Engineers Combat bonds - general tips from veterans please...

jacozilla · Jun 5, 2016

Anticipating I will need to stack large amounts of combat bonds to unlock at least one engineer later on, would like some general info. As much as I've played ED, one area I never got into was combat bonds. Bounty hunting yes, combat bonds no.

Can get the basic mechanics and stuff from goggle, but what I was wondering is - can one earn a lot of combat bonds without dinging your major faction, or do you end up basically lowering one in order to take sides with the other?

e..g I am friends or allied with all 3 major powers. I don't really care if I off minor factions in local systems, but would like to stay friendly/allied with all major powers. Is that possible if racking up lots of combat bonds?

Right now, all I can think of from theorycraft pov is alternate taking sides in conflicts - work for feds, then empire, back to feds, etc, and hope it neutrals out. Can anyone who plays for all major factions and does a lot of combat bonds chime in?

Leskit · Jun 5, 2016

I haven't done "a lot" of combat bonds, but find a system that's in civil war, go to the conflict zone, and side with the minor faction that is aligned with your major faction. There's a decent chance that one of the minor powers that's in the war isn't aligned with the alliance/feds/empire.
Caveat: It's been since before Horizons that I did combat bonds...

DNA-Decay · Jun 5, 2016

If you're killing people, you need to chose a side.

Klab · Jun 5, 2016

Ater you enter a CZ, fly to the outskirts of the battle and then choose a side in 'functions' in the right ui panel. Kill anything that appears red on your radar, and be prepared to bail out if it all gets a bit hairy. Staying with your green friendly NPC's does help a lot. Anything you kill will not affect your reputation with any of the minor or major factions, it's not like killing NPC's in a Nav beacon. Also be aware that ships in a CZ are a lot tougher to kill, as they are fitted with military set ups. Hope this helps , Good Luck CMDR!

Cmdr Zach · Jun 5, 2016

Worth checking if the engineer who wants combat bonds may only take them from wars in his system. If so don't waste time hording them elsewhere.

Pardot Kynes · Jun 5, 2016

jacozilla said:
Anticipating I will need to stack large amounts of combat bonds to unlock at least one engineer later on, would like some general info. As much as I've played ED, one area I never got into was combat bonds. Bounty hunting yes, combat bonds no.

Can get the basic mechanics and stuff from goggle, but what I was wondering is - can one earn a lot of combat bonds without dinging your major faction, or do you end up basically lowering one in order to take sides with the other?

e..g I am friends or allied with all 3 major powers. I don't really care if I off minor factions in local systems, but would like to stay friendly/allied with all major powers. Is that possible if racking up lots of combat bonds?

Right now, all I can think of from theorycraft pov is alternate taking sides in conflicts - work for feds, then empire, back to feds, etc, and hope it neutrals out. Can anyone who plays for all major factions and does a lot of combat bonds chime in?

As far as I can see, this is a minigame that has little or no effect on your status with any faction (unless of course you are doing it as a mission, when it will be a bonus for that faction.) There's lots of anecdotal evidence for this and previous posts - but they are scattered.

I wouldn't worry by assuming anything particularly clever or subtle is going on in this game.

Andragon · Jun 5, 2016

What happens actually if you shoot ships without choosing a side?

jgm · Jun 5, 2016

Andragon said:
What happens actually if you shoot ships without choosing a side?

That side becomes hostile to you but you don't receive bonds for ship destruction.

Dimensions · Jun 5, 2016

Most CZs I've fought in are between a minor faction aligned with my super power and a minor faction that isn't aligned to any super power. I would try to find this type of war if you you don't want to lose rep with any of the other super powers.

Soulkiller · Jun 5, 2016

How to find CZs? I filtered for state on the galaxy map for Civil War and went to that system.... there is a Civil War but no CZ. Is this normal?

Dimensions · Jun 5, 2016

Soulkiller said:
How to find CZs? I filtered for state on the galaxy map for Civil War and went to that system.... there is a Civil War but no CZ. Is this normal?

It's a bit weird how it works. If you filter for systems in civil wars and wars, that system state seems to persist even though there is no longer a war occurring inside it, but these filtered systems are still affected by war state effects. I think most faction and system states persist for a while after they have occurred. However, when a war starts the system state doesn't seem to change immediately (there is a lag) even though a war is taking place inside it.

I've bolded faction state and system state because from my observation it seems the faction state shows what is happening right now, while the system state tells you what systems are still under the effects of war (can't remember what the effects are - but it affects things like security and trade I think in that system).

So except for player driven websites that list CZs, I've found the only way to find them is to go to the galaxy map filter for planets at war and civil war and look at that system's internal info. There you can find the current state of all the factions in that system. If any of the factions are in a state of war there will be a CZ there. If no factions are in a state of war, that means the fighting is over (usually one faction will be in retreat) and there will be no CZ there. I then look at the system info of nearby planets that do not have a system state of war, and look to see if any of the factions inside that system are in a state of war. If there are any then you will find CZs there.

Basically a system in a war state may not have any fighting (i.e. no CZs) taking place inside because it is talking about the effects from the war state before the fighting starts and after the fighting stops. If a faction in a system is in a state of war that means combat is currently occurring (i.e. has CZs), but this may not have triggered that system's war state yet, so you can have systems without war/civil war state that has a CZs them. That's what I figured out anyway.

DrakeAurum · Jun 5, 2016

Combat Zones are pretty darn tough now. I lost my first ship since the update in a Low Intensity CZ, trying to take down a very persistent Cobra. Not sure I'd try it again without winging-up.

Bomba Luigi · Jun 5, 2016

You don't lose rep for the side you fight against, I at least never noticed it. And yes, the people who tell you to not imedialty pick side but boost out at first you need to listen to, thats a very important thing about CZs.

Other then that the Vulture is still king in CZs as far as I can tell, don't have any trouble. It only can get troublesome if you have much more reds then greens around you, in that case fly to a place where there are lots of green.

Nerwan · Jun 5, 2016

Bomba Luigi said:
You don't lose rep for the side you fight against, I at least never noticed it. And yes, the people who tell you to not imedialty pick side but boost out at first you need to listen to, thats a very important thing about CZs.

Other then that the Vulture is still king in CZs as far as I can tell, don't have any trouble. It only can get troublesome if you have much more reds then greens around you, in that case fly to a place where there are lots of green.

This is all true, you don't lose rep and the thing about staying where there's greens is bang on. The only thing I take issue with is the bit about the Vulture ;-p I rock on in there with my Python every time. CZs can get a bit hairy, I only just survived the other day after being focused by 7/8 ships at once but that's a rarity and you can survive that thing if you've got the SCBs to handle it. I suspect they pick on bigger ships more than small actually although I don't have any solid facts on that so it could be that a smaller ship would actually draw less attention from the reds..

jacozilla · Jun 5, 2016

Klab said:
Ater you enter a CZ, fly to the outskirts of the battle and then choose a side in 'functions' in the right ui panel. Kill anything that appears red on your radar, and be prepared to bail out if it all gets a bit hairy. Staying with your green friendly NPC's does help a lot. Anything you kill will not affect your reputation with any of the minor or major factions, it's not like killing NPC's in a Nav beacon. Also be aware that ships in a CZ are a lot tougher to kill, as they are fitted with military set ups. Hope this helps , Good Luck CMDR!

Oh nice, it doesn't affect rep. If I'd known that, would have tried combat bonds before now.