Newly built ships committing suicide

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Newly built ships committing suicide

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All Forums >> [New Releases from Matrix Games] >> Distant Worlds 1 Series >> Tech Support >> Newly built ships committing suicide

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Newly built ships committing suicide - 5/25/2013 4:58:07 AM

farflamex

Posts: 71
Joined: 7/23/2009
Status: offline

There's a very strong giant Kaltor in my system and every time I build a new ship (still right at the beginning of the game, just after discovering the first hyperdrive) it just warps off to the Kaltor and dies. I can't stop them doing it. I've tried adding them to fleets and telling the fleet to do something else, but while they're still in the system they still go and attack it. Since I can never get more than 1 ship to survive more than a few seconds, I can't gather them together to attack it at the same time. I've just lost 5 frigates and 5 escorts (didn't realise until most of them were already dead). I'm trying desperately to keep clicking patrol a moon over and over to stop them warping away but it's impossible once 2 or 3 are trying to do it.

Is there a solution? I think the game needs some sort of passive option or something for military ships. I've tried escorting other ships etc. It's ruined my first attempt at a fleet and since I have no money, I can't rebuild it.

Also noticed what appears to be a bug, when a ship has no hyperdrive and is out of fuel and there's no fuel at the station next to it. It keeps trying to dock at the station (very slowly) and reporting that it's out of fuel but seems unable to do anything about it. Eventually I had to scrap a construction ship as it was just spamming the hell out of the messages.

Enjoying the game though, it's much more fun in the pre-warp stage cuz I can micro everything... except my ships apparently :p

Post #: 1

RE: Newly built ships committing suicide - 5/25/2013 6:20:30 AM

dostillevi

Posts: 222
Joined: 8/31/2012
Status: offline

First up you need to disable automation for those ships. There's a setting in the game options that lets you disable the automatic ship automation that kicks in when new ships are built, and you can toggle automation for military ships from the lower left options bar. Next up you can change the engagement area for your ships.. along the lower left of the screen when the ship is selected are options for engagement area and whether posture is offensive or defensive and what the range is for that posture. Setting a defensive posture for the ships with range set to the lowest setting and having them with autopilot off should completely fix your kaltor issue.

(in reply to farflamex)

Post #: 2

RE: Newly built ships committing suicide - 5/25/2013 6:56:07 AM

Tanaka

Posts: 4378
Joined: 4/8/2003
From: USA
Status: offline

What he has also shown is an AI weakness. This needs to be fixed so the AI isn't committing suicide with its ships.

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Post #: 3

RE: Newly built ships committing suicide - 5/25/2013 7:32:01 AM

Speeder

Posts: 79
Joined: 5/25/2013
Status: offline

Heh, I had a legends game that eventually I lost to Silver Mist, thanks to stupid AI...

The AI just kept feeding the mist, all teams (including mine), kept sending stuff to the mist, like colony ships, or even some military ships...

It was utterly silly for example once, see a ship automatically attack a mist, when the ship had firepower of 50, and the mist was size 900 and had strength 120... it was VERY silly.

Not only that, I thought this was a fluke, only to see SEVERAL of my military ships do the same (jump on the mist hoping to kill it, and happily die)

The AI seemly is specially bad to take account enemies that ignore armor and shield, and happily attack them, and when they start to get pounded, they keep there shooting instead of fleeing, because their shields are not dropping...

(in reply to Tanaka)

Post #: 4

RE: Newly built ships committing suicide - 5/25/2013 11:00:22 AM

Resan

Posts: 98
Joined: 4/1/2010
Status: offline

Had the same problem. Any ship I had that wasn't actually doing something specific would fly of to take on impossible odds all by them self. Even if I had them on manual control. Turns out there was an option controlling this.

Under option -> Your Empire Settings -> Default Engagement Stance -> Other. Setting this to "Engage when attacked" fixed it for me.

That being said, it does show that the AI are crap at deciding whats a winnable fight

Then again, as an army/fleet, even if one ship can't win and will die trying to fight the enemy, this might still win you the war.

