Fleet Control Wish

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solops
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Fleet Control Wish

Post by solops »

A recent conversation has crystalized an issue and a desire for me. The "lack of control" feeling about making fleets do what you tell them to has always been a drawback in DW, though it has gotten much, much better with each expansion. It is actually pretty good now, BUT...The AI still seems to interfere with manual orders at inopportune times, requiring one to watch specific fleets carefully. I WANT the AI to manage many fleet related functions, but sometimes it gets in the way. The game is way too big to comfortably manually manage all fleets all the time, so we really do NEED the AI auto-management to handle most things just to keep all of the little stuff moving. But, I sometimes wish for more direct control over the composition, management and movement of selected individual fleets. It would be a great thing to be able to flag specific fleets as "user controlled-AI hands off" while letting the AI continue run everything else. Fleet composition can be frustrating. For instance, say I want to let the AI manage fleet composition in general BUT I want to customize composition of a particular fleet A for a mission and KNOW that the AI will not change it later, so I flag Fleet A. Now the AI will manage the composition of all the un-flagged fleets but leave the composition of Fleet A and any other flagged fleets alone. Having played DW and all of the expansions since the original release, I have learned how to work around these issues, but it would be nice not to have to. Any chance of coding something like this in?
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Spacecadet
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RE: Fleet Control Wish

Post by Spacecadet »

You can do that easily now.

Just select the Fleet you don't want the AI to control and make sure the Automation is turned off for that Fleet (lower left window).
You might also want to double check that the ships in that Fleet are not automated either after turning off the Fleet automation.
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solops
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RE: Fleet Control Wish

Post by solops »

There is no indication that disabling Fleet Automation protects its order of battle when fleet composition has be left to the AI to determine. From the manual: "Automated fleets will take on missions and engage nearby enemies even if they are not in the same system." I always disable automation on fleets I "micromanage" in attacks. You pretty much have to. As best I can tell, they are still subject to some global AI orders.
All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing.-Edmund Burke
Liberty lies in the hearts of men and women; if it dies there, no constitution, no law, no court can save it.-Judge Learned Hand
Bingeling
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RE: Fleet Control Wish

Post by Bingeling »

I think fleet formation is an "all or nothing" when it comes to the AI. It setting is at the very bottom of the empire policy screen.

If you want to manually control your fleets, I think this one is better left at manual control.
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Erik Rutins
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RE: Fleet Control Wish

Post by Erik Rutins »

If for a particular Fleet Automation is turned off, the AI automation should not change the fleet formation/composition even if it's handling that for all the other fleets. Is this happening differently for you?
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Raap
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RE: Fleet Control Wish

Post by Raap »

I think low fuel overrides manual orders. At least they'll go refuel if they've no orders, even with automation off. Less than x% shield will make individual ships flee unless you altered that setting in the ship's design. Also, even with automation turned off they will engage ships if they currently don't have an order, unless you set the engagement settings for that fleet to not engage(or short range).

I'm fine with most of those, though I do sometimes wish for a simple button(for individual ships and fleets) that says 'DO NOT FLEE OR DO ANYTHING BUT WHAT I TELL YOU TO DO' while activated. Trying to build a space port with a constructor(pirate-empire) is beyond annoying if it's a popular planet to raid.
solops
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RE: Fleet Control Wish

Post by solops »

ORIGINAL: Erik Rutins

If for a particular Fleet Automation is turned off, the AI automation should not change the fleet formation/composition even if it's handling that for all the other fleets. Is this happening differently for you?

This ought to be stickied in bold somewhere. Has it happened to me? I think so, but honestly, in the crush of management I can not say positively. I will test clinically test for it.
My post is driven by mild frustration over fleets detouring for odd reasons, such as Raap mentions, when I wanted them do something (Be at Altair on the 27th and fight or be SHOT!). I suppose I am looking for a draconian override. However, if what you say is true, then combined with the other features of "auto-off" and fleet stance manipulation, you may have indeed given us the best of all possible worlds. Maybe the UI of the features and lack of idiot proof information about them is my problem. I would probably do better with a single individual fleet management button having sub-menus for fuel, attack orders and OOB control where the auto-control icon is now.. The downside to that would be that one would lose the nice instant visual feedback of the fleets control status that you now have provided. I guess I'm gonna have to reduce my whining request to "document the feature better and with an in-game hover pop-up" until I can prove something else is going on. I still get irritated by things like Raaap does, though. I can say for sure that the improvements since the original DW are staggering.
All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing.-Edmund Burke
Liberty lies in the hearts of men and women; if it dies there, no constitution, no law, no court can save it.-Judge Learned Hand
Spacecadet
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RE: Fleet Control Wish

Post by Spacecadet »

Don't forget this :



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Spacecadet
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RE: Fleet Control Wish

Post by Spacecadet »

And this :

Image




These settings will override all else if an enemy comes into your system.




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