[X3LU] Mayhem 3.21b

[Joubarbe]

60-80 bailed ships in one sector? Half ships are bailed ones? You definitely have a problem somewhere.

[all_other_names_taken]

Yeah, I'm on day 3 atm, never seen more than 5-6 bailed ships in one sector, and they did not bail all 'at once', but accumulated over time since no one seems to be interested in claiming them for some time.

While I'm writing, I have a question of my own.
Help me, Joubarbe, for I have sinned. It's been a year or two since my last Mayhem game.
Is it normal that there's no place to buy Docking Computer or QJE anywhere in the universe?
I scanned through the release notes, but haven't noticed this mentioned anywhere.
Is my installation f-ed up? If not, I would be interested to hear the reasoning behind this. The beginning of the game is quite tiresome without DC. I would understand it in a 'hardcore' mode like the one without JDs.

[magitsu]

Is it normal that there's no place to buy Docking Computer or QJE anywhere in the universe?

Yes, you are for the most part supposed to produce and equip your own ships. Sanctuary provides a reliable way for doing this. The other way is to scavenge/trade ships and take it off them if they happen to come with it.
Some things are not available for trade at all, but many things you can trade at the beginning. But you are steered towards becoming self-sufficient, for example with the incentive to get +1 perk to all sanctuaries by each permanent declaration of war you have to courage to do. Almost all factions have some trade good that you need for fleet production, so you need to do it yourself if there's a war preventing trade. The most important good for fleet production is Meatsteak Cahoonas of Argon. Teladi has Teladianum, then there's Soja husk, BoFu, Rastar Oil... and the unique set of Terran goods.

You can get a free QJE to all of your ships you are building with one sanctuary perk. Otherwise it can be traded for one of the color crystals you occasionally get from mining (or buy from mining outpost).
DC is quite common in bailed ships or in ships that you can buy from the companies. Just freight exchange when two ships are docked if it's on a wrong ship. Or of the crystals will also do as an upgrade at the sanctuary docks.

QJE = 2 blue crystals (506k at NMMC mining outpost in Scale Plate Green)
DC = 2 yellow crystals (212K at NMMC mining outpost in Scale Plate Green)

[all_other_names_taken]

...

Oh, thanks, I know how to play Mayhem, I just said I haven't played it for quite some time and, if I remember it correctly, last time I played those items could be bought at equipment docks and company HQ stations. I was asking if they were removed as a design decision by the Panda or I somehow messed up my installation.

[magitsu]

Oh, thanks, I know how to play Mayhem, I just said I haven't played it for quite some time and, if I remember it correctly, last time I played those items could be bought at equipment docks and company HQ stations. I was asking if they were removed as a design decision by the Panda or I somehow messed up my installation.

Removed Feb 2018.
viewtopic.php?p=4701380#p4701380

[all_other_names_taken]

Removed Feb 2018.

Thanks, that answers the part of my question about QJE. I guess the Docking Computer also got deleted somewhere along the way, though for that one I really can't see even a hint of a good reason why. Nothing important, was just wondering.

[magitsu]

Removed Feb 2018.

Thanks, that answers the part of my question about QJE. I guess the Docking Computer also got deleted somewhere along the way, though for that one I really can't see even a hint of a good reason why. Nothing important, was just wondering.

Some of the starts have docking computer, at least the taxi one.

[Joubarbe]

The Docking Computer only works on Player Ship. In that regard, it a very useful equipment and shouldn't be available just as an ordinary equipment. You should feel the difference and be happy when you finally achieve building one. I mean, the thing teleports you!

And yeah, the taxi gamestart is the only one that is equipped with such a gear. Makes sense for a taxi.

[all_other_names_taken]

The Docking Computer only works on Player Ship. In that regard, it a very useful equipment and shouldn't be available just as an ordinary equipment. You should feel the difference and be happy when you finally achieve building one. I mean, the thing teleports you!

And yeah, the taxi gamestart is the only one that is equipped with such a gear. Makes sense for a taxi.

I see.
I do tend to do a bit of taxiing at the beginning, so I was feeling the pain.
Your reasoning makes sense, at least partially, because I didn't wait to build it, just found it in an abandoned ship after a couple hours of playing.
And I wouldn't exactly word it as 'it teleports you' (although it does over a very small distance), I see it more as a means to cut out manual docking which gets too old and boring too soon.

