Boarding while not in the system

[Soondead]

I have watched several videos on the subject and tried about a dozen times now, using teams of Odyssey, Nemesis or Cerberus craft, armed with laser beams, ion cannons or plasmas. I pause the game and order a boarding, telling each ship to target the TURRETS. Not the engines, not the shields, not "disable the target" and certainly not "just destroy it lol" but the TURRETS. In my last attempt, the attack ships didn't even have turrets of their own, to completely eliminate that problem from the equation.

The result is invariably the same: My ships proceed to destroy the target ship, never taking out even a single one of the turrets.

So I have to ask, is this even possible or do I *HAVE* to be in the system, in a ship, personally taking out all the target turrets myself while the AI ships just wait because they are idiots who can't follow a simple order??

[Pille]

No, you don't have to be in the systems. Just order your ships to "keep distance" and spam marines. Save before you give the order to board and as soon as your marines are on board the target ship, get them out of firing range or deactivate the turrets

[Pille]

"attack surface elements" is just an extended kill command that disables ship elements first and then destroys the ship

[Soondead]

Originally posted by Pille:

"attack surface elements" is just an extended kill command that disables ship elements first and then destroys the ship

Well... except for the tiny little detail that it doesn't actually disable ship elements first..?

I never got a single boarding pod to launch because turrets have to be taken out first.

[BlackD]

So the ai still keeps firing at ships that are currently boarded? Thanks. Guess i dont board then.

[Soondead]

Originally posted by BlackD:

So the ai still keeps firing at ships that are currently boarded? Thanks. Guess i dont board then.

I have never actually gotten to the point where they started boarding; the turrets don't get taken out so stage 1 never completes. Ofcourse, another factor is that even getting to the point where I had a sufficient force to attempt a boarding in the first place means I had to first secure a steady income -- at which point the potential income from boarding and then selling a ship isn't really worth all the trouble. I've just been beating my head against this over and over because I thought there had to be some crucial detail I was missing. Instead, it seems that the mechanic simply doesn't work as intended anymore because AI pilots are useless.

[BlackD]

The most success i had when i was boarding stuff was when i personally took care of the turrets with an somewhat agile M ship, lowered the hull with heavy torpedos and mines and then let the fleet launch marines. But the whole process was so tiring that i just stopped. Hoped the devs would "smart-up" the ai to the point that they dont shoot at ships with their own troops on but taking Pilles comments into account i guess they still didnt.

[Soondead]

Originally posted by BlackD:

The most success i had when i was boarding stuff was when i personally took care of the turrets with an somewhat agile M ship, lowered the hull with heavy torpedos and mines and then let the fleet launch marines. But the whole process was so tiring that i just stopped. Hoped the devs would "smart-up" the ai to the point that they dont shoot at ships with their own troops on but taking Pilles comments into account i guess they still didnt.

I don't mind them shooting up a ship if so ordered, but I do mind them shooting up a ship when specifically ordered to only take out the turrets. It's not even as if they shoot the turrets and accidentally destroy the ship; they clearly don't aim at the turrets at all.

[BlackD]

Originally posted by Soondead:

I don't mind them shooting up a ship if so ordered, but I do mind them shooting up a ship when specifically ordered to only take out the turrets. It's not even as if they shoot the turrets and accidentally destroy the ship; they clearly don't aim at the turrets at all.

Well, thats the problem. Even IF they took out all turrets, they wont stop shooting until you babysit them. They dont care if your troops are onboard or not.

[Soondead]

Originally posted by BlackD:

Originally posted by Soondead:

I don't mind them shooting up a ship if so ordered, but I do mind them shooting up a ship when specifically ordered to only take out the turrets. It's not even as if they shoot the turrets and accidentally destroy the ship; they clearly don't aim at the turrets at all.

Well, thats the problem. Even IF they took out all turrets, they wont stop shooting until you babysit them. They dont care if your troops are onboard or not.

Yea... pausing the game to babysit the AI is already part of the core gameplay as far as I'm concerned :-P

[Venerable_Sin]

Originally posted by Soondead:

Originally posted by BlackD:

So the ai still keeps firing at ships that are currently boarded? Thanks. Guess i dont board then.

I have never actually gotten to the point where they started boarding; the turrets don't get taken out so stage 1 never completes. Ofcourse, another factor is that even getting to the point where I had a sufficient force to attempt a boarding in the first place means I had to first secure a steady income -- at which point the potential income from boarding and then selling a ship isn't really worth all the trouble. I've just been beating my head against this over and over because I thought there had to be some crucial detail I was missing. Instead, it seems that the mechanic simply doesn't work as intended anymore because AI pilots are useless.

Have you tried using only lasers? I have witness A.I. pilots being very inaccurate when trying to take out subsystems. I don't think it will change the fact that they keep shooting at destroyed subsystems so you might have to mitigate the damage by calling 90% or more of the attacking force away after a certain threshold or time limit. (I've never attempted out of system boarding and don't know how to check NPC subsystems from outside of system)

Using only lasers may get you the accuracy and reduced damage output so that you will have enough time to pull your attacking force away and call your marines in.

[trooperrob]

Does your boarding fleet have missiles.
Last time I played I thought that a boarding fleet looks at the damage done to the target before firing.
It can't (or doesn't) allow for missiles in flight. So if 10 ships fire 10 heavy torpedoes, but the shield / hull is full, they might fire 10 more etc.
When they all hit target is destroyed.

I would have: All NPC ships without missiles for boarding.
2 wings.
1 heavy, pulled out when you have inflicted sufficient damage.
1 light wing for maintaining damage / distracting.
Let us know if that is better / works.

[Crimzin]

So just reading through this, In all honesty I never have tried OOS or purely Ai boarding but what about your ships turrets? If the enemy ship shoots at anything, don't the Ai controlled turrets on your or Ai ships then proceed to destroy the ship?

You could try disabling ALL turrets on your Ai fleet to see if that makes a difference, to the outcome, off course you may have a fleet with only turret weapons which could be an issue.

[Soondead]

I have tried all lasers, I have tried disarming all turrets on the attack ships and I've tried sending attack ships that have no turrets at all. Plasma fails fast, ion cannons take forever and lasers are somewhere in between but the end result is always the same; not a single enemy turret gets taken out, pods never launch and the enemy ship is destroyed. I can stop the attack and let the enemy shields recharge several times, it doesn't matter.

[Armandhammer]

This could be something introduced in 7.0 - I do remember that my Syn would not destroy a ship if a boarding command was given... (of course make sure turrets on Syn are not set to attack everything)... But yeah, boarding command should stop attacks...

Worth flagging as a new bug

[Soondead]

No, I had the exact same problem in 6.2 so this is not a new problem.