Tractor Beams and abandoned ships.

[Eric Walch]

P.S. If you intend to capture a ship that has escorts DO NOT attack the escorts. Fight the cargo ship until the pilot ejects (ship will no longer display a legal status for the pilot) and then the escort fighters will now protect 'your' new ship if it comes under attack form any pirates on way to the Dredger.

Why did I never thought about doing this
I always considered a bug that escorts kept hanging around a ship whose pilot had ejected. It was specially a bug because escorts never defended themselves in such situations.

Starting with 1.74, escorts are released from their task when the pilot of their lead-ship ejects and start to hunt for criminals by themselves. Your trick won't work anymore. Actually am I surprised it worked as escorts generally need their mother ordering an attack and the salvages ship isn't doing that.

[Poro]

So I think I've given up on salvage missiles for now, unless somebody has a tip as to how to actually get the salvaged vessel into the mouth of the dredger. And just out of curiosity--a ship typically costs in the hundreds of thousands of credits; how much do you get for salvaging one? I bet it's nowhere near that much.

I'm surprised you're having difficulty (and that some think that salvaging is not worth it), since this is how I make the bulk of my money

Yes, If the vessel is already being attacked then you have to deal with the attackers first, or leave it alone. But if you can find a vessel that you can salvage then it's just a case of following it's heading, using injectors to zoom ahead of it, and taking out the pirate groups (almost always two waves) well before your salvaged vessel shows up. In fact, sometimes they aren't even groups - I've had occasions where one pirate showed up, and none in the second wave.

I find it easy to make lots of money this way, but then I am in a Rapier, once I switch to a trader/fighter in the future it should be more challenging to mop up those pirates, as well as trading becoming more profitable again.

Oh, and to add to the pricing info I gave in the quoted section above: an Anaconda will get around 5k, and the Griff Boa will fetch a whopping 8k. I now longer play with Griff Boas - too tempting

Starting with 1.74, escorts are released from their task when the pilot of their lead-ship ejects and start to hunt for criminals by themselves. Your trick won't work anymore.

You're telling me. When I first updated to 1.74 I disabled a pirate Python and then sat there waiting for the escorts to go idle... yet they seemed somehow piqued that I had taken their employer.

[caracal]

So I think I've given up on salvage missiles for now ...

I'm surprised you're having difficulty (and that some think that salvaging is not worth it), since this is how I make the bulk of my money

One thing I've learned about oolite: Things that are difficult for one player seem to be dirt simple for others, and vice versa. For me, most often it's reading someone here saying, "Oh that? Why, that's dead easy!" about something I've been struggling with forever. Occasionally, rarely, I'll read someone saying, "I could never manage to do X no matter how hard I've tried," and that's something I find feasible, in some cases even easy. I assume that players for whom everything in oolite is hard eventually wander off and play World of Goo or something. Which, don't get me wrong, has its own challenges, but is a very different kind of game. And those for whom everything is easy, well they write OXPs.

I said up front that I've only tried salvaging three times, and that I suspected there was a technique to it that I just didn't know. And turns out, there is! I think my very first experience, that of fighting off a clean trader only to have a cop shoot my salvage, caused me to think in terms of sticking close to my salvaged ship, rather than flying ahead to clear its path. Thinking back, it's quite possible that method would have worked in my second two tries. One thing that clearly doesn't work is trying to keep the ship safe in the middle of a dogfight. (Makes you admire those WW2 escort fighter pilots all the more, because that's exactly what they did do.)

I find it easy to make lots of money this way...

Earlier in the thread you suggested that one typically gets less than 2% of the ship's resale value for a salvage. That's nothing to sneer at, but it would gripe me a bit to think of the salvagers buffing off a few scorch marks, maybe replacing a computer and a shield generator or two, and making 98% profit. I guess those dredgers go through quirium pretty fast, so gotta pay the bills.

Oh, and to add to the pricing info I gave in the quoted section above: an Anaconda will get around 5k, and the Griff Boa will fetch a whopping 8k. I now longer play with Griff Boas - too tempting

Heh, nothing to sneer at indeed. I've seen Fugitive Griff Boas, but I can't recall ever seeing a pirate Anaconda. Maybe I just don't hang out in the right systems.

