State of X4

[A2G]

it's plain impossible to move ships to relative positions.

Not my experience. While could definitely improved, it's certainly adequate for this sort of thing:
https://www.dropbox.com/s/qta0be4bs0y2u ... 1.jpg?dl=0
This was phase 2 of an attack on a Xenon SPP. Most of the station modules on the side nearest my fleet had been eliminated at that point & needed to move my ships safely around it to demolish intact modules on the far side.

Furthermore, in my 3.0 Argon game I almost completely eradicated HOP from the universe using the same tactics - trashed every single HOP station & almost every ship. By the end of it all HOP had left was a handful of building sites in Faulty Logic VII. Let them keep those, it's a horrible sector to go to war in (full of mines). Doubt I'd have been able to do this if the AI & map were quite as dreadful as you claim:
https://www.dropbox.com/s/0hpgytfc23jwt ... 1.jpg?dl=0

By the way, got a couple of workarounds for the lack of a map scale (which I'd agree should certainly be there). If you're in-sector with your fleet, target the ship or station you're planning to attack to determine range & position your forces relative to your own ship. I normally fly towards the target until I'm around 20km from it, then give orders to my ships. Often these orders will be a fly to positioned around halfway between my ship & the target (i.e. just outside L Plasma turret range), then the attack order.

An alternative approach (which works both OOS & IS) is to have a ship in the fleet running Protect Position. Generally have my carriers (which are also my fleet command ships) running Protect Position with a 20km radius. It's handy to do this anyway (automates a good chunk of the responses my fleet makes), however also means if I need an estimate of approximate distances at the map's current zoom level all I need to do is click on one of my carriers & the outline of the Protect Position zone provides a scale for the map.

Yeah the map is such an awesome tactical tool, i love the ability to manipulate units on the Z axis, how do you do that again? Oh yeah there isn't an up down on the sector plane, you get to **** around with your right mouse buttone, which is a camera orbiting a fixed point (and doing it badly). Sweet jesus.

Your Battle example, hey you do you, but it wasn't to my point, you moved a mass of ships from A to B to the target with fly and wait, and overwhelmed it when your fleet got into its range. My point was as to the utility of the interface, the map, it lacks the tools for anything other than point and click your ships on the enemy. As a tool it's awful.

[GCU Grey Area]

i love the ability to manipulate units on the Z axis, how do you do that again?

Typically I flip the map on it's side, adjust for altitude above or below ecliptic, then fan the ships out in an arc about 10km from the target, with the concave side towards the enemy. Doesn't take more than a few seconds to setup my fleet's firing line. Could be improved but what we've got is functional if a little clunky. Definitely prefer X4's approach with the queued orders system, default behaviours & attack/intercept/defend roles to the tools we had available in previous X games.

[Raylak]

i love the ability to manipulate units on the Z axis, how do you do that again?

Typically I flip the map on it's side, adjust for altitude above or below ecliptic, then fan the ships out in an arc about 10km from the target, with the concave side towards the enemy. Doesn't take more than a few seconds to setup my fleet's firing line. Could be improved but what we've got is functional if a little clunky. Definitely prefer X4's approach with the queued orders system, default behaviours & attack/intercept/defend roles to the tools we had available in previous X games.

Firstly, there is no way you are manually setting up a firing line of multiple ships or fleets within 'a few seconds'.

Second, it shouldn't be necessary to manually position a firing line as that should be the default AI attack method for capital ships. Destroyers and up should be dropping out of cruise just outside their main battery range and drifting just inside range, then holding position or strafing while firing on the target. Not dropping out within spitting distance and drifting past, then having to turn around only to get wasted before they can fire their main guns.

The downright disgraceful AI, though I'm tempted to start calling it AS for Artificial Stupidity, is just a joke so the player has to either solo, micromanage their fleet, bring overwhelming odds and hope for the best. The tools the player has to micromanage a fleet battle are at best poor, but mostly woefully inadequate, especially in any sort of larger fight. the map just becomes a jumbled cluster of ship icons overlapping as they collide into each other in real space and half of the tools immediately cease to do their role, such as formations in fleets. Formations are almost utterly meaningless as a fleet never enters cruise in a coordinated manner, despite many many space fighter games having this function in the past, and once a fleet starts fighting they ignore any formations anyway.

