Help me git gud, question thread

[khade]

I'm pretty sure there is a soft time limit: at some point in the game, crackdowns just start happening.  At least that's what I've heard, I don't get that far. 

[Dreamsicle]

I'm pretty sure there is a soft time limit: at some point in the game, crackdowns just start happening.  At least that's what I've heard, I don't get that far. 

Yeah I asked about it earlier,

Spoiler:

they start beginning of year 3 (2603).

[KiriKaneko]

OMG, I thought I was more or less safe so I've been taking my time!

Fortunately I now have all my medical supply facilities fully operational, I'll be raking in tons of cash so I'll get on with that training facility next and start being more aggressive to the ayys

I'm unlocking tons of new craft how. I got a fortuna but it doesnt have sliding doors so I dont like it. Does anyone know which transporters have sliding doors? I like to camp them when dealing with dangerous enemies

I have Guardian armor now which not only gives me even more solid protection, but also has some thermal vision and night vision. Ofc I'd like power armour, but when the training facility is complete I'll be able to play more recklessly with my troops. Also have a decent flying armour, storm armour, it has less armour than guardian but still decent, and the speed is incredible, trying to decide whether or not to get one

Gonna finish the research I've currently got and then make whatever best interceptors I have unlocked. I can then research stop preying on civvies and start shooting down bigger faction ships instead, maybe raid some bases if I feel up to it, I'm sure I can actually kill them with enough laser fire eventually. I've got a 37mm rifle but it's so heavy we cant use it even if nekid. We could with the loading suit, tho the suit is somewhat prohibitive, but I imagine power armour is probably better so I'll wait for power armour or gauss weapons I think. Currently researching school graduation which I imagine will unlock something nice

I've attached a save to this post in case anyone wants to take a look

[KiriKaneko]

How long have I got til all of the governments abandon me? Looked on the A1 tech tree and it seems I'm not too terribly far from power armour, which leads shortly after into annihilator which is the best armour. After that I should have no problem at all just facerolling all opposition to get the remaining tech and items I need for the best craft and weapons as well. Only thing that seems prohibitive is the research times, money will be no problem, I'm gonna be making 40M a month profit just from med supplies so I can even buy hostages if I want to in order to get that better tech faster and make my raids on HQs and big ships as safe as possible

I might end up converting one of my production bases into a lab base, just fill it with libraries if I end up with hundreds of millions but way too many projects and all the governments pulling out on me

Edit: I still haven't found any power armour parts. I assume none of the enemies I've fought use power armour but I don't know where to find them. Maybe if I wait for a mercenary ship to land, then we all get on the Fortuna, equip fuso swords and elerium grenades then banzai out there, use elerium grenade spam on any vehicles we see, run down any soldiers, see if we can get right up to the doors and camp them, if there are flying vehicles then I guess have some people with laser rifles just spam fire and hope they go down. I don't think power armour parts are something I can actually pick up, and I havent see anything drop them yet but the only things I havent killed yet are mercs, star gods and faction leaders and I'd say out of those the most likely to drop them are probably the mercs, who are also easier than star gods

Edit2: Looked ahead some more. Still can't find out anything about who has power armour parts, but it seems like gauss weapons may not be far out of reach, and aren't that much weaker than plasma. Actual plasma weapons requires star god captures which are the hardest enemies and thus if I can beat star gods then I probably dont even need plasma weapons, and gauss requires merc captures. This makes me think I'm supposed to be fighting the mercs now. It seems that laser guns with unlimited ammo are around the corner so I'll probably go for them next, and maybe buy some mercs to study or try and take them down. I wonder what weapon is best for stunning them. Handles dont seem to have the power to even bring down people wearing tactical armour without 3 100+ melee aim girls smashing them in the back for a turn, so I probably need something better to knock them out with, or just shoot them and hope they start bleeding out. I think I'll just focus on my current tech for now, but I'll look out for merc ships and make an effort to engage and capture some

Edit3: Also I've unlocked space missions but I only have space suits and I'm not satisfied with their armour. I assume power armour is space-worthy? Is there anything up there worth getting or should I ignore these missions?

[Marza]

Does anyone know which transporters have sliding doors?

PACHYDERM, Deliverator and Triton are some of the transports that have sliding doors.

How long have I got til all of the governments abandon me?

Depends on luck and how effective the player is at identifying and disrupting shipping that the major factions launch to sway local governments. One midgame technology prevents local governments from withdrawing their support.

Edit: I still haven't found any power armour parts.

Power armour parts are actually very rare. There is a lategame technology that allows you to buy them from the blackmarket, but until then you'll have to loot them from enemies that wear it.

Spoiler:

Trader Guild military ships are what you want to look for.

Edit3: Also I've unlocked space missions but I only have space suits and I'm not satisfied with their armour. I assume power armour is space-worthy? Is there anything up there worth getting or should I ignore these missions?

A couple of power armour types are 0g capable, keep an eye on your bootypedia when you research them. And space pirates are better than normal pirates. Be a space pirate.

[legionof1]

Government abandonment isn't a huge issue, there is a tech the stops it from occurring. So long you reach that tech before you lose more then like 5 its not even a cause for concern. It even quite possible to lose all the governments and still be fine on internal production for funds. Losing them all is not a game over.

Power armor part are primarily found from Marsec Bodyguard corpses. There are a few others but bodyguards are most common. Note that you must rob/kill/enslave power armor users to get the parts. Researching them as captives doesn't yield loot.

