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I dislike watching my cruisers spend weeks crawling after a planet at low speeds. Are there any mods that slow the speed of planets or just freeze them in place?

click on the planet (or anything) and the camera locks onto it when you press the L key

No... that would only change the camera. I want to slow or stop planets from orbiting their star so that docking and refueling doesn't take as long. Also, my mining stations have a habit of "falling off" of their planets which renders them useless.

I was going to say the pause button [:)] but seriously I don't think the current modding 'technology' is capable of changing that aspect of the game. Incidentally, I recently inadvertently made a ship with a speed too slow to dock at the planet. That was very annoying. And very stupid.

If ships were smart enough to warp in front a planet's path it would make docking a lot easier. But they always seem to wind up chasing the planet around instead.

You can force them to warp in front by telling them "move to this point". And the distance have to be sufficient, of course.

That is just a solution for those times you watch the process and feel an urge to intervene, though.

If you can add more "proton thrusters" to your ship designs, that will enable ships to "catch up" to the planets...

ORIGINAL: invaderzim

If ships were smart enough to warp in front a planet's path it would make docking a lot easier. But they always seem to wind up chasing the planet around instead.

This would be nice - Logically they should be able to predict the planet's position by the time they arrive at normal flight speed and then aim "ahead" to exit warp at the planet.

ORIGINAL: Bingeling

You can force them to warp in front by telling them "move to this point". And the distance have to be sufficient, of course.

That is just a solution for those times you watch the process and feel an urge to intervene, though.

Oh, I didn't know that! I'm even stupider than I previously thought (especially as I scrapped two colony ships, because I couldn't get them to reach the planet, and then I sacked the planetary leader for killing 60 million innocent colonists).

Use a Desolation Moon...[;)]

Klatu was able to stop Earth, maybe he will teach us how to stop other planets? (j/k)

ORIGINAL: invaderzim
Also, my mining stations have a habit of "falling off" of their planets which renders them useless.

Does this really still happen? It was supposed to have been fixed in the original DW...

You're going to make me paranoid and tabbing through all my mining stations now [:-]

Yea add a super project Planetary Engines which will cost a few hundred thousands of creds, tons of steel and whatnot and burn non-stop consuming thousands of fuel keeping planet in place. So freighters can dock faster.

+1 on that. Except mine was a colony ship I designed by mistake and it could never catch the damn planet. Lucky, I only build one before I notice the mistake.

Do all planets and moons have the same speed ? Anyone has an estimation of their speed ?

Wondering now if a pre-warp colony ship out of fuel would manage to catch up. Sending them to colonize so early could help, I suppose.

I generally estimate 3 for planets and 4 for moons, but these are only ball park figures.

Edit: the figure for moons is when they are travelling in the same direction as the planet.

ORIGINAL: feelotraveller

I generally estimate 3 for planets and 4 for moons, but these are only ball park figures.

Edit: the figure for moons is when they are travelling in the same direction as the planet.

yup that's what I have found as well

ORIGINAL: paShadoWn

Yea add a super project Planetary Engines which will cost a few hundred thousands of creds, tons of steel and whatnot and burn non-stop consuming thousands of fuel keeping planet in place. So freighters can dock faster.

In 1.9.0.5:
There's absolutely no need of that. As soon as you order one of your ships to go to a planet, they "get" the planet's speed as default and above that their cruise speed.
So if you have a ship with 20 cruise speed, the planet's speed is 3
- when you're behind it (in planet orbit) your ship's effective speed will be 23 (you're nearing the planet with 20)
- when you're in front of it, the effective speed is 17 (but you're nearing the planet with 20)
When you're raiding a planet, the orbital speed doesn't affect the ships, and this may apply to station attacks as well.
You can use "move to planet" though until you get in firing range though.

On the other topic:
yes, I saw mining stations fall off of their planet/asteroid when no materials are available for their retrofit.

The problem is when your ships run out of fuel. They slow down to impulse speed which is about the same speed as the planet. They are so slow that sometimes they can't catch the planet, so they can't refuel. You can do some fancy micro with a resupply ship since it can come to a dead stop, but this very annoying.