Colony threats

A player colony will face various colony threats at times, depending on factors including its location, industries, and use of AI Cores. Some of these also affect NPC colonies.

In Starsector 0.95 and later, most threats do not appear till the colony reaches size 4.

Colony Crises

Main article: Colony Crises

The Colony Crises intel item is the major colony threat system in version 0.97, providing hostile activity from almost all factions in the Sector with story-based resolutions.

If the player's colonies meets certain criteria(s), it will start generating points overtime until it reaches 500 where an aggressive faction will start preparing their attack, which will commerce properly upon reaching 600 points.

Here's a cheat sheet on Colony Crises without going into too much details, for more information, seek out the main article:

Table of Colony Crises
Faction	Criteria	Aggression	Resolution	Rewards
Hegemony	AI Usage	AI Inspection Fleets	Defeat 3 sets of Fleets	Unfettered use of AI
Persean League	Player Colonies Size	System Blockade Fleet	Defeat the Fleet or join the Persean League	Reputation gain with the Hegemony & Independent (only by defeating the Blockade)
Luddic Church	Luddic Majority on Player Colony	Takeover Fleets	Defeat the Fleets	Luddic Majority Benefits Doubles
Tri-Tachyon	Commodities Competition	Mercenary Raid + Commerce Raiding	Deal with the Mercenaries + Destroy enough Tri-Tachyon assets	Possible Trade Agreement, increases Accessibility for both Tri-Tachyon & Player Colonies
Sindrian Diktat	Fuel Production Competition	Saturation Bombardment Fleets	Defeat the Fleets	25% Increased Fuel Export Income
Pirates	Player Colonies Exist	Raiding Fleets	Defeat the Fleets and/or make a deal with Jorien Kanta	10% / 20% Increased Accessibility (defeating the raid / making a deal with Kanta)
Luddic Path	Sufficient Tech Presence	Saturation Bombardment Fleets	Defeat the Fleets	All Luddic Path Cells are Disrupted for a while

Pirate Activity

	There have been signs that pirates are targeting shipping and colonies in this system - from port inspectors being pressured to turn a blind eye, to inconsistencies in cargo manifests, to other increased criminal activity. The pirates most likely have a base somewhere relatively nearby.
–In-Game Description

Pirates will often prey on trade convoys to and from colonies, with successfully destroyed trade convoys resulting in Shipping Disruption, causing temporarily reduction in accessibility and some commodities shortages.

Besides originating from Pirate colonies, Pirates will also build Pirate Bases in uninhabited systems as a place of operations to carry out piracy on inhabited systems. These bases will eventually be discovered given enough time, appearing on the Intel Screen, and afflicted Factions will eventually put a bounty on the base.

If a system is targeted by a Pirate Base, then the colonies in the system can gradually be afflicted by Pirate Activity, resulting in reduced stability & accessibility. NPC factions' systems may also face a Pirate Raid organized by one of these bases given enough time, which will show up in the Intel Screen.

Pirate Bases are not automatically revealed, and must be located by the player. If unable to be located manually, the player can visit the dockside bar of any colony under the impact of pirate disruption, where they will find a grizzled spacer. Talking to them will reveal the system in which the pirate base is located.

Pirate bases are typically the lowest level of an Orbital Station, though may occasionally spawn as more powerful stations with deadlier defenders. They may also be docked at and traded with, assuming the player has the necessary reputation or their Transponder is off. Destroying a Pirate base is the same as attacking any other station, and will immediately restore the lost stability and accessibility to any affected colonies.

Pirate bases will continue to spawn regardless of the state of the Pirate faction in the sector. Even if all Pirate bases and colonies are eradicated (including those in the Core Worlds), more will continue to spawn endlessly.

Reputation with the Pirate faction has no effect on piracy, which instead can be alleviated by making an agreement with Jorien Kanta.

Luddic Path Cells

The Luddic Path will install Cells on colonies whose activities offend their religion such as certain industries, use of special items and AI cores with particular anger at the use of Alpha Core Administrators. All activities weigh a certain amount of interest that if concentrated enough on any particular planet will prompt them to start a Cell. In numerical terms a planet can bare at most an interest of 6 before Cells are installed. For interest break down, see table below.

	There are indication that Sleeper Luddic Path cells are being organized on (market). The Pathers have not made any significant moves, but are apparently preparing to do so if whatever activity that they object to - industrial development, or the suspected use of AI cores, and other such - continues.
–In-Game Description

Luddic Path Cells begin their existence as Sleeper Cells, indicating the intention of the Luddic Path to disrupt operations at the colony, but exhibiting no immediate effects on the colony or its industries.

	There are active Luddic Path cells on (market). They are engaged in planning acts of terror and industrial sabotage, but are unlikely to carry them off unless the overall level of hostile activity in the system provides sufficient cover. The cells also provide intel to Pather fleets operating in-system.
–In-Game Description

After an undetermined period of time, they would become Active Cells and attempt to put together the manpower to sabotage the target of their ire on the colony. For this, they require smugglers to bring in supplies from a nearby Luddic Path base. Once they receive enough support, they will attempt to perform an act of terrorism within the colony to disrupt operations. A colony with high stability will often be able to fend these attacks off, however a successful attack will disrupt an industry or cause a temporary stability penalty.

