Intercept

The intercept mission allows a ship to attempt to intercept another. Intercepting ships move after regular ship movement.

Intercepting a ship will allow you to see which planet they went to, and thereby learn their destination. Using an idle freighter intercepting at warp 0 is a good way of tracking enemy ship movements. On your next turn, your ship's waypoint will point to where the target ship went.

You can also break tow by trying to intercept a ship that is far away (e.g. longer than 81.0 ly away at warp 9). That ship can then move closer to you. This can save you fuel when trying to break tow, especially if you have lower-tech engines but want to break warp at warp 9. HYP ships can also be intercepted in this way. For example, if you set intercept mission to a HYP ship which is ~350 ly from you, it can then jump nearby. The HYP ship can even be set to go to the same planet that your ship is already at. In this way you can break tow (by setting a long waypoint) without having to move your ship!

Multiple Interceptions

In the case where a ship A is intercepting a ship B which is also intercepting another ship C, the ship B will move first to intercept its target, C. Then ship A will try to intercept ship B.

In the case where there is a loop where multiple ships are intercepting each other, the Host will decide which moves last. The ships that are deemed most likely to intercept their target (by being closer and having a high warp speed) will move last. More info on loops can be found here.

Classic-mode Exploits

As of Jan. 2021, Standard uses the Chained Intercept system, which addresses annoying issues from classic. But if you are using the classic style of intercept, your intercepting ships will not always reach their targets. Veteran players will try to avoid interception by enemy ships by intercepting other ships themselves. Since intercepting ships move in order of ID#, from lowest to highest, ships with a higher ID# will in this way avoid an intercepting ship with lower ID#.

Intercepting with cloaked ships

Intercepting ships with a cloaking devices do combat a bit differently. They do combat before normal ship-to-ship combat. They also do combat in reverse order of ID# (highest to lowest). In past versions of Host, Priority Intercept was called "cloaked intercept" but has been renamed in NuHost. In addition to Priority Intercept, NuHost has 2 other ways that ships with a cloaking device can intercept:

• Priority Intercept is an advantage given to cloaking ships who are on an intercept mission. Cloaking ships will attack the ships they are set to intercept (if Primary Enemy is set) before regular combat. In this way, a cloaking ship can destroy a target ship, regardless of the combat order the defending player has chosen.

• The Cloak & Intercept mission is available only at Planets.nu for Bird players, and only in Standard or Campaign modes. It is similar to priority intercept, except it allows a ship to remain cloaked while intercepting, as well as re-cloak after combat (if undamaged). You do not need to set PE for Cloak & Intercept mission; if you want, you can simply intercept a ship without attacking (and remain cloaked). This is useful if you want to tow away a ship from a fleet to attack or capture it. This can be quite deadly with a privateer ally, who can rob ships that you tow to them.

• Re-cloak Intercept is a mission available only to the Deth Specula Stealth. It is like a normal Priority Intercept, except that the Deth Spec will re-cloak after destroying its target (if undamaged).

When your target disappears

• If your target ship cloaks, your intercepting ship will hold position
• If your target ship is destroyed by hitting a mine, your intercepting ship will move to the original location of the target ship (where you set your waypoint).

See Also

Intercept Mission documentation at Planets.nu, including chained intercept.
Donovan's on Intercept
Cloak Intercept Planets Magazine Ship Movement