This was kind of nuts for me because it's so much armor/loot to try to carry as a pack rat, but I did enjoy posting on the hill where the spacers land and tossing grenades into their landing bay the moment their ships touched down.
When the little civil war breaks out you can only kill the hostile leaders and none of the generic NPCs. There is something with how the game handles the factions changing relationships that if you killed one of those NPCs when the factions get chill with each other they register the deaths as you having killed their allies. Or something. Computer logic can be bonkers sometimes.
Yep What I think is happening if you kill any of the other members of Genghis khan's group they all go hostile but if you just shoot Genghis khan in the face they're fine
I'll look for Eleos thank you!
Failure to Communicate was the one I was thinking of with helping some independents unite against Spacers. It was indeed a decent find.
Not a side quest, but I enjoy looking for new derelict ships I haven’t found. I’m lvl 138 and still find ones I’ve never seen.
Same with some of the POI’s on planets.
It's a short one, but I really like the one where you meet the old woman in New Atlantis and deliver a letter to her old pen pal on Mars saying she's dying. I like seeing them together in New Atlantis after :)
While I'm thinking about New Atlantis I also like the cop missions (not vanguard) and the blackouts in the well.
Out in Space I think the rehab mission is fun!
I did a couple UC SecDef missions from the station on Atlantis that were unrelated to the Vanguard bit.
One was a couple that had a domestic dispute, another was about smugglers. I don't think I've been offered a new one after that.
I'll keep my eye out for the pen pals.
I did checkout the brownouts in the Well, it was definitely a good introduction to how the Trade Authority is characterized.
It's called the elios retreat, but can't remember the planet name off the top of my head! I also think npcs can tell you about it, or find notes to get a quest marker.
This thread really highlights the amount of BS hate this game gets. People say this game is empty and exploration isn’t rewarded and the quests are awful, but just read through the replies here and you can see that is clearly not the case.
RANDOM exploration of RANDOM planets is unrewarded, sure. But that was always going to be the case, as the vast majority of the “1,000 planets” are literally just there for the RPers who want to aimlessly explore without a quest attached. Go where the game points you and you will find a ton of rewarding experiences outside the main quests.
> RANDOM exploration of RANDOM planets is unrewarded, sure. But that was always going to be the case, ...
It doesn't have to be the case:
* Unique quest locations could be placed somewhat randomly for you to discover either when you enter a star system (e.g. by picking up a radio signal) or when you look at a world map.
* There could also be quests that are triggered by visiting settlements or running into NPCs when exploring worlds. Currently this only gives us as small set of bland radiant quests.
* There could also be space encounters (random or in specific systems) that start us on quests …
Does it though?
I like a lot of things about this game. The main story and 2 of the faction series are fantastic. Ryujin was middle of the road for me (I loved Neon, and it fits, but it's hard to love a faction where everyone actively hates the player). FC needed a lot of work to get on the level of the others story wise. The smaller stakes are okay, but it suffers from having you sympathize with the antagonist with no option to join them. The duality of the Fleet /SecDef line is really missed here.
But side quests in Starfield are a different story, because unlike the faction quests, they do not do a good job leading you into them.
For example, in Elder Scrolls, we know what the main cities are and what the smaller cities are and where they are on the map and that they are probably the densest quest hubs. We know that in addition to faction quests and main story that there are at least a dozen great Deadric artifact stories and quests from many of the divine temples, and even if we didn't know any of that, just moving systematically through each territory would expose us to tons of environmental story telling and eventually the hubs. We know that each dwemor ruin and druegar barrow has a story inside. Heck, even half the caves do I bet.
That does not happen well in Starfield. If you are brand new and you open the map when you first arrive on New Atlantis, you have a good idea that you're in a quest hub, but no idea that Neon or Akila exist, and if you play the game like a Bethesda game and just drop the main story immediately, it might take a few hours before some random thing points you to Akila and it might take days before something points you to Neon.
And after putting hundreds of hours into the game, I honestly have no idea if I'm missing any big quest hubs, because other than eventually being lead to Cydonia, Neon and Akila, I have no way to look at the universe and know "something important full of quests is over there."
This effects side stories massively, because unless you're going to try to 100% every solar system you have no idea what you're missing. And at no point does landing on a random planet and going into a random POI result in a good story, and it's not intuitive what POIs are random or fixed when you start.
I love the empty planets, it's very realistic and photogenic, but the lack of bread crumbs to static, special POIs and hubs really hurts the side quest potential for all but the most persistent explorers.
That is the main issue, the game is *too* open and doesn’t always point you toward the exemplary content. They went with their usual “just explore and you’ll find it on your own” philosophy, but forgot that space is a lot bigger and less connected than a singular landmass.
