Game Tips: Don't read if you don't want spoilers

[hookoa]

These are a few tips that I've picked up while playing Transcendence over the years. I'm sure most of you know most of these here, but I figured I'd post some tips that I've found useful and others can do the same. They're valid up till 1.0RC6. I normally survive past St. K's; sometimes I make it to Heretic. These could be spoilers, but everything is there in the source.

For the record, I don't Tinker and I don't Fabricate, so there's nothing in here about that. If there's anything helpful that you know, post below.


Misc:
-Buy ultra light titanium armor and test unknown barrels. For about 150 credits each, you can identify barrels with no risk to expensive armor.
-Jettison all your cargo before opening sealed cargo containers. It only takes a second and is worth it.
-If you have light titanium barricades, set them up on all four sides of an agriculture station before accepting the mission. Don't waste quads. They're worth almost as much sold.
-Upgrading reactors and those fuel assemblies wont be useful anymore? Top off your tank before upgrading to get the most use out of them.

Black Market:
-Friendly (green) T-31 transports with viking escorts are almost guaranteed to carry Illegal stuff, which is almost guaranteed to get you an ID from the guaranteed hotel in Rigel Aurelius.
-NEVER jettison a black market mission container. Losing a container is a great YASD.
-Missions (gaining rank) lower the cost of goods from the Black Market, but take forever.
-If you can't afford all of one type of illegal from the Black Market, don't buy it yet. The druggies at Vicky's are also affected by the new buying limits.

Money Making:
-Stockpile goods when you get mass quantities of them. Eg. If mining with the freighter, don't deliver 53 tons of titanium ore, 14 tons of uranium ore, and 39 tons of plasteel ore to the corporate station. Jettison them near the station, and after all the mining is done, deliver one load of 200 tons of titanium ore, a second load of 200 tons of plasteel ore, and then all the rare ores. They'll buy more from you.
-Open ammo crates (near stations that can decon/repair you). The ammo is worth more identified, and it wont kill you.
-Ice Farm ----> Hotel is a great route, but if Reclusive Hotel is five systems away, deliver to a nearby corp station. They pay almost the same.
-Korolov missions are totally worth it. Once Charon Frigates start spawning, it's easy to get upwards of 500 stilettos from them. Ka-ching! or Ka boom! It's your choice after that.

Navigation:
-Need a clue where friendly stations are in a new system? Sit at the gate and watch where friendly ships and enemy ships fly off to.
-Same goes for finding enemy bases in nebula systems.
-Keep notepad open. Alt-Tab to it and write down system names, which systems have important stations (hotel, Black Market, Commonwealth Fortress, etc) and what things you still want to do in each station.
-Don't want to get close to that red blip on your LRS? Hold "T" until everything's targeted, and that unknown station will be added to the system map without having to get close.
-Need to find a stargate, but there's lots of Big Bads around? Order something cheap from a corp outpost and check the delivery time immediately. Now look on the map for planets/objects that far away from the station. Tada! You've found the gate.

Docking:
-No docking ports available? Sometimes you can tap freighters and other personal craft with a single shot from your weakest weapon. (Don't destroy the ships, just knock.) They'll leave.
-Lots of wrecks around? Clear the targeting computer (R) then hit (F) when directly over the station. It will be the first target and you can dock.

Escorting Ships:
-If the superfreighter delivering ore the CSC isn't attacked and it's at least 2/3rds to the CSC, shoot out one of its armor sections and get ready.
-Bad positioning-------You-------Enemy-------Freighter (two ships are shooting at the freighter)
Good positioning-------Enemy-------You-------Freighter (one ship is shooting and one is a shield)
-Charon frigates will shoot at you if you shoot at them. You can draw fire until the freighter is clear.
-If you know there are enemy stations between Korolov Station / CSC and the stargates, clear those out. The freighter will either fly through the swarm or add dozens or more light seconds to their trip.

