X4: Foundations – Why Can’t Anyone Hit Anything? Combat Basics

Dealing With Vectors: Like “Rock, Paper, Scissors,” But Not.

 
Here’s something I currently have come to understand about vanilla X4 combat: different projectile speeds divide the weapons into a sort of “Rock, Paper, Scissors” tactics. 
 
You might notice that this isn’t a straight-up ship class comparison; it’s not about ship type versus ship type. Rather, different types of weapons are effective against different kinds of targets depending on their size and maneuverability: slower projectiles come with higher damage, but that does not mean a whole lot if you can’t hit the target. 
 
That’s because all shots are aimed at the target’s current trajectory, and most of the time the target is turning or changing speed, completely invalidating any projectile fired at the old trajectory but too slow to catch part of the target in time. 
 
Weapons like pulse lasers make for an interesting exception: what if your projectiles are moving faster? It definitely makes a difference: faster projectiles will catch targets of changing vectors from further out because the shots are aimed for the center of mass and there will still be a part of that target they will clip in time. But you have to get close for that to happen. It doesn’t take much distance for most projectiles to miss a small, turning target. 
 
That’s why, if you look for it, you will see projectiles missing constantly, uselessly slewing off into space. That phenomenon is really what this guide is all about. Once you understand that a lot of weapons won’t hit because the projectile speeds are mismatched with the target’s ability to change vector, combat becomes less frustrating and makes more sense. 
 
That’s basically the TL;DR right there. But if you want to read more about it, the other sections of this guide talk about the major categories of the ships, what they’re good for, and some of the weapons that are effective against them. 
 
I tried not to tell you every little nuance of every possible weapon exploit to be found, because what fun would be that be? Games can be ruined by following guides to tell you how to play. Get out there and experiment! 
 
 

“Paper” – Small-Sized Combat Craft

 
Small ships, “paper,” can only be reliably hit by beams and light missiles unless you get close enough that turning is not enough to dodge the projectiles. 
 
Of course, if they’re charging straight at you or otherwise heading at a constant speed in a straight line, that’s another story. Most ships “joust” when attacking. Because the weapons are on the front, how else are you going to do it? So, even against fast ships, slow projectiles will eventually hit them, given the luck of draw of which opponents engage which and who lasts longer. Happens all the time: when you’re just out by yourself fighting off Xenon, they’re all jousting you, wrecking themselves on your bolt cannon sprays, taking beams ends up foolish when everything is so easy to hit anyway. It feels like taking a knife into a gunfight, the wrong tool for the wrong job. 
 
As it turns out, it’s not. When it’s 20 on 20, the odds that each firer will be shooting at a target jousting them become much lower, and projectiles become next to useless. You can order whole wings to take enemy fighters on one-by-one, only to miss spectacularly, creating moments of, “Why can’t anyone seem to hit anything?!” Try equipping them with some beams or light missiles, and that same battle that would take minutes to resolve now wraps up in seconds. That difference is what this guide is all about. 
 
Smaller ships bank on their opponents inaccuracy to survive. Against most of the weapons in the game, that’s actually a pretty good bet, but accidents happen. Though there are a few categories of small, “Paper”-ish combat craft in this game, they generally perform the same in combat. 
 
Scouts are basically Fighters, but they tend to be poorer armed (1-2 small weapons), less shielded (usually only 1 shield generator), and emphasize more speed. Naturally, Scouts are best at scouting, go figure. This doesn’t make them bad at fighting: the “Interceptor” class is basically a Scout green lit for fighting. If you’re planning on a fighter wing that only needs one weapon per fighter, then this isn’t a bad way to go. 
 
Fighters are the kind of Scouts that are actually intended to fight, so they drop a bit of that speed for more firepower (usually 2 weapons, rarely 3) and increased durability. They pull this off without breaking the bank: weapons are expensive, putting only 2-3 on a fighter isn’t putting too many eggs in one basket. These are your basic space grunts, ready to sacrifice themselves stupidly to charging plasma turrets head on. 
 