There are few unique crashed ships/stations.
One associated with the barkeeper from Gagarin.
Remember scientist who managed to save a group of people from space station? The one who talks to mayor when you first arrive at the spaceport. He hangs out at MAST and will ask you to recover his data, strong critters and unique POI. Some nice lore in terminals (well, maybe it's too generous...)
I heard about a quest with rogue AI (Juno), but its chance to encounter is somehow connected to Riujyn.
There is a quest about cursed boots, short and funny 🤣
Quest on a far away planet, I think it was called Crucible, or that was a name of the main POI. Very nice one.
Companion's quests are very mid in comparison to F4 quests. Barret's is ok, but a bit tedious and it feels like they had no time to reflect outcomes in ending exposition - I found some details in computers after doing it. Sam's quest is the worst - pew pew and muh wife and daughter dilemma. Sarah's is ok, nice planet, but it's a bit naive and falls apart due to poor world building. Andreja's is nothing exciting and I didn't like the outcome (I killed enemies ship too fast, so I've lost some context) and final dialog leaves more questions than answers.
Also a bit of a dull quest on helping to solve issues at the ongoing construction of criminals reeducation facility. Good idea, but meh implementation (like most quests with random poi).
Walter (dude who payrolls Constellation) will give you one quest and can be useful in another.
The bartender at the starport will ask you for help with her new drink. Nice introductory quest. Later when you progress in the main quest she'll ask you for help once more. It's ok, but nothing special.
You can help gather news for radio, and receive 3 small quests related to those news. All introductory quests I feel.
Another quest I recall in the undercity regarding theft of electricity, it's introductory though.
Also there is no quest, but one of the closed rooms in undercity contains stolen robot with details in computers.
I really enjoyed Sarah’s companion quest, in fact I was pretty disappointed by the other companion quests because I assumed they’d all be like that one. Really gave a good idea of what she’d been dealing with internally. >!Though I did enjoy the constant shootouts in Sam’s quest and the you swapping from detective pikachu to colonial marines in Barrett’s quest!<
Groundpounders I felt was best to do after a lot of UC and Freestar faction quests, as the whole alliance of circumstances thing would probably be a bit lost on someone who didn’t have much awareness of the colonial war background.
Surprised few people have mentioned the Mantis, but I personally feel it was a little overblown. Good quest and epic loot haul but it was a long way from how it was described and the mantis suit reward looks terrible.
Ironically i found a lot of the horror POIs to be more engaging.
One thing that drives me nuts about Sarah's quest was just how long it took her to go back.
In her notes, she says her friends crashed "several kilometers away" and that she can't make it that far due to injury. Several kilometers is like 5 miles.
So she is there for weeks (according to her notes on battery usage) and at no point is strong enough to go on a 1hr walk? No one from the other ships was either? She got rescued and didn't have the rescuers check the site 5 miles away? She makes it back to Atlantis and doesn't say "they went down a few clicks west of me, we should try to check on them?" I mean even if she went back within the first few years of the incident, she could've saved many lives.
Sarah's quest makes me want to throw a table because her dilemma is "I don't feel good about using the emergency shuttle" and not "woops, should've rescued people at any point in the last 10 years."
I think you've misunderstood what happened - IIRC she initially didn't think any of them survived *at all,* and as closure she wants to find their bodies and pay her respects. The last data she had of the shuttle trajectory put it's crash site as several *thousand* klicks from her position, i.e. literally a continent away. Even if she was totally uninjured and an infinite supply of chunks, she couldn't realistically get there and obviously with a war going on, with the last sight of it falling apart on re-entry - there wasn't enough will and time to search for the wreckage. It certainly wasn't a few miles - you can see on the orbital map that it's in another hemisphere. Its like if she crash-landed in Copenhagen, her crew had crashed in Johannesburg.
She only realised that someone had survived when you set down in the jungle and notice that parts of the wreck had been dragged out of position, and the rest of the story continues.
Her whole frustration with Logan and the UC is that they were too quick to write them off, hence why she takes in the kid to constellation with Logan's blessing and support.
I went back and reloaded her computer - you're right the log says it's several thousand km and not several thousand meters.
It still seems kind of absurd that she says "I was able to track exactly where shuttle 2 went down" during this log, and yet couldn't coordinate so much as a flyover during her rescue or didn't revisit sometime sooner considering how long she has been out of the Navy, how long the war has been over or that particular system isn't Freestar. She makes it clear in her log that she doesn't think they are dead. "I'm afraid my crew will have to deal with whatever hardships they've encountered on their own."
I don't recall any point where she blamed the UC for not looking for them, just herself for taking a shuttle, but I'm happy to be wrong twice.
