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+--- Thread: Let the crew do the work (/showthread.php?tid=114999)
Let the crew do the work - JadenTrent - 05-02-2014
this is an idea that i have been thinking about for a while:
after purchasing a capital vessel (gunboats, cruisers, BS, trains) that are necessarily operated by your crew, wouldn't it be awesome to be able to pass tasks down to your crew, making your ship operate "by itself"?
i'm talking minor tasks such as heading from one waypoint to another or having your guns automatically lock onto and shoot targets.
i've always found it a pitty that you have to control a big vessel just like you operate a light fighter.
what i think should be possible, is to utilize the same funktion that NPCs function on.
>NPC patrols have certain waypoints to deal with => they do so. one after another
>npc major vessels have serveral enemies in front of them => every gun operates by itslef, not firing all at the same ship in simultaneous bursts
i think it should be possible to apply these funktions onto a player's ship (i'm not a modder though. just thinking if the game provides that funktion already, it should be possible to apply these modes on players' ships aswell).
i imagine it like that:
a player should be able to enter a command into the console to switch an automatic function on, and switch it off by re-entering the same command.
like this:
/faw ("fire at will") turns all of your turrets into enemy seeking, auto operated LITERAL 'turrets'; re-entering /faw would make it stop.
/tby ("travel by yourself") will beat down every waypoint on your map within one solar system. after jumping, you of course would have to enter the cmd again, since NPCs aren't programmed to travel further than one system either.
entering /tby again while in the process of auto traveling would give you back the control of your ship.
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why make this happen?
first of all i think this would greatly improve the authenticity of commanding a major vessel. you are the captain, you give the orders, your crew executes them while you get out of your chair and go get a coffee.
is it "OP and boring"?
i dont think so. autotravel spares you having to click at your 'next' waypoint and hitting F2/F3 all over all the time, it does not make traveling any more boring than what it is now. ;D
/faw theoretically takes away all the fighting action, since your ship would do all by itself, but practically it just saves you the nasty work of trying to hit slippery light fighters that circle your battleship like a bunch of nasty flies.
PLUS; /faw is a significant cutback in efficiency. enabling it means that you do little damage to many enemies at once, instead of dealing tons of damage to a single one. (you want to do the latter against a dangerous strikeforce of enemies, to have kills as quick as possible sothat less enemies deal damage to you)
bottom line:
auto travel wouldn't make the game more boring, plus you'd still have to watch out for pirates.
auto fire wouldn't make you stronger at it would only be wise to use against enemies that don't stand a chance against you in the first place.
all that you fine modding ladies and gentleman would have to do, would be to connect certain NPC-functions to console commands
(correct me if i'm wrong. i just really hope it actually is that simple)
RE: Let the crew do the work - Unlucky_Soul - 05-02-2014
AFAIK this is not possible with the current game mechanics. Freeworlds Tides of War had Auto turrets but they fired one target at a time. IDK if you could fire along with auto turret
RE: Let the crew do the work - utrack - 05-02-2014
It *could* be done with OpenServer, but there's no one willing to burn so many hours on this at the moment.