SETA and TS/TP deaths

[gillrichard]

I did an experiment this afternoon:

I sent some 30 TP/TS ships off to various new factories in new loops I set up, they all had to fly various sectors to get to their new homes.

Here is what I did, on one load I got in my pegasus and told it to dock a long way away, I used SETA to speed up the journey.

5 of my TPs and TSs were lost in 10 minutes of SETA (at factor 10)

I then loaded the exact same game, set off on the exact same journey and have just completed it WITHOUT SETA at all and guess what? NOT a SINGLE transport lost.

SETA I conclude penalises the player for using it. Simple Enough

[Gazzareth]

SETA I conclude penalises the player for using it. Simple Enough

If you have chance it would be interesting to know if you get the same result with a lower SETA factor ??

[CBJ]

Try the same experiment again a few more times. The random element is quite strong in this game and a single run of your otherwise interesting test might not tell us much.

[gillrichard]

My pegasus is now engaging in the same journey again I will try 6x seta tonight, not 10, it takes a while either way

I could of course do it all in a dolphin for fun.

CBJ - when you say random element have scriptors noticed what causes differences in game play?

[CBJ]

I wasn't referring to anything specific, and I certainly didn't mean to imply it was anything to do with scripting.

In my experience, the locations in which Khaak clusters spawn are random. If they happen to spawn in a sector in which your ships are operating then you will suffer losses, if they don't then you won't.

If this is the case then running the simulation once for each scenario will simply show that the clusters that spawned while the game was running appeared in different places, which is highly likely.

[gillrichard]

I figured as much,

however my tests should be more valid than that because as they run through only khaak that spawned before the run can hurt them as they spawn quite far out and TPs at least run quite quickly.

I read earlier that if you are on 10x SETA then only 1 in 10 calculations is made, rather than everyone 10x faster. If this is true then I can see why more ships are lost on SETA than not.

[Gazzareth]

rather than everyone 10x faster

I could imaging your processor quivering every time you get close to hitting the "j" key....

[gillrichard]

Particularly as it is Celery, oops I mean Celeron

[simonnance]

rather than everyone 10x faster

I could imaging your processor quivering every time you get close to hitting the "j" key....

*sniff*

hmm, i smell something.......

is that my toast.......

hmm, toast soesnt smell plasicy....

OH *************T!

[Carl Sumner]

I think the video dispaly takes a lot more processor time than any "out of sector" calculations. But then I'm not the one who programmed them, so I can't be sure.

I have noticed that "in sector" collisions are a lot more common when in SETA. I had a set fast M5 to follow me and it sometimes hit me as I turned or stopped in autopilot. Hitting J to turn off the SETA as it approached seems to prevent this. (That was in V1.2 though, haven't tried in V1.3.)

[gpz1100]

SETA definately penalises the player. I've been doing the same experiments myself and I think the Khaak also home in on the player where ever you are. I tried parking up at Argon Prime and all the Khaak incursions were in the surrounding sectors where a lot of my factories are. Then I parked up somewhere well away from any of my factories and never once got the 'Attention one of your ships is under attack'

Cheers

GPZ

[Malice_101]

SETA doesn't really penalise the player if it's used for what is designed for. Conviniently speeding time so you can get from point A to point B in short order.

As stated already, the game system must cut corners when it processes. If it didn't you would need a liquid nitrogen cooling system to stop your processor screaming in horrific agony before exploding, and killing you and anyone within a three mile radius instantly, thereby blackening the sky and leaving humanity groping impotently in stifling darkness.

[allan501]

I now use seta x5 seems I lose a lot less transports when under attack whereas x10 they almost always die.

[gpz1100]

In my experience, the locations in which Khaak clusters spawn are random. If they happen to spawn in a sector in which your ships are operating then you will suffer losses, if they don't then you won't.

Khaak spawning is definately NOT random!

I have a Centaur in every Argon, Split, Teladi, Boron and pirate sector on the map. I get to know about every single spawning and there are certain places where they spawn many times more than others. Don't know if this would be the same on all games as there is a degree of randomness at the outset of a game but most people would say the OB has more than it's fair share of spawnings and I find that Profit Share probably has the next most. It's probably something like 9 out of every 10 spawnings are either OB or Profit Share. Others high on the list have been Dukes Domain and Atraus's Cloud. Also I think the player attracts spawnings to their location. I can go to a sector that hasn't recorded a single spawning and if I stay there long enough, sure enough the little buggers will show up. I do all my empire managing from one of the unknown sectors where I don't have any property.

[Miklatov]

I'm not convinced Khaak spawning is random either.

Scenario: My factories in Ore Belt proteccted by my Centaur - Only smaller clusters ever appeared and only one at a time.

Very recently bought a second M6 for Ore Belt and within 30 mins, my factories had become under attack by 2 clusters at once.

Gonna try moving one centaur out of ore belt and see what happens.

[gillrichard]

I think Khaak is indeed random, although more frequent in certain areas such as Presidents end and Ore Belt. The reason I say this is if you fly around after a period of SETA there are random Khaak m3s (fewer m5s which often get taken out easier) hanging around that liberally take potshots at your Mantas / TSs. I tend to find most of my losses are these ships. Often this involves sectors with no cap ship defence.

Last night I did an overnight non-seta run to discover I lost 5 Mantas out of 147, not a bad return, of course my GPPC is still producing quite slowly

[gpz1100]

Well there's one way to prove it. Over the next few days I'll log every Khaak spawning against the sector it spawned in, If it's random then there should be an even spread everywhere appart from PE and OB which I think have certain trigers for spawnings. E.g. everytime I enter OB from the North gate I trigger a spawning and I think OOS ships do too.

Cheers

GPZ

[CBJ]

Randomness can produce some funny effects. If, as I suspect, it is random, then with 130 or more sectors, you will only start to see a roughly even spread after several thousand Khaak clusters have spawned. I'd hate to think of you making notes for that long.

[gpz1100]

I have about 70 Centaurs spread all over the universe. In a nights play I'll get maybe 20 warnings of ship attacks when they chase down newly spawned Khaak clustes. Over a few days I will have a pretty good spread but I can tell you now that from experience there will be sectors that get many many more spawnings than others and I'm not talking about OB or PE. As I've said I think you can have an influence on spawning by where you are on the map. You can prove this by parking up in a sector of space where none of your own factories are and letting the game run. Then do it while you park up in a sector thats surrounded by your own property. You'll see a big differece in the number of ships lost.

[number6]

A shorter way to check the randomness perhaps is after there is a spawn, load a previously saved game and see if it happens again.

I tend to think it is quite random, from my limited experience. One time when I was leaving my SSP in KE in my Pegasus, I saw a large cluster spawn very close by. I also had my Bayamon dock there as well, so I said, screw this, I'll reload and then launch in the Bayamon instead and try to help mop those guys up before they do any damage. Reloaded, launched the Bayamon, and nothing happened. I waited around a few minutes in SETA and it never happened.