Can someone explain the Dark fog targeting?

[Cerodil]

So I've asked this before but I've never gotten an answer and I've been unable to figure it out myself.

Exactly how does dark fog targeting work, when they send attack groups. Looking online says they target the nearest structure to them but that's complete bull.

I know that signal towers make this question not really matter but I like to restart and "perfect" my builds, I do this in tons of games I play. So it's very annoying when I purposely set up a box of turrets right up next to the enemy bases, so that they are the closet things. Then after a few waves my factory which is directly opposite the enemy bases on the planets is attacked by a wave that just ignored/went around the turret box or went the long way around a pole or something.

I've gone out of my way to try to figure this out even measuring the degrees things are from each other on the sphere and it makes no sense. At this point it just seems to be a random target and now it's just bugging me that I don't understand it so I'd love for someone to explain it.

Edit: typo

[vkobe]

90% your closest building

10% other building

to be sure build your outpost like fortress, put one control tower and anazyse base per mining station

if your mining are in small area you can build line defense around them

also add drone with your analyze base to assist your control tower

also i recommend to destroy hostile tower when they are too close of your mining station, you are not forced to block the magma hole, just put a control tower near the magma hole, it will shot the magma hole every time the dark fog try to drop a new base in the magma hole

the annoying part it is when the lady spam your control tower shoting the dark fog and the alert alarm

[nevryn]

Putting a 'box' of turrets next to a base doesn't work.. Put a ' octagonal ring' around the base at 3 squares outside their range and farm the base. Don't use a single signal tower, otherwise they will over whelm that point.. use three of them equally spaced along one side of the ring. 99% of units will then favour that side. You can farm a lvl30 base with 2 rings of gauss turrets firing titanium ammo, backed by 12 pulse cannons firing basic shells along the side with the 3 signal towers. One the bases get above level 18 you'll need to put a line of Babs in front of the guns, to stop them being destroyed. The DF will favour targeting the BABs rather than the guns, and the BABs have a lot more HP

[NocheLuz]

I'm not having a problem with DF targeting that much. However, I do observe the behavior that some DF units did indeed target things that should be outside of their targeting radius. But it is because that unit is hovering away from the group. When DF sends the signal to attack, the units that are away from the group will target the nearest building, which is sometimes on the opposite side of the planet. That is why you have a problem with the DF units going around to attack their nearest building.

The solution is to make sure no other buildings are within a radius of the DF base and build your outpost very near to the DF base.

Another example is that you are using a signal tower to extend the range of Missile Turrets. Sometimes, DF units that are outside the range of the Signal Tower (maybe a new unit that spawns on the opposite side of the Signal Tower) will target the Missile Turrets itself and ignore anything near them. I did have this problem when I tried to destroy DF bases that were close to each other.

[nevryn]

Originally posted by NocheLuz:

Another example is that you are using a signal tower to extend the range of Missile Turrets. Sometimes, DF units that are outside the range of the Signal Tower (maybe a new unit that spawns on the opposite side of the Signal Tower) will target the Missile Turrets itself and ignore anything near them. I did have this problem when I tried to destroy DF bases that were close to each other.

Yes you get that when 'taking' a new planet. You set up your 'beachhead' somewhere secure, and then run you 'attack' power line out to the nearest clump of bases. Drop your BABs, Pulse cannons, and Lasers, and power them, then drop the signal tower to initiate the missile volley against the first base. Aside from triggering an attack by all the closest bases, you will see streams of DF units head off in the direction of the Beachhead. This becomes even more obvious when you get down the the last 2 or 3 bases, where instead of heading directly towards you they head off in seemingly random directions, which are usually signal towers left behind near destroyed bases to ensure the DF don't kill your geothermal plants.

[Cerodil]

Alright I'm going to try to explain my question better seeing as people don't seem to understand what I'm asking, even though it's the thread title.

