Ship Formations + Attack Patterns

posted on April 21st, 2009, 3:32 am

One of the great things in A2 were fleet formations and Attack Patterns. They look much more like the Trek shows (especially DS9) if ships were formed into a wall-like formation, and attacking while moving in complex maneuvers.

I brought this topic way back when Beta 2 first came out, and I do remember Optec saying that it is in a low-priority category,  but I think it's time to give our ships a little more movement during battles. It also would look a lot better than ships being in a 4x4 "square" formation

posted on April 21st, 2009, 3:36 am

im glad you brought this up, ive been meaning to for a while

i agree tho, you should be albe to have different formations and patterns, and set it up for instance with a ^ formation and have the descent be the first ship and soke up all the damage and support ships come last

cus its anooying when they all form up in random order

another thing i think needs to be enabled for fleets, is the possibility for them to go as slow as the rest of the fleet when moving, cus its really annoying when you go to attack a kligon dude with your norways, and you take out some of his ships with plasma but by the time the rest of the fleet gets there, you lost all your norways

posted on April 21st, 2009, 3:41 am

I think by holding down control and clicking all ships travel at the same speed Ray 

Other than that, although formations would be a nice thing, I micro enough not to notice it really (although line formations would be great to avoid AoE weapons with much less micromanagement)

posted on April 24th, 2009, 1:15 am

I think there should be some program similar to the map editor where we design our own attack patterns. For example, Attack patern A: Split up and approach enemy on 3 sides and surround them by circling arround. 

posted on April 24th, 2009, 1:18 am

Classic pincer movement... I like it. Dont know how much i would use it though

posted on April 24th, 2009, 1:21 am

Hmmm....

Each race could have it´s own flight patterns, maybe just in name. For the federation something like Evasive Pattern Delta and such, they always say stuff like this on the show.

There could be special maneuvers like the Picard Maneuver available only under certain circumstances, say like researching it at starfleet Command. I love that idea. 

posted on April 24th, 2009, 1:25 am

Lol, my ship formations are what I call ... micromanagement! 

Pincer attack = splitting my fleet into two or more chunks and doing the evil deed 

posted on April 24th, 2009, 1:30 am

Well, even if this was implimented, there wouldn't be anything stopping you from using "micromanagement".  Plus, it would help us more micromanegemnt handycapt players. 

posted on April 24th, 2009, 1:33 am

I believe there was mention of "3D scripted attack paths" in the old odfs, but I was never sure what they did.  they obviously didn't have any visual effect, but maybe, if I understand what they are for, they could be re-written to have an effect on how a ship approaches an enemy.

posted on April 24th, 2009, 1:57 pm

I think by holding down control and clicking all ships travel at the same speed Ray 

Other than that, although formations would be a nice thing, I micro enough not to notice it really (although line formations would be great to avoid AoE weapons with much less micromanagement)

There is an exception to this that I have noticed and its when (for the Borg at least) you put a constructor in the fleet.

posted on April 24th, 2009, 2:45 pm

there are attack patterns and evasive maneuvers are very important part of vessel vs vessel combat.. and not just starships....
attack patterns - when your attention are to attack
evasive maneuvers - when you want to make a run for it if encounter enemy ship

posted on April 24th, 2009, 3:32 pm

Thats true skill i mean especially the Federiation in the show is more than 1 time outgunned. The enemy has more ressources, more ships(Dominion) or better technology(Borg). Everytime there is a maneuver to escape the enemy, to regroup or to disable the enemy vessel. I think picard made a fantastic maneuver to destroy a ferengi marauder (battle of maxia). Maybe as a special weapon for certain ships that you could research. The ship with the special weapon engage the  enemys and sacrifice itself so that the fleet can escape(Self Destruct,Warp Core breach with area damage?). Would be nice to implement that in FO. 

posted on April 24th, 2009, 3:44 pm

There is an exception to this that I have noticed and its when (for the Borg at least) you put a constructor in the fleet.

that's funny.. they slow down for a constructor, yet assims and scubes cant stay together without this.... lol
damn A2 movements  >:(. 

posted on April 24th, 2009, 3:51 pm

i think i can make a profile of preferred maneuver by each race:
borg- dont do maneuvers.. they just come and assimelate one by one
dominion- they always flying fast, come and go like attack

all the rest are kind of dogfight maneuver s romulans and klingons clock alot and attack you in surprise.. so its surprise attack the like predator.. they cycle the attacked ship etc...

posted on April 30th, 2009, 3:43 pm

I just wish my ships wouldn't pivit around like they were on a spinner during every fight
I mean fleet ops is so graphicly beautiful and every thing looks so realistic.... till my ships get in a fleet fight and they are piviting around like a spinning top shooting things LOL