[rusky]

Destroyers and up should be dropping out of cruise just outside their main battery range and drifting just inside range, then holding position or strafing while firing on the target. 

That's pretty much the behaviour I'm seeing with 5 star pilots on the latest beta.

Still need some manual positioning though since the wrecks of the station modules can prevent them from fully destroying a station if you attack from only one side.

[GCU Grey Area]

Firstly, there is no way you are manually setting up a firing line of multiple ships or fleets within 'a few seconds'.

Never actually timed it, however never takes long to shift-select my destroyers, give them all a fly to at ~10km from the target, followed by the attack order, then moving the fly to orders to set up the firing line. Most of the time altitude adjustment is not needed (generally only for defence platforms which may have been hidden a significant distance above/below ecliptic), but even that extra step doesn't take long.

Second, it shouldn't be necessary to manually position a firing line as that should be the default AI attack method for capital ships. Destroyers and up should be dropping out of cruise just outside their main battery range and drifting just inside range, then holding position or strafing while firing on the target. Not dropping out within spitting distance and drifting past, then having to turn around only to get wasted before they can fire their main guns.

Ah I see - presumably you just want to be able to click on a station & it's blown up without needing any further input from the player. Would find that a bit dull personally. I rather enjoy the tactical element of setting up my forces to attack a station, deciding on the optimal approach direction, moving my ships around to give them a clear shot at intact modules, etc. Frankly not sure I'd want this automated & for enemy stations to be destroyed with a single mouse click.

The downright disgraceful AI, though I'm tempted to start calling it AS for Artificial Stupidity, is just a joke so the player has to either solo, micromanage their fleet, bring overwhelming odds and hope for the best. The tools the player has to micromanage a fleet battle are at best poor, but mostly woefully inadequate, especially in any sort of larger fight. the map just becomes a jumbled cluster of ship icons overlapping as they collide into each other in real space and half of the tools immediately cease to do their role, such as formations in fleets. Formations are almost utterly meaningless as a fleet never enters cruise in a coordinated manner, despite many many space fighter games having this function in the past, and once a fleet starts fighting they ignore any formations anyway.

Recommend using better trained pilots - it does make a difference, particularly for capital ships. For fleet battles can also recommend using Protect Position as default behaviour for the command ship. Generally have my destroyers assigned as an Attack group, along with around 1/3 of the fighters aboard the carrier. Remaining fighters are given the Intercept role. For example, this is the fleet structure I'm using in my current game:
https://www.dropbox.com/s/9vnbelfrzftxl ... 1.jpg?dl=0
Playing the game this way minimises micromanagement of fleets. As soon as an enemy ship enters the Protect Position zone the command carrier automatically gives the destroyers Attack orders. They are backed up by the Attack fighters which are essentially there to provide a distraction, drawing turret fire & preventing the enemy from using travel drive. Meanwhile the Interceptors guard the Attack fighters from enemy fighters. Works well for gate defence, though I also use this approach aggressively by dragging the Protect Position icon towards enemy fleets. Obviously can also give explicit orders to the fleet as a whole, or individual elements, as needed.

[Raylak]

Second, it shouldn't be necessary to manually position a firing line as that should be the default AI attack method for capital ships. Destroyers and up should be dropping out of cruise just outside their main battery range and drifting just inside range, then holding position or strafing while firing on the target. Not dropping out within spitting distance and drifting past, then having to turn around only to get wasted before they can fire their main guns.

Ah I see - presumably you just want to be able to click on a station & it's blown up without needing any further input from the player. Would find that a bit dull personally. I rather enjoy the tactical element of setting up my forces to attack a station, deciding on the optimal approach direction, moving my ships around to give them a clear shot at intact modules, etc. Frankly not sure I'd want this automated & for enemy stations to be destroyed with a single mouse click.

No, the strategic element should come from counter moves. So I order my destroyers to engage a station, they move to their engagement range and begin bombardment, then the enemy defence fleet comes to engage this would obviously be from a different orientation than the station, so they would be attempting to set up a firing line on one of my flanks. Without me getting involved here, I would start to take heavy losses as their fleet can all fire on mine and I don't have good shots to return fire. Now either I send in reserves to engage the enemy fleet on a flank or try to maneuver my destroyers to engage the fleet directly.

