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[nomadic_leader]

Variations of this posted before but not for a while.

Problem: Manually switching weapons is ponderous but often required; e.g. AI/autofire doesn't use frag bombs correctly as PD vs missiles

c.f. 2012 about AI/autofire poor decisions for firing frag bombs. Alex' reply that bombs will be updated http://fractalsoftworks.com/forum/index.php?topic=3000.0

c.f. 2013 about current solution for missiles-keys to toggle autofire of a group http://fractalsoftworks.com/forum/index.php?topic=6968.0

Above doesn't work for frag bombs. Try a Brawler with 2 frag bombs in the universal slots. The autofire/AI doesn't fire in response to missiles, despite frag bombs being PD and very good vs missiles.

Instead only when any enemy ship- be it fighter or capital- is near, then autofire spams out all the bombs uselessly.

I equipped an AI shuttle with 3 frag bays vs fighters, the shuttle never fired.

Battles are unforgiving if flying a frigate; manually switching takes a finger from WASD- easiest now is to pause the game, switch, fire the frag bomb once to blow up enemy missiles, then pause and switch back to cannons--  feels cheap and breaks flow/immersion (all the pausing in starsector is a topic in itself).

Solution: Key to toggle through all non-auto groups.
Mapped near WASD so your thumb or pinky could reach without interfering with manuevering.

Is a frag bomb update still planned? If so this key would be unnecessary in this case, but still useful. What do more experienced players think?

Note lefties usually remap WASD etc to PL;' etc and use left hand for mouse. So numeric group keys are far away; if you map them to random keys,  then you have arbitrary keys assigned to numerically ordered groups- mnemonically problematic. Just cycling through non-auto groups would be easier, and for the rare occasion you want to manually fire broadsides etc you'd press the appropriate number key.

Bolder UI feedback about weapon groups to shorten comprehension time-

• Selected Weapons group turns blue on the Hud (current brighter green is a bit subtle)
• Disabled groups turn red on HUD
• Out of ammo groups (and charging?) turn orange on HUD  (it's a pain to switch just to see if there's ammo)

Maybe the UI already gives such feedback, if so it's pretty subtle for new players.

[Okim]

Frag and cluster bombs are strike weapons and thus are not supposed to be used by AI\autofire as pd weapons.

The fact that they are effective against missiles/fighters does not make them 'perfect pd' weapons in the eyes of AI.

If you wish them to act like that make your own mod for it (look for weapons.csv file, open it and replace 'strike' tag with the one used by pd-weapons).

[nomadic_leader]

Frag and cluster bombs are strike weapons and thus are not supposed to be used by AI\autofire as pd weapons.

The fact that they are effective against missiles/fighters does not make them 'perfect pd' weapons in the eyes of AI.

If you wish them to act like that make your own mod for it (look for weapons.csv file, open it and replace 'strike' tag with the one used by pd-weapons).

Thanks, I'm just experiencing the game as a player not a modder, so I wasn't aware of that.

In the game though, it says they are a PD weapon.
http://bayimg.com/DAaFOaAgk

Does it say primary role PD becuase of the ANTI_FTR tag in the csv?

Since they make such good PD againt missiles, I suggest that the AI take advantage of that- in the vanilla game (without a mod). Also don't understand why the shuttle I tested didn't use it against the fighters if it has the anti_ftr tag, but this is what Alex meant by them not being finished I guess.

Anyways, thoughts on the key to toggle through non-auto weapons groups?

[Gothars]

Welcome to the forum nomadic, nice to have you


The issue I see here is that you'd often have more than two manual weapon groups, and finding out which one you switched to would require you to direct your attention away from the battle. Having to do that is, again, a strong incentive to pause the game, which would subvert your entire reason for this suggestion. Not to say that it could not be useful, but the potential advantage seems negligible.




(Bombs in general are very overpowered at the moment, just try equipping a Lasher with five of them to see what I mean. I'm pretty sure they will be changed, or even made unavailable as mountable weapons, so I doubt there's much point in basing control changes around them. )


Concerning combat UI changes, there are a lot of possible improvements, and Alex is aware of that. I'm sure he will come around to that eventually, but my personal guess is: not before all campaign core features are implemented. (Or new mechanics render the current UI unusable).

[FunkTheMonk]

The hull mod Integrated Point Defense AI (4 OP on a Brawler) will make frag bombs target missiles, but just tried it out - it just throws a curtain of bombs up at the first sign of incoming missles and eats your ammo

[nomadic_leader]

The issue I see here is that you'd often have more than two manual weapon groups, and finding out which one you switched to would require you to direct your attention away from the battle. Having to do that is, again, a strong incentive to pause the game, which would subvert your entire reason for this suggestion. Not to say that it could not be useful, but the potential advantage seems negligible.

Thanks for the welcome.  Agreed, for a cycle weapon groups key to work we need more in-your-face interface cues like an FPS, or having the weapon sprite flash once on the ship. My suggestion to change the color of the group text still requires you to look down.

With or without bombs, I think these UI changes should be eventually added, since it's hard to reach the number keys to switch groups, and as you say distracting to see what's going on with them at the bottom of the screen.

Now my other question is how can you tell at the refit screen which weapons that say "primary role: Point Defense" are the ones that don't shoot missiles down?

[Gothars]

Now my other question is how can you tell at the refit screen which weapons that say "primary role: Point Defense" are the ones that don't shoot missiles down?

As far as I can tell, all that function properly, IE all except frag bombs.


By the way, if you find the the pause function to be as disrupting (but irresistible) as I do: I had some greatly enhanced, more intense fights after "disabling" pause by binding it so some obscure key.