I'm kind of scared to log in
- Thread starter Gorgonaut
- Start date
Completely agree... The new AI has been a game changer for me, they're suddenly a lot of fun and quite varied. They've really rekindled my interested in the PVE game, I haven't done any PVP since 2.1 landed.. (that will change of course ;-)
This is the problem with the forums. Five or six people encounter a bug and in all explodes into "The game's broken, if you don't want to die, don't even log in"
It's sad, really.
OP, please don't worry. It's fine.
It's sad, really.
OP, please don't worry. It's fine.
I ventured out into the wild black yonder in my Vulture for the first time in 2.1 yesterday. Since some missions seem to be bugged at the moment I went to a high res for some bounty hunting and got into the swing of things by tagging onto an NPC police wing and "helping" them score kills. Pretty safe and easy to make money that way but a bit boring. In-between kills I scooped a few materials, the 100K+ Anaconda or Python bounties usually drop 1 or 2 of the rarer ones.
Getting more confident I headed off for some NPC one-on-ones. Made sure police reporting was on, started with low bounties and worked my way up. I found my limit was about a 60K bounty, anything more is a struggle for me in 2.1. I love this about 2.1, you have to actually think about what you are doing both before and during combat now. Think I need to learn to fly FA-off and get something with a bit more firepower to take out the bigger bounties now, an FAS or FDL maybe.
Only got interdicted once in a few hours, but then I haven't tried carrying cargo, doing missions or pledging to a power yet.
Getting more confident I headed off for some NPC one-on-ones. Made sure police reporting was on, started with low bounties and worked my way up. I found my limit was about a 60K bounty, anything more is a struggle for me in 2.1. I love this about 2.1, you have to actually think about what you are doing both before and during combat now. Think I need to learn to fly FA-off and get something with a bit more firepower to take out the bigger bounties now, an FAS or FDL maybe.
Only got interdicted once in a few hours, but then I haven't tried carrying cargo, doing missions or pledging to a power yet.
Just read that that FDev ar patching the NPC one-ahot bugs, as well as removing most of the Engineer upgrades they use, as well as other fixes.
They kept the AI intact, which is great- I really enjoyed that during the beta. (especially getting attacked by pirates while landing on a planet, then getting defended by the 5-0, then losing hope as the pirate wing destroyed the fuzz, before blowing me up while I tried to help the police, all at low altitudes)
I'm back, and I cant wait to explore the Big Black, to the tunes of Orange Goblin.
They kept the AI intact, which is great- I really enjoyed that during the beta. (especially getting attacked by pirates while landing on a planet, then getting defended by the 5-0, then losing hope as the pirate wing destroyed the fuzz, before blowing me up while I tried to help the police, all at low altitudes)
I'm back, and I cant wait to explore the Big Black, to the tunes of Orange Goblin.
It seems way way better this evening. The AI is still good, but it looks like the rapid fire bug has been quashed. Good times!
NPCs loosing Eng Mods as of today....
https://forums.frontier.co.uk/showthread.php?t=257892
https://forums.frontier.co.uk/showthread.php?t=257892
I usually fight with FA on, except for short periods when turning, flying backwards and such. I'd love to learn more advanced techniques.
I often end up circlestrafing my target, perpendicular to his or her pitch, because at close range, i can strafe upwards or downwards faster than their ship can turn.
Also, I have like, 2 pip configs. Full-engine pips, and 1 pip on sus and eng, and the rest in weapons.
I often end up circlestrafing my target, perpendicular to his or her pitch, because at close range, i can strafe upwards or downwards faster than their ship can turn.
Also, I have like, 2 pip configs. Full-engine pips, and 1 pip on sus and eng, and the rest in weapons.
I've been trying for hours now to make some money bounty hunting in a FDL. Most of the time i end up getting rammed by the ship i am hunting and currently barely am able to keep my ship repaired and stuffed up. Combat as an imcome source just doesnt cut it after 2.1.
I am not the greatest Pilot around, for sure not, but at least i thought i could handle myself and did fairly well in the Cutter. But with the FDL i have great problems with the current AI.
GORDON'S ALIVE???
In order to play the game effectively, you can't even begin to use a cheap ship. Tell me where I can buy a cheap ship that has the capabilities to space/surface mine, travel many LY's to reach the Engineers, carry the gear, has adequate weaponry/armor/speed and cargo space and SRV's, bays and whatnot. If you use a small ship, you will accomplish small things and since ED requires grind, you will NOT advance.
Since the new upgrade, I have mined, collected mats, bounty hunted and traveled more than ever before to try to get the mods to become competitive. I was successful in avoiding being blown up. Up until today.
