Thargoid invasion - Next target systems?
- Thread starter Aleks Zuno
- Start date
IIRC it takes until after the next weekly tick for the caustic cloud to dissipate enough for us to access the debris field
Two “weeks” technically, so you have the tick/reset where the Titan becomes vulnerable, it explodes, the next cycle reset still has the caustic death field, and then does it become accessible the second-next Thursday.
A different curiosity I noticed just now - the Thargoid Titan status panel has a line of “Thargoid Controlled systems in range: ” now. Weirdly, I am only seeing it for Hadad, and there’s no number displayed. Anyone have a guess what it could be for?
So am I correct in assuming that Indra is next?
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That was the idea, although the plan was to be careful about it and prepare a large Research payload first which covers most of its systems, so that completing them all at once prevents them from being attacked again while we clear to the Titan. With update 18.06 coming, that part of the plan may no longer be necessary, but we cannot be sure yet. It sounds also as if we may still need some care later on not to lose the final Spire prematurely, but again, we need to measure the new strengths after the update to be sure of that.
In the meantime, that list of unreachable systems is fine for completion now, avoiding those which have a payload stored so as not to duplicate efforts.
Okay—from the reduced M. Indra list we are visiting first Arietis Sector OS-R a5-0 and Arietis Sector TY-P a6-1, possibly with scope for completing Arietis Sector TY-P a6-2 quickly also. The latter is receiving Spire progress, although it is also a very weak system either way, so there is not much difference in when to visit it!
Hey! Aquitaine and Sword of Aegis are both AGIS vessels, we've got 12 system's samples between them up to the pre-update requirements. Would you like us to wait for the update or a desired time to turn them in or get them out the door ASAP? We've been using this spreadsheet as a tracker. You can find the systems completed under the "Fleet Carrier Assignments" or "Current Cycle" tabs as well as progress in others.
That is actually a quite difficult decision; if we disregard update 18.06 for a moment, the answer would be to hold them because you have many for systems which can be attacked by the inner bunch, and it would be needlessly difficult to separate them when there is no actual need to deliver for systems which cannot be attacked.
If we consider update 18.06 and assume that everything works, it could be as well to deliver now, in effect abandoning the first stage idea of completing so many all at once. The main reason to deliver is that a complete payload held now can only possibly become an incomplete payload later, and presumably the original Alert concern will disappear, if the new Spire progress and worthwhile Conflict zones would keep a clearance drive going beyond ten systems in a week.
I think I could just about trust that the update will avert the need for a purge-week and that those outer systems could be delivered now, but it would be good to hear some other thoughts regarding that, especially from @Phill P.
As an aside, I took the held systems from the spreadsheet and noted them in the unreachable list purely to avoid short-term duplication; INIV is not otherwise tracking or holding anything long-term, and indeed we will soon deliver those three systems! Actually it could be good to annotate the spreadsheet instead, for those systems which cannot be attacked by the inner ones.
Well I'm with you on this. How ironic that after Oya some of us expected a curveball to happen as we hit Indra and sure enough we got one, but one that could actually help.
How much it changes the plan I don't know and we won't know until the patch goes through and we all test the hell out of it. I would be tempted to hang on to the samples for now, as even with the update Indra will still have the problem of being able to spam all its Alerts in a way the other Titans cannot, so in that sense it still presents a unique challenge compared to the other Titans. Almost every system is a potential Muruidooges the way you described it to me when I asked you if you could put a plan together, plus the star density means we are clearing a smaller periphery spatially, hence the need for the purge in the first place.
I have no problem if you think the samples should be finished off on orders that already exist and handed in now. We'll get them done. I just don't want the good people of Indra's hard work over the last few weeks to be wasted if they have to do it all over again in two weeks. I don't doubt their work ethic for a second, these guys and girls work hard, but I'd rather do it once and do it right to spare them that. That was the whole point of preparing early, to get something done before the help came in from Hadad so you all could see that some progress had already been made and how much more could be made with your assistance and gift for strategic planning.
That's my main concern, because there are a lot of good hard working people in Indra who would be a massive help to future efforts if we could free them up from defending Indra all the time.
@Aleks Zuno Further to that point unfortunately I don't think sampling is out of the picture yet. In unpopulated Alerts there's nothing else to do, Orthrus kills are too time consuming to get with signal sources as erratic as they are, so unless they do something really special with kills and salvage it may still be the best way to clear them.
Indeed; tomorrow this may change, but it seems for now that most of those systems should still be held until we can observe the Spire efficacy, Conflict zone efficacy and strength measurements, hoping that they remain completion amounts or at least not far from that.
For @XenosAurion:
There is not much to be done about stored payloads possibly losing their value, but I think that delivery is a reasonable way to secure some of them!
Alongside strengths, a few things which will be interesting to watch or test after update 18.06:
For @XenosAurion:
- The Aquitaine cargo should be withheld at the moment, although prepare for a potential delivery after the update.
