Balance the Predator

Suggestions Open Space
1

Ok, I know Open Space is supposed to be dangerous. I get that. I like a little bit of fear to keep me from getting bored. It’s great fun to jump into a sector and see a random Defiler and think “Oh ****. Nope, nope nope!”

 

 

But when a player takes a Tier 5 Guard specifically outfitted for Alien hunting (Full EM Resists, Thermal Weapons, Enemy Damage Debuffs, Self Resistance Buffs, Multiple Shield Heals) and still doesn’t have a prayer of killing one of those abominations you call a Predator? That’s a problem.

 

Now it wouldn’t be a problem if they only spawned once in a while. A little jumpscare to keep people guessing. A random high-level encounter. But when they appear in almost EVERY SINGLE ALIEN PATROL in high level space? I’m sorry, but those things are impossible to kill by yourself without respawning at least once, but they never appear alone. They ALWAYS have a freaking HUNTER escort! And they have a radar range that would make a Recon blush! And did I mention that shooting any of the Aliens in the group with them makes the ENTIRE group aggro onto you?

 

You wonder why players fly only Tacklers and Recons in open space? There is your answer. Standing and fighting your NPCs isn’t an option when there are NPCs that can kill you no matter what you do to prevent it or kill it.

 

 

EDIT: And honestly, it does get a little old seeing nothing but Tacklers and Recons. The variety is just not there. Makes it a pain for players who don’t have one of those two classes to do ANYTHING in open space.

 

DOUBLE EDIT: I can also understand if the developers want there to be NPCs that are only killable if you are in a group. But if that is indeed the case, those specific NPCs should be far less frequent to encounter (as in, not present in every single patrol), and drop some reeeeeaally nice loot so players will actually want to squad up and kill them.

2

i think, the aliens were cool as long as they were not mainstream; but even then it was like too much at once.

 

having some dangerous pve encounters inbetween actually usually not so dangerous pve encounters is usually the way to go to balance survival games. in invasion, its almost just mass op ships;

 

to kill predator, you gotta go full damage; i usually manage them with a gunship and 1-2 duplicators; but i fully agree, i don’t see the point how it is currently; I just do dailies for the rewards, honestly.

3

i think, the aliens were cool as long as they were not mainstream; but even then it was like too much at once.

 

having some dangerous pve encounters inbetween actually usually not so dangerous pve encounters is usually the way to go to balance survival games. in invasion, its almost just mass op ships;

 

to kill predator, you gotta go full damage; i usually manage them with a gunship and 1-2 duplicators; but i fully agree, i don’t see the point how it is currently; I just do dailies for the rewards, honestly.

My point exactly. Defiled Solaris Wasteland and to kill a Predator there, alone with a T5 Tackler, with so many Hunters, other Predators and Drones, it is time consuming and annoying as hell.

It can take 5-10 minutes, depending on the enemy spawns and if you have auto repair hull ability equipped or not.

4

having some dangerous pve encounters inbetween actually usually not so dangerous pve encounters is usually the way to go to balance survival games. in invasion, its almost just mass op ships;

Not so dangerous:

Station pirates (10k health or so, typically killed by police before they even get a shot off)

Biomorphs (not that much health, simple to dodge or tank shots)

 

Dangerous:

Any other pirates (~50k health or so, difficult to consistently dodge or tank [or impossible, for laser pirates], very easy to aggro six to ten at a time)

Any other aliens (~100k health or so, difficult to impossible to consistently dodge or tank, very easy to aggro six to ten at a time)

 

So basically, stay at home station if you don’t want to deal with ships that can wipe out dedicated builds. Or make a recon with doomsdays and 700 m/s speed to kite the hell out of them for missions.

5

Recons? Tacklers? 

6

Thanks, we will gather further feedback and discuss this topic.

7

I kill 3-6 predators daily in Scrapyard.

 

Step 1:

Use any ship that has speed, can tank/escape fast/be hard to detect and make sure the happy alien bunch is following you.

 

Step 2:

Lure them into a pirate/scanavger/police patrol and see how it turns out.

 

Step 3:

Kill whatever is still alive (if they are still too hard, soften them with another patrol)

 

Step 4:

Loot da corpses!!! -Profit

 

 

Tacklers and recons are, no question, best ships for quickly navigating F**ING BS sectors, but I find other classes very useful in open space. It all comes down to the pilot, his preferences and the mission itself :slight_smile:

8

Step 4:

Loot da corpses!!! -Profit

With the level of suck invasion loot is at, I’m amazed you can profit from it at all.

9

Taking out predators along with hunters can be done alone in many ways. The easiest by far is to engage when aliens are fighting other npcs (shoot and get the loot). You can use range and speed too (takes more time) or you can use tank and dmg. Yesterday i went over terramorphing station and completed that escort mission all by myself in a guard: i had to kill many predators and hunters, as a matter of fact, i missed 1 cargo ship that managed to get to the warp gate since i was dealing with too many aliens xD…I used an inquisitor S with HB, stayed most of the time with shields (i got hit into hulls in 2 or 3 moments in 20 minutes). Guards are perfect for solo taking out predators and it aint hard if you do a 1vs1 (missions that requires you to kill a predator spawns them alone without escort; only normal/non-mission predators are escorted by hunters)…just be a little careful and make sure you dont agro the entire map.

About profit, i prefer a recon with spatial scanner and avoid all fight…it has amazing results.

