Autonomy

posted on September 28th, 2010, 6:24 am

So i have a few questions and a request about special weapon autonomy


-----When you put the special weapon autonomy on red-----

*How does the ship decided what special weapon to use?

*How does the ship decided when to use that special weapon?

*How does the ship decided who to use that special weapon on?

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Alternately, would it be possible for support ships to set which special weapon you want that ship to use automatically, so say, would it be possible to tell my canaveral to use the sensor blackout automatically over the other two special weapons?

Or could it also be possible to say use this special automatically (such as defense patterns) when taking damage, or use this special on small ships automatically?

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And then for movement autonomy that just confuses me,

How do i get ships to chase fleeing enemy ships without ordering to follow them (green autonomy)?

-----Because my understanding is-----

*Green they will stay together and do only what you want them to.

*Yellow will stay together but roam around anywhere.

*Red is utter chaos where they split up and roam around the map.

posted on September 28th, 2010, 4:47 pm

Anybody?

posted on September 28th, 2010, 6:00 pm

I'll give it a bash.

As far as I know not all specials are set to be used automatically.  I'm not sure what controls this, i think part of it is it must have a target to work (eg: special torpedos, combat transport, etc).  Not 100% on this though.

If a ship were to have multiple specials which it can use automatically i think it will fire the highest level one if it can (possibly the one that costs the most SE).  I'm not sure if it would then use the lower level one if there is enough SE for that but not for the higher one...

This is all mainly conjecture because i've never really looked into it.  I'm sure one of the more experienced players can answer with more certainty.

As for movement autonomy you understand right (i think).  One tweak I would like to see is if Yellow would restrict your units from chasing too far, just a limited distance and after that return to their origin.  Seen plenty of RTS where you can set behaviour like this.

posted on September 28th, 2010, 7:09 pm

for special autonomy i think that ships just try to get rid of as much energy as they can in the shortest time. they can use specials that dont need targets, like ecm.

as for movement autonomy, even on green it will chase a nearby enemy that is attacking one of your units, if set on red alert and it doesnt have orders.

posted on September 28th, 2010, 10:29 pm

I dont belive it chases on green....

posted on September 28th, 2010, 11:28 pm

I know it chases on Yellow movement.  On green, I've never had it so much as move outside of stock.

In stock, I tend to put the Enterprise next to my starbase on green movement, red special, and still find the stupid thing trying to chase enemies.  (I don't care how buff it is, if it getting killed will end the game, I tuck it in a hole and don't let it out.)

posted on September 28th, 2010, 11:31 pm

Green Alert and Green Movement Autonomy and my ships never move.

posted on September 29th, 2010, 11:51 am

they do move on green.

as long as they are on red alert they will move to engage if an enemy unit attacks a friendly unit nearby.

sit a combat ship like a sabre on red alert green movement near a miner. but out of range.

then have an enemy attack the miner. the sabre will fly in and fire on the attacker.

posted on September 29th, 2010, 1:06 pm

Wow, i've never noticed that.  In fact I've been annoyed a lot by ships on red alert/green movement sitting there while a nearby friendly ship is getting pounded, but happy that the ship is doing exactly what I ordered it to do.

posted on October 2nd, 2010, 1:40 am

they do move on green.

as long as they are on red alert they will move to engage if an enemy unit attacks a friendly unit nearby.

sit a combat ship like a sabre on red alert green movement near a miner. but out of range.

then have an enemy attack the miner. the sabre will fly in and fire on the attacker.

Yes, this ALWAYS happens to me. In my opinion, green movement autonomy should mean absolutely NO movement whatsoever, but i think the ship should be allowed to rotate so it can target enemy ships that are within range. I mean, what is the point of green movement autonomy if it makes the ship move without an explicit order?

What really annoys be about green movement is that when I right click on an enemy ship, giving the order to attack, my ships will sit there. But yet they attack enemy ships that are out of range when I don't give the order.

posted on October 2nd, 2010, 1:42 am

Ah, good old A2 glitches - they're being worked on