Beginning to Dislike Mission Misdirections

Landge · Feb 18, 2015

I took on a pirate hunting mission requiring to kill 6 pirates in 2 neighboring systems along with a collect and a deliver mission, same area to build up my relations with the feds. Since the pirate mission had the shortest time to complete I focused on that one first.

I start searching USS locations for targets. Everytime I get a proposal from the opposing faction to change my mind. I know it's a game mechanic to "enhance" the mission but they REALLY get on my nerves. How does this other faction know that I am going to stop at this particular USS so that they can talk me into changing my mind? It would be more "believable" if they would follow you, track you down like interdictors do. Not just be there when you arrive. For each and every USS there's a pilot waiting to make me an counter offer. This is as annoying as interdictions.

I started KWS each to see if they are wanted. Nope 2 are clean but the pirate one, in a T7, is WANTED with a 10,000 cred bounty! Eureka! Vengeance at last. I'll show them I'm not going to switch sides! Besides I already killed 5 and this one will compete my task.

I take the 1st shot and immedately get a 100 cred fine. WHAT! He's WANTED! I double check to be sure. Yep 10,000 bucks worth warrant. What's the deal?
That's not going to stop me though. I've had enough of their lies and misinformation! You are going DOWN! We traded shots until the T7 popped.
5,000 credit FINE, I'm WANTED for MURDER, and a 10,000 credit REWARD! Oh well at least I keep 5,000 after clearing my name.

But that's not the end. I can't close out my pirate mission. It was replaced by the "Abort mission and meet me here location".
I check mission status and I have a full count of 6 kills. I've doubled back to each of the Fed stations in the 3 systems and none have the option to close out in the BB. What gives?

tl/dr: Took on kill pirates mission. Got offer to abort. I didn't. Killed messenger. Got REWARD and FINED. Can't finish because station doesn't have it listed on BB anymore to close out.

shrinkshooter · Feb 18, 2015

combat missions are bugged more often than they're not. i just came back to the game after a several month hiatus, and virtually all of the mission-breaking or -interrupting bugs from when I left are still there, plus a few new ones like what you just described. Getting your killcount reset to zero by an alt. mission offering on a hunting mission is still here, and that one's been around for four months at least, and I think closer to six. Or the idiotic assassination mission where you track down an Orca with no bounty, and even though it's clearly your mission target, killing it does nothing at all.

The devs have a lot of ground to cover, and bug fixes tend to come fast for the little things and slower for the big ones, but I'm surprised none of the above has been dealt with yet.

Dbrn47 · Feb 18, 2015

shrinkshooter said:
combat missions are bugged more often than they're not. i just came back to the game after a several month hiatus, and virtually all of the mission-breaking or -interrupting bugs from when I left are still there, plus a few new ones like what you just described. Getting your killcount reset to zero by an alt. mission offering on a hunting mission is still here, and that one's been around for four months at least, and I think closer to six. Or the idiotic assassination mission where you track down an Orca with no bounty, and even though it's clearly your mission target, killing it does nothing at all.

The devs have a lot of ground to cover, and bug fixes tend to come fast for the little things and slower for the big ones, but I'm surprised none of the above has been dealt with yet.

It's apparently hard for them to reproduce, especially when so many chime in with "I have zero issues" after someone brings this problem up. I haven't even seen it mentioned that they know about any mission problems at all. It's frustrating.

Landge · Feb 18, 2015

Should I even bother to ticket this with all the other issues FDEV has on their plate?

Dbrn47 · Feb 18, 2015

Landge said:
Should I even bother to ticket this with all the other issues FDEV has on their plate?

Mine haven't even been looked at as far as I can tell. I would say that the more tickets they receive on the issue the more likely they'll get to it, but I don't really know if that's even true.

Commander Halley · Feb 18, 2015

The best way to get the rep you want for the missions, is to click Back, instead of Accept, and do trading instead.

Kyudos · Feb 18, 2015

Landge said:
WHAT! He's WANTED! I double check to be sure. Yep 10,000 bucks worth warrant. What's the deal?

Was he wanted in the system you were in? Even after a KWS, if he's clean in the current system it seems it's illegal to touch him. I've been caught by this one too...

kaaldesh · Feb 18, 2015

Dbrn47 said:
It's apparently hard for them to reproduce, especially when so many chime in with "I have zero issues" after someone brings this problem up. I haven't even seen it mentioned that they know about any mission problems at all. It's frustrating.

Lol hard to reproduce?! What the heck game are these guys playing? (Incredulity not directed at you.)

I get an issue on 4 out 5 kill missions. The same NPC issue that OP mentioned. Offer to switch sides, and it RESETS my kills

I get this offer on literally EVERY kill mission, but only resets my kills 4/5 of the time. This is incredibly unfortunate since the doggone USS are so hard to get the ones you want anyway! (Kill pirates is admittedly not AS rare a USS, but still pretty uncommon) Also got a mission where for 3+ hours only 1 out of the 2 required smugglers even spawned.

Worse is the federation mission where killing the target ruins your rep with the federation lol.

