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Shrimp or Shrimps posted:Do you have to be enemies with that station for the mines to trigger? I don't think I've ever used mines. There's dumb mines and there's more expensive IFF mines. Dumb mines still home in, but just blow up anything in the vicinity.
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Jul 18, 2022 04:27
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Ursine Catastrophe posted:Yep, that's the gist of it. The IS/OOS thing where mines don't exist if you're not nearby means teleporting to another sector, directing your mine-laying ship to leave the vicinity, then teleporting back so the mines start working again and blow the station up will work to save the mine-laying ship Ahh, right OK then. I still don't mind my 'suicide bus' routine, but yeah that's definitely more cost efficient.  Either way, it's not really something I plan on doing again. I've got my one sector in Silent Witness, so that's all I really need
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Jul 18, 2022 04:30
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I only started doing it on a more widespread manner when I started earmarking ships to pick up inventory drops during/after combat from xenon defense near gates and kept having the sector-owner's cops be like HEY YOU CAN'T PICK THAT UP THAT'S ILLEGAL so naturally, the correct and proper response to "get pulled over for having illegal AI tech in the trunk" is "blow up the sector courthouse about it and replace it with your own courthouse so that it's not illegal anymore", which is how laws work
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Jul 18, 2022 04:38
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Is there any way to force/save edit the worker's welfare questline into starting on a custom save? I just read about the quest not liking custom saves. I'm already backed into a weird hybrid of only having one save so I have to accept ship losses and having ten sequential saves while doing quests since they like to turn inside out, swallow their own guts and die. I don't want to have to scrap another 40+ hour save because I didn't know about the game's unique kinks.
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Jul 18, 2022 05:37
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I just looked it up - how is it meant to trigger normally?! I'm not sure if I've ever seen that race before, to be honest. Is it from ToA, maybe? I can't believe I've missed it for so long, if not.
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Jul 18, 2022 06:04
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Worker's Welfare is the name of the quest. I think it's supposed to be universal and start whenever the PC builds a habitat on a factory.
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Jul 18, 2022 08:09
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Happy Underpants posted:Worker's Welfare is the name of the quest. I think it's supposed to be universal and start whenever the PC builds a habitat on a factory. Oh! Interesting - since I definitely built a habitat in my last game. Thanks, I'll have to keep an eye out, next time I make one. Also, speaking of which - are factories that make foodstuffs actually profitable enough to be worth making? Since I'm just thinking about possibilities for some small megacomplex ideas. Since my main moneymaking complex is a small-ish (as far as megacomplexes go) refinery in Terran space, which makes a lot of cash. I also have a large recycling plant in my personal sector, but it doesn't make a lot of money - I end up using a lot of its output for construction projects and it makes enough money to keep the lights on, so I consider it to be a success. But yeah, aside from that (and a few small SPPs scattered around for a very slow trickle of money, which have paid themselves off a few times over) I hadn't really built much else, last time I played. So I'm not sure what to branch out to next - so I'm considering making like, an ARG food complex around ARG/ANT space, perhaps? With a habitat using some of its own production in order to boost its output. Would that be worthwhile do you think, or should I focus on something else? I'm not sure, really... I guess I could always take my old reliable route in X3TC, which was to make lots of drugs  EDIT: Since yeah, I'm not really sure what else is in dire need. I know the Terrans always need more refining, which is why I branched out into their space. And the Split seem to need everything (mostly because they get smashed by the Xenon) but otherwise, I don't really recall what's in high demand, across the galaxy. I guess maybe I could make a factory for electronics or something in Terran space (using some of my own materials, that is) but eh I dunno Major Isoor fucked around with this message at 08:20 on Jul 18, 2022 |
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Jul 18, 2022 08:15
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Major Isoor posted:Oh! Interesting - since I definitely built a habitat in my last game. Thanks, I'll have to keep an eye out, next time I make one. From what I recall food is almost entirely to feed your own workers to push your profit margin just a little higher on all your factories and has very small profit if you try to purely overproduce and sell it. But it's been a while since I played so maybe things have changed.
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Jul 18, 2022 08:21
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I believe the long-term goal is producing everything you need to make your own ships in-house, and then either using the ships or selling ships to other factions.