[Dragofer]

Just started out with Mayhem, wish I'd done so much earlier as it's already been plenty fun. Dropping in here though because it seems almost all of the NPC economy is defunct because of a severe shortage of energy cells. This affects the majority of the around 80 sectors I've discovered so far, half a game day in, almost everything is out of energy cells. I haven't seen something like this in my X3LU playthrough.

Makes me wonder if this is something that happens occasionally in early-game and will get fixed sooner or later by GoD spawning plenty solar power plants, or if something's gone wrong? My install does seem to be fine, the main menu reads v1.72 of LU and v2.913 of Mayhem and everything else looks like it works as intended.

[magitsu]

Just started out with Mayhem, wish I'd done so much earlier as it's already been plenty fun. Dropping in here though because it seems almost all of the NPC economy is defunct because of a severe shortage of energy cells. This affects the majority of the around 80 sectors I've discovered so far, half a game day in, almost everything is out of energy cells. I haven't seen something like this in my X3LU playthrough.

Makes me wonder if this is something that happens occasionally in early-game and will get fixed sooner or later by GoD spawning plenty solar power plants, or if something's gone wrong? My install does seem to be fine, the main menu reads v1.72 of LU and v2.913 of Mayhem and everything else looks like it works as intended.

It's the mechanic that assigns empty sectors at random. If that cluster hits to what would normally be populated heavily with solar plants, then that faction / nearby sectors are going to grind to a halt. If the heavy shield/laser production sectors get wiped, there might be plenty of energy around.
For example in one of my recent starts there's amazingly zero solar plants around Argon Prime because The Hole, The Wall, Antigone Memorial, Power Circle, Home of Light and Ore Belt are unassigned. It's crazy drought because there's just 2 Medium Solar plants at Teladi Gain in all of that area bordered by split/pirates/paranids.
That's either an amazing business opportunity for your solar plants or a significant halt to Argon/Boron economy in that corner of the map. (here's the save if you want to take a spin: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1842XxG ... sp=sharing )

In that game I plopped 1st sanctuary to Antigone. Just the first perk Solar Panels produced 2.1k/5min (300% sun) and that started the train of energy transports. Then 3-4 solar plants each at 4.78k/4.4min later it steadied out. The first ones raked in about 1 million per hour from npc trades at a price of 26. At 3-4 plants it started to look like oversupply until I got some cahoona complexes etc. in the next sector.

But yeah, they can be out of solar even if everything is good. Until they are almost full (because by then selling energy won't be profitable for traders) some of the factories can gobble obscene amount of e-cells. The Outpost etc. ones with stable price of 32 and very large storage especially provide a massive sink for energy much like your sanctuaries could. Early on the NPC traders might not see much in the way of trade besides energy.

In another start similar empty cluster around Mars meant that there were for example 11 less Protein Paste factories than normally. Terran/ATF economy in general seems a bit challenging, not the least due to their sectors being way too big. Also the lack of ice asteroids means their few pre-placed ice facilities are relied heavily for water production because the alternate method, water plants can't secure enough ice. The chains do have quite a bit of flexibility because secondary products are not required for production, they are just there for money/resource sink.

The assignment of initial Cores vs Borders can also be similarly significant drastic shaper. Also whether Xenon has empty sectors next to them - if there are, they take one instantly and proceed further. With opposition they might not be able to advance at all. Against a core they might be the losing side. When everyone gets more cores eventually (at higher threat level, aka when you are ready for it) that should be when the AI economy also grows a bit.

They will be taking empty sectors or Xenon/Pirate sectors near their cores eventually. Then the balance between factories can improve. Between good factions little changes because clean wars (based on racking up war score) don't wipe the sector clean, it just transfers it as a whole. That's why you can see Argon owning Teladianium factories etc.

This kind of variety is among the best things in Mayhem.

