Idiot's guide to Space Rangers 2

[bryce777]

I've restrained myself from using the afterburner because the tooltip is fairly ambiguous, does it hurt me in any way? Or just hurt the engine's durability...?

It damages your engines to use them. That is a big part of why I usually don't get the fanciest ngine available right when it comes out. Having them wear out becomes quite expensive to repair!

 

[FaranBrygo]

I think it damages the engine but not permanently.

 

[suleo]

I've restrained myself from using the afterburner because the tooltip is fairly ambiguous, does it hurt me in any way? Or just hurt the engine's durability...?

It hurts the engine's durability. Use it too much and the engine will break. If you don't have the nanitoids (the module that automatically repairs stuff) you should only use the afterburner very sparingly and as a last resort.

EDIT: yes, the damage isn't permanent, it's just like any other damage, i.e. you can repair it. That makes the afterburner usage very expensive without the nanitoids. Also, if your engine breaks donw completely, I think you can't move and that is kind of bad...

 

[Major_Blackhart]

This gameis good. When I get home, I'm gonna play it hardkore.

 

[kingcomrade]

I'm still running around basically doing FedEx quests, since I can't really find anything else to do. My ship has only (2 sets of) missiles because I basically only defend myself from pirates while I cart cargo around and do FedEx quests. I've dumped everything but my droid, my engine, and my fuel thingy. Missiles are nice because the enemy AI will shoot at them instead of at my hull. Maybe that's bad since I have a droid, because missiles cost money, but sometimes I can get them to pay me off.

 

[suleo]

This gameis good. When I get home, I'm gonna play it hardkore.

Yea it's pretty nice although it has in my opinion one important flaw (and I am surprised noone here has mentioned them yet )

LEVELED LISTS (of sorts).

Essentially, when you get better equipment, almost everyone in the gameworld gets better equipment, more or less for free. I was surpised to get the latest greatest super-duper engine, only to find out that the game now spawned pirates and such with an even BETTER engine than my own. Mind you, there were none of those around before I upgraded.

This, in addition to the inflation (get more money and things cost more, because you now have more money) does prevent powergaming to an extent, but it's also rather annoying. If I fight (or trade) hard to get my super new-tech engine or the newest weapon after "liberating" it from the dominators, I don't want every other newly spawned pirate moron to have it as well!

Be that as it may, the game is still fun and quite addictive (to me at least)

 

[bryce777]

I'm still running around basically doing FedEx quests, since I can't really find anything else to do. My ship has only (2 sets of) missiles because I basically only defend myself from pirates while I cart cargo around and do FedEx quests. I've dumped everything but my droid, my engine, and my fuel thingy. Missiles are nice because the enemy AI will shoot at them instead of at my hull. Maybe that's bad since I have a droid, because missiles cost money, but sometimes I can get them to pay me off.

Well, if you have three high damage weapons, then you normally will not get attacked by pirates. It can be tough to get initial capital at first.

I should not have been so hard on you, because there is no manual and the game is easy to play in a lot of ways, but extremely difficult to master.

The missiles are good for civvy and pirate kills, but the frag cannons do more damage and don't cost money to reload. there are a few modules that can make missles pretty devastating, but usually I like the frag weapons.

Just be careful with your upgrades and don't go further into the tech curve than you can afford to meaintain, but get a nice hull and some good weapons and you should be able to get into dominator fighting.

It is not a quest heavy game; the text quests are great, but they are not extremely frequent. I never get more than 10 or some per game and I believe there are 30 altogether.

Make sure when fighting dominators to lead them in such a way that they do not end up shooting all the dropped equipment; that way, if something good pops up, then you can double back and pick it up.

 

[kingcomrade]

Is there a way to shoot at someone in the middle of a turn? You know, like you are out of range at the beginning of the turn, but halfway through the turn you come into range? That's always bugged me, because the computer is able to do it (as far as I can tell)

 

[bryce777]

This gameis good. When I get home, I'm gonna play it hardkore.

Yea it's pretty nice although it has in my opinion one important flaw (and I am surprised noone here has mentioned them yet )

LEVELED LISTS (of sorts).

Essentially, when you get better equipment, almost everyone in the gameworld gets better equipment, more or less for free. I was surpised to get the latest greatest super-duper engine, only to find out that the game now spawned pirates and such with an even BETTER engine than my own. Mind you, there were none of those around before I upgraded.

This, in addition to the inflation (get more money and things cost more, because you now have more money) does prevent powergaming to an extent, but it's also rather annoying. If I fight (or trade) hard to get my super new-tech engine or the newest weapon after "liberating" it from the dominators, I don't want every other newly spawned pirate moron to have it as well!

Be that as it may, the game is still fun and quite addictive (to me at least)

Actually, they seem to get equipment randomly. When new stuff comes out, they start upgrading. I have seldom had much trouble with pirates, but once I did come across this little feyan bastard who could go around 1200 and had mega shields. He was hostile but always ran away...it was very annoying.

