How is default required rank determined?

[Vanigo (OP)]

I can't see any real rhyme or reason to it. I once had a LAC say it needed a captain. I've had PDCs want captains, and then a nearly identical design only want a lieutenant commander. What is the logic behind this system?

[Erik L]

I believe it is tied to the weapons on board, and/or jump capability.

[Steve Walmsley]

All ships have a base rank of 1. This is raised to 2 for survey ships and ships with jump drives and to 3 for armed ships and ships with hangar bays. All fighters are R1.

You can override the suggested rank on the Class window.

Steve

[Erik L]

All ships have a base rank of 1. This is raised to 2 for survey ships and ships with jump drives and to 3 for armed ships and ships with hangar bays. All fighters are R1.

You can override the suggested rank on the Class window.

Steve

For some later distant version, can those values be user set? Along with a few others options, i.e. Escorts.

[Balibar]

There are some peculiarities.  For example, if one follows the tutorial the first Geo Survey design will have a required rank of Commander.  But the copied design modified to Grav Survey will have a required rank of Lt. Commander.  In my game, my Jump Scout had a required rank of Commander.  But the Jump Geo Survey design and the Jump Grav Survey design which were made from copies of the Scout both had a required rank of Lt. Commander.  

I tried to change the required rank of a FAC from Captain to Commander, but every time I close the Class Design Window the required rank for my FAC shows up as Captain.

[sloanjh]

I tried to change the required rank of a FAC from Captain to Commander, but every time I close the Class Design Window the required rank for my FAC shows up as Captain.

Did you hit the "save" button?

John

[Balibar]

I tried to change the required rank of a FAC from Captain to Commander, but every time I close the Class Design Window the required rank for my FAC shows up as Captain.

Did you hit the "save" button?

John

I didn't even know there was a 'Save' button.  Changes to designs in terms of components seem to get saved without using it.  I will take a closer look at the 'Class Design' window tonight.  Thank you for the information.

[Father Tim]

'Set', it's the 'Set' button, on the 'DAC / Rank / Information' tab of the ship design, right next to the Minimum Rank dropdown & Class Priority number box.

[Balibar]

'Set', it's the 'Set' button, on the 'DAC / Rank / Information' tab of the ship design, right next to the Minimum Rank dropdown & Class Priority number box.

I had thought the 'Set' Button was to set the class priority for assigning officers.  There is a 'Save' button for the DAC/Rank Information Tab that is not present for the other Tabs.  I did not notice the 'Save' button before, though I did look for it on the Design View Tab.  I am curious why one does not need to Save a design to make changes permanent.  It is sort of a Windows standard feature that:
   1. If you don't Save, any changes are lost;
   2. If you try to leave the Window after changing anything, you are prompted to Save.

[sloanjh]

'Set', it's the 'Set' button, on the 'DAC / Rank / Information' tab of the ship design, right next to the Minimum Rank dropdown & Class Priority number box.

I had thought the 'Set' Button was to set the class priority for assigning officers.  There is a 'Save' button for the DAC/Rank Information Tab that is not present for the other Tabs.  I did not notice the 'Save' button before, though I did look for it on the Design View Tab.  I am curious why one does not need to Save a design to make changes permanent.  It is sort of a Windows standard feature that:
   1. If you don't Save, any changes are lost;
   2. If you try to leave the Window after changing anything, you are prompted to Save.

It's the "Set" button I was talking about - it hits them both.

As for why design changes are immediate, I assume it's:

1) because setting up an object that represents the state of the screen so that you can back out changes in a transactional manner is a pain in the you-know-what, especially (I assume) in VB6.

2) because you're not supposed to be editing existing classes that have already been locked, so the equivalent of "exit without saving" is "delete design".

For the info box, on the other hand, I imagine Steve doesn't want to be changing the DB record with every keystroke.  I realize that he could play fancy games that saves the record when the text box loses focus, but again, that's a pain to set up in a way that's not buggy.

John

[Balibar]

It's the "Set" button I was talking about - it hits them both.

Thanks for the clarification.  

As for why design changes are immediate, I assume it's:

1) because setting up an object that represents the state of the screen so that you can back out changes in a transactional manner is a pain in the you-know-what, especially (I assume) in VB6.

2) because you're not supposed to be editing existing classes that have already been locked, so the equivalent of "exit without saving" is "delete design".

For the info box, on the other hand, I imagine Steve doesn't want to be changing the DB record with every keystroke.  I realize that he could play fancy games that saves the record when the text box loses focus, but again, that's a pain to set up in a way that's not buggy.

John

Fair enough.  I am not familiar with Visual Basic.  I know that in Visual C++ anything derived from the 'Object' class has that functionality built in.  But nobody is going to expect anyone to change languages at this point for something as trivial as this discussion.