simulation button/program

[sparhawk]

I have tried to use the simulation button in the design map. I had the right ships put in, from both me as the enemy (I know, because he attack me the turn before)
So I did some tests/simulation and the outcome was that I would loss 50 % of my ships, but because I reaaly wanted to destroy his fleet, I when on with my attack.
But when I got the result back, they were totally different: in only lost 10% of my ships.
How is that possible: is the simulation so bad???
Because I did that simulation like 20 times and every time I got thesame result.
Or is this simulation button/program just not working??

Sparhawk

[Suicide Junkie]

Any experience your ships have could also make a huge difference.

I'm not sure, but racial trait differences could also have an effect.

[Jmenschenfresser]

I think fleets matter alot in combat results. It's been my experience that you need to put ships in fleets and set the strategies to what you have in the actual game.

Sounds like at least the mistake went your way. I had one where I destroyed all my opponents ships in the sim losing around 30% myself. But when the actual battle came, I lost all of mine and he lost one or two. Complete reversal.

[dogscoff]

There are all sorts of possible reasons. Maybe the fleets strategies/ formations were different in the real battle. Maybe some of the enemy ships started the real battle damages or low on supplies.

The simulator is usually pretty good, as long as you don't get too complicated with it. When you start adding planets, bases, units etc it can get a little wierd. For normal ship - ship combat it ought to give you fairly good results.

[LGM]

The simulator misses a lot of modifiers, I think. Especially Ship and Fleet Experience and Racial and Cultural Modifiers. It probably does not handle system modifiers either (Like War and Death Shrines or one of the other Facilities that can affect combat). If a fleet has 20 exp and each ship has 20 exp and +20 attack and defense and +10 ship combat (beserker), that is 70% modifiers that the simulator is not taking into account. That has a big impact on your to hit numbers.

The other thing is start positions can change things dramatically too. If you start on the same side of the map, you can catch your opponent or be caught in a position where your formation is rotated the wrong way.

It is also can be hard to predict what your opponents targetting options will be.

[ September 07, 2002, 17:32: Message edited by: LGM ]

[Fyron]

Extra ships that do not fit in the formation are placed completely randomly in combat, and where they are can make a huge difference in a battle. Also, if your opponent modified his strategies at all, the simulator will not give you accurate results.

[Banjo]

I have come to use the simulator while playing, and I will set up a potential situation and run it several times. I let the AI run both sides and there are times where if the ships are a relatively even match, The outcome is one side wins about half the time. Perhaps the AI has a few options that it uses in combat that uses regardless of the setup. I prefer to run the sim about five times before I accept the outcome.