RE: Posture Frustrations (Full Version)

All Forums >> [New Releases from Matrix Games] >> Distant Worlds 1 Series



Message

Gelatinous Cube -> RE: Posture Frustrations (12/10/2011 7:14:38 AM)


quote:

ORIGINAL: feelotraveller

I understand that they are on manual (but seem my last post). I believe that the explanation is that some of your ships were close enough to the hostile ones to be considered 'nearby', and some were not. Hence the engagement stance applied to only some of the ships. If you had the engagement stance set to 'engage system targets' then (assuming that some of the fleet had not already left the system) the whole fleet would have changed its orders.


Oh, snap. Yes. With a fleet selected, you will see a box for engagement stance near the top of the lower-left-hand Corner-Box. This affects your "Auto-lite" behaviour, namely how far away an enemy ship has to be for it to decide it's worth fighting. I still don't think that should have broken your manual order to leave the system though, unless your ships were actually shot.



feelotraveller -> RE: Posture Frustrations (12/10/2011 7:15:36 AM)

If you want to give your ships the best chance not to have their orders overridden you should specify the engagement stance as 'engage when attacked' but beware if one ship is attacked and the others are not only the ship being attacked will respond.



Gelatinous Cube -> RE: Posture Frustrations (12/10/2011 7:20:21 AM)


quote:

ORIGINAL: feelotraveller

If you want to give your ships the best chance not to have their orders overridden you should specify the engagement stance as 'engage when attacked' but beware if one ship is attacked and the others are not only the ship being attacked will respond.


What bearing does engagement stance have on auto fleets? The same? If so, it adds a lot more depth to what i've been doing with fleet postures.



feelotraveller -> RE: Posture Frustrations (12/10/2011 7:30:06 AM)

I believe that it is the same. I rarely auto much and then only in late game where there is so much going on that I never notice. Basically warships are set up to engage enemy targets and this setting specifies the conditions of that engagement. I think the only way to override this is by changing the behaviour on the ship design details screen to 'flee when enemy military sighted', not that I have ever tried this. [:D] I wonder what 'flee when attacked' would do when paired with engage system targets? Your ship(s) would jump into the attack and then flee as soon as the enemy fired a shot? [sm=00000280.gif]



feelotraveller -> RE: Posture Frustrations (12/10/2011 9:05:29 AM)


quote:

ORIGINAL: MartialDoctor

I think it's good that we have these stances that ships assume after they have completed their orders.

But I think you guys still aren't following me completely.

They have orders currently and are set to manual control. They are in the process of moving out of system. Then, a few ships come in and attack. Then the AI changes a few ships orders to attack from the orders that I gave them. These ships are all in the same fleet. The other ships do not change their orders and continue to leave the system.

And, again, they are not in auto.

Hopefully, that is clear. [8D]



Sorry a bit hasty with my other post. Additionally what could be happening is that the overmatch (I think that's the term?) settings are coming into play. They are found in the options/advanced menu from memory and the default is 2:1. So if it was a lone pirate escort and you had a fleet of 15 cruisers only one would stop to deal with it. I think the overmatch settings are based on firepower and suspect they are set on a per target basis and assessed with an at least criteria. Meaning the automation will try to select ships from your fleet to be equal to or minimally greater than twice the firepower of each individual target. Someone please correct/refine my vaguenesses if they are incorrect. [8D]

Seeing as I am struggling to remember it seems like I need to play some more. [:'(]



Grotius -> RE: Posture Frustrations (12/10/2011 4:50:40 PM)

Remind me -- can we queue ship orders? How do we do that? Also, if I set a ship to patrol, does it know to refuel itself when the time comes, and then to return to patrol? Likewise, do fleets in defensive posture know to refuel and return to station?



ehsumrell1 -> RE: Posture Frustrations (12/10/2011 5:12:43 PM)


quote:

ORIGINAL: Grotius

Remind me -- can we queue ship orders? How do we do that? Also, if I set a ship to patrol, does it know to refuel itself when the time comes, and then to return to patrol? Likewise, do fleets in defensive posture know to refuel and return to station?

Hello Grotius;
To your second and third questions, yes and yes!

