Newcomer / Intro Boom Time delivery (wing): solo suicide?

[AgingGamer]

I've been away from Elite Dangerous since January, 2017. It is a very confusing situation trying to play the game after being away for so long: everything looks pretty much the same, but it's all different.

Anyway, I saw a mission on the board: Boom time delivery of 3600 or so units of beer- my kind of mission! It said "This mission is recommended for completion as part of a wing", but I had insurance so... worth a risk. I loaded up my Type 9 with the good stuff, and off I go....

A few hours later, I'm all done: mission complete and 6 million credits richer. I decide to call it a night, and make one last jump to my 'home' system. Seconds after I shift in I'm interdicted by an NPC, fail the 'mini-game', and am destroyed seconds later in my under-armed freighter.

So, was this just bad luck? A standard occurrence for all 'wing' missions... but why would they attack after the mission was complete? Or did someone really hate the brew I delivered?

Here's a screenshot of the Fat Duck a short while before she was blown to smithereens... <sniff>

 

[Dommarraa]

Once the mission was handed in and reward collected, then its done with.
You can be interdicted for no reason, but the only reasons for attack would be :

• Have Cargo
• Are Wanted
• Are Hostile with their faction
• Power Play stuff
• You Shot 1st

 

[Ashnak]

Usually, a pirate NPC would not shoot you if your cargo hold is empty. Mission NPCs should be deleted after the end of the mission. There are hunter type NPCs that will come after you and shoot in every case, but those have other preconditions.
If you can't remember what the NPC said to you at the start of the festivities, check your logfiles - EDDiscovery makes that a bit easier. All the comms are logged.

 

[AgingGamer]

Once the mission was handed in and reward collected, then its done with.

That's what I assumed, but it felt very 'suspicious'

You can be interdicted for no reason, but the only reasons for attack would be :
...

None of those reasons apply as far as I know. I was just interdicted; I failed the interdiction mini-game by accidentally throttling to zero which counts as 'surrender', but then I tried to run so the NPC attacked. At least that's the way I remember it: the fumes from the cargo hold may have been befuddling my memory.

If you can't remember what the NPC said to you at the start of the festivities, check your logfiles

I don't think I have those logs on Xbox, or at least I didn't back in 2017 although the word at the time was 'maybe one day'.

I'm pretty sure it was all bad luck and idiotic reactions on my part. My cargo hold was empty, so either my attempt to escape made the pirate open fire or, alternately, it was a left-over brigand from the mission who hadn't gotten word that I was finished.

On the basis of this discussion, I'll take another stab at a large 'Boom time delivery...' mission if I see one. Earning five or six million credits from a handful of short trips in my cargo ship seems like worth trying again.

 

[Dommarraa]

Beware the ones that ask you to supply goods. The rewards are often less than the cost to purchase the goods.

 

[Para Handy]

.......... Earning five or six million credits from a handful of short trips in my cargo ship seems like worth trying again.

Missions can pay millions for non-wing ones if you are allied with the factions.

 

[metatheurgist]

Sometimes random pirates will interdict just to check your cargo. They will fire if you do something like try to leave.

 

[Simon Templar]

I've been away from Elite Dangerous since January, 2017. It is a very confusing situation trying to play the game after being away for so long: everything looks pretty much the same, but it's all different.

Anyway, I saw a mission on the board: Boom time delivery of 3600 or so units of beer- my kind of mission! It said "This mission is recommended for completion as part of a wing", but I had insurance so... worth a risk. I loaded up my Type 9 with the good stuff, and off I go....

A few hours later, I'm all done: mission complete and 6 million credits richer. I decide to call it a night, and make one last jump to my 'home' system. Seconds after I shift in I'm interdicted by an NPC, fail the 'mini-game', and am destroyed seconds later in my under-armed freighter.

So, was this just bad luck? A standard occurrence for all 'wing' missions... but why would they attack after the mission was complete? Or did someone really hate the brew I delivered?

Here's a screenshot of the Fat Duck a short while before she was blown to smithereens... <sniff>

View attachment 173505

I have taken a few like this, on my own, in a T9 with a fighter pilot (if worst comes to the worst, I can generally sacrifice the fighter while I get the heck out of dodge). I have had some which are to ferry goods within the same system, never taken them further than the next system, and it is 10m cr or so for 3000T or so of cargo, so only five short runs. So the pay is okay even compared with regular allied cargo missions. I have never had the experience you describe, so I'd put it down to bad luck.

o7