What you are describing is small scale tactical control, which is for a relatively low number of units and where the player makes the vast majority of the decisions for the unit. What I am talking about is strategic command, where the player setups up strategies for the fleets, composition, direction of attack, controlling the rate of reserves, etc, while fleet commanders make the tactical decisions of their relative position to their targets etc.

Recommend using better trained pilots - it does make a difference, particularly for capital ships. For fleet battles can also recommend using Protect Position as default behaviour for the command ship. Generally have my destroyers assigned as an Attack group, along with around 1/3 of the fighters aboard the carrier. Remaining fighters are given the Intercept role.

So with a fleet of over 800 ships I am expected to get 800 5* pilots and manually assign them to each ship before they can actually fight anything, despite needing combat to level the pilots up, well or thousands of hours of doing ****** missions for seminars.

The crew system is just downright poorly done given how older players seem to blame low rank pilots for basically everything. It outright hurts immersion because apparently every crew member we hire is just a random person with 0 training, and apparently common sense no longer exists in the future, which I suppose is realistic.

[GCU Grey Area]

So with a fleet of over 800 ships I am expected to get 800 5* pilots...

800 ships! What could you possibly need a fleet that big for? My fleet never gets even close to that size (see screenshot in my previous post for a typical example). Is the game still any fun when you've got that many ships & can steamroll anything without risk? Seems like overkill to me.

Anyway, it's really only the destroyers which need the best of the best as captains, although I do also like to give my carriers at least 4* captains if I can spare them, since they usually have a fleet command role. I find fighter pilots mostly do fine learning on the job. I do lose a few every now & then, but fighters are cheap to replace & the survivors generally get to around 2-3* relatively quickly. That's good enough for me, I don't bother providing additional training to fighter pilots unless they're about to be promoted to capital ship command.

[Y-llian]

The fact that we dont't have a mass equip command and I will have to order 100 Chimera, one by one, to go to an wharf or EQ dock to restock missiles, can be interpreted as a confirmation that the UI in the game is not exactly optimal?

The need for this functionality has been raised many times over the years, myself included. I even raised it at the virtual Gamescom last year. To my mind, this is something that would add quite a bit to the game not least, saving players from the thousand click boredom just because you want to refit your fleets. In short, we need a function where fleets can easily execute the three Rs - rearm, refit, repair - based on predefined templates.

By way of anecdote, I once decided to refit my carrier fleets because I wanted to try out new weapon configurations. It took me about two hours of sorting, grouping and clicking to get it all done. That’s not playing a game, that’s work.

I really do hope, Ego will kindly look to add this function. Hopefully, for the next DLC at least as there’s no improvements in this area in 4.10 at present.

If not, I may have to go through with my threat of writing bad poetry, lamenting on the suffering of fleet owners!

[Raylak]

I think this highlights the very different expectations players can have of a game like X. For me, I want to be sending big fleets into battle against other fleets like we see in sci fi films, half a dozen capitals deploying hundreds of fighters as protection for their bomber wings, interceptors to counter enemy bombers, medium sized support ships covering roles from anti fighter platforms to heavy torpedo boats. Essentially a much more homeworld esque method of battle.

You appear to favour small engagements dominated by a handful of big ships doing the majority of the work and a bunch of chaff to get in the way of some enemy fire.

Frankly it looks like Egosoft want X4 to appeal to both but don't want to put in the money and effort to make the game good in either aspect. I can honestly say I've spent more time fighting the games controls and mechanics than fighting enemies and empire building combined.

[A2G]

I think this highlights the very different expectations players can have of a game like X. For me, I want to be sending big fleets into battle against other fleets like we see in sci fi films, half a dozen capitals deploying hundreds of fighters as protection for their bomber wings, interceptors to counter enemy bombers, medium sized support ships covering roles from anti fighter platforms to heavy torpedo boats. Essentially a much more homeworld esque method of battle.

You appear to favour small engagements dominated by a handful of big ships doing the majority of the work and a bunch of chaff to get in the way of some enemy fire.

Frankly it looks like Egosoft want X4 to appeal to both but don't want to put in the money and effort to make the game good in either aspect. I can honestly say I've spent more time fighting the games controls and mechanics than fighting enemies and empire building combined.