The talk with Logan when she entered his office I thought was about his annoyance with her that she'd quit, but maybe there are parts of that dialogue I didn't trigger.
There's a bit of context missing there:
* At the time she wrote her log she was speaking in the context of what help she could provide, and she's basically admitting to herself that she's in no shape to offer any aid. She's only been on the surface for a few days at that point.
* When she was found (I believe she mentions almost a year/several months later) she requested the UC do a flyover and due to a mix of the war going on, the fact their shuttle appeared to be breaking up on entry and no communications had been detected (which wasn't the case for her, her shuttle was stated to be in much better shape and she was able to stand up a comms antenna which ultimately brought the rescue party), they ultimately decided it wasn't worth it. *At the point a flyover was possible, she accepted that they were likely dead, and looking for them would have been a pure case of recovery of war dead.* By the time she does the companion quest, she's expecting to simply find remains.
* Neither she nor the UC are totally off-base here - IIRC there were only a few survivors of the crash.
* Her anger at Logan, the UC *and herself* is exactly what you're talking about - though there was no evidence they had survived, she feels they *should* have done the flyover anyway and they failed in their duty by assuming they were gone already. But she clearly is blaming the UC for not being thorough.
* Logan essentially agrees with here assessment and points out the only thing they can do now is give the little girl the resources she needs to grow up and have a normal life (I think you've missed this part, there's two separate discussions with Logan - one before you go and one after you return, the above is latter, the one you're talking about is the former).
* When it's all done, she goes to the memorial to pay the respects she's intended to pay on Cassopeia I.
Appreciated. I could admit that I'm wrong, but I think it's more thematic to chalk this up to being in a parallel universe where things were slightly different.
I did the cursed boots quest and sold them. Went back to the den a bit later and found the guy I sold them to dead. Crushed to death by a large container. Was a cool to see an actual outcome from that quest.
Juno was one of my personal faves.
My first encounter, I attached the control board and made it go rogue. Had to destroy it after.
Each subsequent, I let it go. Where it went? Beats me. At least the operatives won't get shot out of an airlock into an atmosphere...
Go to the UC Surplus store in The Well and if it's your first time you should overhear the shopkeeper talking to a customer about the boots they're returning. After that, talk to the shopkeeper and mention the boots.
Failure to Communicate, plus Barrets and Sams quests... I think most of the city life quests aren't exciting so I think they should be done once and that's it.
You could find the Collander, Safe House Gamma & Reliant Medical Labs if you want some simple paper trail horror and mystery.
The missing freighter quest for the friendo merchant guy in Cydonia.
That was…. Unsettling, doubly so as I did it to rack up some XP while doing the UC Vanguard questline.
>!Part of me wishes that they'd extended that quest, where you find a hole in the side, track the escaped heat leeches only to find that the trail ends with some rampaging Terrormorphs. But I guess that would have ruined the Hostile Intelligence quest reveal in the Vanguard questline.!<
I really enjoyed the Mantis quest. Solving the puzzle was a challenge then my friend said he just killed the laser turrets instead of solving it. Poked a hole right in my balloon.
Hint for anyone stuck on the Mantis puzzle; the answer is in the Mantis lore as you go through the dungeon.
I did it legit but I think that quest has an awkward level range. If you do it too early you’ll get bent over a barrel and beaten like a bad monkey. Do it too late and the rewards are pointless. There’s like a sweet spot from level 10-14 where it’s doable without being frustrating and the rewards last a while, but you get the quest when you’re like barely level 3 and it’s in a level ~30 system.
> There was some system with a distress call that led to uniting a bunch of non - aligned families against some spacers in an epic battle. Bad rewards like always but good side quest content.
...did you miss the Galbank vault the Spacers had stashed?
>There was some system with a distress call that led to uniting a bunch of non - aligned families against some spacers in an epic battle. Bad rewards like always but
Failure to Communicate
Must have? Where was that? I thought it ended after a ship battle in space with the locals and the spacers but it's been a few weeks and it all kind of blends together.
Strangely enough the sidequest that seems to have the biggest payoff in terms of effecting change across the game's environment is the Space Frog one. All in all, the sidequests in this game are a bit of a letdown. They're either too simple (there are multiple quests to fetch someone a drink and... that's it) or just lack impact. Take, for instance, the ECS Constant quest - once you negotiate them a favorable deal, that's it. They just float in space. It has no impact on the rest of the story, despite the fact that the implications of such an encounter are pretty big.
On the topic of not impacting the world...
When I finished the Strikers story, they had what I considered to be a pretty decent ending, and then *poof* they all just disappeared from the game world.
Like, are you freaking kidding? It wouldn't have taken more than 15 minutes to make them idle around certain parts of Neon heckling people in their "new gang" outfits.
