Fleet automation

[ExoneratedPhoenix]

Hi All,

Is this just not possible or am I an idiot?

I want patrol ships to circle planets or mining stations, or even the sun, and attack anything in the system.

So I get the fleet, name it, shortcut it, and set their home system to what I want them to patrol. I have tried both attack and defend, and range "system". I then "patrol x" I then turn automation on. I have tried different combinations of automating then patrolling etc.

Issue 1 - Despite the range setting, these ships when set to attack leave the system, and go into neighbouring empires to take down pirates etc. I did this multiple times. It seems broken.

Issue 2 - As soon as the patrolling ships neutralise a threat or require refuelling, they go back to sitting around doing nothing. When I have 40 colonies on the go, this becomes an unbearable level of micromanagement.

I have also looked in the fleet options and empire policies to identify anything weird.

Is it just not possible to have a fleet circle a system automatically at all times, while refeulling and going back to patrolling straight after?

[ZumZoom]

Curious about this as well.

[RugOp'81]

There is no problem. You are doing it correct.
It looks like the fleet aint doing anything, but they are just saving fuel by just sitting there doing nothing.

Just like you said, select a home base for the fleet, set it to DEFEND, select the range (choose anything except EVERYWHERE), and set the fleet on automatic. And they attack (defend) any hostiles within your selected range.


You just cant let them patrol and automatic defend at the same time.

[arvcran]

Been a while ... but you need to read up on Automation Policies and DWU deep Options.

Also read up on Stances and Postures in the Galactopedia. I believe I determined that the implementation or design was flawed compared to what the documentation suggests is functionality.

My not so reliable memory is telling me the lead ship in the fleet is actually the fleet and conflicts with implementations between fleets and ships ... very fuzzy but I did make every effort to resolve getting the darn things to do as documented :).

It is a somewhat actually very complicated problem to solve ... considering fuel needs are in conflict with mission needs in terms of where the ships/fleets are at any given time. The mere fact alone that their is also Automation/Manual default settings for ships, stances, and postures sets up a priority override hirearchy which may not be evident.

my two cents ;-)

I seem to remember that you want to make sure you have the home base defined for the fleet when automated. They will always return there. I think setting the range to system helps keep them there ... but they will go hunting for fuel outside the system.

Patrolling is a mission you have to manually do and is not an automated function. So once the fleet completes the Patrol mission (usually when you order them to attack manually) ... remember to get them to patrol again after the fight.