Fleet

A fleet is a group of spacecraft that are led by a single flagship. To create a fleet, use the Spacecraft (F9) window's Fleet tab while onboard a spacecraft and click the Make Fleet button to designate the ship a flagship.

Alternatively a ship can be given the Fleet mission order to make a ship become a flagship, to join an existing fleet, or to depart from their fleet.

Flagship

The flagship is the fleet leader.

Ordering a fleet ship to become a flagship promotes it to the flagship and the previous flagship is demoted. Ordering a flagship to exit the fleet dissolves the fleet.

Fleet management controls to designate the ship as a flagship, to join a fleet, and to exit a fleet. Fleet ships check in with the flagship periodically. The flagship lists those ships in a table with information about them on the Fleet page. Right click them to manage them.

Splitting Fleet

You can select multiple ships in your fleet and right click on the one that will be the new flagship. Then select the Make Fleet cpntext menu option and they will split off into a separate fleet with the new flagship.

Fleet Formation

At the helm console, you see a box indicating your ship's position in the fleet when it is not locked into position. Once you are close enough to that spot, you can use a helm button to lock your ship into its formation position. At that point, your ship is slaved to the flagship and it will move in sync with the flagship until it is unlocked, which the pilot (or the flagship) can do at any time.

NPC pilots of fleet ships always try to reach their formation position so they can lock in to the fleet. They are more successful when the flagship is not moving. Some formations, such as column formation, make it easier for the ships to get locked into their positions.

The fleet ship checkin information shown in the Fleet table is used to limit the maximum warp and maximum acceleration of the fleet to the slowest ships. If anybody can't warp the flagship will not go to warp. Likewise, if anybody can't wormhole the flagship will not go through wormholes.

When flying to a space station, the flagship moves the fleet next to the station as if it were one huge ship. All the locked ships in the fleet are considered to be in range of the station for trade purposes. It also keeps the fleet together very well through wormholes and at warp speed. The NPC pilot of the flagship considers the radius of the entire fleet when avoiding obstacles.

Formations

Formations are described relative to the flagship. Fleet ships are arranged starting with the largest down to the smallest. No formation places a fleet ship directly in front of the flagship.

• Column - Fleet ships are placed in a straight line out behind the flagship.
• Echelon Left - Fleet ships are placed in a line to the left angled 30 degrees back.
• Echelon Right - Fleet ships are placed in a line to the right angled 30 degrees back.
• Rank - Fleet ships are placed alternating in straight lines to the right and to the left.
• Rank Left - Fleet ships are placed in a line to the left.
• Rank Right - Fleet ships are placed in a line to the right.
• Shells - Inspired by electron shells. The flagship is at the center. The first 2 fleet ships are placed to the left and right of the flagship. The next 8 fleet ships form a box at the next larger shell radius. The next 28 ships form a sphere at the next larger radius.
• Shield - Fleet ships form concentric rings of 8 ships a short distance in front of the flagship. Many rings would look like a target with the flagship peering out of the bullseye.
• Sphere - Fleet ships form a sphere centered on the flagship. At 8 ships, a box is formed. At 12 ships, the positions match the vertices of an icosahedron. Additional ships form concentric icosahedrons at increasing radii out from the flagship.
• Vee - Fleet ships are placed alternating in straight lines to the right and to the left, angled 30 degrees forward.
• Wedge- Fleet ships are placed alternating in straight lines to the right and to the left, angled 30 degrees back.

Missions

Fleet ships are free to have their own individual missions. They just can't move if they are locked. There are a few mission orders that become the current order for the entire fleet when they are the current order for the flagship. They are: Attack, Plunder, Hide, and Stand Down.