The inflation can be annoying, too. But, you can hedge against it a little by storing money in goods. Unfortunately, equipment eventually becomes hundreds of times more expensive(especially hulls), whereas prices only go up by a factor of maybe 5 at most. Drugs definitely appreciate the most in value over time....

 

[bryce777]

Is there a way to shoot at someone in the middle of a turn? You know, like you are out of range at the beginning of the turn, but halfway through the turn you come into range? That's always bugged me, because the computer is able to do it (as far as I can tell)

That annoys me, too. Especially when I am running from dominator torpedoes. If there is a way to do it, I don't know how, but it definitely should be done.

Targeting also should not be lost when a ship temporarily goes out of range.

 

[Major_Blackhart]

What type of mods are out there already for the russian version, and think we can expect a english version of them anytime soon?

 

[bryce777]

Maybe balor or someone else who speaks russian will stop in and answer that. It seems doubtful any mods would make it to englsih, but there is a patch that tweaks gameplay a lot which might make it into the new US version, that isn't in the UK version....

 

[Svartberg]

1. just like you said on your edit, upgraded equipment costs more to repair, so it's probably wiser not to put money into everything (like i did with my r.i.p character) even if you can afford it now, because the repair will be crazy.
2. i'm not sure about this one - but i think that the lower hull an item has (less weight) the faster it will be damaged, it might be that equipment of lower weight is naturally more expensive and would mean the repair is more expensive too, but after i changed my initial ship with much smaller equipment i got crazy repair bills

My first game was with a merchant class and i made lotsa money with the fedex missions and trading but i naturally got sick of it and changed to a warrior rig, and i just found that i couldn't keep up with the pirates or dominators - i couldn't make a spacebuck from combat - i got like 3k cr from scaring some pirates and i had to spend like 3k on repairing my stuff, which was barely damaged ... the only way for me to make a living was to do fedex missions, not my cup of tea ... maybe piracy will be better, but it doesn't seem lucrative that much either ...
I see some rangers with Mercenery class, do they just kill pirates from boredom or do they actually make a living from it ... (i don't get many bounty hunts from the governements and usually it ruins my relationship with the race involved)

I'll probably restart the game, as i killed only 6 ships after 8 years of gametime ...

By the way, nice "guide", i expected to find the obvious stuff, but i actually learned a few nice starter tactics for my next smuggler/pirate bucanneer, thanks

 

[bryce777]

The smaller ones are more expensive, so need to be repaired more. I don't *believe* they get damaged more frequently but the game is so complex, and undocumented, it's hard to say.

In my first game, it took me 23 years to beat the dominators. I was able to will battles, but they always cost more than I won.

The last game I played, I won in 17 years. Actually, really in 15, but I screwed around trying to get good upgrades before taking on keller.

In that game, I found I could fight the dominators profitably almost from the beginning, and I finished the game with a hull I found about 10 years in, despite many better hulls showing up, and I did not get nanitoids at all.

One thing that helps a lot is getting artifacts in the wormholes. Lots of them are very useful.

I think the big key to success, though, was to not get too high into the tech curve and not to get super high tech things you dont need, such as an expenisve gripper or the very latest engine.

I don't think fighting pirates is going to be too profitable, but if you hit merchants hard and fast you can exthort some money without any damage to yourself.

 

[bryce777]

Oh, and thanks - glad you liked the guide.

 

[Svartberg]

I think i was wrong about the smaller ones, it's just the price of smaller ones are naturally higher, and the quality i had was poor.

Just read octopus guide too, coupled with the stuff on your guide, and restarted as a gaalian mercenary, things are going very well after only one year of gametime.
Instead of trying to fiddle around or buy uber light hightech equipment i used low tech gear, nearly pure gaalian (except 1 faeyan weapon) and a tech1 engine with 23 parsec jump (i restarted a couple of times until i got that on my starting gear).
Instead of my first game where i tried a bit of everything, i sticked to fedex missions with my lvl2 charisma, i saved and saved cash (didn't buy any parts, because i didn't need them for fedex) and finally had around 25k and bought a pretty good gaalian warrior battleship, and now i can also take the bounty hunt missions and make nice cash with my charisma.

I'd say the most important thing for a new player to learn is :
1. higher quality gear is more expensive, but gets damaged slower - after half a year the money you save on repairs will be worth it.
Gaalian>Faeyan>Human>Peleg>Maloqi
2. a starting equipment of engine with 23+ persec jump is very important if you intend to do most freelance missions, it's also lowtech so you barely get maintenance fees.
3. don't be afraid of stimulants early on, everyone uses them.
4. a smart ranger sticks to lowtech gear early on.
5. military bases (and i think other centers) repair for nearly half the price, keep that in mind.

 

[bryce777]

"military bases (and i think other centers) repair for nearly half the price, keep that in mind."

Damn, yeah...I forgot that one. I NEVER remember when I am playing.

