Can anyone explain Fleet Mining?

[Kielm]

Hello!

I've been following the game for a while and have a measly twelve hours or so under my belt, but I've been scratching my head trying to figure out fleet mining.

I've done a lot of searching on the topic and found only pieces of the larger puzzle - some things work, others don't. I'd really appreciate a bullet-point list of steps for how to set it up, or failing that, answers to the following questions. Please forgive my ignorance, I haven't even figured out how to set up a shipyard / manufacture blueprints yet.

- what's the minimum number of ships to set up fleet mining?
- do the mining ships have to be able to dock with the mothership?
- if so, what are some options for doing that?
- do any ships require a bobby AI? If so, which ones?
- is there a preferred salvager / computer ratio for doing this?
(- what's all this I read about salvagers being 'slaved' to cannons, too?)
- how is the cargo transferred to/from docked ships (if required)
- how can I import and spawn some blueprints I've downloaded to study them in a creative game?

Right now, all I have in my single player game is a mining ship and a home base on a planet (docked). I had to disable npc pirate spawning because of a combination of "heavy load" errors and crashes, so afaik it's just pirate stations to worry about.

(Incidentally, i'm running an 8-core 3.5Ghz intel with 16Gb of RAM and a GTX980 - tried 4-8Gb allocated to StarMade, disabling NPC spawning has worked best - plus it gives me a chance to actually learn how to play!)

If anyone wants to share some advice on how to proceed from where I am now to space-faring badass I'll be grateful for that, too

 

[kurosawa]

This is going to be good

- what's the minimum number of ships to set up fleet mining?
What ever you like

- do the mining ships have to be able to dock with the mothership?
No

- if so, what are some options for doing that?
basic rails, pickup/shootout rails on the mother ship. Rail Docker on drone

- do any ships require a bobby AI? If so, which ones?
All ships that the AI will be piloting needs Bobby

- is there a preferred salvager / computer ratio for doing this?
(- what's all this I read about salvagers being 'slaved' to cannons, too?)
Put salvagers in long lines in a chees board fashion
Secondary computers add effects, in this case with salvager + canon you can make a continuous beam

- how is the cargo transferred to/from docked ships (if required)
you hook up cargo units with the basic rail and rail docker, then turn of pull in 1 storage block and add pull x item on the other

- how can I import and spawn some blueprints I've downloaded to study them in a creative game?
In the main menu there is an utility that allows import /export
[doublepost=1489162793,1489162701][/doublepost]Drone AI how ever is still lame in the head, it has been improved lately but it still have a long way to go.
If you experiance you drones just idle, recall them and move to another sector, wait for them to catch up and then issue a new mining order

 

[DrTarDIS]

Hello!

I've been following the game for a while and have a measly twelve hours or so under my belt, but I've been scratching my head trying to figure out fleet mining.

I've done a lot of searching on the topic and found only pieces of the larger puzzle - some things work, others don't. I'd really appreciate a bullet-point list of steps for how to set it up, or failing that, answers to the following questions. Please forgive my ignorance, I haven't even figured out how to set up a shipyard / manufacture blueprints yet.

- what's the minimum number of ships to set up fleet mining?
- do the mining ships have to be able to dock with the mothership?
- if so, what are some options for doing that?
- do any ships require a bobby AI? If so, which ones?

WB2 Starmade.
Hope you enjoy the new [Tab] menu. It'll help you a lot. also the "expanded block shapes" in your hotbar, use right click to toggle which ones are quick-accessed on the bar.
A fleet requires zero ships to be made, and you can add quite a few ships to the fleet after creation. A mining fleet only starts working at the second ship or more, the main ship must be under player control to actually salvage with the main ship. Bobby doesn't need to be there to act as a mining drone, it's more for entities outside of the "fleet" like turrets.

Docking is automated by using "rail pickup point" once with a set of entities in the fleet. The "pickup rails" and "shootout rails" are non-clipping rails used to orient and guide a drone that has been recalled.The drone R&D thread, and the wiki link at the top of the page, are where you should look to get a better idea before you do your own experiments. A little advice I can give is to use the "idle in formation" command at full stop and oriented to the sector to build your pickup points and rails from. it will help save a lot of collision headachs when/if you use the "carrier recall" command.

- is there a preferred salvager / computer ratio for doing this?
(- what's all this I read about salvagers being 'slaved' to cannons, too?)
- how is the cargo transferred to/from docked ships (if required)
- how can I import and spawn some blueprints I've downloaded to study them in a creative game?