- Observing the unreachable systems list, actually I think the Sword of Aegis cargo should be delivered now!
There is not much to be done about stored payloads possibly losing their value, but I think that delivery is a reasonable way to secure some of them!
Alongside strengths, a few things which will be interesting to watch or test after update 18.06:
- The Spire progress rate.
- The new Spire effect at M. Indra, given that some of the present periphery are complete.
- How well one combat wing can progress a non-peripheral Control system (I suggest Arietis Sector DQ-Y c9).
What about Hyades Sector NN-S b4-2, HIP 20419 and HIP 20577? None are completed yet but if they are urgent we can push to get them done.
Withhold! Those are among the inner systems which would be part of the purge-week, which we are assuming for the moment may still be needed. The case where it is not needed is if Spire progress works well enough and keeps rolling as promised to us, because the Alerts can be stormed first then the Spire will affect Control systems as if the Alerts never existed.
I would also pause general Research efforts until testing it after the update, rather than rushing to complete payloads which will have unknown value. The unreachable list has special cases; those can be completed at any time, making them sensible targets for an active Research wing to gather and deliver today while the value is known, exactly as we did yesterday.
Speaking of knowing the value, I aim to store a few test systems today to be delivered tomorrow after the update. It occurs to me that it may also be worth checking whether Cyclops samples become different to Scout samples, and indeed trying Orthrus-hunting again in empty Alert systems, the previous major test being @DemiserofD with the Orthrus hunt and results.
Copy that.
Sword of Aegis carrier was unloaded.
So I see; thank you!
From the unreachable list we completed Hyades Sector PI-S b4-1 earlier, and we have HIP 21008 and HIP 22422 coming a bit later this evening. Tomorrow evening is presumed reserved for testing many things, depending on any system strength and action efficacy tests occurring in the meantime.
Noting that some M. Indra peripheral systems are complete, the first observation surely will be whether Spire progress indeed starts affecting closer systems, and by how much. Alongside that, the valuable checks will be Orthrus-hunting in empty Alert systems, missions in populated Alert systems and Conflict zones in Control systems, ideally avoiding those with payloads stored.
If these actions help system progress appreciably, and if the new Spire progress works as promised—it becomes very likely that we can stop worrying about storing for a large purge-week, deliver the Aquitaine cargo then just start rolling the peripheral progress forward. Once the completion radii reach the little cavities where populated systems have been defended, new Alerts should direct themselves mostly at farther-out systems which can be stormed quickly, putting the Spire progress back onto the next Control systems. I think some care is still needed when we reach the ten systems before the final Spire, but we can think about that a bit later after seeing how it all works.
If Frontier's claim about not needing a spire even to clear the innermost Titan systems is accurate, having the final Indra one misplaced slightly (in when it becomes exposed, if that even still applies as a notion at all post-update) might not be as fatal as it would've been prior to the rebalance...
... though I assume still preferable to not lose or expose it too early, considering how progress will not reset or be lost for them then, and clearing the inner core will no doubt still not be easy.
(Anyway, all needs to be seen in practice and everyone can get to that soon, so there's limited value in pondering the theoretical much further right now. In my view, at least, and admitting I may not be the best at it.)
Mini field testing - off-maelstrom to reduce risk of interference, but, no guarantees here
...so ~0.007989 approx for 102 samples for swahku.
Previously ~107 samples would have been worth 0.0007 warprogress... so, initial implication - unless 10 people all had the same idea, seems samples are notably more effective than they used to be, at least for inhabited systems 5.36Ly from an ex titan?
Code:
{ "timestamp":"2024-05-28T15:01:59Z", "event":"FSDJump", "Taxi":false, "Multicrew":false, "StarSystem":"Swahku", [...] "WarProgress":0.001999,
{ "timestamp":"2024-05-28T15:33:22Z", "event":"CollectCargo", "Type":"ThargoidScoutTissueSample", "Type_Localised":"Thargoid Scout Tissue Sample", "Stolen":false }
{ "timestamp":"2024-05-28T15:33:25Z", "event":"Cargo", "Vessel":"Ship", "Count":102 }
{ "timestamp":"2024-05-28T15:56:18Z", "event":"MarketSell", "MarketID":129021055, "Type":"thargoidscouttissuesample", "Type_Localised":"Thargoid Scout Tissue Sample", "Count":102, "SellPrice":1620, "TotalSale":165240, "AvgPricePaid":0 }
{ "timestamp":"2024-05-28T16:29:14Z", "event":"FSDJump", "Taxi":false, "Multicrew":false, "StarSystem":"Swahku", [...] "WarProgress":0.009988,...so ~0.007989 approx for 102 samples for swahku.
Previously ~107 samples would have been worth 0.0007 warprogress... so, initial implication - unless 10 people all had the same idea, seems samples are notably more effective than they used to be, at least for inhabited systems 5.36Ly from an ex titan?
Worth keeping in mind system strength for the inner Titan core will also have been reduced with the update.