[MOD] Miscellaneous IZ Combat Tweaks

[w.evans]

No problem. ME2 is fun, especially the first time around.

Good test set-up would likely be a damaged ship owned by you that does not have an engineer, and a MICT non-combat ship, with construction urvs equipped, owned by you in the same zone. The engineer of the MICT ship should repair the damaged ship. Too bad I thought of the test set-up too late for testing last Sunday.

[Nemesis_87]

Hi, played ahwhile back and tried your mod, worked pretty good then. Just put rebirth on for a bit and tested some things, such improvement to a great/essential mod

Anyways i just updated all the old files and seems ok but not sure if its a problem

I went into battle with my arwarn and 2 tarns, Target was a Xenon I. My ship had about 30 assault drones. I set the def officer yes to both settings and the drones launched, But everytime they launched they didnt really do anything. Didnt see any missiles being launched and i think all they were trying to do was redock back on the arwarn

Maybe it has something to do with the arwarn trying to jump away due to damage?

ANy advice would be apprictiated

[w.evans]

Hey Nemesis_87, The problem with Assault URVs docking when their parent ship gets too far away was fixed with MICT v0.49. Now, they shouldn't try to dock until their target is destroyed. However, they are extremely slow, so it may look like they're not doing anything when they are, in fact, moving to range. Are you sure that they're trying to dock? (When you click on an Assault URV, does it say "Docking" or something like that?)

[Nemesis_87]

well, i reinstalled everything so pretty sure i am using the newest version

And yep, clicked on them and it said they were docking, will do some more testing though

Edit: would love to test right now but seems steam update ****** the game lol.

http://forum.egosoft.com/viewtopic.php?t=382804

[w.evans]

Edit: would love to test right now but seems steam update ****** the game lol.

http://forum.egosoft.com/viewtopic.php?t=382804

They pushed the buggy beta?! Now, that sucks.

[Nemesis_87]

Ok did some more testing, with both an arwarn and tanaris

ANyways here are my results

Sometimes with both ships the ship info states that the drones are in use, yet cannot see them

But when i did see them launch i kept an eye on them, i click on them and check my HUD

Commander: Tanaris
Command:Attack all enemies
Flying

I had my tanais fighting a xenon k so would last a fair bit of time. What happens though the drones just point at the k and do nothing

Any thoughts?

Thanks in advance

Edit:Another result i keep getting when trying with my arwarn, It boosts in an i can see only 1 drone being launched, Ship info says all 30+ are in use. I know they come out in clusters were a single one suddenly turns into a group but that dont seem to happen, It seems to just fly around rapidly for some reason and dont really do anything useful

[w.evans]

Thanks for the feedback!

I had my tanais fighting a xenon k so would last a fair bit of time. What happens though the drones just point at the k and do nothing

They're launched at 12km to target, have to get to within around 4km to launch torpedoes, and are extremely slow. By themselves, they tend to just get wiped out by hostile turret before they can even get a salvo off. Only times I've ever gotten them to firing range is if there are close-ranged capships or fighters drawing the hostile ship's fire. I find that they're worth it when they do get a salvo off, though. Really needs controlling when they're launched, however, for them to be effective.

If you're absolutely sure that they aren't moving (should be moving towards their target with those orders), or aren't firing although they're in range, I'd like to take a look at a save. No promises on when I can take a look, though, because I'm extremely short on time these days.

Edit:Another result i keep getting when trying with my arwarn, It boosts in an i can see only 1 drone being launched, Ship info says all 30+ are in use. I know they come out in clusters were a single one suddenly turns into a group but that dont seem to happen, It seems to just fly around rapidly for some reason and dont really do anything useful

Yup, they're launched one after the other, but with no delay in between (so should be around 1 millisecond delay between individual drone launches), so for all intents and purposes, they appear to be launched all at the same time and clip into each other. I guess it is possible that they'll all maneouver exactly the same, but highly unlikely. Dunno why they didn't separate when you tried it. They have always done so in testing.