10

Taking out predators along with hunters can be done alone in many ways. The easiest by far is to engage when aliens are fighting other npcs (shoot and get the loot). You can use range and speed too (takes more time) or you can use tank and dmg. Yesterday i went over terramorphing station and completed that escort mission all by myself in a guard: i had to kill many predators and hunters, as a matter of fact, i missed 1 cargo ship that managed to get to the warp gate since i was dealing with too many aliens xD…I used an inquisitor S with HB, stayed most of the time with shields (i got hit into hulls in 2 or 3 moments in 20 minutes). Guards are perfect for solo taking out predators and it aint hard if you do a 1vs1 (missions that requires you to kill a predator spawns them alone without escort; only normal/non-mission predators are escorted by hunters)…just be a little careful and make sure you dont agro the entire map.

About profit, i prefer a recon with spatial scanner and avoid all fight…it has amazing results.

The problem with engaging when aliens fight other NPCs is that half the time, you aggro two groups instead of none.

 

Your guard story is nice, but the fact that your daily mission took twenty minutes is telling on its own.

 

And recon with spatial scanner is great, but avoiding fights isn’t the best course of action when most daily missions require kills.

11

The problem with engaging when aliens fight other NPCs is that half the time, you aggro two groups instead of none.

 

Your guard story is nice, but the fact that your daily mission took twenty minutes is telling on its own.

 

And recon with spatial scanner is great, but avoiding fights isn’t the best course of action when most daily missions require kills.

Even more annoying is when you want to find some NPCs to kite the predators into to help kill it (because let’s face it, even a 10+ swarm of NPCs dies to predators) but you’re in Jericho space, where the Cybers are allied with them.

Hope you brought doomsdays. And you’ll still probably die.

12

The problem with engaging when aliens fight other NPCs is that half the time, you aggro two groups instead of none.

 

Your guard story is nice, but the fact that your daily mission took twenty minutes is telling on its own.

 

And recon with spatial scanner is great, but avoiding fights isn’t the best course of action when most daily missions require kills.

With a patriarch i wouldve definately took much less time and it wouldve been much easier too (higher shield tank, 10% crit chance+ 2 CPU slots to equip infrared or targeting coprocessor)…most likely that i wouldve done it at first attempt (instead of missing the cargo ship cos i was still shooting aliens). My inquisitor S handled pretty well 2 and even 3 groups of aliens (hunters+predators), no excuse for a patriarch.

 

Even more annoying is when you want to find some NPCs to kite the predators into to help kill it (because let’s face it, even a 10+ swarm of NPCs dies to predators) but you’re in Jericho space, where the Cybers are allied with them.

Hope you brought doomsdays. And you’ll still probably die.

Jericho maps can be a little of exception (you can still lure them to guard turrets and police patrols wich is very effective)…specially solaris wasteland (imo the hardest map in open space). Doomsday arent that great, cruise are far better (extra damage, you hit more shots since they turn much more according to speed, double area of damage (that really matters to hit multiple ships at once)) and firestorm beats it because of area of dmg…even EM missiles from intis are better than doomsday. In Fed and Emp sectors ive find myself in many situations were 4 allied npcs are more than enough to draw fire from a single predator (yes, they are alone if they belong to a mission) for me to comfortably shoot it down (using gravi scanner with crit build even).

A few tips to fight predators:

-If you have less than 450ms, make sure you have some way to run away (cloack, microwarp, engine overcharge, etc.) or to tank and deal a lot of dmg (aka: be a guard). Cruise is perfect for fighters since its very likely that you wont be able to kill the predator in the first attempt and you might get outnumbered, right there is when speed is crucial to survive, heal, disperse multiple groups and then come back.

-Predators deal EM but also thermal dmg, so if you are not runnig adaptives make sure to get 1 therm resist mod.

-Missile shield is a vital mod to equip at your guard since predator EM balls are guided and considered as missiles.

-When facing multiple groups, A: run away to split them and come back when they are not together. B: use cover to block some of the ships line of sight while you shoot the rest (this helps a lot, specially with a slow ship like a guard); staying close to 1vs1 is always the best.

-Predators from missions are always alone; take your time to not lure any other ship and strike it when no other groups are nearby.

-If you are fighting near allied NPC, run/cloack for some seconds untill predator/hunters turn agro to allied NPCs and then strike them back (they might reagro you, so be ready to get cover again).

-Fed recon/cov op can kill a group of predator and hunters if using 2 adaptives; make sure to kill weakest ships first (hunters in this case), equip the most you can to damage (EM missiles, curved reflector for pulse laser/supernova for EM, CPUs that boost crit dmg/chance, iridium heatsink/pulse dischargers) while maintaining maximum survability (use 1 EM hull resist (therm works too) and sacrifice 1 cap slot to be energy stable and be able to use regen while constantly ABing).

-For some jericho maps like gas harvest: get inside those rectangular boxes near the center of the map, lure the predator/hunters and shoot it safely from inside, it cant be easier to do it like that.

-Predators and hunters usually activate pulsar when YOU are in range, stay away so your friendly NPCs dont get raped by pulsar.

-Always carry with you 2 heal mods (if you are in a guard, bring instead 3 shield heals).

-You can kill a predator from long range with a tackler using cruise: get about 5km distance, shoot with gravi scanner to slow him down, place both turrets and use reverse with AB…watch your distance (if it gets too close use cloack). Be sure that your as.s is heading to the highest/lowest part of the map and you wont agro anyone. This tactic is really coward, takes a while but works very well.

-You can safely shoot down aliens when they are “hibernating” (you identify it easily because they stand almost still in one spot)…just like how rennieash does it (you can find them like that without doing anything from your end: take advantage of it).