Zealot... Worth it?

[TheMarkov]

Question regarding Zealot.

I just unlocked it and so far I enjoy using the class. I've been reading threads here for awhile and I noticed that most players go for Bounty Hunters and M. Officers.

Although I really enjoyed my Bounty Hunter, it being my first captain, I'm confused as to whether restart the game as a Zealot or restart the game as a Bounty Hunter again, in Demanding difficulty...

Thanks...

[fallen]

@markov - interesting question! What appeals to you about each of the two professions? Each Star Traders game can be so different than the last, I would say it is worth playing both and seeing which you like. You might also consider, what types of contracts are you running, what type of ship are you flying, and how are you making money--and that might help you pick a class to use for your particular strategy. Are you trying to use your Demanding difficulty game to unlock more awards? Why does Zealot appeal to you over BH?

Welcome to the forum!

[tomdini]

Why restart? Just make a new captain.

I enjoy the Zealot class myself. I usually play as a pirate or a military officer as I prefer open war and violence in deep space, and the Zealot class gives you some of the benefits of both those classes.

First off, the starting piloting ability of the Zealot means you can keep your fuel consumption under control right from the get-go. Intimidation is maxed out too, so fuel consumption drops even lower, and with a higher starting tactics rating than even the pirate, conflicts with other ships early on can usually be won (I play on Crazy, for the most part), leading to quick experience and free refills for the gas tank.

No matter the game I'm playing (unless I'm a smuggler or a merchant), I usually buy lots of ranks because of the numerous benefits. Cheaper fuel, repairs, and torpedoes, and greater reputation gains when completing contracts not to mention better pay for the work you put in (greater risk too, but I like the danger). The Zealot also receives Shalun edicts for only 5 bucks. So when a smuggler spoofs his identity and I end up targeting one of my "own" vessels, I can get that death warrant back right quick by slipping the prince a few bucks for his time. Once you have enough money it's not a big deal but in the early game, I hate dropping $1000 credits over the span of just a few months simply to keep the bounty contracts lucrative.

I always use a military officer to get Rapid Rank II, and then use the Zealot I unlock for Rapid Rank III. When doing race-against-the-clock style awards, I usually play as a bounty hunter because those contracts are very lucrative and Cadar hands out tons of them. But it takes the military officer a level or two before he's really set up for proper bounty hunting or blockading... the military officer comes with hand-to-hand skills and a commanding aura (Intimidation) but lacks actual spacer abilities such as piloting and tactics.

In a standard game where I actually care about the long run, the Zealot is a lean mean blockading machine and with the right stats, you can make a lot of money and garner huge rep gains quite quickly during Solar Wars. But the Zealot is also geared for combat and makes a fine glorified bounty hunter.

When doing Rapid Rank III or generally in the mood for vaporizing enemy hulls, I use the Zealot in just such a role and forego the blockades because they suck up valuable time and I'm trying to earn rep fast and kill lots of people. I usually surrender my starting weapons load to the first patrol ship or pirate who gives me trouble, unless I manage to slip through security for the first year or so, and will loot additional weapons from other spacers I fight once I start hunting and bloodletting. The weapons help in blockades but I won't acquire them unless I need some cash and I'm near a shortage, or I find a military officer to sign on with me. Get pilot skill to around 7, then focus on stealth. This minimizes encounters with enemy navies and predatorial privateers and lets you use your torpedoes with greater efficiency.

The best scenario is when your starting faction is allied with another, and both factions are in various aggressive conflicts. For example, right now Cadar (my faction) is in an alliance with Thulun, and Thulun is in a trade war with the Rychart Group while Cadar is in a Solar War with De Valtos. This gives my Zealot lots of leeway when it comes to making mischief and earning rep fast. I can run a few contracts for Cadar, and if the Maker's luck is with me, I try to plan my routes to bring me back to a Cadar world for another five contracts. But with an alliance your potential for work is doubled and whenever I can land at a Thulun world for more contracts, I know those contracts will earn me rep with Cadar too (while the alliance lasts... the politics of the Quadrant are inherently unstable).

