Proposed Changes to Fighters

[Þórgrímr]

Sounds to me like you wish to turn fighters into just another version of a gunboat. Why have them at all if you are just going to turn them into even smaller ships. Does not make sense to me.

Fighter squadrons are not ships, not even close, they are mobile weapons platforms that operate as a group, not as individuals, and as such NEED a base for support. They are not small ships to be stationed in orbit without even a base to station them on. Even gunboats need some sort of base or tender to support them.

So turning fighters into just small ships makes no sense. Except for ease of programming.

I know my opinion does not count for squat here, but I just could not ignore this proposal. Aurora already has gunboats, why do you need an even smaller version of the gunboat?



??rgr?mr

[Charlie Beeler]

I presume that part of the reason for the fighter status change has to due with the errors generated in movement that I reported.

I like a lot of what has been suggested.  

But...

I'd prefer to try to keep the size of fighters small.  

They should at least start with missile rails that can only be reloaded aboard ship not from an internal magazine.  A possible later upgrade being internal rotory systems.

A series of light extremely short ranged weapons for engaging other fighters is a must.  It should be a self contained system similiar in principal to gattling and chain guns (ie weapon and magazine as a unit).  As they progress in grade the rate of fire should increase (5 rounds per 5 sec, 6 per 5, etc). Each round does a fractional point of damage.  Not all necessarily hit though.  

To go with the light weapons a modification to armor handling is needed.  Simplest is that an armor rating of 1 is handled different.  Allow for cumulative fractional damage to eventually get a single hit through.  As an example fighter gun rounds do .1points of damage.  If within a single 5 second pulse a fighter with armor rating of 1 recieves 11 hits, the eleventh penetrates for a single point of internal damage.  The counter resets to 0.  It also resets to 0 a the beginning of the next pulse along with sheild regeneration.  Yes, ships with armor ratings of 1 are vulnerable as well, ships in combat areas should use tin cans for armor   .  

Progressive ability to penatrate higher armor ratings should be allowed, but should be expensive to research and implement.  Mainly to keep fighter to fighter viable not as warship killers.

[Haegan2005]

I'd prefer to try to keep the size of fighters small.  

They should at least start with missile rails that can only be reloaded aboard ship not from an internal magazine.  A possible later upgrade being internal rotory systems.

A series of light extremely short ranged weapons for engaging other fighters is a must.  It should be a self contained system similiar in principal to gattling and chain guns (ie weapon and magazine as a unit).  As they progress in grade the rate of fire should increase (5 rounds per 5 sec, 6 per 5, etc). Each round does a fractional point of damage.  Not all necessarily hit though.  

To go with the light weapons a modification to armor handling is needed.  Simplest is that an armor rating of 1 is handled different.  Allow for cumulative fractional damage to eventually get a single hit through.  As an example fighter gun rounds do .1points of damage.  If within a single 5 second pulse a fighter with armor rating of 1 recieves 11 hits, the eleventh penetrates for a single point of internal damage.  The counter resets to 0.  It also resets to 0 a the beginning of the next pulse along with sheild regeneration.  Yes, ships with armor ratings of 1 are vulnerable as well, ships in combat areas should use tin cans for armor   .  

Progressive ability to penatrate higher armor ratings should be allowed, but should be expensive to research and implement.  Mainly to keep fighter to fighter viable not as warship killers

I happen to agree.

[Steve Walmsley (OP)]

I presume that part of the reason for the fighter status change has to due with the errors generated in movement that I reported.

Yes, that was one of the main reasons for me to start looking at the way fighters are handled. A lot of the abiltiies that yourself and others have asked me to add to fighters are already available for ships. Making fighters use the same rules as ships also makes them internally consistent so they are much more believable than a different type of unit following different rules. Finally, until v2.6 I had to maintain code for ships, fighters and precursors separately, which meant if anything major changed in movement, sensors, combat, etc I had to update three separate areas of code which took three times as long and had three times the potential for error, or simply for missing something. Now I should be able to add features more quickly and with less potential for problems.

