Negative scores on missions

[x60mmx]

I've recently had a string of missions that gave me negative scores for killing the enemy, ending up with missions giving me ~-150 to -450.    They were all combatants so I had no idea I would be penalized for killing them.  Is there anyway to tell which ships to not assault? 

[x60mmx]

Just got -890 from enemy casualties alone on a mission.   

[ivandogovich]

There are factions that are actually designed to give you negative scores.
Govt, Civilians, & Rebels to name a few.

This is designed to present hard choices:  Do I go after that big juicy military transport or not? etc.

Once you learn these factions, you can decide whether or not to engage or not, etc.  If all else fails, if you spot one on the battlefield, you can always get back on the Bonny and abort.

[x60mmx]

How can you tell what faction it is before sending a ship to assault it?  It seems about 3/4 ships give me negative scores.

[ivandogovich]

Hyperwave decoders.

Battlefield ID... "Hey these are the guys from that other mission that gave me a negative score."
- Stun one, and see what it is:  "Govt Agent?  That sounds bad!"

And when Ufopedia.org is online, you can check the enemies there.  Their score is reported on the individual unit page.  Unfortunately the site has been down for a week. :
 https://www.ufopaedia.org/index.php?title=Piratez

[Arthanor]

Learning to recognize your targets in the battlescape is key in Piratez, from telling which gives bad scores to identifying which are worth risking your gals to get them alive and which is dangerous.

If you can catch the shipping before it lands, you can also look at the interception pictures. At least some government and rebel ships are distinguishable.

It is really tedious, but it is possible to stun all enemies (just make sure to revive one completely disarmed one, grab all their stuff (including elerium from destroying power sources) and then abort the mission. You haven't killed them, you haven't kidnapped them, so you don't get their negative score, but you have looted them so you get the value of the items + their stuff.

[Boltgun]

While intercepting, if you get a ship with red/blue lights under its windows, you'll get a big negative score.

If you see civilians and shirtless fat guys on the field, you'll get a negative score too.

Anyway, you can compensate the loss by hitting on other ships as well. Stunning the enemies, especially civilians since they are mostly harmless, mitigates the loss too.

[ivandogovich]

Stunning is *usually* a good idea, but it backfires on Govt forces.   On the last Military Transport I took down (with juicy load of precious armor!) I killed 10 (-180 pts) and stunned 1 (-30).  So stunning the one Military Police was more costly than killing his buddies.

[Ruludos]

Unfortunately, there are several mission types that can be flown by the Government that are indistinguishable from normal ones. They can sometimes fly Mineral Extraction, for example, which is impossible to figure out without a Hyperwave Decoder or landing at the wreck. After that it's just constant prayer that they don't retaliate.

Basically, don't shoot things down unless you need points to avoid getting shut down or you know who you're shooting. If you're playing it safe with your interceptions it should be easy to bug out if you happen across the Government.