AX conflict zones

[Anakausuen]

Just got a zone where the interceptors didn't spawn (even though it still said the voice line) and I was able to mix it up in there easily until I ran out of ammo, synthed a reload for each multicannon, ran out again, finally decided to burn off the caustic damage I'd picked up at the start of the fight, sat there on the edge throwing fighters at the fray until I ran out of those too, and eventually cruised off because the scenario progress bar had been full for ages but wasn't registering a victory. Ho hum.

Once again, the difficulty spike between scouts and interceptors for solo players is massive. I'd love to have something in between.

Sounds like a funny bug there, I've also noticed something similar happening at normal conflict zones, where if you rout the enemy capital ship all victory progress stops and it goes on forever. Indeed scouts are far easier than interceptors... especially since two interceptors spawn and the AI aren't programmed to attack the hearts lol. Here's hoping this will all be fixed soon

 

[Screemonster]

Just switched my krait's loadout up. Two flak launchers on the mediums to get rid of the swarms and three turreted large multis for the scouts - if I'm lucky and only get a couple of cyclops for the interceptors then it's an easy job to take out the swarms then just fly around mopping up scouts while the NPCs tie up the interceptors.

Or just flak the scouts to death, that's always fun.

 

[CMDR Hagglebeard]

Thowing in some input on March 6th-

I don't think you should invariably be able to win CZs - in some circumstances, you should lose, and not rarely, either.

Currently, I have solo'd AX Conflict Zones a few times in my Alliance Chieftain. These times were usually with all interceptors being the most basic 'Cyclops' variant, although one time we had 2 Cyclops and 1 Basilisk. Interceptors are much easier to destroy with the AX Defense force support, if they survive - If the AX forces have more Type 10s, Anacondas, and Chieftains, they tend to last longer, but a lot of Cobras and the like tend to die quickly. This is a variable you have to take into account at the start of the battle, and be sure to kill the special scout variants early so the AX forces don't get covered in caustic. Yes, you have top babysit them, to a degree.

However, if I have more than one Basilisk or a single Medusa enter the fray, I leave. I can't take those on. So, for me, it's gamble based on what interceptors appear, and the composition of the AX forces.

You should also note that at least one player (CMDR Aranionros Stormrage) has completed the AX CZ and killed the Hydra at the end - solo. So, it's not impossible, just very difficult.

 

[RedTape]

Hello Commanders.

I couldn't agree more with the sentiment that AXCZ's are not well balanced for solo play. I find the scouts to be fairly easy until the Interceptors drop in. By then I am on my own. While I don't have 3,000 hours in the game, I am no noob with over 650 hours. I can spend hours in a human CZ in any of my ships from a Corvette to a Viper using synthesis, etc., but that is simply not possible in the AXCZs. The materials needed for synth are a pain to collect. Some require scooping up debris left over from the destroyed Thargoid which simply isn't happening in the heat of battle (I tried).

Even though I have a fully engineered Krait 2 specifically built for this work, it seems hardly worth the risk at a $11M rebuy. At best, I take out all the scouts and maybe beat up an interceptor before I am overwhelmed. I then jump out with 30-50% hull, turn in my claims, rearm and repair for a net of maybe $100K. This also doesn't count the dozen+ hours spent mining the Gaurdian tech, engineering the build, and the $150M I poured into the purpose built ship in the first place.

To add insult to injury, it also appears that the NHUSS are gone now. I was unable to find any after going to a half-dozen systems with damaged stations and landing on countless rescue ships with no missions. I could not find a single NHUSS after 8 hours of jumping in and around these systems with obvious Thargoid activity and loads of AXCZ's.

Maybe I'm missing something and actually doing this wrong, but after countless time spent surfing the web and forums trying to figure this out, I'm about ready to hang up the joystick and move on to something else. I'd appreciate any suggestions for finding NHUSS which seems like it would be a much more fun, manageable, and sustainable way to solo play.

 

[Hully333]

It cant be easier, its got to be harder. Its Thargoids we are talking about. Some things are just not meant to be done solo. They have to cater for the wings.

Low, medium and high intensity AX conflict zones perhaps ?