Fighting:
-Begin the running away part before the shields collapse. Run 'n Gun is a great mantra, especially early game.
-"I" -> "A" can save your life.
-Enemies pursuing you over long distances will gravitate toward a line directly behind you. Weapon firing backwards + ferians = Weapon firing backwards + some loot
-Gems of Freezy-Timey + Aquilas = Excellent Loot
-If you're hiding on a station/star/asteriod/planet and want to make a break for it, wait until the enemy ship just passes you in the opposite direction. They have to slow and turn around before chasing.
-Weapons with a "push" (recoiless cannons) can nudge wrecks up against enemy stations, blocking their shots and allowing you to shoot them on the edges. (Abbasid fail badly here)
-Same thing works in the Arena. A cheap recoiless cannon and the melee shipwrecks can make a weak barrier to rest behind.
-If a station is nearly destroyed (97-99% damage), kill it when enemy ships are flying over it. Ranx gunships are really bad about this.
-For enemies that run (vikings, ranx guns, etc), dont knock out their shields until they're turning or travelling in the same direction as you. This will allow you to keep shooting as they run.
-Keep patch spiders unequipped. They'll only get damaged in combat and wont heal you enough during an encounter to matter. Once you win, equip, repair, then unequip again.

Plain ol' Dirty Tactics:
-Want the loot from a friendly Taikon/Adventure Outfitters/Corp Post? Ranx dreads don't care who they shoot at and Ferrian Warriors have bad aim. Keep the station targeted and run when it's about to blow.
P.S. Loot first, sort later.
-Teratons have great defenses, but no prisons. Smash and grab if you can. They'd do the same to you.
-Xenophobe fleets with worldships can take out Taikon stations. Target and follow. Your shields only need to survive the run in and out. (Always keep the station targeted so you know when the present is opened.)
-Manticore gunships defending stations are quick to attack and fairly quick to die. They're a great source of high end MAGs, especially if you can lure powerful enemies close to friendly stations.
-Want to kill the salvager that stole your loot, but he's an even match? Wait till he gets to a spot with a lot of wrecks. He'll keep docking and looting, giving you plenty of time to punch through one section of armor.

[digdug]

awesome list Hookoa

I have a simple known addition to the Ice Farm route:
Fuel Depot ----> Ice Farm ----> Hotel

-Don't want to get close to that red blip on your LRS? Hold "T" until everything's targeted, and that unknown station will be added to the system map without having to get close.

I didn't know about this. However it sounds a little like cheating or it can be a bug ?

-Open ammo crates (near stations that can decon/repair you). The ammo is worth more identified, and it wont kill you.

True, however there are a few inconsistencies , not all ammo boxes are profitable when opened. Example:

name cost weight
itAmmoBoxMAG 1250 2500 ---> 25 itZG24ClusterMAG = 2500 1500
good, it cost more and weight less

itAmmoBoxThermo 1250 2500 ---> 25 itThermoCannonShell = 875 625
this is not good, sell the box if you don't need the ammo.

[Prophet]

Tinkers:
Some tips if you can find a tinker station in an early system
1 Fusion trigger = 1 XM900 Lucifer
4 damaged turbolasers = dual turbolaser
4 Cerallox ore = 1 Ceralloy armor segment -> EMP immunity
5 Duralloy ore = 1 Duranium armor segment -> regen
Tinkers can also be a great place to find deals on decent armor. Sure it's damaged but armor is easy to repair.
They can also be a godsend if you are low on cash. Backtrack to scoop up damaged weapons and devices and the tinkers will happily pay you for them.
Also, if you dock with the tinkers while radioactive, the tinkers will make your ship immune for 1600 credits unless your armor is already enhanced or immune. Find a decent set of armor and a radioactive barrel, use it next to the tinkers and get it applied. Borocarbide paste is difficult to find and you don't want to waste a corporate trade order on them. A lot of radioactive wrecks have decent loot and will easily pay for the paste application.

Teratons:
Teraton fabricators are a must if you want to use the high end or alien launchers as the ammo is very hard to find in ample quantities.
1. Drop fuel into the pit
2. Drop Ore into the pit
3. repeat steps 1 + 2 three times
4. drop in an ammo that you need you should get up to a dozen back
5. repeat until the tentacles crush your fuel or ore
6. drop some high end luxury food to make the tentacle monster happy
7. repeat until your ship is overflowing with ammo
The fabricators can do more than just make ammo but its generally less worthwhile.

The teraton research experiments generally are useless. If you have the proper medical item on your ship you won't be insta-killed and you might get a trinket worth a few thousand credits. Better to simply sell the medicines.


