Utilizing Empire Tree, Fleets, and Unit AI to reduce Micromanagement?

from Sins Forums
Hi all,

I feel like I'm starting to grasp the game, and am finally getting some high-level skirmishes with my buddies. What I'm finding though is that most my battles turn into micromanagement nightmares. Not just nightmares, we’re talking hideous twitchfests that invovle wrangling with an interface that wasn't designed for such things and a unit AI that makes terribly unintuitive decisions. I'm talking Warcraft 3 level twitchfests, and it's driving me nuts! This game was supposed to be the opposite of that! (sorry for the wierd formatting, the forum seems to insist on putting extra space where I don't want it)

From an interview with Blair on Gameinfo.net, http://www.gamersinfo.net/articles/1714-producer-blair-fraser-of-sins-of-a-solar-empire:



If you aren't interested in the low-level, twitchy micromanagement of combat, turn all the ships in one of your fleets to the automatic settings that you like and send them to a planet you want taken. They will take care of the rest.

End of quote


This is not my experience. But when developers say something like this, and my experience is something completely different, I prefer to assume I'm not using their system properly rather then assum Blair was talking out of his ass. (because I respect Blair, and I don't think he would willingly talk out of his ass.)

So there are 3 mechanics I think are pertinent to this aspect of the game, and I'll discuss my questions about each one individually.

1) Empire Tree:

The empire tree is supposed to reduce clickfesty micromangement by showing all the pertinent info in one place, allowing you to choose targets without having to zoom in on them and click them individually. I prefer to use the stack option (show units in stacks of ten, whether than an icon for each unit) because without it the screen gets very unwieldy very quickly, and I can’t actually count how many units I or the enemy has.

The trouble here is that you can’t cue up orders from the empire tree in stacked mode. If you rt. Click on a stack, the ships will attack one unit from that stack and go back to whatever their automatically chosen target is. Is there a way to create an attack cue of 30 ships by clicking 3 times (once on each stack) rather than 30 times (coming out of stack view and clicking on each ship)? I can’t figure it out.

2) FLEETS:

I get how fleets work, and autojoin and all that stuff. And I get that there are settings for engagement range and fleet cohesion. My impression is that setting up my fleets properly is a critical factor in creating this fire-and-forget approach to combat. But I can’t seem to get this working for me. I still wind up having to hotkey each unit type and kite them around the grav well, dancing and moving like I was playing oh… say, warcraft 3. Can anybody provide some suggestions about how to optimally organize my fleets? And what the different cohesions are good for. Or how fleets affect the unit AI to help them make intelligent decisions?

Here’s a simple, and common example. The opponent has built a bunch of flak frigats and LRMs. I have access to all the basic stuff too, Lights, LRMs, Flaks, maybe even carriers. My economy is stronger than his, there’s no reason I shouldn’t be able to take him in a head to head battle. What would I build and how would I arrange them in fleets so that I can “turn all the ships in one of my fleets to the automatic settings that I like and send them to a planet I want taken and have them take care of the rest.

3) UNIT AI, specifically targetting priorities.

The publicity for this game greatly hyped a more advanced, more tactically aware unit AI that would take care of the nitty gritty while I worried about larger problems. This is what I notice: Unit AI checks for targets in range. If so, attack target. If not move towards closest target. If multiple targets in range, attack flack frigate first.

Why oh why does the unit AI prioritize flak frigates? And how can I arrange things so that the unit AI can take care of itself so I can begin getting my trade routes up while the battle resolves.

Now there’s an argument to be made that some people like the twitchy micromanagement, and the game should reward it. And as good as the automated stuff could be, the player who does it all himself should win. I completely disagree with this argument. Games do not have to cater to everyone!! There are plenty of games out there that reward twitchy micromanagement. If you want a twitchfest, go play one of those games. Sins is not one of them… or at least it has spent a lot of time and energy billing itself as not one of them.

So if Sins indeed is not about twitchy micromanagement, can somebody please help me figure out how to use these twitch-reducing mechanics effectively.

A note to the devs, in case I’m wrong, and there aren’t solutions to these problems, they’re just problems: I am not a casual gamer, I am trying to play the game at a high level and optimize every aspect of my play. But I don’t understand why your automation doesn’t serve my purposes. It’s frustrating to see a big list of important features that only apply to people who don’t care that much. If the idea was to put in enough automation for the people who weren’t interested in micromanagement, but make that automation weak enough so that the players who wanted to micromanage still had something to do, please STOP! I refer you to my above point. Games do not have to cater to everyone!! Is your game for the twitchy microey crowd, or for the people who want to think on a grander, higher level? Please pick a side and commit!! And optimize the game in that direction. This best-of-both-worlds thing results in an inelegant, awkward, tepid, gameplay experience where highly publicised features do not serve the purposes of people who are actively seeking to get the most out of them. I'm sure this is not news to you. I have no doubt you all have had this exact conversation already several times... and that's why I'm so perplexed by this state of affairs. Any insight would be very helpful and very very much appreciated. /rant

Much Thanks.

29,137 views 5 replies
Reply #1 from Sins Forums Top
Okay, I've done some more research and have some information about how fleets work.

An entire fleet will always focus fire a single unit. So the point of a fleet is primarily to serve as a focus fire group.

The fleet will choose it's focus fire target pretty wisely based on damage type vs. armor type. I've occasionlly noticed some wierd behavior, i think sometimes it may choose wierd things based on the units that are in it's immediate proximity. But generally it chooses quite well. So that's nice.

