Fleet Management

[Doohl]

An extension of Issue #1, Fleets are groups of vessels (or just one) travelling together at the speed of the slowest vessel in the group. They can be assigned formations and spacing. Vessels can break from the fleet and form sub-fleets to later be merged back into the main fleet.

Left-clicking on a fleet will reveal its context menu, containing the following information:

• Name: The fleet's designated name.
• Status: The fleet's current status. Examples: Resupplying, Engaging, Moving, Idle.
• Damage Report: This will only show if any vessels in the fleet have sustained damage. Displays a list of vessel IDs and their damage summaries.
• Casualty Report: This will only show if any vessels in the fleet have sustained casualties. Will simply display the number of casualties for every vessel and any KIA officers. Ie: "10 casualties (OKIA: Lt. Johnson)"
• CO: The commanding officer of the fleet. The CO will receive penalties for managing more people than they are trained for. The entire fleet will receive a large penalty if a staffed CIC (Combat Information Center) is not present on one of the vessels in the fleet.
• Active Missions: A queue of fleet missions, and who assigned each mission (name and ID of the officer, or the playername). The fleet will act upon the mission at the top of queue. The queue is ordered by mission 'priority,' which is a number describing the urgency of the mission and the rank of whoever assigned the order. Player orders will have the highest priority. In the future, the CO of the fleet will be able to override player orders or even spoof the Active Mission queue if the vessel is in active rebellion or mutiny.
• Vectoring: The current Flight Solution, if any.
• Heading: The current velocity relative to the fixed point of the star system (usually the star). A fleet will always have a heading.
• ∆V Remaining: The lowest vessel ∆V budget in the fleet. Measured in either m/s or km/s.
• Vessels: A collapseable list of vessels in the fleet.

Players can also issue the following missions / commands by right-clicking a fleet:

• Move: Perform either a Hohmann or Brachistochrone transfer to reach the target destination. The player will be notified if the transfer exceeds the fleet's ∆V budget. Can specify the orbit distance - so this can also be used to shift a fleet to a higher/lower orbit around the same body. Will output the time and ∆V required for the transfer before requesting the player confirm the order. If the transfer is Brachistochrone, ask the player for the acceleration factor (as an order of g's). Player cannot exceed maximum survivable g force if the fleet has human crew.
• Engage: Designate the target fleet or bogey as fire target, if it is not already. This merely means the fleet CO is weapons-free to begin firing. The player does not individually control each vessel's firing patterns. The CO may order this himself if the situation calls for it (such as receiving fire). The fleet will not actually pursue the target.
• Disengage: Remove the target as a fire target. This will stop all weapons fire - order will be ignored if the target is still inflicting damage upon friendlies.
• Scuttle: Order all scuttleable vessels in the fleet to scuttle. Will completely destroy the vessels and anyone within. May be ignored if morale is low enough. May be ordered automatically by vessel COs if a CIC or Bridge is about to be penetrated by boarding parties.
• Resupply: Order a fleet to resupply at the current location. Can only work if the vessels are equipped with resupply pods. Will output the amount of time needed to complete the resupply.
• (More to be added)