Losing the ability to refuel....

[Jrandom]

I have all of my salvaged ships in 1 fleet. I have been in my first major war with an AI, and I noticed that I can't refuel the ships In this fleet anymore. I tell them refuel at a couple of the planets in the system, nothing. I tell the entire fleet to go off and refuel, nothing. I build a fuel ship, sent it over, tell one of the empty ships to use it to refuel, nothing.

Did I do something, like research some kind of super fuel, refit my fleet, and then not have the proper materials to make the fuel? Or is it some kind of bug?

[Bingeling]

Fuel for ships is either Caslon or Hydrogen (I think, I am not a true vet...).

If you click on the ship design, it will say if it is caslon or hydrogen in the top right where the info about the reactor output is given. A ships design got a link in the info box you see when it is selected in the main screen, that is the fast way in. If the rest of your ships are caslon (which is the fuel at the start) and the new one is on hydrogen, you may have trouble refueling it. If you don't have hydrogen stores.

When you know what you look for (caslon or hydrogen), see the stores of your stations/mines and verify that it is present. The quick way is to double click the info panel on the station to see its details from the ship list, and go to cargo tab.

A spot related to this is the tools to see where resources are hidden. In the galaxy map, you can mark "known resources". Select your caslon or hydrogen, and yellow dots are on the known sources of those in the galaxy (as discovered by you).

The expansion planner is another screen where you can somewhat quickly see where your sources are. Select the option looking somewhat like "Show your empire's location for resource" it is not the actual wording, but only 4 or so options... It will give a list of your mines mining the selected resource. If you have no caslon mines, you are in trouble...

The resupply ship must dig up fuel. If nothing in it stores, no fuel. Locate a caslon source (or hydrogen if that is what you need) by the galaxy map. Look for one with a high percentage behind caslon, and deploy your resupply ship there. Give it a few seconds to mine, and you should see caslon in its hold. Refuel, profit.

Being out of fuel is great! It really messes things up. Wars give trade embargos (no, you can't buy any), and they kill your mining bases.

[Data]

Bingeling is correct on all counts...especially on the "Being out of fuel is great! It really messes things up" part [:D]

[Bingeling]

Whenever you start a new colony, it is always nice to do a click on the "queue a nearby constructor to put a gas mine here" button in the lower left detail window. On a nearby caslon source, that is.

In a game long ago, I was going fine until I charged a neighbor. The world did not like that, and I was trade sanctioned by multiples. That was when I learnt I had few caslon sources and got most by imports...

Don't under estimate the effect of a 30 ship fleet on the local caslon supply... Especially if your designers are daft and does not put energy collectors on the ships.
[&o]

[elanaahova]

data, as usual, is correct. And yes, energy collectors are essential for almost everything. Ships, even when 'idle', waiting at a rally point (the lead ship), or waiting at the star of a system, when set to 'patrol the system, ' all use fuel, even when idle. So tghe collectos are essential. Definitely read the aar, and the forums, its how i am leaning the game.