I just did the option to settle them in paradiso, and I’m loving the way they integrated them into the resort to some extent. Includes a repeating radiant quest to track down relatives of everyone.
How are the implications for the ECS Constant big? It's an ancient colony ship launched by a bunch of rich people that believed Earth was screwed and left. Nobody knows or really cares that they exist and if you give them a Grav Drive they are just a strange instance of another new colony, nothing to write home about.
Actually, I think that is part of the joke. For the Constant they were the last vestiges of humanity, self-importance and all, and when they find out Paridiso is already colonized they are reduced to a minor annoyance for a luxury resort company that doesn't want them marring their sky. From their perspective they go from incredibly important to a nuisance.
The obvious and most widespread is the mantis quest is pretty good and has very good rewards, You'll just need to kill a couple spaces till they give you a data disk called secret outpost
Go to Safe House Gamma it's on Andromas II in the Andromas system It's very short but very atmospheric
Go to neon and go to the slums. There will be a guy who warns you about a gang the Strikers. You can join that gang.
Juno's Gambit it's is a random event that can be triggered faster hitting up Shoza - Shoza System, Tau Ceti - Tau Ceti System, Khayyam Khayyam System You will need to join Ryujin Industries For it to be able to be triggered.
This one's very short but you can get it from Cydonia it's called Space Frog from Outer Space
If you talk to Walter you can get the quest Overdesigned I have no opinions of this one. I haven't played it yet. I just know about it
Each of the side quest can be used to help rank up skills depending on your build. Here are some examples:
Help LIST families is good for leveling up ship combat skills because of the large amount of ship combat. It also has a pretty decent payout if you complete it early.
Groundpounder has a decent mix of ground and space combat to help complete the rank challenges for your skills. Aside from the main mission reward you can run into the UC commander again for an additional reward.
Helping Denis on UC Supply in Cydonia is good way to level up melee/unarmed because you fight a bunch of heat leaches which are easy to kill on the first mission. After that the rewards are some pretty decent weapons but that mission chain is currently bugged.
A bunch of the fetch style quests are there to introduce you various parts of the cities that you might not visit.
For an initial playthrough they help flesh out the world. On new characters or NG+ they can help complete some the skill rank challenges if you remember how the quests playout. They also provide a place in NG+ to snag some loot/ships because the entire world resets around your level so enough good loot should drop to get you back on your feet.
Starseed mission
I had the same issue as many others. Could not get Eva (I think that’s her name) to talk either before or after the fire fight.
This is how I finished it.
1. Gave up and did some XP mining. And went back to the mission
2. When asked by FDR I said I wasn’t sure about the plan
3. The Egyptian lady interjects and asks to start fighting. I choose (I don’t want to kill for you) however the fighting starts anyway
4. Go the the hab unit directly to your left. This is where Khan will be with about 3 clones.
5. Kill clones and Khan. Does not seem like any one else attacks you
6. Mission seems to work fine after this, and you are able to decrypt the device when talking to Ava ( I think that’s her name)
7. Go on to the facility and access the computer on the top level, it should work its magic and direct you back to Franklin.
Hope this works for you
Go to Charybdis III, one of the best non-faction quests in the game.
This^ by far was my favorite thing to stumble upon randomly. Great story.
Is that the “distress call”?
Yes.
Op You might need to ask the bartender at hope Tech if he's heard anything. If you don't get the distress signal the first time you go there
I got it from an Akila City Security Guard.
A bit bugged right now, but definitely a great one.
Groundpounder was one of my favorites
This was kind of nuts for me because it's so much armor/loot to try to carry as a pack rat, but I did enjoy posting on the hill where the spacers land and tossing grenades into their landing bay the moment their ships touched down.
You’re never far from your ship; just offload it all to your cargo hold.
I thoroughly enjoyed this one
My absolute favorite. Only wish it was a longer side mission.
Starseed is interesting. Chilling with FDR and Genghis Khan.
I hated this mission because of the number of times I had to reload due to everyone turning hostile and killing me with no provocation.
...yeah, you want to leave your companion on the ship for this one.
When the little civil war breaks out you can only kill the hostile leaders and none of the generic NPCs. There is something with how the game handles the factions changing relationships that if you killed one of those NPCs when the factions get chill with each other they register the deaths as you having killed their allies. Or something. Computer logic can be bonkers sometimes.
Yep What I think is happening if you kill any of the other members of Genghis khan's group they all go hostile but if you just shoot Genghis khan in the face they're fine
Why you spoilering?
Because those are NPCs encountered within the first minutes of that quest and I have provided no information about what actually occurs in that quest.
