Just decided to describe Xenon ships boarding with the "Second Wave" method. This method isn't new and has been known for 10 years and that is the reason it should be slightly revised. A lot of changes were made in X3 Universe and if one tried such approach as it was described it past, they probably wouldn't succeed nowadays. And the original article has a lot of details that you may not need.
Disclaimer
This may not be the best way to get Xenon ships in X3FL because there are several ways to get trained marines. You may just collect enough of them and send an additional boarding pod every deck or two and that's all. Despite they aren't 'five stars marines' their number itself matters. Actually, I never tried such approach but I see no reason that it wouldn't help. But in my case I prefer to save my elite fighters because it took me eternity to get them trained with overall skill 90 plus.
TL;DR - the method idea in one sentence
Send the marines in two waves when the first wave of low-skilled marines goes ahead and has to successfully pass at least one deck (two for "I") and die 1-2 seconds BEFORE the elite group finishes cutting the hull.
Prerequisites
- 8-10 low-skilled marines to boarding "Q" or about 15 to boarding "I"
- 21 "five stars marines" for "Q" or 26 for "I"
- 7 boarding pods for "Q" or 9 for "I"
- Any M7M except Aquilo
- Another ship that can get on board 10 (for "Q") or 15 (for "I") marines and launch boarding pods
- A jump beacon would be very useful
The elite marines is always a big problem. It always takes time to get them trained. If you want to save time a bit you can experiment and reach 45+ of 'mechanical' for half of the group and then focus on 'hacking'. And then on 'fighting' of course, because it has to be maximal. To be honest I didn't check the formulas, but such approach should work, because only best mechanics and then hackers in the team matter.
One boarding pod can take up to 5 marines. "Q" accommodates 20 marines while "I" does 25. During the boarding it always worth to send an additional one, so it will require 5 and 6 pods for these ships respectively. For the first wave 2 or 3 pods are needed as well.
This boarding example doesn't use rockets so M7M is needed only because it can launch 26 marines at once. It's possible to use other ships but technically it will be more that two waves and it will be a pain to synchronize them. Thus, M7M is desirable for the second wave.
Other ship is needed for the first wave. In case of boarding "Q" Acinonyx Prototype is sufficient. For "I" Kogarasu Maru may be sufficient as well but I haven't tried. I used Carrack for that because there are only two M7 that could launch the pods and Carrack is one of them and could be easily obtained.
A beacon is needed only to save time. It's possible to use a typical gates instead.
Tactics
- Prepare all your ships and place there exactly correct number of marines. Do not forget boarding pods and enough amount of energy cells
- Find and isolate the target and knock down the shields and save the game
- Summon your ship with first group (to boarding "Q" you don't need a separate ship and could use your current one) and make sure the marines are able to cut the hull and successfully clean up at least one deck (two for "I"). It's very importand and if at least one survives you have all the chances. The idea here that the deck last marines die is considered successfully completed and the next group will start from NEXT deck. Again, you send let's say 8 marines to "Q". This "Q" has 4 decks where it kills 5 marines on the first deck and rest will die on the second one. Right after that the elite group will start fighting and the fight for them will be started from deck 3, so they would need to pass through only two last decks. It's quite safe and the ship could be boarded with no losses.
- Reload the game and fly away from the target at approx 15-20 kilometers, drop your beacon (or just return to the closest gate, being followed by the target) and summon your both ships. Each ship should have exactly correct number of marines and enough boarding pods. Order them to standby and go back to your target.
- Knock down the shields that probably got raised a bit and fly around the target. You have to end at the position when the target is BETWEEN you and your support ships that should be at the distance of about 10 kilometers. Because you have ordered these ships to stop they have exactly same distance to the target. Save at this point.
- Launch the first wave from 'Piracy' menu and now the main tricky moment starts. You have to find some "anchor" in the timeline what you could use as the reference point. Most likely it will be the moment when your first pods touch the target. Because they will fly up to the target from behind they have very high chances to reach it safely. Watching the Personnel tab in 'Property Owned', make sure the "touchdown" happened at the same time for all pods and save the game.
- Wait about 20 seconds and launch the second wave. Use any stopwatch and remember the interval. Don't forget to keep target shields down. The idea that the elite group has to open the hull one or two seconds AFTER the first wave dies. If they do it before, some of them will be forced to jump out because of no free slots in the target, some will join to first wave and die. If they do it with some delay you will hear "boarding operation failed" and the process will start from scratch. Measure how far you are from that point and adjust your time interval between waves.
- If you are very close to that point then save each attempt when your elite group starts to cut the hull. The time the job takes for each operation is not constant and if you are a second too late or vice versa then try to reload the last attempt and next time it might be on time. But it's also possible to get the situation when the second group comes into play exactly when it's needed.
- At this point reload last saved game each time when one of your elite fighters dies. Remember, they are fighting only on the last two decks that helps them to survive.
Kogarasu Maru was the my battle ship, Carrak with 15 low-skilled marines and 3 boarding pods was used for sending the first wave and some M7M (actually, used it first time, thus didn't remember) with 26 marines and 6 pods was used for the second wave.
Next time I tried to board "Q" and prepared 5 marines. I trained some of them for 'mechanical' beforehand but that five didn't succeed, so I added 3 more but they weren't trained for that skill. In result I had problem when 2 of 3 attempts one group wasn't able to cut the hull. And at the same time I had to synchronize it with upcoming second wave. So, it took me some time to find the moment when first group is able to get in and the second comes on time. And after that 3-5 reloads were needed to get the boarding with no losses.
Acinonyx Prototype was the my battle ship and I launched first wave from it, sent there 8 marines on two pods. And the same M7M launched 21 marines on 5 pods.