Why not use missiles? Resupply

[Caesar999]

Resupplying supply ships is all but broken. I get the feeling Egosoft wants to stick with a "cool"/cinematic style resupplying of these ships but this may be at the cost of it being used at all given the current method is entirely impractical. I just watched my resupply ship try and dock with a freighter I have assigned to trade with it indefinitely. I grabbed my carrier (head of fleet), recalled all subordinates, and sent it two sectors away to destroy a Kha'ak hive. As of now the hive is almost destroyed and my supply ship is still trying to dock with the freighter, back where the fleet started. I have two freighters assigned to this so once it's done with this first one - if it ever is done - it will start this process all over again with the second one.

If EgoSoft is wondering why players don't use missiles look no further than the above. I know I won't any longer. It's bad enough having to tolerate this to support repairs.

My suggestion: Forget this method of having the two ships perfectly align with each other and just have them get close to one another and have drones moves the cargo back and forth. Drones are already being used but why does this perfect alignment need to happen?

Here's my save: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1FwT4Ik ... sp=sharing
Note my carrier/fleet (most of it anyway) is in Antigone Memorial while the supply ship is goofing around in Getsu Fune.

[donzi]

Yes, AUX are not working as intended and will be corrected hopefully soon enough.

In the mean time, maybe assigning S or M ships to buy for the AUX and making a rule to only buy from them?

I kind of shelved the AUX for a bit, and don't have that much exp with them anyhow, but have begun to use them again since 7.00 released to learn a bit more about them despite L/XL <-> aux docking probs.

I think the docking alignment is valuable. XR and being side by side I guess wasn't suitable for X4, but I'd rather have my drones travel distance short as possible and most resistent to destruction or susceptable to drone behaviour anomalies.

[GCU Grey Area]

I handle resupply of carriers & auxiliaries manually. Just don't like the idea of automating this & letting the ships decide for themselves when to leave the fleet to get missile parts etc & what route they'll take (concerned they might decide that their idea of the 'optimal' route might take them right through the middle of an enemy fleet). Instead I have given my main fleet a baggage train of L freighters nominally operating on Defend orders (for the fleet's auxiliary). Each of these freighters holds 3k Missile Components, 3k Smart Chips & 18k Energy Cells - mixed loads so only a single ship needs to dock to top up everything needed to make missiles. Each of those freighters also has an S ship assigned to it (Defend/Docked) so that in an emergency I can transfer small amounts of cargo between ships much faster than waiting for the L freighters themselves to dock with carrier or aux. When those freighters are empty I manually order them to fly to an appropriate station to restock, via a route I choose for them.

[Caesar999]

Yes, AUX are not working as intended and will be corrected hopefully soon enough.

In the mean time, maybe assigning S or M ships to buy for the AUX and making a rule to only buy from them?

I kind of shelved the AUX for a bit, and don't have that much exp with them anyhow, but have begun to use them again since 7.00 released to learn a bit more about them despite L/XL <-> aux docking probs.

I think the docking alignment is valuable. XR and being side by side I guess wasn't suitable for X4, but I'd rather have my drones travel distance short as possible and most resistent to destruction or susceptable to drone behaviour anomalies.

Even if it takes a literal hour to do so? The AI pilots simply cannot do it properly. You said you haven't used Aux ships much so I assume you haven't noticed this, but I made that suggestion assuming it's just too difficult to get the AI to do this maneuver correctly - in which case it's better to just do it another way.

[Caesar999]

I handle resupply of carriers & auxiliaries manually.

As do I and I'm sure everyone else right now, but I think it's unfortunate this is necessary. It's more fun to focus on the warfare than the mundane aspects of supply, in my opinion anyway. And incidentally, I don't think I'm alone in my opinion which is why most people use Blast Mortars or Plasma Cannons on their bombers instead of torpedoes and missiles.

[Koizuki]

I do use some missiles, but not everything uses them, and it's for 3 main reasons.

One is simply that it's tough to control how missiles are used in a fleet setting; you end up having to use a singular type of missile on ships most of the time because the AI is not smart enough to use "appropriate" missile types against different targets. Beyond that, they will just keep firing them until the enemies are dead, even if what they've already launched is sufficient, especially when it's a whole squadron of fighters. I tried equipping a squad of 24 fighters with Interceptor missiles once, and the moment a Xenon M appeared the screen was absolutely filled with over 100 missiles chasing the poor thing, most of them obviously being wasted.

The next problem is, of course, the resupply issues with Carriers vs Aux ships, though that is still workable if you are aware of its intricacies and quirks.

The final problem is simply the amount of resources you need to sustain larger fleets. As explained above, a lot of missiles get wasted during each engagement, so on top of how much some missiles cost to create (Torpedoes, mainly) we also have some that are needlessly expended, and both need to be re-equipped, and I don't try to generate that many missile components because then I feel locked to using missiles constantly; else you end up with a massive overflow of them that the NPC economy can't absorb.

