Hengest wrote:I am not sure of the extent to which trading or combat missions differ in their effect on the fortunes of a faction. I have been focusing on combat as I am sure the my Cobra is more effective a fighter than it is a trader.
Any thoughts on that?
The Cobra can carry a fair amount of cargo. I brought my Asp with 60T capacity, but the missions I've been offered could easily be handled by a Cobra - maybe even my Vulture.
My feeling is that if you are trying to help a minor faction that is not in control, and assuming there are no conflict zones, then the way to help is to run missions. The missions can be delivery, fetch, or combat, but completing the missions will increase your rep and increase their influence.
In regards to bounty hunting within a system, I feel that it only helps the local controlling faction (in independent systems*). Only they can issue minor faction bounties. So, for example, if you bounty hunt in Leesti, the local bounties are issued by Reynhardt Intellisis (RI), and if you kill these wanted ships and turn in the bounties, it helps RI. If RI thinks they are clean, then it is illegal to hunt ships that are wanted by the major factions. What you can do is bounty hunt in other systems and then turn in the bounties at a station/outpost controlled by a different faction. For example, in Leesti, Kolomorgorov Hub is controlled by Alliance Union, so they will gain influence in the system if you turn in your Alliance bounties there. This is good for the Alliance, in general, and I assume it reduces the influence of RI, which is also good. I have no idea how it affects the influence of Independent Leesti for Equality, which is the faction that I think we really want to support.
I'm not sure about combat bonds and minor factions. I assume that the non-system-controlling minor faction will control at least one station/outpost and you turn in your combat bonds there to increase their influence. Or is the combat bond office totally independent on each station? What if the minor faction doesn't control a station/outpost? Is that possible?
I wish Frontier could be more clear on all of this.
*Note: in Alliance/Empire/Federation systems, I believe bounties can be issued by both the major faction and the local controlling minor faction. So if you were careful, you could legally hunt the ships wanted by the major faction and turn in those bounties at a station/outpost controlled by the other minor faction to increase their influence, while avoiding the wanted ships with bounties issued by the local controlling faction.
Hengest wrote:Also I am wondering about the factions and bounties of those I kill. When I scan a wanted cmdr I always thought that the faction shown was who they are aligned to rather than who had put a bounty on them. But then why is it that my rep can rise with a faction when I have killed 20 cmdrs aligned to them? Broken game or me being a bit stupid and not understanding?
I haven't payed much attention as I generally just hunt wanted ships, but I still never fire on "green" wanted ships. Anyway, I believe the target panel shows the local controlling faction, and after you scan a ship the target panel will also show what faction the ship is allied with, but when you look at the contacts panel, then you see who issued the bounty.
Hengest wrote:Anyway guys, I am away at our caravan but will be returning later today so will hopefully tean up with some of you from about 8pm UK time.
Ah, outdoors and fresh air. I vaguely remember those.
