Thoughts on Fly-by Boarding

[Akorolev89]

I know this subject came up before, but what are your thoughts on fly-by boarding with no rep loss?

I recently had a discussion on X4's subreddit about it.

Basically, I think it should be fixed in the base game (or made into a toggleable option) for tha sake of keeping the letting faction and relations system make sense as opposed to "oh, this guy just took our flagship? Well, nevermind. He didn't shoot at it, now did he?"

Heres's a to the Reddit discussion for reference: https://www.reddit.com/r/X4Foundations/ ... &context=3

Basically what the other person was saying was "who needs immersion and game world coherence, I want early Asgards". I'd like to find out if this is a prevailing oppinion in the X4 community in general.

[adeine]

I don't like how rep loss is automatic/tied to the destruction of elements and I think boarding with no/minimal rep loss should be possible if you're smart about it.

I wish X4 had better developed pirate gameplay with some of the illegal ship upgrades/software that earlier games had. How neat would it be if you had a communications jammer allowing you to knock out comms of ships in unpoliced or remote sectors and then plunder or board without automatic rep loss? Or being able to hack/turn off highways along their path of travel to accost ships like in Freelancer?

[Alan Phipps]

I think this will turn into a re-run of this thread and other similar ones.

[Akorolev89]

I don't like how rep loss is automatic/tied to the destruction of elements and I think boarding with no/minimal rep loss should be possible if you're smart about it.

I wish X4 had better developed pirate gameplay with some of the illegal ship upgrades/software that earlier games had. How neat would it be if you had a communications jammer allowing you to knock out comms of ships in unpoliced or remote sectors and then plunder or board without automatic rep loss? Or being able to hack/turn off highways along their path of travel to accost ships like in Freelancer?

Exactly, it needs to be alancerd both ways.

I had a suggestion in the same Reddit post on how I see it:

Currently: a clearly identified ship flies within touch range of an expensive capship, drops boarding pods and takes it over, killing/scattering the entire crew. But it never opened fire, so no big deal. We're in space, s**t happens, right?

Solution: It should still be possible, but needs a lot of adjustment. Here's how I see it:

Phase 1 should require something like the SCA/YAK cover device to hide the boarder's identity and some sort of a jammer to stop the target ship from identifying you and sending a distress signal. If you start the operation within the radar range of another ship or station belonging to the target's faction, they report you immediately and you take a rep hit.

Phase 2 could be left as is. Let's say boarding pods are disposed of after dropping off the marines and the target cannot detect the marines themselves.

Phase 3: if the target enters it's faction sector during active fighting it will send out a distress signal causing local security to send a unit to follow it and investigate. Marines should not be able to take control of the ship (be assigned as captain/crew) while this unit is present. The unit will follow the ship while it remains in a friendly sector. The player has an option to temporarily distract the unit by hacking one of the nearby stations.

After changing hands the ship should require a device (maybe even single-use) to change it's ID. If the ship gets scanned before the device is used, you are revealed as the captor, take a rep hit and the ship is targeted as hostile by the previous owners.

This way you can still get intact ships with no rep hit, but it takes a more effort, some luck and pretty much excludes ships that are part of a fleet (e.g. moon Asgards).

At the same time, rep hits for destroying ship components in sectors that are neutral/hostile to the target should be disabled if you kill all the distress drones.

[Akorolev89]

I think this will turn into a re-run of this thread and other similar ones.

It most probably will. Just wanted to see what's up and add my own 2 cents without necroing old threads.

[caraota]

I think this will turn into a re-run of this thread and other similar ones.

It most probably will. Just wanted to see what's up and add my own 2 cents without necroing old threads.

Basically there are those who are against and think it should be fixed and those that think it should be left alone… but both side agree that the changes must not be enforced by Egosoft and remain as an optional difficulty instead (probably as part of custom game options).

I mean if you go to nexusmods and steam workbench you’ll find this community loves both types of mods, those that make the gake harder and more varied and those that trivialize certain things like LATT…

[Akorolev89]

I think this will turn into a re-run of this thread and other similar ones.

It most probably will. Just wanted to see what's up and add my own 2 cents without necroing old threads.

Basically there are those who are against and think it should be fixed and those that think it should be left alone… but both side agree that the changes must not be enforced by Egosoft and remain as an optional difficulty instead (probably as part of custom game options).

I mean if you go to nexusmods and steam workbench you’ll find this community loves both types of mods, those that make the gake harder and more varied and those that trivialize certain things like LATT…

Basically I agree, everyone should be free to mod a singleplayer game however they see fit.

As far as the vanilla game goes, the fact that you can take an openly hostile action towards a faction and cause no rep drob just seems broken. Especially considering that a lot of other stuff - ship and blueprint availability, trade prices etc. is built around the rep system.

But there are still a lot of bigger faction-related issues to be addressed before this one.