I like a lot of what has been suggested.  But... I'd prefer to try to keep the size of fighters small.  

They should at least start with missile rails that can only be reloaded aboard ship not from an internal magazine.  A possible later upgrade being internal rotory systems.

I have created a new weapon system called the Launch Rail, although its more like a box launcher in reality. It can only be reloaded within a hangar so although ships could mount them it's not a great idea unless there is a huge hangar nearby for reloads. This also means that fighters will need carriers or bases with hangars if they want to reload. I'll combine the existing hangar bays and parasite hangers into one system similar to parasite hangars but half the size for more flexibility.

The Launch Rail is 15% of the size and cost of a full size launcher, although because there is no reload rate it is usually much cheaper than that because only the base reload tech is needed. The Launch Rail will require 15x the base reload time once it is on board a mothership, so a Size 4 Launch Rail will require 30 minutes to reload (30 seconds x size 4 x 15). I'll probably add some code to speed that up with a fighter operations bonus. Here is an example below

Code: [Select]

Size 4 Launch Rail
Maximum Missile Size: 4     Mothership Reload Time: 30 minutes
Launcher Size: 0.6    Launcher HTK: 1
Cost Per Launcher: 1.2    Crew Per Launcher: 0
Materials Required: 0.3x Duranium  0.9x Tritanium
Development Cost for Project: 12RP

Note that Launch Rails are not affected by increases in Reload Rate Technology as they are reloaded by the crew of the MothershipThe Launch Rail can be developed at any time as there is no pre-requisite. The smaller reloadable launchers are more expensive to develop and will need the preceding tech as well. Although you could potentially put a reloading launcher on board a fighter it won't be a good idea because the fighters are relatively short-ranged and will likely be able to land and reload their launch rails more quickly than the smallest reloadable launcher. For example, the quarter size launcher with Missile Reload Tech 3 will require well over an hour to reload and is almost twice the size of a Launch Rail. Unless it was for some specialist function it would not make sense to build a fighter with half the firepower and twice the reload time. It may make sense to do that for Fast Attack Craft though because they will have much longer deployment periods.

A series of light extremely short ranged weapons for engaging other fighters is a must.  It should be a self contained system similiar in principal to gattling and chain guns (ie weapon and magazine as a unit).  As they progress in grade the rate of fire should increase (5 rounds per 5 sec, 6 per 5, etc). Each round does a fractional point of damage.  Not all necessarily hit though.  

To go with the light weapons a modification to armor handling is needed.  Simplest is that an armor rating of 1 is handled different.  Allow for cumulative fractional damage to eventually get a single hit through.  As an example fighter gun rounds do .1points of damage.  If within a single 5 second pulse a fighter with armor rating of 1 recieves 11 hits, the eleventh penetrates for a single point of internal damage.  The counter resets to 0.  It also resets to 0 a the beginning of the next pulse along with sheild regeneration.  Yes, ships with armor ratings of 1 are vulnerable as well, ships in combat areas should use tin cans for armor   .  

Progressive ability to penatrate higher armor ratings should be allowed, but should be expensive to research and implement.  Mainly to keep fighter to fighter viable not as warship killers.

I like the general principle, although I will probably handle the mechanics a little differently. The main thing is though that you have now given me the basis for an anti-fighter weapon that ships won't automatically want to use, which is great!

How about instead of fractional points of damage, which I would have to track and possibly allow for repair later, have a weapon that has the potential to cause damage to fighters and missiles but not ships with a full 1 point of armour. I would implement John's idea along with this so that ships also had the option to use the 0.5 fighter armour. However, there is only a chance for each hit to penetrate 0.5 armour, or even the 0 armour of missiles, rather than a cumulative effect that isn't used in other parts of the game.

The mechanic in coding terms would be that each shot from the mini-gun has a chance of inflicting a full 1 point of damage. If that happens, that shot would kill a missile, and have a 50% chance to penetrate the 0.5 armour of a fighter and still bounce off a ship with warship armour. This would allow also strafing of "thin skinned" ships or FACs if the player used 0.5 armour for them.

