Combat

Contents

General Combat Info

Battle Tab

Are you a weakling or an overlord? Will you be a diplomat or a conqueror? As you explore the galaxy you will encounter others that are trying to expand their empires. In this area you can build your reputation for combat.

Things to know and consider for battling.

Ship Strength

Ship strength is listed for the members of your legion. It is the sum of their attack and defense points. This value gives players an indication of the relative abilities of the members in your legion. This value changes as players shift weapons, defenses, add crew, use an artifact, or complete missions with bonuses.

This in a good indication of the players' combat capability at any given moment. How ever, it does not include other stats which also affect players' survivability in combat, protection from hacking or hacking abilities, and success in stopping raiders or raiding ability.

Combat Reputation


Enemy Base Battles

If you are currently in a Legion you will also see an Enemy Bases button on the battle tab. If have 100% Legion Loyalty, that is to say, have been with the legion for at least one week, then you can participate in a base attack, which may reward you with Silver Badges, and for bases Level 4 or higher, you can raid the base after it is disabled, with the chance to receive a Base Crate.

PvE

At random, you will encounter computer-controlled enemies while exploring deep space. These enemies are commonly referred to as non-player characters or NPCs. Some are common and are worth some experience. Others will give you a chance to improve your ship or planets via special modules, artifacts, and sometimes research points. Some may only be encountered at certain times of the year during special events, whilst others are only available whilst certain missions are in progress.

By default, you begin with 2 NPC Slots. This means you can "see" up to two NPCs at any one time. This list can be permanently expanded later to a total of 8 slots by using special artifacts.

Additionally, if you are currently in a Legion you may see an Elite/Boss Battles button on the battle tab sometimes. These are NPC Elites and NPC Bosses that have been shared by members of your Legion. Which NPCs you can see in the list is dependent on your Rank.

By Encounter

By Faction

Holiday Special NPCs

Mission NPCs

The above is only a small sample. There are many more NPCs (far too many to list here) which spawn either on completion of certain missions, or randomly during them. For more detailed information check the Missions page or the Category: Mission NPCs

PvP

These encounters are between players (bottom section of battle tab - maximum 10 targets at a time).

Ship to Ship Battle begins when one ship attacks another. Each time an attack occurs, both the attacker and defender exchange hits.

If the attacker deals more damage than the defender, then that battle is considered a win. Winning battles grant more experience.

Players will now be able to block other ships from interacting with theirs, and vice versa. In order to prevent abuse, blocks have the following restrictions (subject to change):

  • Blocks last for exactly one month (cannot be canceled during this time), though they can be renewed.
  • The requesting player must not have initiated any offensive actions against the player they wish to block in the last 24 hours, AND
  • The requesting player must have at least 10 offensive actions from the player they wish to block in the last 24 hours, OR 30 offensive actions in a 7-day period.
  • Players are limited to a maximum of 5 players blocked at any given time. To block another, one will have to expire first.

Choosing a Target

Check rank, race, and profession. Take into account Weapon, Defense probes. Compare to your ship and see what you have. Also consider the amount of decks your respective ships have, and their impact on the PvP damage cap. There are a variety of successful ship-building strategies.

Combat Badges

Combat Badges are special items gained during player-vs-player, player-vs-base , or player-vs-NPC encounters.

Badges can be spent on the Battle Market to buy special artifacts, ship modules, planet structures, and ship allies. They can also be used to further upgrade existing modules, structures or ship allies that you already own.


PvP Strategies

  • If you want to ease in to PvP look for players who are "Balanced" or "Weak" when you click their ship and look on the stats page you can see exactly how many people they have disabled and how many have disabled them.
  • If your first target has a low number of kills, and a high number of disables, he's likely a pushover (at least for the time being).
  • Try combat against them first, so you can learn to tweak your ship's kit to be a better PvP, as you do, you should move to more balanced players approaching even kills and disables, and then move on to players who have more and more kills than disables.
  • However as you do this you should change to a legion which is more PvP centric, a PvP player may be seen as a troublemaker within a legion that is not very PvP as their legion will become a target more often for an aggressive player's legion. Legions that make frequent attempts on Exotica tend to be more PvP-oriented. You can also check the kills leaderboard to see which legions are hosting the top 10 killers.

PvP Etiquette

  • There are no official rules to PvP, so you can keep or ignore any of these depending on your Legion's feelings on their need for them. However a lot of players have developed sorts of sets of moral 'codes' they abide by; preferring, for instance, to concentrate on much larger players than them who have bullied them often when they were still NewBs on GL.
  • Normally a single Disable, Raid, and Hack is considered 'nothing' at all to a true PvP player unless they have a grudge against the player, or his legion.
  • When alerted for badging, it's often considered a poor move on the part of the player who did the alerting.

PvE Strategies

Three main reasons of PvEing or NPCing:

  • To get the best possible Ratio of Energy Spent to Experience Earned. To Wit: Fastest Possible Leveling.
  • To Gain special artifacts only available through NPCs often it is better than any item obtainable at the player's level, many times some of the best items in the game come from Boss and Elite NPCs.
  • To help your legion mates clear their battle tabs of Elite and Boss NPCs.

Elite NPC

  • Elite NPCs have either 3 or 4 slots for Legion mates to do damage, the top 3 or 4 players will all be awarded one of the Elite's Artifact drops at random, and a set amount of XP usually in the range from 100 to 200, so long as the NPC is actually killed. if time runs out, no one will get a prize.
  • Elite NPCs usually are shared immediately by players once they get their own LOCK on the NPC.
  • Players can receive awards without gaining a lock on an Elite NPC, however players who do the minimum damage on an Elite NPC to block others from getting a prize, and leave the NPC to be finished up by the other members can expect a lot of resentment from the player who shared the NPC, and if they do this consistently the legion may expel them for harming it's more dedicated players.
  • Players who share elites want you to kill them ASAP, normally Elites are an item that can be killed within minutes to an hour, and when you are NPCing they are holding a spot which could be used to get a new NPC in it's place.

Boss NPC

  • Boss NPCs have been seen to have between 8 and 15 slots; The # of slots seen is usually 8, 10, 12, or 15. 10 and 12 appear to occur most commonly. The top N players, (Where N is the Number of Lockable Slots on the NPC) will all be awarded one of the Boss's Artifact drops at random, and a set amount of XP usually in the range from 150 to 250, so long as the NPC is actually killed. If time runs out, no one will get a prize.
  • Boss NPCs are usually shared immediately by players before they get their own LOCK on the NPC.
  • Players can receive awards without gaining a lock on an Boss NPC, however, because a Boss sticks around for several hours to a couple of days, and more players can get a prize, this is often allowed at first as players may have mis-judged their energy, gone to sleep, and will come back to finish up their due amount of damage when they next get on the game. Doing so consistently will cause other legion members to look down on you, and consider you a "Weak Link" should they need to make space. However because Bosses do not have the urgency for removal that Elites have some players can slide by doing this for a period of time before they are reprimanded.
  • Players who share Bosses want you to kill them ASAP, however this means in the space of several hours or a day or so. When you are NPCing they are holding a spot which could be used to get a new NPC in it's place.

See Also

General and NPCs:

PvP and Battle Rewards:

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