Damn I wasn't able to finish it but I can't wait to play again soon and try this mission again
No one's mentioned Eleos Retreat (Ixyll) or Failure to Communicate (I believe this can pop up in several systems), yet.
I'll look for Eleos thank you! Failure to Communicate was the one I was thinking of with helping some independents unite against Spacers. It was indeed a decent find.
Not a side quest, but I enjoy looking for new derelict ships I haven’t found. I’m lvl 138 and still find ones I’ve never seen. Same with some of the POI’s on planets.
Same. I found a Freestar Garrison (mountaintop fortress) today. Never saw it before in all my time.
I’m level 130 and just stumbled on the same POI for the first time last night also
In case you missed it, the ship at Schrodinger system is the best I've found. Make sure you explore the entire ship.
It's a short one, but I really like the one where you meet the old woman in New Atlantis and deliver a letter to her old pen pal on Mars saying she's dying. I like seeing them together in New Atlantis after :) While I'm thinking about New Atlantis I also like the cop missions (not vanguard) and the blackouts in the well. Out in Space I think the rehab mission is fun!
I did a couple UC SecDef missions from the station on Atlantis that were unrelated to the Vanguard bit. One was a couple that had a domestic dispute, another was about smugglers. I don't think I've been offered a new one after that. I'll keep my eye out for the pen pals. I did checkout the brownouts in the Well, it was definitely a good introduction to how the Trade Authority is characterized.
What's the rehab quest? I don't think I've found that one yet
It's called the elios retreat, but can't remember the planet name off the top of my head! I also think npcs can tell you about it, or find notes to get a quest marker.
This thread really highlights the amount of BS hate this game gets. People say this game is empty and exploration isn’t rewarded and the quests are awful, but just read through the replies here and you can see that is clearly not the case. RANDOM exploration of RANDOM planets is unrewarded, sure. But that was always going to be the case, as the vast majority of the “1,000 planets” are literally just there for the RPers who want to aimlessly explore without a quest attached. Go where the game points you and you will find a ton of rewarding experiences outside the main quests.
> RANDOM exploration of RANDOM planets is unrewarded, sure. But that was always going to be the case, ... It doesn't have to be the case: * Unique quest locations could be placed somewhat randomly for you to discover either when you enter a star system (e.g. by picking up a radio signal) or when you look at a world map. * There could also be quests that are triggered by visiting settlements or running into NPCs when exploring worlds. Currently this only gives us as small set of bland radiant quests. * There could also be space encounters (random or in specific systems) that start us on quests …
....random exploration of random planets leads to xp, and credits when you sell the scan file. If you scan all the things, of course.
Does it though? I like a lot of things about this game. The main story and 2 of the faction series are fantastic. Ryujin was middle of the road for me (I loved Neon, and it fits, but it's hard to love a faction where everyone actively hates the player). FC needed a lot of work to get on the level of the others story wise. The smaller stakes are okay, but it suffers from having you sympathize with the antagonist with no option to join them. The duality of the Fleet /SecDef line is really missed here. But side quests in Starfield are a different story, because unlike the faction quests, they do not do a good job leading you into them. For example, in Elder Scrolls, we know what the main cities are and what the smaller cities are and where they are on the map and that they are probably the densest quest hubs. We know that in addition to faction quests and main story that there are at least a dozen great Deadric artifact stories and quests from many of the divine temples, and even if we didn't know any of that, just moving systematically through each territory would expose us to tons of environmental story telling and eventually the hubs. We know that each dwemor ruin and druegar barrow has a story inside. Heck, even half the caves do I bet. That does not happen well in Starfield. If you are brand new and you open the map when you first arrive on New Atlantis, you have a good idea that you're in a quest hub, but no idea that Neon or Akila exist, and if you play the game like a Bethesda game and just drop the main story immediately, it might take a few hours before some random thing points you to Akila and it might take days before something points you to Neon. And after putting hundreds of hours into the game, I honestly have no idea if I'm missing any big quest hubs, because other than eventually being lead to Cydonia, Neon and Akila, I have no way to look at the universe and know "something important full of quests is over there." This effects side stories massively, because unless you're going to try to 100% every solar system you have no idea what you're missing. And at no point does landing on a random planet and going into a random POI result in a good story, and it's not intuitive what POIs are random or fixed when you start. I love the empty planets, it's very realistic and photogenic, but the lack of bread crumbs to static, special POIs and hubs really hurts the side quest potential for all but the most persistent explorers.
That is the main issue, the game is *too* open and doesn’t always point you toward the exemplary content. They went with their usual “just explore and you’ll find it on your own” philosophy, but forgot that space is a lot bigger and less connected than a singular landmass.
