Ship/Fleet Exp

[General Hawkwing]

A question I have is about ships/fleets gaining experience. Is there a possible bug in the program that suspends the gaining of exp. when you only damage a ship and not destroy it. The reason I ask, is because I had a new fleet guarding a warp point. When an enemy was within reach for me to strike and return, I would send the fleet to intercept the enemy. Now being a 'bean counter' I tend to play a very number focused game. I realize that the cost for a fully functional ship is the same as a lame duck, so I only damaged the ships until they could not move. Talk about 'frozen assests'. http://www.shrapnelgames.com/ubb/images/icons/icon12.gif However, in the next few battles I did destroy some ships, yet my fleet exp. did not increase. Only after clearing my fleet and rejoining it could I gain exp points.
Any ideas why the fllet would not gain experience? Colud it have glitched on the first enemy ship not being destroyed?

[Baron Munchausen]

The game is not supposed to give you experience until ships are actually destroyed. There's no bonus for just damaging a ship. So, that part isn't a bug. As far as I know, you don't get your experience until the combat is over. There is still a problem with missiles and credit for a kill, so if you are using missiles it's possible that you are not getting proper experience boosts for kills. Other than that, a fleet gains experience just like a ship. +1 per ship destroyed.

[General Hawkwing]

No, I wasn't using CSM's, I was using PPB's. I realize you don't get exp. for damaging only destroying.
My question is: could not destroying the first ship in the 1st combat, prevented the fleet from gaining exp. in next combat.
After the 1st combat, my fleet slaughtered about a dozen ships in 3 combats and still had exp. 0%. I then disbanded the fleet, recreated it with the same ships and after the next combat they gained exp. equal to the ships killed.

[Baron Munchausen]

Ah... you think something got "stuck" because of the damaged ship? Interesting thought. You could probably test this by deliberately taking on a smaller force and firing just enough to cripple them, then backing out. Then save the game, and you can go back & finish them. Try it without disbanding and reforming the fleet,then try it with disbanding & reforming. If you can reproduce it, you've found a bug.

[Samurai]

Just how important is fleet experience?

[UmberGryphon]

<BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Samurai:
Just how important is fleet experience?<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

Well, it depends on how you play. If you use Religious Talismans or CSMs or otherwise don't need to make to-hit rolls, it's not a problem. If you fight at point-blank range, it's not a big deal.

I, however, fight at max PPB range (range 6) all the time, and unless I have better combat sensors than they have ECM (which doesn't happen anymore now that I have the AIs on maximum boost) I need all the help I can get.

Even with 20% experience on both my ships and my fleets, I sometimes have problems hitting at range 6, especially on smaller ships. I shudder to think how rarely I'd hit if I didn't have the 20% fleet experience.

[Nyx]

Does experience effect only acuracy or does it change defenses too?

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[Daynarr]

It adds to both defense and offense (accuracy). So it useful even to religious empires because it will make their ships harder to hit by enemy.

[Tomgs]

Has anyone ever experimented with fleet experience? I took a fleet with 10% exp saved the game went into combat then recalled the game disbanded the fleet and created a new one and my to hit percentages were the same with a new fleet with no experience. The ships however had the same experience both times ranging from 8 to 12 percent. Has anyone else tried this? Was this just a fluke or does fleet experience mean nothing?

Thinking back on it though I may have cleared the group assignments before I tested this I wonder if that caused the fleet experience to be nulified? I will have to test it again and see if that was the problem.

[This message has been edited by Tomgs (edited 19 January 2001).]

[Emperor Zodd]

Maybe you only get a 2% combat bonus for every 10% of experience.

[Tomgs]

OK I just reconfirmed this. I had a fleet with 10% experience with 3 ships. The ships experience were 1%, 14% and 20%. All this experience came from combat no facilities were used. First I entered combat with the fleet. Staying in formation the to hit chance from 6 spaces away was 26%, 39% and 45% meaning the base chance must have been 25% with 1, 14 and 20% added or 15% with the fleet 10%. I reloaded the saved game removed the three ships from the fleet and held the shift button and selected all three and reentered combat. The to hit chances were identical from 6 spaces away. This seems to me to mean that the fleet experience has no bearing on to hit chances. I don't know if it helps in defence.

Can someone else try this and see if they get the same results? I have made a couple of mods but nothing that should effect the to hit chances. Also if someone out there uses the facilities to raise fleet experience does this change the results?

Edit: Ok I went back again to that battle and made both races human players. There is not a defencive bonus for fleet experience either. I will send off an E-mail to Malfador to see if he knows about this.

[This message has been edited by Tomgs (edited 19 January 2001).]

[Emperor Zodd]

E-mail MM about it.

[Samurai]

This is the reason for my original question farther down the thread: How important is *fleet* experience.

I've noticed no benefits from it whatsoever.

As anyone under any conditions in any situation received *noticable* benefits?