I'm going to start by saying that I fully understand how BABs and signal towers work and that turret "boxes" aren't great later on. However I'm talking about the first few hours before having all that tech that renders worrying about this question useless.

So I had one game where I built my turrets a ways from the main factory area. They were 20~ degrees away from the bases with the closest other building being more than 50 degrees away. For the first 5-6 attacks this worked flawlessly with me only having to walk over to the turrets every other wave to pick up and replace the broken ones. However after that I had an attack that went all the way around the planet and attacked the main factory completely ignoring the turrets that were 5 times closer.

I want to know why it would do this, I don't want to know how to avoid it. I'm curious as to why it's happening in the first place.

vkobe says it's rng and I'm not a fan of that idea but if that's truly how it is then so be it. I prefer if it was something more concrete, more controllable or manipulable. Something that I can use and take into account for in the design and layout of my factory.

[NocheLuz]

Originally posted by Cerodil:

Alright I'm going to try to explain my question better seeing as people don't seem to understand what I'm asking, even though it's the thread title.

That is basically what I said. But I think you misunderstood my answer, so I have to make it clear. As long as you don't have at least 2 turret sites in opposite directions of each other, your situation can happen. Because there will be DF units that on the opposite side of your turrets. The DF units on the opposite side, let's say, are about 20 degrees away from the base. This means those units are only 30 degrees from your factory and more than 50 degrees from your turret site. So they attack the factory.

If you want, you can prevent this from happening by placing 2 Turret sites opposite from each other (DF base on the middle). Even if there are DF units that are away from the base, it'll still target the opposite Turret site.

If you still have questions, I suggest you observe how the unit goes around the base to attack your factory. There might be RNG but basically, your factories are just too close to the DF base.

[Cerodil]

Originally posted by NocheLuz:

That is basically what I said. But I think you misunderstood my answer, so I have to make it clear. As long as you don't have at least 2 turret sites in opposite directions of each other, your situation can happen. Because there will be DF units that on the opposite side of your turrets. The DF units on the opposite side, let's say, are about 20 degrees away from the base. This means those units are only 30 degrees from your factory and more than 50 degrees from your turret site. So they attack the factory.

If you want, you can prevent this from happening by placing 2 Turret sites opposite from each other (DF base on the middle). Even if there are DF units that are away from the base, it'll still target the opposite Turret site.

If you still have questions, I suggest you observe how the unit goes around the base to attack your factory. There might be RNG but basically, your factories are just too close to the DF base.

You're right I don't understand what you said. If the turrets are the closet to the bases how could the factory possibly be closer and there for viable as a target unless I expand to far in around the planet which I'd never do in the first one or two hours of the game, the time frame this discussion is about.

In your example you say the dark fog units can be more than 20 degrees from a base. I've never seen this once ever. Unless the base is attacked or threat maxes out they just run/fly around its perimeter.

[NocheLuz]

Originally posted by Cerodil:

In your example you say the dark fog units can be more than 20 degrees from a base. I've never seen this once ever. Unless the base is attacked or threat maxes out they just run/fly around its perimeter.

It's just base expansion, when DF expands the base it'll also expand the range in which the units are away from the Core/Base. You did say it only happened after some time had passed right? I think it is because it expands their base so the DF units also roam further away from their Core.

Let's say, your Turrets are 20 degrees from the base, your Factories are 50 degrees, and DF units roam at 5 degrees from the Core. If the base expanded that 5 degrees can become 10 degrees or more depending on the range of the base expansion. This makes the units that are further away from the Core now sit only 30 degrees from Turrets, and now 40 degrees from your factories. If your measurement is accurate, this is still not a problem. But I did observe DF behavior where before the attack signal is sent (the threat level is max), some DF units will stray from the Core for some distance before selecting the target. This is why I said RNG is involved. You can also observe this behavior in your game just before DF attacks.

