User blog:Thunder Luigi/Cheating the "Challenge" Freelance Mission

Try this the next time you want to challenge someone in the space lounge:
 * Upon exiting the space station, stop your ship.
 * Hold the fast-forward button until the opposing ship either completely leaves your field of vision or is over eight or so kilometres away.
 * Start your ship up again and attack the pirates the opponent clearly missed :D
 * PROFIT!
 * PROFIT!

During these challenge missions, it is assumed that you're racing against the opponent towards the waypoint established, because the opponent is travelling noticeably faster than you at full speed. When reaching the waypoint, and the pirates spawn around it, there is a very high chance that either 1) the opponent got there first and has already shot down the ships or 2) your boost, if you have one, overshot the waypoint and you have to waste your time turning around while the opponent shoots down the ships around that waypoint.

However, if you stop your engines, you notice that the opponent travels in very specific directions and will sometimes fly back, not firing until the pirates have spawned. Those specific directions reach the waypoints that aren't established for you until you have reached them. The pirates don't spawn at all until your ship has reached a certain distance from either the waypoint or the point that the pirates are made to spawn at (I don't know the technicalities of this).

This applies to every other freelance mission where there are waypoints and pirates, even the escort missions where the waypoints are "invisible" and the pirates spawn a certain distance away from the station.

Armed with this knowledge, you can now fly the galaxy and make a dumbass out of everyone, especially the pirates.

~TL