What's the secret to settlement combat?

[Northpin]

Not that I'm bothered: I spent my first two days in Odyssey hoovering up G3 suits and weapons.

Heh, same here.
Having a G3 Artemis, A G3 Maverick and 3 G3 Dominators (i figured that combat suits will be subjected to different potential modifications) and a various array of g2/g3 weapons certainly made things doable and generally more fun

 

[Helvellyn]

Like a Threat rating that we can trust?

Exactly like that Mind you I've only done a couple of missions in Odyssey so far so I don't know just what the situation's like. First one had no enemies, the second one turned up as I was leaving and I ran my ship in to them (accidentally, but they had bounties on them so that was OK, quite funny watching them trying to run when I tried shooting them from the ship too).

 

[Linnunrata]

It's an horendous design. But we've managed to turn it into something less horrendous and quite a few reliable working theories help find more items (but you do need to actually find an item first and that's the bit that's horrendous).

Yep, the sharing & caring thread is awesome and a big o7 for everyone contributing to it, will do the same whenever I actually find something that I don't need to buy myself.

 

[VR Lucian Arkright]

Like a Threat rating that we can trust?

This is a big part of it - In principle I like that foot combat is dangerous, however, taking on a threat level 2 out of 10 (or even a 4/10) shouldn't be this brutal!

 

[Ydiss]

Exactly like that Mind you I've only done a couple of missions in Odyssey so far so I don't know just what the situation's like. First one had no enemies, the second one turned up as I was leaving and I ran my ship in to them (accidentally, but they had bounties on them so that was OK, quite funny watching them trying to run when I tried shooting them from the ship too).

Threat rating is largely irrelevant to what actually happens. It's the same with POIs with a threat rating. Threat 1 POIs can be devastating for a new player. I've seen a threat 2 with 6+6 scavengers! 12 at once if you're not quick enough. No new player can survive that. Threat 2.

I believe Threat can go up to 8, maybe 9 (based on ship stuff). If threat 2 has 12 scavs...

It just doesn't work. So what I'm saying is the hardest it can get right now is probably the sort of challenge I'd want to see at threat 5 and higher. I think that's fine. And it should scale right down to basically one or two targets at threat 1. Scav missions at threat 1/2 should give us NPCs with a much lower "assist" radius too. So sure, we've got 6-12 targets to kill but we can be smart and "pull" them one or two at a time, rendering the whole mission much more manageable for new players. By the time we get to threat 8 (which I've never actually seen yet) then that assist radius should be "settlement wide" and at that point we want 12 targets plus more arriving throughout the fight (like 2-3 additional boat loads of them).

 

[CMDR Rabbit]

I believe Threat can go up to 8. If threat 2 has 12 scavs...

not sure if this has changed, but my experience in alpha was that there was no functional difference between the number of scavs relating to threat level, it seemed more the likelyhood of them showing up.

I'll admit to not exactly being scientific in my observations though.

 

[Linnunrata]

I've seen a threat 2 with 6+6 scavengers! 12 at once if you're not quick enough. No new player can survive that. Threat 2.

Heh my first true on-foot combat mission success was one of these, though I think there was just 10 enemies. I fought a number of running battles in the (unpowered) settlement but in the end had to cheese it with breaking the aggro by hopping into SRV and driving away a bit, so I could actually piecemeal them.

I wonder what is the deal with ratings tho, the commandos were labeled "harmless", is it their ship combat rating or what?

 

[Ydiss]

Heh my first true on-foot combat mission success was one of these, though I think there was just 10 enemies. I fought a number of running battles in the (unpowered) settlement but in the end had to cheese it with breaking the aggro by hopping into SRV and driving away a bit, so I could actually piecemeal them.

I wonder what is the deal with ratings tho, the commandos were labeled "harmless", is it their ship combat rating or what?

Well for that example I was talking about POIs. In this case it's several different POI types. You arrive, there are 6 there and a minute or two later a ship drops another 6 on you. Now, this is amazing. When this first happened to me (the dropship thing) at a vacant POI, back in alpha, I wet myself. This is so cool. They just need to get the numbers right. At threat 2, there should be 2 scavs plus maybe 2 via dropship. Maybe 0 + 3 or something like that.

