Escape Velocity: Nova on Windows is OUT!

Post by **Dalton** » 2003-07-27 01:49pm

phongn wrote:Get into the Sigma missions - you'll get access to their upgrades, ships and access to the hypergate system. That'll shave a lot of time off your travels.

I have access to those, yeah. It's pretty sweet.

SirNitram · Post by **SirNitram** » 2003-07-27 03:05pm

Dalton wrote:
phongn wrote:Get into the Sigma missions - you'll get access to their upgrades, ships and access to the hypergate system. That'll shave a lot of time off your travels.
I have access to those, yeah. It's pretty sweet.

Nothing can beat a Manticore fully pimped out with the Sigma upgrades and all the other neat thingies. I won't even trade it in for Polaris ships.

phongn · Post by **phongn** » 2003-07-27 03:28pm

Even the Raven

SirNitram · Post by **SirNitram** » 2003-07-27 03:50pm

phongn wrote:Even the Raven

Paycheck not here yet = Not registered yet = No Raven for me yet.

But a fleet of six Scarabs can completely lock down Earth with no difficulty. But it won't let me dominate it.

Slartibartfast · Post by **Slartibartfast** » 2003-07-27 08:34pm

Shadowhawk wrote:It said I was member of the Bounty Hunter's Guild in my Honors for a while, but for some reason, it disappeared after a while.

That happens when you hit any federation ship. It's damn easy to do accidentally, and can completely fuck your game if you haven't done at least their second mission (because you're stuck with that thread and can't progress in any other)

Bounties start at 25k a pop, but apparently stay that way until you progress in the bounty hunter string. Most systems will have 1-3 bounties waiting for you. I always take a pair of bounties when I'm in GLi-Tech-nia, and when I hyper out, they always show up about 10 seconds after I finish the jump. Two quick explosions later (even if Federation forces happen to help), a hop to Earth, and you're 50k richer. I think you have to destroy their ships, though, so no capturing. Looting might work.

There's also a 100k for killing traitors, methinks. Or killing feds for the aurorans.

Shadowhawk · Post by **Shadowhawk** » 2003-07-27 09:32pm

Slartibartfast wrote:
Shadowhawk wrote:It said I was member of the Bounty Hunter's Guild in my Honors for a while, but for some reason, it disappeared after a while.
That happens when you hit any federation ship. It's damn easy to do accidentally, and can completely fuck your game if you haven't done at least their second mission (because you're stuck with that thread and can't progress in any other)

Oh, hell. I accidentally hit feds all the time, because their stupid fighters like to interfere in my fights, and always get between me, my FPC turret, and my enemy.
I would assume that if I were out of the Guild, I'd stop seeing Guild members flying around and I wouldn't be able to access bounties any longer.

Slartibartfast · Post by **Slartibartfast** » 2003-07-27 10:05pm

Shadowhawk wrote:
Slartibartfast wrote:
Shadowhawk wrote:It said I was member of the Bounty Hunter's Guild in my Honors for a while, but for some reason, it disappeared after a while.
That happens when you hit any federation ship. It's damn easy to do accidentally, and can completely fuck your game if you haven't done at least their second mission (because you're stuck with that thread and can't progress in any other)
Oh, hell. I accidentally hit feds all the time, because their stupid fighters like to interfere in my fights, and always get between me, my FPC turret, and my enemy.
I would assume that if I were out of the Guild, I'd stop seeing Guild members flying around and I wouldn't be able to access bounties any longer.

I think you can still collect bounties. But if you're in one of the last BH missions, the Earth object apparently gets changed with something else that looks exactly like it but doesn't have Sigma missions or lets you collect bounties. That happens in several threads.

Shadowhawk · Post by **Shadowhawk** » 2003-07-27 10:17pm

Slartibartfast wrote:I think you can still collect bounties. But if you're in one of the last BH missions, the Earth object apparently gets changed with something else that looks exactly like it but doesn't have Sigma missions or lets you collect bounties. That happens in several threads.

