Please fix repair drones!

[X-Tie]

Repair drones are infuriating when piloting L or XL ships with main guns! They have a repeat pathway that brings them continuously into the line of fire. Since you can't control when to activate or deactivate them, either you don't use your main guns because your drones have decided it's a good time to repair stuff, or you end up shooting them all up.

So please... Make it so that we can activate or deactivate repair drones like defence drones. And change that pathfinding so that they don't go back and forth directly in the line of fire! It's not like there isn't space to go AROUND the main guns...

Or just call them suicide drones and call it a day.

[chew-ie]

Or just call them suicide drones and call it a day.

If Egosoft picks this option, I'd like to suggest giving us the possiblity to select a target for the suicide drones.

[X-Tie]

If Egosoft picks this option, I'd like to suggest giving us the possiblity to select a target for the suicide drones.

I just don't understand the logic behind these drones, it makes no sense that we can't activate or disable them, nor does that suicidal looped pathfinding. It feels like a dev put in an annoying drone easter egg where repair drones prefer dying than repairing.

[LameFox]

I've been asking for ages to be allowed to turn these off, like we can with every other drone type. Not sure why they singled out repair drones to be totally outside control, especially when they've historically been so annoying. Getting left behind, getting hit by the ship, getting themselves killed. Why would I equip drones that go out to the place my ship is taking damage to die one by one in a conga line of stupidity? What is the point?

They even nerfed the crew repair rate specifically for player property some while ago to make these awful things more mandatory. The good(?) thing is that hull repair rates in X4 are meaningless relative to incoming combat damage anyway, so my ships aren't missing out on much if their drones die, it just takes longer to patch up after the fight. Which is exactly why I'd rather toggle them off until then.

But, oh well. It's been so long I've given up, they must for some reason specifically want us not to control these.

[X-Tie]

I've been asking for ages to be allowed to turn these off, like we can with every other drone type. Not sure why they singled out repair drones to be totally outside control, especially when they've historically been so annoying. Getting left behind, getting hit by the ship, getting themselves killed. Why would I equip drones that go out to the place my ship is taking damage to die one by one in a conga line of stupidity? What is the point?

They even nerfed the crew repair rate specifically for player property some while ago to make these awful things more mandatory. The good(?) thing is that hull repair rates in X4 are meaningless relative to incoming combat damage anyway, so my ships aren't missing out on much if their drones die, it just takes longer to patch up after the fight. Which is exactly why I'd rather toggle them off until then.

But, oh well. It's been so long I've given up, they must for some reason specifically want us not to control these.

Well, as you said, all I have ever wanted since the release of the game is for those repair drones to be activated or disabled, like all other drones... Is it really too much to ask? They can do their derpy pathfinding, but NOT IN COMBAT!

[BitByte]

Ore and Gas collector drones enabling / disabling should be changed so that player can do that before takes control of the ship. At the moment ore/gas collector drones control is greyed out when ship is controlled by NPC.
When player takes control drones fly out immediately and this is not good thing if you need ship for short period (e.g. loot containers from space) or hurry to get ship safe (e.g under attack or in hazardous area).

Those are same reasons why repair drones should be possible enable / disable by player to prevent them to die in dangerous places (laser towers around or hazardous area).

[X-Tie]

Ore and Gas collector drones enabling / disabling should be changed so that player can do that before takes control of the ship. At the moment ore/gas collector drones control is greyed out when ship is controlled by NPC.
When player takes control drones fly out immediately and this is not good thing if you need ship for short period (e.g. loot containers from space) or hurry to get ship safe (e.g under attack or in hazardous area).

Those are same reasons why repair drones should be possible enable / disable by player to prevent them to die in dangerous places (laser towers around or hazardous area).

Ah good point. I don't fly L miners anymore so I forgot about that aspect.

[Zloth2]

Which destroyers have this issue?

[gbjbaanb]

all of them - any destroyer taking damage will deploy repair drones that then get instantly blown up by enemy fire. So when you do need them (ie after the battle) there are none left.

I think changing the algorithm to decide when its safe to deploy them is not going to be easy and will always be unsatisfactory, which means that even if the player gets manual control of them, the NPCs will still send them out to die or you'll have to micromanage every ship.

A better solution perhasp would be to have the repair drones work like R2 units in starwars - they do not go out and fly around but stick to the hull instead. If they're inside the shields then they should be protected and can repair away happily. This would have a beneficial effect on QoL as nobody likes to pilot a ship that's had its engines blown away with a very long basic repair time. Repair drones would get ships that weren't destroyed back in action quicker.

[BitByte]

Which destroyers have this issue?

Phoenix is good example from L-size destroyer where repair drone working path crosses main battery's fireline.

[LameFox]

It's even more common when it comes to their turrets. I'm experiencing this right now with an H I am using to board pirate destroyers. They come out mid fight, and just fly in the way of the ship's own turrets. I don't even know why it's possible—I've seen ships in this game launch missiles at me through their own geometry. Yet we need repair drones that get shot down by their own ship? For what?

[alt3rn1ty]

I just dont equip ships with Repair drones (since .. years ago) because of this Kamikaze Drones problem.

