Problem with auto-attack?

from Stardock Forums
I'm playing a Gigantic map and it's just be and one other civ left. Both of us have half the map and we're currently engaged in one utterly massive battle. I have upwards of 230 ships flying around harassing them but it's becoming impossible for me to give them all the time of day, so I'm using the Auto-Attack feature.

First of all, does anybody know if there is a hotkey for this function? Second of all, the problem I'm having is that every turn a number of the ships will simply come off auto-attack. Sometimes midway through their moves. I assume this is because the ship they were thinking to attack is no longer there, but is there a way to remedy this?

Thanks,
-Ben

~SDC~
210 views 9 replies
Reply #2 from Stardock Forums Top
T is the hot key.

Their target probably has already been destroyed, at which point they await further orders from you. I can put in code so that if it has a directive and its destination gets cancelled, it automatically finds a new one rather than waiting for your orders.
Galactic Civilizations IV
Reply #3 from Stardock Forums Top
CariElf, thanks for the hotkey, and yes, having it either automatically go to the next target, or having an option for it to do so would make really big maps less boring in the endgame, as I tend to do the same thing, particularly with AMMs.

Will Auto-Attack and Auto-Retreat work together if/when it works this way? If so, there's something CivIII does that would be nice. An option to autolaunch once a ship is completely repaired. Actually, in CivIII it just puts the repaired unit back into the queue of units awaiting orders, but ships in orbit never await orders, as near as I can tell.
Reply #4 from Stardock Forums Top
That would be very cool CariElf. It would make things much less tedious in the later stages of huge games. Micromanagement is good and as much as I cringe to simply watch the computer play the computer, there are other things that I need to concentrate on that are more important than the ships (like paying for the bloody things!)

~SDC~
Reply #5 from Stardock Forums Top
Yes, auto attack and auto retreat should work together.

I think that all directives get cancelled when a ship goes into orbit.
Reply #6 from Stardock Forums Top
Would it be possible to limit area ships work?

In one of my game I put my ship into autoattack on area enemy seemed to move quite many non-combat ships. But first thing this ship did was head to nearest current enemy battleship spotted ...pretty far away from intended area.

I would like to setup patrol zones where ships attack enemies. Like sector sweep (but bigger because single sector really is too small for that feature) combined with auto attack (inside patrol area).



Reply #7 from Stardock Forums Top
Does auto retreat come into play immediately or when a ship is low on hit points?

If hit points is the answer...how low do they need to get before turning back home?

Alz
Reply #8 from Stardock Forums Top
Another option I'd like is to only Auto-Attack ships
NOT in orbit. And also I'd like it to be a little more
intelligent on just what ship it attacks...if it's obvious that the ship it attacks is going to win, then skip that ship. No need for intentional suicide. :)
Reply #9 from Stardock Forums Top
It works by hitpoints, and I'm not sure how low it has to go before auto-retreat kicks in.

I'll check about the range of the auto-attack.