Could use some advice on how not to die

[Susanna]

Hiya, details are in my pm... For those reading...

1. Always have a destination plotted (at least one jump) in the galaxy map. ALWAYS! Even if you are only travelling between stations within a system. When you arrive at your destination (last jump), the VERY first things that you do is throttle to zero, gal-map, plot a jump. Do this every time you arrive (I.e. your destination system). This is more important than anything! Always have a destination system set. More important than fuel scooping or anything!... throttle to zero, gal-map, plot a jump. It doesn't matter where, just as long as you have a jump plotted. Bookmarks are great for this. Pick the top one, plot route, exit gal-map. It takes only seconds to do!

2. Have the 'continue jump route' button bound to a hotas or keyboard button and know which button it is! This is going to save your life.

3. Once you have plotted a jump out, select the real destination within the current system that you wish to visit from the navigation panel on your left.

4. While flying towards that destination, observe any ships flying between 5 and 7 o'clock on your scanner, especially if they are close to you! Using Next Target, select them so that you know what type of ship it is. This aids your situational awareness. Don't fly straight towards your destination, try to keep ships in front or to the side of you, even if this means taking a long sc route to your destination.

5. If the ship interdicts you, DON'T PANIC. There is no reason why you can't escape from this.

6. Submit to the interdiction by throttling down to zero and press the Continue Jump Route button. You will get pulled out of supercruise, don't be alarmed.

7. Put 4 pips to systems and two pips to engines to maximise your shield strength. Once the initial spinning is over boost away from the attacking ship, and continue boosting as your engine capacitor recharges.

8. Your FSD will cool down quickly because you submitted (10 seconds). As soon as it has finished cooling down press the jump button to start charging your FSD. This will require 15 seconds.

9. Continue boosting away and evading the attacking ship while your FSD is charging. Shortly before your FSD reaches full charge, point your ship at your destination and hit boost again in that direction.

10. Your FSD should now have engaged and you have left your attacker for dust... Well done. You have lived to have another go at reaching that station you where headed for!

Go back to step 1 [yesnod]

There are several good videos on YouTube that demonstrate this. Do take a look!

Here is one for example. https://youtu.be/woy8nmaVuVg

Is this the best way to evade interdiction? No, but it is the safest way until you have more experience.

Susie
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[Wyaston Hypatia]

Here's another option: Reset your save and start again.

As you have only played a couple of weeks you won't be losing much, and you will quickly get it all back. Starting is much easier now, especially if you aren't trying to work out how to fly.
Nearly all the enemies you will encounter are at a low level. So you can learn how to deal with them as you progress.
The start is a different game from when you did it, you might find it enjoyable.

 

[colprice2002]

If you're doing local passenger missions (say a few hundred light years round trip), I'd recommend the Dolphin. Not too expensive (use grade 4 thrusters - not much different from grade 5), and lighten ship (no weapons, minimal shields) and add a fuel scoop.

With 70% throttle you should be able to evade most interceptions, if not, the dolphin can run much fadter than an Asp.

For 1000+ly missions, the Asp has a better jump range, and once outside the bubble there's not many other ships around.

Do read the passenger description carefully before accepting the mission:- some of the high paying passengers are wanted, some are more likely to be intercepted. Choose wisely!

 

[CMDR Cosmic Spacehead]

Check your outfitting, if you expect danger, install the highest class class shields in the largest slot, also fit shield boosters in the utilities.

You don't actually need weapons unless you want to fight back.

So when interdicted, target them! And fight it, they're easy to win right now. Throttle down to the blue zone and chase the escape vector until the blue bar reaches the top.
If you're winning, great!
If you're not, and the red bar is climbing above 2/3 up, immediately zero the throttle to submit.
Submitting shortens your FSD cooldown.
Now, the important part, check your target. Set your pips to 2 to shields, 4 to engines, 0 weapons (2-4-0). This allows you greater speed, and more boost. 4-2-0, and 3-3-0 is also fine. Just make sure it's one of them. Lol
IF it can mass lock you, target a new system to jump too. Any will do. Boost, use lateral thrusts, chaff, anything to avoid fire. Don't just fly straight. Don't even align for the system yet.
Charge your FSD for Hyperspace, once charged, pull a sharp turn to line up, and boost to straighten out. Once the countdown starts, you're safe.
IF the target can't mass lock you, boost, use lateral thrusts, chaff, etc, same as before, but as soon as the cooldown is over, charge for supercruise, and boost to align your vector. You don't need to face your target.
Any drift (particularly in the Asp) will prevent a jump, which is why you need to boost to straighten up.

You'll survival any encounter with that above tactics. Even in a shieldless sidewinder.
Practice the Interdiction game when possible, avoiding being pulled out of supercruise is the safest option.

Fly safe!

CMDR Cosmic Spacehead

 

[Deleted member 115407]

The AspX can't take anything in a straight fight except the occasional novice cobra. It doesn't have the shield strength, firepower, or maneuverability.
Hold out for a vulture or grab a viper mk4.

I'm not picking on Ananym, just seeing some "AspX can't fight" sentiment on here and thought I'd share a quick comparative...