I'm not sure about ratings to be honest. The difference appears to be mostly down to their equipment being better (most notably is the suits health and resitances go up). The other problem is mercenary rank progression is broken, so it only goes up when we do CZs. This means very few of us have gotten past "mostly defenceless" yet! So who knows what happens when we get up to higher ratings? I'm certainly not grinding that out for science.

not sure if this has changed, but my experience in alpha was that there was no functional difference between the number of scavs relating to threat level, it seemed more the likelyhood of them showing up.

I'll admit to not exactly being scientific in my observations though.

Yeh there's something to that. In terms of the missions though it seems to have an impact on it. Threat 2 scav missions = 5-6 targets, threat 3 = 10-12 (and all threat levels higher never goes above 12).

When it comes to other mission types and POIs then I think you may be right because you don't always get enemies. I'm ok with that to a degree but the actual opposition strength definitely needs to be taken more into consideration than that.

 

[cmdr Temeleen]

its pretty simple.

• keep moving
• use higher ground (rooftops)
• know where ammo crate is

thats all you need to do. The only thing that can annoy you consistently is goliath (skimmers are easy to kill). You just have to keep avoinding its line of fire.

 

[Linnunrata]

The other problem is mercenary rank progression is broken, so it only goes up when we do CZs.

Well this sure explains a lot, I was a bit puzzled with my meager progress on that bar.

 

[jimbeau1571]

Playing Horizons you're a captive audience: you don't have many other places you can go. Playing an FPS? Unless you're already committed to ED, if Odyssey frustrates you you'll just go elsewhere.

This. I've been playing ED since 2015, and I had had enough of the FPS constant death and then followed by 20 mins of the prison, Shuttle to ship, get a new mission cycle sent me back to mining and doing the old missions.
At least I felt like I was still progressing to somewhere.

 

[Guyperson]

I believe Threat can go up to 8, maybe 9 (based on ship stuff). If threat 2 has 12 scavs...

So far I've seen up to 8 at a threat 3 crash site, plus a ship stopping by to drop off 6 more. Yet I've also seen the same threat level only have 2 and no reinforcements, or even no hostiles at all and no ship ever shows up to drop any off. Also threat 3. The actual threat of POIs is all over the board to the point where the assigned threat level seems like it's merely a suggestion.

A new player running around with G1 gear is going to find their biggest threat is being vastly outnumbered, which can easily happen even at threat level 1. And it probably shouldn't.

 

[Ydiss]

This. I've been playing ED since 2015, and I had had enough of the FPS constant death and then followed by 20 mins of the prison, Shuttle to ship, get a new mission cycle

It's definitely an issue. All throughout alpha, I kept raising this "new player" issue and kept getting told that "it's fine, everyone has billions of credits and will just buy all the items they need and do fine" and I kept saying "no, even veteran players will struggle with some of the content early on because it can be randomly brutal".

"New player" is basically all of us. I really struggled early on (I even gave up on Alpha 1 because it was horrendous). Some of us will naturally adjust faster because we've played FPS games or we spend a lot of time dying/failing to work stuff out (I did in alpha). But my feedback in alpha was the same throughout: early doors content is too flippin' hard for new players and that mostly comes down to the combat part of it.

The tutorial gave me hope. The NPCs in that were weaksauce (although still far too many of them; I think Fdev have greatly underestimated their AI's abilities and think we need to constantly have 6-12 thrown at us all the time). I hoped that meant new players could continue to learn in scenarios that were easier to manage but that's not the case. If anything, it is now harder than it was in Alpha and it's so obvious that low threat AI is just as proficient with swarming and laser guided grenade throwing as any other threat NPC so...

The problem is, there are too many critical issues in the game and so this isn't likely to change soon and it just means new players are being driven away, which is what I said would happen (and, I repeat, I was told it wasn't an issue by naysayers).

 

[Koma Pahu]

So far I've seen up to 8 at a threat 3 crash site, plus a ship stopping by to drop off 6 more. Yet I've also seen the same threat level only have 2 and no reinforcements, or even no hostiles at all and no ship ever shows up to drop any off. Also threat 3. The actual threat of POIs is all over the board to the point where the assigned threat level seems like it's merely a suggestion.

