News Flash: Another way to get a Negotiator class ship
Early in my new game (Sector 11) I was offered the opportunity to trade up to a Negotiator class ship. This caught me by surprise, because I have, to the best of my recollection, had no contact with the Unifier faction. Certainly, I have had no significant contact with them; and no sighting of a Unifier embassy up to this point. So (augmenting my prior post), apparently there is more than one way to get a Negotiator class
...
Incidentally this class ship comes with a built in Shield Regenerator (good!), and a built in "Diplomaticizer" (harmless). This ship was markedly better than the second-generation Trader class ship I was piloting, except for having slightly less cargo capacity, and (more surprisingly) a slightly slower speed. Since the Negotiator class ship that I traded up to late in my last game was
very fast, this also surprised me. However it's other assets (far stronger hull, and much more crew, for example) considerably outweighed its limitations. Still, the variance I have seen between just two examples of a Negotiator class ship makes me think that the strengths and weaknesses of the various classes of ships may be much more "fluid" than I had thought. Random chance may be a bigger factor!
Final note: Negotiator class ships are nearly solid red in colour, and rather menacing looking
... Still loving this game!
