Ship combat experience
 

Is combat experience broken in the current patch?

The FAQ says that a ship's crew gets 1% experience for each ship it kills, but I'm not seeing that. My ships -never- show any experience gained from combat, only if I use a training center. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon9.gif

SpaceBadger

Re: Ship combat experience
 

They only get experience for direct fire weapons. Fighters and Seekers will not earn experiences, I don't think Ship Capture or Ramming will either.

Re: Ship combat experience
 

IIRC ships gain experience only in strategic combat, not tactical.

Re: Ship combat experience
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">I've made ships gain experience with tactical combat. Unless it was removed in a current patch, it has been a while.

It's a fun thing to do -- turn all ministers on, and just control one ship or one fleet.

Be the Captain Kirk/Picard/Harrington/Whoever and preserve your home empire, while the massive beaurocracy around you continues to make dumb decisions.

Re: Ship combat experience
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">That's retarded. Will it be fixed? Using v1.49, I noticed that no ship or fleet ever gained any experience, and I hoped this was something broken with 1.49 that would be fixed when I got Gold. But you're saying it is still broken/intentional?

Re: Ship combat experience
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">Argh. Well, that explains it - I almost always use tactical combat in single-player. I will have to check in the game that I have going with my son to see if my ships there have been getting experience (simultaneous turns, all combat is strategic).

Oh well, I have been thinking that I ought to use strategic combat more, just to get used to it for playing PBW, etc.

Thanks for the info.

SpaceBadger

[ October 16, 2003, 16:40: Message edited by: SpaceBadger ]

Re: Ship combat experience
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">Whoa! What a great idea! I'm going to have to go home and do that!

Does the quality of the AI affect how the Ministers handle things?

Can we arrange a PBW Version of this game? That would require some serious trust, honor, or soemthing....

Re: Ship combat experience
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">I sure don't seem to be getting any experience that way. Was there something special you had to do to make this work? (Such as the minister thing you mention below?)

Quote:

It's a fun thing to do -- turn all ministers on, and just control one ship or one fleet. Be the Captain Kirk/Picard/Harrington/Whoever and preserve your home empire, while the massive beaurocracy around you continues to make dumb decisions.

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">That does sound like fun. I guess I will have to try the ministers sometime and figure out how they work - never have used any of them so far.

SpaceBadger

Re: Ship combat experience
 

I just ran a test game using 1.84 and had some combat and the victorious ship gained 1% experience.

Re: Ship combat experience
 

Ok, I did a little more testing. The ship that fires the Last shot destroying another vessel gains 1% experience. However, I can't seem to get it to add any fleet experience. Perhaps that is broken and is what people are thinking about? I am sure I have seen fleets gain experience in strategic games, so perhaps the fleet experience is broken for tactical combat only.

Re: Ship combat experience
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">Sigh, well there is one BIG problem, IIRC. Even if all ships in the fleet (and the fleet itself) that I want to control have the ministers off -- if the resupply minister is on -- he still starts taking control of ship movement when the fleet is at the half supply level.

And the standard AI is a little too dedicated to drone research. But hey, that's what the government wants, who am I to argue?

[ October 16, 2003, 18:02: Message edited by: Arkcon ]

Re: Ship combat experience
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">I think I'd use the TDM AI which, if the Ministers follow the AI, should end up with a more sensible Research path. But still, I'll follow the government's orders even, I guess, when they tell me to pull my fleet back for refueling.

Re: Ship combat experience
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">Argh. Well, that explains it - I almost always use tactical combat in single-player. I will have to check in the game that I have going with my son to see if my ships there have been getting experience (simultaneous turns, all combat is strategic).

Oh well, I have been thinking that I ought to use strategic combat more, just to get used to it for playing PBW, etc.

Thanks for the info.

SpaceBadger</font><hr /></blockquote><font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">That is the only way I do combat and I gain for the ship, have not paid that much att to fleets

Re: Ship combat experience
 

I'm quite sure the fleet will get XPs too but it needs many more destroyed ships to get one point. In a recent battle between 376 enemy ships with round about 10.000 fighters and my 230 ships with round about 5.000 fighters my fleet jumped from 20% to 46%. No enemy survived, I had about 80 ships remaining. Go figure the XP per kill yourself. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/tongue.gif

Re: Ship combat experience
 

Getting the killing shot with a direct-fire weapon generally gives +1 experience to a ship. This works in all modes of play.

Destroying drones and fighters, and I think even using seekers can give some experience too, but it's much less. The game does track experience at a finer grain than full visible percentage points, but for practical purposes, ship experience is just +1 per killing direct-fire shot.

Fleet experience is also tracked on partial percentage points. A good battle often gives up to about +1, but any battle gives some - it may take a few before you get a +1. I think battles with fewer opponents, and/or battles where you outnumber the opponents, may give less. Battles which involve planet capture seem to give a lot less too (or maybe it's just battles without enemy ships). I think fleet experience is also divided between all the friendly fleets in the battle.

