Maintaining formation and other whines

raynor · #1 January 31st, 2001, 10:19 PM

One of these days, I'm going to get smart and change the default formation for all my ships. It seems that most fleets default to the 'arrow' formation or somesuch where the leader is in the front row with the next two ships to the left and right in the second row and so on.... I think this has to be the most worthless formation I've ever seen.

From what I understand, it was one of the MOD'ers who first suggested the WALL formation which seems to have been added in one of the patches. In this formation, all your ships are in one long rank. IMHO, this formation is much better for me since I attack with a fleet of six or eight identical ships with balanced firepower.

So, to frame this as a question: How can I change it so that every time I start a new game, the default formation for any fleet will be 'The WALL' instead of the other default?

raynor · #2 January 31st, 2001, 10:47 PM

How many of you use this particular tactic?

I'll just use 'AUTO' and leave my ships in formation while they destroy the enemy ships and any defences. Then, I'll click ORDERS->Clear all group Formations.

Next, I'll select my transport hiding in the corner, and click ORDERS->Set Group Leader and choose any old group and formation.

The advantage of this is that when I press 'E' on the keyboard for End Turn, it will automatically select the transport instead of the leader of the group of warships that bombed the planet. This makes it much, much easier for me to move the transport in and drop troops on the planet.

Now, if they would just make the view shift so that the ship is *always* in the center...

(Err.. Change tactic above to read trick/method)

[This message has been edited by raynor (edited 31 January 2001).]

Baron Munchausen · #3 February 1st, 2001, 02:45 AM

Also, why can't you CLOSE UP a formation when some ships get destroyed? Isn't the point of a formation to have the ships protect each other and tocoordinate firepower? If they mindlessly keep a position three places back when the intervening ships have been destroyed that's not very helpful. There should be a "re-assign formation slots" button to close them up.

DirectorTsaarx · #4 February 1st, 2001, 05:54 PM

Uh, raynor, I think there's an option in the combat window to have the screen "Always center on current ship" or something like that. I frequently turn that off, because I usually like the center to be somewhere between my ships & the enemy ships.

raynor · #5 February 2nd, 2001, 04:57 PM

quote:
Originally posted by DirectorTsaarx:
Uh, raynor, I think there's an option in the combat window to have the screen "Always center on current ship" or something like that. I frequently turn that off, because I usually like the center to be somewhere between my ships & the enemy ships.

Ya know... I hear what you are saying. I recall having to re-center the view when I have it on 'Auto' because, like you, I want to see *both* sides of the conflict and not just my ships firing off the screen.

But when I'm on manual, I don't think it works. Because I know for a fact that even though that option is turned on, I have to keep moving the display so I can tell my transport ship to move to the planet.

I sure wish they would alter the AI with some sort of toggle so that they stop firing individual weapons themselves when you get close to destroying all the WEP's on a planet... GRRR! I hate when I forget to switch to manual, and my ships start destroying tons and tons of facilities on a planet I've brought in troops to invade with.