Follow orders - please follow **** orders

[pref]

there are times you want a direct order to override, and times you don't. The situation is anything but cut and dry but the current approach is a better option than having direct commands ALWAYS overriding.

So can you say an example when instead of executing your order immediately, you want the ship to go dock and instantly undock and execute your order?

[ubuntufreakdragon]

There are many community fixes, testet, working and ready to port to the vanilla game but Egosoft tried to make their own versions and utterly failed.
I wrote one of these fixes for station-based traders.(no more selling 1 energy cell)

[Sam L.R. Griffiths]

there are times you want a direct order to override, and times you don't. The situation is anything but cut and dry but the current approach is a better option than having direct commands ALWAYS overriding.

So can you say an example when instead of executing your order immediately, you want the ship to go dock and instantly undock and execute your order?

You are over simplifying the issue in play - there is a clear workaround for your complaint as I have highlighted.

To answer your question though, there are tactics that could justify it: tagging a target, luring it back to the carrier/fleet/station via the dock command (follow and fly to position/object do not work well enough as alternatives), then engaging the target again when the lured target is in the desired kill zone.

[GCU Grey Area]

there are times you want a direct order to override, and times you don't. The situation is anything but cut and dry but the current approach is a better option than having direct commands ALWAYS overriding.

Agree with that. Really like the queued orders system in X4 &, for example, being able to set my destroyers to attack every enemy capital on the sector map in a specific sequence (normally closest first). This approach would not work nearly as well if direct orders automatically countermanded previous orders.

Think what we need is an extra section in the orders menu specifically for priority orders - i.e. duplicating the orders as we currently have (fly to, attack, etc), but using them from the priority section puts them at the top of the queue, whereas using the orders from the standard orders section puts them at the bottom of the queue (as they do now).

[Sam L.R. Griffiths]

There are many community fixes, testet, working and ready to port to the vanilla game but Egosoft tried to make their own versions and utterly failed.
I wrote one of these fixes for station-based traders.(no more selling 1 energy cell)

I think that is besides the point really - we have had a competent and effective modding community for the X-games in general for quite a long time BUT Egosoft seems to have lowered their standards and that is not a good thing.

Kudos to yourself and the other active modders for X4 though, can't wait till the mods start appearing on the Steam Workshop - I do not touch the Nexus mod site at all (neither as a modder nor a user).

[pref]

You are over simplifying the issue in play - there is a clear workaround for your complaint as I have highlighted.

No, i'm not, you were just joining in the discussion by taking the last sentence out of context and trying to have an argument for the sake of arguing.

To answer your question though, there are tactics that could justify it: tagging a target, luring it back to the carrier/fleet/station via the dock command (follow and fly to position/object do not work well enough as alternatives), then engaging the target again when the lured target is in the desired kill zone.

That is a most stupid example, you don't want your ship to dock in this case. Again just argue for the sake of arguing.

Generally any default behaviour is an indefinite action, and direct orders are commands you want to happen soon.
You don't want your AT to go on autotrading and forget your order if you issue an equipment change or fly to or whatever else, you don't want your destroyer to go on defending pos when you give a direct attack order, and you don't want your ship to dock and wait when you issue any command.
Sometimes it makes sense to preserve the current last order issued by the set behaviour sometimes not - but generally without this distinction its best if any direct order overrides any commands generated by behaviours.

Really like the queued orders system in X4 &, for example, being able to set my destroyers to attack every enemy capital on the sector map in a specific sequence (normally closest first). This approach would not work nearly as well if direct orders automatically countermanded previous orders.

Those are not orders which result from a behaviour. Manually issued commands are a different topic.

[letsplay]

Basically, I would settle for being able (have the option) to tell a ship what it _must_ do, whatever the subsequent consequencs.
(Think this is usually referred to as an 'order' in military parlance.).

Maybe a check box next to the current instruction that simply means do what I say now, without delay or deviation ?