Okay, you've convinced me, maybe I'll buy another salvage missile at my next refit and give it another try.

[Smivs]

but I can't recall ever seeing a pirate Anaconda.

I don't know about Pirates, but I've certainly seen Offender Anacondas before.

[Poro]

Heh, nothing to sneer at indeed. I've seen Fugitive Griff Boas, but I can't recall ever seeing a pirate Anaconda. Maybe I just don't hang out in the right systems.

*Cough* yes well... I was on a bounty hunter mission to kill someone in an Anaconda, and I thought 'Great, I've always wanted to see how much a 'Conda would salvage for'... but the thing is, the pilot suffered a "mysterious accident" after a witch jump to escape from me, so I never did get to find out...

... until I spotted an innocent Anaconda with just a few escort craft: it was so tempting. Anyhoo, themz l33t hackorz can clean up all kinds of clever things with computers!

[Switeck]

I have been PMing Eric Walch about various OXPs of his I've been hacking.

I said up front that I've only tried salvaging three times, and that I suspected there was a technique to it that I just didn't know. And turns out, there is! I think my very first experience, that of fighting off a clean trader only to have a cop shoot my salvage, caused me to think in terms of sticking close to my salvaged ship, rather than flying ahead to clear its path. Thinking back, it's quite possible that method would have worked in my second two tries. One thing that clearly doesn't work is trying to keep the ship safe in the middle of a dogfight. (Makes you admire those WW2 escort fighter pilots all the more, because that's exactly what they did do.)

Less seems to happen off-camera than on. If no one is shooting at the salvage ship after it's on-course for the dredger, no "friendlies" likely will if both it and them are outside your scanner range. The derelict ship is supposed to be reset to "trader" once you hit it with a salvage missile. Bounty hunters may still see the bounty on it though. Normally, the dredger is at nearly a right angle to the witchpoint-planet space lane so the salvage ship won't stay in that for long.

I wouldn't even suggest TRYING to salvage ships unless you have a forward military laser and at least a beam laser to the rear...along with shield boosters, extra energy unit, ECM, witchfuel injectors, and at least 1 spare missile. You'll need considerable awareness of where the spacelane is, where your salvage ship is (and going), and where the dredger is...while doing this as well!

Beating the pirates between the salvage ship and dredger often requires a little finesse. Inject in front of the salvage ship till you're no longer mass-locked, then use J (torus drive) to get FAR ahead of it to get an early jump on the pirates. Once they appear in range, slow to a stop and blast the faster/weaker ships with your forward laser while hopefully you're still at >15 km from them (and out of range of their beam lasers). Once your forward laser is overheated, flip around and run away and speed up to max speed. Use the rear laser to blast a couple more enemies...and maybe use missiles as well. Trick to using missiles is only use a missile on an escort-type enemy that's unlikely to have ECM. (Sidewinders, Cobra 1's, and Mambas.) Fer-de-Lances, Pythons, and even Cobra 3's are far more likely to have ECM...so don't waste missiles on them unless they're ECM resistant missiles. Attack the Pythons last if they are still over 15 km away. With any luck, you can disable at least 1 of them and use a salvage missile on it as well! If a pirate uses injection to escape, don't give chase unless all or almost all the other enemies are dead. If it escapes your radar range, go back to your salvage ship (good luck finding it!) and escort it in. I've had escaped pirates circle around and kill my salvage ship too many times.

Once you've defeated the pirates between you and the dredger once, you can salvage practically every derelict ship in the system with near-impunity. So clear out all the pirates on the space lanes first, then later go back to salvage them. If you have Deep Space Pirates installed, this can be harder as you could encounter more enemies at random. So in that case DON'T be jetting around between your salvage ship and the dredger after clearing out other pirates. Deep Space Pirates only spawn in front of your ship when you're not in the space lanes...if in front of your ship isn't near the salvage ship, the salvage ship will not encounter pirates!