 

[CMDR Cosmic Spacehead]

It cant be easier, its got to be harder. Its Thargoids we are talking about. Some things are just not meant to be done solo. They have to cater for the wings.

Low, medium and high intensity AX conflict zones perhaps ?

I'd be perfectly happy with high medium and low AX zones.
Low being all scouts, maybe one Cyclops.
Medium being, scouts, 2 Cyclops or maybe 1 Basilisk.
High, anything goes.

I still can't defeat anything bigger than a Cyclops. I'm usually heavily damaged and out of ammo after a fight with one, so I have to leave.

 

[Krakenheim]

I am not an extraordinary pilot but I have been running AX Conflict zones in a Krait Mk II and honestly as long as the interceptors are Cyclops I can solo it by spliting them up, scouts arent much of a problem, the NPCs are there for local color and I like it as in normal conflict zones you should do the lion's share, AX Conflict zones are probabbly what is called "end game" so please dont nerf them. Notice that a month ago I couldnt take on a Cyclops, I am learning and hope someday to take on Basilisk.

 

[DAB42]

Flying a fast krate and still losing the battle because you can not scan the interceptors is very annoying. The scanner should not even be require by this time in the story line,

 

[Icybow73]

Thanks for all the comments, you helped me out here. Though I didn't create this post, this will make me think twice before going into an ax conflict zone

 

[Wildcard]

This is also my complaint about AX Combat zones and just Combat Zones in general. You can only stay in the zone for so long and then you have to jump back out to reset it.

For AX Combat zones I would prefer that the Friendly NPC's and the Scouts respawn more regularly, if anything this is a problem with AX Combat when you either cant find a target because you in the AX Conflict with a full Wing or your build is so good you kill them too fast. Then you have to worry about the Interceptor which honestly should be removed from these lower end intensity and put into the higher ones. I personally other wise would have no problem staying inside a single conflict zone for hours.

As for regular conflict zones this newer mechanic of them running away after you've killed like 6-10 is just lame and again you have to leave and come back. Again this is boring and lame when I could stay in a normal conflict zones for several hours even after i've run out of ammo. Its called synthesis after all and there's nothing to use it on.

 

[Drelthar]

Needs low (scouts only) med (scouts and occasional interceptor) and high (scouts and all the way up to the most powerful interceptors)

 

[SlickPBW]

I also am having a hard time with the AX CZ. I agree with all of the above and I’m working to increase my skills and tweak my designs. I think they are a bit hard but I also agree that they are supposed to be hard and we should not make them easy.

I do have a question: if I leave an AX CZ before it completes, does this count as a “loss” for humans and a “victory” for the bugs? And thus strengthen the bug position in the system?

I don’t want to be making things worse.

 

[Screemonster]

I also am having a hard time with the AX CZ. I agree with all of the above and I’m working to increase my skills and tweak my designs. I think they are a bit hard but I also agree that they are supposed to be hard and we should not make them easy.

I do have a question: if I leave an AX CZ before it completes, does this count as a “loss” for humans and a “victory” for the bugs? And thus strengthen the bug position in the system?

I don’t want to be making things worse.

As far as anyone I've spoken to knows, it's just the kills that count. Completing the objectives just gives some extra bonds to everyone in the zone.

 

[eptija]

Have been happily offing Thargoids for a while (courtesy of guardian gauss canons) and thought I would try an AX conflict zone.

And so I am happily offing the scouts/marauders etc before focusing on the interceptors. The white bar is a bit over halfway to victory. Everything is fine: 98% hull and 2 full shield bars with the third at about halfway - This in a G5-everything conda with a truck-load of HRPs/MRPs, prismatic shields and 6 shield boosters.

I hear "Frame shift anomaly detected". I kill the last scout on my scanner about two seconds later. Maybe a second after that I hear "ship under attack". My fighter evaporates, my shields go to zero, my hull drops to 73%, my thrusters and FSD go off-line, my canopy blows. I check my modules: All the MRPs, fighter hanger and weapons are also toast.

The time from "Frame shift anomaly detected" to catastrophic damage was significantly less than 10 seconds*. I do everything under the sun to reboot/repair. Forget it - 38 million+change re-buy

I never even saw what hit me. Can someone enlighten me as to what the **** happened?

