What's there to do past the basics?

[mycanoidlord]

So I just got this game a few days ago, went through several new games almost immediately just figuring stuff out, but I was really excited for it.  I love all the detail and differences among the different starports and factions, and the complexity of making profit with trading.  I went with the star trader class each time but mostly tried to play as a merchant, eventually moving into a merchant/boarding hybrid to give myself more combat options when I couldn't run away immediately.  I'd eventually end up just starting to get destroyed each time by everything once I hit level 9ish or so, which I think was a combination of not getting a better ship than the Vae Victus and not realizing that you have to repair armor at the military base.

Then after reading some stuff on the wiki I decided to try an explorer and wow what a difference.  I've now got hundreds of thousands of credits on hand, the nicest crew/hauling ship I could find, and tons of rep/ranks with a few of the factions.  All of which came from casually pulling artifacts off of Javat Mining Camp with no apparent consequences.  Now I'm confused about two things, why am I doing so well with this?  Is explorer just unbalanced?  I was making gobs of money with it just with it's starting stats, if I had wanted to I could have leveled my stats towards any other type of character build and still came out with tons of rep and money that would've been much harder to get actually starting as a different class.  Secondly it doesn't feel like there's any mid or end game to this that I've seen,  I don't really have anything to spend the money on.  I haven't seen any ships that cost more than 200ish-k and nothing better for my character than the 30 engine, 40 crew, 70 hold ship I got almost immediately.

I understand this is a sand box game and you're supposed to set your own goals, but I feel like in just this once quick playthrough I'm to the point where I could just buy/statbuild/rep-grind towards whatever I want, and then I'd just be doing it to see what the mechanics of other activities are like.  I'm currently playing the free-version on android, is that the problem?  Is this just like a beginning of the game demo that has a lot of content missing?  Either way I'm probably going to try the other classes, and maybe start upping the difficulty to get more milage out of the game since I really like the gameplay style but it's a bit discouraging to feel like getting to the point where I've got a nice ship, lots of money, lots of rep doesn't seem to have any real game play differences to it than just starting out.  Any insight on this would be appreciated, I could have easily missed something as I haven't put a bunch of time into the game yet.

Also some random questions I have as well.  How do I get the scout officer?  I've got to the planet wilderness they're stated as being at, and seen the rumor text in the wilderness description, but then no amount of exploring or harvesting seems to cause anything out of the ordinary to happen, I never actually see them.

Why is it so hard to get to the conflicts screen?  I go to status, click contracts, hit the drop down menu at the top, and then click conflicts from there.  It seems really out of the way compared to other things, especially since I use it constantly (almost every time I'm about to go trading in a port).  Is there some easier way?  Do more experienced players not feel the need to use it all the time?

What's with the hate for Steel Song Clan on these boards?  I'm guessing it's just like a running joke as I've not seen them act particularly different in my playthroughs than any other faction (IE incredibly bi polar and disruptive to what I'm trying to do).  Seeing as I've been wanting to play with a merchant style I've been starting with House Thulun each time and I really like allying myself with them, Javat, and Steel Song.  It gives me a nice little third of the map in the northeast corner that I can call "home".

[fallen]

Moved to ST RPG boards.

[Cory Trese]

Great questions. With over a hundred combinations of difficulty and character class (not to mention Faction) there are literally hundreds of viable play-styles, some requiring more skill with the game than others.

To answer any specific questions about UI issues like Conflicts, I'd need to know what type of device you use.

The free version is a basic demo that includes about 20% of the game's overall difficulty curve.

[mycanoidlord]

Thanks for the reply! And sorry for posting to the wrong board.

I'm using a HTC One Remix on Android.

Could you elaborate a little about the differences between the free version and the elite? I know it adds a lot of map, more ships, and other things. But does it change the things I mentioned? Are there really expensive ships, more interactivity with higher rep-ranks?

[poryg]

Aug 22, 2016 16:57:12 GMT -5 mycanoidlord said:

So I just got this game a few days ago, went through several new games almost immediately just figuring stuff out, but I was really excited for it.  I love all the detail and differences among the different starports and factions, and the complexity of making profit with trading.  I went with the star trader class each time but mostly tried to play as a merchant, eventually moving into a merchant/boarding hybrid to give myself more combat options when I couldn't run away immediately.  I'd eventually end up just starting to get destroyed each time by everything once I hit level 9ish or so, which I think was a combination of not getting a better ship than the Vae Victus and not realizing that you have to repair armor at the military base.

Then after reading some stuff on the wiki I decided to try an explorer and wow what a difference.  I've now got hundreds of thousands of credits on hand, the nicest crew/hauling ship I could find, and tons of rep/ranks with a few of the factions.  All of which came from casually pulling artifacts off of Javat Mining Camp with no apparent consequences.  Now I'm confused about two things, why am I doing so well with this?  Is explorer just unbalanced?  I was making gobs of money with it just with it's starting stats, if I had wanted to I could have leveled my stats towards any other type of character build and still came out with tons of rep and money that would've been much harder to get actually starting as a different class.  Secondly it doesn't feel like there's any mid or end game to this that I've seen,  I don't really have anything to spend the money on.  I haven't seen any ships that cost more than 200ish-k and nothing better for my character than the 30 engine, 40 crew, 70 hold ship I got almost immediately.

