Newbie questions and comments

[TheWidget]

First of all, I found your game two days ago and was instantly addicted. Most annoying when I really should be getting some work done.

Anyway, I have a few questions and comments. My apologies if these have been brought up in the past but the search wasn't coming up wit anything useful

1) On my phone (ZTE Blade with custom rom) message pop-ups other than the ones from my First Mate only appear for about half a second and so I only get a brief impression of what they say. I've tried looking in the options to increase the time but couldn't find anything appropriate

2) How do I know what the current political situation is between factions? I seem to spend a large part of the game making up for the fact that I've just broken a trade embargo and hence upset a faction that I was trying to offend. Is this information on a screen somewhere or am I expected to remember it. This is rather hard to do when I don't even have time to read the alerts (see 1)

3) When is it safe to attack/destroy a ship. I am vaguely under the impression that if they attack me and I only disable them, then the consequences are pretty light. But otherwise I seem to upset people.

4) Is it possible to regain favour of a faction that thinks the worst of you? In one game I managed to upset one faction due to breaking some trade embargoes and then letting matters drag out until at one point they had me at -97. I think this dragged down my rating with the other clans and made keeping people happy was a never ending cycle of appeasement. I know you can buy parole for small misdemeanors and as long as the spice halls are offering contracts you can slowly work your way back into favour but I think there is a point where this is a losing battle.

5) In one game when I was a wanted criminal I came across a military patrol and the "Acknowledge" button was displayed and I assumed (possibly foolishly) that this would have the same behaviour as usual as in to let me pass. However, the ship promptly arrested me and I spend some unknown number of years waiting parole. I know that "surrender" implies resigning to the consequences of being boarded but I was most surprised that acknowledge resulted in my arrest.

Thanks for all your hard work!

[Cory Trese]

1. there is a set of options called "Long Notifications" that increase the duration of the pop-up messages.

2. There are officers that trigger additional alerts. If #1 helps, then I think this will help with #2.

3. That is generally correct.

4. The best way to win back favor is with a Trade Alliance between an enemy and a friend.

5. There is an issue I'm working on right now. Essentially, your reputation can change (based on your cargo and crimes) between the press of the Acknowledge button and the assignment of results. It is probable that they found something on board that they did not like and sent you to prison. This is not on purpose and I'm trying to puzzle out a way to fix it without breaking more things / making people angry.

Thanks for the EXCELLENT post. I love getting questions and feedback from new players!

[12coryt]

Sweet, I was wondering why my messages popped up and disappeared so quickly as well.

Oh and Cory, I had a question as well. I have a Thulun Defender, and when I first bought it my Fuel seemed to drain pretty slowly. As of last night I was playing, and my Fuel was dropping drastically. I would go one turn before and only wast 1/2 or less and last night I would go one turn and waste maybe 2....has anyone else been noticing that?

[fallen]

12coryt - this can be caused by so many different circumstances. Do you have damage to your solar sail? Are you flying through red zones? Have you recently purchased any ship upgrades that list this type of effect?

[12coryt]

These are the upgrades I have:
Reinforced Prow
Sonic Disrupter
Extended Mainsails +15
Torpedo Control Pods +20

I don't see anything about it reducing fuel, but sometimes in a red zone I do notice more damage and fuel consumption of course. But mainly I was in green zones and this was still happening.
I also have a mechanic on board, so when my solar sails break they're fixed right away.

[poof]

I got one important question, but don't wanna open new topic about it. I want to know how award system works. Since there i already got some of them ( ships etc) But i don't get it. All awards that i get counts for all captains? Or some of them counts for only that captain? If that is true , how do i know which one?'''''''''''''

[fallen]

poof - Any award you claim affects all other captains. If you go into the Palace, Hall of Records, you can see all of the awards of the current character, all that are possible, and all the claimed awards, which will list each captains name with the award. If more than one captain qualifies for an award, you can claim it multiple times.

[ichon]

LOL- if only I had know about making the popups longer earlier would have saved a huge amount of time puzzling through why pirates that attacked me with no cause actually worsened my relations with not only their faction but other factions as well.

As a relatively new player the only suggestions I have so far is a better star map- right now to figure out where planets are that have a shortage I have to simply guess or click all planets in an entire quadrant to create a waypoint and see if the name matches. Unless there is a simple way to find named planets I just am missing?

Next- more scaling of the difficulty in a captain's life. I play regularly at crazy and impossible and find the first year completely random- sometimes very easy, sometimes very hard. Once past that first year though things get easier and easier if I avoid boarding attempts (all my deaths have so far been to ramming attacks and aliens). Perhaps more advanced ships and a couple hidden factions? IE- factions that don't display faction standing and have moving motherships that you can dock at to get special missions or try and buy your way back into favor.

Also it might be cool to have a chance at some super relations missions to perform for factions you are a wanted criminal. IE- a chance to completely betray factions currently in good standing to gain favor with factions where you are a wanted criminal. Nothing to completely switch the odds but if you have +50 with a faction and -500 with an enemy perhaps a mission that gives -25 to the favored faction but +100 with the enemy faction. So if you work at it you have a chance to switch alliances as right now past a certain point it becomes unenjoyable chore to switch faction favorites. Perhaps only available to certain characters? Smuggler, Star Trader, Captain, etc but not spy, zealot, or officer.

[Fenikso]

Oct 2, 2011 23:54:11 GMT -5 ichon said:

Unless there is a simple way to find named planets I just am missing?

Click menu button on your phone and select Rumors. There is a button on the right of each rumor which will set your autopilot target.