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Jul 18, 2022 08:21
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Hmm, OK then - I might avoid making food for now then, in that case. Good point on aiming for shipbuilding, too. On the topic of shipyards, do habitats help with ship construction at all, or only for resource production? Probably only for resource extraction I guess, but I hadn't thought about that until now. Anyway, in that case I might put an advanced electronics factory in Silent Witness I perhaps (my company is based in SWXI technically, but I figure having slightly more 'reach' into the rest of the galaxy will be worthwhile. Maaaybe even Hatikvah's Choice III, but being in HC is real risky in my game) and then branch out to field coils, smart chips and maybe even claytronics.
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Jul 18, 2022 08:31
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The only direct thing habitats have an effect on with shipbuilding itself is "crewing the ships"; there's some amount of "better performance" that comes from a ship with a proper service crew but I don't recall the actual numbers offhand.Major Isoor posted:EDIT: Since yeah, I'm not really sure what else is in dire need. I know the Terrans always need more refining, which is why I branched out into their space. And the Split seem to need everything (mostly because they get smashed by the Xenon) but otherwise, I don't really recall what's in high demand, across the galaxy. I guess maybe I could make a factory for electronics or something in Terran space (using some of my own materials, that is) but eh I dunno In my experience in the earlier-game, it's better to "enable trade" than it is to try to find and throw a lot of effort into a niche right off the bat-- setting up trade stations that are basically container storage on the edge of someone else's space, setting up purchase orders and your own ships to deliever "whatever happens to be low in that area at this moment in time" and setting up sell orders for the maximum allowed means you're not locked into producing one thing and accidentally completely tanking your market if the high-price demand is temporary or you fill it completely. Then once you have a couple of those trade depots more-or-less passively generating income you go whole-hog into ship production monopoly where you have stuff that can construct everything from raw materials up.
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Jul 18, 2022 08:58
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Well, I've dived back into the game, after not playing for a few months or so. Glad to be back in my old(ish - started anew at the beginning of the year) save. I had some money banked up and a surprising amount of blueprints unlocked, so I've made a food+medicine megacomplex to feed everyone in my my future habitats, as well as hopefully make a tiny bit of money back. I've also got a high tech megacomplex under construction, too. Eventually I'm gonna build a massive (for me anyway) ship tech factory that will cost 90+mil in resources (according to the X4 calculator) which will make all the various 'Components' wares (shields, weapons, turrets, as well as a couple others I can't remember. Also claytronics and some other bits), which I'll try to mostly build with my own resources. After that...I guess I'll get into shipbuilding like you guys suggest.  Hopefully my current projects will be able to supply the bulk of my shipbuilding, but I can always expand my factories if needed. I'm definitely gonna have to get some EMP bombs to try and steal the prints for the ship manufacturing modules though, since I vaguely recall them being insanely expensive, especially if you factor in the need to buy up on all the ship+weapon+etc blueprints, too. So that's definitely a 'later' problem. Hopefully I'll have some nice piles of cash by that point, to soften the damage to my bank balance.
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Jul 25, 2022 04:14
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Sorry for the DP - just wondering though...I know service crew numbers matter for repairing your ship (well, for large ships and medium too, but not small) but what about auxiliary ships? Since if you load them up with hull parts and e-cells they'll repair capital ships in the fleet. Do service crews impact the speed of these repairs, at all? Like, could I get away with having a small crew on an auxiliary ship, and not see any downside as far as repairing other ships go? I haven't really used aux ships in the past, so I honestly have no idea. Since I was wondering about loading it up with marines if possible, for opportunistic boardings.
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Aug 2, 2022 02:09
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As far as I know aux ships are just mobile wharves and it takes five seconds regardless, but I'm not 100% sure.
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Aug 2, 2022 04:13
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I haven't played one of these games since getting REALLY into X3 a number of years ago. It sounds like X4 is a solid upgrade at this point, are the Split and Terran DLCs the one to get for now? Are there any recommended QoL mods or just general tips for getting into this game after playing X3 a bunch previously?