While attempting to complete a mission for mats, I was interdicted by a Python that within a minute had taken out my shields and brought me down to 64% hull. Be aware that I also had a Python with reactive armor, which apparently is just like tissue paper now. So I not only boosted, but jumped to another system, repaired. Interdicted again, avoided the interdiction through the escape route. Tried again to complete the mission, interdicted again by an Explorer, fought that one and knocked it down, down to 46% hull. As I was trying to boost to reach my destination, the same Python that had interdicted me before shows up, close range, and proceeds to blow me out of space within a minute, and of course they target your critical systems with unerring accuracy, which adds to your quick demise.
I don't mind a fight. In fact, when I was interdicted I usually fight it out and I enjoy it. Before, I looked forward to an interdiction, now you have to run or you will die if an equal or greater ship hauls you down. Even the smaller ones can knock you around as well. What is the fun of that? I am deadly combat, over 60% to elite and have shot over 9k ships of all sizes so I am not a newbie. There is no fight now in these encounters, you just die. Now I must say that not every NPC is a Boss NPC, but these appear to be just that and appear regularly. But the cost to re-spawn an A-Class Python? It's not like other video games were lives are easily obtained, to get CR's, rank and everything else in ED, requires time and effort, but to been blown up w/o a chance sucks, all your efforts seem worthless.
By the way, a disturbing number of Pirates seem to have augmented ships as well.
You too will experience this if you are active and try to reach the new goals. Don't dismiss other CMDR experiences as anomalies; the posts are full of the same event such as mine. FD needs to re-balance. The NPC weaponry is over the top, their speed as well. You can damage them but not if you can't last more than a minute, you won't live through it if a Boss gets you.
"The Stars My Destination"
Alfred Bester
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It's being fixed as you speak -
From Zac in Updates:
"The first change is that we will be removing almost all Engineers upgrades from the NPCs in game. There are a very few select upgrades that will remain for coding reasons but they will be low level and not combat specific upgrades. On the whole you should notice that the vast majority of upgrades are gone from NPCs which will mean that players will be greater equipped to deal with NPC threats and should be able to last longer in a combat situation, should they need to make a hasty exit. It will also mean that players who gather their own upgrades will have a technical advantage on the NPC combatants too. The good part about this is that these are all server side, which means we are able to make those changes today! Commanders will be able to see the changes taking effect shortly."
It's a great response[up]
I have not been affected by the insta-kill bug yet, and I have been interdicted as well as spending a lot of time in combat in Hi-Res zones.
The AI itself hasn't really been "made harder" so much as it has been fixed. The NPC behavior is much more in line with their stated skill level now and they don't do the "barrel roll of stupid indecisiveness" anymore. That is to say that they're not giving out freebie kills anymore, but they're still able to be killed. Think about the random fights in 2.0 when the AI didn't glitch out at all and that should give you an idea of how it is now.
If you're not sure though, go buy a cheap ship... Well, cheaper than a DBS anyway... And run around in that for a bit. Try an Eagle out for a bit, I guess. Be smart when picking your targets, know when to run.
To me the gameplay has improve quite a bit, and I only died once because I wasn't paying attention to what I had actually targeted in a High-Res (somehow I targeted a Clean NPC as it flew close to a Wanted NPC and I opened fire while surrounded by System Security ships... Oops.)
I notice everyone who is saying that the AI is not so bad mentions that they are bounty hunting in a Hi-RES and not a Haz RES. Before 2.1 people were in Haz Res. That is the biggest difference now. Haz RES sites are no good for bounty hunting any more, I'm making about 1/3 the amount of bounties there than I did in 2.0 because the fights are much longer, and I have to go back much more often for repairs. Anacondas and dropships that can out turn you every time and manoeuvre like an eagle is ridiculous.
So I will be joining the Hi-Res crowd and do what I did when I first started playing the game when I had a much smaller ship and less skill, follow the police ships around and get a few hits in to get the bounty. What I don't understand is the AI was fine in the last beta patch, and then they ramped it back up for 2.1 launch. FD always do this, they go to an absolute extreme and then very slowly work their back to something sensible, rather than starting in a sensible place at the beginning. Illogical in my view and causes to much fiction in the community.
So I will be joining the Hi-Res crowd and do what I did when I first started playing the game when I had a much smaller ship and less skill, follow the police ships around and get a few hits in to get the bounty. What I don't understand is the AI was fine in the last beta patch, and then they ramped it back up for 2.1 launch. FD always do this, they go to an absolute extreme and then very slowly work their back to something sensible, rather than starting in a sensible place at the beginning. Illogical in my view and causes to much fiction in the community.
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Okay that's weird. I had loads more success tonight in a haz res, compared to the rest of the weekend which was an uphill slog.
I don't know if it's just complete random chance or whatever it could be. Previous nights I was lucky to make 200k before having to restock and repair. This evening 500k without even breaking a sweat.
I haven't tried combat zones this evening so I can't gauge if that's improved.
All very odd.
I don't think this has been implemented yet, I'm still getting hit with npc thermal attacks.