However, If you still want to say "It is the first two hours in the game", I think you should just build your base on the landing site and make the Wind Turbine line to the DF base and transport ammo there. I never got DF to attack my factories because it was like 100+ degrees away from their base (the turrets are about 30 degrees from their base). I do this before wave 2 begins and it works great. This is why I observed the behavior of DF units that target things that should be outside their range (They go and attack the Missile Turrets that should be in my base).

[Cerodil]

Originally posted by NocheLuz:

It's just base expansion, when DF expands the base it'll also expand the range in which the units are away from the Core/Base. You did say it only happened after some time had passed right? I think it is because it expands their base so the DF units also roam further away from their Core.

Are you talking about another base landing? Every time I see this happened I check if there is a forth base. Sometimes there is a forth base other times there isn't.

I've never seen the dark fog go away from the base like you're explaining, I don't watch them before attacks that often though. I have noticed sometimes they are grouped up and push each other a bit before they start moving. Even if they do do this and end up 5-10 degrees from the relay I can't see how that would make the factory the target, the turrets would still be closer no matter which direction they went.

[NocheLuz]

Originally posted by Cerodil:

Are you talking about another base landing? Every time I see this happened I check if there is a forth base. Sometimes there is a forth base other times there isn't.

I'm talking about the base expanding. If you play on the default setting, it'll only happen after about 2-3 waves of enemies attacking. The DF base will build another Raider Camp/Turrets outside to expand their base. This will also make some of the DF units roam out more. In the default setting, this will happen very slowly. But if you still making factories, it'll fully expand in about 5-6 hours (depending on your power usage).

After they fully expand, they might build another Camp for another unit type. But basically, they'll only expand to a certain extent (about 5-6 times their starting base). In terms of area expansion, it'll expand about 2 times the radius from its Core. So you don't have to worry about the DF base expanding too much.

Also, you are talking about fourth base, so I assume you are playing in a very hard DF setting. So, I think you might already know almost all of the DF basics. I only played on the Brutal max setting once, and never again do I want to experience that.

[Cerodil]

Originally posted by NocheLuz:

I'm talking about the base expanding. If you play on the default setting, it'll only happen after about 2-3 waves of enemies attacking. The DF base will build another Raider Camp/Turrets outside to expand their base. This will also make some of the DF units roam out more. In the default setting, this will happen very slowly. But if you still making factories, it'll fully expand in about 5-6 hours (depending on your power usage).

After they fully expand, they might build another Camp for another unit type. But basically, they'll only expand to a certain extent (about 5-6 times their starting base). In terms of area expansion, it'll expand about 2 times the radius from its Core. So you don't have to worry about the DF base expanding too much.

Also, you are talking about fourth base, so I assume you are playing in a very hard DF setting. So, I think you might already know almost all of the DF basics. I only played on the Brutal max setting once, and never again do I want to experience that.

Yes I'm playing on 1200% and yes I understand a lot about dark fog and how to deal with them. I do only play this difficulty so I guess I forgot the bases actually expand, sorry about that.

I just didn't get one aspect of the dark fog and wanted to ask if anyone can explain it. It seems to just simply be rng which is dumb cause I want to be able to counter/control with little effort by playing smart but I guess just account for randomness is how I'm going to have to go forward. Which is annoying seeing as I'm trying to be more efficient.

[NocheLuz]

Originally posted by Cerodil:

I just didn't get one aspect of the dark fog and wanted to ask if anyone can explain it. It seems to just simply be rng which is dumb cause I want to be able to counter/control with little effort by playing smart but I guess just account for randomness is how I'm going to have to go forward. Which is annoying seeing as I'm trying to be more efficient.

I think the thing about what I said is that sometimes, you can observe that the DF unit attacks from different angles even if they are coming from the same base. If they go straight into your base they should always attack at the same angle. I've observed that before the attack, sometimes they'll go out from their Core at a certain distance before beginning their attack. So they attack at a different angle than the previous one.

I think this is what RNG does to their pathing. Well, there might be someone who researches or even learns about the DF code that can explain this. I'm only observing some of their behavior and might not be true.