Civilian freighter behavior

[Edward Hamilton (OP)]

Is there any way to influence or direct the behavior of civilian freighters? Currently they seem to only pick up from my homeworld and then move to colonies.  If I create a contract that involves shipping from one colony to another colony, or from a colony back to the homeworld, they ignore it.

I also wish I could convince them to use the Lagrange point jumps.  They keep wandering off into the vast empty region between my primary star system and my secondary, 2 trillion km apart.  That's a long trip!

[Beersatron]

I believe that the logic is based on the chance of a profitable return trip after dropping off your contract. In my last game I noticed them going to my colonies more and more over time - as the colony grew and increased its wealth and trade exports/imports.

Also, commercial spacesport might not hurt either.

[schroeam]

So, in starting a new game I have 7 countries/alliances starting on Earth, all pre-TN.  I am working on colonizing Mars using ships with conventional drives and before I researched Trans-Newtonics I was able to research orbital habitat.  I'm not sure if anyone else had this happen, or if it is even supposed to happen, but I just had a shipping company build an orbital habitat.  It will be interesting to see what they plan to do with it. 

Adam.