TC: Finding M7/M Return Ship Missions

[Thrasher91604]

I'm looking for these to train my marines' fighting skills. My fight rank is about 25, trade is 28. Is there a region of the universe that gives more of these missions?

[StarSword]

Whether a Return Ship mission is available and what ship comes out it is randomly determined. But if you're just after marine training there's an easier way to do it.

Go to a sector with civilian TLs and little military presence (the Argon Casino in Montalaar is a good choice for TC). Civilian TLs have no weapons, so all you've got to do is keep the shields down.

[Triaxx2]

Be warned though, that while civilian TL's have no guns, they might have internal sentry lasers or other boarding nastiness. Scan before you attack.

[Nanook]

The ships you get in the Return Ship missions are dependent on your rep with the race offering the mission, among other things. You'll only get M7/M7M ships if you're in the second or highest rep level with that race.

And as mentioned previously, the RNG (Random Number Generator) plays a huge role, too. The chances of getting the big ships are much lower, even at the highest race rep, than getting the smaller ships. Luck plays a huge part.

[Thrasher91604]

Thanks!

I got lucky and found an M7 after scouring about 15 sectors. My poor 0 - 1 star fighting (but 5 star in everything else) marines got slaughtered. Out of 16 marines only 7 survived. Those did gain about 10-20 points in fighting. Hopefully enough will survive 4-7 more boardings!

I the meantime I bought 9 more marines with fighting above 50. I need to get hem trained in non-fighting skills. May be a while before I can finish the PHQ plot.

[Triaxx2]

Yeah, training fighting is the hardest part. After a while you'll learn to buy only high fight skill marines. Watch out for TM's for sale secondhand at stations. They'll often have skilled marines on board.