How to do a Beacon Mission.....

[PINKY]

I recently took part in a Robot Beacon mission for the first time. As I was new to it, I looked up for a sticky guide, but could not seen one, only 3-4 threads of tips but no comprehensive instructions, so thought I would attempt some. Please feel free to add any comments and correct any errors and I will edit the posts accordingly.

Instructions

Robot Beacons can be obtained from mining or in Auction. I wont go too much into detail here, as I assume you already have one if you are looking for instructions how to use it…

If you look at the details of your Beacon, it will give you co-ordinates to go to.

Get your party together – I would suggest at least 8 people, or you will never loot all the boxes at the end of the mission in time with fewer people.

Before you start, co-ordinate your team. Decide who will be doing what.
My tips are:

1. Assign your three most powerful people to lead the team. They will encounter the bots first and can look after themselves - It is vital that you do form a team, otherwise only the beacon holder will blast off with the ship and everyone else will be left behind.. It also makes it easier to comunicate when you are all on seperate levels in the looting stage

2. Everyone else can help and/or FAP the leaders. These three leaders will also be the ones that take out the boss at the end. (More on why later)

3. You also need to allocate everyone levels on the bot ship, so everyone upon destruction of the boss knows where they are looting. There are 6 levels on the ship. The first level you encounter is the easiest and has the fewest boxes, but you will need someone fast to reach it on the way back as you will be on the clock. I suggest you have one person looting the top level on the way back down, and split the rest of the team evenly amongst the level. Again, people with the highest agility should be assigned to the lower levels as they will be faster and time is everything!

4. On the way up to the boss level you have 60 minutes (any longer and the countdown starts). Use this time to your advantage - scout out the levels looking for the boxes - they generally wont "load up" so you can see then until you are virtually on top of them. As you find them, call them out e.g. "2 Boxes on east wall". Add them up so the person responsible for clearing that level knows how many they are looking for.

5. On the way back down speed is EVERYTHING. Before you go, put everything you dont need in storage to keep your wieght down. Also worth remembering, you cant run as fast as normal because the gravity in space is lower than that of the planet. Try running at CND or CP to experience the speed you will run at.

6. The lighting on the ship is very dark (all blues and greens) I highly recomend truning your gamma all the way up in optinos, or increasing the brightness. It will prove invaluable once you are up there! (most on my screenies had to be lightened in photoshop for them to show up!)

7. Recomend you take reasonable armor protection to... Shogun or Vigi for the lower level beacons, adding 6a Plates for the biggere ones would help too!

8. Your lower skilled players are just as valuable.. remember this is all about the loot and it is very hard to loot ALL boxes even with a full team. So the guy in Goblin with a FAP 5 must be protected!

9. You may have heard Bots can shoot through walls in other beacon mission threads - let me expand on this, they can actually stand inside thick walls and shoot you from inside them. We found the best way to deal with them is to aim roughly where the shots are coming from and shoot. However, a recent update means you only need to kill 75% of the bots on any level to progress, so you can leave them if you want, alternativly, Keep shooting and eventually you will hit it.

10. For a map (print it out!) click HERE and some info of potential loots and bot levels, click HERE
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Ok, so you got you beacon, you have organised you team and you are in the right co-ordinates…. What are you waiting for, activate the beacon!


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Once activated, the ship will come down like this


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A door will open and a “light bridge” will appear. Run up it!


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Ok, don’t panic yet, this is only a shuttle to the mothership, there are no bots here!

[PINKY]

You need to insert the Robot Beacon into the control panel and then the ship blasts off on its way to the mothership. (this is done by dragging the beacon from the inventory on to the control panel)


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Once you reach the Mothership, you are officially on the first level of the beacon mission. You need to find the teleporter to the next level. On my beacon mission there were no bots on this level (it was a 29 pedder) I don’t know if harder missions will have bots on this level, so be warned…


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[PINKY]

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Notice in the last picture above the green box… This is a storage box. It is what you will be looting after completing the levels…. On all levels you go through, take you time and look for Storage box positions… This will help you on the way back down to find them and loot them.


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[PINKY]

Continue working your way through the levels. The bots you find will be increasingly harder. On each level, the object is to kill at least 75% of the bots and find the teleport to the next level. Remember where these teleports are, you will need them in a hurry on the way back down.


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There are two teleports in each level. One is the one you arrive via the previous level, and one will take you to the next. The Teleports are only funtion between two floors, so you cant keep clicking one to get to the top, or to get to the bottom (on the way back down). You must remember where the TP's are to get back down quickly when looting


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One of the levels is a maze. Its vital to remember the route to and from the entry and exit teleports. Also where the boxes are on the way up, so you can find them easy on the way back down!


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On the final level, there will only be the boss, although on higher level Beacon Missions there may be additional bots too! On the 29 ped mission I did, it was a Warrior Gen 06. It is now not necessary to kill the boss, providing you kill 75% of any bots on the bosses level. I you do need to kill the boss, send your three best players to kill him. Everyone else, wait by the teleport. Once the boss is dead, or 75% of bots on that level are dead, a message will tell you the self destruct has been activated and you have 8 minutes.

NOTE: ALL PLAYERS MUST BE ONE THE FINAL BOSS LEVEL AT THE TIME OF ITS DEATH OR AT THE TIME 75% OF BOTS ON THAT LEVEL ARE DEAD. THOSE WHO ARE NOT WILL NOT BE ABLE TO LOOT CONTAINERS!!!

This is why most of you waited by the teleports… everyone should run directly to their allocated level and loot the storage containers. (TIP: It may be faster to use auto run). If you clear all the ones on your level. Type LEVEL X CLEAR. And run to the next level down and help in there.
You cant tell which boxes have been looted and which haven’t, this is why you must say in the chat window when you clear a level, or your team will loose valuable seconds opening boxes that have already been looted.

It takes 10-20 seconds to open a storage container.

The messages will keep coming up, giving you a countdown to the self destruct until the ship blows and you all revive back on Calypso. (Or if you open all the boxes and make it back to the start, you will return to the mission start point)

If anyone dies before the end, that’s it – you are out of the mission, so look after each other. If one dies, that a lot less boxes you will be able to open!

However, if one of you is bugged, it IS safe to relog - we tried!

When it comes to splitting the loot, the team rules do not apply, and anything an individual loots they keep, so if you do plan on sharing it out at the end, make sure you decide the loot splitting rules before hand and take only people you trust...


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GOOD LUCK!

[MindBuster]

For discussion and other members comments please visit this thread...

How to do a Beacon Mission.....

[PINKY]

This guide has now been updated 10th July 07

[711]

Nice work Pinky, thanks for the update, +Rep!