How to create/manage a fuel depot?

[Zhuikin]

So the situation is like this:

I have a system with the super Luxury thingy, that i am protecting with a automated fleet on defense posture.
And it works fine, until the fleet needs fuel.
The system has no fuel source of it's own, so the fleet goes gallivanting across my empire.

The planet in the system does have a large spaceport, my empire has tons of fuel - just not on location - and i constantly see freighters idling at spaceports, so the cargo capacity is fine as well.
They just seem to place no priority, to moving the fuel around.

I tried to manually order the fleet, to refuel locally, in hopes that the created "demand" will cause deliveries and it kinda does for that one refuel cycle, but it has no lasting effect.

So, is there a way to create a fuel depot?

[Retreat1970]

You're using solar panels right? On the ships? If they aren't moving they shouldn't eat fuel. Maybe I remember wrong. Also the private sector does what it does. Bacon's mod lets you be in more control, again if I remember right.

[Zhuikin]

You are correct about Panels. But i don't like them on military ships.
The only military ships, that aren't moving, are reserve fleets - these i just park, where fuel is abundant.
Automated warships in particular always move. Even on defensive posture they end up shuffling around, patrolling or doing some other AI-stuff. Also the fleet does a lot of fighting burning fuel.

At any rate, while solar panels might prolong the time on station a little, it's not a solution for bad infrastructure.

Bacon i'm unsure about.
It does a lot of interesting things, but also changes a lot of things, that do not need changing in my taste.
I'll have to give it a try after all. Thx for the tip!

[sneo24]

Doesnt work that way.
You can use some byplay to avoid this, but it's always present.
- One version of Gas Station with plenty of cargo bays where you stop you fleets for refuel + no independent units patroling scorting.
- One version of modified military ship with gas stractors and cargo bays. It will "mine" the indicated planet even if it has a mine on it. BUT it will download it's cargo in the NEAREST planet

I use this REFINERY system of big stations and always have fuel. It's a lot of min-max and most people dont like that.
I use the modified ship a lot in the first 30 years but only in my capital. the moment you add another colony to your home system it will disrupt your mining.

Another way is to use hydrogen fuel for the private sector and caslon for the military or viceversa. It's midgame and your problem still is not fixed.

I tried a gigantic station over the star with a lot of energy to fuel converters and cargo bays, never worked.

[Siddham]

The way to do it is to put energy collectors on your system defense ships; making sure to exceed the static energy use by a decent margin.
Park them near the star where they will get plenty of energy and make sure the global setting in the options menu is set to attack system targets.
No need to use a posture. They will just sit in that spot using no fuel and will only move if an enemy enters the system.
If they have sufficient surplus of ECs you wont need to reposition them. They will be able to get enough energy no matter where in the system they end up.

[SirHoraceHarkness]

Why not use a constructor to build a few defense bases around your mine?

[Retreat1970]

Well, imo, not putting panels on ships to cram one extra gun or engine is silly (unless you're RP). Military fleets spend 90% of the time just sitting around.

[Shark7]

My solution to this problem is to build a star base with gas extractors, about 20 cargo bays, and make sure to NOT put a commerce module on it. By leaving the commerce module off, the base acts just like any other gas mine, but civilian ships will not pick up an cargo from it. So you have a large base with lots of fuel on hand and it won't be loaded up and hauled away by the civilian economy.

[Zhuikin]

Thank you!
This is the useful reply, i was hoping for!

[SirHoraceHarkness]

Well you could have always just designed a super mine station with lots of shields and guns. The ai will ignore it on refits but will transfer cargo from it the same as a standard mine and you can build them were you want.

[Siddham]

I understood the problem to be how to manage the fuel issue for a system fleet in a system without a fuel source.
If there isn't a mine (fuel source) in the system I dont see how a Star Base can help?
I believe that setting the home base of the fleet to the planet in the system will cause the AI to stock it with fuel.
But of course it may take some time to build up.

[Aeson]

ORIGINAL: Siddham

If there isn't a mine (fuel source) in the system I dont see how a Star Base can help?

Energy-to-Fuel Converter - not that that's really a viable way to produce fuel early on, seeing as it's buried at the end of the Energy Collection line.

I believe that setting the home base of the fleet to the planet in the system will cause the AI to stock it with fuel.
But of course it may take some time to build up.

I'm pretty sure that all colonies that lack spaceports have the same target fuel stockpile regardless of fleet presence; what you might be recalling is more fuel-carrying freighters going to a colony hosting a fleet because a colony hosting a fleet will deplete is fuel stockpiles faster and thus trigger whatever mechanism gets used to tell the freighters to move resources around more often.

[SirHoraceHarkness]

ORIGINAL: Siddham

I understood the problem to be how to manage the fuel issue for a system fleet in a system without a fuel source.
If there isn't a mine (fuel source) in the system I dont see how a Star Base can help?
I believe that setting the home base of the fleet to the planet in the system will cause the AI to stock it with fuel.
But of course it may take some time to build up.

His core issue is protecting a mine over a resource which can be done in other ways that I have laid out and won't take any special workarounds or an automated fleet. You can custom design mines and defense bases to be as powerful as a starbase or capital ship or even more powerful. I will often design fortress mines for distant fuel sources that have much much higher storage capacity than a standard mine along with starbase level shields and weapons.

[LordMM]

Couple of ways to defend a mine. One way is someone mentioned above is to convert that said mine into a super fortress. However, That isn't your question. The Bacon mod allows you to manually set up supply routes from a source to a destination. In this case, your spaceport. Which you should be able to then use as a refueling Hub.

The other method as someone again mentioned is to use Energy collectors on your local Defence units, which should considerably increase the time in which they can defend the station.

