Whos on first when it comes to firing?

[Gryphin]

Who fires first in simultaneous combat.
In a recent battle a warp point defended by sats and ships is attacked from the other side. The defenders ships open up and blow away several ships that the stack of sats could have knocked out. The 78 stats with 4 direct fire weapons each still had plenty of unused weapons when they finished off the Last ship within range.
If the sats had fired first the BattleCrUsers could have cleaned up what was left and then gone after ships further away.

[Fyron]

In Gold games, the defending empires (those that were already in the sector) go first in the battle. If there is more than 1 defender, which specific defender goes first is random. The attacking empires (those that just moved into the sector) go Last. If there is more than 1 attacker, which specific attacker goes first is random.

In Pre-gold games, the empires go in order of player number.

[ November 11, 2002, 21:02: Message edited by: Imperator Fyron ]

[Gryphin]

I asked the wrong question.
How do we, (if we can), control which element firers first?
Is it related to the order of deployment?
If I deploy the sats, then enter with my ships will the sats fire first?

[Fyron]

Umm... the first built object _might_ be the one that fires first, but I do not really know.

[capnq]

I think your ships always move and fire first, then your sats and planets with weapons platforms fire, and finally your fighters and drones move and fire Last.

I'm not sure about any of that, though; I don't see many combats with all the types together on one side.

[ November 11, 2002, 21:49: Message edited by: capnq ]

[Gryphin]

I'll test and see what fires up first.
Still, if it turns out that ships get in the first licks, am I the only one that would like it changed?

[dogscoff]

Maybe... Having ships go first could be a good thing, since they can gain experience and units cannot.

I think if a change were to to be made the only satidfactory one would be some system where the player defines the order (maybe a bit like repair priorities?), but that has the potential to be nightmarishly complicated and I don't think it's likely to get implemented.

[dogscoff]

Perhaps short-ranged weapons should fire before long-ranged ones...

[mac5732]

how about simultaneous firing with damage be accessed after each round of combat for both sides? this way all units from both sides, ie; ships, sats, battlstations etc, all fire at same time, damage/destruction applied after end of each firing sequence/round of combat??

just some ideas mac

[ November 12, 2002, 16:08: Message edited by: mac5732 ]

[dogscoff]

Mac, that would be the ideal solution but it would be a massive coding change for MM, since the turn system is at the very heart of the game's combat engine.

Maybe for SE5 though...

[mac5732]

Dogscoff, I was afraid someone would say hard code changes... http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon7.gif I'm sure it wouldn't be all that easy to implement because of ftrs, drones, etc, but I thought maybe something like the combat in Pax Imperium II, not exactly like it, but maybe something similiar....

just some ideas mac

[Gryphin]

It may indeed be a hard code issue more complex than it is worth.
Still I would love to see Fixed units such as Sats and WPs fire first. Then the mobile elements can engage targets further away.
I can dream.

[Gryphin]

Ships can't gain experiance if they get blown out of the sky buy talisman toting BCs. I'm guessing the 3 ships that could have been destroyed by my sats cost me 1 or 2 BCs.