[caraota]

It most probably will. Just wanted to see what's up and add my own 2 cents without necroing old threads.

Basically there are those who are against and think it should be fixed and those that think it should be left alone… but both side agree that the changes must not be enforced by Egosoft and remain as an optional difficulty instead (probably as part of custom game options).

I mean if you go to nexusmods and steam workbench you’ll find this community loves both types of mods, those that make the gake harder and more varied and those that trivialize certain things like LATT…

…, the fact that you can take an openly hostile action towards a faction and cause no rep drob just seems broken. Especially considering that a lot of other stuff - ship and blueprint availability, trade prices etc. is built around the rep system.

But there are still a lot of bigger faction-related issues to be addressed before this one.

I just returned to the game from a really long period if absence so I can’t comment on the faction issues you mention… but yeah.. the piracy game could use some love and deeper mechanics for sure, but there must be a way to commit crime and get away with it, right? or at least try… I mean, think about… who in is sane mind would go try a rob a military vessel using another vessel that is continuously broadcasting your identity so the victim can call home and say: Hey Val Selton is robbing me? is also weird that I can get really close to a military vessel without any repercussions…

Don’t get me wrong, I think the issue with fly-by boarding, and this is not my idea, is that pods do not inherit attacker’s momentum like satellites do, plus why on earth will a government commission a military vessel for duty with less than half it’s crew capacity, and with the majority of them being rookies. Veteran mariens make a huge impact on the boarding process… in my current save I tried to board an Asgard that had like 75 veteran marines plus a good amount of able-crewman and it took me a good amount of time and a lot of marines to board it (like 1k of something)…

What I’m trying to say is that the mechanics needs improvement but it has its place, you can choose to take the rep hit and shoot and do the normal faster boarding or take the stealth approach that will take more time and require the blood of more marines to achieve….

[KextV8]

Boarding a factions ship should have a large rep hit. With XL being enough of a penalty to send you directly to -30 from +30. An L military ship should send you to -20 from +30.

Piracy is punishable by life imprisonment in most nations. In many it's also punishable by death. The slap on the wrist we get for piracy in X4 is a huge disconnect.

[A5PECT]

Sure, you could conceivably get away with surreptitiously hijacking a civilian cargo barge in real life. But there's no way to board and commandeer the USS Gerald Ford without the US government immediately knowing and becoming very, *very* angry at you (regardless of how good of terms you were on prior). And that operation would surely involve more than *another* aircraft carrier sailing up to it, dropping off some dinghies of soldiers, and sailing away with zero incident.

[Akorolev89]

Basically there are those who are against and think it should be fixed and those that think it should be left alone… but both side agree that the changes must not be enforced by Egosoft and remain as an optional difficulty instead (probably as part of custom game options).

I mean if you go to nexusmods and steam workbench you’ll find this community loves both types of mods, those that make the gake harder and more varied and those that trivialize certain things like LATT…

…, the fact that you can take an openly hostile action towards a faction and cause no rep drob just seems broken. Especially considering that a lot of other stuff - ship and blueprint availability, trade prices etc. is built around the rep system.

But there are still a lot of bigger faction-related issues to be addressed before this one.

I just returned to the game from a really long period if absence so I can’t comment on the faction issues you mention… but yeah.. the piracy game could use some love and deeper mechanics for sure, but there must be a way to commit crime and get away with it, right? or at least try… I mean, think about… who in is sane mind would go try a rob a military vessel using another vessel that is continuously broadcasting your identity so the victim can call home and say: Hey Val Selton is robbing me? is also weird that I can get really close to a military vessel without any repercussions…

That's also true. And making military ships too difficult to board is on te oppsite end of the spectrum - why even bother if building a destroyer costs less in both time and resources.

In one of my previous comments I suggested a middle ground solution - a device similar to SCA cloaks that hides your identity + a scrambler to change the ship's ID after you've boarded it, so the previous owners don't recognize it as their own.
This way you can still get away with piracy, but it takes a bit more time and effort and it actually makes sense that you don't take a rep hit - the other faction never knew it was you in the first place.

...why on earth will a government commission a military vessel for duty with less than half it’s crew capacity, and with the majority of them being rookies.

So true! In my last playthrough I use the DeadAir Jobs mod - among other things it adjusts ship crews to be realistic. Good luck boarding an L high-tech trader with your bunch of recruits now, nevermind an Asgard
But then we need a way to train our marines other than just throwing them into the meat grinder or hand-picking 3-stars worth 2,5 mil each.

[Akorolev89]

Boarding a factions ship should have a large rep hit. With XL being enough of a penalty to send you directly to -30 from +30. An L military ship should send you to -20 from +30.

Piracy is punishable by life imprisonment in most nations. In many it's also punishable by death. The slap on the wrist we get for piracy in X4 is a huge disconnect.

