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Highest difficulty level is especially fun. I love hunkering down and defending the two remaining star systems from dominators, waiting for tech to advance, upgrading stations so they stand a chance when Keller and his gang pop in to say hi.
Definitely give it a go.
Best ways to make cash early on are quests which yield a lot bigger rewards than trading since you need money to make money from trading. However, the amount of cash you earn from quests rises throughout the game, so it might be a good idea not to do everything at once.
Espoecialy if you invest in charisma and head for ground RTS missions. almost every if not all dominator liberated system have at least one Ground RTS mission if you manage to get there on time
I played it a lot and it's a great game, but i never understood the combat. As a solo ship i could never battle dominators efficiently. I understand that you can arrange an "invasion" with friendly ships, but i remember the costs being significant.
Once your equipment becomes good enough you can take on entire domintor fleets yourself. Hull Structure and Shield Gen and Droid will make the greatest difference as they can dramatically increase survivability. You will barely take damage but, as the battles last long and you're bombarded with attacks, the repair costs will be massive. You will literally destoy your own weapons by cutting entire dominator fleets apart.
However, if you can take out enough dominator ships, other Rangers will smell the chance for glory and will join the battle. Basically you can arrange an invasion to happen this way, although obviously this tactic is viable only in the late game.
The game is seriously awesome. If you think rationally, putting all those different elements should be a recipe for a disaster but somehow it just works.
I played it a lot and it's a great game, but i never understood the combat. As a solo ship i could never battle dominators efficiently. I understand that you can arrange an "invasion" with friendly ships, but i remember the costs being significant.
Damn... I'm seven years in and I've liberated four systems by myself. Missile launchers + decent droid so you can stay in the fight. Fast Hulls are awesome for their speed boost, and obviously get good engines. Then just fly away, fire shitloads of missiles, and watch them all die. I think there's one Kelleroid ship that actually uses afterburners, but it's very small and one salvo should finish it off if it gets too close.
The only downside is reloading missiles can be expensive. Do some missions to earn some money if you had bad luck with the equipment the Dominators drop. Pirates are a much bigger problem - they actually have afterburners and normally hit pretty hard.
However, if you can take out enough dominator ships, other Rangers will smell the chance for glory and will join the battle. Basically you can arrange an invasion to happen this way, although obviously this tactic is viable only in the late game.
It's unfortunate for them that at that point in the game I am a berserker that destroys everything in sight indiscriminately, so usually such an occasion ends wiping a significant portion of the ranger roster.
Text quests in this game were a real enjoyment for me and my brother when we were kids. Some of them actually include some math and non-trivial logic puzzles, which amused me to no end. Rocket launchers may be good for the start of the game, but better not use it if you care about the money, and some of dominator weaponry (as well as last tier 'alliance' ones) can destroy them pretty easily. Also, "artefact" things are cheaper to repair in general, so it's better to use max regen/damage reduction things (don't remember the names) constantly and even remove the field generator if the fight / situation permits it (i think it decays even while you travel in space without actually fighting anything or hitting anything (aka asteroids)).
Also, don't take the Vortex thing (not sure how they would call it in the runglish translation), it's the best way to waste all your money on the hull repairs as it's range is pathetic. I think i was using Turbo-gravitation gun ("turbogravir" in russian), and disintegrator i guess (one that has the highest radius), as well as decently-rolled IMHO 9000 from dominator wrecks. Remember that it's possible to de-select certain guns and use only the farthest hitting ones if that enables you to hit the dominator / ranger/pirate/trader while running from it and recieving 0 hits. Damage / weight / durability and even price (aka repair cost) depend heavily on the race of the weapon's manufacturer.
Starting equipment doesn't matter much EXCEPT for the rocket launcher, since rocket launchers are almost impossible to find early on and are very useful. Everything else is just oversized and takes up too much room on the ship, you'll either be selling it immediately or selling it in a month or two, because you want room in your ship to carry stuff. 2 of the starts also come with their own rocket launcher, for a max of 2 if you take a start with one + the bonus equipment.