So for me, I produce a modest amount of missile components; enough that the NPC economy can absorb them if I'm not using them, but otherwise I use just enough missiles to consume what I produce in a reasonable timeframe.

Edit:
I do also make use of closed loop economy, but not everywhere; else 100% of my missile components go unused.

[donzi]

A) In the mean time, maybe assigning S or M ships to buy for the AUX and making a rule to only buy from them?

B) I think the docking alignment is valuable. XR and being side by side I guess wasn't suitable for X4, but I'd rather have my drones travel distance short as possible and most resistent to destruction or susceptable to drone behaviour anomalies.

Even if it takes a literal hour to do so? The AI pilots simply cannot do it properly. You said you haven't used Aux ships much so I assume you haven't noticed this, but I made that suggestion assuming it's just too difficult to get the AI to do this maneuver correctly - in which case it's better to just do it another way.

Do you mean 'it' being the S or M ship as a tender? ..L/XL ship allignment?

Part of my use with the AUX along the beta 1 to release path did reveal a bit of trouble with supply via assigned sub ships to the AUX and the AUX doing resupply directly. I posted a bit about that here during the beta.

I'm guessing IS and OOS L/XL <-> AUX in 6.20 was workable. Going in-sector or live stream as a nudge for now to get that sort of docking done is a drag, slow and strange.

Although the NPC 'ai', autopilot, etc often is not as efficient as the player, it does help in a lot of ways and I hope the basic AUX + L/XL action get's useful via NPC. I see the NPC factions having the same trouble and sometimes go in-sector just to get their own AUX able to recieve delivery or L/XL repair.

[Falcrack]

IMO, the key deficiency of resupply ships and carriers is the inadequate cargo space. If they had like 5 times their current cargo capacity, they could resupply a meaningful number of fighters before needing to get resupplied themselves.

[Scoob]

AUX Ships aren't working properly? I wonder if that's linked to the Ship Maintenance Bay issue I reported (with evidence) during the Beta? In summary, I used to attach an S/M Ship Maintenance Bay to some of my Defence Platforms - namely those on Border sectors with the Xenon. I'd keep these station well supplied from my own economy, and assign S and M-Class Subordinates to the station in a defence role. Prior to v7.0, I'd see the subordinates replenish missiles and countermeasures as well as repair their hull as needed, all automatically based on supply settings. In v7.0 - throughout the Beta and now - this simply does not work. I abandoned a long-term game as my Maintenance Bays simply don't work any more, yet they were great prior to v7.0, repairing / resupplying any subordinates to that station, AND my passing Traders would call in for the occasional repair too. Bonus was that Friendly Factions would also use the facilities, making me money - in some instances a LOT of money.

I used to use Carriers a lot, I still do, but keeping them supplied cannot be automated - I know we can send them to go shopping themselves, but that's just silly - so I don't use missiles on their subordinates so I don't have to keep manually topping them up. Support ships did work, but I previously found the combined Defence Platform / Maintenance Bay to work so very well.

Like I said, I reported this during the Beta, provided numerous saves, but it never attracted any Dev issue. Perhaps they ignored it because it is linked to the Support ship issue? I assumed they've acknowledged that one, as it's a bit of a game breaker if they don't work.

All that aside, Carriers should absolutely be able to use a subordinate M-Class Trader (for example) to supply the needed wares. They also need more storage. Having to manually do this is silly. I really hope this gets changed eventually, but I'd settle for Maintenance Bays being fixed and Support ships working properly.

[Caesar999]

Do you mean 'it' being the S or M ship as a tender? ..L/XL ship allignment?

L/XL ships. Using a M or S ship will likely be faster but they die a lot easier. Also, even if you use S or M to resupply the aux ship, there's no getting around your carrier having to dock with the aux ship if you want things to work automatically.

Although the NPC 'ai', autopilot, etc often is not as efficient as the player, it does help in a lot of ways and I hope the basic AUX + L/XL action get's useful via NPC. I see the NPC factions having the same trouble and sometimes go in-sector just to get their own AUX able to recieve delivery or L/XL repair.

Actually this problem is just as bad IS and OOS. The L/XL ship will just keep circling around the aux ship trying to line up perfectly. If they don't get it right they make another circle. It goes on ad nauseam. There is no reason whatsoever for this ridiculous requirement to line up perfectly. The AI is never going to be able to do it without cheating (which I would be totally fine with - like they cheat at going through gates). I don't care how it's fixed so long as it gets fixed. Or maybe I just don't use carriers. Seems a shame though.

