[Bonus Plugin] Group Management System (GMS)

[Puruco]

Moggy: I have a flet of 1 carrier, 2 destroyers and severals m6 & 7's. All have jumpdrives and ecells. If the leader (M1) jump, they all jump with him with this script?

[jlehtone]

This script does not actually affect the jumping in any way. Other ships in the group escort the leader just like you can set ships to escort other ships with stock commands. In fact they do run the very stock commands. And stock escort commands make the escorts jump as their leader jumps. Unfortunately, the stock jumping routine for BigShips has couple flaws. But Moggy has an unsigned fix for that, don't you?

[teladianium]

FWIW, I tried -n and -null but they both asked for three numeric inputs and a ship type, this didn't fix the problem - i.e. to disable the group command.

Then tried -unset and 0 0 0 and this worked.

Now I'm back claiming ships and almost have enough for my Python, just haven't decided on a name for it...

I didn't check the forum earlier otherwise I might have tried moggys fix.

[jlehtone]

I've now got all set up for the first combat test after the BP release. Four Groups, all number 6. In lack of imagination, the fleetnames are 'Blue', 'Cyan', 'Dora', and 'Emil'. Centaur lead and four Nova Vanguards in each, 50/50 Protect/Attack. Test target: XI. Will do single 'GHK Escorts Lauch Missile' (Typhoon) at each K, and then issue 'GHK Attack All Enemies'.

Mission complete. Took only 2 hours and 33 minutes ingame. Rammed one Nova myself, rammed another so bad that Xenon managed to nail it, and one Centaur had a rendervouz with rocks.

But GMS, all as expected. The initial GHK Typhoon assault was quite successful, although one Typhoon warhead collided with a Nova and several assumedly with asteroid.

Occasionally, during a fight, some ships wander off. When they no longer see enemies in their scanners (I had Duplex on Novas and Triplex in Centaurs), they just 'Idle'. This includes particularly the 'Attack target of Leader' ships. About 4-5 times I had to coarse them back to action. I did that using the GMS "Attack target of Leader" command, telling every escort to "Protect". That called the lost souls back into formation. At first I did reset them again 50/50 to Attack/Protect but later did not bother.

The helper was Paranid, so there was an all-BPSG Oddy around. To keep it away, I did let some Xenons to wander around. For that, "GHK Protect me" hotkey was the tool. That called the Groups back to formation with me. A bit after next batch of Xenon I released the groups again with "GHK Attack all enemies".

GMS and GHK definitely work for me.


@teladianium: Pausing the GMS command means that the ships is still formally a group-member, although it does not activate the default command nor auto-refuel. Events like loss of group leader, setup of another group, or GHK commands will still treat it as group-member. That may be good, or may be confusing. But yes, it does solve the problem of your ride taking a hike the moment you fancy a stroll outside.

[ek3515809]

I am using the new Xtended mod, if the leader uses jumpdrive, will the rest use it too? does this work with point to point jumpdrive?
I noticed that if you set a ship to follow or protect you it doesnt jump after you. if it is a wingman, it does.
but you can't make capital ships wingman, so how do I make them use the jumpdrive?

[moggy2]

I am using the new Xtended mod, if the leader uses jumpdrive, will the rest use it too? does this work with point to point jumpdrive?
I noticed that if you set a ship to follow or protect you it doesnt jump after you. if it is a wingman, it does.
but you can't make capital ships wingman, so how do I make them use the jumpdrive?

Better ask the the Xtended Mod.

This script doesn't change the default behavior for jumping, but what you describe is not correct for Vanilla.

[ek3515809]

okay, thanks!

[Reginald Barclay]

Great!
Just a question it is not possible to have graphic interface for manage group? (like interface with R key)

[Sandalpocalypse]

Bug: If I name a group, say, "Knight %snum", the leader ship will be "Knight Lead" with 2 spaces.

[moggy2]

by design

" Lead" has an extra space before it to ensure that it's listed above the numbered group ships.

[Sandalpocalypse]

Ahhh, i see. Clever.

[Laureati]

Hi moggy,

Congrats on getting on the bonus pack. I wanted to check something with you. Does the group management system work only for the player-owned ships or can the NPC AI access it as well.

I'm asking because I'm working on an AL fleet script, where NPC (e.g. Argon military) fleets restock on ammo for their patrols - as well as do other things.

[moggy2]

the ai doesn't use gms.

It would probably work on the ai. There might be a bit of a performance hit though, other than that I can't think of a reason why it wouldn't work.

[Laureati]

Thanks,

Hope you don't mind if I go through it to see what I can use for my fleets idea.

[Sandalpocalypse]

One of my ships refuses to be -unset or -nulled. Any solution? It's stuck as a leader; it inherited it when its previous leader died.

I can't upload the save without some difficulty, my x3 computer doesnt have web access atm.

[Sandalpocalypse]

Another two occasions on which an inherited leader refuses to be Nulled or Unset.

i dun want busters leading my patrol flights xD

I also noticed that Group Carrier Commands overwrites some LV's cheat scripts cheats in the General list when I use it. It might just be too many commands in the general menu...

[ezra-r]

Im having a few problems or Im not smart enough to use this.

I moved 10 ships I want in one group to an Unknown Sector, then I have run the group command from my ship.

The ships I brought are my M7, 3 M2 , 4 M6, 3 M1's.

Group Name: Main Fleet
Group Number: 1
Number of Ships: 11
Type of Ships: Ships

At the end only 6 ships got added to my group called Main Fleet (1).

What are the cases in which some ships wont be added? What do I have to select to make the script select all at once in one group?

[jlehtone]

Which ships refused to join, and were they running some command at the time? Your input seems correct.


BTW, I would not make one group from ships like that.

[ezra-r]

Which ships refused to join, and were they running some command at the time? Your input seems correct.


BTW, I would not make one group from ships like that.

so ships running commands wont join the group?

The pirate reaver (M2), and a Xenon J which was attacking ships didnt join.

Why is it a bad group? I want them to jump to protect me on a very difficult mission I dont want to give them separate orders but to react all to the same orders I give.

[jlehtone]

First, no matter how you tell them to jump, you better have this fix or equivalent.

In Group, you tell the Lead do things. The rest simply "Protect Lead" or "Attack target of Lead". Even single M2 (on attack run) spends much time on collision avoidance. Other M2's on escort of it even in non-combat situation are already rather unnerving and hapless.

Don't make personal ship part of Group, you lose tactical possibilities. Besides, "Protect me" and "Attack my target" setups are stock commands.

You could create three groups, each with the same group number, and M2 as Lead. Then you would have three ships to receive your commands, and each would have escorts. Sure, you cannot tell them to jump with one keypress, but BigShips wont jump simultaneously anyway. You can quite quickly tell each to "Jump to me", and once in sector issue combat commands.