[Feature Request] Donating Ships / Stations to factions

[Rei Ayanami]

Motivation : In my current game ANT, ARG and PAR are getting totally smashed by HOP. I don't want them to get wiped out, however I also don't want to start a war with HOP since I still need them until I have bought all their Blueprints.

I think it would be great for diplomacy-gameplay and manipulating the universe if we had the option to donate selected ships/stations to a friendly/allied faction to help them out. In the case of ships, they'd be used for defense/offense or used as free galaxy traders, in the case of stations they'd simply produce for that faction. If the donated station contains any administration modules we could even donate entire sectors to a friendly faction since the sector ownership would change to the faction the player donated to, subtly influencing where they'll send their patrols and where their empire grows.

In exchange for donating to a friendly/allied faction we'd get reputation/equipment mods/equip mod materials/blueprints.

[Miravlix]

Well, they do have donate fleet missions, so don't they already have that?

I sometimes get missions to take over a zone for a faction, but they should be for all factions against all enemies of the faction. ANT wont give me missions to do stuff in the void that they lost cutting their land in two, it's only the factions that has "war missions" where you can get to take Xenon sectors for ARG or HOP sectors for Paranid.

All factions should have take sectors next to ours that is an enemy, Teladi is at war with PAR and HOP, but has no war missions or PAR towards Teladi. This create some inconsistencies in the world that you can only do silly trade missions for Teladi and ANT, even while they do have many enemies and HOP that is the top Xenon killer, don't have a HOP vs Xenon stuff. I find that weird.

ZYC has missions against Argon, but none against FRF and FRF has no missions against ZYC... Is this a war game or not, give us the damn faction war missions for all of them.

[Stoats not Goats]

Additionally, you can just sell ships to that faction although I've found that ships that aren't of a model that they themselves would normally produce don't do anything and get de-spawned.

[Tilen]

This is something that I also have been wishing for. I fully support this idea!

[BigBANGtheory]

In principle it seems perfectly sensible it does leave some awkward questions or cases though. For example if you donate military assets to ARG how should HOP feel about that even if you are not directly involved in the conflict because you kind of are by proxy? I think what Egosoft is trying to do is have you economically support NPCs but from a conflict PoV forcing you to pick sides to some degree or turtle up. Then pick a different game start for a different experience.... at least that is how it comes across whether or not its intended that way.

I think what is a little frustrating is having to use build missions as the mechanism, and selling ships its not clear that if needs to be of the faction type for them to persist but it does make sense in many cases. I find there is a lot of unclear game mechanics in X4 that you're expected to figure out as part of the gameplay and its a fine balance as to whether that is good gameplay or not I guess it is if you arrive at an answer.

[gorgofdoom]

Donate? Why not just sell them to the faction? They don't consider money for themselves; it's generated for the player only. They get ships for "free" and give you money (which doesn't hurt them in any way)

If you really want to wreak havoc among a specific factions enemies:

Move 50-100 kitted nemesis to the nearest enemy sector.
Sell them to the faction you want to support.
Watch fireworks as they annihilate everything.

you can use this tactic to remove specific stations if you put them right next to it. It's a way to get around combat rep penalties if you're willing to commit assets entire to one task.

[leoriq]

Motivation : In my current game ANT, ARG and PAR are getting totally smashed by HOP. I don't want them to get wiped out, however I also don't want to start a war with HOP since I still need them until I have bought all their Blueprints.

You want to achieve everything in one game? If you side against HOP, and you are doing that, though covertly, why do you want their blueprints? Yes, their capships are superior to any other non-Split capship, but don't you want the challenge?

[Nort The Fragrent]

HOP are Pinking all over my game, there fleets are huge.
But not to worry ! By staying one step ahead. I have placed Admin stations in their path. So they are inadvertently fighting for me. When they clear out a sector it then becomes mine. With not a shot fired by me.

As for donations, I have over 100,000,000,000 sloshing around. The faster I spend it , the more it becomes. I would like to donate some of this loot to the Argon, as they are getting pushed back. The Argon have always been nice to me, so I would like to return the favour.

To be able to build a large kick ass defence station and hand it over to you friends would be good.

Arms dealers don't get bloody, they get rich. They make the goods, ship them off to who ever wants to pay the big bucks and they sit back in the sun shine whilst thousands die.
I am an arms dealer in my game, but don't seem to have the control over who is being supported ! And more the point, I can not stop a specific faction from benefiting from my network of bad ass stations. I can stop all factions from purchasing, but not one specific faction. Or have I missed a check box somewhere??