Matrix Games Forums

I fairly new to this game, and i only recently encountered a fight where i really had to micromanage it.

My plan was;
Split forces into 2 fleets, the "Grand Armada" and a small "Strike force".
Sending in the strike force to attack the gas mining station & engage their fleet away from the home world which is surrounded by (the standard?) 4 defense bases.
Then Engage with my main fleet to take out the bases.
Basic stuff.

Execution; TO MY HOROR!
Strike force took out the mining station and about 3 fleets scrambled to protect it... I then told them to "Move here" next to some semi-destructed ships... (even bothered to send repair ships to repair them... thats the way i roll!).

...sent in my main force to attack the bases.
Now the horror part starts, 3 ships of the small strike force decided to make a SUICIDE RUN against the Homeworld!
My question is... why?! Why would they do that?!
I tried toying with the fleet settings... stances and all... and individual orders... but they keep reventing the their suicide run!

Whats the problem?

My first guess would be that they have the 'engage system targets' engagement stance. But you say you have toyed with this. Let me get it clear. You give them orders with a specific (not system targets) engagement stance. You have the default engagement stance for 'no mission' (which they will revert to once they have moved) set to 'nearby' or 'when attacked'. It is not an attack postured fleet with 'attack any targets' orders, or similar. And they still go on a suicide run? [&:]

set your defualt stance to only when attacked under options and the ships will better follow commands. What happens is your fleet stance changes back to the game default after what ever action it last preformed. Took me a few times to figure this out after small raider fleets would kill themselves against the home world after they killed that mine on the other planet.

ORIGINAL: Dracus

set your defualt stance to only when attacked under options and the ships will better follow commands. What happens is your fleet stance changes back to the game default after what ever action it last preformed. Took me a few times to figure this out after small raider fleets would kill themselves against the home world after they killed that mine on the other planet.

set your defualt stance to only when attacked under options and the ships will better follow commands.

Figured its something like this... how do i set the default stance tho?
Haven't seen anything in the fleet screen... or maybe i am just blind...

You have to go to options --> empire settings and there you can set the stances for your ships.

a couple thigns to keep in mind, setting to only when attacked means your ships will sit at thier last location until attacked, but they may chase the attacker until it is dead, which means that a lone escort may lead your ships back to the home world to die. If you set to no default then they will just sit there and allow that lone escort to shoot at them and not fire back.

Oh sweet Jez, I had the same issue with a big fleet when invading a system, pretty much cost me the game.

I'm going to start the game up and see if I can fix this with the above suggestions.

Thank you.