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Author Topic: Why do my ships insist on suicide missions and why are they so slow?  (Read 2888 times)

geminitiger

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Two problems I can't figure out about this game in combat.

1) Why can't my speed 75-90 speed ships overcome and destroy a ship with 45-ish speed before it gets to edge of the map when they are in retreat mode from the start of the map (the persuit phase)? If I either go full assault or click the ship and get "eliminate" they usually drag ass out of range and let the enemy escape. (for example three falcons trying to chase down a fuel or storage ship)

2) How  is it that when I tell all of my ships to "rally" at a some point, often times one of my ships decides that it's going to make it's way over 1/3 across the map into a group of enemies and die. They often also ignore orders to direct retreat, or single ship rally points, totally nonresponsive. They don't just react slowly, they continue to fly in the wrong direction often being lured off by a wolf or something into a pack of something fiercer. It's annoying af. I can literally say that, ok this ship has decided to suicide, nothing I can do to get it back to formation and 30-45 seconds later it's destroyed with the ship itself making no effort to escape.

I'm fairly new to this game and I hope this is just poor playing or lack of understanding on my part. (Ps- all my officers are steady, if that matters)
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Lucky33

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Re: Why do my ships insist on suicide missions and why are they so slow?
« Reply #1 on: January 18, 2020, 02:55:33 AM »

When facing multiple enemies, AI gets into stupor and is unable to properly set its priorities. This is why you need to give it the "eliminate" orders. And you need a reckless officer to follow them because everyone else will start "assessing the threat" and will come to the inevitable conclusion that everything is lost, ship is doomed anyway and will ignore the order. Reckless officers dont think. They act. However even them will not intentionally burn drive through ships so you should reassign the order if target has moved behind the backs.

And its not about attacking the largest target. Its more about going with the flow. The idea is to keep going. If anything, you should prioritize HIL owners. AI is completely unable to comprehend their threat and will take tremendous and completely unnecessary damage.
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Plantissue

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Re: Why do my ships insist on suicide missions and why are they so slow?
« Reply #2 on: January 18, 2020, 05:13:04 AM »

1) A ship with no flux and no flux use gets +50 speed bonus. Firing a weapon or turning a shield on removes that bonus. That said, I don't seem to get your problem and I don't understand what you are trying to say for your second sentence.

2) If you have told a ship to attack an enemy ship and then tell some ships, including that ship to move to a waypoint, the attack order remains on the enemy ship. The game selects an appropriate ship or number of ships to attack that enemy ship which still has that attack order remaining on it. On the command UI, after you have issued the rally order, you have to remember to look at the enemy ship with the eliminate order on it and click on the button or press the hotkey (N) to cancel the assignment on the bottom right. It's the same for the escort and fighter strike orders as well.

Hope that helps you.
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Thaago

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Re: Why do my ships insist on suicide missions and why are they so slow?
« Reply #3 on: January 18, 2020, 10:15:28 AM »

1) The AI will often try to flank or keep at maximum weapon range instead of flying at the enemy at full speed - in duels its the right behavior (most of the time), but it fails in pursuit battles. Honestly I don't do pursuits at all anymore.

2) The AI will opportunistically try to attack smaller ships, and since it thinks it can win it will chase them, even when it is too slow. It also has a very hard time disengaging from combat, though I don't know why: this even happens when a ship is significantly faster than what is fighting. However, I do find that retreat, rally, or defend orders do work to pull ships out of this situation. Direct retreat you need to be very careful with.
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Null Ganymede

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Re: Why do my ships insist on suicide missions and why are they so slow?
« Reply #4 on: January 18, 2020, 09:15:49 PM »

Clean up stragglers with fast assault loadouts. If your ships are slow bring Salamander missiles and interceptors. Thunders, Claws, plus some stuff to keep them alive.


If the AI is alone at high flux with no way to vent / has no armor left / is at an overwhelming ship size disadvantage, it will treat orders like suggestions. Eliminate/Direct Retreat might still work, or might make things even worse.

This is especially annoying when you've got a small but well-equipped fleet that could take a fight if ships stood their ground, but the Luddites/pirates look scary and no battle line forms. Then everything gets split up and dies. If you like to fight outnumbered, you can:

  • Recruit aggressive officers only.
  • Prefer bigger ships. Cruisers aren't scared of frigate swarms, same for capitals and destroyers.
  • Load out your ships with enough shield coverage, point defense, and outgoing kinetic damage to survive being flanked. Turn on the "full assault" mode or whatever it's called, command the fleet through eliminate and direct retreat orders. (They don't cancel full assault.)
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Plantissue

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Re: Why do my ships insist on suicide missions and why are they so slow?
« Reply #5 on: January 19, 2020, 05:08:14 AM »

delete
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Plantissue

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Re: Why do my ships insist on suicide missions and why are they so slow?
« Reply #6 on: January 19, 2020, 05:08:46 AM »

Did you read his post or did you only read the title? He doesn't have issues with targeting down ships in a normal battle. Quite the opposite really.
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geminitiger

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Re: Why do my ships insist on suicide missions and why are they so slow?
« Reply #7 on: January 19, 2020, 05:42:41 AM »

  • Recruit aggressive officers only.
  • Prefer bigger ships. Cruisers aren't scared of frigate swarms, same for capitals and destroyers.

I think aggressive officers are not what I'm looking for in normal battle, I mean I could be wrong but I want balanced types I think.
Capital ships are too slow for persuit phase, most of them are speed 30.. again I could be wrong but I don't think that will help.
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