How do I Load Troops onto Transports?

First, you've got to make transports and/or combat transports. Make sure the planet isn't set to auto-launch. When the ship is made, double-click its icon in the little side screen to launch it -- at which point a little slide bar will come up to let you set the number to load.

On transports, I think the limit is 1000 million (billion?). On combat transports, it's 5000 million (billion?).

Troop transports are probably THE most annoying thing in the game for me.

I have yet to EVER wish to load a transport with empty space. I like the auto-launch in general, and if I had it off I'd probably forget which systems have it...

So I end up having to re-orbit the ship, which causes the screen to jump to the next ship (and I have to memorize where the planet is) and then manually load.... doing this with a big invasion force is such a pain.

They need to change the default to max capacity with transports.

Maybe they could just change the way auto-launch works. Launching 0 troops is annoying, and so is launching a colony ship with half a world's population on it (6000M instead of the intended 200M). Perhaps on the options screen you could have an "auto-launch" checklist, with every ship type listed.


~SDC~

Err, which little side screen? When I click to launch, I never get a slider, it just automatically launches. (:(

Very carefully? :notsure:

The auto-launch shouldn't give you problems :notsure: . Are you sure you have enough people on your planet, that you are launching your transport from, to load onto it?

~SDC~

I usually build them on my main planet, quite late into the game. I don't know how many people are there, but it seems like there should be enough.

Autolaunch always gives me a full transport, and usually gives me a full conbat transport (depending on system size).

That's odd.

I have no problems with auto launch either. It always gives me full loads of troops or colonists.

In answer to the question above the launch button for transports is the same as you use for colony ships. It is the green button to the right bottom of the screen that says launch

just make sure you have the correct number of soldiers, just like you would to adjust the load for colony ships.

Yup, auto launch gives me full transports too.

Autolaunch automatically loads 1/4 of the star's population on the transports and colony ships, not to be exceeded by the limits on the transports.

Strange. I always get people on colony ships, never on transports. I fear reporting it as a bug because it is probably just that I am doing something wrong, but I can't see that I am doing anything different.

Autolaunch only fills my transports when I have massive amounts of people on the planet (which is rare)... that formula for 1/4 of pop seems right.

The problem is... who the heck builds combat transports and wants to invade with less than the maximum (aside from cheese tactics)?

The computer sure doesn't, I shoot down their full transports all the time.

DEVs please make it max load transports as default. Colony ships are no problem, but transports are the worst.

Colony ships default to have the system's population, so if you're launching it too quickly, you wouldn't have a problem. Transports may not have a default amount of troops if you manage to bypass the loading screen.

Try this: Single left click on your transport. Now click on the button next to the orbit slots that has a picture of a ship and an arrow. You should now have the loading dialog below the orbit slots. You can now use the slider to adjust the amount of troops, or just hit launch.

Well that's odd. My transports are launching with full loads on autolaunch, even if that means taking 1/2 or 1/3 of the pop, not 1/4 as you say.

I have tried the suggestions listed but still cannot load my transport.

I have the opposite problem. There are times that I want to send empty Transports to the next system because it is building a long-term project and I can't interrupt it to build a Transport (Military projects don't seem to save points like social projects.)

But I have found it impossible to launch an empty Transport (or Combat Transport). The lowest slider setting that will produce a launch is 244M. You can set 0M, but the ship won't launch.

Is there a way to launch empty transports?


~SDC~

No, but you can aim for 1M people in a transport.

Set the slider to 0M, and click on the right arrow. From here, you can launch the 1M into space. (Also useful for building transports at small planets, and filling them at the planets with larger populations.)

Let's use our new image displaying capabilities to make sure everyone's one the same page 

1.  Click on a star on the sector map to get the "Ships in Orbit" window to open on the lower right side of the screen.

2. Double click on the transport you want to launch (or press the Ship icon to the right).  You'll get this new window below it, allowing you play with the slider and determine the # of troops to put onto the transport (Up to the max # of troops for that ship).

3. Press launch to knock the ship out of orbit.  You can view the crew-count of the transport on the ship data window (lower right corner of the main screen).

4. When you attack, the number of troops will be viewable in your data display as show below.

Hopefully this helps out!

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Another undocumented feature:

If your transports are in a fleet, you can have them all attack simultaneously. You can also have them attack individually. The advantage of having them attack indvidually is that you get a separate roll for each transport. Also attacking indvidually, you can use one of the nasty attacks, knowing it will fail, but not damaging the planet. The transport that finishes off the planet can then use an ordinary attack. If you have a group-transport attack, and you use one of the BC-costing attacks, do you have to pay more? Do you get a bulk discount?

Also, does it bother anyone else that colony ships have unlimited capacity? Should I really be able to put 50,000 people on a single colony ship? I was thinking that the colony ship cap should be less than a transport, something like 500.

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Sweet trick with the multiple-transport/Invasion Tactics move. Do I hear a Tidal Wave coming?

The Colony ship capacity doesn't bother me, because you lose the ship the minute you use it. I'm playing around with unconventional Colony ship tactics right now. Such as:

1) Redistributing population within a multiple-planet star system. Simply train a Colony ship and launch (which draws pop equally among the planets) and land on the high-PQ you want to beef up (which populates only that planet).

2) Taking advantage of the Colony ships' extra speed to save your Transports time. Train a Colony ship back at home, load all you want, then send it to the front lines and colonize the highest-PQ planet you can find--doesn't have to be 15. Have your Transports ready to load up everybody. Then you can either destroy colony or leave a really low pop there, to try and encourage defections. Or just gift it to the AI, just in case that actually helps. If you're lucky, you might even get an ethical event.

3) Comibining 1 & 2. Train a Colony ship, land on a multi-planet star system you own, have Transports waiting to bleed off excess pop, which will draw equally from all planets.