Auto-Attack selection

- what is best?

from Sins Forums

With Auto-Attack on I think every ship finds a target and attacks it.  This means that my support cruisers and defence/flak frigates stray from the Illuminators/LRMs that they are meant to be defending!

I need some help to keep my fleets organised and support ships staying where they are meant to be and not straying ino range of assault cruisers and frigates

Is it best to leave Auto-Attack on for your whole fleet and set tactics to tight formmation/hold position, or turn it off and manually direct all fire and movement.  If auto-attack is turned off, do the defence/flak frigates engage fighters and bombers?

Does a ship with auto-attack disabled still fire at enemy targets that enter weapon range?  Is this the same as setting tactics to hold position?

 

Can anyine please enlighten me on with their thoughts on this

strategy
6,078 views 4 replies
Reply #1 from Sins Forums Top
What I found, is that if you turn off auto attack ship will not attack ANY thing unless you order them to. With out auto attack, they do not attak enemy ships when they are in range, or even when they themselves come under attack, by the same said enemy ship. In other words, they don't fire unless told to, not even is selve defense. Look at the Colony Figates, they come out of the yard, with auto attack off. That why they do not return fire, even when they are under attack, and are just waiting for the next line of orders(and yes colony ships have guns).

Setting tactics, to hold position just means, that the do not move(this is what I have seen so far). If it is still set to the entire gravity well, the ships, will move to attack any enemy ships that enters the well(as long as auto attack is on).
Reply #2 from Sins Forums Top
The best bet is to use the "hold/grav well/local area" tactics as they cover the three basic things your ships need to be doing.
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Reply #3 from Sins Forums Top
it depends on how your fleets are grouped.

If you create a fleet with LRMs and support cruisers/flaks... your LRMs will move into position to attack the target you click on and the support cruisers/flaks will stay close by. If they are not in a fleet however your units may scatter all about.

Your flaks may chase fighters and bombers all over the grav well unless they are in a fleet. They they will stay close to that fleet and provide defense cover.

Turning off auto-attack means the ship will not fire at all, unless you click the attack button and click a target. Then once that target is dead it will stop firing. I wouldn't mess with auto-attack unless you have a very good reason to.


The best thing to do is create fleets of various units. The units in the fleet will behave intelligently... your attack vessels will attack while your support vessels will hang back and support. Again, if you dont' create a fleet, you may wind up with units doing silly things.


Reply #4 from Sins Forums Top
As mentioned, the best solution is to select all your ships that you want together, make a fleet, and set that fleet to Hold Position. They will still 'auto attack' things that are in firing range without given a specific command, but they will never break formation and go chase things. Fighter and bomber squadrons are autonomous to their carrier, having the carrier on Hold Position will not affect its strike craft.

edit: Local Area can also be good if you do not like to micromanage all that much. With more freedom, they will break formation a bit, but they will be able to pursue their natural prey. IE, light frigates do their best damage against flaks and support cruisers, so they will move a bit and fire at those in a fleet/fleet battle.