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Softening the target (Optional)

The Ion Disrupter and Ion Cannon weapons of the Boron not only do high shield damage but also have a high chances to chance to destroy weapons and equipment allowing the player to strip a target ship down to a defenceless hull.   This is recommended if trying to board Rapid Response ships as destroying the Jumpdrive prevents the ships from fleeing when their shields run low and destruction of the Cargo Lifesupport removes Lifesupport System removes any enemy personnel (which tend to have high skills).   Skilled players can even perform the softening of targets using some support TM ships (Angel, Pleco and Magnetar), otherwise use Argon Eclipse/Centaur or Boron Mako/Skate/Thresher ships.

Spacewalk Boarding

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With this kind of boarding the player uses Wildfire and Silkworm missiles (Wasp and Dragonfly missiles also work) at a long range to lower the shields of the target if no softening is performed before launching the drones.   Drones are launched at a distance of 6-8Km from the target and ordered to Attack Shields of the target.   Once the target shields are <10% the player can either start flying away from the target and uses the Launch Marines command to allow the target ship to fly into the cloud of Marines while being far enough away from the player ship that it is not actively firing towards the player and oncoming Marines (this is where you will pointlessly lose your personnel) or the player can try and fly underneath the target ship and launch the marines just as the ship flies overhead that all marines instantly contact the target hull (player is more likely to take damage with bigger targets but more synchronised boarding and lower losses however, fatal collisions with the target ship are more likely).   Ships recommended for spacewalk boarding are the TP class ships, Geochen (Teladi) (high shielding for a TP), Ocelot (Split) (has enough speed to dodge incoming fire) and Angel (Boron) (has Ion Disrupters to help reduce target shields and soften them up) and the Argon  Argon TM class ship Zephyrus (high shielding , has Ion Disrupters to help reduce target shields and soften them up and Thunderbolt Missile compatibility for depleting for depleting the shields and can carry all ships and equipment needed for clean boarding and escape tactics) and Magnetar (Has Ion Disrupters to help reduce target shields and soften them up).   It typically takes up to 50 missiles for a boarding operation of an M6 using a TP.   The Mechanical Skill of the personnel used limits what ship classes can be boarded with this method

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Xenon (and to a lesser extent Terran and ATF ships) have a high innate boarding resistance making them mince boarding personnel (even without the Internal Security Lasers equipment).   This means only use personnel with a Fighting skill of 100 and even then casualties can be expected.   Always board with one more marine than the capacity for the ship class (9 for M6/M6+ and 21 for M7/M1/M2) as this greatly reduces casualties.   For the Xenon P/PX do as stated in the Boarding Pod Boarding section but just use 9 personnel to board with and expect up to 1 loss of personnel.

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For players not doing the Suicidal Squid starting scenario it is advised to have at least 5-9 Salvage Insurance to be able to save at key moments of a boarding operation on the off chance something goes wrong and a reload is needed.   For most ships saves 3-8 can be skipped but for Xenon ships it is recommended.

1. The Approach: Save once the player has gotten within range of the target but before opening fire (in case it becomes a good idea to abandon the plan)
2. Ready to Board: Save once the target shields are down and before the personnel are launched for the boarding operation
3. Hull Contact Established: Save if all personnel make it to the hull.   This allows reloading until all personnel synchronise fighting on Deck 1 for lowest casualties (a must for Xenon ships). In X3: AP this is the only save that affects casualties on all decks 
4. Middle of Deck 1 (X3:TC Only): Too late to change the fate of those fighting on Deck 1 but the outcome of Deck 2 has not yet been determined
5. Middle of Deck 2 (X3:TC Only): Too late to change the fate of those fighting on Deck 2 but the outcome of Deck 3 has not yet been determined  
6. Middle of Deck 3 (X3:TC Only): Too late to change the fate of those fighting on Deck 3 but the outcome of Deck 4 has not yet been determined  
7. Middle of Deck 4 (X3:TC Only): Too late to change the fate of those fighting on Deck 4 but the outcome of Deck 5 has not yet been determined
8. We Are At The Computer Core: Save to be able to reroll what the new ship has ware wise once ownership is transferred (good for getting Jump Beacons)
9. Victory: Save once both the captured ship and player ship are evacuated to a safe location    

Boarding Operation Mechanics

Source: http://x3tc.net/abordazh-mehanika-igrovogo-processa_110.html

Personnel Training

Marines/Mercenaries have Fighting, Engineering, Mechanical and Hacking skills that range from 0 to 100 affecting their performance during boarding operations.   The Fighting Skill can only be trained by performing successful boarding operations, increasing by 5-9 points with each successful operation.   All other skills can be trained at NPC Trading Stations, Equipment Docks, Military Outposts, Military Bases, Marine Training Barracks, Rehabilitation Facilities, Pirate Bases, Stock Exchanges, Orbital Defence Stations, Orbital Patrol Bases, Research Stations and Unique Facilities for a price.   The number of stars personnel have are based on the number of Skill points divided by 17 and rounded down.   The Overall stars is based on the average of all Skills.

