Help controlling AI actions

Your suggestions please

I'm trying to create a new government that behaves in a neutral fashion (aiding Feds in Federation space, Aurorans in Auroran space, etc...). The govt resource doesn't seem to help. Any suggestions?

I know it's bad form to answer a question with a question, but what resource editor are you using?

I ask because I know the Novatools gövt resource editor starts a government with a default class membership of zero, which is a valid class number. Unfortunately the evil Bureau of Internal Investigation is also class zero so you could possibly be mistakenly associated with the bad guys. If that's the case then you should set all of the unused class numbers to -1, not zero. Other than that as long as you declare the governments that you want to be chums with as allies, your governments ships should not attack them. If those governments don't have your government's class as an ally they should just leave you alone unless you pick a fight with them.

Arturo, on Jun 19 2005, 07:51 AM, said:

If that's the case then you should set all of the unused class numbers to -1, not zero. Other than that as long as you declare the governments that you want to be chums with as allies, your governments ships should not attack them. If those governments don't have your government's class as an ally they should just leave you alone unless you pick a fight with them.
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And another detail, just in case: you will be neutral with everyone except the governments whose gövt resource indicates they are xenophobic.

Thank you both for your replies. They have given me food for thought. Now let me expand the question somewhat, if I may.

First of all, my preferred editor is Resedit with Novatools. I have Mission Computer, but rarely use it.

Now, what I'm essentially trying to do is create a government that honors existing political boundaries. If the Aurorans come to, say, the Gateway system and engage the Feds, this government would assist the Feds in repelling the Aurorans. Conversely, if the Feds invaded Heraan Astra and attacked, the government would fight alongside the Aurorans.

Therefore, the "allies" and "enemies" categories would change depending upon whose space the government was in. Neutrality (as you have described it ) only works if you take NO action, as opposed to supporting the defender.

Lastly, I'm trying to accomplish all this without making enemies of every government in Nova.

The "xenophobic" tag is a twist I hadn't considered, but I think I can work around it.

If it helps, think of this government in a "NATO" or "United Nations" capacity.

For that, have a look at the gövt flags:

Quote

-"Nosy": In non-allied (but non-enemy) systems, warships of this government will attack the player (or not) by comparing the legal status of the player in the system (that pertains to the other, non-allied government) to its own CrimeTol, making it possible for it to attack even if the player is not considered a criminal there by the local authorities (thus this government being nosy). The default behavior is for the warships of this government to never spontaneously attack the player in systems belonging to non-allied-nor-enemy governments (they consider they don't have the authority to act outside of their juridiction). This flag is set for the Aurorean government and Vell-os, for instance.

(source: Zacha Pedro's annotated gövt template)

Judging by what ZP wrote about the "Ignore Samaritan" flag a few lines further down, it would seem it also affects their behaviour towards AI ships. I haven't tested though, so if I say "it might work", don't take my word for law