Heavy Fighters are when Fighters get serious. Now we’ve got lots of weapons (4, 5, or even 6), plenty of shielding, and often two or three times the hull points than other ships of the same class. When fighters are on menu and money is no object, Heavy Fighters are your best bet. 
 
It should be noted that S-class weapons are not that bad! While M-sized weapons mounted on medium-sized ships might be the size of small buildings, the little S-mounted guns on fighters do almost half as much damage. Consequently, “paper” can put out a surprising amount of firepower from a very small package. (No wonder they cost about as much.) Just bear in mind that a lot that time that firepower is going to be pointed away from the target, lining up another joust, unless the target is running away. 
 
 

“Scissors” – Medium-Sized Combat Craft

 
Medium ships, “scissors” are torn to shreds by medium-speed projectiles, whose travel time makes it tricky to catch fighters but their DPS is considerably higher. Though some of medium-sized ships (like Corvettes) are very fast, they’re big enough and have enough inertia that they can be reliably hit from much further away. Everything from bolt guns to pulse lasers to impulse turrets are bad news for medium-sized ships. “Heavy” missiles can usually catch them too. Ironically “flak” turrets are more effective against medium craft than fighters because their projectiles are slow but high DPS and the AOE component doesn’t go off unless it gets close enough to the target. 
 
However, their shields are strong enough to withstand beam DPS or a moderate amount of punishment from anything. They’re more heavily armed than fighters and have a lot more flexibility to bring their weapons to bear. Consequently, medium-sized combat craft will reliably beat a fighter or three just from sheer firepower, but go down surprisingly fast against a full wing. Against slower projectiles, like plasma cannons or capital ship batteries, medium craft are still just nimble enough to evade them most of the time. That’s what makes this a “rock, paper, scissor”-like situation: there’s fully three categories of projectile speeds versus ideal targets. 
 
Again, dodging doesn’t work when you’re charging a firer head on. Like Fighters, medium-sized craft tend to “joust” their intended targets. So if your NPC captains decide to joust a plasma turret that’s firing back, it’s going to hurt. I have yet to see NPCs that know how to strafe, but medium-sized craft are too large for strafing to do much good anyway. With ten times the shielding of Fighters, they can soak up a bit more punishment before it matters. With a lot more of that “broadside of a barn” thing going on, medium-sized craft also take several times the shots that would have otherwise missed fighters. This is why medium-sized craft are generally balanced to be roughly as affordable as Fighters. 
 
Although these general combat performance factors are in common for all medium-sized combat craft, they vary in three major categories: Corvettes, Frigates, and Gunboats. 
 
Corvettes tend to be fast and have most of their weapons up front. M-sized weapons do approximately 200-250% of the damage of S-sized weapons (those fitted on fighters), so this makes Corvettes highly powerful in player hands. (NPC pilots will tend to waste most of this firepower coming around for another “joust”). They can generally only hold roughly 40 reloads of missiles, although mk2 missile launchers will add slightly more “bonus” capacity than mk1 missile launchers. 
 
Frigates are uniquely gifted with a small fighter dock and the ability to carry up to two small ships. However, this is a bit of a red herring: the dock is not actually there for fighters, which might as well stay launched most of the time. Instead, it is useful for launching Mk2 Laser Towers, mines, and using Combat Drones. Frigates can carry 100 missiles and have the most cargo of any of the medium-sized combat ships. Frigates are good all-around workhorses. 
 
Gunboats generally lack a real niche – Frigates can literally do everything they do better. Like Corvettes, they can only hold 40 missiles in storage, but the M-sized turrets on Medium-sized ships do not allow missile launchers to be placed like they can be on L-sized ships! (That seems like it might be an oversight to me.) Though Gunboats have better turret coverage, turret DPS is generally lower than forward guns, so the Gunboat came out worse for the trade. 
 
That said, Gunboats are not really that much worse than the other medium-sized combat ships in a fight, and letting the turrets do the work might require a little less babysitting when piloted by an NPC captain. Just expect them to go down just as fast as any other medium ship when under withering “scissors”-adverse firepower. At least you can save a little on hull part cost by going with a Gunboat. 
 
