Turrets on "Defend" - It appears I have a different understanding of the word! - Improvements in a future build

[photomankc]

Curious if this is other people's experience?

Ship is Ides Vanguard, I have two Pulse Laser turrets MK2 installed. Since my starter Discoverer is sitting in the warf stripped down to let Bo-whatever-ta blow it up at the anomaly and my new Nova is sitting in the never ending queue of ships waiting on @$#%ing engine parts, I decide to run some trades and try to explore more map in my slow-ass transport to maybe come across a factory selling the freaking things. Mostly I keep in travel-drive and whiz past the enemies that appear to infest every square inch of space. My turrets were both set on "defend" so my assumption was they would open up on things that attack me and land hits.

Finally a Khak thingy lands some hits as I whiz by and drops me out of travel and proceeds to maul my ship while the turrets sit by quietly doing nothing. I tried turning a bit with it (as best a brick in space can turn) and when I was facing it, still no fire. Turn to the left and right hoping to give the turret a better view, no dice. Now my shields are ate up, can't boost away aaaannnndddd an Xenon M joins in the fun. I guess Khak and Xenon are buddies on the schoolyard bully circuit. I frantically switched to "Attack Target" and finally after a delay the turrets engage the M and seconds later... I'm dead.

So is that aspect broken? I don't like running around with "attack all" or "attack target" set since there can be collateral damage but after that experience I left them on "Attack Target" and they do a decent job of tearing up S ships that attack alone so a reasonable defense to the lone pirate or xenon fighter. Is "Defend" actually another word for "Deactivate"?

[Mysterious Mr. M]

Turrets and AI are overall dysfunctional in the current game. The only turret command that works 'most' of the time is the "attack all" command, but even that command falls flat in specific situations.
I made a video that showcases a number of problems including turrets not targeting enemies or stop firing for no reason.

[photomankc]

Wow.... that's.... just sad.


Okay, so it's not some goofed up setting, they just don't work very well at all. That stinks. The combat in AP was actually working nicely. Turrets were useful and generally did the right things. That defend behavior seems pretty hard to excuse. How was it not noticed that they will let something shoot you to destruction without response? I guess I'll just have to stick with "Attack all" and let come what may if I'm piloting a ship with turrets.



And what was the deal with the Paranid guy surfing space on an engine?

[Mysterious Mr. M]

Wow.... that's.... just sad.


Okay, so it's not some goofed up setting, they just don't work very well at all. That stinks. The combat in AP was actually working nicely. Turrets were useful and generally did the right things. That defend behavior seems pretty hard to excuse. How was it not noticed that they will let something shoot you to destruction without response? I guess I'll just have to stick with "Attack all" and let come what may if I'm piloting a ship with turrets.

I highly doubt Egosoft was unaware of these issues. Given the state of the game it is quite clear the game was launched far too prematurely. As to why they did so, i can only speculate it might be related to their financial situation.

And what was the deal with the Paranid guy surfing space on an engine?

For some reason when you try to claim a s/m ship with a boarding pod the marine will be riding on top of it...
And the messed up UI happened after i had my ship fly away in travel mode for a while. I needed to get away form some hostiles to record the scene in peace.

The alternate explanation is that the Paranid are demon worshippers. That would explain why their middle eye does a creepy 180 when talking to them, or why their destroyed stations magically regenerate in an instant.

[radcapricorn]

...That would explain why their middle eye does a creepy 180 when talking to them...

That's not exactly a middle eye

[j.harshaw]

Could you please provide a save where this is happening? Would help identify the particular case where the turrets don't fire.

[Mysterious Mr. M]

Could you please provide a save where this is happening? Would help identify the particular case where the turrets don't fire.

Though i don't have a save with the exact same issue with the "defend" command as the OP, i do have two saves with similar turret related issues as shown in my previous video link.
https://drive.google.com/open?id=1B0KYb ... 1ph8_DzdDy
Save 003 has the issue where the turrets just wobble and won't shoot when selecting the xenon station right in front while using "attack my current enemy" command.
Save 004 turrets stop firing at a targeted surface element after a few seconds. Deselecting and reselecting the surface element causes the turrets to fire for several seconds and then stop again. This also is while using the "attack my current enemy" command.

