AI should use boost!! [Extremely slow drones]

[AURAequine]

So you've made a couple little mining drones, quick, nimble and can stop on a dime.

They have a max velocity of 119m/s and can brake at 231m/s

 

You've commanded them to escort you and you fly to an asteroid field only 18km or so away.

Naturally you've boosted to get there within 12 seconds in your ship that has a max velocity about 3 times faster.

 

But you sit there and cringe as your drones that were meant to follow you slow creep ever so slowly towards you, you got there so quickly yet they took 148 seconds?!!

 

Piloting the drone yourself on full boost got you the same distance in only 41 seconds..

Roughly three and a half times quicker!

 

So much for "Escorting" huh?

 

[AURAequine]

Traveling speed with the order "Mine" is even worse.. They're travelling around at a extremely slow 0.3km/s -_-

 

EDIT: No exaggeration, this is literally how fast they were going from one asteroid to the next..

 

[Giltone]

From what i understand, the AI currently is limited in speed depending oh how good the brakes are. Maybe that is the limiting factor on your mining drones?

 

I've ran around with a few ships with insane braking speed, and the drones were relatively quick to move (not boost quick, but then that's the trade off ain't it?) Don't mine yourself and it will take a little while longer, like with the independent targetting. Though iirc they are working on improving the ai at somepoint down the line.

[cy414]

im currently assuming that this is a feature that will be added once the ai path finding has been worked on.

 

as it is, their navigation is a bit weak.

[AURAequine]

Hmmm.. I hope that when the AI is improved I hope that turret direction is considered when using the "Mine" command. Seems like a waste when they dance around the asteroid and go back and forth only mining half the time because the ship's own body blocks it.. :/

 

The main reason I found with why the mining drones are so ineffective is their inability to strafe around an asteroid.. They only go back and forth with their rotating, and this mean only half of the time is spent mining because the other half, the turret is blocked by the ship's own rotation..