[Nemesis_87]

Well, ship jumps in close and I'm pretty sure they have been within 4km, but they do get to a point were they just stop actually moving and just face the target.

[Nemesis_87]

Well after a massive number of tests i have still never seen a drone (Assault or overun) Fire a single shot, they just seem to want to launch, stand around or redock :/

Shame seeing thats this games selling point lol, Gonna completely reinstall everything and start a new game and see how it goes (hopefully i might get the same results as you)

lol tbh this mod is the sole reason why i keep coming back and giving rebirth another chance seeing it actualy makes ship combat actualy work

[Sparky Sparkycorp]

Well after a massive number of tests i have still never seen a drone (Assault or overun) Fire a single shot, they just seem to want to launch, stand around or redock :/

Shame seeing thats this games selling point lol, Gonna completely reinstall everything and start a new game and see how it goes (hopefully i might get the same results as you)

lol tbh this mod is the sole reason why i keep coming back and giving rebirth another chance seeing it actualy makes ship combat actualy work

You'll get no arguments from me regarding the awesomeness of w.evan's work

I can provide a bit of info on vanilla Overun drone behaviour though. I did some tests with them during 3.61 RC1 and they worked against capitals and stations. IIRC, they also worked against the Skunk when I was getting chased by PMC drones during the plot mission at the Tech Laboratory in Buried Treasure (cicra Rebirth 3.5x). Like drones with guns, they setup attack runs and launch their rockets at targets, bank away and repeat. They are not particularly accurate, managing to miss stationary stations with about 1/3 of salvos (...) but they didn't seem to get stuck or not work.

[Nemesis_87]

when they launch are they set to attack target or attack all enemies?

[mcaule]

Just a quick update on MICT_supp8. Got a bit of testing time in yesterday, and can verify that repairs to other ships are working.

Repairs to ships belonging to other factions is not working in the released version, but has been fixed in the version that I'm fiddling with. Will work on getting a few more things in before releasing this as a new update.

At the moment, ships do not launch construction URVs to repair other ships. Got this working on the version that I fiddle with, but have been having trouble getting them to dock after repairs are done, so will try to get that done before releasing. However, if Engineer Drone Fix is installed, the rate of repairs takes equipped construction URVs into account.

To modders, the debug log is extremely messy with MICT_supp8 installed. engineer.ai is funny in that much of it seems to have been written with the possibility of doing repairs to other entities in mind, but other parts of the script not so much. Very little error suppression written in. In particular, if a damaged ship is designated for repair, then gets destroyed, it goes through the whole script, throwing up a LOT of errors, before looking for a different target. Functionality does not otherwise look impaired, just really messy debug log. Sorry about that. Suppressing all of those errors would require modding a lot of the script and opted not to do that at the moment to keep a big chance of maintaining compatibility with other mods that modify engineer.ai.

I apologize for the extremely slow pace of the development of MICT_supp8, but I'm extremely busy at the moment and unfortunately have very little time for this little hobby. I can at least verify that MICT_supp8 works and doesn't appear to break anything.

Quick question mate, how does experiment work? I wanna try it myself, but I have almost no free time to fully test it myself, so I rely on people experience

[Sparky Sparkycorp]

when they launch are they set to attack target or attack all enemies?

Good question...I'm not sure.

I just realised that I should add that my testing was done with then launched by the Skunk whereas you were discussing ship-launched drones. Therefore my testing may not have been relevant to this discussion - sorry for that.

[Nemesis_87]

lol np, any info is appriciated

[w.evans]

question mate, how does experiment work? I wanna try it myself, but I have almost no free time to fully test it myself, so I rely on people experience

Experimental in this case means that I'm not entirely sure that it's working as it should. Sorry that this is still the case after, what has it been, three weeks? So if you want to try it out, would advise that you:

- set up a test case (a good test case with MICT_supp8 would be to have a badly damaged ship that you own in zone with no engineer on board. For most conclusive results, would advise that you get rid of the engineer BEFORE the ship gets damaged to make sure that the engineer doesn't start repairs before you fire him/her or call him/her to the Skunk.)
- SAVE YOUR GAME
- BACK-UP THIS SAVE
- install MICT_supp8
- call a MICT repair ship into the zone where you're in (a MICT repair ship would be a non-combat ship, the crew of which have ALL primary skills rated at at least 4 stars, with equipped Construction URVs. You could order the MICT repair ship to escort the damaged ship so that they'll stay close together, but not necessary.)

