat damage to even be noticeable to an E rated Eagle, it's never going to be meaningful in most contexts.

Off-topic, but I want to build one of these - looks like a lot of fun. Any particular reason not to use Enhanced Performance Thrusters?

Mass and power. I want the shields to recharge, the thrusters to work, and the FSD to remain powered, through malfunctions. With that mass budget, EPTs are also not enough of a performance improvement to make up for the downsides. I tried both, but could never get the EPT setup to work well without too many sacrifices.

 

[Northpin]

Here comes the the second in command

It would be sad if it wasn't funny
Actually it is sad.

Have you ever seen a Vette going to 600+ without boosting?
Cheats?
No, only a wingman using Force Shell to speed up that Vette so it could keep up and even overpass a boosting Cutter
Enjoy

The same principle is applied and can happen to an NPC with knocked out drives, that is drifting at full speed, speed that an be increased by rail shots, force shell shots or collisions. I've had Alliance C-ships or C3 drifting away at speeds that i could not match - usually in CZ where their thick hulls can take a lot of damage, but their drives are easily knocked off by the missile spam

 

[Rudi Raumkraut]

Dear,
You still haven't muted that oytis guy?
Had enough of his trolling useless existence after 3 posts from him

 

[badibeat]

You still haven't muted that oytis guy?

I hope so, but this makes for a nice thread with a lot of useful information wrapped into it. please go ahead...

 

[Vetinari]

I do like a debunk thread.

i read recently that NPC PP seem to have more power available than 40% when destroyed. Is that true?

Player: aaargh! my heat is over 100% panic panic panic panic [too busy with panic to notice that they've only taken about 3% module damage]

That so used to be me

They are there for a single fight, they don't have to consider long term issues.

Wont somebody think of the NPC children!?

 

[Morbad]

i read recently that NPC PP seem to have more power available than 40% when destroyed. Is that true?

40% is the malfunction level, but a destroyed power plant stabilizes at 50% output and NPCs seem to have the same 50% available that CMDRs do.

Source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ynu0eBXmkeI


Assuming they are configured as fodder, rather than for escape, there is nothing suspicious about what they can power with a destroyed PP.

 

[Trollymctrollerson]

+ 100 rep for super turbo turkey puncher. DOOOOOM

 

[Morbad]

+ 100 rep for super turbo turkey puncher. DOOOOOM

I probably spent more time playing that in the Doom 3 shareware than playing the actual Doom 3 shareware.