capturing planets question
 

ok, why do I have such trouble capturing more than 1 planet in the same sector. Normally one gets captured and the other gets glassed. What's the trick? I seem to recall it might having more than 1 troop transport. Is that ??

Re: capturing planets question
 

Well, having two trasports is definitely required!

The transports drop all troops in order to have the best chance of victory, and there will be none left for other planets, unless you have multiple transports...

Re: capturing planets question
 

Also, you can pull your troops off of the planet you just captured (leaving enough to keep it under your thumb) before you go after the next target.

Re: capturing planets question
 

<font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">This will work only if you run the combat and not do an auto turn or the computer will glass it still

Re: capturing planets question
 

There are a couple of issues.

The AI tends to invade the planet the fleet encounters in the combat window first. Now, you may have ordered it to attack the bigger one, and some people insist that never fails -- but people do report this sort of failure often enough to make me think it may be a mild bug.

Once you've conquered a planet, weapon platforms on the opposing planets now may target each other. If the fleet formation prevents the troop ship from getting into position quickly enough, well, fortunes of war and all that, chaps. Cheers. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon10.gif

I've been playing FQM-Deluxe with the TDM modpack. No deliberate glassing, must try to invade at least. With all those breatheable moons -- it's tough.

Re: capturing planets question
 

When I first started capturing planets I just had this one big transport,but to my surprised it droped all 400 troops on the one planet.
Now I like to have 6-8 troop transports(I find the battle cruiser hulls to be very good for this,very fast,reasonable shields,can carry enough troops and the planets defenses usually go against a more heavily armed ship).
As soon as I conquer a planet I leave the troops and the troop transport behind as I go to the next planet.

Re: capturing planets question
 

<font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">Actually off the top of my head I can not remember ever being able to capture the bigger planet. It seems like every time I try I end up capturing the moon and glassing the larger planet, without exception. At least in my experience that has been the case. I wish there was some way to get the bigger planet.

Geoschmo

Re: capturing planets question
 

<font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">Check my SEIV code. I'm a micromanager. I don't let the AI do anything because it does dumb things like glass planets I want to capture. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon12.gif

Re: capturing planets question
 

my quesiton is really for PBW so unfortunately the AI is unavoidable in this case.

Re: capturing planets question
 

pssst... here is what you do

select planet 1 for attack
then select load troops and select that planet
select planet 2 for attack
then select load troops and select that planet

repeat....until you have selected all the planets you wish to capture....

Re: capturing planets question
 

<font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">I doubt it will solve his problem - loading troops works outside the combat, I think. He is asking how to stop AI to glass planet there are 2+ planet in the same sector and first one was captured.

Re: capturing planets question
 

<font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">That is correct. You need at least as many transports as enemy colonies in the sector you attack. However if the ground combat is not won by your troops (be aware of mods that reduce the ground combat turns) more transports will drop their troops on the same planet. Then you might need much more than one transport per colony.

[ July 15, 2003, 16:56: Message edited by: Q ]

Re: capturing planets question
 

<font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">You have just been unlucky then, as I have seen many "planets" captured before the "moons", and vice versa.

Re: capturing planets question
 

i have never had a problem doing the way i post....

Re: capturing planets question
 

I observed several strange incidents at planets with trabants too. Things like the fleet hangs between the planets, cannot reach the other side with the runaway ships of the enemy. It could be also that a hanging fleet between planets can block the troop transporters and it is more a matter of luck if one gets through to either the planet or the moon(s).

Re: capturing planets question
 

Yeah, pathfinding skill of SE is close to the drunk stuck between two lamp Posts. It is still far better thah what I could code http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon7.gif

Re: capturing planets question
 

<font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">Tesco, that works for conquering planets in different sectors in the same turn, but not multiple planets in the same sector.

Re: capturing planets question
 

<font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">Check my SEIV code. I'm a micromanager. I don't let the AI do anything because it does dumb things like glass planets I want to capture. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon12.gif </font><hr /></blockquote><font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">Even in solo play, simultaneous turns add an extra layer of complexity. It is just too easy to outsmart tactical AI. But even a simple task of intersepting enemy fleet in simul. turns game can occasionly superseed Napoleon' tactic on Austerlitz !!

Re: capturing planets question
 

I'm sure most of you know this, but in Tactical, if the multiple planets are adjacent to each other (sometimes they aren't and there's a row of empty sectors between them), you can drop troops on one planet, conquer it, then select the conquered planet and order it to drop troops on an adjacent planet.

Re: capturing planets question
 

<font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">WHOA!
That's a heck of a thing.

Now if I could just set the strategy for all planets to Drop Troops I could have this sort of thing take place in Strategic quite automatically.

[ July 16, 2003, 13:50: Message edited by: Loser ]

Re: capturing planets question
 

Yes, that would be neat. Unfortunatly you cannot set strategies for planets, only ships and units.

Geoshmo

Re: capturing planets question
 

<font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">*photographed using the rules of evidence and added to the list of things for the next revision to the Newbie FAQ*

Great tidbit!

Slick.

Re: capturing planets question
 

You mean it wasn't in the FAQ ? Yay, I'm getting my name in the FAQ credits !! But remember, it only works when 'the stars are right' and the planets are adjacent in the tactical map.

I'm not sure how I'm going to explain it away when / if my Stormtroopers pull this little trick off in my story thread game.

Re: capturing planets question
 

That sounds like a rather gamey exploit to me. How does a newly conquered planet have the capability of launching troops off into space and then dropping them down on another planet? The troops are needed for riot control and such, and to keep the new planet secured.

Re: capturing planets question
 

<font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">Well consider this. An ally colonizes a moon in orbit around a planet of its ally.

War is declared. If an ship is in orbit, the moon will fire weapon platforms, launch fighters and glass the planet.

So why not conquer the planet with troops? Why else colonize some else's moon http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon10.gif

Re: capturing planets question
 

It would be better if you could drop just enough troops to conquer the moon, then drop the rest on the planet. But no, 'drop troops' is an all-or-nothing affair. Using 'Void Jumping Troops' (pat. pending, hehe) partially corrects this imbalance. I say partially because it only works in Tactical and even then only part of the time, because the planets often won't be adjacent.

Re: capturing planets question
 

Yeah but isn't dropping all troops more realistic? Look at real life battles. You can guess how many troops you need based on intel but you never know for sure.

Maybe a "batch" system would be in order so that you can specify before an attempted planet capture how many troops you want to drop per combat turn. This would continue until the planet is capture so if you capture a planet fairly quick, you would have enough troops to continue to the next planet in the same system.

I think i'll add that to the wish list.