Vega Strike Forums

I took one of those patrol missions where "Encounters with aeran merchant marine forces likely."

My character is in good standing with aeran merchant marine. The ships show up as red and try to shoot my ship down, but can't be targeted by the 'R' key.

Anything else happen with this? Did you ever manage to get them targeted at all using the other targeting keys??

Not sure about the specific combination, but yup, these thing happen.
Yes, patrol (not cleansweep) encounters get spawned as unfriendly even if the faction is friendly.
And yes, threat list in some circumstances skips obviously hostile ships. Especially in circumstances when ships from a "friendly" faction can bounce between red and green (e.g. you caused damage, but they fight someone else).

Yes, I can target them with other keys.