 

[Drelthar]

Have been happily offing Thargoids for a while (courtesy of guardian gauss canons) and thought I would try an AX conflict zone.

And so I am happily offing the scouts/marauders etc before focusing on the interceptors. The white bar is a bit over halfway to victory. Everything is fine: 98% hull and 2 full shield bars with the third at about halfway - This in a G5-everything conda with a truck-load of HRPs/MRPs, prismatic shields and 6 shield boosters.

I hear "Frame shift anomaly detected". I kill the last scout on my scanner about two seconds later. Maybe a second after that I hear "ship under attack". My fighter evaporates, my shields go to zero, my hull drops to 73%, my thrusters and FSD go off-line, my canopy blows. I check my modules: All the MRPs, fighter hanger and weapons are also toast.

The time from "Frame shift anomaly detected" to catastrophic damage was significantly less than 10 seconds*. I do everything under the sun to reboot/repair. Forget it - 38 million+change re-buy

I never even saw what hit me. Can someone enlighten me as to what the **** happened?

Maybe two medusa spawned and both attacked? Dunno!

I have seen two Cyclops spawn at the same time.

 

[CMDR Yates]

In short, I reckon:

• More NPCs should spawn in at a certain rate as others die off or flee
• NPCs should make some attempt to target hearts, but not too effectively
• Occasional "special forces" NPCs with Guardian weapons should have a chance of spawning in small numbers late in the battle
• Maybe we don't need to get close and scan the hearts on CZ Thargoids? Perhaps the NPCs have scanned them and "shared" the information.
• Different levels of AX CZ danger level. Low (Scouts), Medium (Scouts, Cyclops), High (Scouts, all types of Interceptor), Extreme (same as current arrangement, with no respawning NPCs, intended for wings)

 

[eptija]

Maybe two medusa spawned and both attacked? Dunno!

I have seen two Cyclops spawn at the same time.

I have faced-off against a solo Medusa before. It was nowhere close to delivering the kind of DPS needed to trash my ship that fast, even with a bunch of mates. I reckon it was about three maybe four seconds from "fine and dandy" to "utterly f****d".

Still confused

 

[eptija]

In short, I reckon:

• More NPCs should spawn in at a certain rate as others die off or flee
• NPCs should make some attempt to target hearts, but not too effectively
• Occasional "special forces" NPCs with Guardian weapons should have a chance of spawning in small numbers late in the battle
• Maybe we don't need to get close and scan the hearts on CZ Thargoids? Perhaps the NPCs have scanned them and "shared" the information.
• Different levels of AX CZ danger level. Low (Scouts), Medium (Scouts, Cyclops), High (Scouts, all types of Interceptor), Extreme (same as current arrangement, with no respawning NPCs, intended for wings)

I like the idea of wing-only conflict zones. It a CZ is a death sentence for a solo player, then I would prefer to know in advance and save the re-buy cost rather than being blown to pieces before I can 180-flip and see what has just dropped in.

 

[Kissamies]

I have commented on this before. With my Guardian weapons I do pretty well, even once or twice defeated an harder than Cyclops interceptor that I can't normally beat. Of course, when the final Hydra shows up, I just book it.

I agree about the xeno scanner. It's fine for scanning stationary interceptors, but would need triple the range to have a chance on angry ones in CZ. In general I like the interceptors showing up, but the difficulty jump from Cyclops to Basilisk is big and I think the ones that spawn in the middle of the fight should always be just Cyclopes, except maybe for those extra-hard wing only CZs. Also, tone down the scout spawning when the interceptor is in the field. Otherwise they pile up. Similarly, the final interceptor could be an easier variant except for the expert wing CZs.

 

[Screemonster]

Starting to get tired of them bugging out and turning into "scouts only, no interceptors spawn, the ride never ends", especially when there are other players around. After a while of just scouts, there get to be so many ax npcs that you can barely turn to intercept the new scout spawns before they're blown away.

It'd be helpful if the NPCs were so good at keeping scouts off your back while the interceptors were around!