I could do this by having a reasonable chance to hit and each shot from the mini-gun that hit would then be tested for penetration (which could be part of the technology for the weapon) and if it penetrated it caused a point of damage. An easier way to handle it would just be a low or very low chance to hit but any hit was a 1 point hit. The beauty of this weapon is that it is fine for an extended dogfight between fighters and a low-odds shot at a missile but it isn't a good weapon for ships given they usually have a very limited time to engage a missile. Technological advancements could include higher rates of fire as you suggested. I would also use John's idea about using a zero or small size gun-only fire control system that used the fighter's own speed for its tracking speed.

I may also add an ability for fighters to "lock" another fighter into a dogfight based on a combination of speed and pilot (commander) initiative. Once locked, the fighter with high speed/initiative would always move last during movement, giving it the ability to stay with its opponent and continue firing.

How does that sound?

Steve

[Haegan2005]

Note that Launch Rails are not affected by increases in Reload Rate Technology as they are reloaded by the crew of the Mothership[/code]
The Launch Rail can be developed at any time as there is no pre-requisite. The smaller reloadable launchers are more expensive to develop and will need the preceding tech as well.

I like this idea.

 

How about instead of fractional points of damage, which I would have to track and possibly allow for repair later, have a weapon that has the potential to cause damage to fighters and missiles but not ships with a full 1 point of armour. I would implement John's idea along with this so that ships also had the option to use the 0.5 fighter armour. However, there is only a chance for each hit to penetrate 0.5 armour, or even the 0 armour of missiles, rather than a cumulative effect that isn't used in other parts of the game.

The mechanic in coding terms would be that each shot from the mini-gun has a chance of inflicting a full 1 point of damage. If that happens, that shot would kill a missile, and have a 50% chance to penetrate the 0.5 armour of a fighter and still bounce off a ship with warship armour. This would allow also strafing of "thin skinned" ships or FACs if the player used 0.5 armour for them.

I rather like this idea

I would also use John's idea about using a zero or small size gun-only fire control system that used the fighter's own speed for its tracking speed

.

Excellent idea. Any thoughts about lasers and cannon similar to the Starfire gunpacks?  Could the gunpacks be linked to the mini-gun idea above? This could also use the rail launcher idea for size limits.

I may also add an ability for fighters to "lock" another fighter into a dogfight based on a combination of speed and pilot (commander) initiative. Once locked, the fighter with high speed/initiative would always move last during movement, giving it the ability to stay with its opponent and continue firing.

Steve

This "lock" adds yet another realistic dimension to using fighters and makes me actually want to stage a fight for them. I have had carriers for ten years for most of my races and none of them wants to get in a fight but one and he hasn't found anyone yet(or so he thinks).

[Steve Walmsley (OP)]

Sounds to me like you wish to turn fighters into just another version of a gunboat. Why have them at all if you are just going to turn them into even smaller ships. Does not make sense to me.

Fighters are smaller versions of gunboats only in the sense that gunboats are smaller versions of ships. All three will use the same rules and physics, which will make the game much more internally consistent.

Fighter squadrons are not ships, not even close, they are mobile weapons platforms that operate as a group, not as individuals, and as such NEED a base for support. They are not small ships to be stationed in orbit without even a base to station them on. Even gunboats need some sort of base or tender to support them.

Fighters will require bases or carriers with hangars to reload their launch rails and because of their horrendous fuel requirements will need carriers if they need to be deployed in the outer system, let alone other systems. I will still have squadrons with designations and nicknames, etc but they will be administrative (maybe even mini-task forces) and you will easily be able to move fighters between squadrons. I will track where every fighter in a squadron is at the moment and you will be able to launch and land by squadron. However, because you move fighters as fleets you will have much more flexibility in splitting squadrons, establishng CAP as part of a formation and even have damaged fighters pulling out to return to base.

So turning fighters into just small ships makes no sense. Except for ease of programming.