This is truer than you know. Ego have always had huge ambitions for the X series, the game drips ambition. There is no other game like it regardless of theme. It is a true cross between a 4X (yeah yeah i know) and first person flight/combat game. For the Sci fi genre nerds it's holy grail territory, not only can you Picard a starship, you can Wing Admiral marshal Air chief an essentially infinite number of ships, each of whose bridge you can stand on. And in all that is the problem There are so many games rolled into one, that of course it's insanely complex to bring everything to a high bar. And the cross genre nature of the game, means the fanbase has different cliques all legitimately lobbying for what they want most in the game.

I'm a huge X fan, bought more copies of each of the games than i remember, mostly given as gifts, and will laud its brilliance to anyone who will listen, but when it falls short on aspects which are not clique goals (we got cockpits back!!!) the feet must be held to the fire. And AI and UI has to in my opinion be priority, not only for current players, but to increase ease of access to such a daunting title for newer players.

[zazie]

I find fighter pilots mostly do fine learning on the job. I do lose a few every now & then, but fighters are cheap to replace & the survivors generally get to around 2-3* relatively quickly.

What do you mean by "relatively quickly"? Has pilot-leveling been improved since 4.0?

I have stopped playing X4 after 3.10 - for one reason: lack of pilot-leveling. In my two games, ~14 IG-days the first, ~30 IG-days the second, none (=0) of my pilots ever got to 4 star (only exception: pilot from the HQ-plot, but I got him with 4 stars already). Pure Vanilla.
Just to make my point clear: In both games I wiped out the Xenon, using a bunch of about 25 Nemesis Vanguards for fighting Xenon fleets OOS (up to 3 Ks) and - in later game - 12 to 20 Oddysseus for fighting large Xenon fleet with multiple Is and/or stations. I "trained" my pilots from the beginning (as they are numbered I always know which ones to pick) with Kha'ak or other 'disturbancies' of my trading fleet, I make them collect wares after those fights, they land a lot, they travel a lot, the best/oldest have hundreds of kills - but no one ever got 4 stars.

And no: Seminars are not the solution. Giving them 'seminars' is an insult to the idea of "getting reputation and skill through piloting in fights".

[GCU Grey Area]

I find fighter pilots mostly do fine learning on the job. I do lose a few every now & then, but fighters are cheap to replace & the survivors generally get to around 2-3* relatively quickly.

What do you mean by "relatively quickly"? Has pilot-leveling been improved since 4.0?

I have stopped playing X4 after 3.10 - for one reason: lack of pilot-leveling. In my two games, ~14 IG-days the first, ~30 IG-days the second, none (=0) of my pilots ever got to 4 star (only exception: pilot from the HQ-plot, but I got him with 4 stars already). Pure Vanilla.
Just to make my point clear: In both games I wiped out the Xenon, using a bunch of about 25 Nemesis Vanguards for fighting Xenon fleets OOS (up to 3 Ks) and - in later game - 12 to 20 Oddysseus for fighting large Xenon fleet with multiple Is and/or stations. I "trained" my pilots from the beginning (as they are numbered I always know which ones to pick) with Kha'ak or other 'disturbancies' of my trading fleet, I make them collect wares after those fights, they land a lot, they travel a lot, the best/oldest have hundreds of kills - but no one ever got 4 stars.

And no: Seminars are not the solution. Giving them 'seminars' is an insult to the idea of "getting reputation and skill through piloting in fights".

Relatively quickly = within a few hours if fighting is fairly continuous, e.g. part of a fleet defending a gate, while a defence platform is built behind them. Naturally earned Pilot XP seems to top out at around 2-3* (i.e. on their own an average pilot can only be expected to attain an average level of skill). As I understand it, it's not impossible for a pilot to progress further just unlikely. Generally speaking, if you want improvement beyond 2-3* it takes training, either using seminars or at HQ if appropriate facilities have been constructed on a terraformable planet. Have not tried the latter yet though so can't comment on how effective HQ pilot training is, how long it takes, etc. Have been getting sufficient high level captains for my destroyers by seminar training high morale fighter pilots.

[Meme Turtle]

I find fighter pilots mostly do fine learning on the job. I do lose a few every now & then, but fighters are cheap to replace & the survivors generally get to around 2-3* relatively quickly.