While zooming about space, if I run into any De Valtos ship I think I can take down, I'll do it - that earns me rep with both factions. And if I bump into a Rychart merchant or smuggler, I'll fight them as well because striking a blow for Thulun in the trade wars gives me positive rep with Cadar due to the alliance. So when the conflicts work out like that, you can earn lots of rep fast because so many foes provide reputation gains, and as you gain rank in your faction (dirt cheap with the Zealot, who gets, I think, an 80% discount on promotions with his home faction), you gain rep even quicker and the cycle continues. It's only 58.4 in my current game and I have a rep of 42 due to taking out Rychart patrol ships and a few Thulun merchants.

If you can score a military officer, keep lots of weapons in your hold because it gives you a greater combat bonus, even if you don't board the other ship (although that is where the bonus is most effective... you'll still due a lot more damage with guns and torps with weapons onboard). I usually fly the Danti Cautela when I play my Zealot (before I've unlocked other starting ships and sometimes even after) because with a Medium/Quick rating, you can more or less keep up with merchants and smugglers early on and after a nano-solar coating (+6 sails), you have some decent long-range combat abilities as well. Plus the high engines and the Zealot's piloting skills allow you to avoid pirate ram attacks and dodge most barrages at close range, and obliterate your enemies with counter-barrages. I usually dump two or three torps into their engines and sails as my quarry attempt to outrun me, then close to within 1 km and unload on their engines for a non-lethal takedown.

The Danti Cautela has too many engines to be an effective boarding vessel as is, but after getting the +15 Crew/+10 Cargo interior upgrade (forget the name of it), you have 21 crewmen for a hostile hull boarding and another 10 weapons you can stash in the hold, which is pretty good for the early game. If I can't get this upgrade for a decent price (in other words, NOT at an independent world or a faction planet that doesn't appreciate the Standard Cadar Greeting), then I try to get a Prow Torpedo Battery upgrade because 10 torps is better than 7, and I get another torpedo salvo with an accuracy bonus after closing to medium range, before zeroing in for a run at their engines. Obviously I want the crew and cargo upgrade fast (the battleship architecture upgrade is very nice as well, but a little costly in the early game) because I have to decide sooner rather than later as to whether or not I ought to dedicate experience solely to guns and torps or develop some warrior abilities, too.

The Zealot is pretty fun because you can go on a rampage with fairly successful results even in the early game. Plus I tend to play as a loyalist so I actually get rewarded for sticking with my home faction (Zealots get a 75% increase in promotion prices with other factions, if I recall). Usually I only drop cash on pardons when bounty contracts have made me rich but unpopular, and I don't want the scum of the galaxy getting in my way every couple of weeks trying to earn a pretty penny for my glorious deeds.

Hope this sheds some light. Bounty hunters are cool but Zealots get death warrants for cheaper and come combat-ready at turn 1. The bounty hunter's primary advantage is that he can use surveillance to buffer himself from a contract gone bad (spoofed smuggler identities, high-level merchants with super fast ships, or a powerful enemy with a big ship you don't want to face) but I find by steadily stacking the pilot, tactics, and stealth attributes in my favor, I can usually survive even these harrowing dice-roll encounters regardless of my ship taking heavy damage. Plus once I unlock Rapid Rank III, any of my captains can gain that same ability with the Predator Tracking Array.

[tomdini]

As a follow-up... reputation 75 by 60.15. This Zealot captain is annihilating everybody with terrifying virtuosity! My first female captain, too. Not that there is an actual gender selection but she has a woman's name. I got my stealth to around 6, pilot at 7 and tactics and intimidate at their defaults of 7 and 9 respectively, then maxed out pilot and tactics at 9, then maxed out stealth at 9, and basically have been stockpiling around 21 exp at a time so I can raise my attributes and then the appropriate skills. I have never actually gained rep this fast with a pure combat captain focusing on bounties without any assassin duels ongoing. Usually I'm getting rank 9 just under the wire in early 64. The trick is that I am constantly stumbling across Rychart and De Valtos vessels and taking advantage of the Cadar-Thulun alliance. So in between contracts, I am also gaining reputation and experience to improve my odds and accelerate my progress.