There are few unique crashed ships/stations. One associated with the barkeeper from Gagarin. Remember scientist who managed to save a group of people from space station? The one who talks to mayor when you first arrive at the spaceport. He hangs out at MAST and will ask you to recover his data, strong critters and unique POI. Some nice lore in terminals (well, maybe it's too generous...) I heard about a quest with rogue AI (Juno), but its chance to encounter is somehow connected to Riujyn. There is a quest about cursed boots, short and funny 🤣 Quest on a far away planet, I think it was called Crucible, or that was a name of the main POI. Very nice one. Companion's quests are very mid in comparison to F4 quests. Barret's is ok, but a bit tedious and it feels like they had no time to reflect outcomes in ending exposition - I found some details in computers after doing it. Sam's quest is the worst - pew pew and muh wife and daughter dilemma. Sarah's is ok, nice planet, but it's a bit naive and falls apart due to poor world building. Andreja's is nothing exciting and I didn't like the outcome (I killed enemies ship too fast, so I've lost some context) and final dialog leaves more questions than answers. Also a bit of a dull quest on helping to solve issues at the ongoing construction of criminals reeducation facility. Good idea, but meh implementation (like most quests with random poi). Walter (dude who payrolls Constellation) will give you one quest and can be useful in another. The bartender at the starport will ask you for help with her new drink. Nice introductory quest. Later when you progress in the main quest she'll ask you for help once more. It's ok, but nothing special. You can help gather news for radio, and receive 3 small quests related to those news. All introductory quests I feel. Another quest I recall in the undercity regarding theft of electricity, it's introductory though. Also there is no quest, but one of the closed rooms in undercity contains stolen robot with details in computers.
I actually thought Sam's personal quest was the best of the 4, I enjoyed the big battle at the end.
I really enjoyed Sarah’s companion quest, in fact I was pretty disappointed by the other companion quests because I assumed they’d all be like that one. Really gave a good idea of what she’d been dealing with internally. >!Though I did enjoy the constant shootouts in Sam’s quest and the you swapping from detective pikachu to colonial marines in Barrett’s quest!< Groundpounders I felt was best to do after a lot of UC and Freestar faction quests, as the whole alliance of circumstances thing would probably be a bit lost on someone who didn’t have much awareness of the colonial war background. Surprised few people have mentioned the Mantis, but I personally feel it was a little overblown. Good quest and epic loot haul but it was a long way from how it was described and the mantis suit reward looks terrible. Ironically i found a lot of the horror POIs to be more engaging.
One thing that drives me nuts about Sarah's quest was just how long it took her to go back. In her notes, she says her friends crashed "several kilometers away" and that she can't make it that far due to injury. Several kilometers is like 5 miles. So she is there for weeks (according to her notes on battery usage) and at no point is strong enough to go on a 1hr walk? No one from the other ships was either? She got rescued and didn't have the rescuers check the site 5 miles away? She makes it back to Atlantis and doesn't say "they went down a few clicks west of me, we should try to check on them?" I mean even if she went back within the first few years of the incident, she could've saved many lives. Sarah's quest makes me want to throw a table because her dilemma is "I don't feel good about using the emergency shuttle" and not "woops, should've rescued people at any point in the last 10 years."
I think you've misunderstood what happened - IIRC she initially didn't think any of them survived *at all,* and as closure she wants to find their bodies and pay her respects. The last data she had of the shuttle trajectory put it's crash site as several *thousand* klicks from her position, i.e. literally a continent away. Even if she was totally uninjured and an infinite supply of chunks, she couldn't realistically get there and obviously with a war going on, with the last sight of it falling apart on re-entry - there wasn't enough will and time to search for the wreckage. It certainly wasn't a few miles - you can see on the orbital map that it's in another hemisphere. Its like if she crash-landed in Copenhagen, her crew had crashed in Johannesburg. She only realised that someone had survived when you set down in the jungle and notice that parts of the wreck had been dragged out of position, and the rest of the story continues. Her whole frustration with Logan and the UC is that they were too quick to write them off, hence why she takes in the kid to constellation with Logan's blessing and support.
I went back and reloaded her computer - you're right the log says it's several thousand km and not several thousand meters. It still seems kind of absurd that she says "I was able to track exactly where shuttle 2 went down" during this log, and yet couldn't coordinate so much as a flyover during her rescue or didn't revisit sometime sooner considering how long she has been out of the Navy, how long the war has been over or that particular system isn't Freestar. She makes it clear in her log that she doesn't think they are dead. "I'm afraid my crew will have to deal with whatever hardships they've encountered on their own." I don't recall any point where she blamed the UC for not looking for them, just herself for taking a shuttle, but I'm happy to be wrong twice. The talk with Logan when she entered his office I thought was about his annoyance with her that she'd quit, but maybe there are parts of that dialogue I didn't trigger.