To queue ship orders, first select your ship, then, using the right click menu combined with
your intended map placement, issue your first order. Then, using the right click menu again,
go to the bottom of the menu and you'll see the part of the menu for queuing orders. Go to
your next map placement, then use the queuing portion of the menu to place your next ship
order, and so on (Note that when queuing orders, not all of the orders from the initial main
right click menu may be available as they are from an initial order - such as the ability to
queue building a Resort Base as an example). Hope this helps! [:)]



MartialDoctor -> RE: Posture Frustrations (12/10/2011 5:27:42 PM)

quote:

ORIGINAL: feelotraveller

I understand that they are on manual (but seem my last post). I believe that the explanation is that some of your ships were close enough to the hostile ones to be considered 'nearby', and some were not. Hence the engagement stance applied to only some of the ships. If you had the engagement stance set to 'engage system targets' then (assuming that some of the fleet had not already left the system) the whole fleet would have changed its orders.


Yeah, this is what I came to the conclusion of and what I am saying is frustrating. If I give orders to move, of course I don't want them overridden by the computer AI even if units come into range. Having the stance take effect when the orders is over is great but having the stance override my commands is not something I like occur.

Of course, your guys other advice to change the stance to 'engage when attacked' would be more effective for my current situation. But that would require changing one's stance constantly as units in this stance will not attack anyone unless attacked; they won't help other ships in their fleet either, only defend themselves. So, this requires lots of micromanagement.

Interestingly, I had my settings to 'engage system targets' previously and it was even more difficult to keep my fleet together (part of the reason I ranted a bit there in the beginning). My ships were constantly breaking off from the fleet when I would give them orders. This is due to the fact that fleets do not act as one fleet but rather as a group of individuals, who you can give the same orders to more easily. Thus, with the 'engage system targets', you may get groups of individual ships breaking off from your fleet and going off in different directions in the system (if there are multiple targets).



Grotius -> RE: Posture Frustrations (12/10/2011 7:30:23 PM)

Thanks, ehsumrell!



Litjan -> RE: Posture Frustrations (12/10/2011 8:01:59 PM)

I can feel the OPīs frustration and share it. This is the problem:

The ships in DW always have a mind on their own. Even if in "manual" they will obey certain rules that you can set. These rules are set up in varying and confusing places.

1.) The way a ship behaves during combat is set in the "design" screen. Here you can finetune how close they will attempt to get to their enemy and also when they will turn tail and run.

Example: Your colony ship is REALLY close to the target planet, but absolutely REFUSES to fly and land, because a teeny tiny pirate escort is somewhere in the same system. You order to colonize, it changes back to "fleeing from pirate XY". The reason: Itīs logic is set to "evade whenever enemy sighted" in the design screen. Solution: Go to the design screen for this very colony ship. Change the "fleeing" logic to "never" or "when shields down" or something. You can do this even though the design screen "nags" when you open it that you canīt use it because the ship is already in use...

2.) The engagement stances that come with certain "mission" - do NOT confuse this with "postures". You can see a little symbol for that over the ship details windows and click on it to change the stance "on the fly". It is set up initally in the options menu - you can tell them to "engage system targets" or "engage when attacked" and something in between. These two are the most extreme stances, though. There is no stance "do nothing". This is due to the fact that initially ships were too passive and failed to attack close enemies, too busy with their own little missions. There are some problems with this, as you have noticed.

a.) Ships are really eager to attack and are distracted from their orders easily. If they are being targeted by enemies, there is NOTHING mission-wise that will make them listen to you - they will take the fight. Your last way out is the red emergency "escape" button or right-click menu to make them escape.

b.) You really need to watch out for automatic stance-switching. If you tell them to attack a mining station the stance usually changes to "attack nearby enemies only". Fine. But as soon as the mission is over (station dead) they will switch mission to "nothing" - which usually has the stance "engage system targets" with it. Ouch. They are usually smart about attacking only weaker targets (this can be set in the "attack overmatch" slider in some hidden menu - labeled "empire setting" for some unknown reason). BUT if that weak target sits right next to a huge enemy starport...tough luck. Besides - the enemies fleet in their homesystem WILL respond to you - at this point your ships are "under attack" and therefore itīs "shields up and charge the phasers!" again...