 

“Rock” – Stations, and Large-Sized Craft or Larger

 
Larger ships and stations, “rock,” naturally lack of much maneuverability. Their large size makes slower, more damaging weapons (like plasma and Destroyer batteries) effective against them. (Torpedoes too, but they can be shot down and don’t launch very quickly.). 
 
Larger ships can have their surface elements (thrusters, shield generators, and turrets) targeted directly, and should. They can be completely disabled for capture operations. So swarming them with a bunch of “paper” fighters is not such a bad idea. When paper covers rock, this little “rock, paper, scissors” analogy comes together. When ordered to attack capital ships, smaller craft will deliberately prioritize disabling their surface elements first. 
 
However, larger ships have constantly regenerating shields. Smaller ship shields stop regenerating awhile after hit, these do not. The same weapons you would use against “scissors” and “paper” targets won’t do enough damage to overwhelm those shields unless used in very large numbers. Consequently, large ships are pretty much invulnerable to anything but a coordinated attack (or the batteries on other large combat ships). 
 
Large and extra large combat ships might be Destroyers, Carriers, Battleships, and Auxiliaries. 
 
Destroyers and Battleships possess the “main batteries” that are good at other large ships and hardened stations. Just note that NPC captains generally will not use those batteries on their own unless ordered to attack something, and will tend to approach too closely when they do. Some players prefer to simply order them to “fly towards” that target until their large plasma turrets are in position to bombard the station, then order them to stop, as that tends to keep them out of range from taking unnecessary punishment from enemy reciprocation. Higher star piloting skill captains tend do this naturally. Battleships are relatively-new additions to X4, in a tactical sense you can think of them as several Destroyers glued together. 
 
Carriers have much heavier shields than Destroyers, and (along with Auxiliaries) are the only ships capable of repairing and refitting smaller ships in the field. You might notice that most L-sized ships and larger all have the ability to carry 40 or more S-sized ships. But what’s the point of docking them if you can’t repair them? I suppose it does keep them out of harm’s way and prevents them from wandering off. But, for the most L-sized ships, those docking bays are only really good for deploying laser towers. It’s Carriers that make real carrier operations possible. They also come with specialized launch bays for rapidly deploying their fighters. 
 
Auxiliaries are intended for a “fleet supply” role, with a unique supply role to match. In addition to what the Carrier can maintain, they can maintain large ships as well! They are not intended be sent directly into combat. That said, they make for interesting drone carriers. 
 
 

“Extra-Paper” – Drones, an Often-Overlooked, Awkward-To-Use Class

 
Finally, let’s talk about Combat Drones, an often-overlooked combat asset. 
 
Combat Drones are basically a smaller scout that can be stored and deployed from inside of a larger ship. Sounds an awful lot like a Fighter on a Carrier (to the point where some of the Fighter subordinate logic seems to be inherited) but Combat Drones are the miniature version of that. So much smaller they can be considered “extra small,” and so “extra-papery” for the purpose of considering what kind of weapons will be effective against them. Drones run off internal batteries and will expire if not retrieved after awhile. 
 
Drones are armed with a single pulse laser. If you remember what I said earlier about pulse lasers, they’re best against “scissors,” medium-sized targets, but the projectiles are fast enough to catch “paper” ships at closer ranges. Getting hit with a single drone pulse laser is a mere annoyance. Getting hit with a dozen can tear Gunboats to shreds in no time! See where this is going? 
 
To use them, set a mode on the ship’s loadout screen or mini-menu. “Defend” mode will generally only launch up to 5 at a time and only when the thing they are defending is directly under attack. Switch the drone mode to “escort” and it will launch all drones in defense mode while keeping them in a picket around the ship. Like with turrets, unless “armed,” the modes do nothing; drones will dock with the ship when disarmed. There is a very real threat of leaving your drones behind, so you need to disarm them and let them dock before moving on. Another way to do this is to use the “recall subordinate” command on the map screen. NPC captains are fairly good at recalling subordinates, but expect this to delay getting underway to the next destination. 
 
