How is the A.I

[Pile_O_Gunz]

Hey all I havent played for awhile but have been reading some interesting posts on the new A.I.

What state is it in at the moment ? I have the classic light-weight trade Anaconda build with a 4A shield gen and A class shield boosters is that tough enough these days or will it die on the first interdiction ?

 

[Cmdr Eagleboy]

Hey all I havent played for awhile but have been reading some interesting posts on the A.I.

What state is it in at the moment ? I have the classic D rated trade Anaconda build with 4A gen and A class shield boosters is that tough enough these days or will it die on the first interdiction ?

Very very different opinions all over the board. In my opinion difficulty scale by ranking works, I like how NPCs fly, when having goot outfitting, they are force to rekon with. More variety needed in tactics.

 

[askavir]

If you're not actively looking for combat, even with the downgraded 4A shield and a lot of shield boosters you will be fine, if you always submit in case of attack and immediately engage Sir Robin manouvers. As the Anaconda is not exactly a Cheetah in terms of speed, I advise to keep always 4 pips to shields (no point in having 4 to engines while running in slow ships) while waiting for the FSD to charge. Upgrading (or in this case, un-downgrading) the shield up to 5A wouldn't hurt, you only lose 16 tons of cargo space, and depending on the amount of boosters, you get a lot of extra shielding (remember that boosters add percentage of the base shield, so the higher the base shield, the larger the effect from boosters).

Chaff, and now especially point defence are now very useful too as missiles now lay waste to ship modules, if shield is lost.

Good luck and tell us how it went.

tl;dr; You'll be perfectly fine in that ship if you know how to bolt quickly, consider upgrading to 5A instead of 4A shield but it might not be necessary.

 

[Duane Dibbley]

Aww that's nice..they're fine..how are you?

 

[nothingfaced]

Broken.

 

[SP45M]

Played 6 hours to test the new scary AI, not a single interdiction. In fact I can't recall a single interdiction this year. I must be lucky/unlucky. With no interest in "Grafting" (my new word for grindy crafting) this way overdue update is a complete non event.

 

[Ian Skippy]

A 4A shield has an optimal mass of 280t. I wouldn't bother with it: either put actual shields on it or go for massive hull tanking (which is also pretty silly on a conda, but still). My take on the new AI: its fine, as long as you use your head and take proper precautions. So sacrifice some cargo space and put some decent shields, SCB and hull reinforcements on there, and make sure you bring loads of boosters and some missile defences. Those 'yolo' builds from <2.1 might not last long at all, nor should they.

 

[Cmdr Ultra]

Add two Point defense units to the top Utility mounts just in front of the two C3 hardpoints. They will get alot of work and look amazing shooting all the time.

Oh and Turrets get Turrets on top of that Anaconda.

 

[Enderby]

Got interdicted 5 times in a row by an npc with a much better ship than mine. (And I cannot now ever evade interdiction as I used to be able to)

If I try to fight I die in 5 seconds so I boost away and back into supercruise then they interdict me again (and again).

My mission is to reach a station a looong way away in the system. There is no way I can do this.

I get this each time I have a delivery mission with threat of hostiles. They are always much much better ship than me. Not sometimes, always.

It makes me sad.

 

[ammonitida]

Hey all I havent played for awhile but have been reading some interesting posts on the new A.I.

What state is it in at the moment ? I have the classic light-weight trade Anaconda build with a 4A shield gen and A class shield boosters is that tough enough these days or will it die on the first interdiction ?

It's way too hard!!!1 I once faced an imperial eagle in my Anaconda, and for the life of me couldn't hit it with my fixed weapons, whereas before 2.1, a ship like that would be courteous enough to position itself in front of my sights so that I could hit it.

 

[Cmdr Ultra]

Got interdicted 5 times in a row by an npc with a much better ship than mine.

If I try to fight I die in 5 seconds so I boost away and back into supercruise then they interdict me again (and again).

There is no way I can do this.

You just need to Hi-wake out to another system, then Hi-wake back.
The very first thing I do after every Hyperspace jump is set an escape route on the Galaxy map. Keeps you alive.

 

[Enderby]

Thank you yes good advice but I go back again to the original system to do my mission that npc always shows up again.
Which is all good in theory and makes sense except in my humble craft I can never defeat them. I am trying to make money to upgrade!

I guess I'll have to give these missions a miss for now. It's the game and I understand it should be a challenge to complete missions but should not be impossible.

 

[cmdr_Havalok]

Well over 150 NPC encounters and have not died yet. Had to run more than I used to as the AI tactics have definitely improved. Obviously, if I have not died I have not encountered an Insta-Killer NPC. Take close note of the RANK of the NPC as ELITE are more dangerous, even the smaller ships. Expect that. Definitely taking me longer to kill ships at BH sites (FDL A all the way). My income has dropped about 20% in that area. Hauling cargo 100-150 Ts (Python not quite A-rated) from 4-15 jumps I get a variety of NPC interdictions. Most are low-level and I kill them but maybe 2 out of ten is big and tough. Python or bigger that is dangerous or higher I pretty much run from now immediately rather than test my metal. The old tactics of submit and boost have gotten me thru so far.

I'm not a bad pilot but I'm not spectacular either. I only use FA OFF if I think making the other pilot laugh will buy me escape time. The AI are flying smarter but so far my same old skills are still getting me thru things. I guess starting off as a smuggler taught me to size up the opponent and know when to fight and when to "...WUN you Wascally Wabbit WUUUNNN!"

o7 Hope that helps.

Spoiler

[video=youtube;jdZ6RA_c6oE]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jdZ6RA_c6oE[/video]

 

[Whiterose]

Hey all I havent played for awhile but have been reading some interesting posts on the new A.I.

What state is it in at the moment ? I have the classic light-weight trade Anaconda build with a 4A shield gen and A class shield boosters is that tough enough these days or will it die on the first interdiction ?

Lol. I could say that your Condie will be fine, but I could be lying, this is the forum after all.

 

[Bill Clement]

Hey all I havent played for awhile but have been reading some interesting posts on the new A.I.

What state is it in at the moment ? I have the classic light-weight trade Anaconda build with a 4A shield gen and A class shield boosters is that tough enough these days or will it die on the first interdiction ?

I spent three days in a Type 7 trying to get myself killed. Finally succeeded on Thursday. So with the AI at it's hardest setting I managed to go about my affairs in the weakest ship I own, in the most dangerous places I could find. When I was finally caught and destroyed it was by a FdL- something that could have happened before the patch. Link https://forums.frontier.co.uk/showthread.php?t=259602

My T-7 was well shielded, but didn't have point defence. That hurt each time my shields went down. If you can run a decent shield and point defence then I'd say that's the way to roll. When I started taking missions the ships coming after me were bigger and much tougher. You don't need to worry about that in an Anaconda! I think you'll be fine... as long as you're happy running when it all goes South!

 

[thorn-]

I have the classic light-weight trade Anaconda build with a 4A shield?

Yeah, have fun with that -2 Class shield...

 

[JRok]

I think the AI is fine in regards to their flying tactics and it's still pretty challenging (at least for me) as I'm having to use FA-off/boost a lot, chaff, Point Defense, and still getting my clock cleaned here and there, but I'm also still running into a ships once in a while (1 out of 4) at the High RES that are flying aggressively... however, they're not using their weapons which is obviously a bug.

 

[Jason S]

OP I would if i were you move up to A6 shields.