Learn and love the Galactic Search feature. It's insanely awesome for planning trade routes or finding good items. Most of the time in the early game you want to be trading Luxuries since they have the largest price ranges. Early on Trade is the best method of making bank, though missions along the way help. Ground combat missions especially pay very well if you do them. Do the tutorial, it hard codes a planet to sell cheap equipment which you can sell at other planets for a while if you don't continue the tutorial. Getting a loan from the business center helps for starting cash, I'd recommend the mid-term loan (short term works on highest difficulties where dominators destroy all business centers quickly, thereby erasing your debt). Make sure you pay back the loan in time, otherwise planets start hating you and it goes up a ton.
Fighting Dominators (who normally come in large groups) is almost suicidal early on, they WILL tear you to shreds. Your main hope is to outspeed them and use your long range missiles to shoot away while outrunning their own missiles. Also get stimmed from the medical centers when you can, max ATK/DEF stats is crazy helpful (they shift the damage rolls up or down). If you git gud you can make a toe-to-toe combat ship with Dominators pretty quickly combined with stims. The big advantage of not using missiles is that you tend to have much more dominator equipment to pick through after the battle is over, since missiles normally destroy a lot and dominators will also shoot their own equipment to stop you picking it up if you aren't around.
Hull damage reduction is far more important early game for defense than shields, but shields stop pirates from scanning you and attacking if high enough.
If you ever get in a fight with non-dominator ships, don't destroy them (unless its for a mission). Radio them and tell them to pay you credits. Otherwise destroying ships usually starts pissing planets off, even if they were pirate ships. Money is money.
Science bases are mad helpful for upgrading equipment. Always take advantage of them. They also will take any Dominator equipment you find and pay you 100% of their base value (normally equipment is 30%), and certain equipment they'll pay 200%. Makes Dominator hunting very profitable when you get it, and scavenging after a defeated Dominator attack is even better early game (watch the news or the galaxy map to see where they are going).
Ranger bases take nodes and give micromodules, which are a second type of upgrade for equipment. Tends to be more lategame, but micromodules give massive bonuses. Protip: Ranger bases try to offer micromodules which you don't currently have in your ship. You can literally stay docked at a ranger base and move nodes/equipment with nodes from your ship to the ranger station hold and it will change what they offer you, great if you want to buy 5 burnz micromodules for your weapons all at once.
Black holes are your main source of artifacts. Artifacts go from meh to badass and nigh-essential stuff. Can also get some artifacts from missions, but its much rarer. There is also "black hole equipment", which has no race-type. Certain artifact effects are doubled when equipped in conjunction with certain black hole equipment slots, but the black hole equipment can't take micromodules. Artifacts are also like Micromodules in that the game won't give you another of the same type if you have it on your ship already. BTW if you have all 3 of the scanning artifacts active you can see what artifacts other ships are carrying while in the black hole, the last enemy you destroy is what you'll get.
SR2 HD adds a somewhat cheesy early-game method to get a much better hull: Join the pirates for a freebie with 400+ space and decent slots. Only costs like 1k cash to switch back to Coalition side. Up to you whether you want to take advantage.
Money becomes a big issue in the late game, because the repair costs are tied to the value of your equipment. Battles against dominators willl generally cost you money, do to this. Early on, you can join battles and just avoid combat scavenge the remains (get a big cargo hold and a powerful gripper),
This is why you need the Nanitoids artifact. Go black hole diving. Instead of repairing all of your equipment all you have to do is repair the nanitoid, and its like 2k rather than 200k.
I played it a lot and it's a great game, but i never understood the combat. As a solo ship i could never battle dominators efficiently. I understand that you can arrange an "invasion" with friendly ships, but i remember the costs being significant.
Level charisma and ask individual rangers to join you. Also watch the news, it will often say "military ships are gathering to attack x", go with them.
Also if you black hole-dive enough you'll get something very OP eventually.
I have 4 of these drones that I can take wherever I go. Up to nearly 100 AoE damage, x5 per ship, x4 ships. Could have given them full Myoplasmic equipment for moar damage but was lazy
Also, don't take the Vortex thing (not sure how they would call it in the runglish translation), it's the best way to waste all your money on the hull repairs as it's range is pathetic. I think i was using Turbo-gravitation gun ("turbogravir" in russian), and disintegrator i guess (one that has the highest radius), as well as decently-rolled IMHO 9000 from dominator wrecks. Remember that it's possible to de-select certain guns and use only the farthest hitting ones if that enables you to hit the dominator / ranger/pirate/trader while running from it and recieving 0 hits. Damage / weight / durability and even price (aka repair cost) depend heavily on the race of the weapon's manufacturer.
