Figuring out ETA of ships?

If you're "missing something", so am I.

I don't think there is a "in game" way to find out a ships ETA.

I'm guessing that it's not implemented (yet?) due to the complexities of each ship needing to have it's ETA recalculated either:
1) at the beginning of each turn (or)
2) after completion of each starbase speed improvement (and interdiction beam in time of war) and/or completion of techs which effect speed

Hope this helps.





~SDC~

What I do is just count the parsecs and divide by the movement rating. I, too, would like an ETA when you set autopilot.

~SDC~

Yeah it would be very nice if there was an in-game distance measurement aid. Counting squares becomes very tedious after the millionth time. Trying to figure out if you should go left or right around a planet to get somewhere far away, etc.

Civ3 has a very nice distance measurement system built in. Very easy to use. I never had to count so damned many squares as I do now, heh.

The only time I do count squares is when I'm either in a race (to a resource, for instance) or trying to coordinate an attack (getting the high-attack warship to the system to wipe out the orbiting defenders, then invading with transport before new defenders appear). Otherwise, I don't worry about it... especially when crossing a number of sectors.


~SDC~

I had it working to some extent at one point, but it was either slow or didn't update correctly, or both, so I shelved it.

The ships go around objects unexpectedly in the dynamic GC environmment so any ETA would be an estimate. Would be a helpful but minor goal to implement.

Maybe you could contact someone over at Firaxis for a hint on how they did it. It works very well in Civ3, and they had all kinds of tougher obstacles to deal with like water/land/mountains/roads/borders and stuff like that. All we have to worry about in GalCiv is planets, anomalies and other nonmoving simple stuff.

In any event it doesn't sound like this is a feature that will be in GalCiv any time soon, I guess. :notsure:

'All we have to worry about in GalCiv is planets, anomalies and other nonmoving simple stuff.'

And AI ships, Space Monsters, Pirates, starbases turning into terror stars, anomolies appearing or being picked up, and sudden unexpected changes in range and/or speed from techs, starbases, and UP Issues.

~SDC~

An estimated eta based on the current situation would be good enough for me.

re: An estimated eta based on the current situation would be good enough for me.

Same here.
E != Exact. E = estimated.
An(e)eta would be a nice feature - even if it dosen't compute life, the universe, and everything.

Thanks

~SDC~

Something akin to HOMM would be nice, imo. Little markers each turn to show how far each ship will move based on its moves at the beginning of the turn, with each marker having a # that indicated the turn it will arrive there. i.e. first marker is (1) (reach that in one (this) turn), then (2), etc. I would like this very much!

Additionally, something that would be VERY nice is some way to find out WHERE each ship is going by clicking on a destination. Shift-right click for example, on a resource, system, etc.. would bring up the ships enroute, one after another (if there is more than one). Would be very helpul, imo (altho having the autopilot routes is nice.

fleabitfox

The thing I do most is trying to figure out, "Ok, which starsystem/resource is closest to this colonyship/constructor?" The only way to answer that question is to count squares, no matter how many there are. Dozens of squares for each ship every turn gets old.

I don't really care if there are enemy units currently in the way because they'll probably have moved long before the ship gets to that point anyway. The only purpose for this feature is extreme-long-distance travel, where current position of enemy units is not important. The only important obstacles are planets, resources, starbases or anomalies. Those are all nonmoving objects.

This game has no rivers, roads, oceans, mountains or political boundaries. I would think it would be much easier to do this in space than when it was done in Civ3, where it was done perfectly and very fast despite all the complicating issues.

Of course, things like fixing the Research screen are much more important. But still this would be one of those "very nice" GUI features to add maybe in an expansion or something.