Strange things with the game balance

[Mad Hollander]

Mighty, gorgeous anaconda is actually the weakest ship that can be bought. Even the adder is much stronger than anaconda. It can be bought with naval energy unit. I spent lots of time to looking for the system where anaconda can be bought with an naval energy unit and didn't manage to succeed. I even wrote an oxp that shows the systems where anaconda with naval unit might be found, but this didn't help.

Anaconda is a very bit ship and very slow, which make it vulnerable to all kinds of attacks. However, anaconda hardly ever fall into dog fight. Looks like there is some game restriction to make the life easier for anacondas.

The most painful restriction for anaconda - 127 of quantity per market per each commodity. This make difficult to monetize the huge cargo. Actually, one evening of game on Boa Cruiser gives the same amount as Anaconda. The 'usual' income per day is about 1 000 000 Cr. I measured the average income with Anaconda and Boa Cruiser and seems there is almost no differences. Anaconda is a bit profitable, but the cruiser is much faster. Anaconda requires lot of time to get to the market, lots of time to fight with pirates, lots of missiles and etc. Boa cruiser has great speed and therefore avoid the most unnecessary fights.

The most profitable contracts are Gold, Platinum and Gem Stones. The most of commodities don't worth to deal with them. Some of the commodities are difficult to buy, and some them are difficult to sell. I.e. I often make ten or more jumps trying to sell the furs or liquor/wines for the good price. I.e. when I choose to trade trade only with computers, luxuries and machinery, I got stable and quite big profit per hop. Once I started to buying almost the all commodities at the lowest price and selling them as high as possible and finished the evening with a very small profit - almost the half of the usual income.

Adder with a military laser is absolutely invincible against the most of the enemies - it can fight from the distance 25km and even more ! Moreover, in a dog fight it is very successful because it is has almost the best pitch and roll speed.
Howhever, it falls almost into every ambush. I don't know why. Looks like the game logic consider the size as the main factor. To me, this is strange comparing to the anaconda - lloks like firates seeking for a smaller ship without cargo and avoid the weakest ships full of commodities.

The most of ships, even pirates, are absolutelly passive. After some shots they try to escape. The most of the traders don't try to resist at all.

[Cody]

Adder with a military laser is absolutely invincible against the most of the enemies - it can fight from the distance 25km and even more ! Moreover, in a dog fight it is very successful because it is has almost the best pitch and roll speed.

Indeed! An iron-assed Adder is a sweet ship to fly - I have a nice purple one in my hangar!

[Zireael]

The most painful restriction for anaconda - 127 of quantity per market per each commodity.

This is going to change soon(ish) - see the 1.82 economic changes thread.

As for the military laser Adder, it might change too - see 1.82 combat changes thread.

[Mad Hollander]

One more thing - 'flee' is kind of weird. To me it is obviosly that those, who run away must do lots of maneuvers as possible to save the life. Actually they are too easy to kill.

[Smivs]

Anaconda is a very bit ship and very slow, which make it vulnerable to all kinds of attacks. However, anaconda hardly ever fall into dog fight. Looks like there is some game restriction to make the life easier for anacondas.

Not really, although pirates do weigh-up the odds when deciding whether to attack, and as Anacondas normally have six escorts the pirate groups would be wary.

[Mad Hollander]

I can't understand why they attack me on adder more often than me on anaconda. I don't have any escort and, usually, when they start shoot from long range, I quickly lose the shield. But later something strange - they ally me to kill them one by one and even don't try to do any maneouovres to avoid that.

[Smivs]

I can't understand why they attack me on adder more often than me on anaconda.

It may be for the same reason...an Anaconda is a much tougher ship than an Adder, so is a more daunting target.

