Planetary Invasion & Expansion Problems

[BIGtrouble77]

I have a bit of an issue where I can't take over any planets outside of my sector. I think I may have set the game to have 1-1.5 sector colonization range.

If there's no way to colonize planets because they are out of range, can I just attack them? I am trying to take a planet that has a friendly population, but my troop ships will not deploy on that planet.

There's obviously something I'm missing. I know I can restart the game and extend the colonization range, but I'd like to try and salvage this game. Any suggestions on expansion would be greatly appreciated.

[Bingeling]

You can invade anywhere. As for colonization range, less than 2 sectors is a low settings unless you have high star density.

About your troop ships. Do they have troops? Do they have the "attack" order on the colony? And do they have "never invade" setting in the top right area of the design?

Attacking should work just fine as long as you have troops and have not messed up the design setting.

[Aeson]

It's also possible that this is a fuel issue, if the target world is particularly distant and your transports lack sufficient range or fuel to reach. If you're seeing the troop ships head towards the planet, get partway there, and turn around to go refuel, then you might want to try getting a fuel source closer to the target, moving your transports there first, refueling them at that closer source, and then moving on the target, or redesigning your transports with greater range (by using more efficient reactors or switching to a more efficient hyperdrive, or by adding more fuel cells; cutting the transport's static energy requirements, typically by stripping out unnecessary components with static energy requirements such as proximity arrays or by removing enough components to allow the ship to have fewer life support and hab modules, can also work, but since this generally requires removing components it's not always feasible).

[BIGtrouble77]

Thanks so much for the responses. I think there's a difference between and attack order vs an invade order. Doesn't the attack order have the cross-hair cursor and invade have the arrow cursor?

When I select my troop transports and right click on the planet nothing happens except for the confirmation sound. They just sit there (they are right outside of the planet so fuel is not an issue). There are definitely troops on the transports. I'm wondering if I'm missing a module in my ship design as I have that all set to manual. I added every recommended/required module for a troop transport.

I never had this issue in my previous games so I'm a bit surprised that this isn't working as expected.

[Aeson]

When I select my troop transports and right click on the planet nothing happens except for the confirmation sound. They just sit there (they are right outside of the planet so fuel is not an issue). There are definitely troops on the transports. I'm wondering if I'm missing a module in my ship design as I have that all set to manual. I added every recommended/required module for a troop transport.

Check the design for the troop transport, look for the Invasion setting, and make sure that this is set to something that isn't "never invade." That's the only thing I know of, aside from not having troops on the transports, that could cause a transport to just idle even when sitting next to the target after receiving an attack or invade order.

[BIGtrouble77]

ORIGINAL: Aeson
Check the design for the troop transport, look for the Invasion setting, and make sure that this is set to something that isn't "never invade." That's the only thing I know of, aside from not having troops on the transports, that could cause a transport to just idle even when sitting next to the target after receiving an attack or invade order.

Ahh, I think this is it. I made this design from the colony ship template. I confirmed it's set to "Do Not Invade".... but I thought that this setting just affects the AI's automation rules.

Is there a way to change this setting without having to retrofit?

[Bingeling]

You can change the settings in the top left at any time, and it will work. The only catch is that it affects all ships of the class (and no other ships).

So if I watch my low tech ships sit at the max distance and not putting any dents in the pirate base shields, I can just enter their design and change the standoff setting (point blank, of course).