Thanks to all who joined in, both in-party as well as those able to find our instance and follow our merry band around the 'verse.
AFTER ACTION REPORT
Learned a bit more about the current state of the Party function and another great community experience. Had difficulty establishing the party myself (players not showing online) so made Blind_Owl party leader and we eventually got 8 players in the party - selected a private room in Discord to go voice activated comms.
We made a request on general chat in the instance to see if a few folks would leave the instance so we could get more TESTies in our ICC Credit Grind/Asteroid Death Rape party and enough people obliged that we ended up with a good size group (Connie with 3 aboard, 2 or 3 Super Hornets , a solo Connie and I think 2 or 3 Vanguards), to borrow from the classic Blue Thunder 'And that, gentlemen, is one hell of a shit-storm in anybody's language!'
Many, many pirateses were killeded, alas we were unable on at least one occasion to save the girls in the civilian Connie and had to repeat the mission (a total of 3 times for the Connie). It seems that if there is too much time/distance between ships hitting the trigger point for the mission on the distress beacon/protect civilian missions the late arrivals can shoot, be shot, and spend precious fuel and ammo without getting the reward - you can wait until the mission resets and then proceed (don't travel back to the ICC, and then back to the mission, all you do is waste fuel). Just watch mobiglas and you will see when the mission resets.
CAVEATS
Couple things to be aware of - it is a good idea for everyone to board the large ship prior to heading out on the first mission - if you end up getting separated from or abandoning your ship you will be able to see the large ship and talk them in for a pick-up - I forgot to suggest this last night.
Everyone must be tracking EACH ICC mission on mobiglas to be eligible for any rewards. If you get out of sequence you won't earn anything other than endless laughter and the undying appreciation of your wingman or crewmates - and of course being TESTies permission to consume mass quantities of beer if you are so inclined.
The current mission system and rewards are not adequate to cover operating costs with a profit for whoever is piloting the larger ships - I completed 4 missions at 2500aUEC each, but spent about 9000 aUEC on fuel ammo and repairs on the Connie, in only 2 Cry-Astro stops - I assume that as the sim matures this will be addressed in some mechanic but right now the reward system favors smaller single and 2 seat ships - but it is way fun to bring a 'Farer or Connie.
We had an interesting issue where I was flying big pitch loops around the ICC while we waited for another player to catch up with us after a death/crash and one of the Connie gunners managed to get thrown from the ship - we spent several minutes doing a crude SAR pattern and were actually able to pick him back up through a combination of voice and general chat comms - this level of immersion was really cool for me (I am a very casual gamer, SC is first MMO I have played, I am more of a Flight Sim guy).
3 hours of solid play for me, no crashes/glitches and only a few aggravatingly low FPS stutters - I did not have FRAPS up so I was not directly monitoring FPS (I run 1440p at High with custom uder.cfg on an R7-360 currently and usually get mid 20's which is good enough for me for now).
At one point we had I think 8 player ships and more than 10 pirates in a confined space in a full-on fangs-out furrball, it was a beautiful moment that shows the potential of where the sim is headed - right up to the point I drifted the Connie into an asteroid Fast and Furious style and knocked a whole engine/nacelle off.....
All in all, I had a great time and it seemed everyone else enjoyed it too.
Many thanks to:
- Blind_Owl
- CrudeSasquatch
- Smeggy
- Murderer
- DoctorAntelope
- Spectre33
- Havrek
- Beerjerker
- Fade691
- Anyone I forgot
'Gimp