Sisters of Domina
Wondering how to get your rank up so you can start shattering all your enemies? Destroy a Sung slave camp and take the slaves to a shrine. Go to the 'Sanctum' and 'Offer' the slaves to the sisters. It only takes about 30 slaves to get to the maximum level.

Identification of items
Testing out roms, crystals, barrles etc. is generally best to do when you are right beside a friendly station preparing to upgrade. Better yet if your current items are already enhanced as some/most bad items will simply remove a previous enhancement rather than add the negative effect.

DO NOT TAKE MISSIONS IN BINARY SYSTEMS!!
Unless you desperately need the missions to rank up it's generally not worth the time or effort that will be required. Many times the missions will simply be extraordinarily difficult like trying to escort a superfreighter to a CSC thats 6000 ls away and by the time you manage to get out to it it's already 90% injured and you only have 5 fuel rods left.


Finally, don't be ashamed to move onto the next system if you haven't killed everything in the current system. You may find some better equipment or a lucrative trade route and can come back to finish the job.

[Bobby]

Teratons can be great for getting high end weapons with a little hoarding of armor and food.

fuel gives it energy, armor gives it resources, foods make it happy. If it doesn't have enough resources it will get very angry if you give it devices, ammo will simply be crushed.

give it fuel first or it can't digest armors.

my process:
1. drop fuel (I do 20 pteracnium, then I'm set for a long time)
2. drop armor (whatever I pick up from enemies, usually military, but at this point credits aren't so important and teratons won't buy it, plus armor is heavy.)
3. drop 5 good foods, ice moss, prime beef, etc (I hoard some on a mule from previous systems).
4. drop a weapon or shield: ie damaged positron cannon
5. recieve your improved weapon (im90/ ktyrn launcher/ positron lancer/ etc) or shield
6. repeat steps 2-4 as until happy with the products.

[Brzelius]

Something else to add for Teraton fabricators:
They start at neutral and have 5 possible moods (very angry, angry, neutral, friendly, very friendly). As said, feed them some comestibles to make them more happy. They lose positive mood after some uses or if you feed them stuff like radioactive waste barrels.
When they're friendly, they will convert a shield or weapon you drop in into something the same level (e.g. Ares Positron Cannon IX -> Heavy Ion Blaster IX).
When they're very friendly, they will convert a shield or weapon you drop into the pit into something the next higher tech level (e.g. Omnidirectional Ion Blaster IX -> IM90 multitarget blaster X or Jotun Deflector IX -> Lazarus shield generator X).
When giving them a level X item to convert when they're very happy, they will crush it and get angry (they won't produce level XI items).


Also, some other tips:

