In recent games i've had a lot of trouble keeping my colony ships safe. If i have a combat fleet guarding a friendly system (i.e. in guard mode) then an enemy fleet should not be able to enter that system and attack a noncombat fleet (i.e. a stack of colonisers) which are also in that system, without first going through the guard fleet. But this seems to happen to me, regularly.



I was going to post this as a bug, but it seems to me that combat order (i.e. which fleet attacks which) seems to be totally random, regardless of guard, blockade, or invasion status. So, i suggest reworking this part of the game so that it behaves more logically.



Suggestions:



(1) If you have a fleet guarding a friendly (or empty/neutral) system, then that fleet enters combat first. Other fleets are safe from attack until the guard fleet has been dealt with. If multiple fleets are guarding the system, then pick one of the guard fleets at random. (At the moment, the game seems to pick from fleets at random regardless of whether theyre guarding or not).



(2) If you have a fleet guarding a friendly system, then an enemy fleet cannot invade that system without dealing with the guard fleet first. (At the moment it seems that enemy fleets can begin an invasion regardless, and you then have to attack them with your guard fleet in order to stop them).



(3) Dont make blockading occur by default just by placing a fleet in an enemy (or indeed neutral) system. Make it an overt act - you (and the AI) have to put the fleet in guard mode to initiate a blockade. This should stop you having to take out otherwise harmless scouts, needlessly impacting diplomatic relations.



(4) If i'm invading an enemy system with one fleet, i should be able to put a second fleet on guard duty to protect the invasion fleet. An enemy fleet should then be unable to interrupt the invasion unless it first deals with the guard fleet.

There are two different issues here: blockading; and protecting individual ships within fleets. For blockading, please continue the discussion here:

http://forums.amplitude-studios.com/showthread.php?3047-annoyance-enemy-can-maintain-blockade-break-siege-with-scouts

For protecting ships within fleets, I have not been tracking the threads, but in jetkar's suggestion thread you can find many mentions of this.

Ah, ok, had a quick look at jetkar's thread but must've missed that. Feel free to close this thread.