I just jumped into five instances of Low Intensity Combat Zones, flying an FDL, not heavily upgraded but decently so. The first time I killed a Taipan and was almost immediately ganged up on by 4 or so NPC ships. Second time there weren't even any friendly ships in the combat zone. Third and fourth time the sides were even, and I still found myself surrounded and being ganged up on by a ridiculous murdergroup of NPC ships that are still somehow absolutely perfect shots with PA to the point where three ships of Viper MkIII size and SMALLER with at least one with PA will drop my shields in less than 15sec. I haven't met a Python or Vulture pair that can do that. Why am I being annihilated by super accurate PA still? The 5th CZ instance I tried in a row my side outnumbered the enemy pretty heavily, and after I shot one single ship a few times 7+ enemy ships jump to my exact location and my previously completely full shields are almost gone, down to 1/2 bar in less than 8 seconds. Why is it that I can last at times for 20+min in a CZ and others I am ganged up on by PA cheating NPC's who take impossible shots and somehow take aggro from THE ENTIRE COMBAT ZONE? Starting to get a little upset here.
Combat Zone Difficulty Imbalance
- Thread starter Czar Petrovich
- Start date
Git gud. Lol
Just kidding. CZs can be very random, LOW CZs can actually be harder than High. It's bizarre.
The agro you receive is pretty much based on how much damage you do.
NPC's seem to "target highest threat" when deciding which target to pick next. Which is often the one dealing the most damage.
Here's some tips,
Firstly, don't go to a CZ unless your ship is prepared, enemies there are much tougher than your average pirate.
Go fully A rated, maximum shields, master pip management.
Secondly, go High. High often is easier, due to the likelihood of larger ships which share the agro around. In a low CZ, you're likely to be one of the bigger ones, hence, bigger threat.
When you drop in to a CZ, don't select a side. Instead, fly to about 3km out from the nearest ship. Deploy your hardpoints, set your pips, launch your fighter, etc.
Then select a side. You won't be immediately hounded by all the hostile ships.
When picking targets, look for small fur balls of combat, with more of your side, than theirs. You'll quickly out number the other team, and eventually your team will rule he CZ, effectively spawn killing the enemies. Lol
Stick to the edges of the zone too, don't wade in head first.
Look for larger friendly ships, if a Cutter, Corvette, or Anaconda are on your side, stick close by, protect them, and they'll protect you, by being the bigger threat.
(Unless you're bigger of course).
Hopefully that's all you need to keep you alive.
Fly safe.
Just kidding. CZs can be very random, LOW CZs can actually be harder than High. It's bizarre.
The agro you receive is pretty much based on how much damage you do.
NPC's seem to "target highest threat" when deciding which target to pick next. Which is often the one dealing the most damage.
Here's some tips,
Firstly, don't go to a CZ unless your ship is prepared, enemies there are much tougher than your average pirate.
Go fully A rated, maximum shields, master pip management.
Secondly, go High. High often is easier, due to the likelihood of larger ships which share the agro around. In a low CZ, you're likely to be one of the bigger ones, hence, bigger threat.
When you drop in to a CZ, don't select a side. Instead, fly to about 3km out from the nearest ship. Deploy your hardpoints, set your pips, launch your fighter, etc.
Then select a side. You won't be immediately hounded by all the hostile ships.
When picking targets, look for small fur balls of combat, with more of your side, than theirs. You'll quickly out number the other team, and eventually your team will rule he CZ, effectively spawn killing the enemies. Lol
Stick to the edges of the zone too, don't wade in head first.
Look for larger friendly ships, if a Cutter, Corvette, or Anaconda are on your side, stick close by, protect them, and they'll protect you, by being the bigger threat.
(Unless you're bigger of course).
Hopefully that's all you need to keep you alive.
Fly safe.
Think about a "Combat Zone" as a "Dungeon" in some MMO.
The game has many places where you can "shoot at something", among them the "Combat Zone" are the most dangerous, of course, it is possible to survive alone (all that CMDR_Cosmicspacehead says is true, he understand the concept).
But in the end, a "Combat Zone" is the location for several players in the "wing" (more danger, more fun).
The game has many places where you can "shoot at something", among them the "Combat Zone" are the most dangerous, of course, it is possible to survive alone (all that CMDR_Cosmicspacehead says is true, he understand the concept).
But in the end, a "Combat Zone" is the location for several players in the "wing" (more danger, more fun).
I appreciate the feedback, but this is more than just me not being prepared. My FDL is beast. I get ganged up on while in a wing. This doesn't change the fact that 5 teeny ships can master PA my ship in seconds from 800+ shields with 4 SBC and I still can't survive sometimes. It's ridiculous.
NPC's are notoriously bad with PAs.
I really wish i had a video of a battle with an NPC Clipper with PAs vs my Python.
Needless to say, i never took a single hit from the PAs... Lol
And I was stationary.
It's Railguns you need to worry about.
These will shred the shields off most ships, and NPCs simply can not miss with them, because they're hitscan weapons.
800mj shields isn't a great deal to be honest.
I don't have the figures with me, but it doesn't take many PA/Railgun shots to strip that. And i believe PAs ignore resistances, so if your shields are augmented for resistance instead of pure Mj, you're opening yourself up to a big weakness Vs PAs (and ramming).