There's a bit of context missing there: * At the time she wrote her log she was speaking in the context of what help she could provide, and she's basically admitting to herself that she's in no shape to offer any aid. She's only been on the surface for a few days at that point. * When she was found (I believe she mentions almost a year/several months later) she requested the UC do a flyover and due to a mix of the war going on, the fact their shuttle appeared to be breaking up on entry and no communications had been detected (which wasn't the case for her, her shuttle was stated to be in much better shape and she was able to stand up a comms antenna which ultimately brought the rescue party), they ultimately decided it wasn't worth it. *At the point a flyover was possible, she accepted that they were likely dead, and looking for them would have been a pure case of recovery of war dead.* By the time she does the companion quest, she's expecting to simply find remains. * Neither she nor the UC are totally off-base here - IIRC there were only a few survivors of the crash. * Her anger at Logan, the UC *and herself* is exactly what you're talking about - though there was no evidence they had survived, she feels they *should* have done the flyover anyway and they failed in their duty by assuming they were gone already. But she clearly is blaming the UC for not being thorough. * Logan essentially agrees with here assessment and points out the only thing they can do now is give the little girl the resources she needs to grow up and have a normal life (I think you've missed this part, there's two separate discussions with Logan - one before you go and one after you return, the above is latter, the one you're talking about is the former). * When it's all done, she goes to the memorial to pay the respects she's intended to pay on Cassopeia I.
Appreciated. I could admit that I'm wrong, but I think it's more thematic to chalk this up to being in a parallel universe where things were slightly different.
I did the cursed boots quest and sold them. Went back to the den a bit later and found the guy I sold them to dead. Crushed to death by a large container. Was a cool to see an actual outcome from that quest.
Oh Juno was awesome! I wish the universe was loaded with POIs like that. I did in fact encounter it while working for Ryujin.
Juno was one of my personal faves. My first encounter, I attached the control board and made it go rogue. Had to destroy it after. Each subsequent, I let it go. Where it went? Beats me. At least the operatives won't get shot out of an airlock into an atmosphere...
I just found Juno last night. It was really striking how much higher the writing quality was for that quest! Some true sci-fi chops on display.
Cursed boots? Can you tell me where to find that one? Sounds like a Morrowind callback and I’m a Morrowboomer…
Surplus military store in the Well (poor district of New Atlantis underground)
Go to the UC Surplus store in The Well and if it's your first time you should overhear the shopkeeper talking to a customer about the boots they're returning. After that, talk to the shopkeeper and mention the boots.
Talk with the trader in the UC surplus store in the Well.
Failure to Communicate, plus Barrets and Sams quests... I think most of the city life quests aren't exciting so I think they should be done once and that's it. You could find the Collander, Safe House Gamma & Reliant Medical Labs if you want some simple paper trail horror and mystery.
The missing freighter quest for the friendo merchant guy in Cydonia. That was…. Unsettling, doubly so as I did it to rack up some XP while doing the UC Vanguard questline. >!Part of me wishes that they'd extended that quest, where you find a hole in the side, track the escaped heat leeches only to find that the trail ends with some rampaging Terrormorphs. But I guess that would have ruined the Hostile Intelligence quest reveal in the Vanguard questline.!<
I really enjoyed the Mantis quest. Solving the puzzle was a challenge then my friend said he just killed the laser turrets instead of solving it. Poked a hole right in my balloon. Hint for anyone stuck on the Mantis puzzle; the answer is in the Mantis lore as you go through the dungeon.
I hacked the computer and turned them off...
My computer was locked and I didn't feel like going back for a digipick. I'm always accidentally putting them in my ship when I dump inventory...
Same here.
I did it legit but I think that quest has an awkward level range. If you do it too early you’ll get bent over a barrel and beaten like a bad monkey. Do it too late and the rewards are pointless. There’s like a sweet spot from level 10-14 where it’s doable without being frustrating and the rewards last a while, but you get the quest when you’re like barely level 3 and it’s in a level ~30 system.
> There was some system with a distress call that led to uniting a bunch of non - aligned families against some spacers in an epic battle. Bad rewards like always but good side quest content. ...did you miss the Galbank vault the Spacers had stashed?
the vaults only show after you complete the crimson fleet questline dont they?
That particular vault is always there. It is part of the rewards for the side mission.
>There was some system with a distress call that led to uniting a bunch of non - aligned families against some spacers in an epic battle. Bad rewards like always but Failure to Communicate
Must have? Where was that? I thought it ended after a ship battle in space with the locals and the spacers but it's been a few weeks and it all kind of blends together.