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Boarding Resolution Algorithms

Source: https://translate.google.co.uk/translate?hl=en&sl=ru&tl=en&u=http%3A%2F%2Fx3tc.net%2Fabordazh-mehanika-igrovogo-processa_110.html 

Cutting The Hull

First contact of the personnel to the hull of the target ship causes a 5% 90% Race Rank point loss followed by an additional 900 points (5%-50 ,000 pointsin TC).   Hull cutting is performed in groups using the same formula as used for determining the number of boarding pods launched.

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The Mechanical skills of the personnel in each group is sorted in descending order and the two highest values are combined.   There are then five rounds (6 if a Hull Polarising Device is present) of hull cutting which during which if the target shield reaches over the maximum shield percentage all boarding personnel are instantly eliminated.   Should the effective Mechanical Skill be below the effective hull resistance the group of marines will be ejected back into space.   If the effective mechanical skill is higher than the effective hull resistance then the group of personnel enter the target ship and begin fighting.

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This means that if an Atmospheric Lifter or , Valhalla or any other Terran/ATF TL/M2/M2+/M1 has a Hull Polarising Device there is a chance that even personnel with maxed Mechanical Skill will and Boarding Pods will fail to cut through the hull.   Hull cutting takes 22-40 seconds with a Hull Polarising Device adding an extra 6-9 seconds through the extra round of shield percentage checking.

Fighting On The Decks

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Device adding an extra 6-9 seconds through the extra round of shield percentage checking.   Although more personnel can be launched than the target ship Marine Capacity+1 and begin cutting the hull, only enough personnel to make up the Marine Capacity+1 will enter the target with extra personnel being ejected back into space.   It is possible to have personnel cutting the hull when other groups are already fighting on the decks.

Fighting On The Decks

The target ship will be set to Foe if not hostile already. During this stage of boarding the target ship takes hull damage four times on each deck with a total based on the formula 0.6*(100-Average Engineering Skill)% and boarding will fail if the hull drops below 5% at any stage during the boarding operation.   This means personnel with low Engineering skill should not be used to board ships with under 65% hull and personnel with over 59 points in Engineering are required to board an Aran.   There is then a 10-15 second delay of Fighting to allow other groups to finish cutting through the hull to try and maximise the number of personnel fighting on each deck.   Once Fighting (Deck x) begins any personnel that cut through the hull will have to wait in Fighting until the end of the current deck to join.   Each deck fought on causes a 10% Race Rank point loss followed by an additional -100 points (2%-20 in TC).   This means 5 deck ships will cost at least 9,556 Race Rank points which is enough to bring the Race Rank of the boarded ship owner race from 6% of +6 down to 0.   The Boarding Strength of the player personnel is then pitted against the Boarding Resistance of the target ship.

• Boarding Strength = ƩFighting Skill of all Fighting personnel aboard the target (including those not on a deck)±10%
• Boarding Resistance (Commonwealth) = (Base Boarding Resistance+ƩFighting Skill of all NPC personnel aboard+Internal Security Lasers Bonus)±10%
• Boarding Resistance (Terran/ATF) = (Base Boarding Resistance*4+ƩFighting Skill of all NPC personnel aboard+Internal Security Lasers Bonus)±10%
• Boarding Resistance (Xenon) = (Base Boarding Resistance*2+85*Marine Capacity-80*Number of Decks Passed)±10%
  • Internal Security Lasers Bonus = 200

Possible casualties on both sides are then calculated between the first and second audio played for the deck (means save before this point).   The number of possible casualties are then scaled according to how big the difference between Boarding Strength and Boarding Resistance is before playing roulette as to who dies from the player personnel.   If Boarding Resistance - Boarding Strength is ≤ 40, then there is an additional 2% chance to adjust Attacker possible Casualties by +1 and Defender Possible Casualties by -1.

