Paranid incursion into Light of Heart, killing cahoona bakeries !!!

[GeminiFire]

Wow, I have never seen an incursion like this, but it may have happened and I was just otherwise occupied....

I was trying to move a silicon mile, ore mine, and SPP-L to the Unknown sector adjacent to New Income (55% ore & 50% silicon less that 15kM apart). The closest place to get all three was Legends' Home. That corner of my universe is fairly quiet, with the exception old stupid station traders wandering through 347, and becoming lunch for a Q and Company (even had a TL try 347 with same result).
At one point, I could not locate the Argon TL (Legends; Home), and it was not on the ship list. When I checked my messages, I was informed the my hired, LOADED TL was destroyed by a Paranid Zeus in Light of Heart (Argon)! WTF!!!! Since they left my ASATs alone, I was able to see a Zues, 2 Deimos and 2 dozen M4 & M5. I jumped in to see this in person.
At that time, the Zues and Diemos (2) were hammering on a Bakery, and shortly thereafter I witnessed my first station destruction (Cool!!! and not my station). Over the next hour or two (real time) they would hammer on the EQ dock and Shipyard but not get past the shields. They did, with their escorts, ruin the day of many transport ships, and when the Paranid would move to another area, I would sneak in and pick up the goodies. They could not do as much damage as i would have expected.
I was expecting an Argon Armada to jump in and "drop the hammer", but not yet (never seen a capital fight in X3, but i loved those in Freespace2). Since I have only found 25Mj shield fabs with the Paranid, I am not inclined to do much (as if I could).
I dropped 6 LTs in Aladna Hill at adjacent gate (S), to scratch their paint if they came through. The only thing that came through were 2 paranid traders, and they did not last long, though the drones seemed to confuse the LTs. My rank also dropped 10% for that little bit. I guess that my LTs have my name on them, so i best be careful where I be careful where I leave them about..
Also, as a Matter of Principle I set a Booze/WeedPlex in Hatika's Faith, and have a fully trained CAG doing his thing. I am a firm believer and supporter of recreational illicit products so I had to have one myself, and dedicate resources and transports to support everyone's choice.
There are normally a few Pirates in-sector, but they don't hate me (yet), and generally leave me be.
This night for some reason, there were 2 M5 ship picking at the Bliss Place only (maybe trying to shake loose some party materials). Of course they could not scratch the shields, but they were out of range from my LTs (poorly placed). I went and picked up 6 LTs at my weapon complex, and dropped them in their faces as they are chasing me in my Zupheris.

LTs are COOL up close, as long as they are shooting at others.

I have tried to avoid fight ranking to keep things mellow, and getting a trading/manufacturing money machine together.

I read a lot about XEmporors defending their world with fleets of Capital Ships. I guess this is the fisrt step into that world. I have held up Argon Patriots plot and awaits me in Heretic's End.
Maybe I'll buy an M7 with a collection of Ships and wander back up that way. With 24 SF Mistrals "working it", I am beginning to make a bit of Cash. I have a LONG way to go to make the Vanilla Billionaire Club.

Just a story about my little X-Universe....

Paranid pissing you off too?

All stories welcome, and Studied...

GF







off-topic, i LOVE the trained CAGs.

[Nanook]

... I have held up Argon Patriots plot and awaits me in Heretic's End....

Just to clarify, the Argon Patriot start has nothing to do with any plots. It's just the starting conditions of the game you chose to start with. Here's a list of the plots and their requirements - TC Plots FAQ. It sounds like you've started the first one on the list.

[Wolvan]

All stories welcome, and Studied...

Race invasions are my second favorite part of this game! Jealous that you got a good non Kha'ak/Xenon one.


Anyway, today I was cruising around down south looking for some more advanced sats when I stumbled into Contorted Dominion (fairly hot border zone between the Split and Boron) and I got to see one hell of a fight.

There was a Heavy Hydra with a decent cloud of escorts kicking around the southern end of the system staying well clear of the OWP while blowing up as many TSs bound for Strong Arms as they could. I knew things were going to get interesting and I was looking for some salvage anyway so I figured I'd stick around and watch the fun.

Let me tell you it was a damn inspiring thing to watch that little hydra cast its defiance at the split warmongers, the thing and it's escorts took down 3... yes that's THREE Tigers like they were made of tissue paper and at least a half dozen heavy dragons and assorted escorts before meeting the wrong end of a torpedo. I know on paper the heavy hydra is just better than worthless but man, seeing that little guy in action has really made me want to pick one up and see what I can do with it. I didn't get any hulls (using NPC bails) but I got almost 3/4 million in dropped missiles.

Then later on, I decided to take a break from my DiD game and fired up my 'just for fun' pirate game. Well I was actually passing through that unknown sector where you were building those mines (most people refer to that system as Avarice BTW due to events in X3R). I was trying to get back to my base in Danna's without having to go all the way around through paranid and pirate space since I'm hostile with the Boron and Argon at the moment, but I figured I was in my pirate Buzzard, and at 260+ m/s I figured I'd try slipping through Avarice and enter pirate alley via Aladna Hill.

Well I jumped out of the gate into Montalaar and got the whole 'turn back or die' message. I hung by the gate for a minute to see what they'd throw my way, but nothing showed up on scans. I could see flashes off in the distance so I figured the local fuzz were busy and started heading towards the north gate.

In my pirate game I have NPC bails at the default of 60% and on my scanner up pops 'Heavy Centaur' 'Mammoth' 'Gladius' 'Peregrine' 'Mamba' 'Mamba' 'Falcon' 'Mercury SF' and on and on.... All pilotless.

WTF?

I moved a little bit further into the system and thats when I saw the pulsing golden beams. Gulp.

Full blown Khaak Invasion. 2 destroyers, a carrier and a crapload of fighters. Figured I'd turn it to my advantage, so I danced around the capitals while scooping up as many of the ships as I could. as soon as I had them claimed I sent them into avarice and then through to the SY in Ianamus Zura. A bunch of the stuff got picked off on the way but in the end I came out with a mammoth, a heavy centaur a dragon, a bunch of mambas, and some TSs.

As far as I know the purples are still going nuts in there, most of the stations were debris and the local argon and boron garrisons had been cleaned out. Might have to go back in an hour or two (game time) and see if there's any more goodies for me to appropriate!