[radcapricorn]

Generally any default behaviour is an indefinite action, and direct orders are commands you want to happen soon.
You don't want your AT to go on autotrading and forget your order if you issue an equipment change or fly to or whatever else, you don't want your destroyer to go on defending pos when you give a direct attack order, and you don't want your ship to dock and wait when you issue any command...

I agree, current behavior seems very weird. I haven't gotten that far into the game yet, but already can tell. Just this morning I sent my ship to mine some hydrogen. Shortly after, it finishes the order and contacts me. I'm in the middle of something so I tell them to "Wait for new orders". Few minutes later, I open map and tell them to dock at station. I.e. I give those "new orders". They don't move. I open the behavior tab, and sure enough, "Mine" is still there, it's "executing", and it's above the dock order. I can only imagine how frustrating it must be with a fleet of warships.

[pref]

There are many community fixes, testet, working and ready to port to the vanilla game but Egosoft tried to make their own versions and utterly failed.
I wrote one of these fixes for station-based traders.(no more selling 1 energy cell)

Fail, or don't even try really often.. like how come in an economy simulator you have no way to set up ware/resource flow between your assets.
As if the challenge should be playing on the map all times and setting up the same trade runs every minute.

That's even harder to grasp then having the same bugs since release like ships wandering off from defend pos or traders getting stuck with full cargo because they cannot handle a failed trade.

Thanks for the effort with fixing things btw.. hope the stability patch works and when mods get upgraded to 2.x i hope i can have some X4 time again.

[Sam L.R. Griffiths]

Generally any default behaviour is an indefinite action, and direct orders are commands you want to happen soon.
…
Those are not orders which result from a behaviour. Manually issued commands are a different topic.

Nope - no both counts, current default behaviour is essentially just an automated direct order generator that operates in the absence of any other orders - this is a fair and reasonable approach.

Direct orders should NEVER automatically and universally take precedent over completing ANY queued order chain (regardless of origin) since there could be consequences in other areas - especially when talking about station subordinates, but can apply in other cases too.

As highlighted already, there is the option to cancel any and all existing queued orders for the case where you need/expect an order to be executed as a matter of priority.

As for your accusations against me of arguing for the sake of it, cut the personal element - I disagree with your assertions which are flawed in the extreme.

Under the current order issuing scheme, any direct orders already take precedence over the default behaviours BUT any already issued orders whether manually injected or otherwise have equal validity and precedence.

No-one is saying the order execution behaviours are not flawed, but the current order queue principles are fair and reasonable.

[letsplay]

Except that cancelling an order only works temporaily until it is reinstated.
In my OP example almost imediately. So many 'red' targets that the auto attack order was continually reinstated.
For each ship that had gone astray.
Almost impossible to extract ships from their self-imposed path to destruction - let alone release them for my intended purpose.

An order should be an order, not a request.

[radcapricorn]

Direct orders should NEVER automatically and universally take precedent over completing ANY queued order chain (regardless of origin) since there could be consequences in other areas - especially when talking about station subordinates, but can apply in other cases too.

Yes, yes they ALWAYS should override any current behavior. That's what direct orders do, in real life, and in any sensible RTS. If I wanted to queue up orders, well... the common UI for that existed since mid-90s at the very least.

As highlighted already, there is the option to cancel any and all existing queued orders for the case where you need/expect an order to be executed as a matter of priority.

Yes, very convenient when you have an urgent order.

As for your accusations against me of arguing for the sake of it, cut the personal element - I disagree with your assertions which are flawed in the extreme.

I second pref's assessment. It's not the first time either.

Under the current order issuing scheme, any direct orders already take precedence over the default behaviours BUT any already issued orders whether manually injected or otherwise have equal validity and precedence.

No, they do not. An order issued after a command to "wait for orders" should bloody well take precedence. It seems you're not very well acquainted with what it is exactly you're trying to defend here.

[graphicboy]

*facepalm*

If back in X3, after telling a ship to do something, it didn't... I'd have uninstalled and never looked back.

"I don't care what you're doing. Go do -this-."

[Hornet108]

Boys & Girls

Lets cut through the he said she said eh? I think we can all agree the current commands and orders system and the AI and wings is very broken and needs fixing. No?

