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- Jul 6, 2013
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Was testing out the new rails and have the following tips, info and ideas.
Drone reload magazine.
You can setup a drone magazine docked to the main ship. Use a shootout to line up with the pickup on the carrier. Need a bit of room between the two and see tip 4 below. Note it must be docked to the carrier or the re-dock timer won't allow it to dock. Not sure if that is a bug but it lets this work. Also make sure that you can control the magazine as in button for one drone at a time or use a speed controller to slow them down so they all don't jam in. This saves you from flying every single drone in one at a time. The fleet I setup did recognise that pickup as the return point. Not sure if this makes a difference but I used the docker beam to dock to the rail on the drone magazine.
I tired the reverse to use a pickup point and shootout on the carrier to load a docked hanger but it gets the re-dock timer and sails right past or collides. If they are far enough apart and not moving it may still work. So you might be able to load a ship up with drones from a station. But I'm guessing you need around 100m clearance for the 4 or 5 seconds at 25m/s.
Other tips
1. The carrier command to return will only work if the pickup points are on the main body of the ship.
2. When using one pickup rail for multiple returning drones. Set up some rail logic to stop an incoming drone to give the drone before it some room to rotate, move etc.... Unless your going for a bay each. Note while this stops issues inside your ship the drones can backup all the way to the pickup point where the next drone may crash into a drone and spin your ship. I was using a small test bed so it might not be so bad for a large carrier.
3. When using individual bays the pickup point has to be 4 or more blocks away from the shootout path or the drone will auto dock after launch. Apparently the redock timer doesn't count for this.
4. Have the docker stick one block out so that nothing is within 1 square of the rail. Otherwise on the shootout path might not be straight which might cause collisions.
Hope this makes it easier for people to load drones into their carriers or saves some headaches.
Drone reload magazine.
You can setup a drone magazine docked to the main ship. Use a shootout to line up with the pickup on the carrier. Need a bit of room between the two and see tip 4 below. Note it must be docked to the carrier or the re-dock timer won't allow it to dock. Not sure if that is a bug but it lets this work. Also make sure that you can control the magazine as in button for one drone at a time or use a speed controller to slow them down so they all don't jam in. This saves you from flying every single drone in one at a time. The fleet I setup did recognise that pickup as the return point. Not sure if this makes a difference but I used the docker beam to dock to the rail on the drone magazine.
I tired the reverse to use a pickup point and shootout on the carrier to load a docked hanger but it gets the re-dock timer and sails right past or collides. If they are far enough apart and not moving it may still work. So you might be able to load a ship up with drones from a station. But I'm guessing you need around 100m clearance for the 4 or 5 seconds at 25m/s.
Other tips
1. The carrier command to return will only work if the pickup points are on the main body of the ship.
2. When using one pickup rail for multiple returning drones. Set up some rail logic to stop an incoming drone to give the drone before it some room to rotate, move etc.... Unless your going for a bay each. Note while this stops issues inside your ship the drones can backup all the way to the pickup point where the next drone may crash into a drone and spin your ship. I was using a small test bed so it might not be so bad for a large carrier.
3. When using individual bays the pickup point has to be 4 or more blocks away from the shootout path or the drone will auto dock after launch. Apparently the redock timer doesn't count for this.
4. Have the docker stick one block out so that nothing is within 1 square of the rail. Otherwise on the shootout path might not be straight which might cause collisions.
Hope this makes it easier for people to load drones into their carriers or saves some headaches.