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Aug 6, 2022 22:08
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terrans add terrans, unsurprisingly, which are their own seperate economic system that also doesn't interact with the rest of the universe much, as terrans dislike everyone else enough to not dock. (and vice versa) despite that they do send out kill fleets to kill xenon incursions, you'd think the commonwealth-other-then-argon would warm up to them split are commonwealth that are more or less on the otherside of the xenon sectors, keeping them somewhat seperate. their ships are usually the glasscannon no safety features all gun variety, which makes them the usual go-to player control ship, although I go for the terrans more. ToA adds some pirate stuff and a few sectors and kind of sucks. Keep in mind even some of the QoL mods need all three, so you'll have to check. Sector satellites and kuertee's more generic missions are both my big recommendations, the former lets your satellites scour an entire sector's stations when you place them and keeps them updated without adding more CPU-killing vision that planting normal satellites on everything would (and makes general exploration a lot less tedious) while the latter helps with mission generation as in vanilla it only tries to spawn seven missions, so you come up with very few offers. As for tips, the economy is pseudo-real in 4. In 3 AI just kind of existed and it was all an act, but in 4 miners actually bring materials to processors which then go through a chain and ultimately (with the exception of habitation stuff) goes to the ship building stations. The AI doesn't have money while you do, though, but otherwise everything needs to exist to move it up the line. Starting the game the station spread is randomized beyond the plot ones, and there is intentionally holes in the net that you "need" to fill. Find the wharves/shipyards, scan them to 30% so you can look at their logical overview at any time and take a look at what they're missing, then make that thing. (Usually hullparts.) The economy is centered around war via ships and very few polities are explicitly at war with each other at the start, without your plot-mission intervention, so it's mostly the xenon bogeymen doing the heavy lifting to keep that strumming along. Which they do. Factions can lose ground at like 20+ hours from xenon pressure if you don't tidy up the economy, but it's a very slow and gradual process. Otherwise, the only other big thing I can think of is as a heads up pretty much all of the actual structured, not randomly generated missions (story ones, etc) all basically loving suck and are an absolute chore. Make a hard, dedicated save whenever you're directed to fly into a structure, as you are very likely to clip through the wall at some point and get stuck - and if you do manage to get out you probably broke the scripting. oh actually if you do full screen windowed you can alt tab and the game will still run, while if you press pause while you're loading a save it will load the save in paused so you can look away while it does that forever
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Aug 6, 2022 22:49
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To be fair to ToA though, I absolutely love the recycling mechanics that were added. I've got a pretty big recycling megacomplex (with about a million solar panels to power the drat thing) and a heap of tugs pulling heaps of wrecks over from nearby sectors. Perfection! The free hull parts and claytronics from that have been super useful to me. But yeah, the protectyon (or whatever it's called) mechanics are super underbaked, and it's a large component of the plot for the expack, so I get why it's not regarded too highly. 100% get SV and CoH though, then maybe ToA if/when you're bored or want to recycle shipwrecks
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Aug 7, 2022 02:09
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recycling would be better if it wasn't pigeon holed into the toa sectors by the utterly obscene energy cell requirement
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Aug 7, 2022 02:30
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Yeah, that's true. That or Mercury, haha (which is so far from the action there'd be no point building a recycling plant there, really. I think I've got like, ~36 solar panels powering my station
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Aug 7, 2022 11:44
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Gamerofthegame posted:**Lots of helpful advice** Hey I just wanted to say thanks for posting all these tips! Just got my first corvette and the UI improvements over X3 are fantastic.
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Aug 15, 2022 00:20
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steam says i played 44 hours of X3 over ten years ago i don't recall a single on eof them I hopped on the bundle for X4 this week, thanks for the good posts in this thread re: QOL mods and such. Gonna see if I can pay attention long/hard enough to make a go of it in this game
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Aug 26, 2022 17:28
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Just came back from Gamescom and was happy to see Egosoft being really visible everywhere, probably most of the indie companies participating. I was super hosed as I was there for work and didn’t make it to their stand, but Tides of Avarice videos played on LVD screens in the main throughfare are. I think they’re doing much better financially, as the last time I was on Gamescom a few years ago they barely had a stand.
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Aug 26, 2022 17:37
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Mokotow posted:Just came back from Gamescom and was happy to see Egosoft being really visible everywhere, probably most of the indie companies participating. I was super hosed as I was there for work and didn’t make it to their stand, but Tides of Avarice videos played on LVD screens in the main throughfare are. I think they’re doing much better financially, as the last time I was on Gamescom a few years ago they barely had a stand. Any indication what their next project/steps are? I'm curious what comes next.
