Combat rewards - Patrol and XI

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Hob Anagerik
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Combat rewards - Patrol and XI

Post by Hob Anagerik » Wed, 24. Dec 08, 01:01

Anyone else notice a massive drop in rewards for M1/M2/M6 kills? Earlier today I was getting something like 7-8 million for an M2 and now I'm only getting 700k or so. I was getting those high rewards even after I installed 1.3 as that was the first thing I thought it might be. I've tried several missions now and get the same kinds of results but it wasn't like this yesterday or earlier today.

Anyone else seen this or might know what it is?
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Malkuth74
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Post by Malkuth74 » Wed, 24. Dec 08, 01:03

You must be a steam user. We have a new patch that is 1.4 that nerfed the payouts.

Too many people crying like babies I guess had to ruin it for others that don't have 10 hours a day to play this game.

Derakarsis
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Post by Derakarsis » Wed, 24. Dec 08, 01:06

It seems that they are unable to actually find a happy medium. If trading didn't suck so badly for reward vs. time invested, people wouldn't have complained so much.

Well... yes, this is the internet, they probably would.

Many folks have stated that with the reduced kill rewards it has increased the difficulty. What it's actually done is increased the time doing something repeatitive. We're back to killing a destroyer MIGHT buy a single gun.

In another couple of patches they might find a relative balance.
Last edited by Derakarsis on Wed, 24. Dec 08, 01:12, edited 1 time in total.

(/\)arped
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Post by (/\)arped » Wed, 24. Dec 08, 01:10

Derakarsis wrote:It seems that they are unable to actually find a happy medium. If trading didn't suck so badly for reward vs. time invested, people wouldn't have complained so much.
I can't emphasise this more. Plus, I've always found trading a bit monotonous anyway.

And no, don't anyone tell me to go to the S&M forum, for now I want to keep my game Vanilla...

DeadlyDarkness
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Post by DeadlyDarkness » Wed, 24. Dec 08, 01:12

universe traders used to take the boredom of the money making. Now however, they seem to be rather lacking. They may still work, so try investing in some. Even sector traders make good money.

TiGGs
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Post by TiGGs » Wed, 24. Dec 08, 01:13

I'm unhappy about that to, because I liked to use supporting ships in battle. With the reduced payout I'm afraid to lose a single M3 so this game has become a "single player game" for me again... regarding the patrol missions. I usually play "no-reload" games and it really hurts so bad now to lose a M2, so I will keep it in my home sector just to look at when I'm bored.

At least I can play fleet commander with those station defense mission as these payouts aren't nerfed yet.

Derakarsis
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Post by Derakarsis » Wed, 24. Dec 08, 01:15

From what I've heard (Heresay only) some of the station build missions have really gone up in price reward. Might be worth checking out- after all, before the patch no one can honestly tell you they looked at missions without the red crosshairs as a way of gaining actual cash.

Potential positive diversification!

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Post by (/\)arped » Wed, 24. Dec 08, 01:19

I already do Station Building missions, they're nice while I'm doing some exploring... But arguably they're more unbalanced than the combat missions!

Buillding a 200K factory for a reward of (in one circumstance) 20mill?!

Nice, easy money, but even so! You can't possibly call the combat missions unbalanced (which require some form of player input other than console commands) if you were to rely on these as stable income.

I'm not complaining per se about this... Like I say, I already use them. But the double standards here are crazy.

Derakarsis
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Post by Derakarsis » Wed, 24. Dec 08, 01:27

I think the bottom line is, Missions were kinda slapped onto the game without due regard and rebalance to the overall economy. Now, obviously I personally didn't sit in on the board room meeting when they decided to add them, but I think the results speak for themselves.

Missions are great, an excellent idea, one that made X a much more engaging experience for me. They breathe a little more life into the game.

Its clear that egosoft is attempting to bring them into balance with the rest of the game, they're just having to do it incrementally based on what is essentially community beta testing.

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Post by NeverSnake » Wed, 24. Dec 08, 01:54

JFJohnny5 wrote:I don't feel combat should fully fund my efforts, but considering the next combat rank almost requires a M2... It makes it very difficult to run a game based on combat.
A good incentive to start capturing some ships to sell maybe?
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(/\)arped
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Post by (/\)arped » Wed, 24. Dec 08, 02:05

Definitely. In some respects I am[/i] glad of this patch.. I haven't put my capping boots on since X2 either...

So, to be honest, I'll play it, see what it's like. But yeah. The news isn't good just yet.

b1rd
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Post by b1rd » Wed, 24. Dec 08, 02:34

Honestly, with the recent nerf, invasion missions have gone back to being a tedious single player/ship event which you plow through for quite some time. The new rewards make it prohibitive for a player with just a couple game days to risk losing a 2/3 million m3 just to kill off 10 or so m6s whose rewards don't even cover the cost. Let alone engage the entire player fleet and risk staggering losses, if you consider the player doesn't even get paid for their kills.