• Longzhu spheres can be used to repair or upgrade energy weapons. Found a damaged Ares positron cannon? Use a Longzhu sphere on it and sell it for 10,000 rin (or use it).
• Applying a Longzhu sphere to a non-enhanced energy weapon (+0%) will enhance it to +20% immediately. Successive Longzhu spheres will only add +10% each. Stuff like particle source upgrades will always add +10%, even when not enhanced yet.
• You can enhance weapons to +150% this way, more with enhancing devices. Don't waste any upgrades or Longzhu spheres on them when they're already at max. This also works on the Iocrym fracture cannon, which is truely intimidating with +150%.
• For a full list of tinker "recipes", see here.
• You can order Barrels of regenerating nanos from corporate trading posts, 4 each, and apply them to your high-end armor, even the level XI light Iocrym armor, if you want it to regenerate without patch spiders or patcher arms (or faster with them).
• Buying (at Tempus labs, Black Market stations etc.) and selling illegal goods like Laudanum ampules only makes a profit when sold at Victorian nightclubs in St. Kath's or later (and for that you need a smuggling upgrade for your cargo hold), selling it at Corporate Enclaves will cost you money unless you found instead of bought the goods (but you don't need a cargo hold upgrade to get through customs at Corporate Enclaves).
• There are lots of ways to make money trading. Generally you can almost always buy the stuff that specialized stations offer (mining posts, industries, ice farms, fuel depots) indiscriminately and sell it for a profit at other stations, for example ores to Corporate enclaves or industrial complexes, foodstuff to hotels etc. You can usually sell all the products from the industrial complexes around the St. Kath's arcology and sell them for a profit at the Corporate enclaves and the arcology itself there.
• Autons seem pretty useless to many, but the EMP autons can be extremely useful for disabling hard enemies; also, the mule autons take some getting used to and need special care so they don't get shot down, but you can just park them on top of a planet or sun in every new system. They speed up mining and selling considerably (and everything else, especially when you're not in a freighter).
• You should have one long-range base cracker weapon installed (like a Howitzer or Lancer weapon, but Lancers don't have the WMD attribute, making it tiresome to destroy stations with them) and try to snipe stations from three screens or more away. Have them selected to see if you're hitting them. Ships guarding those stations will fly at you, mostly right into your long-range fire, getting squashed. You may need to adjust the angle when guard wrecks block your line of fire.
• Laser weapons can last surprisingly long. For most of mid game, an omnidirectional turbolaser with a laser collimator is much better and disposes of most enemies much faster than an omnidirectional particle cannon, mostly because Sung and Dwarg are particle-resistant or even -reflecting.
• If Transcendence seems too hard, learn using Domina powers. Getting enough slave coffins from Sung slave camps will unlock them and they never get used up, they always recharge after a fixed amount of time. There are many ways to make the game a lot easier with Domina powers. For example:
• Shoot up several ferian hives, use invoke > sustain to survive the run to a nearby planet or sun, hide on top of it until all Ferians (including warriors) have gathered around you and then used invoke > Circle of Wrath: most should be instantly destroyed, ready to loot. Use Shatter only if you don't care about looting your opponents later, as it will almost always utterly vaporize them.
• Get a beefy shield like a 100 MW Mammoth or Kaidun, ideally +50%. Approach otherwise impossible opponents (for example Ares Shipyard with Phobos / Deimos around). When near enough, start shooting down the hard foes, use invoke > defend so you don't take damage, when it ends and your shield is critically low, use invoke > restore to get it up to full strength again, if that's not enough time to get the nasties killed, use invoke > circle of wrath and finally invoke > sustain to run away, lick your wounds and prepare for the next go.
• Use invoke > ingenuity whenever it's available and you don't need circle of wrath in the next few minutes (they share a cooldown), it will randomly improve your weapons, armor segments (by +20% or +50%), shield or generator (+20% max output and capacity). Only works on stuff that's not enhanced yet. You can get an improved (1.2 GW) Hyperion reactor almost guaranteed after a few tries this way.
• Invoke > desperate espace is some kind of life insurance... if you would otherwise be destroyed, for example getting hit by a disintegration sphere without shield or getting hit on an armor segment that is about to collapse, you will get a short sustain-like effect when you invoked desperate escape at any time earlier. When you used it up, invoke it again to get another "life".

[Curudan]

-Friendly (green) T-31 transports with viking escorts are almost guaranteed to carry Illegal stuff, which is almost guaranteed to get you an ID from the guaranteed hotel in Rigel Aurelius.

There is also a one in twenty chance that the hotel encounter will be some space police who will bust you for smuggling if you don't bride them with 1000 credits. There is no way to tell the difference, so make sure you carry at least 1000 credits to the hotel encounter. It makes a very embarrassing YASD.

-Korolov missions are totally worth it. Once Charon Frigates start spawning, it's easy to get upwards of 500 stilettos from them. Ka-ching! or Ka boom! It's your choice after that.

They are especially worth doing because the Korolov missions are the only sure way to get a class V deflector, and a class V deflector enhanced with the Hiro shield upgrade rom (from the arena) is a formidable shield that will last you a very long time. I usually use mine until I get a mammoth 100!

Once you have achieved Master rank in the Korolov shipping company, you will receive a class V deflector as a gift. This can be tricky, because it is impossible to achieve master rank unless you refrain from destroying the Kronosaurus. When you destroy the Kronosaurus, you get instantly teleported to Legend rank, skipping master rank and the class V!

It doesn't really matter how you avoid destroying it, I usually lure it into a crowd of heavily armed allied ships, so I can get the loot.

Of course you usually only need 1-2 Korolovs to reach Legend, and thus Volkov, but you will usually need more than that to reach Master. The game doesn't always spawn enough Korolov's for that, so it is something of a gamble. You might make a different choice if you have the upgradable NPC's mod installed, and getting Volkov is more important to you than the class V.