For reference, my Python, which isn't combat spec, has 1200mj and around 35~% resistances all round.
And my Anaconda is 1800mj, and 40~% resistances all round.
Both are multirole mission runners.
My FDL hasn't been modified much yet, and in its current state, it can't hold its own in a CZ for long. It's actually terrible and i don't fly it anymore. Lol
Don't forget, it's not the ship count that's the problem, it's the hardpoint count. "5 tiny ships", implying eagle's, or vipers, have 3 or 4 hardpoints each.
That's 15-20 hardpoints firing on you, and because they're agile and fast, their time on target is close to 100%.
5 vipers can be more of a threat than a single Anaconda/Cutter/Corvette.
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Agreed, thank you. I think it is indeed the railguns, but my resistances are pretty high, 50-60 for Kinetic and Blast, and approx 35 for Thermal. A single anaconda or corvette is no problem, generally, but like Ramsey said, it's like suddenly every ship magically decides you're the only enemy on the battlefield. Mind you this is before much time at all has passed, and there is no time whatsoever to create a green ball of doom. I can take a CZ for a half hour most of the time with no issues, mainly not using a single SCB until about a bit after halfway through. Other times I am in the CZ for less than 4min because I've already used all my SCB's and haven't encountered a single large ship.
As I said before, the "hive mind" behaviour you're describing, is a result of the AI ships targeting using "target highest threat" when looking for new targets, which is how I believe they work based on experience.
If you're laying the smack down with all you've got on one NPC, at the same time as 5 others decide to find a new target, you'll suddenly find yourself under fire from these until something else picks up the agro.
If you ease off the trigger and let some friendlies take the heat, you'll find you can slip back out to the edge of the battle to recover.
It's quite luck based though, there's no guarantee a friendly ship will take any heat off you.
If you're laying the smack down with all you've got on one NPC, at the same time as 5 others decide to find a new target, you'll suddenly find yourself under fire from these until something else picks up the agro.
If you ease off the trigger and let some friendlies take the heat, you'll find you can slip back out to the edge of the battle to recover.
It's quite luck based though, there's no guarantee a friendly ship will take any heat off you.
This is clear to me as at times the very first ship I fire at and kill is a Taipan. It doesn't make sense for a human pilot to say "Oh hey let's stop what we're doing and kill that guy, he just destroyed the smallest ship we have!" It'd make much more sense if I targeted and annihilated a Conda or a Python as my first blood. I'd kill me too if I saw that. But a Taipan causing you to take aggro from "human" AI pilots? Seems unrealistic that a person would identify me as the highest threat based on that alone. I mean, I target FDL before Python half the time, yea, but I'm not sure if that's calculated within the game or not.
hehe...I posted something simular, they love to gang up and ruin you I know that. but here are ways around it.
-lure them out one at a time by shooting and running away. then finish them
- stay close to allied NPC's and focus fire on targets
- wait for them to fire first shot, then focus fire and negate that target only
-be Chuck Norris and shoot and kill everything that moves around you like a god.
-go to HIGH intensity and hope there is a Capital ship, use that for cover.
-MOST IMPORTANTLY- Choose your odds wisely, take a few seconds more to analyse the odds of the zone. If you are severely out numbered then don't pick a side, or pick the winning one and steamroll the whole thing
these all work for me so far, havn't died once in my anaconda yet, same when I had a python...never died in conflict zones after that
-lure them out one at a time by shooting and running away. then finish them
- stay close to allied NPC's and focus fire on targets
- wait for them to fire first shot, then focus fire and negate that target only
-be Chuck Norris and shoot and kill everything that moves around you like a god.
-go to HIGH intensity and hope there is a Capital ship, use that for cover.
-MOST IMPORTANTLY- Choose your odds wisely, take a few seconds more to analyse the odds of the zone. If you are severely out numbered then don't pick a side, or pick the winning one and steamroll the whole thing
these all work for me so far, havn't died once in my anaconda yet, same when I had a python...never died in conflict zones after that
This, again. +1hehe...I posted something simular, they love to gang up and ruin you I know that. but here are ways around it.
-lure them out one at a time by shooting and running away. then finish them
- stay close to allied NPC's and focus fire on targets
- wait for them to fire first shot, then focus fire and negate that target only
-be Chuck Norris and shoot and kill everything that moves around you like a god.
-go to HIGH intensity and hope there is a Capital ship, use that for cover.
-MOST IMPORTANTLY- Choose your odds wisely, take a few seconds more to analyse the odds of the zone. If you are severely out numbered then don't pick a side, or pick the winning one and steamroll the whole thing
these all work for me so far, havn't died once in my anaconda yet, same when I had a python...never died in conflict zones after that
There isn't anything wrong with the CZ difficulty.
The OP just doesn't seem to be taking our advice.
If you shoot a Taipan, you'll agro it's mothership too btw. Which is the exact response I will do if an NPC attacks my SLF.
(Assuming it's not insta-railed to death!)
I can take any half decent ship in to a CZ and survive it. Including an combat Eagle.
Admittedly, I don't get many kills... Lol
If the OP won't adapt to the situation, then there's really nothing more we can do here.