New Explorer pointers

[sigurdcole]

Hi there! I just started this terrific game, but I think I may have made a dud start. I saw "Explorer" and I was all into that - going Indiana Jones on exciting new worlds sounded like a trip!

However, I didn't factor that...
    - Only Explorers and Exo-Scouts get Explore, so it's really hard to stack up.
    - While Explorers may get piles of nice loot, you still need to be able to sell it, which requires either substantial Merchant or Smuggler buy-in as well...which are a PITA to recruit if you haven't set up your Officers to class over.
    - I'm bugger-all for gaining Influence or Contacts. I've been scraping by with Patrolling to keep all but one faction from hating me, but it's been pretty punishing.

So, what's a good way to structure my contacts and my crew to support stomping across strange new worlds?

Thanks!

[fallen]

Remember that your starting officer corp can take Exo-Scout and Explorer Jobs right away. They can also switch into Merchant or Smuggler. You can quickly get into either or a little of both.

A good place to start is often an indie world with lower Trade Law. This lets you get around permits and conflicts both, but you'll net -25% profits for your sales. Still - its a dumping ground for anything you can't sell to a proper faction world

[daveal]

I agree that explorer is a little harder to start with. It really helps to use a template with a high skill value, and put your initial skill points into explorer. Also, it's pretty much required to take the contact who gives exo-scout recruits and get two exo-scouts early on so they level up with you. Both of these give you a higher dice pool when exploring, which makes it safer and gives better rewards. If you play on a custom map, you will need to look around to find an indie planet with trade law 2. If you play on the standard map, there is always one in Farfallen in the SW corner, Temple of Refuge. You can always create stashes of artifacts until you find a place to sell, but that doesn't help with early cash flow. Having a passenger cabin or two to do missions is also a reliable source of income, a little faster than merchanting.

[sigurdcole]

Aug 14, 2018 8:59:18 GMT -5 fallen said:

Remember that your starting officer corp can take Exo-Scout and Explorer Jobs right away. They can also switch into Merchant or Smuggler. You can quickly get into either or a little of both.

A good place to start is often an indie world with lower Trade Law. This lets you get around permits and conflicts both, but you'll net -25% profits for your sales. Still - its a dumping ground for anything you can't sell to a proper faction world

That's a pretty great point - I keep forgetting about Trade Law, then I end up with artifacts and nowhere to sell them. Better that than nothing, I guess.

I'm currently re-plotting my crew to support officer multi-classing. Pity that Explorer's skillset doesn't synergize with any other jobs (that I've noticed), and since they're hard to recruit I'm reluctant to divert from single-class Explorer.

[sigurdcole]

Aug 14, 2018 10:26:17 GMT -5 daveal said:

I agree that explorer is a little harder to start with. It really helps to use a template with a high skill value, and put your initial skill points into explorer. Also, it's pretty much required to take the contact who gives exo-scout recruits and get two exo-scouts early on so they level up with you. Both of these give you a higher dice pool when exploring, which makes it safer and gives better rewards. If you play on a custom map, you will need to look around to find an indie planet with trade law 2. If you play on the standard map, there is always one in Farfallen in the SW corner, Temple of Refuge. You can always create stashes of artifacts until you find a place to sell, but that doesn't help with early cash flow. Having a passenger cabin or two to do missions is also a reliable source of income, a little faster than merchanting.

I'm really starting to appreciate how critical the opening Contact selections are. I think that's where I screwed up the most - being a noob, I went for what seemed like a good canvas of options, but being able to recruit the right specialists early seems too good to pass up. I suppose "I don't have any contacts!" is a standard early-game problem.


So, strategic question. Exo-Scouts are complete murder on xenos in crew combat, but their lack of Evasion really concerns me. Is it a common/recommended choice to class them over to, say, Soldier, so they're more general-purpose and get at least some Evasion? Same question re:combat medic, actually.


Thanks for all the pointers!

[drspendlove]

I don't use Exo-Scouts much. I mostly use Explorers for exploring despite them being so hard to find.

However, unless you have either class in the fourth (backmost) position, you'll need some evasion from other jobs. You might be able to get by with very heavy armor but I have a suspicion it isn't as effective as it is supposed to be on paper. Anyway, I combine Pistoleer with Combat Medic and Exo-Scout with Sniper when I use them. Being in the fourth position AND having some evasion is nice.

[sigurdcole]

Aug 14, 2018 16:08:14 GMT -5 drspendlove said:

I don't use Exo-Scouts much. I mostly use Explorers for exploring despite them being so hard to find.

However, unless you have either class in the fourth (backmost) position, you'll need some evasion from other jobs. You might be able to get by with very heavy armor but I have a suspicion it isn't as effective as it is supposed to be on paper. Anyway, I combine Pistoleer with Combat Medic and Exo-Scout with Sniper when I use them. Being in the fourth position AND having some evasion is nice.

Wait, position affect evasion? Or is it just that most weapons and attacks can't even target the back row?

[daveal]

Position does not affect evasion. For both you and the enemy, few attack types can reach the back row.