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Aug 26, 2022 18:48
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From that survey they recently put out it seems like they are looking at an X5 or some other X-related thing like Rebirth? It also seems they've had about 5 years between X games, so they'd be due for another one in the next couple years, maybe Oct/Nov. 2023?
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Aug 26, 2022 22:11
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dumb newbie question but uh is there any way to make the text in the menus larger im old, and blind
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Aug 27, 2022 03:53
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There is a 'UI Scale' option under game settings.
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Aug 27, 2022 05:22
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Hey, before I go and scrape together the components for some EMP bombs (since you can't buy em anywhere outright, right? No black marketeer I've found has 'em) I just wanted to check - is it possible to steal the blueprints for ship fabrication station modules? Or does that only work with regular production modules? Since yeah, although I'm just finishing up building the full production chain a shipyard will use, I'm currently fairly poor. (Only around 10mil in cash. My empire's total value is a little over a billion though - so I passively earn reasonable cash per hour) So although I'd love to branch out into shipbuilding ASAP, if I need to actually pay for the fabrication bay prints, that's gonna be a bit of a wait
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Aug 28, 2022 14:12
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You can't steal shipyards no, gotta buy them.
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Aug 28, 2022 14:17
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Ah, drat! That's a shame. Fair though, since otherwise you'd be able to bypass a massive barrier, granting early access to piles of money. Oh also, for when I've actually got the prints, what size habitat is needed? I remember reading that you need an occupied habitat module to provide crews for your ships. But how many people do you actually end up using? Like, would a small habitat be enough, or would it empty out and take too long to refill? If so, I might need to go for a large one, I guess. (Also, now that I think about it, what about the ToA dormitory modules? Are they any different from regular argon habitats? I assume they're badically just reskins to better fit the ToA aesthetic)
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Aug 28, 2022 14:28
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If you have one you can have at least a captain, but you won't be able to fill it with marines and crew unless you fully meet staff requirements for the station I just slap a few on there and have a farming station supply everyone and call it a day I think I'm finally ready to get back in and try Avarice out. New game or old campaign?
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Aug 28, 2022 14:33
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RBA Starblade posted:I think I'm finally ready to get back in and try Avarice out. New game or old campaign? 98% of it can be done on a fresh save out of the box, iirc, it really seemed to be geared towards newer players/early games the remaining 2% is several million credits in bribes and blowing up a space station, depending on decisions you make so if you don't want to have to detour mid quest to build at least a partial space empire/fleet, maybe old campaign it
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Aug 28, 2022 14:43
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Ursine Catastrophe posted:98% of it can be done on a fresh save out of the box, iirc, it really seemed to be geared towards newer players/early games Lol I'll just go in with a fighter and call it even lol Hmm load in and Duke's Buccaneer's immediately went to -15. I finished the Paranid plot and unified them hours ago, was that why? Did ToA update them? It looks like basically every auto-order broke too lmao so maybe new game it is. Is there a way to clear all these at once? RBA Starblade fucked around with this message at 15:32 on Aug 28, 2022 |
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Aug 28, 2022 15:10
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RBA Starblade posted:If you have one you can have at least a captain, but you won't be able to fill it with marines and crew unless you fully meet staff requirements for the station Oh, interesting! So I need to 100% meet the workforce demands for production, before I can then employ crews? Odd. Good to know, though. I just checked and I can get two L fabs, one S/M fab and one XL fab operated 100% by three L argon habitats, so I'll do that I guess. I just won't have any solar panels etc, since that'll mean that I'll need extra habitats. Thanks for that! One more question though - shipyards don't need much storage, right? Given they only buy resources to then immediately use. So, given I'll have all the resources it needs a short jump away, would a single M storage unit be enough? I'm just trying to figure out how I'll lay it out is all, in a way that's defensible and sensible, yet also somewhat aesthetically pleasing. (If anyone has screenshots of their shipyards, I'd definitely appreciate the inspiration!)
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Aug 29, 2022 02:11
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No you can employ crews before max productivity, it'll just lower while replenishing, and you need a certain amount to max the crew out also
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Aug 29, 2022 02:37
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Major Isoor posted:Oh, interesting! So I need to 100% meet the workforce demands for production, before I can then employ crews? Odd. Good to know, though. I just checked and I can get two L fabs, one S/M fab and one XL fab operated 100% by three L argon habitats, so I'll do that I guess. I just won't have any solar panels etc, since that'll mean that I'll need extra habitats. Thanks for that! You want a fair amount of storage otherwise you run the risk of just sitting there waiting for ships to land, and storage is pretty inexpensive overall. Having more storage is a is low cost, while not having enough is a high cost due to delayed production.