The Cells receive support from Pather Bases. These stations will send out smuggler convoys to the target colony, attempting to supply the cells with the materials they need to carry out their mission. The player can interrupt this operation by intercepting the smugglers, though the survival of the base will cause the continued attempts of these convoys.

As with Pirates, the method to end Pather activity is to destroy the Pather Base. Unlike Pirate bases, Pather Bases can often end up a large distance away from their target colonies, potentially on the complete opposite side on the sector, meaning locating the base can often be nigh-impossible. Fortunately, a single base will often attempt to supply cells on multiple colonies which can reveal their location on the Intel screen. In the case that the bases' location is not known, the player can travel to the dockside bar of a colony under threat from the Path, and speak to the Pather at the bar. For the cost of 10,000¢, the system that contains the Pather Base will be revealed.

Alternatively, if you detect smugglers near the colony then you can mouse over their fleet to see their flight plan or manually tail them back to the base. This is considerably more difficult if there is significant unrelated smuggler activity.

Pather bases are stronger than Pirate ones, starting at a complete Orbital Station and upgrading to a Battlestation. They may also be docked at and traded with, assuming the player has the necessary reputation or their Transponder is off. Destroying a Pather base is the same as attacking any other station, and will immediately restore the lost stability to any affected colonies. If all Pather bases are destroyed consistently for an extended period of time, cells on colonies will begin to fade out and disappear.

Pather bases will continue to spawn regardless of the state of the Luddic Path in the sector. Even if all Pather bases and Luddic Path colonies are eradicated (including those in the Core Worlds), more will continue to spawn endlessly.

	A successful sabotage operation requires a smuggler to go from the Pather base to the target colony, and you could actually stop the event if you attack the smuggler (and locate the base if you tail them back). But neither is exactly easy to pull off.
–Alex

Resolution

If the player has colonies targeted by Luddic Path Cells, then they can offer a bigger counter "tithe" (scaling with the number of colonies, their sizes, and Pather Interest), which is usually around 200,000¢ to 800,000¢; this bribe will negate Pather activity in the player colonies for around 730 days.

A permanent agreement can be reached as a part of the Scythe of Orion quest.

Territorial Expeditions

If you set up a colony in a star system where another faction has a presence, they will disapprove of this and send expeditions to destroy the colony in a saturation bombardment.

A warning is displayed on the Colony creation screen if the star system is claimed by another faction, and by which faction.

Territorial expeditions can be averted through bribes or fought off in the same way as other, "normal" expeditions. They will also stop if the colony reaches size 5.

The player can avoid territorial expeditions by having a commission with the faction that claims the system (if possible); this is the non-player faction owning the largest colony in the system with a Military Base/High Command, or the largest colony period if no such base exists.

Defunct Colony Threats

Expeditions

Expedition info in the intel screen

Expeditions of this kind were removed in Starsector 0.97

If the player's colony upsets another faction's interests, they may send out an Expedition to the offending colonies. These will attempt to raid the target colony to disrupt the disputed operation. Expeditions will be sent even by friendly factions, but not if the player has a commission with that faction. A colony having the Free Port status, trading in high amounts of often illegal goods (Recreational Drugs and Harvested Organs), or holding a large market share of particular goods may cause expeditions to be triggered. Expeditions start at a modest size but get larger as the faction involved sends more expeditions at the player.

These expeditions can be solved in 3 ways:

• Simply fight off the invading fleet. The player can either wait for the expedition to reach their system, intercept them on the hyperspace journey, or take the fight to their staging system (revealed in the Intel). All three methods receive the same reputation penalty.
• Pay bribes to disrupt the expedition before it sets off. This does not lower your reputation with that faction. The bribe costs a small amount of credits (starting at 10,000¢ credits and doubling for each expedition the faction has previously sent, to a maximum of 100,000¢) and 1 SP 0% XP.
• Use your reputation with the faction to disrupt the expedition. This always costs 20 reputation and requires a relationship level of at least Welcoming (25/100) with the aggressor.

Once the Expedition fleet(s) have been launched, any event causing the expedition to fail results in the player losing 5 reputation with the faction (this includes fighting off the expedition, but also events completely unrelated to the player, such as the source colony decivilizing while the fleet is trying to assemble). Other than this, fighting the expedition fleet(s) does not incur any direct reputation penalty.

Hegemony AI Inspection

Inspection info in the intel sceen

Inspections of this kind were removed in Starsector 0.97

While Hegemony AI Inspection still exists within the Colony Crisis system, this version had no conclusion and will persist indefinitely.

If your colony is notorious for AI Core usage, the Hegemony will deploy a special-purpose expedition to the player's colony; an AI Inspection Fleet. Unlike typical expeditions, player colonies will concede to these inspection fleets by default.