(in reply to Speeder)

Post #: 5

RE: Newly built ships committing suicide - 5/25/2013 11:50:06 AM

Sithuk

Posts: 431
Joined: 12/17/2010
Status: offline

The AI does appear to have an issue with the target strength assessment when it comes to creatures. I've just spent a frustrating time manually moving my fleet around to force them not to engage Kaltors that they have no chance defeating until all the ships in the fleet finish building.

Elliot: please can you have a look at the creature strength assessment and stop the AI suiciding ships?

(in reply to Resan)

Post #: 6

RE: Newly built ships committing suicide - 5/25/2013 11:51:39 AM

Bingeling

Posts: 5186
Joined: 8/12/2010
Status: offline

I have not had much issues when in control but I have seen lots of reports on this. I think the AI is decent at strength assessment with fleets, but maybe single ships, partly built fleets, and creatures, are factors messing things up.

(in reply to Sithuk)

Post #: 7

RE: Newly built ships committing suicide - 5/25/2013 12:14:01 PM

Sithuk

Posts: 431
Joined: 12/17/2010
Status: offline

Bing: Fleets have the same issues with creature target strength assessment that single ships do, from what I have seen.

(in reply to Bingeling)

Post #: 8

RE: Newly built ships committing suicide - 5/25/2013 12:57:10 PM

farflamex

Posts: 71
Joined: 7/23/2009
Status: offline

Yes, the ships aren't automated. The problem is that any ship which isn't busy will immediately go off and attack anything in the system, even if you've told it to escort another vessel and have it on defensive/lowest range. Later on it's probably not a problem (I never noticed it before the new expansion) but when you're just building your first few ships it's pretty serious.

If you get some pirate protection they often seem to go over and kill any creatures in your system and it seems like you have no choice with that anyway. Also, I guess a solution would be to ensure I build my first fleet before I get warp, that way, any newly built ship will have to crawl over to the creatures and I'll have plenty of time to turn them around. Once you have a decent sized fleet, the creatures aren't an issue anyway.

(in reply to Sithuk)

Post #: 9

RE: Newly built ships committing suicide - 5/25/2013 4:38:03 PM

farflamex

Posts: 71
Joined: 7/23/2009
Status: offline

Having started a new game, I'd have to say this should be regarded as a bug. It's not so much that the ships are behaving incorrectly, more that, as people have said, they seem to have no idea how strong the space creatures are and should be avoiding them. It's a real pain in the early game, my first fleet needs to be babysitted constantly to stop it attacking until it's strong enough to fight.

(in reply to farflamex)

Post #: 10

RE: Newly built ships committing suicide - 5/25/2013 4:53:09 PM

Speeder

Posts: 79
Joined: 5/25/2013
Status: offline

note: I mentioned ANY weapon that ignore armor and shields, because some newer tech available with the expansion that bypass those (and some old tech that bypass shields) also breaks AI...

I saw one battle where my ships went suicidal, and a couple of battles where enemy ships would happily jump into my fleet, start to get damaged in armor or components, and refuse to flee and keep there getting pounded until they die... Even my pea shooters were dangerous in those situations...

(in reply to farflamex)

Post #: 11

RE: Newly built ships committing suicide - 5/25/2013 4:59:58 PM

Spacecadet

Posts: 1780
Joined: 4/18/2010
Status: offline

There are a few ways to handle this.

You could hold off building Military ships until you can get better firepower.

Ship posture has been mentioned already.

This next one is more of "play style" solution.

For the early Military ships you are building, re-design them.
Load them with Missiles and set their Attack options to "Standoff".

This way your ships should try to keep their distance and will fire from the edge of their range.

There are probably a few more options for dealing with this, but these are the most common.

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(in reply to farflamex)

Post #: 12

RE: Newly built ships committing suicide - 5/26/2013 5:06:36 AM

elliotg

Posts: 3597
Joined: 9/10/2007
Status: offline

Hi all

Thanks for the feedback on this area. As you can probably tell, balancing attacks on space creatures is a tricky area to get right

I'll take a look at this further in an upcoming patch. We also need to improve how engagement stances work for other attack mission types, so with that I'll include a review of how attacks on creatures are evaluated.

We probably need better coordination between nearby ships to attack en masse against a creature.

Thanks
Elliot

(in reply to farflamex)

Post #: 13