This makes "hit and run" tactics on the enemies homesystem basically not possible. They will always degenereate into a huge battle, usually with your ships snuggling up against the enemies defence platforms in their pursuit of unarmed freighters and such. Ships jumping back and forth, expanding clouds of gas and alloy and the body parts of your most promising admiral...

Jan




Keston -> RE: Posture Frustrations (12/10/2011 11:08:02 PM)

I don't want to hit and run the enemy home system, just assemble there to force him to keep forces nearby, then attack the homeworld. I mistook that Empire Settings button for a label - setting less aggressive defaults cures the wanderlust casusing them to suicide against the homeworld defenses, but, as mentioned, they respond when attacked and can be drawn away.



geosch -> RE: Posture Frustrations (12/11/2011 4:15:26 AM)

MartialDoctor,

Just want to confirm my experience is exactly the same as yours (I even mentioned the same situation (attacking enemy system with suicidal ships) in the "bug" thread), and I have the very frustrated with the only solutions that seem to work - more micromanaging.
And thanks for starting the thread, I learn something new every time it is discussed!



Neotheone -> RE: Posture Frustrations (12/11/2011 4:39:36 AM)

It would be nice an even better if we could give direct orders from the ships menu that popups over on the left. You click on your ship, fleet or group and then right click on it to give orders.



Keston -> RE: Posture Frustrations (12/11/2011 8:27:52 AM)

Interesting find: Changing the fleet Stance does not change that of the constituent ships - my example is trying to shift it from When Attacked to Nearby so they don't igrnore attacks on their comrades. I clciked individually on each ship first, but eventually had to change the default Empire Setting for No Orders to Nearby Targets to get them to act responsibly. I suppose the Fleet order controls what the whole fleet does, and the ship setting the individual captain's behavior?

It also looks like management is simpler if you don't arm your transports, though for Boskara the racial special is a powerful weapon that is very tempting.

By using "nearby" as the Empire Setting for unspecified orders I got ships to accumulate in the enemy system without charging the homeworld, though they drifted apart as the enemy tried desperate hit and run attacks at the fringes.



Litjan -> RE: Posture Frustrations (12/11/2011 11:53:52 AM)

What i like to do when preparing for that final assault is to assemble my fleet at a close system - that way itīs only a short jump to the final target and they donīt use fuel while waiting (if they have solar collectors). 



Gelatinous Cube -> RE: Posture Frustrations (12/11/2011 12:13:20 PM)

quote:

ORIGINAL: Litjan

What i like to do when preparing for that final assault is to assemble my fleet at a close system - that way itīs only a short jump to the final target and they donīt use fuel while waiting (if they have solar collectors). 


Absolutely. And because fleet posture is just a background function when your fleets are on manual, this is a really good way to organize your assault so everything goes off at once:

1.) Fuel/Arm all your offensive fleets at the same time. Also, if you haven't already, start positioning resupply ships near your enemies systems.

2.) Set all your attack fleet postures now, but don't actually send your fleets yet. This way your fleet will say in the context box where it should be attacking once your ready. Also, you'll get the pretty visuals so you don't forget what's going on.

3.) Move all your fleets to 'staging areas' around their targets. If these staging areas include a deployed resupply ship, all the better!

4.) Commence attack. After issuing attack orders, hit the automate button for all the fleets you don't plan on micro-managing during the assault. This way, once the initial orders are complete they will continue attacking targets in the general area as long as they have fuel and aren't hurt too bad--and also, once again, the pretty diagrams will keep you from forgetting the different theatres.

5.) Zip around micro-managing where you need to, and flipping fleets back onto auto when you're done. This allows a completely seemless assault that feels like it moves along at a manageable pace, even if you're attacking forty different worlds with hundreds of fleets.

I'm getting better at this every day, I swear. A month ago, that entire process would have been hard for me to put my finger on, as I used to just kind of stumble around during war.



Page: <<   < prev  1 [2]

Valid CSS!




Forum Software © ASPPlayground.NET Advanced Edition 2.4.5 ANSI
1.640625