Assassination Missions even more Tedious than Before?

[Lain]

So me and some friends have been doing Assassination missions, we love assassinations, quick n simple fun while supporting your local faction.
But we've noticed the past couple days that when we do Assassination missions, we aren't sent to scan the target system's Navigation Beacon anymore.
We are sent to scan a planetary installation's beacon in the target system, then are sent to the Real target system where the assassination target lies.
This doesn't really add much to the missions other than extra steps to find your target, it isn't very fun.
We didn't start noticing this until this past Thursday Tick.

Has anyone else been experiencing this occurence with Assassination missions?

 

[Jmanis]

Are these "assasinate known pirate" or "urgent kill order for known terrorist" missions?

The former just send you to the target (or a wrinkle to find a contact in another system), the latter send you to the beacon first.

Latter is much more common in an expansion state in my experience, but can also occur regularly in a none state.

 

[Lain]

Aaaah, the Latter appears to be the case here, That would make sense.
Guess that'd be the case here.

 

[rrobes]

The planetary missions have a white starburst designator, which means you have you do the sutface installation scan.
If that is missing, then no installation scan component, just a space chase. You can still get the silly go see contact "X" in system "Y" to get the bad guy's location.

I avoid the planetary ones.

 

[Lain]

Yeah took me a good hour to finish two missions due to the extra loops.
Lesson learned o7

 

[ShimEnki]

It would be nice if on the "good job" coms from the issuing faction they could while they are at it wire us the moola.

After all, us assassins have far more important things to do other than haul empty elite combat vessels about to collect cash.

 

[avow555]

Yeah took me a good hour to finish two missions due to the extra loops.
Lesson learned o7

Guess I'll be avoiding those missions then.

 

[Charonys]

Hi, since you guys seem to be experts on this: how do I locate systems (maybe even stations) that offer primarily assassination missions?

Pretty sure everyone knows about Robigo as a passenger mission hub or similar systems/stations that offer almost exclusively one type of mission and plenty of those as well.

If there is no mission hub for assassination missions, what's the next best thing? I'd just like to reduce the docking/undocking in various systems at various stations which seems to be more time consuming than the actual hunting/killing.

 

[nosleepdemon]

Hi, since you guys seem to be experts on this: how do I locate systems (maybe even stations) that offer primarily assassination missions?

Pretty sure everyone knows about Robigo as a passenger mission hub or similar systems/stations that offer almost exclusively one type of mission and plenty of those as well.

If there is no mission hub for assassination missions, what's the next best thing? I'd just like to reduce the docking/undocking in various systems at various stations which seems to be more time consuming than the actual hunting/killing.

What you need are fringe systems with two factions trying to undermine each other, but neither side gaining an advantage. They do exist

 

[Unknown Zombie]

Don't overlook systems that have factions in Outbreak. They offer assassination missions (kill infected target).

 

[Stealthie]

We are sent to scan a planetary installation's beacon in the target system, then are sent to the Real target system where the assassination target lies.
This doesn't really add much to the missions other than extra steps to find your target, it isn't very fun.

It's kind of like kicking a puppy to say this but that, right there, is FDev's biggest problem (IMO).

They don't seem to have a good grasp of the difference between adding content and adding repetition - or, in this case, just adding extraneous steps to a task.

 

[Riverside]

I don't have a problem with these, just follow the instructions & do the deed.

But I just had one where the target was waiting in supercruise, flew towards me (great, a quick one) but they hit the star (Arcturus in this case, might explain the unusual behaviour) and disappeared leaving no wake.
I flew to the USS instead, dropped in & killed the scenario spawn target but while doing so the other copy of the target dropped in. I killed that one too but I'd already had the 'mission complete' message from the first one.

Not seen that bug in a while.

 

[Yodebe]

Yes, they're 'easy' but I can well imagine that with just a little bit of difficulty, there would be people moaning that 'it's too difficult' or 'it's impossible' or 'it's bugged' (in fact, don't I remember that from waaay back when they were introduced?)
Suggestions:
1 - If you want to hit a hornets nest, do an anarchy faction's wing mission assassination of a politicain on your own, in a high sec system.
2. do the missions in a 'wrong sort of ship' lol think of it as undercover. I like using my passenger python, because it's undercover enough to get close to the mark, and tough enough to take some hits.

 

[enonymous]

It would be nice if on the "good job" coms from the issuing faction they could while they are at it wire us the moola.

After all, us assassins have far more important things to do other than haul empty elite combat vessels about to collect cash.