I usually arrive at a system, avoid the spacelane, and make a quick torus-induced dash to the main station. Even with Deep Space Pirates installed, I seldom encounter anything. Once at station the first time, I dump off all my cargo, stock up on missiles (which I seldom use), and go back out pirate hunting. Disabling is a matter of luck and timing. Not every Python, Fer-de-Lance, or Cobra 3 has an escape pod...so even if you single-shot them to death slowly they may not bail. With enough enemies such as in a busy anarchy system, you'll likely still get 1 or 2 disabled ships. Try to salvage the slower one first, because it gives you more time to kill pirates on the way to the dredger.

[Sydney2K]

When I was new to these forums one of the first questions I had was the idea of a tractor beam- but when I did a cursory search to see if anyone had thought the same I noted a long thread about the deep space dredger OXP, and decided not to add any more to the discussion. Seeing this thread though, I thought it worth posting my ideas about how a tractor beam OXP could work.

The actual device would be mounted like a gun, so you would target the derelict ship and fire. The ship would then be towed at the same distance as the actual targeting. Physics would indicate that the ship has no mass, so there would be no decay in your ship's speed or performance. However, for difficulty's sake I would suggest that your maximum speed would be cut in half- due to the tractor beam needing that much energy to stay in operation. Manoeuvrability would also be reduced in half. Tractor beams also disable the hyperspace capability of a ship.

You would tow a ship/s to a space station. Once within the space station's shield field you would disconnect the tractor beam and let the ship float free. Immediately you would be logged for the salvaged ship and credited with the salvage fee, and can enter the space station. (Docking computers will not operate with a tractor beam switched on, and dragging a ship during a manual docking will cause an impact.) While you are on the space station unseen tugs would tow the ship away.

A new type of pirate would be created, the Scavengers. These pirates don't seek to destroy your ship and pick up the cargo, they aim to disable ships and tow them away. Scavengers would then fix the ships up and add them to their fleet, plunder the equipment and cargo and use the captured ship for spare parts, or just strip the ship as scrap (alloys.) Scavengers aren't necessarily bloodthirsty and will usually allow pilots to escape in a escape pod (if they have one), but a rich merchant can usually be captured and ransomed. Scavengers are brave but not foolish, and the appearance of any GalCorp craft will usually mean jettisoning any captured ships and a quick hyperspace escape. (Scavenger tugs will siphon hyperspace fuel from captured ships for this purpose.)

A flight of Scavengers is usually a wing of three, four or five fast fighters to harass and deplete a hapless ship's energy, and one ship with four tractor beams to tow captured ships away. Scavengers can attack ships in the space lanes, or they can pounce upon someone trying to tug a ship to a space station. In the latter case the fighters aren't necessarily trying to capture someone, but more to make that someone drop the ship they were tugging, allowing the Scavenger tug to come in and take the dropped ship. Someone may drop a ship so that he or she can regain full energy loads and defend themselves (or fly away.)

Like this idea or shoot it down in flames?

[Micha]

@Sydney2K: I likey. Especially considering there's at least 2 examples of tugging happening in-game already - Buoy repair and the Hognose.

In canon, the manual also describes Vipers as having tractor beams for capturing and towing offenders:

VIPER (POLICE SHIP)
Small, highly maneuverable short range "hunter-killer", the Viper was specifically designed for GalCop Space Policing purposes by Faulcon Manspace and are built under licence on all Medium Tech worlds. The Viper is a single pilot craft, but can carry up to ten humanoid passengers. It has no cargo space, but has a "tug" capability, and can tow a ship of up to 140,000 MTS mass (including the Cobra Mk 3). This popular ship is also carried by large freighter convoys, for defensive purposes.

Given this info, perhaps installing a tug-mount into a ship would need to reduce available cargo space as well (internal bracing and reinforcement, the generators for the tractor beam, etc etc)? Also, depending on the size of your ship would influence the size of the ships you could tow.