They nerfed the missions beyond reason imho.

b1rd

Ozman202
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Post by Ozman202 » Wed, 24. Dec 08, 03:08

I will agree i killed two Xenon K's as part of a mission at Assasin and got no reward for them whatsoever
Too many M3's Die by crashing into their own missiles

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Mars Mug
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Post by Mars Mug » Wed, 24. Dec 08, 03:09

I don’t think it’s fair to expect the developers to guess with each patch what is considered acceptable by the majority. Perhaps the best way to do this would be to post some form of poll or just a thread where people post a price list for kills in a mission, then someone could do some statistical analysis on all the suggestions.

Jambro
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Post by Jambro » Wed, 24. Dec 08, 03:13

The patch is good news who like to work a little bit at their game sessions, its bad news for people who like to play casually and enjoy the easy accessibility of making lots of money in a short amount of time. Personally, I think they are on the right track. X has always been a niche game designed to actually challenge the player with depth and encouragement of ingenuity, and with overcoming challenge the rewards are so much more fun. It adds to the collective feeling that everything in the game carries some "weight" so to speak. I would hate to see Egosoft cater to the add kiddies by hand feeding people everything the game has to offer in matter of a couple of hours. That formula has been done, done and done way too much.

That being said I do agree that balancing needs some serious work still. They need to either kick up rewards up a little bit or allow your fleet ships to collect the bounty - make the risk of combat and losing assets worth it- as others have said. They also need to balance out the other remaining mission types as well. No single 10 minute mission type should make you tens of millions imo.

So please Egosoft, continue to refine your game but don't dumb it down for a mainstream audience. You know what kind of fanbase you keep :).
Last edited by Jambro on Wed, 24. Dec 08, 03:38, edited 1 time in total.

b1rd
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Post by b1rd » Wed, 24. Dec 08, 03:28

The thing is, the game as it is now takes an extreme investment of time from someone who only has a few hours a week to play. Not to mention that only those with very heavy revenue sources, large numbers of stations and time invested, will ever get to see serious fleet action. And even then, only on a whim and at a enormous expense of in-game credits and playing time. (if you don't want to afk SETA through the night, which really shouldn't be necessary)

This patch makes anything beyond a personal fully kitted M7 a toy. Rewards don't even make up for the missiles one could use to speed the missions up.

It brakes the game for anyone who's main interest is fighting.

b1rd

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Seathal
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Post by Seathal » Wed, 24. Dec 08, 03:35

b1rd wrote:The thing is, the game as it is now takes an extreme investment of time from someone who only has a few hours a week to play. Not to mention that only those with very heavy revenue sources, large numbers of stations and time invested, will ever get to see serious fleet action. And even then, only on a whim and at a enormous expense of in-game credits and playing time. (if you don't want to afk SETA through the night, which really shouldn't be necessary)

This patch makes anything beyond a personal fully kitted M7 a toy. Rewards don't even make up for the missiles one could use to speed the missions up.

It brakes the game for anyone who's main interest is fighting.

b1rd
As I said in other posts I totally agree with you. The new reward ssytem breaks the combat side of the game. You can't complete the top-ranking patrol missions because you haven't earned enough money to buy yourself an M2 to face those Khaak M2's and M1's and fleets of M6's that rip your M6/7 apart within seconds and still, those will net a comical ammount. Combat gets boring if it's risky and without prize, mostly like X3R, where the only way to get a considerable fleet/empire was to SETA for nights or use cheats. No Fun.

Derakarsis
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Post by Derakarsis » Wed, 24. Dec 08, 04:00

Jambro wrote:So please Egosoft, continue to refine your game but don't dumb it down for a mainstream audience. You know what kind of fanbase you keep :).
I agree that the hallmark of the X-Series is its level of depth and complexity. I agree that effort, brainpower, and a little elbow grease should be required to attain reward.

What I don't agree with is the level and direction of some of the more recent changes. The fix this thread is refering to is overkill, and a misinterpretation of the overall issues associated with game balance. The fix, as it stands currently isn't a proportial fix. By overextending we simply push into needless tedium- Which isn't what the X-Series is about- We'll reserve that type of timesink for the Grind so commonly applied in the MMO world.

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NUKLEAR-SLUG
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Post by NUKLEAR-SLUG » Wed, 24. Dec 08, 06:32

Personally I think those complaining have just been spoiled by the recent cash-heavy missions. 700k for killing a K is damn good compared to X3:R where you got 10k.

Sure you could do the XI where you got 6m a K but they only appeared every 12 hours or so and you had to actually go looking for them. Missions these days you can generally find one or two in every sector you visit and you've got them on tap.

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Post by Thelic » Wed, 24. Dec 08, 09:04

NUKLEAR-SLUG wrote:Personally I think those complaining have just been spoiled by the recent cash-heavy missions. 700k for killing a K is damn good compared to X3:R where you got 10k.

Sure you could do the XI where you got 6m a K but they only appeared every 12 hours or so and you had to actually go looking for them. Missions these days you can generally find one or two in every sector you visit and you've got them on tap.
This is the kicker. The main problem I had with huge payouts in combat mission isn't the payouts, but the frequency at which the player can take part in them. In Reunion, you would have to scour Trading Stations across the universe for the XI, but now you just putt around in your ship of choice, comming every station with the symbol until you find what you want.

The change I propose, then is to add player owned ships to the total, not just player ships and wingmen. Give incentive to bring more heat to the fight instead of doing a mission for two hours fighting 8 Ps with your Venti.

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