Sat. Formations??
 

Is there any way to mod the starting points of satellites?? Or setting a formation for them? I'm tired of my point defence sat. starting BEHIND the planet in tac. combat where it does no good as it can't reach the damn missiles.

Anyone??

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"The Empress took your name away," said Chance.
Owen smiled coldly. "It wasn't hers to take. I'm a Deathstalker until I die. And we never forget a slight or an enemy." -Owen Deathstalker.

Re: Sat. Formations??
 

I don't think you can. You used to be able to deploy them 1, 5, 10, etc. at at time and it would put them in different Groups and just by chance you would have sats distributed around a planet. However you could not specifically place them in a combat square.

It is worse now - all sats go into the same group reguardless of when / how you deployed them. SO your chances are close to nil that they (sats) will be very effective defending a planet. IOW, they will probably always be on the 'wrong side of the planet'. For now, relegate to using them at Warp Points. That seems to be the only place they are worth it IMO.

Re: Sat. Formations??
 

you can have them in different Groups if you deploy them in combat, but you have to deplay a couplee, close the screen, reopent he launch units screen, deploy a couple, repeat

Re: Sat. Formations??
 

Deathstalker, agreed. Sats are of very limited usefulness in defending planets like that; they ALWAYS seem to wind up on the wrong effing side of the planet http://www.shrapnelgames.com/ubb/images/icons/icon9.gif

Re: Sat. Formations??
 

I wrote to Aaron about this and Fighters being limited to only one group, many times.

I think it sucks the way they are deployed.

Re: Sat. Formations??
 

Agreed EZ - I e-mailed him too. Somebody should do a poll.

Re: Sat. Formations??
 

Isn't there a line in the settings file that reads "Units per Combat Group" or something similar? I remember it being set to 20, maybe it was supposed to limit the number of fighters/sats in a tactical combat stack to twenty and create a new stack if there were any leftover. Anyone know what I'm talking about? If this isn't a feature and I just pulled it outta my @$$, perhaps it should be added.

Re: Sat. Formations??
 

Yes, the 20/space is there, but for COMBAT only, this does not help for launching normally in the game.(And besides, what good is dropping mines in combat anyway??Besides more pdc decoys.) That and much more is in the settings.txt. I just want formations added.(like a ring around the planet/wormhole with say 10sat per square, or stacks of 15sat 4 squares away from the planet towards the enemy. You should be able to LAUNCH your sat into diff orbits.) sorry if I seem to be ranting. http://www.shrapnelgames.com/ubb/images/icons/icon7.gif

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"The Empress took your name away," said Chance.
Owen smiled coldly. "It wasn't hers to take. I'm a Deathstalker until I die. And we never forget a slight or an enemy." -Owen Deathstalker.

Re: Sat. Formations??
 

I use sats anyway - OK they rarely appear on th right side of the planet but they're cheap, and you can double your chances by putting a space station up as well.

Besides, if you have long rang weapons on thm they can keep troop ships / fighters away from your planet no matter where thy're placed.

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There is an exception to every rule. Including this one.

Re: Sat. Formations??
 

I agree that satellites in the original game are of limited use for planet defense. I improved this by creating a weapon mount for satellites with increased range for direct fire weapons. It helps a lot and makes satellites really useful.

Re: Sat. Formations??
 

IMO, sats are good for defence only at Warp Points (in the current deployment configurations). However, I would be interested in knowing about that mod that gives sats weapon mounts that you talked about Q - may make a nice addition against humans.

OTOH, I do not think that sats are totally useless - just useless at defending planets. They make GREAT sensor platforms. Put a cloak and some long range sensors ona large one, drop one in each system (especially the 'dead' ones) and you now have a great info gathering 'network' that you can see everything in the system. It works great for keeping tabs on AI and other players.

You don't even have to have any contact with them - open a WP to another empire territory, slip the cloaked sat layer thru the WP, then close it. Next, start dropping these cloaked 'Recon Sats' in each and every opponent system. As long as the AI (or human player) can't see your ship or sat and you close the WP, you will not initiate any contact with them. Yet you'll still be able to see whats going on - like fleet concentrations, colonies, etc.

Lastly, they are Zero maintainence items - if a construction queue is quiet and you have the points, build 'em and transfer 'em to ALL your Warp Points in the slim chance that some AI ship will get teleported by a 'spacial anomoly' deep into your territory while all your fleets are at the front line. Again, IMO they are quite effective at WP's.

Re: Sat. Formations??
 

<BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><HR>I agree that satellites in the original game are of limited use for planet defense. I improved this by creating a weapon mount for satellites with increased range for direct fire weapons. It helps a lot and makes satellites really useful.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>
There's a Siege mount in the Pirates&Nomads mod, too. +5 range for 2x the space and 5x the $$$.

Re: Sat. Formations??
 

Yeah if you get enough of them in a WP they work real well. I like to put PPB V on them and they do quite well in slowing the enemy down.