ship mass confuses autopilot

[lee]

Has it already been noticed that an increased ship mass (due to loaded cargo) seems to confuse the autopilot?

The more the ship mass has been increased by loaded cargo, the further away from the target the autopilot turns itself off. It turns off at distances of about 25km with 1630% mass and about 200km with 3680% mass (even after upgrading the thrusters).

That is inconvenient for a number of reasons.


The autopilot points the ship to the center of the target. It would be nicer if it pointed the ship to the center of a docking bay if docking was requested.


The autopilot seems to stick to the default maximum speed of a ship (like 300 for an Illama). It could make the ship go faster whenever it would be reasonable, considering the distance to travel and the acceleration capabilities of the ship.

On the other hand, it is arguable that the autopilot ignores the speed (limit) which has been set by the player: When loaded cargo increases the ships mass to like 20 or 30 times the empty mass, I prefer to go slow (like 50--150 instead of 300) so that I don't overshoot or crash. The autopilot ignores that, accelerates to the max default speed (300) and then suddenly turns itself off, leaving the pilot with the problem to handle a ship that is going too fast to safely reach its destination (at least within a reasonable amount of time). It they had autopilots like that in airplanes, a lot of people would die ...

Well, ok, it's not so much a problem of handling it, but it takes a lot of time. You can't do anything but wait for the ship to slow down which wouldn't be necessary if either the autopilot wouldn't turn off far away from the target or if it wouldn't make the ship fly too fast.


Other than that, this new autopilot is a great improvement!

BTW, it would be nice to have a display in the trade menu showing the current mass of the ship so that you don't have to "overload" it.

[loki1950]

That drop off further away depending on the mass should be enough to allow you to decelerate for close manoeuvring as for it using the fastest speed i believe it was just much easier to code that way(the auto-pilot is really just a quick hack more place holder)

Enjoy the Choice

[lee]

That drop off further away depending on the mass should be enough to allow you to decelerate for close manoeuvring as for it using the fastest speed i believe it was just much easier to code that way(the auto-pilot is really just a quick hack more place holder)

Yeah, that's what I was thinking might be behind turning it off early. Quick hack or not, it's pretty good already. It circumvents obstacles and takes you to your target within a reasonable amount of time if the ship isn't loaded. It would be fun to leave it like that as the simplest autopilot and allow players to buy upgrades to it.

We need those upgrades, though. The early disengagement reintroduces the problem of things taking too long and of not having an autopilot.

There could be several levels of upgrades, from "no early disengagement" over "uses jump points and optimized routes and speeds" and "SPECs directly from system to system or uses jump points if faster" to "is even programmable".

[Tc27]

I haven't played any svn builds since 0.5 went stable, but what I'd like to see momentum taken into account by the autopilot.

Start from, say, a mining base, with a couple of light-minutes distance to travel before going around a big planet that's in the way, then a couple more light minutes to the jump point. Normally this will go fine, unless one happens to be in, say, a llama at 1800% of mass; the momentum acquired in going around the obstacle won't get cancelled since the autopilot aims dead centre at the jump point when the path is clear.

Amusing as it can be to sit in a stable orbit around a jump point at a distance of a couple of hundred Ks with SPEC activated, it can be frustrating as a player. Mass and inertia are part of what makes VS what it is, but I would like to see it made possible (whether by default, a config option, or with a ship upgrade) for the autopilot to compensate for momentum and neutralise the drift as early as possible. Taking a bit longer during SPEC travel is less aggravating than trying to dock or jump while moving faster sideways than forwards.

</$0.02>

[lee]

Yes, that would be part of what I call optimized routes. In a simple example, you would go from the mining base to a jump point in a straight line. The autopilot would accelerate the ship until it has crossed 1/2 the distance, then it would decelerate. You would arrive at the jump point at the same speed you were going when you left the mining base.

It's more complicated when the mining base and the jump point move at different speeds or when you can't go in a straight line. The autopilot would have to plot a course in advance, considering the different speeds and the movement (if any) of objects (like the bases, the planets and jump points) to figure out the best course.

It's impossible to do that manually because the player doesn't even get the information needed for that. We also don't have a reasonable way to navigate.

You could try to determine your current position by checking the distances from various objects like planets and bases. But that would be difficult to say the least.

Do planets, bases etc. move like they should? They did that in Elite Frontier ... You had to "catch up" with a planet to land on it, and you would be unable to land if the planet was moving faster than your ship could keep up with. If you tried hard enough, you would eventually crash into the planet

Did I mention that we need an autopilot?


PS: As a workaround, it might already help if the autopilot won't make the ship go faster than the speed set by the player. If the player sets a low speed, like 50, there won't be so much momentum to deal with.

I like it that cargo influences the ships mass, and I think it's very acceptable that it can take longer to fly from one place to another when your ship has many times it's normal mass. But (other than in extreme cases maybe) it shouldn't take too long. Trading is an important part of the game/gameplay and shouldn't become a pita.

Freighters are designed to move cargo: They have large cargo bays. Now they also need powerful propulsion systems --- or a better autopilot to deal with the increased mass.

[whatch1]

This has been on my list of semi functional features

i believe the mass vs spec dropout came from some sort of rebalancing procedure to handycap trading see if you can find some of my posts
on this and others releases before fixes posts


Bill

[whatch1]

This has been on my list of semi functional features

i believe the mass vs spec dropout came from some sort of rebalancing procedure to handycap trading see if you can find some of my posts
on this and others releases before fixes posts


Bill

[lee]

i believe the mass vs spec dropout came from some sort of rebalancing procedure to handycap trading

You mean it's intentional? That's hard to believe.

Programming a good autopilot is probably far from easy, for the mathematics involved alone. I wanted to take a look at the code, but svn didn't check out, and I couldn't find out where the autopilot is.

There seems to be a config variable "auto_pilot_termination_distance", but it doesn't seem to do anything when you try to set it.

[cap601]

One thing that hasn't been mentioned is that you can engage manual SPEC (shift+a) to bring you closer to the jump point. As the cut out is only for the autopilot this brings you as far in as you wish.

The feature is intentional in that it allows you to have a chance at stopping before you hit the target (useful with bases) due to the reduced deceleration at higher masses.

[lee]

One thing that hasn't been mentioned is that you can engage manual SPEC (shift+a) to bring you closer to the jump point. As the cut out is only for the autopilot this brings you as far in as you wish.

Yeah, I tried that. The problem is that the ship doesn't go straight towards the target because it takes time for it to move only into the direction it is pointed. Using SPEC to get closer works, but it looks very odd because SPEC seems to make the ship go faster mostly into the direction it points and not so much faster into the other direction it also moves.

However, it turns flying with heavy cargo into an overly lengthy process --- which to avoid is the purpose of the autopilot. Are we supposed to be limited to in-system trade only because it's too troublesome to move heavy cargo on a path that requires to reach several targets?

The feature is intentional in that it allows you to have a chance at stopping before you hit the target (useful with bases) due to the reduced deceleration at higher masses.

If the autopilot would fly the ship to the docking base if docking is requested or along a route from your starting point to the destination --- which eventually is in another system --- it won't be necessary to let the ship dangerously become adrift at arbitrary distances from its target


Well, where is the autopilot coded? I'm trying to checkout svn to take a look at it and see if I can make some improvement. But the checkout is unsuccessful so far, and I couldn't find the autopilot in what I got ...