Ease of programming is useful and should allow me to do more with less problems. However, I am writing Aurora because its fun to play and given the depth of gameplay available,  I don't think you could argue that Aurora's primary goal is easier programming.

I know my opinion does not count for squat here, but I just could not ignore this proposal. Aurora already has gunboats, why do you need an even smaller version of the gunboat?

I am not sure why you think your opinion counts less than anyone else as you have had many good ideas in the past that I have added to the game and you have contributed a lot in terms of material. Fighters won't be just smaller gunboats. They will be faster, much shorter-ranged, probably use far more one-shot weapons and will require hangars. As a result of Charlie's suggestion, fighters will use a close range dogfight weapon that probably would not be much use for gunboats and they will be far more fragile. Their deployment and combat use will likely be very different to Gunboats.

Steve

[Steve Walmsley (OP)]

I have added the thin-skinned option for all ships. Fighters are automatically thin-skinned but every other ship type has the option by setting a checkbox on the Class Design window. Thin-skinned means that you only need half the normal armour amount but each time the ship is hit there is a 50% chance that the armour will have no effect. Not a good idea for warships but useful for freighters etc. Bear in mind that a thin-skinned ship is vulnerable to a single point of damage.

Note that only ships with an armour thickness of 1 can be thin-skinned.

Steve

[Steve Walmsley (OP)]

I'm actually in the anti-beam camp - I don't see a reason to have a beam weapon just for the sake of having a beam weapon.  That being said, I do think there should be some sort of "gun" system, whether it be flechettes, high-speed rail-gun (similar to a Vulcan), or mini-beams for dogfighting.  Note that modern warships do mount such systems - Phalanx is basically a Vulcan cannon combined with a larger ammo magazine and an AI system (the radar/computer) to shoot at incoming targets.  It is only secondary armament because it is essentially a point-blank/dogfight weapon.

I had been avoiding a gun system because of the fact that ships would also want any small, effective gun system as well and it would create balance problems. However, Charlie's idea of a less effective gun that would inflict a point of damage over time gave me the breathrough I needed. Although I will implement it slightly differently using a full point of damage and low chance to hit it was his concept of causing damage over time that was the key idea. Now I can create a system that is good for fighters in extended dogfights but is not much use to ships because they need high kill probabilities within a very limited timespan.

This brings up the issue of dogfighting, and the "why pay for life-support" in the missile vs. drone question.  What if you gave cockpits (fighter and possibly GB) a "dogfight fire-control" capability that allowed the ship's speed to be used as a tracking speed and can be used for any dogfighting (i.e. non-missile) system?  (You might want to include the requirement that any target be detected by the ship's own sensors.)  

I will add a gun-only fire control system that uses the ship's speed as its tracking speed, although I will probably create a tiny independent system rather than adding it to a "cockpit" system because the code is set up to link weapons to specific fire control systems.

If you allow "light" (0.5) armor in all ship classes (not just fighters) then that puts the concept of "thin-skinned" non-combatants into the game, gives fighters something to shoot at with their dogfighting weapons - think of the scene in Red Storm Rising where the F-15s strafe the Russian freighter.  There would be a strong temptation to put light armor on GB (since they rely on speed rather than armor for defense), which in turn could lead to anti-GB fighter designs.

I have added this to the game for v2.6

So I've done a complete 180 here - I think a small, short-range mini-beam system could be set up for fighters that would not skew ship-to-ship play balance, and would increase the richness of "combined arms" tactics between ships, GB, and fighters, especially if 0.5 armor were allowed on ships and GB as well.  The one play balance tweak that might be needed would be to increase missile speed (both to make them a more difficult fire-control target and so that fighters can't keep up with them) - a typical light (anti-fighter) missile should probably be 2x or 4x faster than an equivalent-tech fighter.

