How to build a char?

[poryg]

Fast/quick ships aren't bad for fighting, but they are rather for fighting using guns or torps, not that much for using board, because the engines use up too much crew.

[grävling]

Hmmm, poryg you _really_ know somethings about torp builds that I don't. Wish I knew what I was screwing up, then. (I suppose you will say, _too much Pilot_ )

[leichenteil]

Nov 13, 2016 4:59:27 GMT -5 grävling said:

leichenteil:

Your basic problem is that your captain is only level 12. Level 12 captains aren't all that good at fighting anything, even with optimal stat allocation for whatever sort of bully you are trying to be. A second problem is that you have a fast/quick ship. fast/quick ships need more pilot than other sorts, and I already think you are underpiloted for anything at all (but you saw that before). fast/quick ships are not the preferred choice of fighting captains. A fast/quick ship says -- I do not wish to fight at all, and when I have encounters I wish to run away, and when I run away I wish to take as little damage as possible (so I put points in tactics).

Ok, I've wondered for days now if there is ANY advantage in having a huge ship with lots of hull for basically anything.
Wiki says good engine/sails to hull ratios are preferred if you want an combat advantage at a certain distance.

Understood this like:
A fast ship always has an advantage in offence and defense at long range.
A quick ship at short range.
This made me think pilot is the most important defense stat for a close range fighter, which it is for a gunner, and so for a boarder too.
Seems like I was wrong.

You also mention the captain is underdeveloped, and I realized that yesterday too when looking at him and my smuggler at crazy.
The smuggler is lvl 18 after almost the same amount of ingame time passed.

Why is being aggressive early a failure?
It is indeed a failure if you loose half your ship in every fight (what's actually happening with the custom one).
But with the Admiral Raider it seemed like loosing a single crew member was worth conquering an enemy ship.
At which lvl do you start being aggressive?
I hunt Aliens mainly since lvl 5 and this is for sure the reason for the xp difference between my smuggler and boarder and why things are going down.
But ignoring all those tasty independent ships and pirates is a really hard thing for me when being a combat captain...

[grävling]

Well, my captains start with the problem that anybody in the galaxy can beat them, because they are worthless, to they can beat ships and captains that are significantly weaker than they are, to they can beat those that are at about the same level, to they can beat ships that are a little better than they are to they can beat ships that are 1.5 times as good as they are to, look out world, they can beat anybody. Since crazy aliens average at 150% of you and can come in at 300% or more, when alien hunting you have to be at the top end of your fighting ability. My level 12 captains, pretty much are still at the 'surrender to anything that looks more dangerous than you are' stage. They are just beginning to take on pirates and independents. Small ones. I want to reach the point where my superior skill in playing the game can beat an AI that is significantly better equipped than I am, but at level 12 the 'this captain isn't skilled enough to do what you want' factor comes out and bites me a lot. (Worse when I have just had a particularly successful captain bite the dust, and I forget that I am not Death Shark Unconquered, Terror of the Void any more. )

[resistor]

Nov 13, 2016 4:12:34 GMT -5 poryg said:

While WARRIOR is the MAIN STAT FOR BOARDING, but it isn't used in the DEFENCE FROM BEING BOARDED.

That's not entirely true, as Warrior plays a role in evading enemy boarding attempts.

To support warrior, you should also have weapons in your hold, every weapon in your cargo is equal to 3 warrior and gives you even crew count bonuses when you are boarding.

Combat Details section of Help file says weapons grant a +1 Warrior bonus for each weapon, not +3.

[filthyluca]

leichenteil you're playing against the curve of the game clock. What is the XP gain from boarding and capturing even a higher level enemy ship versus acknowledging and surrendering to 3 ships during a contract run. They will be similar except with boarding you risk damage, which takes time, which takes money, which puts you further behind the curve. On top of that there is no guarantee of success and you might just get your ass handed to you with nothing to show for it.

[leichenteil]

The tip to buy a slow/low ship with lots of hull was a golden one.
Had a million credits left yesterday with the lvl 12 boarder and was like: "Ok, this leads to nothing anyway, let's try what happens when building a huge slow pile of junk"
Did design a slow/low one with 36 hull, 35 engines/sails, 160 crew and as much hold.
Expected honestly to get totally destroyed by whatever hostile was going to cross my path first.
But contrary to my expectations I was back to status: "Deal 40-100 dmg, receive 0-3 dmg while boarding"
Ship hull seems extremely important for this type of char.
Skill/attribute distribution is at lvl 22 40 pilot, 30 warrior, 20 intimidate, 10 tactics.
Going to try this char on crazy again with 50% xp in pilot/quickness, 25% warrior/strength, 25% intimidate/charisma.
The rest feels kind of useless.

Another project is a torping captain to find out what's my preferred fighting style.
So far I prefer the boarder over the gunners I had.

I will also keep in mind to keep my head low till the captain is at a higher lvl with a better ship.

[poryg]

Huge ship with lots of hull is great for boarders. Not only you receive nice bonuses, but also you survive a hit from nasty ramming pirates. However, against aliens I wouldn't opt for a slow/slow ship, because some aliens are just nasty torpers.
Alien hunting at lv 5 is too soon... As grävling said, there are aliens on huge levels, to be exact max. 390% of the captain level (my highest encounter was 3.54x captain's level Narvidian hunter.
Being aggressive early leads to damage, as mentioned by others. But not only that. You are way more likely to find someone who will be able to kill you. For example you may encounter someone who just damages your ship and then a second hostile captain just kills you off. Another reason are ramming pirates. They love ramming when they are losing and people have lost countless ships to rammers.
I usually destroy my first ship in late 70s AE or early 80s AE, when my captain is at least lv 25 (for a boarder sometimes more, because I want to be sure I am ready).

On another note... On sub-impossible difficulties boarding is easy. You receive way less and deliver way more damage than you would on impossible, because of a difficulty factor. So don't be scared when you jump to a higher difficulty.

[leichenteil]

poryg
Funnily enough, the aliens actually weren't hard to defend at lvl 5 on hard difficulty.
One type made me sweat though.
This alien captain was a boarder too.
The moment I realized cqb was a loosing fight I backed off and shot his engines to trash and it worked.

But generally you are all right, fighting aliens at low lvl is stupid.
The 280-290k you get for a dead alien ain't worth the time and earns you way to little xp.

[poryg]

On hard difficulty kind of no wonder. It's quite hard to meet an overpowered alien on lv 5 on hard difficulty... But still there were many captains that succumbed to early alien spawns
It's not about the money and exp though. This game is sandbox and time lost doesn't really matter, since enemy captain level depends on your captain's level and not on passed time. But truth is, it's a waste of time. It's better to wait up and then go have some fun with a developed captain.

[leichenteil]

poryg
True.
Playing on crazy again, below lvl 10, and I wouldn't touch aliens now.
Or basically any other ship.

The biggest problem is at the moment that I try to go for new unlocks.
Especially the contracts with honor achievements on crazy give me a hard time. They make it really hard to not make faction enemies cause I can't refuse to many contracts.
Maybe I should stop to attempt those unlocks with every captain but made a specialized one for it.
Explorer comes to my mind here since he's able to make lots of easy cash.

[bookworm21]

I will usually use a separate captain for chasing such unlicks

[leichenteil]

Nov 15, 2016 10:16:32 GMT -5 bookworm21 said:

I will usually use a separate captain for chasing such unlicks

Which kind of captain would you suggest for the contracts with honor on crazy?

[poryg]

I would do it with any captain. It's easy.

[poryg]

The best choice would be a gun bunny though.