So we get missions that do not have targets spawn, missions where your kill tally is reset, missions where you can't turn in upon completion, missions where completing the objective actually hurts your rep, and all the missions are some "cross my fingers, hope my lucky card turns over" and the target I actually need even pops... after an hour plus at least of mind-numbing meandering around a system hoping and hoping, searching and searching and searching and sear....

As of last night, I stopped doing these USS missions.

Dogthinker · Feb 18, 2015

Workaround:
For the 'kill x of y ship type' missions, rather than visiting USS (triggering counter-offers) I suggest going to the Nav Beacon. Not every wanted ship you find there will be a pirate, but they keep coming, so with a few minutes of pew pew it's not hard to collect enough pirates to satisfy your mission.

Landge · Feb 18, 2015

Dogthinker said:
Workaround:
For the 'kill x of y ship type' missions, rather than visiting USS (triggering counter-offers) I suggest going to the Nav Beacon. Not every wanted ship you find there will be a pirate, but they keep coming, so with a few minutes of pew pew it's not hard to collect enough pirates to satisfy your mission.

I also have targeted and interdicted wanted npc's going about while in SC inbetween and during missions when searching for USS sites. Unfortunately those don't count towards your mission goals. I think they should count too and is an oversite. Maybe they aren't considered pirates. Can anyone verify if pirates found at other points of interest like resource sites count towards your mission goal?

Highlightning · Feb 18, 2015

kaaldesh said:
Lol hard to reproduce?! What the heck game are these guys playing? (Incredulity not directed at you.)

I get an issue on 4 out 5 kill missions. The same NPC issue that OP mentioned. Offer to switch sides, and it RESETS my kills I get this offer on literally EVERY kill mission, but only resets my kills 4/5 of the time. This is incredibly unfortunate since the doggone USS are so hard to get the ones you want anyway! (Kill pirates is admittedly not AS rare a USS, but still pretty uncommon) Also got a mission where for 3+ hours only 1 out of the 2 required smugglers even spawned.

Worse is the federation mission where killing the target ruins your rep with the federation lol.

So we get missions that do not have targets spawn, missions where your kill tally is reset, missions where you can't turn in upon completion, missions where completing the objective actually hurts your rep, and all the missions are some "cross my fingers, hope my lucky card turns over" and the target I actually need even pops... after an hour plus at least of mind-numbing meandering around a system hoping and hoping, searching and searching and searching and sear....

As of last night, I stopped doing these USS missions.

Same. I have almost entirely quit wasting my time with these hunt missions. Would much rather just fly around hunting pirates and other wanted criminals for the bounty creds.

Goilveig · Feb 18, 2015

Landge said:
I started KWS each to see if they are wanted. Nope 2 are clean but the pirate one, in a T7, is WANTED with a 10,000 cred bounty! Eureka! Vengeance at last. I'll show them I'm not going to switch sides! Besides I already killed 5 and this one will compete my task.

I take the 1st shot and immedately get a 100 cred fine. WHAT! He's WANTED! I double check to be sure. Yep 10,000 bucks worth warrant. What's the deal?
That's not going to stop me though. I've had enough of their lies and misinformation! You are going DOWN! We traded shots until the T7 popped.
5,000 credit FINE, I'm WANTED for MURDER, and a 10,000 credit REWARD! Oh well at least I keep 5,000 after clearing my name.

1. Actually, you keep 2500 after clearing your name because you have to pay 150% of the bounty amount in bribes to remove it

2. If he's clean on the basic scan, but shows a bounty on KWS, you're committing a crime (unless it's an anarchy). Bounty on KWS means SOMEONE wants him dead. Unless that someone happens to be the faction whose space you are in, you can't legally attack the person. That's why clean / wanted on the basic target info is so important.

Elfman · Feb 18, 2015

Never go to uss for kill x go to nav point see a wanted ship fly close for a few seconds and if they send a message such as what goodies do you have etc they count towards the mission either way kill them for bounty. Same goes for RES 100% I can guarantee this works it's what I do for every one of these

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I should have said this also works for bounty hunters they scan you and state go ahead pilot your clean and kill traders there the clean ones in haulers

Zanten · Feb 18, 2015

I remember this one time, when I was grinding for rep with the Empire to buy a Clipper (which basically means doing every tiny little asinine task you can get your hands on, CAUSE NEED BARONY) I ended up loading up on maybe 8 assorted Delivery/Resource Acquisition missions, and then just to break the monotony picked up a pirate-hunting mission in a nearby anarchy system. So I pop over there, (had picked up a decently kitted Cobra for the grind, leaving my T7 back in Federation space at my usual trade route,) and was doing the usual 30km/s USS crawl to find some pirates.

Swear to Santa, it took NINE duds before I found a pirate. Three of the duds were just the usual Funeral/Wedding group, but six of them were from ships telling me 'Oh, no, deliver your five tons of monkey dander to OUR station!' Four of these 'turnaround' encounters were in a row, meaning it would be;

*cruise, cruise, cruise...*
"Oh, USS!"
*drop out*
'Oh, hello there trader! I hope I'd find you!'
"Ugh..."
*return to FSD, cruise, cruise, cruise...*
"Oh, USS!"
*drop out*
'Hello there trader, I've been searching everywhere for y-'
"For the love of..."
*return to FSD, cruise, cruise, cruise...*
"Another USS, PLEASE be a pirate..."
*drop out*
'Oh thank God, trader you have no idea how dire things a-'
"GAH!"
*BACK to FSD, cruise, cruise, cruise, cruise, cruise, cruise...*
"Fourth time's the charm..."
*Drop out*
'Hey there, you want to make some REAL mon-'
"FIRE ALL $%*%$& WEAPONS!!!!"