I used Multi-Resonators myself, which can be found fairly small (unlike the atomic guns and later), have a decent 3-hit AoE, are Frag (better than energy for +damage bonus synergies), and can be repaired by nanitoids (unlike IMHO/Vertix).
Vertixs are theoretically powerful if you could find a small, H-level one, then you upgraded it with both the range-boosting micromodule and the science boost on range (costs like 3500 nodes to do this btw). And of course you'll want 5 of them. Then you'll have a 600-some range death zone around you. Otherwise, yeah, crap.
So four years down the line developers have released an update/ fix to Space Rangers HD, the follow up to Space Rangers 2
I am mightily impressed.
I gave it some initial foreplay a while back and although raised some interest, just did not do enough to form a proper relationship.
Hopefully once I finish with viewing the interesting cut scene angles of Lara Craft I might give SP HD another shot.
Update 2.1.2266 (September, 05)
Bug fixes (including fixes and changes delivered via hotfixes after the previous build was released):
- Fixed an error that leads the game to crash after player’s death;
- Fixed a rare error when loading a save file from a much older game version;
- Fixed an extremely rare error that crashed the game when boarding a space station;
- Clicking on the minimap during dialogue with Keller in his black hole no longer crashes the game;
- Fixed an error that showed wrong damage values on weapons;
- New Coalition attacking algorithms try to gather more military ships when attacking hostile systems especially on higher difficulties;
- Fixed an error in counting when military ships switched their base planet after their previous home was taken by hostile factions;
- Uninhabited planets should no longer become unexplored once again after the player didn't visit the solar system consecutively for two years;
- Pirates attacking Dominator systems should no longer be picked as a target for elimination missions;
- Fixed two small and rare errors that took place during paying a fee when players return to pirate faction;
- Pirates no longer suffer strong unnecessary penalities after Coalition was defeated;
- Fixed an error in a dialogue when buying Submodem off a pirate base while advanced adjustment on randomized outcomes is turned on;
- Pirates no longer demand the player to pay off the bribe too aggressively when player belongs to their faction;
- Pirates no longer turn hostile towards the player in case he eliminates peaceful vessels and Coalition military ships;
- The decrease of relationships is calculated more correctly when the victim is hit by an exploding cistern;
- The cost of nodes no longers calculates incorrectly when combining two large piles;
- Pirates no longer behave incorrectly once all their weapons get broken;
- Keller vessels in black hole no longer have maximum possible health points after Coalition is defeated;
- Fixed swords symbol animation speed on the galaxy map when Pirates and Dominators fight in a solar system;
- All those swords symbols no longer disappear after loading the game;
- Several interface elements were corrected in order to fix wrong colors;
- Black hole closing animation now works properly;
- Open and closed hull slots should be seen when checking a hull in the hangar;
- The game tries to spawn player further from Gralgar in case there are no eligible systems in the middle of the map (spawn in the middle advanced adjustment);
- Rangers and pirates gather items of the same type more efficiently;
- User guide now opens correctly from an in-game button;
- Fixed various text mistakes and mistypes;
Balance changes:
- Brand new difficulties up to 500% can be selected while pressing both SHIFT and CTRL;
- Any pirate ending of the game without Defeating all three dominator bosses will lead to a reduction in the points of the record by a quarter;
- The battle of Rogeria is finished automatically after slaying a thousand of Pirates;
- Transfactorial Beacon no longer causes radiation sickness;
- Dominators send less forces when Transfactorial Beacon is used often in a short period of time;
- Trading experience penalty accumulates twice as slow;
- Dominator equipment drop is no longer regulated by the humanoid technology advancement, all dominator items may drop anytime, though more expensive equipment requires higher average capital of all rangers (pirates if Coalition is defeated);
- Dominator equipment much more advanced that humanoid analogues cannot be used until much later; dominator equipment slightly more advanced than humanoind analogues can be equipped but not repaired or upgraded on Dominion or Scientific Base until later in the game;
- Distress signal prefers to drop cheaper equipment first;
- Several Dominator types acquire access to new weapon combinations on highest difficulties and in the lategame on lower difficulties;
- Limited Dominator aggression during the first months on higher difficulties;
