Questions. Possibly stupid ones.

[blackspike]

What does a Death Warrant do?


Which officers are the best? 


Is it my imagination, or does Exploring get massively more difficult as time goes on?


The "Honour of Javat" seems a nice ship. AmIright?


How come I have loads of questions a while I'm playing, but forget them all as soon as I get to the forum?

[abysmal]

Death Warrants give you access to better capture/murder contracts as well as reputation awards with these contracts.

The best officer depends on your playstyle. I like killing things so the Military Officer, Pilot, and Templar work well for me.

Exploring is bettering when hybriding as a smuggler or merchant. There are things that want what you have so getting rid of product or escaping pirates can get tedious if you are focusing solely on exploring.

I have no clue on Javat.

Because the sheer awesomeness of TB games compels you to play the game instead of remembering to write down said question.

Sent from my MB855 using Tapatalk 2

[blackspike]

Sounds like I'm right not to pick up a Death Warrant then! I try to avoid combat contracts.

I'm working on Explorers at the moment, so obviously the Exo-Scout is handy. I'm not sure what others to use. I've tried to break my addiction to Political Officer, and check Embargoes manually before selling.
I think I need lots of Combat help, to try to get away from Aliens/Pirates, so am testing Pilot, Veteran and the odd Templar.

I'm still not sure the best number of crew to take exploring. As my ship/skills increase, and I get exo-scout and exo-crawler, I send more crew. I think I keep accidentally scouring planets and permanently emptying them, but haven't lasted long enough to test properly yet.

Agreed on Awesomeness!

I will try to remember some of my other questions though!

[abysmal]

You wont permanently empty a planet but it can take a lot of turns for it to replenish.

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[abysmal]

The templar is pretty good if alien hunting. Pilot is good for manuvering. You dont need the military officer. Scout is good for exploring.

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[pendell]

Jun 30, 2014 9:22:54 GMT -5 abysmal said:

You wont permanently empty a planet but it can take a lot of turns for it to replenish.

 


With respect, the Online Manual says something different. 

    
"Planets can be exhausted, even for good, during game play.

Exploration difficulty increases as the game goes by.

Rumors and crew composition can greatly affect the outcome.

Often the optimum strategy is not sending the entire Crew.

Consider exploring with 1 Crew per Explorer skill.

Consider Exploration on planets with richness rumors. Review the rumor specifically - do not confused "Scout teams" are an officer rumor, and do not increase the results (they decrease it, actually)."

 

So the answer to blackspike's third question -- "Is it my imagination, or does Exploring get massively more difficult as time goes on?
" -- is a yes .    At higher difficulty levels and later in the game, if I'm reading this right, you can't just land on any given planet and expect a harvest. Instead, you've got to troll the spice halls and palaces for rumors of tech hauls or resource rushes, and follow those.  


I can't answer all the other questions, but I'll take a crack at this one: 

Which officers are the best?

 


That depends entirely on what you're trying to accomplish with your character. 

If you're an explorer, you want a scout [to find stuff on the surface] and a warrior or a templar or a bodyguard [to keep you alive while you're there]. 


If you're a bounty hunter, a pilot plus a military officer gives you bonuses to everything you need to accomplish a capture/kill contract.  


If you're hunting aliens, some combination of military officer/templar/bodyguard/alien veteran.   Alien combat is boarding combat, so every one of your officers should be optimized for this part of the battle. 


If you're a merchant, you want a pilot and a mechanic. A mechanic is frequently a good choice if efficiency is a concern because not-Kaylee will keep your solar sails patched.  If you can't have a mechanic because you need a combat officer, you're going to need a big ship with a hold full of water-fuel -- wonderful for a combat ship, but it really eats into the profits of a merchant. A merchant should carry enough fuel for a full water tank and no more -- everything else should be devoted to cargo space. 

ETA: Oh, yes.  The "Death Warrant" also gives you immunity from that faction's bounty hunters.  Any bounty hunter from any faction will attack you if you have 'wanted criminal' status or if you have restricted cargo (weapons/artifacts/electronics) aboard your ship.   If you have a trade permit with a faction, that faction's bounty hunters and warships will not attack you because you have restricted cargo BUT the hunters can still attack you for the bounty on your head.  A death warrant prevents this -- no hunters from a faction will molest you for any reason if you have a death warrant from that faction.  

Respectfully, 

Brian P. 

[blackspike]

Thanks for the replies.

Death Warrants are worth buying for non-combat Captains then? So long as they have no down-sides, I suppose I should pick some up anyway.


I try to keep an eye on rumours, but rarely get any Explore rumours close by. I'm not sure how long Rumour Events last, and early on it doesn't seem worth flying half way across the Quadrant, away from friendly planets, to pick up a few bits n bobs.

I'm still working on Secondary Officers. Military, Pilot, Bodyguard, they are all going to help in ship-to-ship, aren't they? I tend to use Boarding attacks, unless I'm on my way home with no crew and lots of Artefacts, when I try to run away.