And playing as a "captain" or "fleet commander" is pretty much my favorite way to play SE4 single-player. It's a lot of fun (and very challenging, unless your AI is best) to try to tip the scales as a single commander. However, the Resupply Minister IS a big pain in the aft thrusters! My best solution to that is to commandeer a supply ship. You might also want to disable mines in the game... or else be really careful about scouting ahead to avoid dying to mines - I was having a great game of Proportions as a captain when I led an expedition through a warp point and we were all wiped out by an AI minefield.

Oh, you may want to rename a fleet to "Captain X" (your character's name), and then use it to represent your character in the game, so you can track experience and transfer from ship to ship.

You also might want to run enough turns until the ships and situations involved are interesting.

I recommend using as slow a research rate as possible, though, since the pace of operations as a commander means your ship will tend to be out-of-date after every cruise or two, otherwise.

PvK

Re: Ship combat experience
 

If you add more ships to that fleet, now, will the fleet XP stay the same, decrease proportionately to the (number of ships you add)/(number already there), or will the fleet bonus disappear instantly because the fleet changed?

Re: Ship combat experience
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">You can completely change the ships in the fleet and the bonus will stay the same. It sticks-good to he fleet itself, like it's the commander of the fleet, and does not count on any ship.

Re: Ship combat experience
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">That would explain why I didn't see any improvment. In my test I only ran 4 or 5 combats and the enemy only had one ship each time.

Re: Ship combat experience
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">that makes sense. nice to have a good explanation - even if training to fight together is a big part of multiple-units combat.

Re: Ship combat experience
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">As long as you keep your ship fueled up it doesn't override your orders, correct? You just can't stray too far from the resupply depots? Also, might be good to have your ship fitted with an emergency resupply comp when it's avaialable.

As far as your ship being out of date, stop at the nearest space yard and order a retrofit. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon10.gif That goes down as a ship order so should be his perogative, yes?

This does sounds like a very cool way to play, although it might be a bit akward for a multiplayer game on PBW.

Re: Ship combat experience
 

It seems to me that there should be a cost (to reflect the training and promotion of a commander) associated with fleet creation. Otherwise, aside from the micromanagement, it is always in your best interest to put even single ships into fleets.

Re: Ship combat experience
 

The cost of training one man is insignificant compared to the scale of the game.

Misquote asside, I doubt it would require a single kiloton of anything. Really, that's a whole heck of a lot. These things being built in SE IV are freaking huge!

Re: Ship combat experience
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">I'd say you're essentially correct. It could be done better, and there are some gameplay issues with the advantages and complications of fleet use.

PvK

Re: Ship combat experience
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">If I understand Sabre Cherry, it's not that there should be a mass associated with a fleet. Mainly I think there are some issues with the current way it works, such as that there is a reward (especially with trained fleets) for doing something that is mainly a chore for the player. That the AI doesn't do it very well is another issue. Not a game-breaker, but these things could be done better.

PvK

Re: Ship combat experience
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">Correct, but if you try it, you'll see that the range is about 40% the ship's real range, and does not take into account the distance to a resupply depot, so even if you are travelling near a resupply depot, the AI will force your fleet to take pointless detours to refuel when it still has ample supplies and is near a depot.

You'd want a supply storage comp more than an emergency resupply comp (or, as I suggested, a resupply ship in your fleet), because the problem is not actually running low on supplies, but with the Resupply Minister having a premature cow and recalling your ships at stupid times.

Quote:

As far as your ship being out of date, stop at the nearest space yard and order a retrofit. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon10.gif That goes down as a ship order so should be his perogative, yes?

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">Yes I think it's fun to allow yourself to order retrofits and even the occasional custom design.

However, even when I play, say, an unmodded game on High research cost, it seems like things get researched quite fast, when I'm controlling only one fleet. This type of play involves many turns of cruising around, resupplying, etc., already. Each turn takes much less time to play than when playing as emperor. Needing to constantly retrofit isn't something I'd recommend - you'll have to do it plenty, even with High research costs set.

Also, I think it's a lot more fun and interesting to have things to look forward to, rather than having most of the tech tree burned through before much even happens, and then having a game you get involved in the story of, but there are few tech advantages left to look forward to. Again, I recommend high research costs, and/or using a mod like Proportions or AIC where research is slower (and where ship designs are more interesting). If you prefer the techs in some other mods like Star Trek, Adamant, Devnull, P&N, or whatever, use High research costs and/or consider hacking the mod to reduce the amount of research from research facs (though High is probably enough).

Quote:

This does sounds like a very cool way to play, although it might be a bit akward for a multiplayer game on PBW.

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">PBW is a nice idea, but there are issues such as ensuring against cheating, that it would need to be turn-based movement, that players wouldn't interact much, and that if the players ever met in combat, it would require special intervention to resolve.

The SE4 By Committee game offers an interesting though slow way to do this multi-player, though.

PvK

[ October 16, 2003, 21:10: Message edited by: PvK ]