[Caesar999]

I used to use Carriers a lot, I still do, but keeping them supplied cannot be automated

Actually it can, if aux ships could dock correctly with L/XL ships. The aux ships get resupplied by transports you assign to the aux ship (in a combat zone ideally this would be L freighters for surivability, plus you could load up the freights with supplies ahead of time and just have it feed it to the aux ship as needed). The carrier will resupply from the aux ship. The problem is what's explained above - the aux ship can't trade correctly with L/XL ships (it tries - but just fails).

[Repli]

I used to use Carriers a lot, I still do, but keeping them supplied cannot be automated

Actually it can, if aux ships could dock correctly with L/XL ships. The aux ships get resupplied by transports you assign to the aux ship (in a combat zone ideally this would be L freighters for surivability, plus you could load up the freights with supplies ahead of time and just have it feed it to the aux ship as needed). The carrier will resupply from the aux ship. The problem is what's explained above - the aux ship can't trade correctly with L/XL ships (it tries - but just fails).

Hey,
unfortunately, the aux can only rearm the carrier's missle turrets, not the cargo itself. There is no transfer of the needed wares for missle production on the carrier. You can just dock them together and transfer wares manually

[Ragnos28]

My refuge from this resupply debacle is to have an EQ and use the mass equipped feature introduced in 5.0: https://youtu.be/fChYbC0E7Tc?t=43
Select 60 S/M bombers ---> upgrade/repair ---> select upgrade/repair 60 at EQ --> select the saved profile---> done

And this is about what I will do, until someone at Egosoft have a lightbulb moment and make missiles and torpedoes tradable and transferable wares, w/o the need for the missile turrets trick.

[donzi]

It is a bit odd that missile & drone resupply is hinged on the built/assembled to order sort of approach..

IIRC these were always wares prior to X4. I suppose there is some logic/reason among the old forum posts, etc. Would be more convincing it there wasn't troubles with the AUX ship functionality.

I've been manually restocking an AUX by 'unequiping' collected missiles. Since all enemy seem to drop missiles, It'd be kind of nice to have a resupply task using drops.

[Caesar999]

Hey,
unfortunately, the aux can only rearm the carrier's missle turrets, not the cargo itself. There is no transfer of the needed wares for missle production on the carrier. You can just dock them together and transfer wares manually

Oh I did not realize this. I just assumed it was transferring what was necessary for resupply. This is far worse then and makes no sense at all. I guess using missiles, and maybe carriers too, is out until EgoSoft fixes this nonsense. Does the VRO or any other mod fix this?

[Caesar999]

I just had to sell my aux ship. It had my destroyer caught in the never ending "critical"/uninterruptible docking process for an absurd amount of time. The only way I could break it and get my destroyer back was to sell it to a shipyard. Has EgoSoft acknowledged this problem and stated they are working on it?

[donzi]

Yes.

RE: viewtopic.php?t=462057 and perhaps some of the other numerous threads about it during the beta.

..fingers crossed. Thinking it just was too late in the beta before it was able to get (more) attention.

Messing around with them I have been using them in their role assigned to stations and not carriers. I have some L miners assigned to the station, but no L or XL military aside from barbarossa for hauling things. Eliminated most all problems and is functional for the most part supplying a torpedo osprey.. osprey assigned to AUX as a bomber, aux assigned to the station as support for station 'fleet' (which is trade and tow ships). IIRC I have a couple demeter assigned to the AUX for buying, I also just recycle missile drops at the aux too.

[Kot77]

+1, confirm the problem at 7.00 HF1
I prefer to use Auxiliary as a mobile repair for M and L, but it takes hours to repair L.
Sending the L ship to repair, cancel after 30 min of standing aroung, because after some time L ship stops even trying to move closer to Auxiliary,
sending to rep again, finally with getting another bug of "waiting of nothing" task of Auxiliary (after few cancelling the repair task of L) which holds around 1 hour.

[MKL81]

I just had to sell my aux ship. It had my destroyer caught in the never ending "critical"/uninterruptible docking process for an absurd amount of time. The only way I could break it and get my destroyer back was to sell it to a shipyard. Has EgoSoft acknowledged this problem and stated they are working on it?

Was it also the case that one ship was Commonweath and the other Terran? My Asgard tried to do the same. Is it because it requires different materials for resupply than Commonweath ships?

[Caesar999]

Was it also the case that one ship was Commonweath and the other Terran? My Asgard tried to do the same. Is it because it requires different materials for resupply than Commonweath ships?

No, that’s not a factor. Any L or XL ship simply cannot “dock” with the aux ship to repair/resupply in a reasonable amount of time - takes like an hour give or take. It seems to me they are trying to line up perfectly to dock, but if they are not in perfect position they circle around and try again. This goes on ad nauseam.

What I would like to see is something like how construction ships build stations with their drones. If you watch you’ll see the drones moving back and forth quickly between the construction ship and the station. This same “look” could be used to transfer cargo and repair with the aux ship instead of this silly requirement they line up perfectly.