This is one of the few elements in the game that favor multirole ships. I'd rather not go back just to get paid, but since I have to, I'll stop in a local station and at least buy stuff to trade. Hopefully a good cargo mission going back.

I wish they'd change the limits on missions. Why do my completed missions count towards the cap? When I hit my mission cap and have several completed missions, there is 100% chance I'll find missions I want to accept. "We have 3 mission each paying 10 million credits. Each requires you to take 50 gold to this outpost you're going to visit anyway." Oh, sorry. I have the space and I really want to take your missions, but I can't because...reasons.

 

[MDHansen]

It's kind of like kicking a puppy to say this but that, right there, is FDev's biggest problem (IMO).

They don't seem to have a good grasp of the difference between adding content and adding repetition - or, in this case, just adding extraneous steps to a task.

BUT BUT they value our time, they claim! I'm so confused right now

 

[Alshain]

It's kind of like kicking a puppy to say this but that, right there, is FDev's biggest problem (IMO).

They don't seem to have a good grasp of the difference between adding content and adding repetition - or, in this case, just adding extraneous steps to a task.

Or even just scale the reward with the requirements. I think that's their biggest issue. If the influence/reputation/monetary/material rewards were equivalent to time for doing multiple of the quicker missions, few would complain. However, it's not the case, the time to reward ratio is about the same regardless so people are always going to want the faster missions.

If I can do 3 of the former type in the amount of time it takes to do the latter and still get 3x the reward of the latter, that's a big design flaw.

 

[zipline]

It's kind of like kicking a puppy to say this but that, right there, is FDev's biggest problem (IMO).

They don't seem to have a good grasp of the difference between adding content and adding repetition - or, in this case, just adding extraneous steps to a task.

Last weekend I finished the unlock of Broo Tarquin. 50 fujin tea. You can only buy 21 at a time. It just seems so silly going back and forth, I'd sooner go much further and do just 1 run. On that 3rd run for just 8 more tons I was thinking "why?"... just a time sink.

 

[Rock Hunter]

Last weekend I finished the unlock of Broo Tarquin. 50 fujin tea. You can only buy 21 at a time. It just seems so silly going back and forth, I'd sooner go much further and do just 1 run. On that 3rd run for just 8 more tons I was thinking "why?"... just a time sink.

I just unlocked Broo on my alt account....I’d forgotten all about the final, annoying, extra run with four tonnes of tea. Damn Brew Broo.

I stacked a load of Assassination missions today and when I got to the last one realised that I must have taken on a wing mission without noticing. My target was an Elite Corvette and his buddies were two more Corvettes plus an FdL. On top of that I had an Anaconda drop in as I’d managed to become Wanted in the system somehow. I’ve taken Wing missions of this type before and usually have one big ship and two, three or maybe four small ships that cause all sorts of accumulated pain but this was tough going in my Krait with burst lasers and frags. I had to go and refit for rails and frags to get things done a bit quicker.

I enjoy them but do skip the planetary scan ones, and roll my eyes every time I get a message about meeting a contact who’ll tell me where my target has gone...thanks FDev

 

[Stealthie]

Last weekend I finished the unlock of Broo Tarquin. 50 fujin tea. You can only buy 21 at a time. It just seems so silly going back and forth, I'd sooner go much further and do just 1 run. On that 3rd run for just 8 more tons I was thinking "why?"... just a time sink.

Oddly enough, I recently did that for my alt-account.

You can't really moan about the need to make 3 round-trips of 6 jumps each way but, OTOH, it's probably fair to ask whether there's any point having players make those three trips.
I mean, in a world where google isn't a thing, I guess the gameplay might come from locating the Fujin Tea (yes, the clue's in the name) and then buying it and taking it to BT but is there really any extra merit in making the player repeat the process two more times?

If we had to go to three different places to find three different items (perhaps requiring some ship modifications to complete each task) and face different obstacles during each task then it'd feel like a bigger challenge.
Instead, what we have is simply a tedious task repeated 3 times to make it take longer.

 

[Faded Glory]

It's kind of like kicking a puppy to say this but that, right there, is FDev's biggest problem (IMO).

They don't seem to have a good grasp of the difference between adding content and adding repetition - or, in this case, just adding extraneous steps to a task.

Unfortunately this permeates the game...

Incoming enemy alerts for delivery missions. Exactly the same enemy every time, one after the other, just a bigger ship and more of them for higher ranking missions.

The repetition and predictability are disappointing at this stage in the game's development. Missions, once they are introduced seem to be just left, good enough so it would seem, instead of being built on and developed adding different scenarios and obstacles to overcome to at least try and give the same gameplay objectives a bit of a fresh feel.