Capturing an Assassination target deletes marines

[Wing2137]

So, I discovered the wildest thing today. I was going to post this in the bug section, but the more I thought about it, the more I realized it's probably not a bug. If you do a mission where you need to assassinate someone, and that person is onboard a capital ship that requires marines if you wish to board it, the ship will jump out the moment you capture it. I've done these missions many times; after killing your mark, the other capital ships usually jump out and (I assume) despawn from the game completely. After capturing an NMMC Phoenix, the ship jumped out along with all my marines. My marines are nowhere to be found under my property tab, so I guess they're gone forever, lol.

I'm guessing that once the marines capture a ship, all of the enemy NPCs are removed just as it's about to switch over ownership to the player. In that short instance where the NPCs were gone, but the ship was still converting to my property, the despawn command must have been executed. I've seen this kind of behavior before when watching a ship being captured as it's turning (minus it jumping out xD). It'll kind of "snap" back into place the moment it converts into the player's property. Either because it's resetting the animation, or it just spawns a clone which is the actual ship you gain after the capture is successful. I'm sure someone who knows more about how this game works (Cycrow ) could probably explain this far better.

Regardless, I suppose you can consider this a bit of an F.Y.I. for anybody considering capturing assassination targets.

EDIT: I actually recorded it happening, as I was trying to record a regular video at the time. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mzqunop3Ua0&t=3m59s

tl;dr If you plan to capture an assassination target with marines, I'd advise against it. The moment the marines capture it, a script that despawns the ship will execute. This will delete the ship, and all of your marines.

[Cycrow]

Was this just a standard assassination mission, ie go kill the target.

afaik, it shouldn't just jump out once you capture it. But this hasn't changed in FL, so i assume it must be the same in TC/AP.

i will have to check the mission script

[Wing2137]

Yeah, it was a standard assassination mission. My game has mods, however I haven't modded the MD or scripts for that mission at all. I actually displayed the mission briefing in the first few seconds of the video if you are curious. I've never tried to capture an assassination target before, so I didn't know that wasn't supposed to happen. Weird.

Next time I run into a mission like that, I'll try to capture it again and see what happens.

[Wing2137]

I was gonna update my last post, but as it's been awhile and I'd like anyone following this to be aware, I'll go ahead and post again.

So, I did another Assassination Mission, and this time the target didn't jump out. It was another Destroyer; this time belonging to the Pirates. I fought them in LooManckStrat's Legacy, capturing the Destroyer in the process. I do want to point out however, that this time I captured the Destroyer after the rest of the enemies tied to the mission were eliminated. When the NMMC Phoenix disappeared in my earlier video, there were still other capital ships and fighters scurrying about. I know when these missions complete, Capital ships jump out and despawn, but fighters usually remain. That being said, I blew up everything except the target this time, and the target didn't delete itself with my Marines after capture. Perhaps that Phoenix jumping out was a fluke?

If I ever have this issue again, I'll be sure to report back here. For now however, it does seem like that first Destroyer jumping out and deleting my Marines was a one-off. Strange indeed...

[Martin Head]

I have not watched your video. But I was wondering if the mission had timed out during your boarding process.

The assassination missions don't usually have a very long time limit, So if it timed out, and the target was removed, taking along your marines with it.

Did you get a mission failed message?

[Wing2137]

Nah. The mission completed just fine. The Destroyer just jumped out, lol. It initiated the jump before the ship fully turned green to indicate it had become Player property. That seems to be the window when it occurred. The other Frigate jumped out at the exact same time, so I'm certain it was the usual despawn command that is utilized on the remaining capital ships once the target is neutralized. I just can't seem to figure out why that happened with the target capture. So far I've not been able to replicate it. It's an odd one for sure...

[Jimmy C]

I've captured countless ships- including many assassination targets. What you saw wasn't a one-off. It's a low-probability event that occasionally happens. In my experience, whether it happens or not is set when you accept the mission. If it happens, the only way to change it is to load a game from just before you accepted the mission and redo the mission completely. That usually works. But I've been unfortunate enough that sometimes repeated reloads don't work. If that happens, all you can do is give up on the target and go for the escorts instead.
But watch out, the capturable escorts are often set to jump out after the target is eliminated by destruction or capture. Use savegames to determine which ships can be safely captured in a mission and reload as needed.
After you've been capturing ships for a while, you'll get the hang of when to save a game during a mission for best effect.

[Wing2137]

Oh, wow!

Thanks for the heads-up! Capturing ships is my favorite thing to do, and I've captured a lot myself, but I never dared myself to try it on Assassination Missions until recently. I'd usually just fly into a sector and capture a military patrol that's not in their own territory (so I lose less notoriety), or I'd just go ham and try to steal the more expensive stuff. I was always worried about my ships blowing up the target beforehand, which is mainly why I never tried it before. I have better control over my ships in my fleet now, so I'm not worried about it anymore. I'll have to keep in mind what you said the next time I try to steal another Assassination target. I hope Cycrow sees what you said. He mentioned he was going to go look at the script file, but I never heard back. If that jump probability is something he could adjust so it doesn't happen to a target being boarded, that would be lovely.

[Cycrow]

It looks like the script is supposed to allow you to capture the ship, as it removes captured/claimed ships from the list of objects that it removed.

but it might be a timing issue, where sometimes, the cleanup routine runs before the captured routine.

i will add a delay in the cleanup to hopefully prevent this from happening

[Jimmy C]

Thanks for the heads-up! Capturing ships is my favorite thing to do, and I've captured a lot myself, but I never dared myself to try it on Assassination Missions until recently.

