Ai patrol block

[supernoob0122]

ive been thinking about how the AI in the game works and i thought about a patrol block for space stations.
it works like this

In order to let the AI know were to patrol around you need the Patrol block for your station when you place it down it will have menus set up like this
_______________________________
Patrol block settings


Patrol radius (1-5 limit)
(input number here)
-----------------------------------------------------
Patrol plane
[] X
[] Y
[] Z
-----------------------------------------------------
Patrol Name
(input name here)
-----------------------------------------------------
Panic?
[]
_______________________________

Panic?

if the player has set the block to panic the AI ships retreat to the base and defends it until the ship or player that was reported attacking the station is destroyed.
(if the player or ship leaves the patrol rout limit the AI stops attacking and returns to the rout they was set to)
_______________________________


AI

when you set your patrol block up you go to a bobby AI and under type a new option appears
(Patrol)
when you set your AI to patrol you get these options
[] Activate patrol

Patrol name
(Enter the name of the patrol you put in the block)

when you set up you AI it will start to go that amount of sectors away and stay in that plane

if a entry enters the patrol sector a message appears to the faction news

"{name} has entered the Patrol rout of (Name of patrol block)"

_______________________________

Other things

• If the patrol block is destroyed the AI Auto panics and goes to its last location and patrols there
• There can be multiple patrol blocks on a station
• there is a limit of 4 ships that can patrol a block

 

[supernoob0122]

No one wants to give any feedback on this idea?

 

[DivineEvil]

Nope. We don't need a separate block for that.

 

[Ithirahad]

Personally, I like the idea... If you don't want to have enemies running around, this would mean that rather than just tossing ships out there, you have to set up a station nearby. This wouldn't fully solve the issue of non-homebase stations being useless, but it would certainly help.

 

[sparkyails]

I love the Idea can you have them guard ships too... like staying near a ship within a certain area to protect it...
like a drone to a mother ship.

 

[Zaphord]

Like the idea, but I have to agree with Divine on this one. Instead of a block you could have all these settings put into the AI menu. You could have it so the AI patrols around a selected entity, say a ship or a station, within a set distance.

 

[GenericFleetCommander]

I think this is a great idea, a major problem I encounter when building a carrier is that I launch my ships, they fly off into the void, and then I have to collect them all again. I like the idea of my fighters just flying around the ship, engaging enemies when they get close and then returning to their set location. Another great idea on top of this is a "return to dock" kind of setting, when you launch the ship, they engage all hostiles until they die or win, and then they return to the place they started.

A major balance problem with this might be that someone spawns #x of battle ships and just have the AI fly around him, it doesn't matter how many players you have in your faction, anyone can build a one man AI army and stomp anyone in his path. Maybe a limit to how big escorting ships can be would be in order, and how many ship you can have escorting one entity. This could be affected by ship size, like a Titan would have more escorting fighters than a gun boat. Of course outer rim stations that are further from the home base (and stations in general) can have bigger ships and larger numbers defending it. I think this would make a great game improving addition, especially if they combine it with single player AI factions and multiplayer factions.

 

[StormWing0]

hmm sounds interesting to say the least. Would be rather handy as well although the real question here is should it be it's own block or should it be merged with the current AI block? Other than that it's a handy idea and yes the one player armada is going to need to be nerfed beforehand. I say this because I'm one of those solo players that tends to have a ton of AI and logic defenses around my bases and trust me they are dangerous when used right.

 

[BlackTangent]

Even though this would only be really useful for AI ships, it's still something that I would support as an integration with the AI block.

 

[GenericFleetCommander]

Definitely integrate it into the current AI block, there is no reason for a new block here. It would reduce clutter and make everything easier to manage.