Now, this may very well be something you guys are aware of (and this may actually belong in suggestions), but I thought I'd post it anyway.

The escorts NPC's are terrible. For the most part they are only useful as vengence bots. For instance, I've been popping Tridents, and the escorts for each convoy seem to have a requirement not to leave a 500m perimetre, centred from the Trident. Lucky for me, my guns can reach from outside that 500m range, so I just sit and blast the trident, while the NPC's scream their impotent rage at me from 150 metres away.

Its not until the Trident goes pop that they actually engage me (and they usually go boom with the Trident anyway).

Anyway, thought I'd post.

NPC escorts are mainly supposed to provide cannon fodder so the PC escorts don't get zerged..

It would be nice if the escorts were more than "cannon fodder".

It's a trade-off: the defend action keeps them within a certain range of the ship they're supposed to defend. If it's too large, they will lag behind and not respond quickly enough to defend any of the smaller ships (anything but a trident or constellation, really). Maybe we could increase it a bit, though. Any suggestions about how much?

I wonder if you could have the defense range modified to different distances for the ship it is assigned to escort?

As far as what the defend radius should be? Perhaps simply the reach of the furthest energy weapon (roughly 600 metres, give or take 50). This would at least ensure that dirty rotten scoundrels like myself can't simply draft off a Trident's tail coats, popping them as we go.

As far as the intent of this limit being to help defend against smaller ships: I can tell you straight up that its not working. The smaller ship first off almost always jump in waay far away from their escorts, the book it fpr the wh/jump point. I never have a problem with escorts of little ships until after I've popped them.

Perhaps it would be possible to split the behaviour? For instance, on a Trident escort group of four, have two stay close (within the limit), and have to aggressively attack? Might work better for the small groups as well.

Also, it seems that each and every defender is asigned to defend one ship in particular. Maybe there needs to be a few that are simply there to attack whoever is attacking ANY ship of the voy. As soon as you land a shot on one ship, this hit squad come after you. Although that too would be easily dealt with (albiet it would need teamwork).

The escorts could travel at the nose of the cap so that it'll have better response time.
Or atleast always in front of the forward movement.

It could be worse, Momerath. Remember X-wing? NPC pilots were worthless. I once recorded a battle in which I had over three hundred kills (and three star destroyers) in an A-wing.

My wingman had one.

At least your AI pilots do SOME damage to the enemy, even if their ranges need some tweaking.

~D.

the convoy system needs a few AI inpruvments before the escorts can be expected to be effective.

1. the convoy needs to stick together. last time i saw a convoy the fastest ships just left the slower ones behind. the convoy as a whole should endevour to remain within a 1-2km area depending on the number and size of the ships in the convoy.

2. the convoy should have a "no fly zone" sich that any ship not on an escort mission or part of the convoy that passes within 1km of the convoy is hailed and ordered to change coarse or be fired on. then if they continue to within 800m some of the escorts attack and will persue to a maximum of 900m before disengaging and returning to formation. the remaining escorts (say roughly half of them) remain in formation unless an intruder comes within 600m of a target ship and then they attack it in the same way as the other escorts.

3. convoys need to respond to each othyer's hails in such a way that we don't get convoy v convoy wars at every womehole.

4. if capitle ship's weapons ranges are increased then the ranges described above will need to be re-examined.

now obviously this would take a lot of work and time. But if it worked would make the convoys a drasticly more interesting and real seeming aspect of the game.

Q;

I like those suggestions. A lot. It sounds very similar to the resupply tactics that were used during WWII naval convoys. (Distances changed, of course.) Makes me wish I were at home so I could play.

~D.
"Nidel the Indecently Dressed"
"Legin the Naked"

The escorts also seem to need better knowledge of their own weapon ranges. Often I see the NPC pirates following one of the convoy ships, pumping N3 bolts into it, with several of the escorts flying right behind the pirate without firing a single shot. It looks like they are keeping exact pace with each other outside of the escorts' "kill zone" (about 150m it would seem). The escorts will only start firing when the pirate stops or turns around after having made the kill.

yaar... preemptive escorts that warn players away (unless they're hated or POS... they get a salvo up the tailpipe as a warning).. would be a big improvement.. maybe add an extra 10% to defender numbers, and set the excess to aggro

Perhaps they could engage targets at 700m, but pick closer targets as priority if available?

I would go for a system where the escort ships pick targets based on what the escorted ship sees as the highest threat (i.e. the things that are damaging it)..

as mom said, it would be nice if the convoy bots were more than just cannon fodder... for lvl 20 combat bots, they sux some real balls.

Lord Q: We tend to disagree on a lot of things, but I think you have it bang-on. Particularly the No Fly Zone idea.