The Danti Cautela is an explorer's dream but she makes a solid combat vessel too, with the right captain. The high engines are critical to my medium/close range barrage strategy, plus pirates never ram me and I basically can't be hit when within 10 km. With the nano-solar coating and a stealth skill of 10+, I usually soften them up with a vicious triple salvo before closing in and knocking out their reactors with a single barrage (and I use quality torpedoes which shred armor, engines, and sails with impunity... Cadar brand!!!!! Indy torps miss often and do less damage, and I'm not fond of clan torps in general, although Thulun ordnance seems okay in desperate scenarios).

I find Crazy to be really challenging, I have been playing on this difficulty for like six months and struggling to make real progress in the game. My Hard level captains provide a nice ego boost when I finally meet the Maker on Crazy. I don't often see such sterling success but I'm basically taking on one bounty contract after another and escaping unscathed and with piles of cash, maybe an armor plate missing or a vaporized crewmen or six to show for the battle. Nothing a little Shalun enslavement can't fix. I guess I've perfected my Zealot strategy at this difficulty because I am finding myself with $300k+ and a new ship quicker than ever before.

Time for Insane, I suppose...

[fallen]

tomdini - wow, awesome posts! Thanks for sharing the wealth of experience and perspective on the Quadrant. Welcome to the forum.

Sounds like its an Insane Zealot for you!

[BlastGT1]

Kudos indeed, your post inspired me to pick up the game again after not playing for a few weeks, and go after Rapid Rank II, which I have now achieved. Now I can play a Zealot myself, which I've been longing to do, but had trouble motivating myself to create a new captain and go after it!

_______________________________


Every day I'm torpin'.....

Party Torp is in the tube tonight,
Everybody just have a Torp time.
Hull breach will make you lose your find,
Pirates stealin', just have a Torp time!

[tomdini]

Thanks, guys! Glad to be of help. Been playing since July of last year and I'm totally hooked to this game. I literally stopped playing everything else: my retro Win98 rig (mostly for MechWarrior and a few other classic titles, such as Thief and X-Wing Alliance), my newer Windows games (such as a heavily modded Skyrim whose screenshots were often mistaken for actual landscape photographs), even my XBox and its absurdly vast collection of titles.... just for the sake of binging on Star Traders. 17 months and counting!!!!!

Star Traders is practically the only video game I play these days. Six months ago I started a new job which takes me on the road weekly so a solid dose of mobile gaming is a must, as I am a gamer at heart and don't like to go too long without a romp through an engaging fantasy world.

The Quadrant is a rich and exciting place to lose myself for ten minutes or ten hours, and the addiction's intensity comes and goes in waves. Past week or so I have been performing horribly at work due to incessant distraction with Cadar's galactic conflicts, it's kind of embarrassing.

This thread, in turn, inspired me to resurrect a long-dead Cadar bounty hunter and he is doing quite well. Almost have the Exemplar Contractor award unlocked on Insane!!!! A totally heartless mercenary, he plays the political game well, buffering his reputation in both Cadar and foreign courts for a couple months, only to turn on his former employers and snag the head of a renegade terrorist or wayward smuggler to score a fat paycheck before sauntering back to bribe the prince for a pardon, or to take a few more jobs to make up for the prior "misunderstanding." I only buy death warrants to boost the prize for hunting other spacers, as I tend to lose my edicts quickly with my treacherous inclinations.

Even though the lack of permits, edicts, and rank make repairs and resupply significantly pricier (negotiate helps some there but it's still more expensive than having a high ranking Rogue Trader and Duelist), I am generating enormous amounts of cash by being willing to take any job offer against any target, so this offsets the higher costs in basically having no real friends and lukewarm rapport with the major players in the Factions.

Fun stuff.

[fallen]

tomdini - glad you are getting all the mobile gaming (and gaming at all!) from Star Traders RPG! Dare I ask if you have tried Templar Assault, which features the fearsome warrior cult of Templars who protect the Quadrant from the darkest of forces?