That WIKI again, do some clicking. use "c" to select a computer, "v" to attach a "slaved" computer to it. Same effects as regular weapons for the most part. Try to keep "salvage power" a little above 200 or it's divisions. See it in your salvage weapon's details in the menu you use to bind it to your hotbar. Most servers have "salvage HP" for blocks set to 200 right now; if your salvage system does 200 salvage damage, the block is salvaged. So numbers that "lead to" 200 easily like 25, 34, 50, 67, 100, and 200 are what you aim to be a little above or at for your salvage "tics." You'll probably understand that jibberish a little better after you play around with your own small test system looking at the output values.

"community content" is a place to find ships people have built. Make sure you have pirate blueprint use turned "off" by default before introducing them, or learn to type "/destroy_entity_dock" really fast and "/god_mode [name] true" religiously. There's tools&options in the loading screen area, you can import/export blueprints you download from there.

Shameless plug for "light versus dark" and "genXnova" servers for online play, where you can ask all the noob questions you want in real-time XD.

 

[Shaker]

Not as fast as mining it yourself, unless your AFK, then they are faster

 

[Dvaren]

but I've been scratching my head trying to figure out fleet mining.

I'll provide a short and concise answer: Fleet Mining: A method of mining far less efficient and far more frustrating in it's current format than simply designing a well thought out dedicated mining cruiser. Sigh.

 

[KiloZulu]

My information may be outdated, since I haven't tried fleet mining with the last couple of updates. My experience, however, has suggested that fleet mining isn't nearly as efficient as simply building a good mining ship and doing it yourself. The reasons are threefold:
1. AI limitations don't allow for the creation of more complex drones. The AI falters when it has a large waffle board or other systems on board. This reduces drones to small, simple designs with single beams or small arrays.
2. Fleet controls for mining are limited, such that you have to monitor the progress of your mining drones - moving them from rock to rock as they complete the mining of each. You can either spend your time watching drones, or doing the mining yourself (the drones take longer.)
3. Each drone needs its own power, thrust, shield, storage, etc., which requires more resources than what you would need if you created a single mining ship with the same mining capability.

I've made some cool fleet mining ships that I enjoy, but it's simply because I enjoy watching the drones in action. Look at all these little things! So busy now! Notice how each one is useful. The lovely ballet that ensues, so full of form and color. When it's time to actually collect resources, I take out a dedicated mining vessel.

 

[kulbolen]

fleet mining: it doesnt work.

 

[Edymnion]

Don't forget you can combine.

Just because you have a mining fleet doesn't mean you can't still have a full mining array on your carrier. Send your drones out to mine one thing, you go mine another. Sure, you'll mine faster than they will unless you've got dozens and dozens of drones, but its still going to be faster in the long run.

Doesn't have to be just one or the other, hybrids work very well.

 

[Dvaren]

Don't forget you can combine.

Just because you have a mining fleet doesn't mean you can't still have a full mining array on your carrier. Send your drones out to mine one thing, you go mine another. Sure, you'll mine faster than they will unless you've got dozens and dozens of drones, but its still going to be faster in the long run.

Doesn't have to be just one or the other, hybrids work very well.

Although I agree with you 100% that this is an excellent way to perform mining operations, I have to admit that in practice, it still fails rather dismally. The issue is that the mining drones require constant intervention in order to maintain their operations which invariably leads to interruptions within your own manual operation.

Mining drone AI should really be hotfixed, even if AI in general remains on the backburner, as to date it's lackluster usability truly diminishes an entire segment of the game that could be quite interesting. I can't speak for everyone, but I'd venture a guess that others build in a similar fashion to myself, which is primarily (a) offensive ships, (b) mining barges, and (c) stations. Adding an entire new class of viable ships would do wonders for keeping interest peaked.

 

[splatthecat]

fleet mining: it doesnt work.

er, yes it does! Try any of my fleet mining systems on the dock and see for yourself.

 

[kurosawa]

er, yes it does! Try any of my fleet mining systems on the dock and see for yourself.

Interesting, does your fleets work each and every time with out flaw ?
Last i tried, the drones where lame in the head and would often not start. this was with default sector sizes which is what i am blaming.

is this the fleet you are referencing ASI Hyena Class Type C Fleet Mining System

 

[kulbolen]

er, yes it does! Try any of my fleet mining systems on the dock and see for yourself.

let me be less facetious for people who need things super literal:

fleet mining: it doesnt work very well, and isnt worth your time unless you really want to fight against poor implementation for role playing sake.

claiming "it works" isnt really helping anyone who may be having trouble with it, possibly through no fault of their own. highlighting the fact that its often buggy and unresponsive regardless of how well built your ships are may help the process of refining it into a worthwhile activity.

ps: im pretty experienced at building "working" ships. its still garbage.

