Tips and Tricks

Scouting tips:

Scouting can be a tedious task sometimes, but is needed to get a picture of what is around. The job can be made quite a bit easier with AE Tools and Snaplinks.

Secret Fleet View:

Here is a trick to see landed fleets on a location you can not see. Move a scout, or any ship really, to the location you want to keep eyes on. Once it lands, quickly do a fleet scan with the Fleet Scanner and save the data. Now before your scout is spotted, send it off on a long journey to anywhere. Now as long as that scout is in flight, you can see the fleets on the location you left from with a simple trick. View this fleet in flight and use the attack link placed by the 'Quick Move / Attack' feature. From a bug in AE, you can still see landed fleets on the location you left from and you have the fleet details for these landed fleets stored on the fleet scanner.

Screenshots

Advanced Production Pages Credits Summary Trade Summary Time Bar with Active or Static Clocks QuickLinks Note and Link Tool

All-in-One Production Page Simple Compact Production Page Fixed Position Queues Advanced Move Page Auto Move Any Fleet

Getting Started

1 Getting the Browser

If you don't have the Firefox browser installed, you need to do that first.

Install Firefox

Once you have Firefox installed, us it to open this page for step 2.

2 Installing Greasemonkey

If you don't have Greasemonkey installed in Firefox, you need to do that before any scripts can be installed in step 3.

Install Greasemonkey

3 Installing Astro Empires Tools

A. You have Firefox running and using it to view this page.
B. Greasemonkey is installed and enabled. Enabled meaning the monkey face on the bottom right of the browser is smiling and not grey.

If A & B are both true: Install Astro Empires Tools

If Greasemonkey is not enabled, right click the monkey face, select 'Enabled'. If you right click the face again, you should see a check mark next to 'Enabled'.

You know AET is running when the options link is visible at the top right of your AE screen.

«-- see image

If you click that link, it opens the options, the page you turn things on and off. But lets not go there now. we need to set AE 'Display Settings' first.

AE Display Settings

Open your AE Display Settings, which is under Account > Display. Set the following items.

A. Display Width set to '1000'
or 'Increase Maximum Width' will not work.

B. Skin set to 'AE Original'
or nothing will work.

Now that you have your AE settings correct, click that link near the top for AE Tools options.

Now scroll down to the 'Format Numbers' setting.

C. Format Numbers set to the same delimeter and decimal as your AE game settings.
just for consistent number formatting for everyhting.

AET Quick Setup

Now things are working fine, but we need to set a few details for everything to work as expected.

1. Highlight players - For no player highlighting, uncheck this box and skip the rest of step 1.
Scroll down to the Highlight Players section and find 'My Guild Tag', enter your guild tag with brackets. Also, for 'Allied/Pact Guild Tags' enter all friendly guilds, seperated by commas, and for 'Enemy Guild Tags' enter all hostile guilds, seperated by commas.

On 'Individual Player color Overrides' no guild tags are used, only the player name. player name=color seperated by commas.

2. Colors - Color names may be used in place of the hex value. Color helper is near the bottom of the configuration page. Hex values must start with a # symbol followed by 2 digits each for red,green,blue.

3. Program Learning - Some information may be needed on pages different than the one you are viewing, so we need to visit a few pages so the script can learn what it needs to function 100%.

A. Visit the Economy page.

B. Visit the Trade page.

C. Visit the Structures page.

Setup Complete. You can visit the configuration page and make changes as often as you like. Changes take affect immediately.

You can now play AE with extra tools, or lets look over some OPTIONS first.

Options

If you don't have AET installed and running, see Getting Started

Option Details

General Settings

Adjust Page Titles:

This is a simple tool to change the titles on pages so the name of the browser tabs are easier to understand.

Add Local Time:

Quick Jump Links:

Increase Maximum Width:

Add empire sub-menu:

Enhanced count down timers:

Format numbers:

Time Helper:

Player Highlights

Highlight players:

Name Locations:

Map Enhancements

Insert base links by map:

Insert fleet links by map:

Move galaxy links:

Base Location Links:

Hide System Border:

Trade

Highlight trade partners:

Highlight duplicate partners:

Highlight unbalanced trades:

Hide Full Trades:

Display Trade Summary:

Advanced Scanners

Show Total Fleet:

Hightlight Rows:

Structures / Bases

Advanced structures page:

Credits History

Credits Summary:

Fleet

Extra movement presets:

Fleet Move Increments:

Default Destination:

System Fleet Scanner:

Location Fleet Scanner:

A lot to say about this feature so a complete section of its own is needed.

