Stupid troop transports that don't drop troops...

[trooper]

Last turn has confirmed what I was thinking :
this pb has been caused by some kind of bug linked to turn execution. With the same ships and same troops, all have worked well this turn...

Too bad for planets glassed Last month...
(Excuses to the families, etc, etc... )

[Paul1980au]

Lol cant speak about PBW but against the AI i always go tactical battle if i want to capture a planet.

Used in conjunction with the emotionless racial ability you can capture without the threat of mutiny - that said if you capture a rioting planet you need to a) build a planet and then urban pacification or have another planet which is not rioting.

Another bug in SE4 i would like to see fixed for SE5 ie if you capture a rioting planet it stops if you have the emotionless ability.

[Roanon]

Originally posted by Grandpa Kim:
I capture planets all the time with no difficulty. Well, two difficulties: The transport could be locked in the corner by other non-combatant ships (not the case in your graphic) or the transport is blocked from the planet by the warships.

Or the transport is blocked by a moon and the artificial stupidity doesn't find a way around it to the planet Pathing is definitely one of the weak spots in Aaron's programming.

One possible that I have never run into: Is your transport cloaked? This may prevent planet capture.

Definitely not. If combat occurs, all ships regardless of cloaking status will participate. So in a big cloaked attack fleet, uncloaking a single ship is enough.

Same thing happened to me. My enemy fired mercilessly at me and my ships just sat there and took it. *Sigh*

There are definitely some severe bugs in the combat engine. I think most of us have discovered that the only, at least partially reliable, difference in strategies is having "don't get hurt" or not. Fancy strategies - forget them. For instance, it is very difficult to convince a ship close in and fire on the nearest ship, even if your priorities are point blank / point blank and nearest/nearest/nearest/nearest. Likewise, maximum range seems often to be interpreted by some captains with a definite unability to read the numbers on the range finder. I even had cases where the lone unloaded transport with "don't get hurt" headed for the map edge for one combat turn, and then turned around and proceeded straight to the planet into the WP's defense fire. And of course, all time favorite is the famous "sitting duck" strategy being followed instead of your choice.
Ok, strategies work most of the time, but I wouldn't bet my main fleet on the shaky luck of it working just in a critical battle - if your fleet can't win with standard optimum range strategy, better wait for reinforces.