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Aug 29, 2022 07:55
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True - can't hurt to have more storage than required, for a shipyard. Also, quick question: Do station traders only buy goods the station requires, or will it also sell goods the station produces, if buyers are within range? Since in my sector I've got a basic refinery, a high tech megacomplex, a ship tech megacomplex and an agricultural+medicine megacomplex. Later I'll add a shipyard to the mix. I've been giving each station two M-sized freighters set to trade for the station. (Plus miners, if required) Is that OK, or is it a rather inefficient way of attempting to have my stations supply one another? Since I mean, the AI isn't perfect. So I'm mostly wondering if that's the best configuration, or if I should say, make a trader fleet instead and have them set to trade in the sector, or something.
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Sep 1, 2022 06:39
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Station traders will both buy and sell yes. Generally just giving stations traders is fine, but if you have a lot of stations in the same sector then a sector trader might be useful too for moving stuff between them, if they interconnect. Generally my solution to supply issues is to throw more ships at the problem. One thing you can do if you're making a lot of stations is build a dedicated mining station in a sector with a lot of ore, and then set some miners as traders for stations that use ore, which will allow them to make trading runs to your station and buy up ore (I would suggest using trade rules to make them exclusive) which allows you to centralize your ore collection and mining fleet. But there's nothing wrong with just making each station independent, really is more of a preference thing. OwlFancier fucked around with this message at 18:10 on Sep 1, 2022 |
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Sep 1, 2022 18:08
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Finally got around to playing with the new expansion, gotta say the new combat soundtrack absolutely slaps https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3FeagSPOCCw&t=115s Did my first playthrough on 4.10 a year ago finishing all the plots, oos combat was broken at the time so my galaxy was boring and no territory really changed hands. This time doing a budget custom start with full war mode ARG+ANT vs TER, TRI vs all and ZYA win. Complete carnage. I got my economy built up with the Terrans and I think I have them so stimulated they're at population cap. I'm at the point now where I've got my shipyard and can start making waves, just surveying the galaxy, ZYA are in shambles pushed back all the way into the northeast, the north is full red xenon. TRI is somehow barely hanging on to their northwest wharf. Hatikvah is just perma hellcamped by xenon. Due to economic roid rage the Terrans have proceeded to kick everyone's poo poo in. Antigone is now just gone. I don't think the Argon have any ships left. Terrans have extended, fully garrisoned and entrenched from getsu fune all the way into flashpoint, and are now simultaneously sieging argon prime, black hole sun, the rest of second contact, and true sight. I'm now hastily trying to establish a commonwealth production line in nopileos' so I can counter balance out the TER war machine with TRI. As I write this I see a Tokyo and Osakas razing Argon Prime, and an Asgard systematically purging true sight. The carnage has my attention so much I've barely touched the avarice content that prompted this playthrough. I should probably set up a salvage yard for the paranid to sell their station wrecks back to them.
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Sep 30, 2022 18:40
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Is there a mod to stop the xenon from building ships? I use this already: https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2426876427 It removes them from all systems except 1, they seem to warp around the universe always having a couple of shipyards in 1 system. My problem is that they keep producing an infinite stream of Xenon K's. I've thrown around 5 billion in ships at them so far and they just keep coming. So loving irritating, I just want them gone.
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Oct 13, 2022 11:41
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TjyvTompa posted:Is there a mod to stop the xenon from building ships? I use this already: https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2426876427 I'm certainly not the best X player, but my biggest threat zone is a constant incursion into Hatikvah's Choice, which I locked down by building a wall of turrets by the gate. It's now a murder, salvage, and occasionally warp to a Behemoth to hoover up loot station. For sector clearing for small stuff, a handful of Asgards OOS does nicely. I learned the hard way that a solo Asgard can be permanently disabled by a sufficiently large fleet of Ms, but it never died. I've been using something like 3 or 4 to clear the Split sectors. Haven't gone after home bases but I've been able to turn around their momentum and keep things at bay.
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Oct 13, 2022 11:59
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