Though unrelated, save 003 also has the another bug where the ship changes orientation when using the ship interaction or map menu while the ship is looking almost directly down.

[blin25]

Turrets in protection mode. They do not immediately react to the attack. It is necessary that the enemies would hit several times. And if there is little shield on the ship, then this is the end of the ship. It was also mentioned on the forum or wiki that the presence of crew members on board can affect the work of turrets.

[photomankc]

Could you please provide a save where this is happening? Would help identify the particular case where the turrets don't fire.

The original situation occurred (of course) two hours after my last save. If I run into it again I’ll save right in the moment and get it to you. Thanks for the interest in fixing things.

[photomankc]

Turrets in protection mode. They do not immediately react to the attack. It is necessary that the enemies would hit several times. And if there is little shield on the ship, then this is the end of the ship. It was also mentioned on the forum or wiki that the presence of crew members on board can affect the work of turrets.

They knocked out 1/2 my shield and the turrets were still offline, grey or whatever. Once I switched modes and they finally engaged they were doing fine so the crew is fine, they also do fine when left on attack all. Nearly killing me off on max shielding for an M ship at mk3 and still not reacting is useless.

I see no reason to wait on multiple hits from a foe ship. It makes sense to wait for a sustained attack before taking a friend to foe, but letting a foe hammer you to the point you are unsurvivable is not a useful setting for a ships defensive turrets.

[j.harshaw]

Could you please provide a save where this is happening? Would help identify the particular case where the turrets don't fire.

The original situation occurred (of course) two hours after my last save. If I run into it again I’ll save right in the moment and get it to you. Thanks for the interest in fixing things.

That would be much appreciated, thanks.

@Mysterious, will take a look at your saves as well. However, while i realize that this isn't the support forum, it would be very easy to lose track of your reports if they're lumped together with this one. Will try not to.

[j.harshaw]

Save 003 has the issue where the turrets just wobble and won't shoot when selecting the xenon station right in front while using "attack my current enemy" command.
Save 004 turrets stop firing at a targeted surface element after a few seconds. Deselecting and reselecting the surface element causes the turrets to fire for several seconds and then stop again. This also is while using the "attack my current enemy" command.

Fixed both. Thank you very much for the saves. They saved quite a lot of time. Fixes should be in a future update.

Note that the issue illustrated in Save 003 (turrets set to attack my current enemy not firing in certain orientations) appears to be specific to when a station is targeted.

[photomankc]

Thanks for the continued work to resolve these issues!

In classic computer-problem style, when I next tried to recreate my issue It didn't happen. I was in a claimed Peregrine and running the turrets on defend, just to see if they would do it again and deliberately picked a fight. Nope, the moment I was hit they all opened up on the attacker beautifully. Even seemed to switch from target to target very well. The next Ides I build I'll fly personally to see if it was just that ship.

[Mysterious Mr. M]

Note that the issue illustrated in Save 003 (turrets set to attack my current enemy not firing in certain orientations) appears to be specific to when a station is targeted.

It is not specific to stations, it happens to capital ships as well. Here is a save where the bottom plasma turrets on my Odysseus won't properly target the Xenon K right in front of it with both 'attack all enemies' and 'attack my current enemy' commands:
https://drive.google.com/open?id=1JdSG2 ... KlxvaHK7eD

[Scoob]

Has anyone else experienced the related issue where turrets are firing just fine when an NPC Captain is in control, but the moment the [player takes the helm all turret stop firing, and don't resume until the player cedes control once more?

Scoob.

[Imperial Good]

Finally a Khak thingy lands some hits as I whiz by and drops me out of travel and proceeds to maul my ship while the turrets sit by quietly doing nothing. I tried turning a bit with it (as best a brick in space can turn) and when I was facing it, still no fire. Turn to the left and right hoping to give the turret a better view, no dice. Now my shields are ate up, can't boost away aaaannnndddd an Xenon M joins in the fun. I guess Khak and Xenon are buddies on the schoolyard bully circuit. I frantically switched to "Attack Target" and finally after a delay the turrets engage the M and seconds later... I'm dead.

It is because the encounter system that teleports them to near you explicitly instructs them to attack you. Same goes for the odd SCA pirate.