Sentry command

[TurinTurambar]

I've never really understood the Sentry command. What does it really do (I can't get it to do anything) and what are some possible applications?

I've heard it mentioned you could set a Star Destroyer on a sun and give it the Sentry order and somehow it nukes the sun when enemies warp in?

I've never gotten Sentry to cause a ship to do anything at all. Not suprising since I am probably using it incorrectly out of pure ignorance.

Turin

[geoschmo]

TurinTurambar said:
I've never gotten Sentry to cause a ship to do anything at all.



The Sentry command tells the ship to "Do nothing", so if your ship did nothing, then it worked exactly the way it was supposed to. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/laugh.gif

What I use sentry for is to take ships out "out of the loop" for the next ship button. When the empire gets large it's difficult to keep track of everything. So I go through all teh ships using teh next ship button and make sure everybody is doing what I want them to do. Next ship skips over ships that already have orders. Sometimes I want ships to do nothing, like if they are sitting over a training depot, or guarding a warp point. So I give those ships the sentry order so they won't do anything and I don't have to stop on them every time when going through the next ship loop.

Telling a ship to do nothing is not at all the same as not telling the ship to do anything. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif

[Strategia_In_Ultima]

.....and somehow it nukes the sun when enemies warp in?




Heeheehee..... Somehow, I find this phrase comical. Nukes the sun..... heeheehee.

I always give ships the Sentry order when I want them to guard/train, or simply wait until the entire fleet is assembled. I never use the next/previous ship/fleet/planet/whatever buttons though.

[Phoenix-D]

The Sentry order is pretty simple. It holds the ship where it is until enemies arrive, then executes any other orders in the list.

So if your Star Destroyer was parked over a star, and you gave it these orders:

Sentry
Destroy Star

It would destroy the star when it first saw an enemy ship enter the system.

[Frederick_d_Ohlmann]

Sentry has 2 use : trigger the order once ennemy is in the system (like blowing away the system - I tend to haves a black hole creator in every system I control) because the sentry clear and others order resolve
Or skipping them for next button, to have less ship to walk throught.

[Strategia_In_Ultima]

As for blowing up the star after enemies enter the sys, this is when you've got Clear orders when enemy presence is detected on, right? Or is it just that a sentry order is automatically cancelled when you detect an enemy?

[NullAshton]

The sentry command isn't over until an enemy ship is detected in the system I believe.

[TurinTurambar]

Phoenix-D said:
The Sentry order is pretty simple. It holds the ship where it is until enemies arrive, then executes any other orders in the list.

So if your Star Destroyer was parked over a star, and you gave it these orders:

Sentry
Destroy Star

It would destroy the star when it first saw an enemy ship enter the system.



Now THAT is the information I was looking for!

Thanks all,
Turin

[Wade]

Concerning the cycle *Fleets* swicth.

Pressing sentry for a Fleet sets the individual ships within it to sentry but the Fleet still cycles.

Is there a way to set Fleets to sentry so that they do not cycle?

-Wade

[Urendi Maleldil]

Woah. So if the fleet orders cycle while the individual ship orders are sentried, does that mean you can order a fleet to patrol through a system and then when it sees an enemy ship to execute individual ship orders?

[Arkcon]

Phoenix-D said:
The Sentry order is pretty simple. It holds the ship where it is until enemies arrive, then executes any other orders in the list.

So if your Star Destroyer was parked over a star, and you gave it these orders:

Sentry
Destroy Star

It would destroy the star when it first saw an enemy ship enter the system.

TurinTurambar said:
Now THAT is the information I was looking for!

Thanks all,
Turin

Yeah, or if the ship ran out of supplies, it will also clear its Sentry orders. That could happen to a parked ship that took damage to components that held half of its supplies, by intel or some random event.

[bearclaw]

Strategia_In_Ultima said:
As for blowing up the star after enemies enter the sys, this is when you've got Clear orders when enemy presence is detected on, right? Or is it just that a sentry order is automatically cancelled when you detect an enemy?



Nope, this is something seperate. Clear Orders on enemy presense will clear ALL orders.

Sentry will unsentry when an enemy ship is in the same system regardless of what the Clear Orders On Enemy Presense setting is.

As for Fleets cycling, just select the Fleet then Sentry (Y button)and the whole fleet will be sentried and will skip when cycling.

[Wade]

bearclaw said:

As for Fleets cycling, just select the Fleet then Sentry (Y button)and the whole fleet will be sentried and will skip when cycling.



Unfortionately this turns out not to be the case. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/frown.gif
I'm using unmodded/stock version 1.95. It seems that this should have been addressed officially by now; in one of the many upgrades.

-Wade

[Fyron]

I've probably only hit the next fleet button twice in SE4. Its so much easier to just use the next ship button (spacebar!) and issue orders to whatever fleet the next ship is in. Turn on the "stop once at each location" flag, and it covers the next fleet button functionality too. And it skips sentried ships.

[capnq]

I never use the Next buttons, but I use the (F6) Ships screen a lot. Sorting the Orders column usually puts all the Sentry ships last. (I think the only common order that comes after Sentry alphabetically is Warp.)

[Parasite]

Note that if you have "Clear Orders On Enemy Presence" option set, your Star destroyer will clear the "Destroy Star" order when enemy ships are sighted. So nothing will blow up or get turned into a black hole. I have not tested this, but expect it to work like this.

A bit more on fleet sentrys. Be sure to clear all orders before setting a fleet to sentry after moving ships in and out of it. If ships are on sentry in the fleet and more ships are added the new ones will not be at sentry. They may not show on the top level screen and that could cause confusion. this may be what is causing the cycle button to be off.

[Wade]

Cycle ships works fine by skipping sentries. Cycle fleets does not skip sentried ships even when all in a fleet are sentried. Maybe it was meant to be this way.

When we choose a fleet to sentry it should sentry the fleet and skip it during fleet cycle.

-Wade