Mission spawned ships are the best ships to capture because there's always more of them. Assassination and station defense mission targets also have very predictable behaviors compared to ships in other combat missions. This means one set of tactics can be used to capture all targets of the same mission type.
Having Adv. Sat. coverage of nearly all sectors is critical for Assassination missions and very handy for Defense missions too. Well worth dedicating a few hundred satellites and a few ships to the task.
For me, fleets just get in the way. Just give me an M7M and I can capture everything bigger than a fighter in a sector.

[Wing2137]

Yeah, station defense missions are my favorite! I love hailing every single fighter and telling them to surrender. I draw all of the aggro onto myself for a more intense fight. I mostly use fleets because I personally find it more fun. It's quite exhilarating to me when there's so much going on at once; especially if we're outnumbered in fighters at least 3 to 1! I also like using multiple M6's with boarding pods that also join the battle and launch up close. It's definitely nowhere near as efficient as using an M7M with tons of flails, but I always enjoy the challenge of being the "tank" and trying to draw enemy fire while the others go in for the raid. I'll admit, it sometimes takes a few reloads. I just love how this game can be played in quite literally any way possible. Sure wish more games had that kind of freedom! I never really used advanced satellites much despite their high utility. Feels like it'd take awhile to deploy them everywhere. I suppose I should have done that while discovering sectors... I do have a few in some key places though. Thanks for all the advice, Jimmy!

i will add a delay in the cleanup to hopefully prevent this from happening

Much appreciated, Cycrow! It'll be nice not having to worry about capturing targets that divide by zero!

[Jimmy C]

I never really used advanced satellites much despite their high utility. Feels like it'd take awhile to deploy them everywhere.

It certainly does, but it's one I consider worth investing the effort in as early as possible ever since I realized mission-spawned cap ships were a source of free marines in AP. That no longer applies in FL, but I still get a lot out of capturing ships in FL so I still spread that sat network out.

You can cover all the areas between gates within a sector with just 1 to 3 adv sats usually. The exceptions are the extra-large sectors.

It's better to use other ships to deploy the Adv. Sats. out-of-sector remotely, more accurate placement that way. Sat. deployer ships need the Special Command software for the Collect Deployed Item command so that they can retrieve deployed Sats when you think the placement is nonoptimal.

[Wing2137]

It looks like the script is supposed to allow you to capture the ship, as it removes captured/claimed ships from the list of objects that it removed.

but it might be a timing issue, where sometimes, the cleanup routine runs before the captured routine.

i will add a delay in the cleanup to hopefully prevent this from happening

Any update on this? I know you've probably been busy with your own mod, but it is quite frustrating when the capture target jumps out and despawns after capturing it... I've had this happen several times since then, but it doesn't happen every time. I have even tried reloading the same battle and recapturing multiple times, and it's as Jimmy said. Sometimes the target jumps out, and sometimes it doesn't. It probably is a timing issue like you have said, but I never know when it's going to happen. I often end up having to reload back to before I started the capture so that it doesn't occur; even then it's not a guarantee.

[Jimmy C]

I often end up having to reload back to before I started the capture so that it doesn't occur; even then it's not a guarantee.

In my experience, reloading the capture never seems to work. If they're going to jump out, they always will. What seems to be necessary is resetting the mission. That is, causing the game to spawn a new mission for you by reloading a savegame you made just before accepting the mission. That's why I always have a savegame for that. Its main purpose is to reset the mission if the target is undesirable or spawns in an unfavorable location though.

[Cycrow]

I have a possible fix in tbe unoffical patch. But not sure when I will release it yet

[Wing2137]

In my experience, reloading the capture never seems to work. If they're going to jump out, they always will. What seems to be necessary is resetting the mission. That is, causing the game to spawn a new mission for you by reloading a savegame you made just before accepting the mission. That's why I always have a savegame for that. Its main purpose is to reset the mission if the target is undesirable or spawns in an unfavorable location though.

So, I actually tested this dozens of times the other night with the same mission. I was able to reload my save to before I launched marines just fine in my game. The capture target wouldn't always jump out for me. I never had to reload to before I took the mission, but I do always keep a save for that in case the mission is in an unfavorable location as well. I think Cycrow's post about when the cleanup routine runs is likely the cause. Lately I've been capturing ships at the same time as a large battle. I wasn't always initiating the capture at the exact same time due to the chaos, so the marines would finish capturing the ship at different game times. The times were close together, but not always the exact same moments. I imagine when the ship would jump out, that was due to the marines finishing the capture in sync with that cleanup routine running; thus resulting in the capture target dividing by zero...

I have a possible fix in tbe unoffical patch. But not sure when I will release it yet

Thanks for the update, Cycrow! I'll just be patient and wait.

[Hwitvlf]

Pretty sure this has happened since way back in Albion Prelude days. It can also happen with Rapid Response ships (especially frustrating). If you save shortly before the ownership change, you can usually find some way to prevent the pop-out.

With assassination missions, destroying all ships in the target's unit other than the boarding target usually fixes the issue- probably because the clean up delete leaves at least one ship behind. On Rapid Response ships, attacking them shortly before ownership change, or jumping in-system/out-of-system usually works. I don't think those work-arounds affect the cause of the bug, but probably change the priorities submitted to the game engine so ownership change happens before cleanup.