[Noob Question] IS & OOS Combat - Can someone please explain this for me?

[SanguineHaze]

So, I'm a fairly new player. I remember briefly touching X2 and X3:R a few years back on a friend's PC, and when I saw it on Steam on sale a few weeks ago I decided to grab X3:R. After a bit of that, I grabbed X3:TC, which I'm currently playing and so far am enjoying more than Reunion.

That said, I'm still getting the hang of some of the concepts of the game. I've seen people mentioning "In Sector" and "Out of Sector" combat, and I just want to double check what I think I know.

In sector = Anything within the containing "box" of the sector.
Out of Sector = Anything a certain distance beyond the edge of the given sector.

First of all: Is this correct?

Secondly: Does the "outside" ever end, or does it continue outward indefinitely? AKA: If I put it on SETAx10, and leave it for a day, will I end up in a different sector?

Third: What is the use of going "out of sector"? Can I find cool stuff? I had spent some time exploring the out of border area in... one of the sectors close to Argon Prime, but I got bored after about an hour of seeing abso-freaking-lutely nothing beyond my ship and a tail of ~10 pirate ships which tried pitifully to catch me (Little did they know I had a jumpdrive, so I left them sitting out there in the great void).

Thanks for reading. Sorry if this was posted somewhere and I couldn't find it (my Google-Fu is not as strong as I thought it was, apparently.)

[jkjklkl]

In-Sector refers to everything inside the sector you are currently in.
Out-of-Sector is everything not in the sector you are currently in, but in other sectors.

I believe if you keep going in one direction, you will loop back around. and start heading towards the center of the sector again from the other direction.

You should be familiar with IS combat. OOS combat, however, is different. These are the rules:
1) Each ship takes turns firing at a single enemy
2) Turn order is determined by ship speed.
3) All weapons are fired regardless of where they are on the ship
4) Weapon energy does not exist

Aaand I believe that's it. I'm sure someone will come along and correct me if I'm wrong.

[Alan Phipps]

No IS and OOS refer to the location, action or ship that is currently of particular interest to you. If it is taking place in the same sector as your personal ship then it is IS, if it is taking place in a sector other than where your personal ship is then it is OOS.

IS has full real-time sector rendering, collision detection and mostly the same types of combat rules and actions as the Player. OOS has regular snapshots in time only, no collision detection and combat is emulated according to a sort of formula behaviour.

Hope this helps.

[Gripen]

OOS is there to simulate what goes on outside the sector you are currently in. They have pretty much nothing in common beside keeping track of where stuff are.

Combat OOS is based on calculations that will never compare to beeing in the same sector, no matter the distance from the center.

You will not reach another sector simply traveling a direction.


edit: damn too slow!

[SanguineHaze]

Thank you guys! That greatly clears up my confusion! (And also explains why a few of my patrols got ganked when I thought they should have been capable of taking out a few measly pirates!)

[rafezetter]

I'd like to ask whats the turn based timer? every x seconds or longer or "until target is destroyed", and does it start slowest speed to highest? meaning the slower m3's get to take first shots because frankly having a heavy m3 (like Xenon lx) firing all guns (including rear facing turrets? which genius coded that) without laser power limitations until death is frankly stupid, it GUARANTEES death in most cases for haulers.

which explains why my altered 3 125mj shielded haulers are still dying to what would ordinarily be a few scout ships, even with heavier turret guns and mosquito missile defence.

[p00fer]

from what ive read the ticks are of 5 secs if you're not watching the sector and 30 if you are, missiles hit instantly, theres no defense against them. from what ive read also the only way to ensure that wont happen is to blockade gates with ~50 LT or 60 m3's, im doing the LT one, one LT at a time

[Alan Phipps]

@ poofer: Other way around for OOS turns. It is 30 sec turns not watched and 5 sec watched. Yes missiles insta-hit OOS but only ever a single warheads-worth per turn and with no accompanying laser damage from the same ship in that turn.

@ rafezetter: While all lasers mounted are included with no energy or range limitations, the total laser damage per ship per turn is then weighted according to an arcane OOS combat forumula with an RNG element included so that the results are not always foregone conclusions. Recent patches have made OOS combat a bit more likely to reflect IS outcomes.

The devs responsible ('which genius coded that'?) had game processing needs to consider and wanted to have some OOS combat without bringing most players' PCs to their knees! MMD will not work OOS (obviously) and if just one fighter fires a high yield missile first round then your hauler is probably dead even with bulked-up shielding.