Plus I would rather have all my Service crew gaining 5 stars from the experience rather than Repair drones beating them to it.
I think if I were to do boarding more often, a ship full of Marines would need Repair drones due to lack of Service crew (and it's best to have either a full crew of Marines OR a full crew of Service crew as they are far more effective than when they are a mix of both).
But I do very little boarding, so have not bothered reporting it.

I think I saw a topic or two a few years ago on the same subject, but I dont think it's been reported as a behaviour bug anywhere in the more appropriate parts of these forums?. Would Egosoft even notice a problem report in this part of the forum?.

[LameFox]

Do they actually compete in terms of repairs? I figured the drones would just boost the rate.

As far as bug reports go, I've reported some things before like drones being left behind, but as far as things like having no option to turn them off, or the drones taking friendly fire... is it even a bug? It reads, to me, much more like an intentional choice that is just very, very annoying.

[alt3rn1ty]

Not compete, but I just see it as if repair drones are reducing the time it takes to repair a ship (working alongside with Service crew), they are reducing the amount of time Service crew are gaining experience, so they progress their star gain at a slower rate.
I have no evidence to back this idea up, it just seems logical to me that would be a side effect of also employing repair drones when I would rather prioritise the work experience for Service crews.
If you already had a full compliment of 5 star Service crew, then it doesn't matter, and indeed Repair drones will probably increase the repair efficiency overall .. if they were not kamikaze on friendly fire.

Is it a bug .. I see it as a Behaviour bug (same as we all see fleet destroyers going kamikaze on Xenon stations as a behaviour bug), who would design a drone to path in front of friendly turrets when they are being used in anger.

I think a switch for us to decide when to allow Repair drones to do their thing would be a good idea, but also the more in depth solution would involve tailored Repair drone paths around any ship that can carry them to avoid going in front of turrets/weapons if we allow them to be used during a battle .. that would probably be a lot of work for the modellers of all the ships though so I'm not sure if thats even a viable thing Egosoft would be willing to spend time on (even though recently they have said with increased popularity of the game they can now afford this game longer development time).
Edit: Or, maybe simpler, make Repair drones not vulnerable to friendly fire while still being vulnerable to enemy fire (if one can be distinguished from the other easily, and without causing any game performance hit).

[Imperial Good]

Having at least 1 repair drone increases repair speed by about 10x. Something like an Asgard with maxed out service crew and repair drones can fully rebuild its engines in a minute or two. Turrets take can be replaced in a minute. The repair speed is astounding and surface elements can be replaced efficiently while in comabt.

The reason this results in less service crew experience is because the service crew spend a lot less time repairing. They will gain more experience repairing for 10x longer than getting the repairs done efficiently in 1/10th the time.

As far as I am aware the repair drones flying around in high attention is purely visual. Ships without repair drone mass traffic lanes still repair faster with them even though the drones never visually come out.

I think repair drones even boost repair speed of M ships, which are an example of ships without mass traffic lanes for them. This is, or at least was, possible using a chassis mod that increases drone capacity.

[LameFox]

I could see flying in front of main guns being a bug but with turrets they can't not be in the way. In combat that turret could be pointing anywhere around it—any pre-made path nearby runs the risk of being 'in front' at one time or another.

Regarding repair experience, if it's tied to the time it's performed rather than the repairs that have actually taken place that seems like a weird choice.

[Nanook]

... (and it's best to have either a full crew of Marines OR a full crew of Service crew as they are far more effective than when they are a mix of both)....

As a side note, I equip all of my ships with just marines. When not actively boarding, I switch them over to service crew, which gives them experience in engineering as well as morale. (Marines just flying around in a ship gain no experience, not even morale.) That morale increase then helps when they switch back to being marines at boarding time. So in the end, I have high level service crew that are also high level marines.

And after a successful boarding op, the marines are then switched back to crew in the new ship and rapidly repair it, before being brought back to the boarding ship.

[alt3rn1ty]

... (and it's best to have either a full crew of Marines OR a full crew of Service crew as they are far more effective than when they are a mix of both)....

As a side note, I equip all of my ships with just marines. When not actively boarding, I switch them over to service crew, which gives them experience in engineering as well as morale. (Marines just flying around in a ship gain no experience, not even morale.) That morale increase then helps when they switch back to being marines at boarding time. So in the end, I have high level service crew that are also high level marines.

And after a successful boarding op, the marines are then switched back to crew in the new ship and rapidly repair it, before being brought back to the boarding ship.

Very nice tip, TY

[BitByte]

So in the end, I have high level service crew that are also high level marines.

And after a successful boarding op, the marines are then switched back to crew in the new ship and rapidly repair it, before being brought back to the boarding ship.

Pity that marines doesn't gain any extra bonus from their service crew skills for boarding.
It would be nice if that skill also affects boatding speed (2nd stage) and maybe also to fighting part (3rd stage) as they could disable critical life support systems. Or against Xenon disable ship computer systems and internal defences on 3rd stage (as Xenon is machine).

I've also educated my marines and pilots for higher morale as being service crew.