Is there anything I can do to secure Fields of Opportunity for trading?

[birdtable]

I never grouped anything .... depends on what "additions" you have made but I always found individual control saves your sanity.... others may disagree.
Mentioned earlier I waved the big stick with 5 Olmekrons none were grouped.
Look forward to you returning to describe your fleet exploits ...

[Sinxar]

All those destroyers got rekt in Fields of Opportunity. Only lost some MK1 drones. They respawn super fast too. Got 9 kills on the first gate by the outpost. 12 more around the outpost itself. Those are just the ones that were camping the area. On the way to the other gate more were spawning but I decided to just keep going. Got 6 more that were hanging out on the OL gate in Sea-green Oasis and also the 8 around the station there as well. They are still spawning though, guess you aren't supposed to kill them because the respawn rates are crazy high. At least they are very easy kills, only takes 10 seconds or less for each one to go down.
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[Lord Crc]

I always like to keep 3-5 Balors around if I want to secure a zone. They're fairly cheap and a few of them makes short work of most ships.

Personally I've been very disappointed by the subordinate AI, so I just order each ship to patrol zone.

It should be said I'm using the improved combat mod tho (MCT).

[Sparky Sparkycorp]

It is also possible to acquire Phoenix Marauders without tanking reputation.

They can be targets of Assassination missions offered with FoO. Whilst they will generally (maybe always) be pirates, they will not belong to the two local 'pirate' factions.

[RAVEN.myst]

I got a Fulmekron and three light sul's right now. What is the best way to group these guys? Was thinking I should let the Fulmekron be the leader (i have him set to attack enemies) but I'm not sure how the logic works.

I am afraid he will send in the Sul's to get wrecked vs a big ship while slowly lumbering over to put some dps on the target. Or would it be better to group the Suls and let the Fulmekron do its own thing? Ideally I want the Fulmekron to tank it while the Suls get in there with drones and guns since they are on the weak side.

Well, the basic principle of having the slowest, heaviest ship as the leader is sound - its escorts will be able to keep pace with it even when losing ground through manoeuvres, and can theoretically break off to engage light enemies and then resume their station. However, in practice, unfortunately I have to agree with the negative consensus - the subordinate AI doesn't work very well at all. The escorts tend to dance around, jostling for the same positions (on several occasions I had the AI eventually give up and result in two or more escort ships overlapping!), then even when they do settle down, they don't often distribute themselves logically (on some occasions, I had 3 smaller ships escorting a larger one, and instead of spreading out at 120-degree intervals, they all ended up occupying one 120-degree arc, thus protecting just one side of the ship), and often they end up getting in the way of their leader. This last I found particularly true when trying to escort an Arawn with a group (ranging between 4 and 6) of mixed Taranises and Olmekrons - it was so bad, that the group couldn't even travel anywhere, as one of the escorts would cut across the leader's path, or even merely get close, and the leader would then veer off, only to repeat this process indefinitely.

I think it's really sad, as building a tiered fleet structure has the potential to create effective operational units and deploy them in interesting battles - but alas, 'tis not to be...

@Sparky: thanks for that tip, it hadn't occurred to me (probably because I tend to avoid the deus ex machinas resulting from missions - I play more organic games with smoother development curves - which has its disadvantages, heh.) If I play in FoO again, I will make sure to "shop" in that manner

However, for sector patrols, I find that 2- or 3-ship patrol units can be quite effective - say, a Sul/Stromvok escorted by a Balor. However, any larger than that and the formation gets unwieldy as soon as the action is in-zone.

[Sinxar]

Sadly modders don't seem too interested in fixing any of this stuff. I got MCT and disabled boosting to/from battle and jumping to target. This helps a lot as ships will attempt to flee if their shields get too low (yay traders aren't completely incompetent anymore!) so having a decently fast Light Sul to finish off the enemies that are trying to run away helps. I finally cleared out FoO with minimal losses. Using the Fulmekron on those pirates works very well. I may get two or three Olmekrons and group them with the Fulmekron to keep the area secure.

Something deeply satisfying about dishing out punishment to these guys who think they can just shoot my fleet with no repercussions.
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[spankahontis]

Sadly modders don't seem too interested in fixing any of this stuff. I got MCT and disabled boosting to/from battle and jumping to target. This helps a lot as ships will attempt to flee if their shields get too low (yay traders aren't completely incompetent anymore!) so having a decently fast Light Sul to finish off the enemies that are trying to run away helps. I finally cleared out FoO with minimal losses. Using the Fulmekron on those pirates works very well. I may get two or three Olmekrons and group them with the Fulmekron to keep the area secure.

Something deeply satisfying about dishing out punishment to these guys who think they can just shoot my fleet with no repercussions.
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Problem i've had though is indestructible stations, they draw your Patrolling Fulmekrons like moths to flames when chasing down enemy ships fleeing towards them.

They attack those stations and are stuck shooting them until you order them to return to where they were originally patrolling.

