RES BH not as productive?

Anton_ · Apr 16, 2015

Has it had a nerf lately?

Not so long ago I was seeing an almost constant stream of big ships with very worthwhile bounties, and mostly popping up within range -- now it's just small fry. I'm at a pristine, metal-rich ring

Any big ship that shows up is mostly clean, and the vast majority of ships are cops, sometimes to the exclusion of all else. If I spot a battle off in the distance and boost-boost-boost towards it, by the time I get there the party's over, and it was just an petty-crime Eagle anyway -- and then I'm way away from any other action.

I've tried resetting but doesn't seem to work for me, still the same small fry -- unless I'm doing it wrong, or just unlucky? Grateful for any tips!

Guidebot · Apr 16, 2015

I too have noticed this in the last day or so. Glad it's not just me. I kinda thought maybe I'd killed all of the pirates in the system... =)

Nanosmo · Apr 16, 2015

Keep resetting, sometimes it'll take me 5+ times.

Anopheles · Apr 16, 2015

I find a burst of big ships followed by a period of small ships. Keep scanning the sky for combat, sometimes they spawn out of scanner range.

janmb · Apr 16, 2015

It just seems very random.

Some times I can drop into an instance that is totally dead, mostly cops and miners and the few baddies I find are all lame winders and eagles.... Then you get the instances where you get that constant line of condas, pythons, clippers and dropships...

Only advice I can give is that if you cruise around and don't see any large wanted ships within the first few minutes, just leave that instance and drop into another RES (or log out and back in to get the instance reset). Don't log out within a RES though - I had a friend lose a ship the other day due to being positioned inside a rock when he logged back in. He was refunded, but still not fun.

Anton_ · Apr 16, 2015

Wondering if I'm doing the reset right, though?

( > Main Menu > Start > [cycle between Solo/Group/Open]
Or do I need to log out as well?)

And does the quality of the RES have any effect of the spawn quality?

Jastebro · Apr 16, 2015

The global effect of the last pair of CG's was reduced crime rates as the investigation of the assassination attempt on the Emperor progresses.

You are simply experiencing the effects of an extermination camaign across imperial space of all things with a wanted status.

I imagine you will have better luck in Alliance & Federation controlled territories, as they haven't cracked down on crime yet.

Rankaze · Apr 16, 2015

Anton_ said:
Has it had a nerf lately?

Not so long ago I was seeing an almost constant stream of big ships with very worthwhile bounties, and mostly popping up within range -- now it's just small fry. I'm at a pristine, metal-rich ring

Any big ship that shows up is mostly clean, and the vast majority of ships are cops, sometimes to the exclusion of all else. If I spot a battle off in the distance and boost-boost-boost towards it, by the time I get there the party's over, and it was just an petty-crime Eagle anyway -- and then I'm way away from any other action.

I've tried resetting but doesn't seem to work for me, still the same small fry -- unless I'm doing it wrong, or just unlucky? Grateful for any tips!

Speaking as someone who doesn't reset them, I have not noticed any change. I get the really good hunting maybe a third of the time, I get slim pickings about a third of the time, and i get a mixed bag about a third of the time.

Anton_ · Apr 18, 2015

reynols said:
SC out and then back into the RES also works on resetting the instance.

Oh, didn't know that. Presumably, then, SCing from a "dud" RES to a neighbouring RES in the same planetary ring will have the same effect?

Synther · Apr 18, 2015

It might be related to the planet. For example I noticed that Almad 1 has more bigger ships than Almad 7 (After two trips), and that Fong W4ng 7 (replace 4 with A) typically always has big ships as well. What supports this theory is that FD plans on having "High Intensity RES" in powerplay accourding to the newsletter and they may be messing with that now.

Frenotx · Apr 18, 2015

Jastebro said:
The global effect of the last pair of CG's was reduced crime rates as the investigation of the assassination attempt on the Emperor progresses.

You are simply experiencing the effects of an extermination camaign across imperial space of all things with a wanted status.

I imagine you will have better luck in Alliance & Federation controlled territories, as they haven't cracked down on crime yet.

What? I didn't hear about this.

Frenotx · Apr 18, 2015

Yeah, I've noticed a general decline in the payout of res bounty hunting. I'm in empire space. Even when I get a spawn that's mostly big ships, there's a LOT more downtime between them, and their payout is generally lower. No matter how good the spawn, there just send to be ready few bad guys.

Killing Time · Apr 18, 2015

I just bought a new Eagle for the lols and went hunting at a RES. It was slow-ish at first but after about 20-30 minutes of Sideys, Eagles and Cobras the instance picked up and I was tagging Pythons, Dropships and Anacondas (with a little help from the Feds...).
Made just over 1M before I ran out of ammo.

The issue has been raised a few times and I'm pretty sure there is no real difference in the value of any particular RES, or in the worth of switching instances. My guess is that there is quite a lot of cognitive bias going on, where the instances would have picked up again regardless of any player input, but the players are falsly attributing the change to having forced it through instance switching.

Cmdr Zach · Apr 18, 2015

Think the random number generator for RES's isn't giving out as well as it was, however good spawns are still attainable. Not seeing more big ships than I can shoot at like I was before, but after 6+ resets (flying out of instance in super cruise and looping back in) i can get a good run of almost back to back anacondas, pythons, asps, drop ships and clippers. Made 3 million last night in a couple of hours in one instance.

Still reckon population size (bigger the better) and government type (communist/dictatorship better) make a difference on the random roll/number of pirates you see.

Some RES instances start with a few big ships then switches to small. The sweet spot is obvious when you reset to it.

Obtuse · Apr 18, 2015

I started farming res at Jupiter's rings the last few days and I've noticed the all small ships or all large ships instances are gone, now its been a mixed bag everytime, They might have tweaked it.

Anton_ · Apr 23, 2015

As a followup - I've had quite a lot of good BH based on lucrative tips in this thread but, today, nothing! RESs that lined up good value targets at a fairly constant rate now do little better than Adders at 50k. I've tried resetting an individual RES half a dozen times, and then moving between RESs in the same ring - no improvement. Jumped to another star system, no better.

Have they finally nerfed it? Like... oh dear, they're enjoying this too much, and making too much money, can't have that!

janmb · Apr 24, 2015

Synther said:
It might be related to the planet. For example I noticed that Almad 1 has more bigger ships than Almad 7 (After two trips), and that Fong W4ng 7 (replace 4 with A) typically always has big ships as well. What supports this theory is that FD plans on having "High Intensity RES" in powerplay accourding to the newsletter and they may be messing with that now.

I strongly doubt there is any intended pattern to it in the current game. The variations we see are most likely random. Humans are far "too good" at seeing patterns - even where there are none.

As for different class RES, I'm *really* looking forward for that and have great expectations for it. It is so much more fun and less braindead to fight in RES than CZ