Hrm. How do I get to the Sigma thread?

phongn · Post by **phongn** » 2003-07-27 10:22pm

Random incident on the Earth Shipyard.

Shadowhawk · Post by **Shadowhawk** » 2003-07-27 11:03pm

phongn wrote:Random incident on the Earth Shipyard.

Heh. I go to Earth Shipyards and am immediately presented with the thread.

Slartibartfast · Post by **Slartibartfast** » 2003-07-28 03:42am

Yeah, all you need is a bit of combat rating.

Post by **Dalton** » 2003-07-28 03:56am

I picked up the bounty hunter thread too.

Oh, I made a big score today: managed to disable a Pirate Manticore in an empty system and boarded it before anyone else could arrive; wound up picking up over five hundred thousand creds

phongn · Post by **phongn** » 2003-07-28 10:00am

Bah, I would have kept the Manticore. Decent cargo space and quite decent armament, especially if you want to disable other ships (eight ion cannon, w00t)

Post by **Dalton** » 2003-07-28 02:10pm

phongn wrote:Bah, I would have kept the Manticore. Decent cargo space and quite decent armament, especially if you want to disable other ships (eight ion cannon, w00t)

Have you forgotten that I can't capture ships at the moment?

Shadowhawk · Post by **Shadowhawk** » 2003-07-29 12:12am

Just how crippled are the threads in the unregistered version? I seem completely unable to get any more missions in the Sigma, GLi-Tech-nia, or Bounty Hunter threads, no matter how many times I leave and re-enter the systems. Nor can I seem to get any other threads to trigger, like the Federation, Wild Geese, or Rebellion threads.
I've got a 'Worthy of Note' combat rating and 'Good Citizen' status in the Federation, and a ship worth nearly 3 million credits in trade-in.
I'm almost tempted to go find the Vell-os Homeworld, but I suspect that once I get roped into that thread, it'll die just when I'm supposed to check in to get more missions in Sol's bar, just like what happened in my first game.

On another note, is there any way to stop the fucking drop-bears from sucking ~70k credits and entire weeks away when I land on Auroran planets? I've failed several missions now because the goddamn things made my time expires. I get hit with drop-bears more than I get hit with missions.

HemlockGrey · Post by **HemlockGrey** » 2003-07-29 12:30am

Is there any chance this game will run on my P2, 350?

Slartibartfast · Post by **Slartibartfast** » 2003-07-29 12:59am

Shadowhawk wrote:Just how crippled are the threads in the unregistered version? I seem completely unable to get any more missions in the Sigma, GLi-Tech-nia, or Bounty Hunter threads, no matter how many times I leave and re-enter the systems. Nor can I seem to get any other threads to trigger, like the Federation, Wild Geese, or Rebellion threads.
I've got a 'Worthy of Note' combat rating and 'Good Citizen' status in the Federation, and a ship worth nearly 3 million credits in trade-in.
I'm almost tempted to go find the Vell-os Homeworld, but I suspect that once I get roped into that thread, it'll die just when I'm supposed to check in to get more missions in Sol's bar, just like what happened in my first game.

On another note, is there any way to stop the fucking drop-bears from sucking ~70k credits and entire weeks away when I land on Auroran planets? I've failed several missions now because the goddamn things made my time expires. I get hit with drop-bears more than I get hit with missions.

The wild geese, sigma, bounty hunter, glitecnia, etc are minor threads, and are complete in the unregistered version. Sigma has very large delays between missions (you have to drop in the shipyard 3 months after each mission to get the next) and there are only about 3 in total I think.

And I think you can't avoid the drop-bears, but they only attack in a certain season (mating season, dunno exactly what is it)

Post by **Dalton** » 2003-07-29 01:01am

Shadowhawk wrote:Just how crippled are the threads in the unregistered version? I seem completely unable to get any more missions in the Sigma, GLi-Tech-nia, or Bounty Hunter threads, no matter how many times I leave and re-enter the systems. Nor can I seem to get any other threads to trigger, like the Federation, Wild Geese, or Rebellion threads.
I've got a 'Worthy of Note' combat rating and 'Good Citizen' status in the Federation, and a ship worth nearly 3 million credits in trade-in.
I'm almost tempted to go find the Vell-os Homeworld, but I suspect that once I get roped into that thread, it'll die just when I'm supposed to check in to get more missions in Sol's bar, just like what happened in my first game.