 

[splatthecat]

Interesting, does your fleets work each and every time with out flaw ?
Last i tried, the drones where lame in the head and would often not start. this was with default sector sizes which is what i am blaming.

is this the fleet you are referencing ASI Hyena Class Type C Fleet Mining System

Yes, or ASI Micro Fleet Mining System or ASI Isanth-VI Fleet Mining System

No, I cannot say 100% flawlessly, but 95% at least.
[doublepost=1489696699,1489696278][/doublepost]

let me be less facetious for people who need things super literal:

fleet mining: it doesnt work very well, and isnt worth your time unless you really want to fight against poor implementation for role playing sake.

claiming "it works" isnt really helping anyone who may be having trouble with it, possibly through no fault of their own. highlighting the fact that its often buggy and unresponsive regardless of how well built your ships are may help the process of refining it into a worthwhile activity.

ps: im pretty experienced at building "working" ships. its still garbage.

Ever since Fleet mining was introduced I have built and used it. I have even grabbed unfactioned ships left at spawn on a mp server and turned them into viable fleet miners with limited fuss or funds.

I have three pure fleet mining systems shared on the dock and they all work 95% of the time. I have helped countless people get fleet mining to work for them. I have even created a fleet of large miners, not silly little RP drones and been able to wipe out an asteroid field in a minute or two. I cannot believe that I am the only person who can get it to work!

I agree, fleet mining is clunky and need work but it is better than the other fleet commands. AI pathing needs improvement and the "intelligence" needs work, true, but 9 times out of 10 it works. Why when you are sitting next to an asteroid and you issue the command do they fly off to another asteroid to mine it?

 

[Neon_42]

Don't forget you can combine.

Just because you have a mining fleet doesn't mean you can't still have a full mining array on your carrier. Send your drones out to mine one thing, you go mine another. Sure, you'll mine faster than they will unless you've got dozens and dozens of drones, but its still going to be faster in the long run.

Doesn't have to be just one or the other, hybrids work very well.

I though drones couldn't mine in unloaded sectors? Or do you have to be in the same sector?

 

[DrTarDIS]

I though drones couldn't mine in unloaded sectors? Or do you have to be in the same sector?

You can have the fleet mine any of the 26 sectors around the sector you personally are in. Having the ship you are controlling as flagship in a different sector may or may not make them "do the derp dance" they seem to like to do when they break. I personally send my fleet to mine sectors around me, and use my own ship outside of that fleet do "do other stuff, in the sector beside them quite regularly. It makes it easier to "unload" a "broken fleet" by moving one extra sector out of the way and waiting for the server to do it's thing (usualy 40 seconds + disk write time.) then move back over to reload them and try to get them working again.

 

[Neon_42]

You can have the fleet mine any of the 26 sectors around the sector you personally are in. Having the ship you are controlling as flagship in a different sector may or may not make them "do the derp dance" they seem to like to do when they break. I personally send my fleet to mine sectors around me, and use my own ship outside of that fleet do "do other stuff, in the sector beside them quite regularly. It makes it easier to "unload" a "broken fleet" by moving one extra sector out of the way and waiting for the server to do it's thing (usualy 40 seconds + disk write time.) then move back over to reload them and try to get them working again.

awesome! Can i use a station as a mothership?

 

[splatthecat]

awesome! Can i use a station as a mothership?

No, it has to be a ship.

 

[Neon_42]

No, it has to be a ship.

What if i dock the mothership to the station and just send out the drones? Is that possible?

 

[splatthecat]

What if i dock the mothership to the station and just send out the drones? Is that possible?

You could make a dockable platform but the mothership needs to be undocked to be able recall to the drones to the carrier. I have considered it but I tend to travel with my fleet.

 

[NeonSturm]

Don't forget you can combine.

Just because you have a mining fleet doesn't mean you can't still have a full mining array on your carrier. Send your drones out to mine one thing, you go mine another. Sure, you'll mine faster than they will unless you've got dozens and dozens of drones, but its still going to be faster in the long run.

Doesn't have to be just one or the other, hybrids work very well.

Mining drones seem to become useful once you need longer to travel between 2 rocks than to consume 1.