1 year ago today CMDR's began to see hyperdictions with thargoids.
It was mentioned somewhere that in previous games they were much more terrifying, because they were found everywhere and extremely powerful, according to others who have played prior versions of Elite. You see a thargoid and you're not prepared? you RUN. That sounds quite interesting and a bit more dynamic than the current system of how we interact with them.
As it stands, the problem lies therein. We have to find instanced USS's typically to even find a thargoid. We have to seemingly bring the fight to them, always. We see starports that have been attacked, but never see the combat that transpires. We have no opportunity to defend such places, only to see the aftermath and wonder "wow Thargoids must be tough, look at what they did". Still, nothing really scary about it, no real danger is present when you visit a damaged station to my knowledge. Correct me if i'm wrong.
That said, it's nice to see that they are supposedly attacking starports, leaving them damaged. An interesting event to be sure, but still has me wondering about one specific thing... Starports are equipped with fantastic cannons that can tear through any CMDR ship in seconds. Over the past few months we've gotten to research anti-xeno tech that helps us equip our ships with more effective weapons against a common enemy... so why don't starports have anti-xeno guns themselves?
Allowing for this would solve several issues mentioned above, and perhaps open doors to allow for more exciting gameplay.
Imagine this: You are at a starport, and an alert comes through your comms panel as you're docked or near the station. It's a thargoid attack. How do you proceed? Are you prepared to fight in the ship you're piloting? Do you stay in the starport and man anti-xeno turrets for them? Use the starports reserve of xeno fighters to help defend the starport from attack? Or do you run, safely away to another neighboring system? All of these seem reasonable options.
"But what if i'm in a sidewinder and only have 20k CR? I'm not equipped for this and will meet certain death if I try to escape... how incredibly annoying!"
The answer to this problem lies within the system security. They are forced to engage, as is their job title. They're beefing them up soon anyway, so escape is certainly possible even in a sidewinder because the attention of the thargoids would be taken away from just attacking random ships outside.
It could be balanced in such a way that if a starport has no player defenders, it gets attacked and goes into your typical as-it-stands damaged state, providing rescue missions, etc.
Also, balanced in such a way that with a little luck and teamwork, it would be possible to effectively thwart the attack, with assistance from the starport anti-xeno guns and defenses helping out even those incapable yet of getting a fully decked out "anti-thargoid" ship.
This would also open the door to allow thargoids to roam a bit more than currently only being found in instanced locations you search for. It would expand their presence and let them be felt across the galaxy, making the world a bit more dynamic with them included, and bring a sense of "I'm out here, I need to be careful, i'm alone, and there's aliens in space".
Thoughts?
TLDR: Give starports anti-xeno weapons and allow thargoids to roam freely throughout the galaxy like NPC's already do --albeit less frequently found, so that they can randomly attack starports, try and interdict us at times, and generally just increase their overall presence in the game instead of being forced to actively go and find them any time I want to interact with them.
It was mentioned somewhere that in previous games they were much more terrifying, because they were found everywhere and extremely powerful, according to others who have played prior versions of Elite. You see a thargoid and you're not prepared? you RUN. That sounds quite interesting and a bit more dynamic than the current system of how we interact with them.
As it stands, the problem lies therein. We have to find instanced USS's typically to even find a thargoid. We have to seemingly bring the fight to them, always. We see starports that have been attacked, but never see the combat that transpires. We have no opportunity to defend such places, only to see the aftermath and wonder "wow Thargoids must be tough, look at what they did". Still, nothing really scary about it, no real danger is present when you visit a damaged station to my knowledge. Correct me if i'm wrong.
That said, it's nice to see that they are supposedly attacking starports, leaving them damaged. An interesting event to be sure, but still has me wondering about one specific thing... Starports are equipped with fantastic cannons that can tear through any CMDR ship in seconds. Over the past few months we've gotten to research anti-xeno tech that helps us equip our ships with more effective weapons against a common enemy... so why don't starports have anti-xeno guns themselves?
Allowing for this would solve several issues mentioned above, and perhaps open doors to allow for more exciting gameplay.
Imagine this: You are at a starport, and an alert comes through your comms panel as you're docked or near the station. It's a thargoid attack. How do you proceed? Are you prepared to fight in the ship you're piloting? Do you stay in the starport and man anti-xeno turrets for them? Use the starports reserve of xeno fighters to help defend the starport from attack? Or do you run, safely away to another neighboring system? All of these seem reasonable options.
"But what if i'm in a sidewinder and only have 20k CR? I'm not equipped for this and will meet certain death if I try to escape... how incredibly annoying!"
The answer to this problem lies within the system security. They are forced to engage, as is their job title. They're beefing them up soon anyway, so escape is certainly possible even in a sidewinder because the attention of the thargoids would be taken away from just attacking random ships outside.
It could be balanced in such a way that if a starport has no player defenders, it gets attacked and goes into your typical as-it-stands damaged state, providing rescue missions, etc.
Also, balanced in such a way that with a little luck and teamwork, it would be possible to effectively thwart the attack, with assistance from the starport anti-xeno guns and defenses helping out even those incapable yet of getting a fully decked out "anti-thargoid" ship.
This would also open the door to allow thargoids to roam a bit more than currently only being found in instanced locations you search for. It would expand their presence and let them be felt across the galaxy, making the world a bit more dynamic with them included, and bring a sense of "I'm out here, I need to be careful, i'm alone, and there's aliens in space".
Thoughts?
TLDR: Give starports anti-xeno weapons and allow thargoids to roam freely throughout the galaxy like NPC's already do --albeit less frequently found, so that they can randomly attack starports, try and interdict us at times, and generally just increase their overall presence in the game instead of being forced to actively go and find them any time I want to interact with them.
