Can i get some tips on controlling fleets efficiently?

[Warer (OP)]

What is says on the tin, how does an experienced player control fleets to minimize micro?
Specially could someone tell if there's a way to easily control survey fleets ie getting them to scatter into individual units and then get them to reform at a given point.

[skoormit]

For reducing survey fleet micro in particular, I have settled on using larger surveyors with more range and multiple sensors.
That way I never need more than two to finish a single system, even though I play with 10% survey speed.
When a ship finishes in a given system, I either tell it to transit the next JP, or I tell it to go get an overhaul.

As my survey frontier pushes forward, I establish small maintenance colonies further and further out so that my survey ships don't have to return all the way to the homeworld to overhaul.
This way I naturally end up with branches of surveyors in different parts of the map, which simplifies the decision about where to send each one as it completes overhaul.

[nuclearslurpee]

For reducing survey fleet micro in particular, I have settled on using larger surveyors with more range and multiple sensors.

Sadly, this seems to be the way to go as we still don't have a good way to manage survey parasite fleets in C#. Even in Steve's current campaign his survey carriers are area units, sending parasites into the nearby systems. It seems that the VB6 days are gone when a single button press could detach 30 parasites to survey every jump point location.

I have settled on a three-class survey fleet as 'optimal', although you can add supporting units (maintenance, refuel, etc.) as needed as your survey missions reach farther from your core systems:

• Geosurvey Ship, jump-capable. Primary standing order is to survey new bodies, secondary is to move to a system requiring geosurvey.
• Gravsurvey Ship, jump-capable. Primary standing order is to survey new locations, secondary is to move to a system requiring gravsurvey.
• Scout Ship, jump-capable w/ bigger sensors. Manually-controlled to explore new warp points and to place sensor/comms buoys at each new warp point on both sides.

With this setup, the survey ships are completely automated except for refuel and overhaul in some cases (basically, don't let them get too far out of range from a suitable base). New system exploration is done manually as well as setting up buoys to monitor every warp point so I am not too surprised if a dormant warp point spawns in one of my explored systems. All three classes are basically the same and only differ in their mission loadouts. Depending on tech level and specifics of the designs this can allow multiclass building from single shipyards although it is hard to pull this off in practice.

The same system can work with two ship classes if you have an all-purpose survey class (Geo+Grav in one ship), but I usually consider those designs inefficient even if it does allow more strategic flexibility.

[Kiero]

I'm using an all-purpose ship, equipped with geo and grav sensors. A small magazine for buoys and probes (500 M range).
It is a military vessel with a commercial drive and a commercial jump engine. It is not fast but it has a huge range and deployment time of around 5 years.
When my tech is advanced enough I may add some gauss turrets or a small railgun.

I have 2 or 3 such ships in one task group divided into wings that can move independently.
Most of the time my exploration task group will also contain a tug, maintenance station, supply ship, fuel tanker or a fuel harvester station.

I've also tried a parasite approach but that was too much micro for me.

[Black]

I wonder if I do something wrong, because I never considered survey as something that requires automation. I also use larger all-purpose ships with both grav and geo sensors and launcher with probes to check planets with risk of alien presence. Formation of four survey ships gets support from tankers and supply ships to allow long deployments.

[Warer (OP)]

Thanks everyone what you all said makes sense. Already tried the large dual role ship but I ehh might have forgotten you need commercial jump drives for commercial drives....after making 8 6kt survey ships.

[Rince Wind]

That is what Spacemaster is for. Just change it to a commercial JD.

This time around I am using big, commercial carriers (110kt) with 2500t dual purpose survey ships. The 1st version of the carrier had 4 parasites, now I am up to 6, thanks to more efficient jump drives and engines. They are rather quick (~3500km/sec with ion engines, current internal fusion drives version goes 4400), have enough fuel and MSP to last for a long time and have magazines for sensor drones (the 1st version didn't, which was rather inconvenient as the 2 drones my survey craft carried were gone long before they needed to head home and I didn't have a missile transport for the longest time, as I don't use military missiles so far).

The parasites have a maintenance life of about 10 years, so I can keep exploring for quite some time, they now have 1 box launcher (size 6) and 1 of each sensors with a 1000t (slightly smaller for the newest ones) engine at 75 to 85% power (it increased with better fuel efficiency). Also a science department.

When I get into a new system I detach the survey ships, shoot drones if necessary and wait for what they show, then set the primary to survey bodies, the secondary to survey points and the conditional to return to the carrier if their fuel gets low. Then tell them to divide into single ships (the standing and conditional orders are carried over to each of the new single ship fleets).

I have to manually tell them to land once the system is fully surveyed, and I might have forgotten to tell them to go out and find stuff again after they ran low on fuel a few times, but after I got used to it it went surprisingly smooth without too much micro.
It saves a lot of flying back to base to refuel/overhaul and I don't have to bother to manage tankers, ammo/supply carriers or maintenance ships/bases.

The original 4 carriers are still going strong, having recieved upgrades, and I never felt the need to get more. Playing with standard survey speed here.

[boolybooly]

Thanks everyone what you all said makes sense. Already tried the large dual role ship but I ehh might have forgotten you need commercial jump drives for commercial drives....after making 8 6kt survey ships.

Good to know someone else did that! I accidentally made a commercial engine and didnt notice the other day.

The way I look at it, its Aurora, so micro is part of the play and I try to have a patient attitude, Zen of gaming kind of thing. Also make and use order templates where possible and use autoroute.

I have changed from small explorer fleets with one dual survey jumpship and two dual survey escorts, towards the swiss army knife boat design others here mentioned with dual survey, self jump and probe launcher so I can just say go to a system instead of making and breaking fleets all the time.

I still have not worked out what scanners are best for avoiding spoilers on full auto, so micro them on first exploring a new system, but that is a spicey bit anyway!