[Dragofer]

@magitsu
Ah, so I'm not the only one and this may be a regularly occurring thing. From my X3LU playthrough I remember it was tough finding opportunities for new stations because the NPCs had most of their economy covered already. Which isn't to say, however, that I couldn't make billions of credits selling energy cells at max price from a 100x solar SCH with a fleet of 20 high-end tradeships (10000 cargo 110 m/s). Was hoping that in Mayhem GoD - or autopopulate, as it seems to be called here - would kick in and get the economy going again sooner than later, but you suggest that such a major buildup would only happen when the unknown sectors start getting claimed by the NPCs in a later phase of the game.

Supplying all those stations with max-price energy cells would be fantastic profit for sure, but I think I'd prefer to hold off from that. What I really like about Mayhem is how every resource feels hard-earned and needed, so having more credits than I'd really need for such a low level of effort wouldn't fit into the picture. Maybe this'll be the final nudge to get me into piracy and boarding as a source of income and valuable high-tech materials.

[aurelcourt]

In Mayhem you don't really care that much about money, much more about resources.

Money will help a bit with a few things, but you'd only need a few dozen millions to run an end game economy with several shipyards, hundreds of ships and wars going on all over the place!

It's all about logistics and how to expand enough to produce all these resources you need for your ships, without pushing it too far and being defenceless in case of OCV/faction attack

I think I never actually reached the 100million cash mark in Mayhem, even with empires worth >5-10 billions.

That's the beauty of it : a war is won by its logistic supply ! Not only with money like in LU.

Also no more x100 factories or 15000yield asteroid. You actually have to build MANY stations and mines and handle all the logistics that go with it. But you have all the tools available for that

[Munimentum]

Are there only certain TS ship variants that are given to you at the start? I restarted a couple of times after messing up and it seems to only be giving me Demeter variants. I was curious and used the Quickstart option about 20 times and literally only got Demeter variants (might have gotten Dolphins once or twice)

Is this intended or is something influencing which variant you get?

[aurelcourt]

Are there only certain TS ship variants that are given to you at the start? I restarted a couple of times after messing up and it seems to only be giving me Demeter variants. I was curious and used the Quickstart option about 20 times and literally only got Demeter variants (might have gotten Dolphins once or twice)

Is this intended or is something influencing which variant you get?

No idea, but that is usually one of the first things I do before starting to expand : exploring the universe looking for a good TS (>100m/s for example) that I'll scan and research, and which will be the heart of my economy ! I don't really use the first one we find.

[magitsu]

I think you get normal or xl in the normal starts (taxi, miner), with quite a bit of randomness which factions' TS it is. Alliance start seems to give premium TSes like ATF/Terran gives out Bragi.

If you get xl one you get a slightly better (100-200k) start because it's always maxed with energy cells. In alliance starts the goods seem to be more valuable, for example computer parts etc. in that Bragi.

Or maybe it's purely because of what TS gets taken over. If I had to guess it's based solely on whose sector the game random transports you upon start.

Quick start is probably one of the more fixed result ones. I mean Pleco & Springblossom always appear, then it's no surprise if the TS is also always Demeter but allows different type.

So don't play the first two easy presets if you want more randomness to your start. But if you do then you just got to hunt both in sector and the companies used ships for sale.

[viking42]

Hi,

Neither the first post, nor the ModDb page is explaining what this mod is about, what does it bring, what does it change?

[Joubarbe]

It makes hot waffles and fresh coffee.

[Hector0x]

@viking42: The summary tab on ModDb actually has a great overview. But yes, it changes many things and the changelog linked in the 1st post (dropbox) is the only real documentation.

But here is my condensed POV about the most important differences:

- revamp of many gamerules, but no additional ships or content is added. Think of it like a different game with additional layers of depth compared to vanilla.
- certain threats mildly force the player into getting stronger over time
- player has to claim sectors because his power is somewhat bound to the amount of sectors he owns
- this leads to conflict at some point

[magitsu]

Randomization of starts (asteroid generation, random unclaimed sectors)
Focus on faction v faction wars
Core (=shipyard) vs border sector mechanic and invasions from the shipyards
Focus on production and logistics instead of buying equipment/ships
Many ways to achieve the same goal (buy, produce, claim, board, recycle)
Deeper marine/boarding gamepley
Story/ascension
You become a real faction with own sectors, which is balanced by increasing threat and its effects

Some of vanilla litcube's insane production scaling reduced