Auto Combat bug ??

[Druid]

I'm running SEIV Gold with the TDM Modpack that came on the CD, and the latest patch.

When I set up a fleet with Fleet Strategy = "capture planet" and then go into combat against a planet, both AUTO and RESOLVE COMBAT commands completely ignore the instruction to capture the planet. [Yes, there is a transport loaded with troops in the fleet.]

This used to work in SE4 preGold. It used to send the combat ships nowhere and move the transport in to drop troops, if the planet was undefended. Now it just makes a typical attack run: transport to the corner and attack /w the combat ships, until the planet is destroyed.

I havn't tried it with the straight (unmod) start, but I can't imagine a modpack can affect this.

I'd love to hear that I'm doing something wrong, but I think this is a bug.

[dumbluck]

I can think of two seperate possible causes for this:

1- your transports aren't carrying any troops (will give you the benefit of the doubt, and go on to #2)

2- Your Capture Planet strategy has your warships and transports breaking formation.

Just off the top of my head. Anybody know of any others?

[Druid]

2- Your Capture Planet strategy has your warships and transports breaking formation.

I dont understand what this means.

I dont HAVE a capture planet strategy. I just select "Capture Planet" on the Fleet Strategy screen.

Then when I select "auto" or "resolve combat" during tactical combat, the program does the rest.

[von_toaster]

Maybe the planet has low population and is equipped with weapon platforms. The warships probably go for the planet, fire until platforms are destroyed but may kill the planet by doing so (especially if warships are equipped with missiles).
The transport usually stay clear of the planet until platforms are destroyed (that explain the corner attitude of the ship)

Can't think of anything else.

[dumbluck]

I hope I remember this right.

You can edit existing strategies and/or add new ones. This feature is accessed under the little crown in the top left menu; Empires I believe is the name. On the right hand side should be a button labeled "Strategies". Click that, and you see the strategy editing screen. On the left is a list of all your strategies. click on the the empty square beside "Capture planet" to put the green dot in it.

You are now viewing the details of that strategy. In the center are a couple of windows, on the right are several more buttons. One should be labeled "Formations" (i think). Click on it. At the center top window (i think) is a list of all available ship types. Green dots beside them means that they WILL break formation. When capturing planets, this is very bad. Make sure none of your ship types are marked to break formation.

There are other ways to fine tune the strategy, but I'm not familiar enough with it all to go into details...

I hope that helps..

[geoschmo]

The strategy of your transport has to be capture planet as well as the fleet. You set this in the design window. What happens sometimes is people will create a tranport and use "population transport" instead of "troop transport" as a type accidentally. Pop transport strat by default is don't get hurt. You have to specifically override that by changing the strat for that design.

I agree with you it's doubtful there is anything with a mod that can cause this not to work. But I can tell you with 100% certainty that under normal circumstances planet capture works quite well with GOLD Se4. No bug that I have heard reported.

Geoschmo

[Druid]

Thank you.
The strategy for the transport was changed (by mysterious forces, no doubt) to "drop drones"

Changing the transport ship individual strategy back to "capture planet" has cleared up this "bug"

Apparantly this was an "ID - 10t" bug.

[If you dont recognize that bug-type, just put all the numbers and letters together in one big word... EVERY computer has that kind of bug eventually.]

[Fyron]

Originally posted by dumbluck:
[QB]2- Your Capture Planet strategy has your warships and transports breaking formation.[QB]

This does not matter. All you need is for the fleet to have captur planet orders, the transport ship to have capture planet orders, and for there to be troops on it. Breaking formation does not matter 1 bit. On fact, breaking formation helps you to capture the planet more easily.

[Starkiller]

Is resolve combat useful anyway? I prefer to keep the E key pressed.

[Gozra]

Go into the capture planet stragety and reduce the damage planet target below 90%. I suspect all your ships fire until you reach 90% damage but from time to time you reach 89% damage and then the ships all fire again to get that 1% damge. and of course this creates "collateral damage"