A successful inspection will remove all AI cores on the colony's industries and the AI administrator if present, and apply a reputation penalty.

The frequency of AI inspections depends on the number and type of AI Cores used across the player faction. With about 6 Alpha AI cores the first inspection will occur after little over 8 months, the next one after 2x that time, and the next and all subsequent inspections after 4x that time(i.e. once every 32 months) This seems to scale linearly, so for example with 15 Alpha AI cores used the final(longest) AI Inspection timer is about once a year. The inspection will always target the colony with the most AI use.

As time between inspections increases so does the strength of the fleet(s) sent. At their peak AI Inspection consists of two full size fleets(each roughly equal to a 200,000−300,000¢ bounty) and may also have an additional small third fleet.

The player has several options to deal with inspections, selectable through the Avert dialog in the inspection's Intel screen display:

• Comply with the inspection (default). If AI cores are discovered they will be immediately confiscated and the player's reputation with the Hegemony will decrease by 10.
  • If the AI inspection fleet finds less than 80% of the expected credit value in AI cores, as a result of the player removing AI cores after the inspection fleet has been announced, the fleet will disrupt all the colonies' industries, reduce the player's reputation with the Hegemony with 20, and penalize the colony's stability. The player can still safely replace high value cores for the equivalent in low value cores, to change which cores the fleet takes.
  • AI cores in storage will be taken if they are found there after the inspection had expected them to be on industries.
• Resist the inspection, allowing player faction forces to attack the inspection fleet as though they were a typical expedition. This will make the Hegemony immediately turn hostile when the fleet arrives in-system. Resisting is the default and only option if the player is already hostile to the Hegemony.
  • If the inspection fleet overcomes the colony's space defenses, it will seize the AI cores it finds and cause some instability. Each core has a chance to escape confiscation, depending on the ratio of the colony's ground defense strength to the fleet's strength.
• Bribe the inspectors, causing them to arrive and act as though no cores were present. This costs 1 SP 0% XP and 150,000¢ × 1.5^(number of past inspections), capped at 500,000¢.
  • A bribed inspection may still conduct its inspection if the Hegemony turns hostile midway through (changing the default response to resistance when the intel item is viewed in the GUI).

Regardless of the option selected, the player can also personally engage and destroy the inspection fleet while having their transponder off, resulting in only a slight reputation loss. This can even be done with the colony's station and patrols supporting the player, even if the 'comply' option was chosen. Other than bribery, this is the only way to maintain good relations with the Hegemony while keeping the AI cores and otherwise avoiding damage to the colony.

Hostile Activity

Major Event of this kind were removed in Starsector 0.97

Hostile Activity is succeeded by the Colony Crisis system.

Hostile Activity is a major event that starts the moment a colony is established by the player.

It's a representation of the degree to which Pirates & the Luddic Path have in threatening the colonies of the player.

Up to 500 points can be accumulated, affected by monthly & one-time factors.

Defensive Measures

The player can build certain structures / industries that will reduce the monthly points gain, only the highest scoring colony will be used.

• Patrol HQ ~ -5
• Military Base ~ 2x colony size
• High Command ~ 3x colony size

Pirate

Colony presence & stability will generate a monthly score based on the biggest colony's size & stability, if multiple colonies have the same size, then the highest stability will be considered.

Rate: 10 + size - stability

The player can pay a tribute to Jorien Kanta at Kanta's Den for Kanta's Protection, which will immediately subtract 100 points and remove the Colony presence & stability points generation.

Pirate Bases can also contribute points, which varies depending on the number of colonies in range per month.

The player can go to a Pirate Base targetting their colony & make a deal with its boss, where in exchange of 10% of the colony's income, the modifier becomes negative and instead reduce points each month.

Luddic Path

Technology & AI Core usage generates: +<Pather Interest> per month.

Interest needs to be at least 7 on a world, and is accompanied by Pather Cells.

The player can offer a big "tithe", scaling with number of colonies, their sizes & Pather Interest (usually around 200,000¢ to 800,000¢) as a bribe to negate Pather activity in their colonies for around 730 days.

A more permanent agreement can be reached as part of the Scythe of Orion quest.

One-Time Factors

Hostile ships destroyed in battles involving the player fleet will contribute an one-time reduction based on the size of the fleet. Any hostile ships destroyed will count, such as raiding Expeditions.

Effects

Icon	Name	Points	Effect
	Low Impact	50	-1 stability · -10% accessibility · Affects 1 or 25% of player systems, whichever is higher.
	Pirate Raid	100	Revealed at 75 points, will be averted when points drop below 50.
	Moderate Impact	150	-2 stability · -20% accessibility · Affects 2 or 50% of player systems, whichever is higher.
	Increased Defenses	200	Rate of progress is now reduced by size + stability (biggest sum)
	High Impact	250	-3 stability · -30% accessibility · Affects 3 or 75% of player systems, whichever is higher.
	Extreme Impact	350	-4 stability · -40% accessibility · Affects all player systems.
	Repeatable Event	500	Revealed at 450 points.

References

Up to date for latest version, 0.97a.