The Master level shipping missions are very lucrative, though.

EDIT: When a Korolov station is spawned in a system, a matching Charon fortress is also spawned. After a predetermined number of missions (decided when the station is spawned) you will have to destroy the Charon stronghold, and you will not get any more Korolov missions at that station. Also, you will always get more Korolov experience from a round trip escort than an escort to gate mission. Always get the round trip missions.

And make sure you don't find the Charon stronghold before you've finished with that Korolov!

If the Charon stronghold is discovered by the player, you get the destroy stronghold mission regardless of whether or not you've finished all the missions. The strongholds are always spawned way outside the outer orbits of the system, but it is easy to find it if you either, stalk a BM transport through the system, or use a military map ROM.

Don't use a military map ROM in a system with a Korolov!

-Keep notepad open. Alt-Tab to it and write down system names, which systems have important stations (hotel, Black Market, Commonwealth Fortress, etc) and what things you still want to do in each station.

I always did this too, but then I discovered the Captains log by Bobby. It's really saves a lot of alt-tabbing.

Carbide Carapace:

Carbide Carapace is one of my most favorite pieces of armor. They have 200 HP, and a set bonus of 100. So, when you have a complete set, each piece has 300 HP. It has a fairly low price, 32k for the whole set, and a very low mass, 14 tons for the whole set. And most importantly, they very frequently show up on Bushido dealerships, which means that you can have a full set before you even start taking on the Dwarg and Sung.

[hookoa]

Thank you very very much for the Teraton recipes. I've never figured out any recipes through game-play, as it's always been too tempting a method to destroy radioactive barrels.

[SparcMan]

Great tips! I think some of these hints should be hidden throughout the game (maybe in the form of rare data ROMs). That would be a post-1.0 project though. For someone that doesn't know the game very well and hasn't seen any of the hints in this forum, putting a few hints here and there within the game could probably improve playability and replayability.

[Song]

Great tips! I think some of these hints should be hidden throughout the game (maybe in the form of rare data ROMs). That would be a post-1.0 project though. For someone that doesn't know the game very well and hasn't seen any of the hints in this forum, putting a few hints here and there within the game could probably improve playability and replayability.

Very true.

When I made my list of Tinkers Recipes.....I only got about 4-6 of them completely right from what I knew to start with. I had to use the XML to get it right. And I *still* have not finished that list....I really want credit values some time..

You shouldn't have to do that....it should be possible to either hear it at the local pub, or find it in a ROM somewhere.

[SparcMan]

You shouldn't have to do that....it should be possible to either hear it at the local pub, or find it in a ROM somewhere.

Oooooo! The Pub! I hadn't thought of that, but that would be a great idea!! So you randomly run into someone in the pub that offers you a handy tip if you are willing to part with some credits (to pay his tab I would guess).

[digdug]

An additional trick with armor layers:
when I find a nice set of armors, I like to put on them the available barrels I have, even if the enhancement is not great for that type of armor, it's just to have the little boost to survive better.
However later I could find the "right" set of barrels that reduce the weakness of the armor I have, so what to do ? buy new armor ? nah, just use

barrel of degenerative nanos

to remove the enhancement and then apply whatever new barrel you want.

[Atarlost]

The player ship is usually as fast as or faster than most opponents. The Sapphire can match speed with most gunships and outrun all capital ships. The Wolfen can match or outrun everything except hornet battlepods. The freighter can match the Sapphire's top speed with the first drive upgrade and match the Wolfen's with the second. There are very few foes against which you cannot outrange at least part of their armament and with your superior mobility you can control the engagement range.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_ ... The_battle
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parthian_shot

Don't fight like Crassus.

[josh19967]

Tip for fighting the Iocrym Command Ship:
Use a weapon with penetration ability and sit right on the edge of the planet it sits next to. Fire at the commandship. Most of the weapon will be absorbed but some damage will leak through. This can be very tedious but its worth it because they cant really damage you. The trick is not to move because if you do, you may miss the planet. It may look like you are getting damaged when you're not, so just sit there n' chill- As long as you're on top of the planet, you're invulnerable.