Thanks for inspiring the forum with your posts and energy! Welcome!

[themarkov]

tomdini

Epic post... Makes me glad I still pursued a career as a Zealot... Though I met a lot of bumps in the way (I restarted, I think around 5 times due to me dying), I managed to learn how to play smarter and now I'm at year 190.25 AE... And once I got the hang of things, those Clan ships always go down in smokes when we cross paths, though I still have some close runs with some of their ships...

I'm current a Legendary Criminal in all 3 houses and De Valtos (-326), though I'm trying to fix the latter since there's a reward for having 151 rep with all three Syndicates... Been busy blockading ports of Clans waiting for De Valtos to get into a Solar War with some of them...

[tomdini]

I have not tried any other Trese Bros games yet. Star Traders is rich and deep enough that it continually keeps me guessing and on my toes. I'm pretty obsessed. I'm sure your other titles are amazing as well. I am a classic gamer in that it is the old-school aspects of yesteryear's titles (which I grew up with) that make modern games fun for me, what with the additional processing power and glitz you can add to the mix. But often it seems as though contemporary developers never played the good ol' titles that made video gaming a viable and booming business today.

My favorite aspects of Star Traders is the open-ended customization. I can literally build any kind of character I want, with various combos of stats, ships, upgrades, and officers. I like combining classes, such as a Military Officer, fearsome warrior and commander but with keen negotiation abilities and a talent for mercantile pursuits, or a pirate who preys on shipping lanes but is also an apt spy and smuggler. Lots of rpg's these days don't give you that flexibility... you wanna be a warrior, you use battleaxes and wear chain mail and never cast a spell. Wizards are frail, unarmored, wave little wands around and will never touch a blade. Et cetera. What if I want a fireball-slinging barbarian who dual wields daggers with terrifying speed and agility?! Most games don't give you the option, they lock you into a character development path but I like to experiment and come up with combos the developers never even conceived.

I particularly enjoy planetary exploration as it is terrifying to be parked in a legendary ancient city, millions of miles from any civilized planet, digging for loot and wondering what's waiting for you in the deep... my favorite build so far is a Zealot, descended from renown Templar warriors but left behind in the Quadrant when his father crusaded with the Fleet of Law in search of mankind's new homeworld, who hunts and destroys xeno monstrosities while seeking out Narvidian artifacts in long-forgotten tombs and ruins to make his fortune and assist Thulun in understanding and reproducing ancient technology.

The Zealot/Explorer/Smuggler amalgamation gets pretty dodgy at times, as all the weaponry and artifacts in your hold draw out both pirates and aliens with alarming frequency, plus you never know what horrors lay in wait within the far-flung temples and fallen cities of the feral worlds.

[Cory Trese]

"my favorite build so far is a Zealot, descended from renown Templar warriors but left behind in the Quadrant when his father crusaded with the Fleet of Law in search of mankind's new homeworld, who hunts and destroys xeno monstrosities while seeking out Narvidian artifacts in long-forgotten tombs and ruins to make his fortune and assist Thulun in understanding and reproducing ancient technology."

UMMM, Epic!

Me too!

[slayernz]

Definitely agree you're Epic ,Cory <grin>

never actually tried a Zealot. I have only been playing with Spies recently - might have to take one out for a spin.

[starlandra]

having the hardest time unlocking this one... some day....

[Cory Trese]

This is a great quote:

"Hope this sheds some light. Bounty hunters are cool but Zealots get death warrants for cheaper and come combat-ready at turn 1. The bounty hunter's primary advantage is that he can use surveillance to buffer himself from a contract gone bad (spoofed smuggler identities, high-level merchants with super fast ships, or a powerful enemy with a big ship you don't want to face) but I find by steadily stacking the pilot, tactics, and stealth attributes in my favor, I can usually survive even these harrowing dice-roll encounters regardless of my ship taking heavy damage. Plus once I unlock Rapid Rank III, any of my captains can gain that same ability with the Predator Tracking Array."

So much ST wisdom in that little paragraph