Drone Problem - Feature or Bug?

[thesilliest]

I've a Strategy made up that I give to frigates when I want them to keep as great a range as possible from their target while still attacking - it's just a tweaked "Maximum Weapons Range", really. When I give it to them, they follow the strategy acceptably. But when I assign it to Drones, they charge well past the maximum distance for some reason - they just don't follow the strategy. Is this a bug, or are drones supposed to be dumb like that? This is using Balance Mod, by the way.
Thanks!

[thesilliest]

one bump before i give up on this

[Randallw]

Drones can not be given orders. I had in mind specifically that you can't tell it what to do during combat, but it would make sense that it disregards strategy. Drones have a default in se4 to ram the enemy even if you give them missiles, they'll ripple off missiles but then go on to ram. I would imagine the same applies to se5. So far in Se5 I give them a cloaking device and scanners and seed them througout enemy systems. For some reason they never run out of supplies. I do give them extra supplies. In combat they sit and do nothing. I can't move them because they're drones but they don't act because they have no warheads.

[elerium]

Check out the file (for Balance Mod start in the GameTypes\Balance Mod\ directory):

Data\VehicleUnitTypes.txt

Scroll to the bottom and you'll see how a drone is defined to behave...

Unit Capability 11 Type := Cannot Be Controlled By Player Once Launched
Unit Capability 12 Type := Seeks Towards Target And Rams

Therefore by default you can't give them orders and no matter what you equip them with or strategy you set, they will just ram right at the enemy (like an expensive missile). If you want to mod it so they will use non-warhead weapons properly, just remove that line for the Unit Capability 12 Type, and be sure to also change the line

Number Of Unit Capabilities := 12

to 11.

Have fun.

[Yimboli]

you could extend the train of thought that went into this drone policy to say "since an emperor of a galactic empire isn't standing behind the captain of a warship giving him orders, human players shouldn't be allowed to give orders to ships either"

do you think george bush is looking at a tactical view telling each private in Iraq where to go and what to shoot at? I'd argue that we actually have MORE control over contemporary drones (i.e. UAVs) than actual living flesh units.

Bottom line: I feel like this was added as a skin-deep "oh that sounds cool let's do it!" feature without really thinking through it.

[Suicide Junkie]

A most auspicious first post. You'll be popular around here

[PvK]

Randallw said:
... Drones have a default in se4 to ram the enemy even if you give them missiles, they'll ripple off missiles but then go on to ram. ...

Yes, but in SE4 you can change the strategy to use another strategy you define.

[thesilliest]

Oh okay, I think I get it.
Too bad my drones can't seem to stand up to enough punishment to get to their target to ram then. with shields at level 14, to boot...
Back to fighters I guess.
Thanks for explaining!