What do you think about a 4X/RTS style of ship/fleet control across your empire?

[Divinity1990]

The general consensus seems to be that the UI & ship command interaction is terrible and unfortunately I have to agree. The problem lies in the fact that the UI in X:R doesn't really address the fundamental issues of the X3 UI while severely lacking in functionality compared to the former. They basically replaced the menus from the command console with countless dialogue radial wheels with repetitive dialogue. And frankly, I prefer a list to having to hear the same dialogue a thousand times because let's not forget that a player has to reissue commands countless of times to dozens or even hundreds of ships if he wants to manage an empire.


The first X game I played was TC and I've wondered from the first day why I could't just select a ship from the ship list/sector map and right click on it's destination. In a "late game" scenario, X games are more akin to 4X games than to a traditional 90's space combat/dogfighting sim.

If you want to send a fleet/ship to a position in space select it either form a property menu (tweaked version of the X3 version) and right click where you want it to fly to.

Select a fleet/ship and right click an enemy and it will automatically engage it

Select a ship with marines and right click a boardable enemy ship and and a small context sensitive list would appear with the commands "Attack" and "Board".

If you want to send a fleet/ship on patrol simply set a series of waypoints on the map which the fleet/ship will follow in a loop.


If you right click your owned ships you would get commands like "Hold position", "Fly/Jump to me" , "Protect me" , "Follow me" etc.

And so on...


Such a system would be easier to use and more intuitive than the X3/X:R menus (what PC gamer hasn't played a RTS) and at the same time give players greater, more precise and faster control of their assets across the universe.