Engineers Flying around with Mission Reward Cargo - ELITE NPC Interdiction Magnet (??)

[Deleted member 38366]

Just want to know if there's something to that...

When I carry even large Missions, I occasionally get jumped by NPCs triggered by that Mission, same for being filled to the gills with Gold or Palladium.
Makes sense.

However - all that fades when it comes to flying around with a few tons of (dirt cheap in comparison) Mission Reward Cargo ??!

I'm getting Intercepted in uninhabited Systems or any other place... left & right.
All ELITE NPCs asking for my low-value (Credits) Cargo.

Am I the only one getting hammered just for carrying a few tons of these ?

---

ELITE Vulture, ELITE FdL and ELITE Python taken care of...
All over 3224Cr worth of Cargo (?)

PS.
I guess carrying 16 tons of these would make for a completely new way of Bounty Hunting [weird]
Just take your biggest Battleship around and fly in circles - top-value Bounty NPCs will come to hunt you all on their own... No RES or Comp. NAV needed anymore.

 

[Ceekay]

Yeah got hunted over incredibly cheap cargo several times so I note where it's usually sold (or check the blueprint tip) and sell it, the ability to store these items or drop them off with the Engineer is essential as currently they're a bit of a pain, but good call on the enhanced BH technique it means you don't even need an interdictor the target brings their own!

 

[Mighty Dangerous]

This is my thought on it.

Frontier delayed cargo storage because they want us to get interdicted.
They want us to experience the AI, having lug around mats gets us interdicted more.

Limited storage = more interdictions, we won't feel like jettison them as its a waste.
Makes us have to fly around to engineers and use them rather than players harvesting an instance and then making one trip to craft.

I assume it's a mixture of the above and some more.

 

[rrobes]

A related issue is the quality of the interdictors, mostly elites. Just now I was interdicted by an elite Cobra flying my FAS (with only cheap but hard to find Engineer items as cargo), which has now become my go to ship because of armor/speed/weapons. I used it tanked, now I have had to remove HR to gain cargo and modules.

So I said "F" him and took it on. He took my hull down to 78%, OK, but it was like super sniper on ALL my weapons, two 3C beams and two MC turrets all four were knocked down to like 20+% by the end of the fight. Plus he had unlimited chaff except till the very end. Finally blew him up and guess what, NO REWARD. I was too busy and didn't notice that he must have been lawless, so tough poop, pay you 88K for repairs and suck it up.

ALl of the above, except for the unlimited chaff and the supernatural accuracy of the weapons, was OK. I could even live with the accuracy issue, but get rid of this chaff advantage and do something about interdictions with nearly worthless cargo on board.

"Starship Trooper"
Robert Heinlein

 

[GG7]

My biggest problem in 2.1.2 is the 76k bounty I have on me from ONE system. I get a bounty hunter on me at practically every single jump point. Not sure if the Antiquities cargo I generally go for is a magnet or not. I seem to have more bounty hunter interdictions than pirates, even with a million+ worth of this illegal salvage in my hold.

 

[Arry]

I have had NPC pirates dropping me out of super cruise and telling me what a lovely cargo i have and how much they want it. With just missions rewards in hold.

At the same time, I have had pirates tell me how much they want; a couple of tons of bio-waste and so I guess that there are some very desperate NPCs out there and rank, doesn't seem to matter.

 

[Heater]

Last night, I just stopped playing, I am an Elite Combat and Trader, I took two mission for cargo delivery, I was interdicted 8 times, 3 times by same Elite FDL, I killed him, but took damage, then on the next Jump interdicted by the Same NPC but this time in a wing of 6, High waked out, and they followed me.

I think I am done with elite for now.

 

[Sooden]

FD's outlook on the future in space is not promising. Seem when we become space fairing, everyone will be killing everyone else (and risking there own lives) for the smallest tat they can find.

lets hope some balance comes to the game and we hear more NPC messages saying 'another dud, my kids will go hungry' because, risking their lives for trash is more likely to lead to the kids going hungry

 

[Cmdr Esteban]

Yes, I was hunted for Modular Terminals, all two of them at a few hundred credits each.

And yet last night I hauled nearly 200 tonnes of silver and gold over 50 light years without any bother at all. I missed the interdictions actually, now that my Python has been suitably modified

 

[Athan]

I'll add a "me too". I'm Combat-Expert (Trade-Broker, Explorer-Elite, not touched CQC) and I'm seeing mostly Elite, plus a few Deadly, interdictions like this. I too assume it's because of the engineer-related mission reward cargo I'm carrying around until I have all the necessary bits to make use of it.

I've not fought an NPC long enough to be 100% sure that they have unlimited chaff, but it has started feeling that way. Combined with their new maneuverability and tactics it can make it really difficult to even take their shields down so as to start thinking about targeting the chaff launcher(s) to counter it.

 

[Derath]

yes, they have an absolute raging you know what for mission commodities, i've got around 30 in my inventory and I tend to get a pirate interdiction every 3 jumps or so :/ its pretty offensive especially as i can't drop the commodities off anywhere.