Show total fleet row:

Show fleet attack size:

Move link on Empire fleet:

Move link on Fleets page:

Sum guild fleets:

Construction / Production

Production presets:

This tool adds many things to each fleet production page. At the top, the 'Production' heading is replaced with buttons which are paired with 8 buttons placed at the bottom. The top buttons enter preset quantities into ship entry boxes and the bottom buttons set the top buttons. An extra submit button is placed near the top right and reset link labeled 'Clear All' just to the left and down from that submit. Below the new reset link is a 'Fill hanger space' link to fill available hanger space with fighters. Hanger space calculations check for any bombers already entered and will be taken into account. Total cost of ships and time required to produce then are added to the submit button at the bottom and removed from the area above the submit button.

To set a top button, enter the ship quantities you want for each ship type. Anything entered not a number greater than zero will equal zero so no need to add 0 to empty boxes. Then click the paired link at the bottom and enter a name to be the label for this button. Now when you click the top button, all the ship types will have their quantities set to the value you had entered when setting. If you remove the name of a button it will not show until you reset it.

AllinOne production page:

Places a '&' button next to the 'Production' heading on the Empire page. This link will change the Empire page into a production page for all your bases in one. The quick and easy way to add fleet production to all your bases with a few clicks. Fast production option is available for each base individually. Link at the top will copy the first base values to the other bases. Credits required to produce all the ships entered are shown at the bottom but it will not stop you from trying to overspend.

Enter all the sips quantities and types and hit submit. Each quantity entry with a number greater than zero will change to a green box with 'OK' with a success. Entries less than 1 or which are not numbers will show a black box with a '-'; Connection errors or errors sent back from the server will show red. Out of credits will not show as an error. You can produce ships and hit reset to continue if you want to product multiple ship types on bases. You need to stay on that page until all the quantity boxes change and then you are finished.

Production increments:

Adds '-' and '+' buttons next to each ship quantity entry on the fleet production pages. '-' will subtract one from the quantity until zero is reached and the quantity entry is cleared. '+' will add one to the quantity until infinity is reached. Adjusting ship quantities by a few can be done with just a mouse.

Enter production times:

Adds time entry boxes next to each ship quantity entry on the fleet production pages. Enter the number of hours in these boxes to calculate the number of ships to product in that amount of time. If you will be gone for 2 days, you could enter 24 in one time box and 24 in another ship's type and have 1 day production of each type building while your away.

Clear Production Comments:

Adds a link near the top-left of the construction, defense, production, and technology content areas. These links will either show or hide the description lines on these pages. Compacts and cleans up the page for better viewing.

Enhanced queue display:

This tool will move the queues on the construction, defense, production, and technology pages to a fixed position at the bottom of the page. A 'Max queue size' setting controls how many lines the fixed queue will display until it reverts back to its normal position. Makes quick viewing of and manipulation of queue items without scrolling.

Attack

Hide Attack Fleet Buttons:

When viewing a fleet and clicking the attack link, this brings up a page with attack buttons next to attackable fleets. Sometimes this page can get cluttered on locations with many fleets so this tool adds buttons to this page to hide certain fleets. This makes finding the fleet you want to attack much easier and helps limit the possibility of attacking the wrong player by mistake.

My Guild - hides all fleets from the guild entered in 'My Guild Tag' in 'Player Highlighting' except for your fleet. Your fleet always will show.
Allies - hides all fleets from guilds entered in 'Allied/Pact Guild Tags' in 'Player Highlighting'.
Enemies - hides all fleets from guilds entered in 'Enemy Guild Tags' in 'Player Highlighting'.
Other - hides all fleets from guilds NOT entered in 'Player Highlighting'.
Unguilded - hides all fleets not in a guild including United Colonies and Drekons.

The check mark next to each button control the hiding. If checked, those will not show. The buttons just reparse the page. Checked boxes are remembered and used for all locations.
For this feature to work properly, 'My Guild Tag', 'Allied/Pact Guild Tags' and 'Enemy Guild Tags' must be filled in or the script does not know who to filter.

Quick Move / Attack:

When a fleet has landed and you want to move it or use it to attack, this requires you to click on the fleet and then on either move or attack. To add convenience and speed, this feature adds move and attack links to the fleet view while in movement. When viewing a fleet in movement, you will see the flight counter counting down to landing. So when the flight counter gets to 0 you can quickly click move or attack if your landing on a location with enemy fleets. Sometimes there is a lag of a few seconds after a fleet lands to be able to use the fleet so these links will remain even after clicking them until the fleet is usable.