What do you mean by "relatively quickly"? Has pilot-leveling been improved since 4.0?

I have stopped playing X4 after 3.10 - for one reason: lack of pilot-leveling. In my two games, ~14 IG-days the first, ~30 IG-days the second, none (=0) of my pilots ever got to 4 star (only exception: pilot from the HQ-plot, but I got him with 4 stars already). Pure Vanilla.
Just to make my point clear: In both games I wiped out the Xenon, using a bunch of about 25 Nemesis Vanguards for fighting Xenon fleets OOS (up to 3 Ks) and - in later game - 12 to 20 Oddysseus for fighting large Xenon fleet with multiple Is and/or stations. I "trained" my pilots from the beginning (as they are numbered I always know which ones to pick) with Kha'ak or other 'disturbancies' of my trading fleet, I make them collect wares after those fights, they land a lot, they travel a lot, the best/oldest have hundreds of kills - but no one ever got 4 stars.

And no: Seminars are not the solution. Giving them 'seminars' is an insult to the idea of "getting reputation and skill through piloting in fights".

Egosoft has designed the AI level system such that you can't get 5 start pilots(they are supposed to be very rare) but you also need those to mitigate AI unresponsiveness and dumbness. People's been complaining about bad AI, which, to a huge extent is related to arbitrary delays and range calculations based on the skill level, yet here we still are.

Egosoft, perhaps, it's the time to stop fighting your playerbase and redesign AI progression system?

[zazie]

Thanks for replies - so within that perspective nothing has changed and I will not go back to X4.

Egosoft, perhaps, it's the time to stop fighting your playerbase and redesign AI progression system?

Special thanks to that - I could not agree more.

[A2G]

Playing around with co-ordinate attack, and it does bring some semblance of order to the formation assault, when it works. Just now had an Asgard friendly fire a Syn out of existence though. And yes 5* Idiot in the Captain Chair, so Artificial Stupidity by design.

[jlehtone]

And yes 5* Idiot in the Captain Chair, so Artificial Stupidity by design.

I did lose Asgard twice. 5* Idiot in the Captain Chair, but my fleet has only one 5* -- me -- so it was Genuine.

[GCU Grey Area]

Playing around with co-ordinate attack, and it does bring some semblance of order to the formation assault, when it works. Just now had an Asgard friendly fire a Syn out of existence though. And yes 5* Idiot in the Captain Chair, so Artificial Stupidity by design.

Sounds like Coordinate still needs a bit of work before I'll trust it with my fleet. Only tried it once so far, shortly after it was introduced. It decided the optimal strategy was to launch all the unarmed M freighters full of missile parts that were aboard my carrier towards the enemy station. Not entirely sure what they were expected to do when they got there - countermanded the order as soon as I saw what was going on & haven't touched it since. Seems like I'll be waiting a bit longer & sticking with my manually organised firing lines for now.

[A2G]

And yes 5* Idiot in the Captain Chair, so Artificial Stupidity by design.

I did lose Asgard twice. 5* Idiot in the Captain Chair, but my fleet has only one 5* -- me -- so it was Genuine.

When Asgard decides to pop a fighter with its Main Battery, misses, and one shots the friendly destroyer, the fighter is zooming by, perhaps Ego should prevent Asgard using the main battery when any friendlies are in front of it.

[A2G]

Playing around with co-ordinate attack, and it does bring some semblance of order to the formation assault, when it works. Just now had an Asgard friendly fire a Syn out of existence though. And yes 5* Idiot in the Captain Chair, so Artificial Stupidity by design.

Sounds like Coordinate still needs a bit of work before I'll trust it with my fleet. Only tried it once so far, shortly after it was introduced. It decided the optimal strategy was to launch all the unarmed M freighters full of missile parts that were aboard my carrier towards the enemy station. Not entirely sure what they were expected to do when they got there - countermanded the order as soon as I saw what was going on & haven't touched it since. Seems like I'll be waiting a bit longer & sticking with my manually organised firing lines for now.

Yeah it's still idiotic with carriers, but can form an organised Destroyer assault.

[A2G]

Does the AI have rally points for fleet assembly? It doesn't look like it, i constantly watch Argon send solo Destroyers to fight an Asgard. What is the logic behind that? Surely Ai should have assemblies when an Enemy outmatches them.