AI Commander

AI Commander (formerly called Auto Hunt) lets your ship hunt in your place, and it is open to Vessarion Plus members only. On the map you are on, you tick the creature types to hunt and start it; the server flies your ship to the nearest chosen creature, shoots with your weapons and collects the crates of the creatures it kills itself. The price is Antimatter (not Vessarit): while it runs, it is taken off your Antimatter minute by minute. Flying by hand is free; AI Commander only sells you waiting and comfort.

The price: Antimatter

• Plus only. Without a membership the window looks locked (“AI Commander opens with Vessarion Plus.”) and links to the Plus screen; if your membership ends while it runs, AI Commander stops. Plus has no extra fee or discount for it: the right is included in Plus.
• Antimatter is spent. The hourly cost depends on the map (the table below; in Wormhole on the level). To start you need at least 10 minutes' worth of Antimatter; when it runs out, AI Commander stops. While it is stopped nothing is spent.
• If you cannot earn Antimatter, buy it. In the Store 1,000 Antimatter = 25 Vessarit (larger packs are a little cheaper). The window and the LT-4 card in the Hangar have a “Buy Antimatter in the Store” button.
• It does not pay for itself. The hourly price is at least 1.5 times the Antimatter AI Commander itself could earn on that map: a run does not produce Antimatter, it spends it. The big bosses (Notorious Boss, Exile Captain) drop a lot of Antimatter in one go, so AI Commander does not hunt them; you hunt them by hand.

Map speed: how does Antimatter run down?

The table below shows each map's hourly Antimatter cost and its Vessarit equivalent at the Store rate. The window, the chip and the menu always show the time left on this map (by your Antimatter); when you change maps, that time changes too. In Wormhole (every level) the cost is 300 × the level's reward multiplier (×1.6 per level; I-VIII: 300 · 480 · 768 · 1,230 · 1,965 · 3,147 · 5,034 · 8,052 Antimatter / hour; the entry fee and the Antimatter in the capsule are separate; the total price of a run with AI Commander is at least 1.5 times the capsule's Antimatter); on the floors of the Depth, the Shroud's cost × 1.12 for every floor.

How do you start it?

• In the Map (M) window pick the map you are on: an AI Commander button appears in the side panel. The AI Commander button in the Menu (under ≡ on a phone) opens the same window and shows the time left on this map under it.
• The window lists the creatures that live on that map, with their pictures; you tick one or several. It does not ask for a time: AI Commander runs until you stop it, a safety stop happens, your Antimatter runs out or your Plus ends.
• Optional: Sell when cargo is full. If your cargo fills up, AI Commander sells Plunder, Dust and Cores instead of stopping and carries on hunting (materials are not sold; if only the materials are full it still stops).
• There is no strip on the screen: under the AI Commander button in the Menu you see the time left and your kill count (6 h 12 min · 1,431 kills); tapping the button opens the window with what the hunt is doing and the Stop button. If the map has PvP (X-4 and beyond: the units' PvP maps, the shared region, deep space) the window shows a warning and asks you to confirm.

What it does and does not do

• No extra power. Your weapons, ammo, chip and research all apply; fire rate and damage are no different from playing by hand. It uses your skills (Q W E R) only by the rule you set (see “Settings” below).
• Crates. It collects only the crates of the creatures it killed itself (the same as tapping the crate). With a collector drone (Plus) the ship does not fly after crates: it keeps hunting and the drone pulls in the crates (the crystals too). Without a drone the ship flies to its own crate and picks it up.
• When no creatures are left it patrols the map; when the creatures respawn it goes back to hunting.
• Only while you are online. If you leave the game or your connection drops, it stops; there is no offline farming.

Settings: ammo and skills

• Ammo: on the window's Settings tab you choose which laser and rocket ammo AI Commander fires (what you own and what has auto-buy on are listed). “The selected one” uses whatever is selected at that moment. When AI Commander stops, the ammo you chose by hand comes back; if the ammo you chose runs out, auto-buy works as it does when you fire by hand.
• Skills: for Recharge, Surge, Untouched and Leech separately, you set a rule: off, when the shield falls below X% or when health (hull) falls below X% (10%–90%). AI Commander presses the skill as if you had pressed it: the cooldown is the same, and while the percentage stays under the line it presses again each time the cooldown ends. Every skill it presses appears in the notifications.
• Starting values: Recharge below 40% shield, Untouched below 40% health, Leech below 50% health; Surge off. The settings stay with your pilot.
• When health runs low: you choose what happens when your hull falls below the threshold (default 30%, adjustable from 10% to 50%). Fight to the end: AI Commander never retreats and fights until the ship falls. Leave through the gate, rest, come back (the default): the ship keeps firing on its way to the nearest gate, goes through, waits there until hull and shield are full, then goes back through and hunts the same creatures on the same map. If the gate does not let it through for a moment (Untouched is running or a PvP fight is on), it keeps fighting next to the gate and tries again; after coming back it does not flee again for a while. In neither case does AI Commander stop; the skill rules work while fleeing and resting too.
• Antimatter runs down while resting too: while the ship waits beyond the gate your Antimatter keeps dropping; the AI Commander window reads resting · 72% → 100%.

When does it stop?

AI Commander stops in the cases below; your Antimatter goes down only for the time it ran, and nothing is lost for the time it is stopped:

• If you press Stop; if you fly by hand, pick a target or switch the laser off.
• If another pilot hits you (a creature's hits do not stop it).
• If your ship falls (low health alone does not stop it: it fights on or flees and rests according to the “When health runs low” setting above), if you change maps, or if you enter Wormhole or the Crown War map.
• If your cargo fills up (and “Sell when cargo is full” is off), or the laser ammo you chose runs out and its auto-buy is off or you cannot afford it (if auto-buy is on and you have the money, the ammo is bought by itself and AI Commander does not stop; the notification says why).
• If your Antimatter runs out or your Vessarion Plus membership ends (you can buy Antimatter in the Store).
• If it cannot damage a creature for 20 seconds it drops that creature and moves on to the next (it does not stop).

Limits

• One AI Commander per account at a time. There is no daily limit: your Antimatter (and the maps' hourly price) is the only limit.
• AI Commander is provided by the game itself. Third-party programs (bots) that play the game from outside are forbidden.