After a point handles are indeed insufficient for stunning. At some point i transition to Voodoo to handle captures since voodoo powers largely ignore armor and few units resist special type damage. Deamons and star-gods are virtually impossible to capture otherwise due to near immunity to daze type damage. Tesla coils/power maces are another option.

Some power armor is space capable but not all. Loader,harbinger, and annihilator if i recall correctly. Space is something you should do. There is a extra type of soldier you can get, as well as alot of high value components for late game player craft that are more easily gotten in space compared to the UFOs they are normally found on. Most space foes are not particularly challenging being armed with low tech lasers at best. 

[khade]

I understand the crackdowns starting is a sort of kindness, either you're losing at that point, and it forces you to restart, or you start having decent access to resources that are otherwise fairly rare.

[KiriKaneko]

What should I research to stop the crackdowns? They havent started yet and I'd like to be working towards stopping them. My current production is enough to support my campaign even if the govs withdraw their support, and I'm glad to hear they can't force a game over for me that way, but I imagine things are only gonna get more expensive so I'd rather not lose them

Can I not buy 2 marsec guys, one to research and another to rob right after? Sadly I still don't have any VooDoo, I need star gods captives for that right?

Guess I'll make some loader armour and start doing space missions. I've already unlocked deliverator as well and I'll look out for the Triton

Thankyou for all the info

[nrafield]

In order to be ready for crackdowns,  you need Naval Guns and the Kraken. You also need to get the fast interceptors that come a bit later in the tech tree, Predator and Barracuda, in order to catch up to ships searching for your base.
Space missions haven't been very hard from my experience. Most enemies are armed with moderately powerful lasers, and the default armor for gals on it, while very limiting, is enough to protect against them, and is equipped with very strong medipacks which can last you for the rest of the mission. The default weapon should also be powerful enough to kill or disable any enemy in 3-4 bursts. Unless the station you land on is overrun by zombies. Then it might more difficult.

[Marza]

Building on top of what nrafield said, there's nothing you can research to stop crackdown missions from being launched, but you can build a fleet of interceptors capable of blowing battleships out the sky. Or invest in extra hands for base security, let the crackdown into your bases and then steal all their stuff. Or spam hideout shrouds and defensive buildings. Pick whichever options sounds fun for you and go from there, really.

Checked my old save, apparently you can buy Marsec bodyguards for your prisons. I can't remember what unlocks them for purchase, but I'll bet it involves capturing a live one in the field. In the meantime, keep a lookout for the appropriate shippings and hope that luck delivers you one soon.

Stargods do use voodoo magic a lot, but there's one other faction you can also target for that. I don't really want to spoil too much more; I find being overwhelmed with options and the unknown to be a lot of fun and you only have that for the first and maybe the second playthrough. I will say to check your bootypedia, I'll bet you've already unlocked some articles about where to look for some voodoo.

[KiriKaneko]

No idea where to look for VooDoo. I had never seen any marsec guys but there was a marsec bodyguard for sale so I bought and interrogated him for 10M. Now they're appearing on every other missions suddenly and I've been getting lots of power armor parts from them. They have a tendency to suicide with mini-nukes (seriously Dioxine why so much explosive spam? It seems like this is pachyderm camping - the game) which makes them easy to deal with since I just peek out of my pachy to take shots then let them kill themselves on their turn

I also dropped a civilian ship which strangely had goons and a human mage who I'm not interrogating, the mage had a plasma pistol

Also I dropped a academy bomber which had 2 espers inside. I mistook one for a raider and killed it, but captured the other one. I'll research it, then maybe buy another to interrogate if I don't find more. I bought a reverend and broke it so hopefully this unlocks more stuff. Seems I'm unlocking the tech for power armor and gauss tech so I should be able to get more gear upgrades soon, but it seems I'll never transition from pachy camping to open combat since I don't think there's any armour that can protect me from mini nukes if they ever actually hit me with one

[KiriKaneko]

Ok I unlocked VooDoo somehow

[KiriKaneko]

Got another supply ship. Shot some people and then one of them decided to ragequit with a mininuke. The blast nearly reached my pachy and wiped out 90% of the ship, leaving only a corner standing. Had to wait like 20 turns for the smoke to clear to wipe out the last couple of survivors. Why does this item exist, and why do AI soldiers have access to it? XD

[legionof1]

Ai has access to everything aside from the player specific researcher items like custom hand-cannon because much of the concept for the mod is scavenging tech from those you defeat. Aside from some few ships like smugglers and spartan military transports every gun you can scavenge you must first face in combat.

A second pillar of the mod is variety. Not every faction is assured to spawn conveniently for the players tech progression, so there are a number of side-grades in terms of weapons to fill a role.

 

[KiriKaneko]

Perhaps they should at least be an item located in an enemy armory or bunker, rather than something they can use directly. I was thinking of taking a more aggressive approach than my usual pachy camping once I've got a full set of power armour, but since I've discovered the enemy using this weapon I think I'll just stick to camping tactics :/

In fact I'm not sure my pachy can even survive a hit by that weapon, if one of them with the mini nuke leaves the enemy ship then panics and shoots it somewhere nearby it might wipe out my pachy and crew or something, I'd best stop doing supply ships, I think even flying armour wouldnt put me out of the blast radius the smoke cloud was so high