Fleet pursuit mechanic broken?

[Vince]

I am not quite sure if it is a bug or by design, but from my experience the Aliens can magically pull some acceleration out of their behinds (pun intended). Engaging fleets should be straightforward and obey Newtonian physics. If ship A has higher acceleration value then ship B it should be impossible for the ship B to escape even if it has a higher ∆v. Especially if both are already close to each other.

My fleet consisting of ships with a cruise acceleration of 50 miliG and combat acceleration of 1 G can never catch an Alien fleet with 5 miliG cruise acceleration and 300 miliG combat acceleration.

So on average a 5 times slower fleet can evade whenever it wishes to do so. That doesn't seem right. Am I missing something here?

[Rashka]

Not broken, just missing the case you describe. If the pursuer has higher acceleration they should be able to force a fight. Otherwise the fleets should use the 'bidding' mechanic we have now.

[Vince]

I am hoping this will be implemented. My Welcome to Earth party was delayed because of this oversight...

[DWI_Suriil]

Its far more complicated than that. Even if you have high acceleration , w/o any kind of R force in space you will just go WOULUOULOULOULOULOU in space and pass by them.
So when you decelerate to slowly get them , I assume they accelerate etc annndd , we repeat.

It comes to a game cat and mouse , who will give up first (run out of fuel)

And thats w/o even speaking of earth gravity, cause too big acceleration will kick you out as a trash can.

[Vince]

I don't think it is that complicated. Its' not rocket scien... Anyway... The moment you catch up with a fleet you occupy the same area in space with matching orbits. Interdiction path your vessels take accommodates for acceleration and deceleration to match the orbit and velocity. Otherwise after declaring O∆v on a pursuit you would occupy a much different eccentric orbit (too much KSP). Which is not the case. If anything the mechanic is simplified to only accommodate for the total ∆v on your vessel rather than the acceleration value.

[DWI_Suriil]

Well...if only you knew how much calculation and efforts are needed to dock a ship to a cosmic station :D.
Out of topic - I really advice you look a film The Martian from 2015 , to enjoy how space is hard.

With some education in physics I may tell you that current Delta V system is okay and very smart. IN THEORY , if you are a super super super super computer , linked to engines with real time control over engine and this computer will have enemy fleet in sight with possiblity to calculate intime its speed , its changes and so VERY VERY precisely adapt current own speed....Well what you said about supperior acceleration is correct.

But thats if you have such a computer and ship linked to and. ..
And some how you have a real time data on enemy ship in space and somehow all gravity related inputs.

Well , forget. Current delta V system is fine :D

[DWI_Suriil]

@Vince BUT HEY! I will not leave you w/o hope.

There is a way to engage enemy fleet actually.
After each engagement there is a timelag , where you cant use your fleet. These rules apply to aliens , to AI.

SO. You build 1 ship as a decoy and join your main fleet. Then you send a decoy to attack alien fleet and engage them. AND right after you send your main fleet , so he arrives 5-10 minutes later

Either your decoy ship die, because aliens will attack, or they flee. Does not matter.
Because aliens will be in a time lag zone, where they are pined.
And so your main fleet can engage them.

Enjoy bro , and give them hell!

[Soul]

its funny watching a ship with a VASIMIR drive try to actually manage to sync up with a moving target, I had to orbit earth at least 500 times with my frigate to finally reach the space station on the other side of the planet because the drive barely lets your ship turn so you can pretty much only go in a straight line at super high speed lol I kinda wish you could mount multiple drives, one for interplanetary and one for maneuvering and combat.

[Vince]

Originally posted by T.MauvaisLoveStory:

Well...if only you knew how much calculation and efforts are needed to dock a ship to a cosmic station :D.
...
Well , forget. Current delta V system is fine :D

I have a rough idea on how orbital mechanic works but an astrophysics student probably would best me. There is a flaw in the way you are thinking. The gravity actually keeps your ship in a stable orbit provided you've expended enough ∆v to push apogee above the atmosphere. There is no need to input any velocity unless you want to change your orbit. When setting an interdiction to match a target orbit you have to input the same thrust and burn time to accelerate and then decelerate. All manoeuvres that you make in game put you in different circular orbits around space bodies which means the total burn accommodates for raising your apogee, adjusting the interception at perigee, and then concluding with suicide burn to kill relative velocity and settle you in circular orbit. To put it simply, the "WOULUOULOULOULOULOU in space" that you mentioned is simplified and already accounted for in the initial ∆v budget you spend towards orbital plane change. This means that at the interdiction point velocities of both ships are the same. In my opinion the ∆v bidding system is too simple and does not accommodate for grater exhaust velocity.

And I did watch Martian. I guess I am an expert now :D

[Rashka]

Children of a Dead Earth did this the most realistic way: Combat happens whenever your ships come close to each other, no matter the relative speed.
Now I get that the game needs to make abstractions (ie: 'Low Earth Orbit' is a single 'place' more or less), but realistically having infinite delta-V shouldn't mean you can evade combat forever.