I understand this is a sand box game and you're supposed to set your own goals, but I feel like in just this once quick playthrough I'm to the point where I could just buy/statbuild/rep-grind towards whatever I want, and then I'd just be doing it to see what the mechanics of other activities are like.  I'm currently playing the free-version on android, is that the problem?  Is this just like a beginning of the game demo that has a lot of content missing?  Either way I'm probably going to try the other classes, and maybe start upping the difficulty to get more milage out of the game since I really like the gameplay style but it's a bit discouraging to feel like getting to the point where I've got a nice ship, lots of money, lots of rep doesn't seem to have any real game play differences to it than just starting out.  Any insight on this would be appreciated, I could have easily missed something as I haven't put a bunch of time into the game yet.

Also some random questions I have as well.  How do I get the scout officer?  I've got to the planet wilderness they're stated as being at, and seen the rumor text in the wilderness description, but then no amount of exploring or harvesting seems to cause anything out of the ordinary to happen, I never actually see them.

Why is it so hard to get to the conflicts screen?  I go to status, click contracts, hit the drop down menu at the top, and then click conflicts from there.  It seems really out of the way compared to other things, especially since I use it constantly (almost every time I'm about to go trading in a port).  Is there some easier way?  Do more experienced players not feel the need to use it all the time?

What's with the hate for Steel Song Clan on these boards?  I'm guessing it's just like a running joke as I've not seen them act particularly different in my playthroughs than any other faction (IE incredibly bi polar and disruptive to what I'm trying to do).  Seeing as I've been wanting to play with a merchant style I've been starting with House Thulun each time and I really like allying myself with them, Javat, and Steel Song.  It gives me a nice little third of the map in the northeast corner that I can call "home".

some officers are elite only, so you cannot get scout officer.
Also.. . Free game is significantly easier than elite. It is good for understanding the game mechanics, but... I eventually got bored of it, as I was too skilled for the free version.
The free game lacks so many ships, including many aliens... And basically you can just use rank ships to survive without a big deal.
Also, the enemy cap is at level 23, unless it has been increased.
And last but not least, the map isn't too large, so you don't get nasty Travel far contracts.

I would say, the most important are first 15 levels, because from there you can already be dominating the game with certain builds.
Explorer isn't unbalanced. It's just easy to play for him. Characters that avoid battle are easier in the game.
Well, we don't really hate steel song (just kidding). Truth is though, the play style is not that different, they also have cheap ship. I just hate steel song, because they try to kill me. It's very hard though.. .

[Cory Trese]

Free limits game level to 23, and the Elite version has been tested out to level 1,000

[resistor]

Funny how it says fallen created this thread in the thread list.

Anyway, welcome to the forum mycanoidlord ! Not everyone hates Steel Song, in fact, there are several Steel Song fanatics around, like myself, Zer0Winds , thefuzzy127 , and maybe contributor (not entirely sure if lurker is). Seemingly everyone who hates Steel Song only does so because they died to them a lot of times. Such grudges are perhaps the most sincere compliment one can pay.

I highly recommend upgrading to Elite, as it gives much more stuff to do, and makes the game more of a challenge.

Increase the difficulty if you think you're getting good at the game, as that makes it much more challenging and fun (in my opinion).

[poryg]

I don't die to steel songs nearly as often as I die to Aliens (in fact, they have never killed me), but Steel songs are always the ones who try to murder me by making me look bad in their eyes through their wicked politics. That is why I hate them, because I want to keep my politics simple in this game, not to worry about their strange alliances and contracts against allies...

[Cory Trese]

However, in defense of the free game I know at least 3 long term players who've enjoyed the free edition of the game for years.

Free will let you play the first 23 levels of difficulty on every difficulty level and character class. A free player who tries out every class will get ages of play, even if they quit after 23 levels.

[poryg]

I have nothing against free edition, but I would have had to build fighting builds very fast to keep it fun... Because if my normal building lets me fight from lv 30,...

[resistor]

Aug 23, 2016 5:27:37 GMT -5 poryg said:

I don't die to steel songs nearly as often as I die to Aliens (in fact, they have never killed me), but Steel songs are always the ones who try to murder me by making me look bad in their eyes through their wicked politics. That is why I hate them, because I want to keep my politics simple in this game, not to worry about their strange alliances and contracts against allies...

In my experience, Steel Song's alliances are almost always with other Clans. Javat is the weird one, as they seem just as likely to cooperate or fight with Clans as well as Syndicates.

[poryg]

Yes. And in my experience most contracts from ss go against Thulun and javat... Especially when they are in alliance...

[Zer0Winds]

That's only on Steel Prima. Go to Steel Fortress, they'll give you contracts against syndicates. Or clans. More syndicates though.

Go farther into the southwest, and you'll get a mixture of deep space independent contracts (or "independent") planetary independent contracts (or "independent") or sometimes even Syndicate contracts.

The Clans have infighting sometimes, but it's bearable. They're mostly neutral or allied. While they are seen as weak, it's an understatement. They're strong... okay Javat has their moments.

No, the Syndicates piss me off (not Rychart. We're STILL waiting for the other to make the first move), and they're always fighting each other... makes it hard to befriend each one.

Javat is the least aggressive though, they're more worried about digging than politics and stuff, so they don't care WHO they're allied with.

Thulun... does Thulun stuff. Yeah I think that's it.

Steel Song (the greatest yet most underrated faction) ally with the clans. They aren't going to ally with the syndicates (okay, SOMETIMES). However as with all politics, they have something going behind the scenes, usually assassins.

Cadar are obsessed with Torps and will do anything to go to war. Also they fear Steel Song the most. To help their fear, they spread the lie that we make our ships from cardboard. Little did they know that works to our advantage...

De Valtos want money, more money, and has the most money. I don't think they care how they get it. Vile dens of corruption, but still better than Cadar.

Rychart are the okay syndicate, but not good. They have spies and big hats... They take pride in their hats.