Assume full gimballed multis, standard A rated for combat (D Sensors and Support), and Military composites for each.

Ship	Shield	Integrity	Speed	Hardpoints	DPS	Utilities
Viper IV	4A / 227mj	525	297 / 373	4	38.8	Chaff,PD
Asp X	5A / 291mj	735	283 / 385	6	52.4	Chaff,PD,2xBooster
Vulture	5A / 498mj	560	244 / 394	2	37.8	Chaff,PD,2xBooster

The Vulture is clearly going to win for shield strength and maneuverability, but suffers from jump range and doesn't multi-role well.
The Viper IV multiroles better than the vulture due to extra power, and has better range.
The AspX multiroles best due largest number of internals, extra power, and jump range combined.

The AspX is far from helpless. OP just needs to learn how to fly it. Compared to the other two, it does make for a big fat target though, I'll give you that.

Also, there is little gain in running a Class 6 shield on the AspX. Better to go with a 5 and save your largest internal for cargo or passengers.

Watch those two videos I shared, OP. Once you are comfortable evading and escaping, then you can get your fighting experience in a little at a time until you've hit the "ah ha" moment.

 

[PanTast]

Avoid fighting is my first tip.
I didn't submit to interdictions for ages. I think it is fairly easy to dodge them in that mini-game. Even in a T10.
Ignore mission critical messages. The bounties for incoming enemy alerts are too small to bother. Passengers don't get mad if you just ignore their messages.
Focus on your current mission. If you have to deliver your payload do nothing else. No USS and no fighting. If you wanna fight, have an empty cargo bay and go to a NAV beacon or Resource extraction site.

Later on you can use cargo to lure pirates to interdict you, but thats for experienced players.

o7

 

[Imo]

Vindenalos is right. The ASP was originally a military vessel named ASP Mk II and the civilian version, the ASP Explorer is also not bad in combat!

[video=youtube;5PLykmkGCUE]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5PLykmkGCUE[/video]

 

[Deleted member 115407]

Vindenalos is right. The ASP was originally a military vessel named ASP Mk II and the civilian version, the ASP Explorer is also not bad in combat!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5PLykmkGCUE

Dakka

 

[GunnerBill]

You can do most of these missions unarmed.

If you are interdicted submit immediately making sure that the game has recognised that you are submitting.

As soon as you are in normal space boost, boost, boost away from the NPC, drop chaff and perhaps a heat sink. By the time they start shooting you will be ready for low waking or even high waking out of there.

It always helps to practice selecting a system to enable a high wake escape so that you can do it under pressure.
Think whether you need weapons at all for what you are doing. IMO having weapons only encourages you to fight when maybe you'd be better off running. If you turn to fight and decide it wasn't a good idea it is probably too late to escape.

 

[Adhock]

Practice, Practice, Practice my friend. You'll find no shortage of people willing to help you do just that in game. I always spend the first few weeks in a Nav Beacon picking at wanted ships or in a Low threat REZ area with a heavy cop presence scavenging off the cops.

You can also just keep replaying the Basic Combat Tutorial mission until you get comfortable enough. A simulation for combat with no risk to you.

That said you also don't HAVE to fight the ships. It's only for bonus cash if you kill them. If you're not comfortable fighting them you don't have you as your primary mission is the safe transport of whatever you're carrying. You will still get paid for avoiding combat and won't get penalized for it. You just don't get bonus cash.

 

[d8veh]

When running missions, don't even think about looking at those ships that interdict you, let alone fight them. They will always be combat ships, while your ship won't be optimised for combat. even if you win the fight, you get nothing for it other than a lot of wasted time.

First thing: make sure that your ship is as fast as possible. That means A-rated thrusters and Power distributor. Change any E modules to D to make them lighter so you can go faster. Dump any modules that are going to slow you down, like weapons and anything else not needed for the missions you're doing. You don't need much in the way of shields. Don't sacrifice speed for shields. Biweaves are enough for most ships, though on an Asp they don't give a speed advantage, so you can have A-grade ones. You might take the odd bit of damage, but you won't get killed. Weaker shields means you can normally get a lighter PP for more speed.

When an interdiction commences, put 4 pips to engines and 2 to shields. Submit, and the moment you drop out, boost. Boost again as soon as you can and engage your FSD as soon as it's cooled down. You don't need to hi-wake for NPCs, but it's mandatory for commanders. Also, if it's a player, you're better boosting towards them. You should always be able to escape from an NPC like that without taking any significant damage. The mistake people make is stopping to see who's interdicting them and whether they think they have a chance of beating him. That's already too late. never look, just run.

 

[Azreh Helas]

I am fairly new and this is what works for me. This migth've been said already but dont ever go in a fight without hull and module reinforcements. Only pick fights with ships your own size and close to your rating. If you are bounty hunting only shoot at ships the Fed's already are shooting at and so on.

And never leave systems without any pips in fact prioritize it. I think you should prioritize weapons and systems unless you are being out maneuvred like hell. Also i think you should avoid hazardous resource zones if you are fighting in those.