A new player running around with G1 gear is going to find their biggest threat is being vastly outnumbered, which can easily happen even at threat level 1. And it probably shouldn't.

Run away! Run away!

During the Alpha, I was getting overwhelmed at one POI so I ran back to my ship and hid inside it’s shields. A risky, but ultimately successful strategy.

 

[CMDR Rabbit]

Well for that example I was talking about POIs. In this case it's several different POI types. You arrive, there are 6 there and a minute or two later a ship drops another 6 on you. Now, this is amazing. When this first happened to me (the dropship thing) at a vacant POI, back in alpha, I wet myself. This is so cool. They just need to get the numbers right. At threat 2, there should be 2 scavs plus maybe 2 via dropship. Maybe 0 + 3 or something like that.

....

When it comes to other mission types and POIs then I think you may be right because you don't always get enemies. I'm ok with that to a degree but the actual opposition strength definitely needs to be taken more into consideration than that.

In alpha I was mostly POIs and had at least one time a threat level 2 crash site, 4 scavs on the ground then two dropships of 6. The sceond drop happening after i'd missiled down all the previous enemies and catching me by surprise.

Or a threat 3 Irregular markers (the small trailer park one) that was completely empty of baddies but LOADED with stuphz for taking.

I did try a multiple relog cheeze on a sattelite crash once (phase 3 i think) and that got interesting. Each relog resulted in one more dropship, like:
First arrival had a couple of scavs,
First relog couple of scavs and a dropship
Second relog couple of scavs and 2 dropships
Third relog, couple of scavs and three dropships

Only saw that happen once though.

 

[Guyperson]

Run away! Run away!

During the Alpha, I was getting overwhelmed at one POI so I ran back to my ship and hid inside it’s shields. A risky, but ultimately successful strategy.

I'd just get back in my ship and carpet bomb the area with mines. If they want to be unsporting I can show them what that word really means.

 

[Fishy]

Here, I got nuked by 6 mobs in a threat 1 distress signal location...

I had the last laugh when I came back to ram them with my ship though.

 

[Linnunrata]

During the Alpha, I was getting overwhelmed at one POI so I ran back to my ship and hid inside it’s shields. A risky, but ultimately successful strategy.

This is a funny tactic. Get through the boarding alive, then you can sit in the cockpit while enemies stand in a line and pummel the ship shields with everything they got. Launch off and fly 500 metres to the air and land back, and the enemies have deaggroed and go back to patrolling.

 

[Ydiss]

In alpha I was mostly POIs and had at least one time a threat level 2 crash site, 4 scavs on the ground then two dropships of 6. The sceond drop happening after i'd missiled down all the previous enemies and catching me by surprise.

Or a threat 3 Irregular markers (the small trailer park one) that was completely empty of baddies but LOADED with stuphz for taking.

I did try a multiple relog cheeze on a sattelite crash once (phase 3 i think) and that got interesting. Each relog resulted in one more dropship, like:
First arrival had a couple of scavs,
First relog couple of scavs and a dropship
Second relog couple of scavs and 2 dropships
Third relog, couple of scavs and three dropships

Only saw that happen once though.

POI behaviour has changed since Alpha.

The way you describe it exactly matches my alpha experience. But now, IM POIs with threat ratings will often have 6+6. Threat 1 has 3+(4, 5 or 6). IM POIs are now seriously challenging for a solo player even in G3 gear. They're often in wide open space so very little cover and you get swarmed fast, so need to use shield grenades and hope you can kill them fast enough. If you can get "into" the site itself, you've got ample cover and 2 barrels to use as well. But otherwise it's literally kiting them for miles... not fun.

Impact sights tend to have 1 or 3 or so. Maybe the odd time a dropship.

I'll defer to your knowledge of Crash sites though, I gave up on those when the missions didn't work and the SRV caused CTDs

 

[Murfelton]

Thing I discovered was that enemies showed up as contacts on SRV, including their rank. You can use that to know how many you are up against. Useful for judging tactics.

I was involuntarily relogging a Threat 3 power up mission due to disconnections. The number of scavengers changed each time. Ranged from at least 7 to 4 enemies.