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[Greiger]

From what I have noticed the enemies tend to target stuff like EWACS ships first most of the time.

Not from some magical knowledge of your ships or anything (hell if you gave an NPR one of your ships it probably not know what the hell kind of ship it's supposed to be even with all the tech data.)  But it seems they target sensor ships because they often have the most obvious sensor blip.  A big active sensor running I think throws off a really big EM blip, which seems to make my EWACS ships become the first thing targeted. 

Looking in developer mode once during a precursor "fight" (the precursors were trying to fire missiles in a nebula, I had to delete them to keep the game running.) I noticed that the only ship they saw of my entire fleet of 20 ships was my EWACS's big ass active sensor, and they were firing missiles at that.  As far as they knew it was the only ship there.

P.S. And yea, good idea to have at least some small actives on most of your full size ships.  I have a sensor ship carrying big thermal em and active sensors with some PD that does most of the sensor work.  But my combat ships carry some actives as well, theirs just aren't nearly as strong or as big as my EWACS.

Having one big ship carrying all your sensor stuff may work better next version, where the AI doesn't just focus all their firepower on the first thing they see every 5 seconds and then go down the line swatting whatever is unfortunate enough to be the next target with the entire fleet's combined firepower.  Next version they will spread out their fire, which may work out better for big ships with big sensors yelling "kick me" all over the galaxy.

[head]

From what I have noticed the enemies tend to target stuff like EWACS ships first most of the time.

Not from some magical knowledge of your ships or anything (hell if you gave an NPR one of your ships it probably not know what the hell kind of ship it's supposed to be even with all the tech data.)  But it seems they target sensor ships because they often have the most obvious sensor blip.  A big active sensor running I think throws off a really big EM blip, which seems to make my EWACS ships become the first thing targeted. 

Looking in developer mode once during a precursor "fight" (the precursors were trying to fire missiles in a nebula, I had to delete them to keep the game running.) I noticed that the only ship they saw of my entire fleet of 20 ships was my EWACS's big ass active sensor, and they were firing missiles at that.  As far as they knew it was the only ship there.

You always see active sensors i think.

[forsaken1111]

From what I have noticed the enemies tend to target stuff like EWACS ships first most of the time.

Not from some magical knowledge of your ships or anything (hell if you gave an NPR one of your ships it probably not know what the hell kind of ship it's supposed to be even with all the tech data.)  But it seems they target sensor ships because they often have the most obvious sensor blip.  A big active sensor running I think throws off a really big EM blip, which seems to make my EWACS ships become the first thing targeted. 

Looking in developer mode once during a precursor "fight" (the precursors were trying to fire missiles in a nebula, I had to delete them to keep the game running.) I noticed that the only ship they saw of my entire fleet of 20 ships was my EWACS's big ass active sensor, and they were firing missiles at that.  As far as they knew it was the only ship there.

You always see active sensors i think.

Not always, but you can see one from a great distance with a passive EM sensor.

[MrWiggles]

You need an EM sensor to detect active sensors.

[Journier]

that horrible mistake was a learning experience atliest   

I have created the new version of my Ripper Class destroyers with small actives.

But then again I may just throw 2-3 heavily armored sensor ships into my main fleets so i have a little more redundancy.

[Greiger]

Yea might as well always be able to see actives since they show up so obvious.  But I encountered an NPR once with a small scout, fired up actives for 5 seconds to identify them and begin communications and diplomacy.  Looking back later in designer mode out of curiosity as to which NPR they really were, I saw that they didn't see my scout at all, even when it had it's actives on, and oddly enough, despite me establishing communications with them and already having a diplomatic team working on them, they still didn't even know I existed.

I ended having to stick my scout on the other side of the jump gate out of their home system, and turn it's transponder on to force them to have a first contact situation when they had a jump ship go through.

[Micro102]

You couldn't just go to their home planet to get a first encounter?


Also, what are everyone's favorite formations? Mine is to clump everything into 1 task group because i am lazy 

[Greiger]

I could have, but they don't like it when you have a military ship (or any ship before a certain amount of DR) in the same system as a populated planet of theirs.  Even then with how I did it their view of me started out at -27.

Though I guess coming through the first jump point of your civilization to see a ship twice your size (it was only my small 4000 ton scout) with guns and shields up.  Only for the viewscreen to come up with a bunch of space lizards cheerfully welcoming you to the galaxy in your own languige would be a rather unsettling experience, hostile or not.

P.S. Yea I go lazy too,  Pretty much all one TG.  If I'm expecting a fight I split into 2, with laser ships up front.  And fighter squadrons splitting off once fighting begins.  But I would hardly call that a formation.

[Journier]

You couldn't just go to their home planet to get a first encounter?


Also, what are everyone's favorite formations? Mine is to clump everything into 1 task group because i am lazy 

lol....

i am guilty of that as well currently.

And for Geo sensor fleets I bring in a single task force of them (say 6 ships) and when they get in system i hit divide, so i get 6 seperate task groups all surveying off on their own automatically via secondary orders.

However, recombining them is monotonous.

For combat ships they all come in system in 1 big Task Group, then if i need to catch enemy ships or something, I will break off a fast contingent or something and run them after the enemy.

[Osmosis Jones]

You need an EM sensor to detect active sensors.

No, you don't. I never use EM sensors, only thermal and active, and I have always been able to detect active sensor blips. EM is for detecting the shields of ships; e.g. it's only really useful for spotting military ships that are already gearing up for a fight. There are better things to waste your research points on IMO.

[Micro102]

I pretty sure there is a button that combines all those groups back together, it was a few pages back.

And I'm pretty sure EM sensors detect active sensors, and they also detect populations, in which the EM rating is much higher then the thermal rating.

[Osmosis Jones]

Electromagnetic sensor strength per hull space of the sensor component. EM sensors detect the shield output of alien ships

They do also detect colonies actually. However they aren't needed for detecting actives.

[Greiger]

I recall reading someplace that Actives are detected by EMs. And my own experience backs it up.  But for the life of me I can't find a quote.

Oh well at any rate you don't see actives automatically.  I think only transponders do that.  Me jumping into the NPR system, turning my actives on then GTFOing the system with them not knowing I was even there was an indication of that.

[Osmosis Jones]

That's the thing though, I have never used EM sensors, and have spotted active sensor pings numerous times. Maybe it's been related to having my own active sensors on-board (a requirement for any ship I send outsystem without an escort).

[Greiger]

Yea, I'm pretty sure that active sensors can detect other active sensors.  But I had survey ships detect precursor actives with nothing but size .33 HS thermal and em sensors onboard.

Maybe it's some detection thing unrelated entirely then.

EDIT: Either that or maybe it was because the precursors were really close.  I hear that there is some special case detection of some sort when it comes to really close range.  Probably simulates visual detection or something.