Consider a 1milligee ship with infinite delta-v, in roughly the same space and roughly stationary compared to a 4g ship with limited delta-v. Unless the ships are VERY far away from each other, the 4g ship should always be able to catch the 1mg ship. The 4g ship can spend say 5kps to accelerate, cover the distance, another 5kps to decelerate, all before the 1milligee ship can even spend 1kps

The delta-v bidding system is fine, it just needs to account for acceleration as well

[Arcimbaldo]

Is there an explanation of these mechanics somewhere? Tried this successfully once, but there's a damaged enemy ship in orbit that I just can't touch. Even though I have much higher total delta-v than the enemy, it for some reason only lets me bid 5 kps at a time. and since they have 450 total, i'd need to click the transfer/engage/pursue buttons almost a 100 times for it to run out.

They have vastly lower acceleration than my ships (I think because their engine is badly damaged?) - 6.6 MILLIgees versus 4gs

[Rashka]

Originally posted by Arcimbaldo:

Is there an explanation of these mechanics somewhere? Tried this successfully once, but there's a damaged enemy ship in orbit that I just can't touch. Even though I have much higher total delta-v than the enemy, it for some reason only lets me bid 5 kps at a time. and since they have 450 total, i'd need to click the transfer/engage/pursue buttons almost a 100 times for it to run out.

They have vastly lower acceleration than my ships (I think because their engine is badly damaged?) - 6.6 MILLIgees versus 4gs

Screenshot? Whenever I've seen the bidding screen it always let me bid up to the remaining delta-v of my fleet.

[Arcimbaldo]

Originally posted by Rashka:

Originally posted by Arcimbaldo:

Is there an explanation of these mechanics somewhere? Tried this successfully once, but there's a damaged enemy ship in orbit that I just can't touch. Even though I have much higher total delta-v than the enemy, it for some reason only lets me bid 5 kps at a time. and since they have 450 total, i'd need to click the transfer/engage/pursue buttons almost a 100 times for it to run out.

They have vastly lower acceleration than my ships (I think because their engine is badly damaged?) - 6.6 MILLIgees versus 4gs

Screenshot? Whenever I've seen the bidding screen it always let me bid up to the remaining delta-v of my fleet.

There's not much to show in a screenshot. The fleet has about 1000 kps, but each time it says only 5 kps is available for the pursuit maneuveur.

Although I eventually managed to destroy the ship anyway by using a trick i saw mentioned in another thread, which is just send two separate fleets to intercept simultaneously - it seems like it can only evade one at a time (don't know if this is an exploit or working as designed?)

[thundershield3]

The way I think of it is that the enemy probably has some forewarning that your coming and can began accelerating earlier if they need to. It's a bit janky, but a decent way to think of it. That said, for stuff with no acceleration like VASMIR drives, yeah, those shouldn't be able to escape.

[fortydayweekend]

I think a simple change that would add some realism/immersion would be for the relative starting velocities to match the "strategic" map, rather than being "slowly moving towards each other" every time

[Vince]

Originally posted by Rashka:

..
Now I get that the game needs to make abstractions (ie: 'Low Earth Orbit' is a single 'place' more or less), but realistically having infinite delta-V shouldn't mean you can evade combat forever.

Consider a 1milligee ship with infinite delta-v, in roughly the same space and roughly stationary compared to a 4g ship with limited delta-v. Unless the ships are VERY far away from each other, the 4g ship should always be able to catch the 1mg ship. The 4g ship can spend say 5kps to accelerate, cover the distance, another 5kps to decelerate, all before the 1milligee ship can even spend 1kps

The delta-v bidding system is fine, it just needs to account for acceleration as well

Totally agree. I get the abstraction. Nevertheless, it is counter intuitive to me.

Originally posted by thundershield3:

The way I think of it is that the enemy probably has some forewarning that your coming and can began accelerating earlier if they need to. It's a bit janky, but a decent way to think of it. That said, for stuff with no acceleration like VASMIR drives, yeah, those shouldn't be able to escape.

It's true in the game that everyone is aware of fleet destinations at all times so I have no problem with this assumption, but If we follow this route, the biding should be presented the moment you select and confirm the target then. Acceleration should also be taken under consideration since mid course corrections could result in you catching up before you run out of ∆v. Especially if your design outperforms that of the opposing ship. Additionally, the ship that evades should land on a different orbit, since there is no elliptical orbits in the game, or pay double the bidding cost to be returned to previous position. Don't get me wrong, I am not arguing to remove the bidding system. I merely would like to see it reworked to be more detailed and allow for additional strategic depth. Not just a loop - intercept, bid, evade, refuel.

Simplest implementation I can think of is to prevent fleets with lower combat acceleration from ever being able to evade regardless of the ∆v they still have left. I bet though there are far better ways to achieve this.