ship capture - 1.9.0.9

[Kayoz]

Ship capture is far more twitchy - I believe it is due to the 1.9.0.9 change:

MILITARY SHIPS, FLEETS AND COMBAT

[i]- military ships are now much better at firing at nearby enemies even when pursuing other targets [/i]

Ships now seem to fire on the target designated for capture regardless of whether shields are down or not. I suspect the above change is responsible (ignoring capture command).

I don't see any need to upload a save file - it should be a doddle to reproduce.

[elliotg]

Thanks for catching this. Fixed in the next update.

Elliot

[Rabble]

All this fixes will be implemented in 1.9.0.9 official update?

[Strat_84]

Does it also fix the problem with fighters destroying ships during boarding operations ?

[elliotg]

ORIGINAL: Strat_84
Does it also fix the problem with fighters destroying ships during boarding operations ?

Fighters already coordinate to minimize damage during boarding operations. Not usually possible to do this perfectly though, depending on the timing of weapons fire, shield lowering, etc.

Thanks
Elliot

[Kayoz]

Seems that ship under capture is ignored by all but the fleet or base that initiated the boarding action.

Specifically, if there are ships not in the fleet or bases in firing range, they will continue firing on the ship while boarding is under-way.

I'm not sure that this is as designed - is it?

[mSterian]

Yeah, capture is still not working right. I destroy countless targets trying to capture them.
It's due to the nature of the shields. Shields go back up, so capturer tries to lower them again for boarding. Which usually does more damage than the shild can take it, damaging components.

My design suggestion is: Stop lowering shield and sending more podsa as long as the boarding crew is in advantage.

[Kayoz]

I suppose that it's possible that it's the shields. My impression from watching the fight was that the stations nearby were lobbing missiles at the target regardless of the fact that it was being boarded.

That said, there's no reason to dump more boarding parties on a ship that's already grossly outnumbered. If you have 20 ships and a single target, they'll ALL blow their wad on that one ship, boarding it with absurd numbers. There really should be a point that your ships say "no more" and don't bother trying to lower the shields, much less drop more boarders. A 2-1 or 3-1 advantage should be abundantly clear who the winner will be.

[mSterian]

You should see a fleet of 20 ships trying to raid a mining station (when playing as a pirate).
Should I say it? yes... you blow the s**t out of the station before the ships even get to launch a pod. What kind of raiding is that?

[elliotg]

Thanks for the ongoing feedback.

In the next update I've further improved boarding and capture so that ships and fighters no longer fire at a target once you already have overwhelming boarding parties onboard the target.

Elliot