The third is to always have a couple of reserve fleets fully stocked and ready to redeploy based on a fuel depot. Every time my forward defense fleets have to retreat and refuel. I have a reserve fleet ready to redeploy there. Then that fleet moves back in refuels, repairs. Then awaits until another of the front line fleets have to travel back and refuel. So, If I have 5 fleets. Three are deployed in the front while two of them are kept in reserve. IF the fleet size is too big. I divide the fleet and redeploy as necessary.

[Siddham]

@ Aeson
Thanks for the clarification re the Energy-to-Fuel Converter...a late game solution.

What I wrote about fuel and a fleet Home Base is in the manual; in the Fleet Postures section...

"Set Home Base: Setting the Home Base of a fleet tells it where to return when it completes missions. It also prioritizes that location as a fuel depot and fuel will be stockpiled there as long as at least one fleet has a home base set there."

I find it works for me; but it takes a little while for deliveries to be made and I guess other ships will also use the fuel.
So I use the solution I gave above for system defense fleets; it is simple and allows me to set & forget a defense fleet.

[Siddham]

ORIGINAL: SirHoraceHarkness

ORIGINAL: Siddham

I understood the problem to be how to manage the fuel issue for a system fleet in a system without a fuel source.
If there isn't a mine (fuel source) in the system I dont see how a Star Base can help?
I believe that setting the home base of the fleet to the planet in the system will cause the AI to stock it with fuel.
But of course it may take some time to build up.

His core issue is protecting a mine over a resource which can be done in other ways that I have laid out and won't take any special workarounds or an automated fleet. You can custom design mines and defense bases to be as powerful as a starbase or capital ship or even more powerful. I will often design fortress mines for distant fuel sources that have much much higher storage capacity than a standard mine along with starbase level shields and weapons.

Yes I also fortify mines etc as my empire develops; but I see no issue with a simple method to set & forget a defense fleet in any system irrespective of whether it has a fuel source or not.

[Zhuikin]

Well, yes, the original question was about a system with no fuel source. But since the answer to that was basically "tough luck", i'll have to settle for the second best, and try making depots nearby.

And no, the issue is not protecting the mine.
It's usually about backwater colonies and stuff like that. Places of no particular strategic importance, that can still be struck by pirates (and usually are, magically the very second, when the assigned fleet leaves for fuel... such coincidence);
Places, where i am not active at the moment, and therefore can not go for the more micro-managy solutions.

And the advantage of assigning fleets to these positions, instead of (or rather in addition to) stationary defenses, is, that i end up having mobile fleets on station across my empire, often close enough to regroup and help, if something really serious goes down.
Call it strategic reserve.

The "valuable" bit of Sharks7 answer was the part about leaving out the commerce center, to make the base exempt from the normal private economy - this, while might seem obvious to some, is something i hadn't thought about myself.

[Bleek]

ORIGINAL: Retreat1970

Well, imo, not putting panels on ships to cram one extra gun or engine is silly (unless you're RP). Military fleets spend 90% of the time just sitting around.

Been there, done that, got the t-shirt, and I won't be doing that again! [:)]

[LordMM]

ORIGINAL: Zhuikin

Well, yes, the original question was about a system with no fuel source. But since the answer to that was basically "tough luck", i'll have to settle for the second best, and try making depots nearby.

And no, the issue is not protecting the mine.
It's usually about backwater colonies and stuff like that. Places of no particular strategic importance, that can still be struck by pirates (and usually are, magically the very second, when the assigned fleet leaves for fuel... such coincidence);
Places, where i am not active at the moment, and therefore can not go for the more micro-managy solutions.

And the advantage of assigning fleets to these positions, instead of (or rather in addition to) stationary defenses, is, that i end up having mobile fleets on station across my empire, often close enough to regroup and help, if something really serious goes down.
Call it strategic reserve.

The "valuable" bit of Sharks7 answer was the part about leaving out the commerce center, to make the base exempt from the normal private economy - this, while might seem obvious to some, is something i hadn't thought about myself.

As I mentioned earlier. Having reserve fleets ready to redeploy is necessary. As one fleet goes back to refuel and Repair, the Reserve fleet redeploys to the front.

I have my fleets divided into Main fleet and Anti Piracy Fleets or Patrol fleets of 5 -7 Ships each. They are faster to repair, consume less fuel as compared to larger fleets and can move around a lot faster. When you take into consideration the time required for a fleet of 25-30 ships to repair and refuel.

If you get into a shooting match with another empire. You can send these same smaller fleets to target their refueling hubs...

In short, move in with your reserve fleet into the contested zone. The send your other fleet for refueling repair, upgrade etc....

[SirHoraceHarkness]

ORIGINAL: Zhuikin

Well, yes, the original question was about a system with no fuel source. But since the answer to that was basically "tough luck", i'll have to settle for the second best, and try making depots nearby.

And no, the issue is not protecting the mine.
It's usually about backwater colonies and stuff like that. Places of no particular strategic importance, that can still be struck by pirates (and usually are, magically the very second, when the assigned fleet leaves for fuel... such coincidence);
Places, where i am not active at the moment, and therefore can not go for the more micro-managy solutions.

And the advantage of assigning fleets to these positions, instead of (or rather in addition to) stationary defenses, is, that i end up having mobile fleets on station across my empire, often close enough to regroup and help, if something really serious goes down.
Call it strategic reserve.

The "valuable" bit of Sharks7 answer was the part about leaving out the commerce center, to make the base exempt from the normal private economy - this, while might seem obvious to some, is something i hadn't thought about myself.

If you want to keep the fleet around as a reserve then build a single defensive base next to the mine and it will act like a refueling station and your private sector will always keep it filled with fuel for any ships needing it.