The important point here, and the point I wish would have been documented more clearly in the manual, or in the tutorial or SOMEWHERE, is that the entire fleet will choose a SINGLE target to focus fire. You can give it this target, or you can allow it to choose for itself based on the damage type of units in the fleet, the armor type of the enemies in the grav well, and possibly proximity to current position.


a SINGLE target! What does this mean? This means that mixed fleets won't choose mixed targets. They will choose a target based on damage type of the majority of the units.

What does this mean to you? MIXED FLEETS ARE BAD! Do not mix unit types in your fleets. EVAR! If you have lights and LRMs... you want the lights in on fleet and the LRMs in the other. Later on when you get your hoshikos, you might want to mix some hoshikos in there, but you want to isolate your damage types into seperate fleets. This units are for this purpose (fleet 1). These units are for that purpose (fleet 2).

This applies no matter what the scale. Whenever you group units into a fleet, you are asking them all to shoot the same target. Lights are good against flak... i tend to use a lot of lights, that's why 90% of the time my fleets go straight for the flak.

Repeat: Mixed Fleets are Bad. Mixed groups of fleets... that's good. You should probly create an attack group of 2 or 3 fleets, hotgroup all those fleets, and call that attack group 1. Then micromanage those 2 or 3 fleets as if they were single units.


Now I'm pretty sure it takes proximity to current position into consideration when choosing targets. This is cool. This means you don't actually have to cue up attack orders. Just move the fleet int he general proximity you want it to kill, and if you were successful in creating a fleet appropriate for killing that target, it should autoacquire the target and proceed to knock them out 1 by 1.


It's pretty neat. It's REALLY neat actually. Like everything else in this game, I'm finding fantastic answers to my questions once I dig deep enough. I just wish they were documented more clearly from the start.



THERE REALLY OUGHTA BE A WIKI OR SOMETHING WHERE I CAN POST THESE THINGS, DOES ANYBODY HAVE ANY SUGGESTIONS?



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Reply #2 from Sins Forums Top
I hate to throw a wrench in such a nice theory, but unless I specifically tell them what to attack, my fleets always spread their attacks out over multiple targets.

Always.
Offworld Trading Company
Reply #3 from Sins Forums Top
Hm...

it's true, I just did some tests with more ships and a larger mix of units... and the fleet did indeed attack multiple targets.

However, the fleet was trying very hard to make each unit type focus fire an appropriate target. For example, it made all my LRMs focus fire a light frigate. And all my light frigates and heavy cruisers focus fire an enemy cruiser. And sent the flak after enemy strikecraft.

When the fleets get so large that there wasn't a single enemy light frigate in range of all of my LRMs, it would choose 2 or 3 different lights to focus fire.

When choosing targets, the priority given to keeping the unit in formation. The AI then chooses an appropriate target for that unit type and tries to focus fire that target with as many units of that type as possible.


So yes, you're right, on further review... fleets do not always focus fire a single target or bust. Fleets do their best to get each unit type in the fleet to focus fire appropriate targets while staying in formation.

This is even better actually.


So a revision to the above post: (because i Can't edit it for some reason)
You do not HAVE to create fleets by unit type. Mixing unit types in fleets is OKAY. However, you should create fleets based on articulation points in your fighting force. That is to say, each set of units that you want to be able to move independently of eachother should be in a seperate fleet. If you're clicking on units directly and moving them around, you're probably not using fleets properly, and the unit AI will fight you on it tooth and nail. So I think you're still best off creating fleets with a primary damage type in mind, with the knowledge that other units you mix in to support that primary unit will choose targets appropriately.

I.E. your LRM fleet can have some light frigates and kodiaks in it, and they will form up and function as a screen of defense for the LRMs. But you'll want to move the fleet around with it's LRM functionality in mind.

Or you can just lump all your units into a single fleet, but you won't be able to take much control over it's parts. (if you do, the unit AI will fight you hard. It will try to restore the fleet formation and choose targets that might not be appropriate to your intention)


Bottom line: I don't recommend selecting units and giving them direct attack orders. I recommend setting up your fleets, moving them into position and letting the AI choose its targets on its own. It does an excellent job of choosing proper targets for each unit type and focus firing as much as possible while staying in a tactically sound formation. Have a seperate fleet for each part of your force that you want to be able to move around independently (this may be 1 fleet/unit type if you're a micromanager).

The only exception to this may be for popping capships. But you should probably just create a special fleet for that purpose.

Reply #4 from Sins Forums Top
If you aren't interested in the low-level, twitchy micromanagement of combat, turn all the ships in one of your fleets to the automatic settings that you like and send them to a planet you want taken. They will take care of the rest.
End of quote


This bit is only true if you just want a Singleplayer expierence against AI. Since Sins is predominantly a singleplayer expierence , then the devs have a right to say this . You dont really need to worry about small ,micro twitch things against the AI , because the AI in essence uses alot of the same automation you do for Tactical play , so its actually quite fair. You dont feel like you are at a disadvantage just because you dont micro twitch. Infact in singleplayer , its more important to manage your diplomacy and expansion, because alliances and not getting double teamed is what wins you games in singleplayer.

However since you say this...

I am not a casual gamer, I am trying to play the game at a high level and optimize every aspect of my play
End of quote


then your entering a world where micro is important.



Reply #5 from Sins Forums Top
You do not HAVE to create fleets by unit type. Mixing unit types in fleets is OKAY. However, you should create fleets based on articulation points in your fighting force. That is to say, each set of units that you want to be able to move independently of eachother should be in a seperate fleet.
End of quote
I agree.

The most important reason to break up fleets, I think, is speed.

If you group fast, light frigates with a slow, lumbering capital ship, you suddenly have a fleet of light frigates that move as slow as a capital ship.

There's no good way of getting your fast ships to move ahead of the fleet without separating them from the fleet, so grouping fast ships with slow ones really gimps the ships that rely on speed.