lets say this , you craft a block/console/device that allows you to record a certain pattern of flight or movements of your vessels( any kind) in that way you could even be a passanger of your own "auto" ship , this could have several uses, here are some examples : -Taxi ; you could set your own system of autoguided ships , allowin you to go several recorded places -Scort : set a pattern flight to go around your base or other vessels -Drones : in the same way that the faction drones work , but created by the player how this could work ? with your "recording"device you start flying or setting the path that you choose from point A (the start) to point B(the finish point) , after you start recording you still will be on control of the ship until you stop recording . this could include even the timming on wich the vessel start from point A and the time that remains docked on point B , in other words something like this : point A , you start recording docked so the ship dosent move right away giving you time to enter and do some stuff ( lets say you stay docked for 5 minutes recording , after that you start fliying ) then you take the path that you want to point B and do the same process of wainting docked a couple of minutes and then you stop recording , so whenever you start the autopilot mode , that ship will do that trip on his own . you can activate or deactivate at will . i hope that could be a start to real autopilot and seems reachable with the game system and mechanics love the game so far , hope you like the suggestion. and i hope to recive some feedback.
Auto pilot so I can walk on my ship or let me hire a pilot. Devs should look into the new game ASKA and what they are doing with the settlers
the curious thing its that already the faction npcs already patrol and at least move around , the just have to allow us to do the same , a solution could be using the motion sensor to set them a path or an area in wich they can intereact with stuff
Walking while a autopilot flies the ship probably won't happen. But the drone / automated ships thing sounds interesting. I would love to have a fleet of drones tending autominers and bigger ships bringing the ore to a refinery station in orbit or another system. Also drones for combat.
I'm doubtful. That said, maybe a simple and useful first step would be this. Have a navigation console you could use sitting in a pilot seat. The nav console would display a list of currently selected waypoints. Players would be able to select one, activate autopilot to have the ship automatically align to it, cruise to it, and stop once they reach it. Adding multiple waypoints as a queue would let the ship to visit each one in order.Waypoints in this queue could be adjusted up or down before engaging the autopilot. The ship would warp to selected waypoints into other sectors if able to do so. Autopilot disengages automatically and the ship autobrakes to a stop if the ship is damaged, the ship becomes immobile or unable to continue towards a waypoint, or the pilot tries to leave their seat. Planetary map markers would have the Y coordinate field opened up so players can create midair approach waypoints. Most importantly, waypoints could be added to the nav queue from the map screens and registry to facilitate automated navigation. The most common use case would be something like this. A player wants their ship to fly home after some mining in a distant star system. From the registry, they waypoint their home base and add it to the nav queue. From the galaxy map, they waypoint and add intermediate stars to warp to. The player then reorders these waypoints in the nav console to create a flight plan. They check their pentaxid supply, hop in their flight seat, and activate the autopilot. First, the ship flies around the planet to the next waypoint's position in the sky, transitioning to orbit there. Once in space, the ship autobrakes to a stop (and waits if necessary to provide loading time), rotates to align to next waypoint, and warps there. This continues until the ship reaches the planetary orbit sector containing the last waypoint. Here, the ship autopilots directly to the planet playfield, then to the last waypoint at the player's home base (mirroring the first STO maneuver). The autopilot disengages and the ship simply idles normally after that. Drones, NPC subordinates, walking on moving ships, all that is neat ideas. But it all depends on the ability of ships to get from point A to point B on their own. This is the simplest and most immediately useful version of that.
yeah we still need this desperately if you actually think about it, the lore has a core AI, which could EASILY be used to call remote vessels to a player(VERY useful as you might often have an SV lander that gets popped and you have to fly back to your CV, just call a different transport SV from your MS) let alone once automated logistics are added you could have drone ships flying around all the sectors picking up locally crafted biofuel and crops and finally we have players who are solo or do not have large factions, it is only fair to balance combat via creating a "core ship" in which all your fighters swarm around, and land on the auto-repair and in designated zones which leave behind ghosts until either they return or the core gets popped on the linked docked vessel(maybe with a terminal that can manually recall any vessel you need like the existing story logic but linked to the ID of the vessel) and given the ability to call "global signals" to say "I need a pickup" or "pickup request pending" or "I need stock" and the logic will simply be "who has the closest source of excess stock of item x and a drone with cargo space to deliver it" a simple set of flags like "can warp" and "has compatible cargo box"(fridge, controller, box, ammo, harvest) and "is capable of dangerous flight"(for when flying through hostile sectors it should have a PHS and at least some form of mounted gun) and possibly a set of flags for "maximum flight time before refueling" and "trip time" so it can determine if it must stop a a waypoint station you set up for fueling all it must do is know the destination location, have a set of blocks that mark the corners of a rectangular landing zone(it will land on the gravity down surface unless the terminal adjacent to the destination zone says a different surface) and will detect occupied via the same logic as repair bays(including a player trying to get in for manual control) and you can even tell a ship to go to a temporary waypoint ala factorio mobile device logic and wait for instructions it should not be that hard to code a transfer logic(fill this slot to count-x, empty other slots of this item) and dump locations(likely near your home base with containers set to "unlimited storage") and use a "drone registry" and a "galactic logistics" screen similar to the current registry and logistics but with slots locked by middle click(just like factorio)