I will put that in.

 

[LCJr.]

Maybe it's a given but using the search engine can speed up hunting for equipment. My only complaint is that it's limited to one word.

For weapons, engines, etc... you can type in one word i.e. "blaster" and you'll get the location and SIZE of the 30 nearest items. Then you can bookmark the smallest ones and see which one(s) are the best stat and pricewise.

Searching for hulls is a little trickier. You can do a generic search for hull and get the closest 30. You can't search for a specific hull type i.e. "ideal" when you want that Ideal ranger hull. You can search for the general class like ranger or pirate, downside is the search will also include any rangers or pirates operating nearby. You can also search for hulls by their armor type i.e. polymorph or nanoobtect if you want the best armored hull available.


Also don't forget about probes. They can be annoyance to keep track of, transport and repair but they usually pay for themselves on the first planet. You always find trade goods on uninhabitated planets and I've found a lot of Lv1 and Lv2 micromodules and even a few artifacts.

 

[Svartberg]

Maybe it's a given but using the search engine can speed up hunting for equipment. My only complaint is that it's limited to one word.

For weapons, engines, etc... you can type in one word i.e. "blaster" and you'll get the location and SIZE of the 30 nearest items. Then you can bookmark the smallest ones and see which one(s) are the best stat and pricewise.

Searching for hulls is a little trickier. You can do a generic search for hull and get the closest 30. You can't search for a specific hull type i.e. "ideal" when you want that Ideal ranger hull. You can search for the general class like ranger or pirate, downside is the search will also include any rangers or pirates operating nearby. You can also search for hulls by their armor type i.e. polymorph or nanoobtect if you want the best armored hull available.

You can write more than one word, but you just have to write them in proper order, example :
1. To search for ranger ships, type "hull ranger"
2. Or enter a perticular hull with the ship name (for example "mesotructural hull pirate") pretty useful, since you would usually want a perticular tech anyway.

 

[LCJr.]

Thanks Svartberg.

 

[Gwendo]

BTW, any difference from this version and the european one?

 

[Svartberg]

There's one thing that really annoys me ...
I'm a gaalian mercenery, and when i kill pirates for no reason my maloq/peleng reputation decreases, wtf ?? the pirates don't even have to be maloq or peleng but the reputation decreases regardless of anything ...
i put so much effort to get a good combat ship, and this kinda sucks
Oh and the reputation decrease happens also with escort missions, that is so silly - i'm hired to protect passive ships and that makes me a criminal, ARGH :shock:

 

[bryce777]

There's one thing that really annoys me ...
I'm a gaalian mercenery, and when i kill pirates for no reason my maloq/peleng reputation decreases, wtf ?? the pirates don't even have to be maloq or peleng but the reputation decreases regardless of anything ...
i put so much effort to get a good combat ship, and this kinda sucks
Oh and the reputation decrease happens also with escort missions, that is so silly - i'm hired to protect passive ships and that makes me a criminal, ARGH :shock:

Some games, just for fun, I indescriminantly slaughter everyone I meet.

It does not pay to actually kill pirates, though. A lot of planets are pro-pirate, especially a lot of the maloq and pelengi planets. If you fight the dominators a lot, it is not a big deal, but if you toast a planet's warships, then the OTHER planets start to hate you, too, and it can get pretty uncomfortable. Thankfully you can get new citizenship at the pirate center which clears you of all wrongdoing. Also, I also up my charisma first, to get better rewards and make fewer enemies....

 

[Svartberg]

There's one thing that really annoys me ...
I'm a gaalian mercenery, and when i kill pirates for no reason my maloq/peleng reputation decreases, wtf ?? the pirates don't even have to be maloq or peleng but the reputation decreases regardless of anything ...
i put so much effort to get a good combat ship, and this kinda sucks
Oh and the reputation decrease happens also with escort missions, that is so silly - i'm hired to protect passive ships and that makes me a criminal, ARGH :shock:

Some games, just for fun, I indescriminantly slaughter everyone I meet.

It does not pay to actually kill pirates, though. A lot of planets are pro-pirate, especially a lot of the maloq and pelengi planets. If you fight the dominators a lot, it is not a big deal, but if you toast a planet's warships, then the OTHER planets start to hate you, too, and it can get pretty uncomfortable. Thankfully you can get new citizenship at the pirate center which clears you of all wrongdoing. Also, I also up my charisma first, to get better rewards and make fewer enemies....

Thanks for the speedy response ..
i didn't know some planets are pro pirate, but that makes sense.
i upped my charisma on start as well, very important for a non pirate.
i know about the pirate center plastic surgery thing, but it sticks you with the default race face, no ?
maybe i should check it out again, thanks for the info.

 

[bryce777]

Yeah, but if you go back to your original race, then I think you get your old face back.

Oh, one other point - on escort missions you can usually tell a pirate to leave the ship alone and they generally will if you have a powerful ship.