If it works, then the engineer of the MICT repair ship should start repairing your damaged ship, and your damaged ship should actually be repaired. After repairs are done, the engineer of the repair ship should revert to monitoring and repairing the ship that he/she is working in.

If you're satisfied, carry on. If not, uninstall MICT_supp8 (simply delete \extensions\w.e_mict\aiscripts\engineer.ai.xml), and load your save. If not satisfied, would appreciate if you would let me know, and why.

EDIT: progress report on MICT_supp8: got it so that MICT repair ships are now launching construction URVs to repair damaged ships, and construction URVs are reliably recovered afterwards. However, work on this seems to have introduced a new problem with getting engineers of MICT repair ships re-monitoring their own ships after they accomplish repairs. Once/If I get that working properly, I'll upload this update.

Don't worry, this buggy version of MICT_supp8 is not available anywhere for download.

...

when they launch are they set to attack target or attack all enemies?

Assault URVs are set to attack the capital ship or station that their parent capital ship is attacking at the moment that they are launched. However, the display will still show "attack enemies."

Other combat drones will attack a primary target, and all surface elements or fighters within a 200 meter radius around their primary target. If there are enough combat drones, these should deploy in several groups, each group going after a different target within this initial 200 meter radius.

Well after a massive number of tests i have still never seen a drone (Assault or overun) Fire a single shot, they just seem to want to launch, stand around or redock :/

One thing that you could try -- just in the interests of verifying if Assault URVs are firing, of course -- would be to change their armament. Fire up your favorite xml editor (notepad+ is ok. notepad is NOT ok and can screw up the file. If you're not sure about this, back-up the file first.) Open:

\extensions\w.e_mict\assets\units\size_xs\Macros\units_size_xs_wardrone_macro.xml

Change:

Code: Select all

props_wps_rocketlauncher_02_macro

to

Code: Select all

missilelauncher_invisible_torpedo_macro

This will have Assault URVs launch the same torpedoes as the Balor. If you also have MICT_supp1 installed, should be hard to miss the fireworks. If you also have MOCT_supp3 installed, this should increase their effective range to 24,000 meters. If they STILL do not fire, please let me know.

[mcaule]

w.evans, I'll try. Thanks for your suggestions. Keep up the good work mate

[Nemesis_87]

Cool, il give that a shot, Also is there anyway to increase the range of regular combat drones? I mean the are meant to be used for carrier warfare

[w.evans]

Cool, il give that a shot, Also is there anyway to increase the range of regular combat drones? I mean the are meant to be used for carrier warfare

Normal combat drones? In w.e_mict\aiscripts\MICT.fight.attack.object.capital.xml

Look for:

Code: Select all

<do_elseif value="this.ship.distanceto.{$dronetargets.{$i}} le 8km">

and change 8km to whatever you like.

They aren't very effective in an unsupported attack role unless launched in large numbers, though. The station drone launching code from MICT_supp4, for example, enables station-based DOs to control large swaths of space by launching lots of drones en masse against multiple targets. Thought that it makes sense with stations because they should be able to equip lots of drones and automatically try to resupply, whereas ships, with more limited supplies and resupply needing more work, use them more for targeted surgical strikes with limited aims, or for distraction in case the ship is in real danger of getting blown up.

Using ship-based drones to attack can be very effective in individual encounters, but will use up drones quickly.

[Nemesis_87]

hmm you got a point, What maybe a good idea is though is to be able to launch all drones with a command? and they can only redock when given another command to redock?

[Nemesis_87]

Also would like to add, This combined with your Epic capital shield mod are awesome, Those battles are just fun to watch