DAYLEET · Feb 18, 2015

First and last time i tried doing those missions i got that bug too so i decided to leave it there and never complete it. One day, as i was abandoning a bunch of mission who had expired from the day before, i accidentally accepted the offer of the pirates to see them somewhere else and that mission can't be abandoned so it has been on my agenda ever since and forever will be lol

Celeste · Feb 18, 2015

Landge said:
I took on a pirate hunting mission requiring to kill 6 pirates in 2 neighboring systems along with a collect and a deliver mission, same area to build up my relations with the feds. Since the pirate mission had the shortest time to complete I focused on that one first.

I start searching USS locations for targets. Everytime I get a proposal from the opposing faction to change my mind. I know it's a game mechanic to "enhance" the mission but they REALLY get on my nerves. How does this other faction know that I am going to stop at this particular USS so that they can talk me into changing my mind? It would be more "believable" if they would follow you, track you down like interdictors do. Not just be there when you arrive. For each and every USS there's a pilot waiting to make me an counter offer. This is as annoying as interdictions.

I started KWS each to see if they are wanted. Nope 2 are clean but the pirate one, in a T7, is WANTED with a 10,000 cred bounty! Eureka! Vengeance at last. I'll show them I'm not going to switch sides! Besides I already killed 5 and this one will compete my task.

I take the 1st shot and immedately get a 100 cred fine. WHAT! He's WANTED! I double check to be sure. Yep 10,000 bucks worth warrant. What's the deal?
That's not going to stop me though. I've had enough of their lies and misinformation! You are going DOWN! We traded shots until the T7 popped.
5,000 credit FINE, I'm WANTED for MURDER, and a 10,000 credit REWARD! Oh well at least I keep 5,000 after clearing my name.

But that's not the end. I can't close out my pirate mission. It was replaced by the "Abort mission and meet me here location".
I check mission status and I have a full count of 6 kills. I've doubled back to each of the Fed stations in the 3 systems and none have the option to close out in the BB. What gives?

tl/dr: Took on kill pirates mission. Got offer to abort. I didn't. Killed messenger. Got REWARD and FINED. Can't finish because station doesn't have it listed on BB anymore to close out.

I don't really mind the misdirection, well I should actually say I don't think I'd mind them as much if more information was made available. The idea behind it is cool and all but some of them just seem confusing. I would like to know what party is making the counter offer. I don't know whether it's a party in an opposing faction, or if it's one in the same faction. There's just nothing to go on to help you decide.

Dbrn47 · Feb 18, 2015

kaaldesh said:
Lol hard to reproduce?! What the heck game are these guys playing? (Incredulity not directed at you.)

I get an issue on 4 out 5 kill missions. The same NPC issue that OP mentioned. Offer to switch sides, and it RESETS my kills I get this offer on literally EVERY kill mission, but only resets my kills 4/5 of the time. This is incredibly unfortunate since the doggone USS are so hard to get the ones you want anyway! (Kill pirates is admittedly not AS rare a USS, but still pretty uncommon) Also got a mission where for 3+ hours only 1 out of the 2 required smugglers even spawned.

Worse is the federation mission where killing the target ruins your rep with the federation lol.

So we get missions that do not have targets spawn, missions where your kill tally is reset, missions where you can't turn in upon completion, missions where completing the objective actually hurts your rep, and all the missions are some "cross my fingers, hope my lucky card turns over" and the target I actually need even pops... after an hour plus at least of mind-numbing meandering around a system hoping and hoping, searching and searching and searching and sear....

As of last night, I stopped doing these USS missions.

Yea I don't know. I can only assume it's hard to reproduce since they haven't said a word about it despite so many reports. The only other options are they haven't seen the issue at all or it's an extremely low priority for them. It doesn't help that people that have done 5 missions swear that they completely understand the mission system and it's a 100% working system for them.

I tested these missions for days straight, only doing them and nothing else. They are inconsistent at best and have remained so through each patch.

Mikey2305 · Feb 18, 2015

Im pleased im a pacifist and travel without guns!

jadefriendly · Feb 18, 2015

the kill reset bug is still very much unfixed.

if I take combat missions (not counting assassinations), I simply don't bother with checking USS anymore as I know, 100%, that it will be counter-offers EVERY SINGLE TIME.
not sometimes, but EVERY TIME

the counter offers really really need to be made more rare, and the kill reset bug needs fixing. I logged a ticket for this ages ago, being ignored for weeks/months with my the other tickets.

Quineloe · Feb 18, 2015

Can you provide a screenshot of you destryoing a wanted ship and getting a murder bounty?

Or did you as I suspect kill a Clean ship that had a bounty elsewhere?