Saving the Antarctica

[Atarlost]

Saving the Antarctica is hard relative to destroying it, but the reward for destroying it is generally better than the reward for saving it, and this will be even more the case when the post-heretic game comes out because the gem of sacrifice is single use while the lamplighter is the most powerful weapon you can go into post-heretic space with.

But there's another big problem with saving the antarctica: You can't allways get the reward. It takes a long time to kill the Aquilas and if the Antarctica is generated too close to the gate it will have left the system before you finish, making the reward unattainable.

One problem is that the Aquilas are friendly until you kill one, and very difficult to kill. Most missiles won't work because frags don't go off in proximity to friendlies. Making them hostile would let you open with missile fire to soften them up at range and possibly give you enough time to kill them all before the Antarctica escaped.

[BloodEagle]

Fragmentation missiles tend to be rather weak at that point in the game, you might want to try upgrading to the (slightly better) Streka series of missile, or that Black Market weapon (I forget the name, but if you purchase enough goods from them then they'll give/install it for free) that all of the smugglers have.

If you have a good thermo-nuclear cannon, plasma cannon, or the IM-90, then it should be relatively simple to kill them all before they finish off the carrier. The weak point, IIRC, is the backside of the ship.

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The reward for saving them is pretty weak, at the moment. I would imagine that in future versions of the game, you could travel back to the St. Katherine system and get a better reward.

[Aury]

Fragmentation missiles tend to be rather weak at that point in the game, you might want to try upgrading to the (slightly better) Streka series of missile, or that Black Market weapon (I forget the name, but if you purchase enough goods from them then they'll give/install it for free) that all of the smugglers have.

If you have a good thermo-nuclear cannon, plasma cannon, or the IM-90, then it should be relatively simple to kill them all before they finish off the carrier. The weak point, IIRC, is the backside of the ship.

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The reward for saving them is pretty weak, at the moment. I would imagine that in future versions of the game, you could travel back to the St. Katherine system and get a better reward.

Atarlost knows what he's talking about. Anyways, he doesn't mean the blast damage, level 3 "fragmentation missile" the charon drakes use, he means just any missile with a fragmentation type effect/explosion.

[Aeonic]

How exactly are people supposed to know what the weak point of a ship is unless they look it up in the resource files? Shouldn't there be some in-game tips that you can pickup somewhere that will tell you how to most effectively target certain larger vessels?

[Atarlost]

Killing them before they finish the carrier is easy. Every time you kill one it reduces the damage the carrier takes. It's killing them all before the carrier escapes through the stargate that's the problem.

They don't really have a weak point. Noncritical segments aren't actually very significant against fast firing weapons. The back of the ship is the gap in their weapons fire arcs, but they have the same armor all around. If their weapons hurt me I might care about their fire arcs, but any shield that can stand up to Ares lightning turrets can shrug off katanas.

[BloodEagle]

Anyways, he doesn't mean the blast damage, level 3 "fragmentation missile" the charon drakes use, he means just any missile with a fragmentation type effect/explosion.

My mistake.

They don't really have a weak point. Noncritical segments aren't actually very significant against fast firing weapons. The back of the ship is the gap in their weapons fire arcs, but they have the same armor all around. If their weapons hurt me I might care about their fire arcs, but any shield that can stand up to Ares lightning turrets can shrug off katanas.

I've always found that hitting from behind runs the damage indicator up faster than from the front or sides. Kind of like how some enemies (marauders and the like) have multiple armor segments (or so it seems) on the same side.

I'll re-check when I reach the encounter, next time.

Killing them before they finish the carrier is easy. Every time you kill one it reduces the damage the carrier takes. It's killing them all before the carrier escapes through the stargate that's the problem.

Is the carrier immune to EMP? I know the standard ones aren't, but I'm not sure if you can still get the reward after firing at them....

[Atarlost]

That would work. It's not worth backtracking for an EMP weapon though. I don't use them normally because a helplessly spinning enemy just spreads out your damage. And the only EMP weapons are relatively low level and one is never normally seen in shops.

[Aury]

That would work. It's not worth backtracking for an EMP weapon though. I don't use them normally because a helplessly spinning enemy just spreads out your damage. And the only EMP weapons are relatively low level and one is never normally seen in shops.

EMP weapons DO work, just hold the spacebar down while on autopilot, and the stacked EMP effect essentially gives you a whole lot of EMP time to deal out your damage....

[Atarlost]

They work. I just don't like what they do. I don't want to sit and shoot a defenseless ship on autopilot. I much prefer to go up against a functional ship and shoot it repeatedly in the same spot. Active ships are usually very nice about allways turning the same face towards you.

[Aury]

I was providing him w/ a "walkthrough" of how to use it (since not everyone might realize that EMP stacks... its why those blasted cnidyst nodules are so effective at knocking you out, since there are so many homing in on you...

[BloodEagle]

That would work. It's not worth backtracking for an EMP weapon though. I don't use them normally because a helplessly spinning enemy just spreads out your damage. And the only EMP weapons are relatively low level and one is never normally seen in shops.

I completely agree.

I'm just wondering if you could use one to disable the carrier (forcing it to spread the damage, and stay away from the gate), yet still be able to claim the reward from said carrier.

I was providing him w/ a "walkthrough" of how to use it (since not everyone might realize that EMP stacks... its why those blasted cnidyst nodules are so effective at knocking you out, since there are so many homing in on you...

*BloodEagle feels the strange desire to point out that he's been playing since before .95.