- Rangers Centre analyzes player’s equipment and at first offers micromodules that can be used on available equipment installed on player’s ship;
- Camouflage changes accordingly when switching to bigger or smaller hulls;
- Uninhabited planets may contain electronic cutters and theoretically even multiresonators (requires a new game to be started);
- Lower requiments to generate better and expensive equipment on uninhabited planets, items up to fifth technological level can be generated (requires a new game to be started);
- Probability analyzer works more correctly to fit two previous changes;
- On 400% and higher difficulties Blazer's shield generators power is locked at 86% (requires a new game to be started);
- Jumping range of broken engines reduced by 40%;
- Equiment wears 1.5 time quicker on 50% repairs difficulty;
- During fights between different Dominator series the frequency of expensive loot drop is based on the luck difficulty;
- A third less Pirate rank points for destroying bases, a quarter more for destroying Coalition flagships;
- Better equipment on military ships and pirates during the battle of Rogeria, better equipment on original Mister Shoe;
- Player automatically leaves pirate faction on attacking pirate ships after the military base lands on Rogeria;
- Tranclucator cost includes costs of its equipment inside;
- Reduced the difference between black hole difficulties;
- Dominator vessel models in Keller's black hole should better fit their size and their minimal dimensions are much larger to be easier to hit;
- Stronger acryne bonuses, weaker skill penalty on Biogenic droid, reworked Nanobrolyte bonuses including much weaker speed penalties;
- Reduced jumping range bonus on Lightning hulls, weaker skill and number of weapons penalties on Peaceful Corsair hulls, added droid on all Conscientious Renegal hulls;
- Lambald to be sold much more often on Ranger Centers;
- Stronger bonuses on Jumpa, Strutter, Maform and Microsize micromodules, no negative effect on Jumpa;
Additions:
- Added a new game ending for rangers who eliminate the huge pirate fleet near Rogeria instead of landing and finishing the text quest;
- New option that turns off animations in main menu (reduces loading time);
- New advanced adjustment option to remove the limitation of using dominator equipment;
- To compensate the new equipment rules vertixes created using the cheat code VERTIX now are made by Coalition races;
- Removed the requirement to equip both radar and scanner to scan enemies when cheat code ULTRASCAN is active;
- Added new features for modders;
- Two music tracks added to the game;
- Refreshed user guide, updated some incorrect and outdated information;
I love SR2, really good. What do you guys make of Starsector? I have been playing it for a week or two and it seems ok but.... I prefer Space Rangers so far! It is more of an RTS to me.
I also think about playing X3 maybe with some mods. I hated it when I tried it in the past but now that I know about SpeedHack, it would solve my biggest gripe. Worth it?
How? Wtf? The combat is awesome, turn based tactical space combat! The trading is like trading in every other game only far less time consuming. The gear is varied, fun to acquire, and you get a really great sense of progression, going from super weak, picking off pirates but avoiding Dominators, and end up being able to capture sectors full of anything. How is that not ideal?!
But if you know some better games tell me! Have you played X3 or Starsector? The latter seems ok but it is more of an RTS.
I don't really know. According to google "Space Rangers HD: A War Apart is the Space Rangers 2: Reboot + Revolution addon". But I think it might contain some more recent patches and tweaks too. But I don't really know.
I tried to play SR2 Reboot the other day but found it doesn't work under Windows 10. The fix seems to be to buy SR2 HD, but no one seems excited about the pirate faction that was added. Bugger.
SR 2: Reloaded is the game you should play. SR HD is semi-official mod from the fans, who managed to make deal with original publisher. Besides good things, like HD, Imperial Star Destroyer or gear rebalance(lategame defence was way too strong in original SR 2), it includes lots of shitty stuff, like horrible backgrounds, "the awesome pirate storyline", which is linear scripted clusterfuck and lots of russian meme references from the early 2010s.
SR 2: Reloaded is the game you should play. SR HD is semi-official mod from the fans, who managed to make deal with original publisher. Besides good things, like HD, Imperial Star Destroyer or gear rebalance(lategame defence was way too strong in original SR 2), it includes lots of shitty stuff, like horrible backgrounds, "the awesome pirate storyline", which is linear scripted clusterfuck and lots of russian meme references from the early 2010s.
well i love SR2 HD regardless that pirate fraction.. more meat more fun. and god damn i would really want that someone make nexus Jupiter 2. i loved story. i remember that i played it on easy because it was too hard for my taste backthen