[cim]

There are AI routines to allow NPC ships to dodge while fleeing - they're just not enabled in the default AI (because they also enable "dodge while attacking"). The AI can be turned up quite a bit tougher than it currently is - my Skilled NPCs OXP adds various improvements at random, or if you want to try it out without affecting normal play, the Combat Simulator OXP lets you fight a range of ships at a range of AI skill levels. There seems to be a general opinion that combat in Oolite is already too tough, though, so turning up the AI skill in the basic game doesn't seem a good idea.

Naval Energy Unit is a very high-tech item, so the chances of it being added to a ship for sale are fairly small. The Adder has twice the base chance of an Anaconda of having extra equipment, but even so the chance of any ship having it is low except at the highest tech worlds.

Most NPCs traders don't resist in a fight for very long because the pirates only attack when they're very sure of victory, and so the trader counts heads and runs away at that point. An Anaconda is considered about twice as dangerous as an Adder by NPCs, assuming its on its own - but once the fight starts if they see either ship has military lasers and other extras they may change their mind and run. Adjusting the odds calculations to give more interesting fights is on the list.

[Mad Hollander]

Naval Energy Unit is a very high-tech item, so the chances of it being added to a ship for sale are fairly small. The Adder has twice the base chance of an Anaconda of having extra equipment, but even so the chance of any ship having it is low except at the highest tech worlds.

Actually there are lots of systems where adder for sale with Naval Energy Unit. The only ship I did't found with naval energy unit, is anaconda.

[Smivs]

Are you aware that the NEU is a special piece of equipment that you cannot buy, but may be awarded during the game for services rendered. You will find ships fitted with these in shipyards as you have seen, but these are 'un-official' and unless you have qualified for one it will not be repairable if damaged. Instead you will be offered an Extra Energy Unit in exhange in this situation.

[ffutures]

Bluntly, even with an NEU the Anaconda is still crap. It's too big and slow, visibility is lousy, turn rate is pitifully slow. A Boa cruiser performs considerably better in combat and can handle up to 175 tons of cargo, so it's worth considering if you want a bigger ship - I got one as soon as I could afford it and never wanted to go back to anything smaller - my current bank balance is 4.5 megacredits and there still isn't anything I would prefer to buy.

Or if you want a really big ship that's actually reasonably robust and fast (though in my opinion not as much fun as the Boa Cruiser) add the Heart of Gold OXP and buy one of those - it's big, it's pretty, and it's faster and generally a much nicer ship to fly than an Anaconda. Costs a quarter-million credits though...

[Ranthe]

Bluntly, even with an NEU the Anaconda is still crap.

"Those be fightin' words, friend..."

It's too big and slow, visibility is lousy, turn rate is pitifully slow.

That's why you don't try and dogfight with an Anaconda. My preferred battle tactic in Atomic Annie is long-range sniping with my forward military laser, with speed cut to minimum to increase the likely time before my opponents get to knife-fighting range. The Anaconda's lack of manoeuvrability is a plus in this case as it allows you to fine-tune your target lock-on instead of swinging all over the place. (Sniper Lock OXP helps too!)

And how else can you strip a local market clean and dump it all in another system while still having space to run multiple contracts?

[ffutures]

Bluntly, even with an NEU the Anaconda is still crap.

"Those be fightin' words, friend..."

It's too big and slow, visibility is lousy, turn rate is pitifully slow.

That's why you don't try and dogfight with an Anaconda. My preferred battle tactic in Atomic Annie is long-range sniping with my forward military laser, with speed cut to minimum to increase the likely time before my opponents get to knife-fighting range. The Anaconda's lack of manoeuvrability is a plus in this case as it allows you to fine-tune your target lock-on instead of swinging all over the place. (Sniper Lock OXP helps too!)

And how else can you strip a local market clean and dump it all in another system while still having space to run multiple contracts?

The trouble is that EVERYTHING can outrun and out-manoeuvre an Anaconda, so you really have no alternatives but to try those tactics. I prefer more fluid combat, with a reasonable chance of scooping up loot at the end of the fight - with an Anaconda cargo recovery is horribly slow, and trouble generally turns up first.