I don't want to play too much with missile speed because the missile combat side of the game works well at the moment and I don't want to risk changing it. A low-chance to hit fighter weapon will mean that missiles should not be too badly affected by a system designing for anti-fighter use. Also, using current Templar tech (which is the same tech used for the fighters) with the new missile design window that allows 0.25 space increments, I can create a 2 space anti-fighter missile:

Code: [Select]

Partisan Anti-Fighter Missile
Missile Size: 2     Warhead: 1    Armour: 0
Speed: 30,000 km/s    Endurance: 10 seconds   Range: 300k km
Manoeuvre Rating: 10
Cost Per Missile: 0.575
Chance to Hit: 1k km/s 300%   3k km/s 100%   5k km/s 60%   10k km/s 30%
Materials Required:   0.25x Tritanium  0.15x Sorium  0.75x Gallicite
Development Cost for Project: 58RPCombining this with the Stilleto class Interceptor, which can carry five of these and still maintain almost 9500 km/s, creates a reasonable anti-fighter platform.

Code: [Select]

Stiletto class Interceptor    190 tons     12 Crew     30.5 BP      TCS 3.8  TH 36  EM 0
9473 km/s     Armour 1     Shields 0-0     Sensors 1/0/0/0     Damage Control 0-0     PPV 1.5
Magazine 10    

Fighter Ion Engine (1)    Power 36    Efficiency 100.00    Signature 36    Armour 0    Exp 25%
Fuel Capacity 10,000 Litres    Range 2.3 billion km   (2 days at full power)

Size 2 Launch Rail (5)    Missile Size 2    Mothership Reload Time 15 minutes
M200 Missile Fire Control  (1)    Range: 200k km
Partisan Anti-Fighter Missile (5)  Speed: 30,000 km/s   Endurance: 10 secs    Range: 300k km   Warhead: 1    Size: 2

So for the small, short-range system, I would say there's no need to keep ships from mounting (lots of) them - they'll only be effective as AA and they'll be much less efficient as ship mounts due to the need for (expensive high speed) fire-control.  This is similar to the mass difference between a Phalanx mount on a ship and an internal Vulcan mount on a fighter.

So I guess I am still in the camp that anti-ship mini-beams don't really make sense (unless at point-blank range).  This can be enforced by having the range vs. size curve for beam weapons be quicker than linear.  It is also enforced by the fact that Aurora armor makes one big hit much more effective than many tiny hits.

Using a combination of your ideas and Charlie's I think I should be able to create a reasonable fighter-based anti-fighter "beam" weapon that can also allow for occasional missile kills and strafing thin-skinned ships, while not creating a effective new point defence system for ships.

Steve

[sloanjh]

How does that sound?

Sounds good.  For the record I still have four wishes/concerns, but overall it sounds good.

I'm still worried that fighters are going to be as fast as or faster than equivalent-tech missiles.  This doesn't feel realistic to me.

I'd still like to see a short-range, low-mass, low-aperture fighter mini-beam, more for consistency reasons than anything else.  Unfortunately, Aurora equates aperture with power (as opposed to range), so I don't see how to do this in terms of game mechanics.

Just how horrendous is the fuel consumption? Is it bad enough to make fighters unusable?  Could a day of fighter-ops suck the carrier's tanks dry?  How does this correlate with fuel consumption in a present-day CVBG?  A thought:  What if you made going slow more efficient than going fast?  I see two ways to do this:

A "military throttle" setting that would consume fuel much more efficiently than full power ("afterburner").  1/2 speed or lower might have a significantly lower fuel cost.  This would probably apply only to fighter/FAC.

Make engine/fuel efficiency proportional to speed.  This would mean fuel consumed per unit time would go like the square of the speed - doubling the speed costs 4x the fuel/second (2x from efficiency and 2x because you go twice as far).  The fuel consumption of a ship at max speed would stay the same - this would just change the interpolation formula for e.g. a 1/2 max speed setting.
In both cases, the idea is to give fighters (and possibly FAC/ships) a "cruise" mode that is more fuel efficient.  To a certain extent, this mimics the two modes for tactical engines in SF.

How big of a performance hit do you think this will cause?  I've been running 1 hr increments on 24 hr advances, and a significant portion of my game-play time is spent waiting for the update.

As I said, though, I like the ideas you've used (especially getting thin-skinned vessels into the game).

