Like the laundry machines of the 20th century, humans of this age have Artificial Intelligence slaves to do perform their most tedious jobs. These creatures can carry out the simple orders of their masters, such as following along, defending a position, or buying and selling goods in various places. Of course, these machines are less skilled than the humans they endeavor to replace, but what they lack in raw intelligence they make up for in tireless dedication.
Making a Bot
Assemble the bots.
The first step in setting up your own bot is to outfit a new spaceship.
Pick an engine, shield etc just as if you were making a ship for yourself.
The last item you must purchase is a Controlbot. This is found in the "Item" section in the trade screen of a large space station. When you equip this item, the ship will become your slave. It will disappear from your ship list at this moment. As soon as you undock, the slave will undock alongside you, and you can then proceed to give it orders.
You will see that your bot has a name based upon yours. So, if your name is "Foobar," the bot will have a name something like "B833Foobar."
You can also see the bot in your Possessions dialog.
Bot Commands
By your command.
Controlling your bot begins with target options. So click on your bot to make it your current target. Punch the 'X' key.
This will present you with various choices:
- Status Report - how many credits, the hull space, shields, what order the bot is following, and the last "Bot Error"
- Do Not Fight/Fight Enemies - this can be toggled. Choose whether or not you want your slave to attack whomever he perceives as most hostile.
- Don't Stay Close/Stay Close - when following you, whether or not to stay close to your ship at all times. If the bot is staying close, it will not attack enemies that aren't around you.
- Attack My Target - the slave will attack the last enemy that you either shot or tractor beamed. Note that if you have your bot on "Do Not Fight" but you also have "Attack My Target" selected, it will attack only people that you attack first rather than whomever he feels like.
- Dock and Deactivate - this is how you stop a bot. After you select this option, the bot will try to dock and turn itself off at the next station you dock at. It will then become one of your docked ships.
- Follow Me - try to stay as close as possible to your ship. If you jump, the bot will follow.
- Guard Location - guard the spot the bot is currently at.
- Guard Object - guard an object you can specify from a list. If this object is moving, it will follow it.
- Follow Orders - follow a specified list of orders. More on this later.
- Give Money - give the bot credits. These get taken back upon bot deactivation if unused.
- Take Money - take credits from your bot. Useful if they've made lots of money for you by trading.
- Edit Orders - Set up the order list. More on this later.
Bot Limitations
Bot slots.
You can only have a certain amount of bot ships. This is how it's determined:
You get bot slots to start, which is equivalent to your level in the Remote Control skill.
If your Remote Control skill is level 11, your bot slots available is 22.
Each bot ship takes up a number out of your bot slots that's equivalent to the ship's tech level, rounded up. So if your bot is a Rosburst, with tech 4, it takes up 4 from your slots.
Additionally you can acquire Bot Research skill which will futher increase your bot slot amount.
Bot Orders
Order the bots about.
Bots can be given an list of orders to follow for automated trading. This can be used on the big space stations controlled by the computer teams, or for trading with yours or someone else's user stations.
Select the "Edit Orders" command from target options. (And when you're finished, make sure you give your bot money and tell it to follow orders).
You will get a dialog with a list of orders. Mostly, the interface is intuitive, and there is some instruction in this window. Some finer points: make sure a Buy or Sell order always directly follows a Dock order.
Do not end with a dock order, or your bot might get stuck.