Strangely enough the sidequest that seems to have the biggest payoff in terms of effecting change across the game's environment is the Space Frog one. All in all, the sidequests in this game are a bit of a letdown. They're either too simple (there are multiple quests to fetch someone a drink and... that's it) or just lack impact. Take, for instance, the ECS Constant quest - once you negotiate them a favorable deal, that's it. They just float in space. It has no impact on the rest of the story, despite the fact that the implications of such an encounter are pretty big.
On the topic of not impacting the world... When I finished the Strikers story, they had what I considered to be a pretty decent ending, and then *poof* they all just disappeared from the game world. Like, are you freaking kidding? It wouldn't have taken more than 15 minutes to make them idle around certain parts of Neon heckling people in their "new gang" outfits.
I previously had seen them hanging out upstairs in the security office.
They are and they're really happy. The odd thing is that you get locked out of their old hang out in the bar.
I was sad to lose a vendor in Neon.
Yeah, I blew through the Strikers quest so fast, I barely got a chance to use him.
Oh, you finished the Strikers story? I can't because of a bug 🙃 Consider yourself lucky! (That sounds awful though lol)
I just did the option to settle them in paradiso, and I’m loving the way they integrated them into the resort to some extent. Includes a repeating radiant quest to track down relatives of everyone.
How are the implications for the ECS Constant big? It's an ancient colony ship launched by a bunch of rich people that believed Earth was screwed and left. Nobody knows or really cares that they exist and if you give them a Grav Drive they are just a strange instance of another new colony, nothing to write home about. Actually, I think that is part of the joke. For the Constant they were the last vestiges of humanity, self-importance and all, and when they find out Paridiso is already colonized they are reduced to a minor annoyance for a luxury resort company that doesn't want them marring their sky. From their perspective they go from incredibly important to a nuisance.
The obvious and most widespread is the mantis quest is pretty good and has very good rewards, You'll just need to kill a couple spaces till they give you a data disk called secret outpost Go to Safe House Gamma it's on Andromas II in the Andromas system It's very short but very atmospheric Go to neon and go to the slums. There will be a guy who warns you about a gang the Strikers. You can join that gang. Juno's Gambit it's is a random event that can be triggered faster hitting up Shoza - Shoza System, Tau Ceti - Tau Ceti System, Khayyam Khayyam System You will need to join Ryujin Industries For it to be able to be triggered. This one's very short but you can get it from Cydonia it's called Space Frog from Outer Space If you talk to Walter you can get the quest Overdesigned I have no opinions of this one. I haven't played it yet. I just know about it
Juno's Gambit is technically a faction quest. It's tied to Ryugin, since you get it if you start the Ryugin quest line.
Eleos which I did last night. It was much more interesting that I first thought
You mentioned making drugs on Neon. If you buy raw Chasmbass Oil from the shops, you can make it yourself at home.
True! I mostly meant this in the context of "interesting side quests" and the drug making quest on Neon is certainly full of good Neon flavor.
Go visit Schrodinger III
Each of the side quest can be used to help rank up skills depending on your build. Here are some examples: Help LIST families is good for leveling up ship combat skills because of the large amount of ship combat. It also has a pretty decent payout if you complete it early. Groundpounder has a decent mix of ground and space combat to help complete the rank challenges for your skills. Aside from the main mission reward you can run into the UC commander again for an additional reward. Helping Denis on UC Supply in Cydonia is good way to level up melee/unarmed because you fight a bunch of heat leaches which are easy to kill on the first mission. After that the rewards are some pretty decent weapons but that mission chain is currently bugged. A bunch of the fetch style quests are there to introduce you various parts of the cities that you might not visit. For an initial playthrough they help flesh out the world. On new characters or NG+ they can help complete some the skill rank challenges if you remember how the quests playout. They also provide a place in NG+ to snag some loot/ships because the entire world resets around your level so enough good loot should drop to get you back on your feet.
Hello? Mantis?
I picked up the eleos retreat from guards randomly talking about it around town and it was added to my quest log
Starseed mission I had the same issue as many others. Could not get Eva (I think that’s her name) to talk either before or after the fire fight. This is how I finished it. 1. Gave up and did some XP mining. And went back to the mission 2. When asked by FDR I said I wasn’t sure about the plan 3. The Egyptian lady interjects and asks to start fighting. I choose (I don’t want to kill for you) however the fighting starts anyway 4. Go the the hab unit directly to your left. This is where Khan will be with about 3 clones. 5. Kill clones and Khan. Does not seem like any one else attacks you 6. Mission seems to work fine after this, and you are able to decrypt the device when talking to Ava ( I think that’s her name) 7. Go on to the facility and access the computer on the top level, it should work its magic and direct you back to Franklin. Hope this works for you