Attacker Possible Casualties = (((Marine Capacity+1)/Number of Decks)+Random Number(0 to 2))-1

Defender Possible Casualties = ((Marine Capacity/Number of Decks)+Random Number(0 to 2))-1

Attacker actual casualties are determined by going through all living attacker personnel using the formula 10%-((Fighting Skill-1)/10), adding them to a group if chosen and randomly killing the unlucky one of the group.   The number of times this process occurs is the number of possible casualties.   This means personnel with a high Fighting Skill have a decent chance that none will be picked for the elimination group.   Defender actual casualties is the same as the possible casualties.

After the final deck there is a battle for the bridge using slightly modified formulas.

• Boarding Strength = ƩFighting Skill of all Fighting personnel aboard the target (including those not on a deck)±6.66%
• • Boarding Resistance (Commonwealth) = (Base Boarding Resistance+ƩFighting Skill of all NPC personnel aboard+Internal Security Lasers Bonus)±6.66%
  • Boarding Resistance (Terran/ATF) = (Base Boarding Resistance*4+ƩFighting Skill of all NPC personnel aboard+Internal Security Lasers Bonus)±6.66%
  • Boarding Resistance (Xenon) = (Base Boarding Resistance*2+85*Marine Capacity-50*Number of Decks)±6.66%
  • • Internal Security Lasers Bonus = 200

If Boarding Strength ≤  Boarding Resistance then the personnel "run out of ammo" and are all killed.   If Boarding Strength >  Boarding Resistance then any remaining target personnel are ejected into space for collection and the boarding personnel begin to hack the computer core.   In total this phase of boarding takes 10-15 seconds+(7-14)*Number of Decks seconds.

Hacking The Computer Core

Despite all the audio played during the hacking process there are only three stages that count.   If Hacking Strength ≥ Hacking Resistance then hacking proceeds to stage two.   If Hacking Strength < Hacking Resistance there is a 2% chance of hacking proceeding to stage two, otherwise the boarding fails and all boarding personnel are ejected into space.

• Hacking Strength = ƩBest + Second Best Hacking Skill (from all living attacker personnel)
• Hacking Resistance = (Base Hacking Resistance*Racial Factor)+Random Hacking Factor+Advanced Firewall Software Bonus
  • Racial Factor Commonwealth = 1
  • Racial Factor Terran/ATF = 4
  • Racial Factor Xenon = 5
  • Advanced Firewall Software Bonus = 70

Stage two has an 80% chance of adding a 2-4 second delay to hacking if the target ship has the Advanced Firewall Software equipment.   During stage three there is a 5% chance the safety will turn back on causing the boarding operation to fail and ejecting the boarding personnel into space.   Ship ownership is then transferred.   In total hacking takes 20-37 seconds + 2-4 from Advanced Firewall Software delay.   This process means that personnel with no Hacking Skill still have a 1.96% chance to hack a ship and personnel with maxed Hacking Skill only have a 95% chance of success.

Wares Kept

When ownership of the target ship is transferred, 90% of equipped lasers, missiles and shields are destroyed.   Kyon Emitter type lasers only have a 50% chance of destruction.   Of the remaining equipment and wares in the cargobay the amount kept is determined by two sequential number generators.   Stations in the cargobay of TLs are exempted and always kept.

Round 1 = 0 to (Ware Number+1)

Round 2 = 0 to (Round 1 Number+1)

Hints/Tips

• Rapid Response M7M ships will waste their personnel by launching it in Boarding Pods they spawn with at any enemy boardable ship that loses shielding.   If these missiles are shot down by the player they have a 50% chance to drop several 4-5 star Marine personnel for the player to collect.  This makes the south gate of Circle of Labour a good early source of highly trained personnel (assuming the Argon are not shooting holes in the player ship).
• Cloudbase South East, Montalaar, Heaven's Assertion, Great Reef, Ocean of Fantasy and Senator's Badlands (add more) are good sectors for boarding TLs since there is almost always a TL present and seldom more than 3 fighters to defend the sector.
• Keep the new personnel coming.   It takes a long time to fully train marines/mercenaries so hire every individual with a high Fighting Skill >40 from the start of the game until there are about 100 60 in training (enough to obtain at least one of every boardable ship including Xenon which mince personnel).
• Use Return Ship and Return Abandoned Ship missions to train the fighting skill of personnel (can spawn M6/M7 ships if the player has a Race Rank of ≥+8 for the mission giver race).