John

PS - On the performance issue: I think a lot of the performance hit comes from "survey next 5 system bodies" in systems with a LOT of asteroids - have you thought of looking at your algorithms there to get better scaling behavior with N (the number of asteroids/moons)?

[Charlie Beeler]

Steve,  I think you got the spirit of what I suggested bang on!!  

I'm really looking forward to the next release.

Something for future consideration.  A change to the fighter/parasite launch function.  Allow only 1 craft per bay/hanger to launch/land per a specific time increment.  To facilitate rapid combat launches add catapults/tubes that have tonage limits "reload" rates similiar to missile launchers.  Most probably won't care for this idea, but I like to build at least one race that has a small fighter compliment on all warships and use them as close combat supplements instead of plaforms for use when loitering beyond the enemies fire range.

[Kurt]

I have added the thin-skinned option for all ships. Fighters are automatically thin-skinned but every other ship type has the option by setting a checkbox on the Class Design window. Thin-skinned means that you only need half the normal armour amount but each time the ship is hit there is a 50% chance that the armour will have no effect. Not a good idea for warships but useful for freighters etc. Bear in mind that a thin-skinned ship is vulnerable to a single point of damage.

Note that only ships with an armour thickness of 1 can be thin-skinned.

Steve

I like this idea a lot.  Thanks Steve.

Kurt

[Steve Walmsley (OP)]

I'm still worried that fighters are going to be as fast as or faster than equivalent-tech missiles.  This doesn't feel realistic to me.

Given current Templar tech, which has the same engine tech for missiles and ships, fighters are coming out around 7500 km - 10000 km. Missiles are from 18,000 km/s to 30,000 km/s. The new 0.25 increment option on the missile design window makes a difference because you can create high speed, short range missiles. Anti-fighter missiles will probably be very fast while anti-ship missiles will be slower but still faster than fighters, which is similar to modern warfare. If it proves to be a problem after significant playtesting I will up the missile power a little

I'd still like to see a short-range, low-mass, low-aperture fighter mini-beam, more for consistency reasons than anything else.  Unfortunately, Aurora equates aperture with power (as opposed to range), so I don't see how to do this in terms of game mechanics.

Is this in addition to a small gun-type weapon or instead of? Aperture affects both power and range because more powerful lasers have longer ranges.

Just how horrendous is the fuel consumption? Is it bad enough to make fighters unusable?  Could a day of fighter-ops suck the carrier's tanks dry?  

Fighters use 100x normal fuel, which is reduced by fuel efficiency. However the engines are still very small. A fighter will probably use about 4000-5000 litres for 24 hours of continuous operations.  

How does this correlate with fuel consumption in a present-day CVBG?  A thought:  

Finding data on fuel storage for modern carriers has proven a little difficult. Assuming 500,000 fuel storage on a carrier with 20 fighters, I would guess that fuel would last 5-7 days of round the clock ops. Given the likely ordnance requirements for such operations, the fuel won't be the major problem

What if you made going slow more efficient than going fast?  I see two ways to do this:

A "military throttle" setting that would consume fuel much more efficiently than full power ("afterburner").  1/2 speed or lower might have a significantly lower fuel cost.  This would probably apply only to fighter/FAC.

Make engine/fuel efficiency proportional to speed.  This would mean fuel consumed per unit time would go like the square of the speed - doubling the speed costs 4x the fuel/second (2x from efficiency and 2x because you go twice as far).  The fuel consumption of a ship at max speed would stay the same - this would just change the interpolation formula for e.g. a 1/2 max speed setting.

In both cases, the idea is to give fighters (and possibly FAC/ships) a "cruise" mode that is more fuel efficient.  To a certain extent, this mimics the two modes for tactical engines in SF.

I have thought about this in the past, although using an occasional increased power mode and higher fuel cost rather than higher efficiency for lower speed. I am just not sure whether this is a a good idea or not. It would require more micromanagement of movement and fleets often have ships of different max speeds. At the moment if you move slower you do use less fuel but it is directly proportional rather than geometric.

