Troops in PBEM

[rja61]

I have a problem. I just had combat with an enemy planet. My attack force included a transport with troops. The fleet wiped out the planet and the troops neer landed. Any idea why? I know how to do this in a normal game but not in PBEM.

[geoschmo]

It should work just like a non-pbem game in which you play the battles in strategic mode instead of tactical.

I have been playing in strategic myslef lately and have not got all the kinks worked out. I was attacking an enemy planet recently and it took three turns of trying before my transports attempted to land the troops.

My ships wiped out his defenses, but the transports would not move in on the planet until every ship/sat/weap.plat/fighter were destroyed.

He had a colony ship that took a couple of turns to catch and destroy, and my transports would not close until that happened.

Geo

[Oggy ben Doggy]

You have to set the fleet strategy to Capture Planet, as I recall.

[Puke]

works best when the landing craft is not in the fleet. I tried to set a fleet with capture planet/point blank so that the non-troop-having ships would follow the lander down to soak up WP fire, but instead they just hung out in weapons rangee bombarding the planet and the lander sat back.

so you can set the lander by its self to use capture planet, and set your supporting fleet to use whatever you want, either a dont get hurt, or a point blank with a low damage threshold.

[geoschmo]

I want my troop transport to stay just out of range of the enemy until my attack ships have destroyed all the sats and WP and destroyed or chased off all the ships.

Instead what happens is my troop transport runs to the corner until all the enemy ships have been destroyed. Like I said before if they have a colony ship or a couple of transports, this can take a couple of rounds of battle to accomplish.

Another problem is with a heavily defended planet, by the time my atack ships have cleared out the defenders, my troop ships hiding in the corners are too far away to get there before the combat round ends.

Is there any way to keep them closer in but out of weapons range?

I have been playing this game for a while, but am a newbie when it comes to strategic combat.

Geo

[Admiral Grover]

I normally give my troop transports (which are actually dreadnaughts) PDC's to keep them in the fleet formation. That way once the defences are gone from the planet, the transports can move in and take the planet.

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Admiral Grover
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"There is a theory which states that if ever anyone discovers exactly what the Universe is for and why it is here, it will instantly disappear and be replaced by something even more bizarrely inexeplicable.
There is another theory which states that this has already happened."
- Hitch Hiker's Guide to the Galaxy - Douglas Adams

[Nitram Draw]

I think there is a way to adjust the type, clasification, of ships that break formation in combat. These ships generally run to the corner for the duration of the fight.
Try removing transports from this list. It may keep them closer to the battle.
I don't know if adding a weapon will screw up the way the AI views the ship but you could try putting a capitol ship missle on them and giving it don't get hurt orders too.