 

[Ananym]

All the advice to submit to interdictions confuses me a bit.
I'm not a good flyer by any means, but I can't remember the last time I failed to evade an NPC interdiction even while flying a type-7.

Players are a different matter, of course. If a determined player in a ship designed to chase decides to kill you, there's only so much you can do.

 

[IndigoWyrd]

As IndigoWyrd says, the best advice is to brush up on your combat skills – but you can avoid combat altogether if you want.

Evasion is a combat skill. Perhaps the most important combat skill.

Evading interdiction is like a very slow-motion version of evading incoming plasma shots or missiles.

There is that whole "The best offense is a good defense" line of thought, and every bit as valid as my preferred: "The best defense is heavy armor and overwhelming firepower" method.

 

[Susanna]

I'm not picking on Ananym, just seeing some "AspX can't fight" sentiment on here and thought I'd share a quick comparative...

Assume full gimballed multis, standard A rated for combat (D Sensors and Support), and Military composites for each.

Ship	Shield	Integrity	Speed	Hardpoints	DPS	Utilities
Viper IV	4A / 227mj	525	297 / 373	4	38.8	Chaff,PD
Asp X	5A / 291mj	735	283 / 385	6	52.4	Chaff,PD,2xBooster
Vulture	5A / 498mj	560	244 / 394	2	37.8	Chaff,PD,2xBooster

The Vulture is clearly going to win for shield strength and maneuverability, but suffers from jump range and doesn't multi-role well.
The Viper IV multiroles better than the vulture due to extra power, and has better range.
The AspX multiroles best due largest number of internals, extra power, and jump range combined.

The AspX is far from helpless. OP just needs to learn how to fly it. Compared to the other two, it does make for a big fat target though, I'll give you that.

Also, there is little gain in running a Class 6 shield on the AspX. Better to go with a 5 and save your largest internal for cargo or passengers.

Watch those two videos I shared, OP. Once you are comfortable evading and escaping, then you can get your fighting experience in a little at a time until you've hit the "ah ha" moment.

The thing is that the AspX has a mediocre base shield strength. This is the base level and is particular to each ship.

The AspX has a base shield strength of 140' the Vulture of 291 and the Python of 293. Hence, the Shields on the latter two ships will be twice as effective as the AspX...

Spoiler

Also worth a read: https://forums.frontier.co.uk/showthread.php/156290-Understanding-Shields-and-Mass

Here is another table of base shield strength.

Spoiler

So different ships with identical Shields will have different MJ strength. Hope it helps.

Susie
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[Adhock]

Also, there is little gain in running a Class 6 shield on the AspX. Better to go with a 5 and save your largest internal for cargo or passengers.

Disagree on that one.

At least for the purposes of a Combat Asp. An Asp X built specially for combat.

Class 4 shields will do the job of adequate protection. Since the optimum hull tonnage of a Class 4 just barely goes over the Asp X hull tonnage. If you were building a Asp for combat then Class 6 shields are a necessity since the higher hull tonnage rating means a better multiplier. Thus extra (hardened) shields.

Now if you were building one for other purposes. I'd most certainly agree with you that a Class 5 is what you need. And I would most certainly agree that the profile and hard points of an Asp X make combat tricky. While you could slice between shots, someone catches you on your flat side you're going to take one hell of a hit and then Class 6 shields are going to be a lifesaver.

Tackling Asps in CZ's was always fun. Almost as much fun as tackling T9's and Condas.

 

[zarrazee]

OP. Add me as friend in game and I'll give you help.

CMDR Zarra Zarson

 

[Alteph Four]

Thank you all for the advice!

My goal at the moment is two things:

1. Earn credits for an anaconda
2. Increase rank with empire (I actually am a few ranks in for fed, but after looking at the ships the empire had the best overall ship according to the stats I saw)

I have about 68m in cash, a viper MK4 A rated (not engineered) a Python and my Asp. Until I get better im not flying my python. I want to try passenger missions so I outfitted my asp for them, however to keep my jump range up I put all my core internals at 4d or whatever was closest to that. Due to that my asp cannot boost atm as the thrusters dont have enough power. I am going to change that as the two systems I found are well within the jump range even using almost all A rated core internals.

I am using a 3a shield on my asp, perhaps I should switch that to a 5a shield.

If I end up liking passenger missions then I want to see about an actual dedicated passenger ship, but the rate im earning credits it wont be anytime soon I can afford a Beluga.

Ill keep a closer eye on the ranking of missions and make sure I dont grab anything above my current ranks.

Thanks!

 

[rhiz]

Evasion is a combat skill. Perhaps the most important combat skill.

I’ll remind myself of this fact the next time I run away. [smile]

 

[Alteph Four]

I almost forgot to mention, im not engaging these enemies in combat, I submit to interdiction, boost constantly until I can spin my FSD back up and run, however I find that when this happens I have the message about my mass being too much and it takes several minutes for my FSD to charge up, which doesnt do my any good when I die in 5 seconds.

So this is pretty clearly a matter of being outranked as ive done this before without issues, this is my first attempt at grinding Empire rank and its pretty ridiculous taht I never had this happen while grinding Fed rank, yet Empire is vastly more difficult?