How big of a performance hit do you think this will cause?  I've been running 1 hr increments on 24 hr advances, and a significant portion of my game-play time is spent waiting for the update.  I think a lot of the performance hit comes from "survey next 5 system bodies" in systems with a LOT of asteroids - have you thought of looking at your algorithms there to get better scaling behavior with N (the number of asteroids/moons)?

I have stepped through increments in the past to see where the lags appeared and the default orders for surveying system bodies are by far the biggest performance problem. I have looked at this a few times and tried different things without much success. I will give it another go though.

Steve

[Steve Walmsley (OP)]

To make beam fire control more accessible to fighters, I have added a Fighter-only option to beam fire control design. Fighter-only beam fire controls can track at 4x normal speed due to the maneuverability and speed of the fighters on which they are mounted. However, as fighters are too small to mount turrets, any weapons they mount will be limited to the speed of the fighter, even if the fire control is capable of tracking at higher speeds. This makes it possible to create beam fire control for fighters that has good tracking speed and is 1HS or less (as low as 0.25 HS is possible for very short-range fire control).

Steve

[sloanjh]

I'm still worried that fighters are going to be as fast as or faster than equivalent-tech missiles.  This doesn't feel realistic to me.

Given current Templar tech, which has the same engine tech for missiles and ships, fighters are coming out around 7500 km - 10000 km. Missiles are from 18,000 km/s to 30,000 km/s. The new 0.25 increment option on the missile design window makes a difference because you can create high speed, short range missiles. Anti-fighter missiles will probably be very fast while anti-ship missiles will be slower but still faster than fighters, which is similar to modern warfare. If it proves to be a problem after significant playtesting I will up the missile power a little

This makes me feel a lot better - I was worried about the fighter flying along beside a "typical" high-speed missile.  I realize that can happen for a low-speed missiles (e.g. V1 or Tomahawk), but it shouldn't happen for high-speed.

What if you made going slow more efficient than going fast?

I have thought about this in the past, although using an occasional increased power mode and higher fuel cost rather than higher efficiency for lower speed. I am just not sure whether this is a a good idea or not. It would require more micromanagement of movement and fleets often have ships of different max speeds. At the moment if you move slower you do use less fuel but it is directly proportional rather than geometric.

I was thinking in terms of the latter (i.e. no micromanagement - you just gain benefit for going more slowly).  The reason that I'm suggesting the change is that you don't gain any cruising range using the current algorithm - the reduced fuel consumption rate is cancelled by the slower speed (i.e. longer travel time).  Linear growth in range may be a bit excessive, however - you might want to use a fractional power of speed, like 1.5 so that the fuel rate goes like (V/Vmax)^1.5 instead of (V/Vmax)^2, which would result in a sqrt growth in range as speed is cut.  In this case you'd have to cut your speed by 4x to double your range, with an overall 8x in travel time.

I have stepped through increments in the past to see where the lags appeared and the default orders for surveying system bodies are by far the biggest performance problem. I have looked at this a few times and tried different things without much success. I will give it another go though.

Thanks.  Have you thought of dividing the system up into 2D "boxes" and saving an (integer) box ID with each asteroid?  If you restricted the algorithm to  "asteroid motion off" then you wouldn't ever have to update, and you could localize your search to asteroids that are nearby.  Especially if you did planets first - you could easily figure out which boxes might have a nearer asteroid and then restrict your SQL query to that range.  You might actually want to have a different set of boxes for each asteroid belt - then you could box in R and Theta.  I suspect most people have asteroid motion off anyway for performance reasons (I do).  It doesn't really help for moons, but you could check at the local planet before searching the system.  Or is the performance problem related to the DB query in a system with lots of bodies?

Just a thought.

Thanks,
John

[sloanjh]

A suggestion I forgot: have the "fighter ops" skill for a fighter commander increase his ability to gain the advantage in a dog fight (although I guess the fleet initiative rating does this too).  You might also add the speed of the fighter to the initiative calculation, since that's an indication of the manuverability.

John