Oolite Bulletins

I'd like to make the suggestion to remove the 256 Kills Bonus for the Constrictor mission. I felt as if I had cheated, when I suddenly had more than 600 kills on my account and became dangerous for just one fairly easy kill...

On the other hand, having invested in that 5000 credit equipment you need (that should not be spoiled here) and a lot of fuel and time, after having captured a realy realy fast escape capsule with the bloody thief in it, the 1000 credit reward is simply insulting. The navy is not that poor I hope, otherwise I will simply decline any future requests for help. The bounty hunters pay far better.

ralph_hh wrote:

I'd like to make the suggestion to remove the 256 Kills Bonus for the Constrictor mission. I felt as if I had cheated, when I suddenly had more than 600 kills on my account and became dangerous for just one fairly easy kill...

I agree, I've always reset the count in my save file. Would be happier if it wasn't there.

ralph_hh wrote:

The navy is not that poor I hope, otherwise I will simply decline any future requests for help.

Don't! The rewards for further missions are much better (equipment you can't get otherwise )

Ha, I'm in two minds about the Constrictor mission.
One says 'It has always been thus', it is canon/tradition and should be left alone.
Another says yes, the financial reward is paltry, but then should you even get anything for helping the Navy - those brave boys and girls (and things) are out there often making the ultimate sacrifice on our behalf, and we should be proud to help out in a small way when we can.
Another (hold on, isn't that three minds?) says the kill bonus is just daft, as I don't think even the Navy has any sway over the Elite Federation of Pilots who keep the tally.
And to add to the debate, yes the mission is too easy. As the first, it shouldn't be too taxing, but really......
So basically, none of my minds know what to think!

Smivs wrote:

... the mission is too easy.

Does the core Constrictor still not have an aft laser? It's been a long time since I did that mission.

Smivs wrote:

... the mission is too easy.

I agree with this. I think there are two things wrong:
1- The mission appears too late, I have already a fully equipped ship and skill in fighting.
2- The Constrictor is not strong enough defensively, My mil lasers shred it before if causes me any problems.

I have a reasonable amount of trouble dealing with the Constrictor to be honest, but it looks like we've got some superstar pilots in our ranks

@Cody: Tried the mission three times just now in trunk to see how things are and the Constrictor definitely has rear laser. Destroyed me with that two out of three, too.

As for difficulty of the mission, in all my three attempts the thief got assigned an accuracy of around 3.75-4.00. If this is considered insufficient, we can always pump it up to 9 or 10 and make a Competent or Dangerous ranked pilot out of him. Warning, though: such high accuracy on such a high-spec ship might trip the mission balance completely towards the other side and make it almost impossible.

another_commander wrote:

As for difficulty of the mission, in all my three attempts the thief got assigned an accuracy of around 3.75-4.00. If this is considered insufficient, we can always pump it up to 9 or 10 and make a Competent or Dangerous ranked pilot out of him. Warning, though: such high accuracy on such a high-spec ship might trip the mission balance completely towards the other side and make it almost impossible.

I'd lean towards keeping it relatively easy to beat, myself. It is the first in-built mission, after all: most of the difficulty is in learning how to find and follow the reports.

<nods>

The constrictor mission does also have a reward of 5000 credits (essentially your expenses claim) whether or not you scoop the pilot. Unless you're watching your credit balance carefully you're unlikely to notice this, as you don't get told about it in the reward screen. The main reward of it is that it lets you do the considerably more rewarding second HIMSN mission later, though.

The kill bonus I think made much more sense in the original material where your kill count was hidden and the fiction was that your combat rating reflected an assessment of your skill (e.g. Trader Fields being ranked as Dangerous - or officially Ryder being ranked as Dangerous - on the basis of her skill). So you hunt down a dangerous ship prototype and maybe the assessors of your case at the EFP note this and think "Yes, time to promote them from Competent to Dangerous". Now you can see the inner workings explicitly it has a lot more implications that weren't in the original.
(We could stop displaying the kill count, but I think it's useful to have some measure of progress once you reach Dangerous)

Constrictor gets an aft laser in Griff's shipset. We could add that to core as well, but it would make it a considerably tougher fight as you'd barely get a break from it shooting at you ... and with its injectors and high normal speed pinning it into a dogfight is unlikely too. I'd be inclined not to do that.

The pilot is guaranteed a non-negative accuracy (basically they get the random -5..+5 accuracy, and then it's inverted if negative). With that and the mil laser they can do a lot of damage in a short amount of time. I suspect increasing the accuracy would be less disruptive than adding an aft laser. 6.5ish (enough to dodge when hit) might be enough in a small fast ship like that. Again, it would probably be a significant increase.

Depending on how quickly the player goes after it - and especially for a new player who doesn't have the in-depth knowledge of the game systems - their ship might not be that well-equipped at that point. I know I didn't have military shields when the mission first came up, though I had everything else.

Disembodied wrote:

another_commander wrote:

As for difficulty of the mission, in all my three attempts the thief got assigned an accuracy of around 3.75-4.00. If this is considered insufficient, we can always pump it up to 9 or 10 and make a Competent or Dangerous ranked pilot out of him. Warning, though: such high accuracy on such a high-spec ship might trip the mission balance completely towards the other side and make it almost impossible.

I'd lean towards keeping it relatively easy to beat, myself. It is the first in-built mission, after all: most of the difficulty is in learning how to find and follow the reports.

I'd be OK with this if the mission was given earlier. In 1.80 it takes longer to get the kills to trigger the mission as either I'm running away from pirates, or they are running away from me when they have take heavy damage. This means that it's not really an early mission (as it used to be) but more middle mission.

I like Cims idea of increasing the accuracy. The kill count addition makes sense once explains and I would agree that being able to kill the Constrictor should get you a rank of Dangerous. The credit reward I think is right as Disembodied points out you are being trained. The reward you get for the later mission by far repays you for both missions and then some. So look at it as an investment.

If you are thinking of giving the core ship a rear you could make it a Beam or even a Pulse laser to keep it from overwhelming the novice player too much and still be able to keep the accuracy improvement.

The game does add shield boosters then military shield boosters to the Constrictor if you take too long over finding it (if you're already Dangerous or Deadly by the time you find it). I suppose the "extras" like an aft laser or increased accuracy, if we did want to add them, could go in at the same times.

If you're already Dangerous or Deadly, you should be able to take it down even if it has an aft mil laser.

The constrictor mission does also have a reward of 5000 credits (essentially your expenses claim) whether or not you scoop the pilot. Unless you're watching your credit balance carefully you're unlikely to notice this, as you don't get told about it in the reward screen.

Then the reward screen should be changed slightly to mention the creds.

The kill bonus I think made much more sense in the original material where your kill count was hidden and the fiction was that your combat rating reflected an assessment of your skill (e.g. Trader Fields being ranked as Dangerous - or officially Ryder being ranked as Dangerous - on the basis of her skill). So you hunt down a dangerous ship prototype and maybe the assessors of your case at the EFP note this and think "Yes, time to promote them from Competent to Dangerous". Now you can see the inner workings explicitly it has a lot more implications that weren't in the original.
(We could stop displaying the kill count, but I think it's useful to have some measure of progress once you reach Dangerous)

Random idea: Don't display kill count until Dangerous?

Having played Elite, I was very happy to find a kill count in Oolite. Please, do not remove this.

If the mission rewards you 5000, then maybe it is fully satisfying, if the message reflects this (it tells you it's just 1000).

The mission difficulty is ok. If you want to go for anything more severe, there are plenty of options, even without OXPs.