Drones are awkward to use. Disarm them while they’re queued to launch and watch some launch while others are docking. Stupid drones! But what do you expect for something made by societies terrified of adaptive AI? There’s a lot of weird little nuances to get used to in using drones, so why bother? 
 
Mostly because drones are great distractions. If you deploy an escort of Combat Drones before engaging several smaller Xenon craft, your chances of survival go way up! The Xenon shoots you, the drone shoots the Xenon, and this causes the drone to aggro them. If you can get an enemy to engage a Combat Drone, hitting them with anything other than a beam takes a very long time. Best of all, if you lose the drone, drones are cheaper than a fine meal to replace! 
 
You can also use drones offensively. “Attack all enemies” mode does not seem to work, but if you can get enemies to hit your ships out while in “escort” mode, the drones will automatically allocate themselves among your attackers. Once launched, drones are treated as part of that “fleet,” and can be given fleet orders to attack a target by right-clicking on the drone carrier on the map while you have a target selected. You can only designate one target a time like this, like flying a kite made up of a doom blob of drones! 
 
If the X universe got their drone AIs figured out, Fighters might as well be obsolete, but there are precious few good drone carriers. Most ships are limited by unit capacities or the lack of proper docks. L-sized ships need to take along repair drones and cargo drones, so that leaves little room for Combat Drones. Frigates and Auxiliaries have the right properties to be effective drone carriers. But, when it comes time to upgrade to proper fighters, don’t dwell too long on getting that perfect drone carrier, as Fighters are superior to drones in every way except for cost and difficulty to hit. 
 
 

Putting It All Together: It’s All About Weapon Performance

 
Though I got a little distracted talking about some of the different ship categories, the important thing to consider in this guide is how rapidly-changing target movement vectors will invalidate most projectiles in X4: Foundations. Consider what your targets are using, and match your forces appropriately. 
 
If you are up against a “rock” – a station or a large combat ship – what kind of weapons is it packing? If it is plasma (the typical large hardpoint armament) then your larger ships are in for a slugfest. (Of course, sometimes fighters will perish charging headlong into many slow projectiles because fighters gotta joust.) If it is mostly medium-speed projectiles, a batch of medium-sized ships won’t last long. If it is beams, keep your fighters out of it. Regardless, you know that these guys are slow enough that you can finally get some use out of those high-damage, slower projectiles and torpedoes. Better yet, don’t destroy them: capture them after disabling their surface elements, but a whole other guide can be written on the capture process. 
 
If you are up against a “scissors” – medium-sized combat ships – how is it armed? Your average Kha’ak Hive Guard favors beams, which are bad news for anyone who relies on evasion to survive, but Xenon P have impulse weaponry, much worse for medium-sized ships. Of course, if you order a Destroyer without an escort to engage a bunch of torpedo boats, you should not be surprised at the repair bill you will get. Regardless, you know that because these targets are too heavily shielded for beams and too maneuverable for plasma, the wide range of medium-speed, moderate DPS projectile weapons or “heavy” missiles are the best at taking them down. 
 
If you are up against a “paper” – small-sized combat ships – how are they outfit? Sure, that sleek Corvette of yours can take down Kha’ak all day along, but then you engage a half-dozen Xenon smaller craft and suddenly you’re rudely ejected into space with your fancy ride in pieces: impulse weaponry hurts. Your Destroyer’s beefy shields render it generally safe against anything that would be a threat to a smaller ship class, but there’s a limit: a huge fighter wing that packs a lot of DPS can probably completely disable your ship! Regardless, because “paper” targets are too small and agile to get hit by most projectiles (unless they are very close to the firer) then you know that the quickest way to take one down is with beams or light missiles. 
 
So, next time you see that everyone can’t seem to hit that annoying Xenon M buzzing around until its luck runs out, bear in mind that this is working as intended. In X4: Foundations, combat makes a lot more sense when you use the right weapon for the right job. 
 

This is all about X4: Foundations – Why Can’t Anyone Hit Anything? Combat Basics; I hope you enjoy reading the Guide! If you feel like we should add more information or we forget/mistake, please let us know via commenting below, and thanks! See you soon!