[pendell]

Death warrants do have a disadvantage in that, because they increase the combat missions offered, they decreases the number of delivery contracts. They are also somewhat risky early game because they increase the difficulty of the contracts you can get, and in the very early game this may mean unwinnable jobs.

So they're probably best as a midgame purchase. The other two are, IMO, mandatory in the early game because trade permits allow trade in restricted goods and act as pirate-b-gone, while military rank allows access to the military base and repairs. I've gone through entire games without a death warrant.

So it's a tradeoff. Are you getting killed by bounty hunters? Then the death warrant might be worth it. Are you specializing in combat missions? Again, the death warrant is good for you. But if all you want to do is fly courier and explorer, you can probably get along without it.

"Military, Pilot, Bodyguard, they are all going to help in ship-to-ship, aren't they? "

Yes.
Pilot helps in ship-to-ship combat, allowing you to close or increase range. I think, at close ranges, it also boosts your evasion and ability to target guns. Spice in the cargo hold helps him.

Military allows targeting of guns and torpedoes, and also assists in boarding combat. Weapons in the cargo hold help him.

Bodyguard is useful in boarding combat, since she seems to take wounds the captain would otherwise suffer.

Templar is useful for anti-xeno combat, and for boarding.

Alien vet is useful specifically against xenos but there is a morale penalty when fighting human opponents. Artifacts help him BUT they also help the Xenos, and they help some xeno variants much more. They can even convert your crew!

That is why, if you're going to have this character aboard, the artifact isolation hold is almost mandatory. This makes up to 25 artifacts undetectable , and provides you all of the bonuses but none of the associated penalties.

Respectfully,

Brian P.

[pendell]

By the way, Captain Blackspike, here's another useful fact I just tumbled to:

www.tresebrothers.com/help/StarTraders/ship_hold.htm

Records

Carrying Records in the hold is useful.

Each Record in the Hold provides a +1 explorer bonus up to 80% of the planet's total Danger or Richness, whichever is higher (AKA, optimal for player).
Each Record in the hold provides a +0.5 Explorer Bonus for the Scout Officer.

Respectfully,

Brian P.

[blackspike]

For my Explorers, Contracts are generally early-game, to get enough rep for a Trade Permit/Rank 1. So Warrants sound good to pick up later, to keep the Bounty Hunters off me later on.

I don't have access to the Isolation Chamber yet, still working on some Badges.
I often have the Weapons Cabinet to help Mr Military, and ALWAYS Records Box for Exploring. I don't like to fill up my hold with anything else, and need to ditch the Water Tanks in favour of Xeno-Crawler.

[squee]

I believe death warrants also increase Rep bonuses for helping that faction out in certain conflicts, so it will not help explorers at first.

[cab]

Jun 29, 2014 20:15:52 GMT -5 blackspike said:

What does a Death Warrant do?


Which officers are the best? 


Is it my imagination, or does Exploring get massively more difficult as time goes on?


The "Honour of Javat" seems a nice ship. AmIright?


How come I have loads of questions a while I'm playing, but forget them all as soon as I get to the forum?

I see you already got some good answers.  I won't rehash that info.  I will say that I rarely bother with death warrants.  I mostly play peaceful non-violent characters though.  But still, even for some more action-intense types it might not be worth it.  The reason is that you will have to rebuy the warrant if you fail the contract.  I'm not sure if that's every time but it's definitely enough to annoy ME.  Also, the way I play I rarely have bounties on my head.

You cannot go wrong with the Pilot in almost any play style.

Honor of Javat is good.  If you like Javat, the Javat Cutter is good too.

[blackspike]

What is a good Skill-Set for an Explorer?

I start by getting my STRENGTH up to 20 (as it doesn't increase my level!) and then Pilot and Explorer to max. Then it's time to boost Warrior to help survival in Wild Zones and Intimidate to keep the crew in line.
As my level increases, I try to keep Pilot at 150% of my Level, increasing Quickness as needed. the rest of my points go into Stealth.
I don't bother with Negotiate, I'd rather be alive and poor than rich and dead!
The only stats I increase are Strength (as mentioned, up to 20), and then whatever Quick is needed for Pilot.
Explore is stuck at 14, unless I get some more spare points.

[blackspike]

OK, remembered one of my gripes:
Rumours! I either get none, or one, or twenty "Why's all the vudka gone", "Syndicates make their own truth", etc that I have to click through to get anything!
Is it worth buying a round of Spice, as they say? Or Buying (£100) rumours? It doesn't seem to make much difference.

[Cory Trese]

Call it what you will ... "gripes" or "richly nuanced procedural content generation system"

1) Buying Rumors makes all the difference in the world.

2) If the Spice Hall is poorly rated, located far from the core, or out of range of any valid Rumors, you will see flavor text on ANY action (buying or randoming.)

3) There are officers that will warn you when the Spice Hall is out of Rumors.

4) Rumors are ALWAYS active, many of them. The question is does your Captain KNOW. You might be ignorant of the Rumors, but they're impacting you every time you land in a zone, trade with a Faction or travel through a sector in space.

5) The Range on a Spice Hall is determined by Hall Rating and Economy type.

6) The Range on a Palace is determined by Palace Rating and Faction type.