They appear to be quite crippled. I mean, I've almost reached a breakthrough in the WG thread, but I can't go further until I register, and almost every planet I land on gives me a reminder to register EV Nova.

Shadowhawk wrote:On another note, is there any way to stop the fucking drop-bears from sucking ~70k credits and entire weeks away when I land on Auroran planets? I've failed several missions now because the goddamn things made my time expires. I get hit with drop-bears more than I get hit with missions.

I don't fuck around much in Auroran space.

Anyway, I'm now running a Mod Starbridge Class C. I'm looking to upgrade to the best weaponry; right now I've got a couple of Hellhound launchers, a couple of Fusion Pulse cannons and a Thunderhead lance. Any suggestions?

Slartibartfast · Post by **Slartibartfast** » 2003-07-29 01:02am

HemlockGrey wrote:Is there any chance this game will run on my P2, 350?

The minimum recommended is 400 mHz, so I guess it will run but a bit slow.

BTW, it's damn stupid that they require Quicktime to run. The only movies in the whole game are the races, one video for each color of the winner, and they're only 2 or 3 seconds long and don't have sound and look like shit.

Post by **Dalton** » 2003-07-29 01:05am

Slartibartfast wrote:The minimum recommended is 400 mHz, so I guess it will run but a bit slow.

BTW, it's damn stupid that they require Quicktime to run. The only movies in the whole game are the races, one video for each color of the winner, and they're only 2 or 3 seconds long and don't have sound and look like shit.

You can turn off Quicktime in the prefs menu.

Shadowhawk · Post by **Shadowhawk** » 2003-07-29 01:18am

Dalton wrote:Anyway, I'm now running a Mod Starbridge Class C. I'm looking to upgrade to the best weaponry; right now I've got a couple of Hellhound launchers, a couple of Fusion Pulse cannons and a Thunderhead lance. Any suggestions?

How'd you get a Mod Starbridge? I didn't think you had registered yet (you mentioned that you can't capture ships).

I kinda like the Fusion Pulse Cannons, but they seem decidedly underpowered when you go up against, say, a Rebel Starbridge Class E (I was raped by one in about 20 seconds, and I got its shields down a whole 27%). It's -really- frustrating when the FPCs decide to lead an enemy on their own (even my non-turrent mount!), though, since they're really damned bad at it. I might dump my FPC turret and buy an illegal ion cannon.

Slartibartfast · Post by **Slartibartfast** » 2003-07-29 01:26am

Mod Starbridge is available in New Ireland.
And I've found that the best non-polaris weapon is the long range railgun because you don't even have to see the enemy to kill it. And it does fair damage.

Post by **Dalton** » 2003-07-29 01:53am

Shadowhawk wrote:How'd you get a Mod Starbridge? I didn't think you had registered yet (you mentioned that you can't capture ships).

If you go the Sigma arc they make their shipyards and upgrades available to you on Earth. One of those upgrades is the Mod C. Careful, though, since you'll lose all your crap when you do it (like my experimental Polaron Cannon). Only 50k though. There are a lot of other really cool upgrades too, but they're VERY pricey. One million credits for an engine tune-up!

Shadowhawk wrote:I kinda like the Fusion Pulse Cannons, but they seem decidedly underpowered when you go up against, say, a Rebel Starbridge Class E (I was raped by one in about 20 seconds, and I got its shields down a whole 27%).

Hellhound missiles REALLY help. Long-range, extremely powerful. Unfortunately, you have to have progressed somewhat along the Rebel arc, and the upgrades (and missiles) are, so far to me, available only at Rebel II in the Koria system (somewhat northeast of Nesre Primus).

Remember that Manticore I mentioned? Took it down with Hellhounds and avoided those nasty ion cannons. Pirate Enterprises were cakewalks too, but you have to be real careful or else you'll wind up accidentally destroying your prey.

