Newcomer / Intro Naval missions, frustrating!?

[Cromarus]

I would consider myself a patient person, I played Elite on the BBC so I'm an old f*art like many here I'm sure.
But I've found myself frustrated with the missions for promotion in this game.
My last mission, kill 5 pirates across 3 systems - timer 2 hours 50 minutes.
So I spend 2 hours and 50 minutes hunting across all 3 systems, I search over 120 USS, in 117 of them I found wreckage , in 2 of them I found an innocent trader, in 1 I found pirates, 4 of them.
Mission failed, faction rep down.

I don't want easy missions, but I don't want impossible if I do everything in my power to complete it.

Still love this game, but very frustrating. Wouldn't mind if this wasn't my one day off!!!!!

 

[the100thmonkey]

Hunt for the pirates at navigation beacons or resource extraction sites instead - much quicker and easier.

 

[Cromarus]

Hunt for the pirates at navigation beacons or resource extraction sites instead - much quicker and easier.

The 3 systems were uninhabited, thus no beacon, and had no extraction sites.

I'd have loved to have a nav beacon to play around!!

 

[insanephoton]

First tip is don't always go for the mission as soon as you see it. I've seen the number of pirate kills as low as 3. Sometimes you might get missions to uninhabited systems, try to avoid them.
Having at least some token cargo helps. And as has already been mentioned, navigation beacons and resource extraction sites tend to give richer pickings than USS. If you still want to try using USS, make sure that you don't have any other missions on the go because you will get all the alternative offers otherwise.

 

[Cromarus]

First tip is don't always go for the mission as soon as you see it. I've seen the number of pirate kills as low as 3. Sometimes you might get missions to uninhabited systems, try to avoid them.
Having at least some token cargo helps. And as has already been mentioned, navigation beacons and resource extraction sites tend to give richer pickings than USS. If you still want to try using USS, make sure that you don't have any other missions on the go because you will get all the alternative offers otherwise.

Went to these missions with nothing else on the go. But will carry cargo from now on.

Thanks, I tend to jump at the naval missions as they come up so infrequently. I'll skip the next 'kill 5' mission. Send me against a General in an Anaconda! Much easier.

 

[Eagle Eye]

Once the mission appears, it will keep appearing so don't worry. Just check the location, if they are empty dont bother taking the mission now, take it on the next station. I often skip these waiting for a favourable conditions. Fetch mission where I dont need to get off the station, general killing in anarchy, pirate killing in populated system. They are much easier than otherwise.

 

[clivewil]

also for future reference, you don't need to visit all three star systems - just one of them will do.

 

[drezen]

Hunt for the pirates at navigation beacons or resource extraction sites instead - much quicker and easier.

If you don't know the systems stated in the mission already, is there a way to tell if they have RESs?

I've found these Kill Pirate missions enormously frustrating for the same reasons as the OP. It's a shame because I love the actual fighting. It shouldn't be too hard to find six pirates in two hours, but it always seems to be. I get the mission, start chasing down USSs, fight a few ships, only half of them count as pirates for the mission, jump to a USS and get offered a mission branch which sets my pirate count back to zero, start again, run out of time.

Frontier either need to make it much easier to find pirates, or at least make sure wanted ships count as pirates more consistently. They need to make that mission branching bug go away as a priority, though.

 

[.Stu.]

Yeah I was having the same kind of search issues for Empire progression. I tried adding KWS and interdictor which were quite expensive as I also had to put the 5mil power plant on to power them!! Still whilst the mission progression was pants I played with and learned a bit about the process of interdiction etc.

I'll try REPs next time along with nav beacon, though I did try beacon in the past too.

Is the spawn of Empire/Fed missions related to completion / rep gain of faction missions?

I would consider myself a patient person, I played Elite on the BBC so I'm an old f*art like many here I'm sure.
But I've found myself frustrated with the missions for promotion in this game.
My last mission, kill 5 pirates across 3 systems - timer 2 hours 50 minutes.
So I spend 2 hours and 50 minutes hunting across all 3 systems, I search over 120 USS, in 117 of them I found wreckage , in 2 of them I found an innocent trader, in 1 I found pirates, 4 of them.
Mission failed, faction rep down.

I don't want easy missions, but I don't want impossible if I do everything in my power to complete it.

Still love this game, but very frustrating. Wouldn't mind if this wasn't my one day off!!!!!

 

[Zelos1983]

What exactly is a "Pirate"? is that simply a wanted NPC?

 

[HipToss]

What exactly is a "Pirate"? is that simply a wanted NPC?

Head to a RES. A pirate will scan your ship and comms something along the lines of "What treats do you hold". Most of the time, a wanted ship at an RES is a pirate. I got a mission to hunt 9 pirates and did it in about 45 minutes at a RES