While I really like the salvage capabilities introduced by Dredgers (and do play with it), I always found it a bit unrealistic that a missile could take over and fly a derelict. Quite apart from the electronic jiggery-pokery, the assumption is that a pilot ejects shortly before a ship disintegrates, so you'd think it would be very heavily damaged. Even if you could take over the controls, there might not be much of an engine left to control! Finally.. what would stop pirates from using modified salvage missiles on non-derelict ships, capturing them, their cargo, and their pilot(s) with no fight whatsoever.

This won't stop me salvaging - after all, it's a -game- and as long as it's enjoyable..
Tractoring would make more sense though.

[Thargoid]

It's now perfectly possible by AI and script to make an NPC ship follow another one (or the player) around as if it's being towed (albeit on a rather stretchy tractor beam). I had a quick play a couple of nights ago and have a test example in my Ooniverse.

But that of course can't be done for the player ship being towed as the AI is non-applicable, but the player ship's position is read/write to scripting...

[Commander McLane]

When I was new to these forums one of the first questions I had was the idea of a tractor beam- but when I did a cursory search to see if anyone had thought the same I noted a long thread about the deep space dredger OXP, and decided not to add any more to the discussion. Seeing this thread though, I thought it worth posting my ideas about how a tractor beam OXP could work.

The actual device would be mounted like a gun, so you would target the derelict ship and fire. The ship would then be towed at the same distance as the actual targeting.

The question then becomes: who would be willing to sacrifice one of his valuable lasers for a tractor beam?

[Micha]

Not sure I'd necessarily agree with having to give up a laser. (Only the rear one would make sense in either case).
However, while towing you can't fire the rear laser, or at least, not without hitting the ship you're towing!!

[Sydney2K]

The question then becomes: who would be willing to sacrifice one of his valuable lasers for a tractor beam?

Not sure I'd necessarily agree with having to give up a laser. (Only the rear one would make sense in either case).
However, while towing you can't fire the rear laser, or at least, not without hitting the ship you're towing!!

I thought about that. You would mount it probably on the port or starboard gun mounts. You would fly alongside the ship, spin the ship around until it's picked up by the tractor beam sensors, and then activate it. It then looks as if it's flying alongside you- leaving your forward and rear guns free for offensive capabilities. I don't think I have heard of people using their port or starboard gun mounts for dogfighting...

[Micha]

I don't think it would make much sense to try to dogfight while towing, especially if your ship is severely slowed down while doing so. I think it'd make more sense to drop the ship and fight, then pick it up again afterwards (assuming it didn't get blown up or stolen).

I also think it'd look very odd to 'tow' something alongside rather than behind - although I suppose normal rules don't apply in the Ooniverse anyway so it's your idea to run with. It would break the precedents set by the other 2 towing OXPs though.

This is all IMHO and fairly minor tweaks compared to the core idea which I think is great and I'm sure I'll enjoy it regardless if you implement it

[Thargoid]

Here is a little stub OXP as a proof of concept for the idea. It's a simple "follow me" AI which makes the ship follow the player at around 1km distance behind.

It could be conceived as a tractor beam, albeit a rather stretchy and flexible one. But the general concept works, although this is just a demo proof rather than a full OXP so it has no polish or anything else.

Not for gaming use, but a little freebie in case anyone else would like to take the idea further and run with it. In the example you can find the test ship as "T" on your ASC. Fly to it - you will then engage the beams and it will follow you back to the main station aegis where it will dock itself.

[tonyhippy]

But as well as for towing, the iconic use of the Tractor beam is for pulling ships closer together, whether it be to help in some way ...or to board. I'd like there to be NPC ships that can disable your ship (perhaps with override missiles) then suck you into their dock: Cue mission screens, desperate bargaining, possibly ending with you losing your life, your ship, money, equipment, or managing a bold escape. Or if you're a nefarious type maybe they've got something for you if you'll agree to do something for them....? Perhaps a mission in which you can be a spy (gasps!) for the Thargoids!
(How "fugitive" would that make you??)

(I gather from what's been said that whilst Non-player ships can pull and be pulled, an NPC cannot pull the player. But if you think about it what's the difference visually if in actuality the bad guy pulls his ship towards yours? If there's no very close point of reference it would look the same wouldn't it?)