[Sparky Sparkycorp]

@Sparky: thanks for that tip, it hadn't occurred to me (probably because I tend to avoid the deus ex machinas resulting from missions - I play more organic games with smoother development curves - which has its disadvantages, heh.) If I play in FoO again, I will make sure to "shop" in that manner

Ha, ha, ha! My pleasure

[RodentofDoom]

They just attack trade ships, even if you have maxed your standings with them, the 'pirate' script they run will still target your trading ships.

If you retaliate and go pheonix hunting, you will lose standings with the teladi aswell because you're attacking potential customers of thiers.

Using any form of automated trade passing through FoO simply places you in a lose/lose situation.

The only way to avoid them is to use a FIGHT ship that also has cargo space (oddly, also a pheonix), manually transfer wares between ships whilst still in Albion, move your pheonix though the Teladi zones, and manually transfer wares again in OL to a second trade ship.

It's a choice
- much micro-management with 0 risk of marauders in FoO
- 0 micro-management through autotrading with much risk from marauders in FoO


Personally I just assign 1 sucellis with 2 Balor escorts to patrol each zone with a gate in thier space. There are enough Xenon floating around to mostly mitigate the losses incurred when dealing with rampaging marauders.

[Sinxar]

If you retaliate and go pheonix hunting, you will lose standings with the teladi aswell because you're attacking potential customers of thiers.

Yeah at this point i'm sure my game is totally busted if this is the case because I gain rep with TU from killing Cartel.

[Sparky Sparkycorp]

If you retaliate and go pheonix hunting, you will lose standings with the teladi aswell because you're attacking potential customers of thiers.

Yeah at this point i'm sure my game is totally busted if this is the case because I gain rep with TU from killing Cartel.

I think Sinxar is referring to losing Teladi Union faction if you pre-emptively attack UA or TC ships with your ships outside of TU missions. Your description of events sounds fine if mission-related.

If you did want to pre-emptively attack UA and TC while blue with them (without loosing TU standings), you could try using a strong Trade ship (Lyramekron) set to Defend escorted by strong XL Fight ships set to Attack (to bait TU/TC ships into going red). If they are already red, you could try instead try setting the Fight ships to Defend too, although I can't remember off hand if they will join in with Lyramekron fights or not.

[Sinxar]

Only Cartel attack my ships though. Are the other guys supposed to attack as well?

[Sparky Sparkycorp]

Uguras Armaments are the other Cartel-like piratical faction.

They also offer a unique mission chain via a unique station in one of the hard-to-find zones. Mentioning in case you're still blue with them.

[Nikola515]

Whole point of that sector is exploration (in my opinion). It is pretty interesting sector for exploring all though this game could use much more exploring features. Unlimited Pirate/Xenon spawns makes it almost impossible for trading. You could always board pirate Titurels or Phoenix Marauders and use them as trading ships. For some reason pirates wont attack destroyers. Anyway I would stick to OL,HoL and Albion for trading unless you want to use mods.

[Sinxar]

Anyway I would stick to OL,HoL and Albion for trading.

Yeah that is a problem as well as stated before. They take shortcuts through Fields of Opportunity and get destroyed because the AI seems to find the best course of action while under attack is full stop and die instead of attempting to flee whatsoever. Its also been fixed by using MCT and YAT. With MCT my 5 star crew tries to save itself and get bonuses (NPCs do too though), with YAT I made them trade in sector while I built up a fairly large industry in OL.

Anyway i'm done with the game now. I mean it was something different and fun at first but quickly became very frustrating, in the death by a thousand papercuts kind of way.

[RodentofDoom]

Imho there's 2 things to do in the Teladi zone

Complete the UA mission for the achievement unlock.
Dock at the overwatch and install the Heavy Laser & Mk III laser.

Once those are both done, you can largely forget about the zone because for the most part it's crap.

OOZ patrols are really the only option you have if you want to continue with automated trading, and that risks losing standings with the Teladi.
To maintain good relations you will need to make frequent visits to the overwatch and complete any combat/patrol missions they have.

[Nanook]

...You could always board pirate Titurels or Phoenix Marauders and use them as trading ships....

Titurels are classified as armed traders, not destroyers. So yes, the pirates will attack them in FoO. The Phoenix is the only cargo-carrying ship that is safe.

[lostboron]

Imho there's 2 things to do in the Teladi zone

Complete the UA mission for the achievement unlock.
Dock at the overwatch and install the Heavy Laser & Mk III laser.

Are you kidding ? There is a reason it's called Fields of Opportunity. I made a fortune trading

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Podkletnov Generators

from the Teladi.

My trading ships kept getting attacked, so eventually I waited with one of them and boarded the attacking Phoenix. Now I use it for trading. Much slower, but much safer. Lost 20 rep with the Cartel, but they keep attacking friendly trading ships instead of my Phoenix.

I used all these credits to start building a Ship Tech Fab. I guess eventually I won't need the Teladi anymore (but I haven't started any mission there or explored, so I still have more to look forward).