Shadowhawk wrote:It's -really- frustrating when the FPCs decide to lead an enemy on their own (even my non-turrent mount!), though, since they're really damned bad at it. I might dump my FPC turret and buy an illegal ion cannon.

What do you mean when you say they lead an enemy on their own? And where do you get the ion cannons? Those fuckers are real nasty on shields (I think they're ion cannons; I've run into Pirate Starbridges that've blown me apart in mere seconds with blue beams of some sort).

Slartibartfast wrote:Mod Starbridge is available in New Ireland.
And I've found that the best non-polaris weapon is the long range railgun because you don't even have to see the enemy to kill it. And it does fair damage.

In my experience I was only able to get Wild Geese ships and upgrades on New Ireland. However, I've found that a lot of pirate modded ships are available on Viking (Tichel system), including Pirate Starbridges, Enterprises and even Manticores (10M creds). Not sure if you need to get into a certain arc for that, though. Where would I get those long-range railguns? I've only run across 100mm and 150mm versions (and those are massive enough as it is for a Starbridge).

EDIT: I just remembered. If you progress far enough along the Wild Geese arc, you have the choice of either continuing into either the Rebel or Auroran arcs. I chose Rebel, and found that Olaf's now my uncle and I have some pretty sweet new upgrades available at Viking, such as Olaf's sensor booster (600k and second only to Polaris sensor boosters) and all the pirate mod ships.

Post by **Beowulf** » 2003-07-29 02:24am

Don't buy drop bear repellant!

Shadowhawk · Post by **Shadowhawk** » 2003-07-29 02:58am

Dalton wrote:If you go the Sigma arc they make their shipyards and upgrades available to you on Earth. One of those upgrades is the Mod C. Careful, though, since you'll lose all your crap when you do it (like my experimental Polaron Cannon). Only 50k though. There are a lot of other really cool upgrades too, but they're VERY pricey. One million credits for an engine tune-up!

Yea, I got all the upgrades (except for the Mount Upgrade) on my Pirate Starbridge. Those two Mass Addition upgrades are handy.
Of course, I lost 'em all when I traded it in for my Mod Starbridge.

Now I need to do a few Long United Delivery missions though, since my funds have been depeleted.
I haven't seen any of the ship-specific upgrades yet, though.

Hellhound missiles REALLY help. Long-range, extremely powerful. Unfortunately, you have to have progressed somewhat along the Rebel arc, and the upgrades (and missiles) are, so far to me, available only at Rebel II in the Koria system (somewhat northeast of Nesre Primus).

You can buy 'em at Rauther in the Rautheron system. I wasn't even in the Rebel Arc and I could buy the launcher and missiles at Rebel II.

What do you mean when you say they lead an enemy on their own? And where do you get the ion cannons? Those fuckers are real nasty on shields (I think they're ion cannons; I've run into Pirate Starbridges that've blown me apart in mere seconds with blue beams of some sort).

The guns were trying to lead the enemy on their own--they fire -way- off-axis in a vain attempt to intercept an enemy that's moving past you.
I forgot just where I saw the illegal Ion Cannons being sold, but it's somewhere around Tichel. Check the fringes of Federation space.

In my experience I was only able to get Wild Geese ships and upgrades on New Ireland. However, I've found that a lot of pirate modded ships are available on Viking (Tichel system), including Pirate Starbridges, Enterprises and even Manticores (10M creds). Not sure if you need to get into a certain arc for that, though. Where would I get those long-range railguns? I've only run across 100mm and 150mm versions (and those are massive enough as it is for a Starbridge).

I just bought my Mod Starbridge in New Ireland. I got my Pirate Starbridge in Tichel, and could have purchased a Pirate Manticore if I had the cash.
I think the larger the bore on the railguns, the longer thet range. I found 200mm railguns deeper into Auroran space.

Beowulf wrote:Don't buy drop bear repellant!

I bought that shit once, and sold it a bit later, but now every time I get hit with one of the damn things, my character says "But I used the repellant!"