[Alan Phipps]

What Hornet said. (OK, that's a weak joke but let's do it anyway.)

[Sam L.R. Griffiths]

...

Like pref, you are over simplifying things and also turning the discussion personal - I am not arguing for the sake of it, I disagree with yours and pref's position regarding direct orders in general. I never argue for the sake of it - period.

IME the move to and wait, dock and wait, cancel all orders and wait ALL do exactly what they say on the tin - the default behaviour does not come into play.

The ONLY issue is that there are default reactionary orders which have global and per ship settings. These behaviours seem to override any and all other behaviours which is fair and reasonable given they are dealing with emergent incidents that may require an immediate response (these have three settings: comply, escape, attack, and wait). The escape behaviour does seem to be at least partly broken since a direct dock at station order seems to escape more effectively than the escape order itself. The wait behaviour I would expect to be just a case of the AI continuing current orders until told otherwise (e.g. in answer to a notification of the incident from them).

Direct ship orders are not the same thing as immediate orders, they are just orders that you can add to the queue which is normally short (0-3 commands) unless you have queued orders manually. In the case of the incidental interuptions, normally orders resume without hicup IME - thus far I have had ONLY one particular station trader out of several that exhibited the behaviour I described earlier but even in that case it was not impossible nor overly time consuming to workaround the issue. I have had several other traders report pirate harassment and not have an issue with it.

I get it that some want immediate orders to be implemented but that should not be done at the expense of the current queued order system. The AI does not normally queue orders after a manually injected order in a queue so a compromise would be for Egosoft to add an additional "Execute Last Order" right-click menu option that would automatically clear all queued orders but the last one.

Right-click/Map-click menu orders should not however be changed to bypass the order queue system.

[Sam L.R. Griffiths]

I think we can all agree the current commands and orders system and the AI and wings is very broken and needs fixing. No?

Nope - not even close really.

The specific order behaviours may need rework but the general commands/orders system in itself is fine. The general concept of queuing orders is pretty much working perfectly and works well.

The only thing that needs rework is really the AI itself.

[Hornet108]

I think we can all agree the current commands and orders system and the AI and wings is very broken and needs fixing. No?

Nope - not even close really.

The specific order behaviours may need rework but the general commands/orders system in itself is fine. The general concept of queuing orders is pretty much working perfectly and works well.

The only thing that needs rework is really the AI itself.

M8 my ships every now and then just straight up stop following me when they are in my wing and just sit there. I know you want to win an argument on the internet but this is broken, no?

[ZaphodBeeblebrox]

I want the ability to issue and order and have it acted on immediately.

I want some means of issuing an order that overrides all preceding orders and is left as the only order in the queue.

Trying to control 50-60 ships in 4 different fleets by having to edit each ships order queue in the middle of a battle does not work well.

[Sam L.R. Griffiths]

I think we can all agree the current commands and orders system and the AI and wings is very broken and needs fixing. No?

Nope - not even close really.

The specific order behaviours may need rework but the general commands/orders system in itself is fine. The general concept of queuing orders is pretty much working perfectly and works well.

The only thing that needs rework is really the AI itself.

M8 my ships every now and then just straight up stop following me when they are in my wing and just sit there. I know you want to win an argument on the internet but this is broken, no?

This is not about winning an argument either - so cut the personal targeted commentary please.

What you are describing is not fundamentally down to the queuing system though, the order queuing system works fine on the whole.

Something similar to what you are describing would happen on at least some occassions in X2/X3, scripts would simply stop running and the controlled vessel(s) would sit dead in space. This rarely happened to me but from what I recall from discussions about the issue at the time CPU loading was at least part of the root cause. I should add - we are talking loading of a specific core in modern computer terms as opposed to the CPU load as a whole. It could well be a comparable issue here, a particular thread being overloaded and causing an AI processing hang for one or more entities. It could also be some kind of inter-thread dead-lock at fault but that is for Egosoft to determine really.

My overriding point being that the order queuing system is not fundamentally at fault - it is the AI for individual operations that is.