Ok, i know this is an old topic. but, i'm not sure whether or not its more beneficial to finish this mission at high ranks, or to just keep killing the npcs for research.

my question is, are there any missions afterwards which are extremely beneficial? or are they about as useful as the decrypting the vault mission...

also, is it more beneficial to have these npcs at high ranks (as in, after all you have to deal with are flamehawks, collectors, and assassins) or is it good to still keep them in the common pool to reduce the number of energy sinks out there?

higher rank input would be appreciated...

Well.. Mission after drops 10 RSL Data Uplink, planetary building; Size: 3, Research: 3, Defense: 50, Cloak: 100.

If you're in no major rush need for more good research planet structures.. I'd just keep Decrypting the Vault going. I'm rank 500 and the boost in research is nice. It does slightly help keep off the flamehawks but not like they're going to stop coming any time soon.

I say finish it when your done with all your research...

• Easy kill
• Good xp ratio
• Mitigates Flamehawk/Assassin spawnrate

That being said, I find Flamehawks and Assassins easier and easier to kill so eventually I figure I'll finish DtV.

Interesting... I've been able to hit the damage cap on the Rogue Data Analyzers so I can always take them down in 6 shots. I believe it takes a more for the assassins and flamehawks. I guess I'll have to check when GL comes back up.

My plan, unless BinaryMan or someone else in the know says differently, is to just do it 9/10 times and leave them there forever.

I've already cleared them off my tabs forever.

As of right now, it takes me 8 shots to kill flamehawks, 9-10 to kill assassins, so i presume it would take 6-7 to kill an RDA(no not Richard Dean Anderson :p ).

I got rid of them pretty much because even if just by the slightest of numbers, they dilute the NPC pool. Right now i've got no missions active which spawn mission NPC's, and it will stay that way until i'm ready to do the mission which requires killing dark-iso runners.

er Dark Iso-runners... those are pain.. .I'm still dropping all 4 debuff artis on them to kill them.

Minimum shots to kill an RDA is 6 (2800/500cap) so if you're hitting for more that 467 per shot, you're essentially capping on one. Flamehawks and Assassins take me 8 and 10 shots respectively (without a shockpulse) so, yeah, they ain't so bad anymore. MinShot on Flamehawks is 7 which makes the energy used differential a meh.. at 5 extra for a Flamehawk. When you have all your research required in the millions, the extra 200 points you get from an RDA is pretty irrelevant. I have to kill 83 just to gain 1 hour's worth of RP. Diminishing returns and all that...

yeah, BUT! RDA is 58xp on kill (assuming NI on you) hawks is 35xp on kill and assassin even less 12xp
+ RDA have those extra 200 Rp's which i pretty much like cuz its extra, and on average its hours income from midcrappy planet

Plus a scrappable artifact making small amounts of credits too.

The xp's the big deal for me - I often grind npc's to speed toward a level-up, and the bonus from them is substantial, especially compared to Rogues and Assassins. And the research structure is no longer as great as it used to be - 3/1 resource/space ratio from an Isolation Bureau, 1/1 from this mission reward. Better than standard structures, but nothing to crap your pants over.

Finish it. the RP you will get from the next missions planet mods is way more then the chump exp you will get from the npc's. Secondly Dark badges rock get as many as you can the mission is a waist to keep around if you have the nrg finish it its worth it.

haha, if the only advantage to finishing it is to get the research buildings... i think i may pass. my 'good' research planets were stolen. so now i'm surviving solely off of scientists and a few crappy gas planets i colonized back when i didnt know anything above rich existed.

another thing i must ask, is is there a third mission after decrypting the vault? theres decrypting the vault, then the buildings mission, then 'unknown' in the wiki... surely someone knows by now?

you can just hack for research like that or better and you get badges

i could, but then i'd have to zero people to get the same amount of research i'd get from these npcs. and the reason i say zero people, is because i find maybe 2 or 3 people tops without firewalls. and i get between 400-800 research~ but no xp... so thats the downside. i usually get between 1600 and 3600 research from an npc run killing these things. thats 4-9 hacks right there. plus its stealing it from other people. not that i have a problem with it, but i'd rather spend my energy stealing research from an npc faction and gaining experiance, than stealing it from players and getting badges... i still have over 200 blues... and thats after buying all the modules and several counter intelligence nexi. theres just nothing left to buy. the inner bypasses are useless at my rank. so its either buy up buildings i'll never use, buy up modules for mediocre at best complex tech, or horde my badges. and i'd rather horde... but no use getting more if i have attack buffs on for npcs.

The Planet Structure is Size:2, Research:2, Cloak:150 for 40 blues gives a good ratio. but there is a abundance of research structures.

overabundance if you ask me... the only things i have left to research are the proxyuniverse whatevers for energy, and from dimensional logistics onward for the base branch. and base tech isnt really a priority for me since at best i'll get access to the universal service terminal in about 5 months. if i started now, and only did base tech until i got it. imo we need more artifact structures. research can be obtained easily through npcs or hacks. but i really only use special buildings on my exotic (dont have the others yet), unless i have over 50 of them, and they only qualify for the exotic if they give at least 2 resource per 1 space. i'm mainly buying up the nexi so that i can use em on my potential resource enrichment worlds to make em invisible.