Could also be a difficulty option if it involves a way to hide your faction ID.
After all, real world nations (read: governments) often get away with even worse things without even a slap on the wrist.

[Akorolev89]

Sure, you could conceivably get away with surreptitiously hijacking a civilian cargo barge in real life. But there's no way to board and commandeer the USS Gerald Ford without the US government immediately knowing and becoming very, *very* angry at you (regardless of how good of terms you were on prior).

If we combine that with my previous suggestion on scrambling a ship's ID after you boarded it we could come up with an even deeper system - a ship's class and purpose determine the chances of you being discovered as the culprit.

E.g. you'll almost definitely get away with a stealing a trader, but a recently hijacked Asgard showing up in Terran space will definitely raise some questions.

And that operation would surely involve more than *another* aircraft carrier sailing up to it, dropping off some dinghies of soldiers, and sailing away with zero incident.

"Huh? What's that? Oh, must've been the wind"

[THE_TrashMan]

The entire reputation/detectio nsyytem needs an overhaul.

An shielded cargo upgrade, to fool police scanner and hide illegal goods.
A spoofer, that burs out after a single use, but hides your ID for a limited time (so you can pirate).

More and smarter check and better boarding/bailing logic. It makes no sense for your opponent to be MORE likely to bail the weaker/smaller your ship is.

[Akorolev89]

The entire reputation/detectio nsyytem needs an overhaul.

An shielded cargo upgrade, to fool police scanner and hide illegal goods.
A spoofer, that burs out after a single use, but hides your ID for a limited time (so you can pirate).

Yeah, those would be nice.

More and smarter check and better boarding/bailing logic. It makes no sense for your opponent to be MORE likely to bail the weaker/smaller your ship is

This is actually one of the few nonsensical things I can understand. If it were reversed, it would be suber easy to fly a destroyer to a hostile sector and surround yourself with abandoned fighters and corvettes in a few minutes. At least it should be in place until the AI learns not to punch way above it's weight.
It does need tweaking though - maybe have the AI compare your ships speed and DPS vs theirs while factoring in damage to both ships for bail checks instead of the hull and shield points.

[caraota]

In one of my previous comments I suggested a middle ground solution - a device similar to SCA cloaks that hides your identity + a scrambler to change the ship's ID after you've boarded it, so the previous owners don't recognize it as their own.
This way you can still get away with piracy, but it takes a bit more time and effort and it actually makes sense that you don't take a rep hit - the other faction never knew it was you in the first place.

So true! In my last playthrough I use the DeadAir Jobs mod - among other things it adjusts ship crews to be realistic. Good luck boarding an L high-tech trader with your bunch of recruits now, nevermind an Asgard
But then we need a way to train our marines other than just throwing them into the meat grinder or hand-picking 3-stars worth 2,5 mil each.

I just did a mission that used such device… and that would be cool.. mask as the faction you are targeting, approach your target and hack the ship (jam comms, disable propulsion and defense, etc) via mini-game… call in boarding party (which could also be cloaked) and begging boarding… Pray the boarding don’t fail and one of your marines doesn’t get capture (which will then lead to big faction rep hit)… if all goes through smoothly then you take control of ship, mask/scramble its signature and you either keep it that way or sell it in black market…

Yesterday I was laughing hard because the shipyard that my Asgard was docked decided to start building a Honshu (or whatever the TER supply ship’s name is) as soon as my asgard started undocking so both got caught in the infinite collition/reposition glitch… I was able to break the loop but got mad at the game and decided to steal the ship… which I did… then sold the ship to same shipyard… and bingo… the shipyard decided to print another Honshu oooh my… with low crew count too… infinite money glitch

[blackphoenixx]

An shielded cargo upgrade, to fool police scanner and hide illegal goods.

We already have that since ToA. It's the Mirage exceptional chassis mod.

In addition to hiding illegal goods It also completely stops the ship from being harassed by pirates.

[Alan Phipps]

" ... It also completely stops the ship from being harassed by pirates" Isn't that bit more the radar visibilty/detection range mod called 'shroud'?

[blackphoenixx]

" ... It also completely stops the ship from being harassed by pirates" Isn't that bit more the radar visibilty/detection range mod called 'shroud'?

I haven't tested what impact (if any) Shroud has on piracy, but Mirage completely stops pirates from harassing the equipped ship.
I've been running two dozen M traders with Mirage mods for over 10 hours playtime now - most of them in heavy piracy sectors like Grand Exchange and Pious Mists - and none of them have a single instance of pirate harassment in their logs.

I figure that Mirage blocks cargo scans completely so as far as the pirates are concerned the ship is empty. That's just a guess though, but it's what led to me trying it out.

[jlehtone]

what are your thoughts on fly-by boarding with no rep loss?

Not my problem.