Matrix Games Forums

Hi all,

So it's been awhile since I played Distant Worlds and now I'm inspired to start up again! I wanted to throw this funny idea I had at all of you and get thoughts and comments.

I Know it's ridiculous, but has anybody tried to make a fleet of just super fast ships (10+ engines) with only shields and that just Escapes as soon as it's attacked? (I guess you have to put a rail gun or something small on it for the 1 weapon requirement) and you set the engagement stance to when attacked escape, or whatever it was.

the reason for this would be a decoy fleet that causes the enemy fleets to go after those ships and then you have a second fleet come in with it with weapons galore etc. It may not work but Just throwing it out there.

Perhaps someone can comment or have an idea of what to do with fast ships with the, "set to escape as soon as attacked", setting on.

I would not think that the escaping ships would do so much good, as the enemy is not too likely to follow.

Maybe try "stand off", very fast, agile and decent shields, and the longest range weapon you can find? The AI should not be too good to stand off against multiple enemies, though.

Ok yes I can see that.


Can I select 30+ ships not in a fleet and tell them to attack an enemy and then select them again with a control group? (control + 1)

I want to see if the ships perform better as all separate 30 ship clump,rather in a fleet.

I guess I'll be selecting my ships every time by control 1 - 9.. since I won't be putting them in fleets.

I do not think fleets matter. The way I see a fleet work, is that you can order all ships as one unit (by ordering the fleet). And fleet members will move to leader if they lack an order (very handy).

You can give separate orders to fleet member just fine, just beware that giving the fleet an order will give that order to every ship (and they forget their previous special order).

If I just want a distraction, I have two fleets, distraction fleet and killer fleet. Distraction fleet moves to star at target system, and a little after, the destruction fleet is told to bust the spaceport/whatever. The distraction just needs enough time for ships at the target to get the idea that they should be killed (pick up the kill order). The longer the distraction ships survive, the better, of course.