Location Move / Attack:

When a fleet has landed and you want to move it or use it to attack, this requires you to click on the fleet and then on either move or attack. To add convenience and speed, this feature adds move and attack links to the fleet row in the destination area for both the location and base views.

Free Account Tools

Remove Banner Adds:

This will remove the AE advertisements from the AE pages, guild pages, messages and boards.
This feature is for free accounts only as upgraded accounts have this included.

Capacities:

Capacities page shows the total of all your bases economy, construction, production, and research capacities. The scripts needs to view the economy page and each base periodically to update the data for this page. The best way to do this is view the economy page and then view the capacities page. From there you can click on each base, when the base is fully loaded, then return to the capacities page and click the next base until you have viewed them all.
This feature is for free accounts only as upgraded accounts have this page included.

Fleet Scanner

stuff

Support

Add Comment

If you have an issue with the script, please post details and we will try to resolve them.

If you anything good or bad to say about the script, let us know your feelings.

If you need to contact Outsource Justified Design, visit their profile.

Other Scripts

Snap Links

** Firefox Add-on ** (for easy scouting)
Snap Links allows users to easily open multiple links in new tabs by drawing a box around them. Links can also be opened in new windows, new tabs on a new window, copied to clipboard, bookmarked or downloaded.

Snap Links Plus - Install

Astro Empires Tools

** This script **

Interface enhancements and additional tools for AE.

Astro Empires Tools - View Code - Install

AE Trade Helper

Interface Enhancement of Astroempires

Makes finding good trade routes easy and fast.

AE Trade Helper - View Code - Install

Astro Empire Quickbar

Adds a tab to the left side of the game window that holds bookmark links.

** Does not distinguish between servers.

Astro Empire Quickbar - View Code - Install

Automatic Movement

We have 2 types of auto movement features. They are called AutoLaunch and AutoMove. AutoLaunch requires the 'Time Helper', 'Launch Reminder', and 'Move Presets' be enabled. AutoMove requires the 'Move Presets' and 'Auto Move' be enabled. These settings are found on the 'Fleet / Movement' tab in the AE Tools settings.

Both AutoLaunch and AutoMove must be set from the fleet move page of the fleet you want to auto launch/move. So, go to the move page of the fleet you want to auto launch or move.

Before you can move any fleets, you need to select ship quantities and choose a destination. These need to be saved for use. The 'Move Presets' places a link on the move page to record the current destination and ships for use at a later time. One of those uses is to fill in the data for an automatic move. So, the first step in setting either auto movement feature is to choose your ships and select your destination, then click the 'Set Move Preset' and click 'OK'. Your preset is now set.

Preset Data can always be viewed on the main fleets page by clicking 'View Preset Data' on the top right of the fleets list.

AutoMove

After a preset has been set, a link titled 'Set Auto Move' will appear right above the move button. Click that link to open an entry form to enter the server time you want the fleet to launch. This form was floated so you can scroll around to see clocks or use the 'Time Helper' to calculate your launch time. The form will be preset with the server time when the page loaded.

If you set a time and it is wrong or plans change and you need to adjust, just cancel the AutoMove and click 'Set Auto Move' again. Your previous entry is remembered for easy edits.

Once you enter the time to move, click 'Start AutoMove' to start the AutoMove. A semi-transparent box covering the move button will appear. A little see-through so you can see the server clock and the arrival clock behind it if your using them. This box contains the move time and a count-down clock. A few notes to remember are posted with the times. If you no longer need the notes, click 'Hide' and the system will remember to hide them until you click 'Show'. When the counter reaches 0, the fleet will move.

** That page must be open with the counter running when the counter reaches 0 or the fleet will not move.

You may leave the page and return at any time before the counter reaches -3. (3 second window for javascript bumps) You can even turn your computer off and come back the next day, and if the counter has not yet reached 0, the move will still be active and counting when you return to the move page. If you return 3 seconds after the launch time, it will be ignored. Though, presets will still be entered in case you wish to launch manually right away. If an AutoMove is not set, presets are not loaded. Manually click them to enter.

Presets are not required for launch of an AutoMove. Preset values may be changed at any time before launch time. Presets can even be deleted. Presets will be cleared when the fleet launches so you don't have a bunch of old settings in memory to worry about cleaning up later. To view or clear preset data, see the fleets page and click 'View Preset Data' at the top-right.

** Desination and ship quantities may be changed at anytime before move. Only the actual values currently entered in the form at move time will be used. Presets are not used at move time, but during page load. They are so you can leave the page and return easily. Though, presets are required for AutoLaunch.

AutoLaunch

The 'Move Presets' turns the launch reminder feature into an AutoLaunch. If you enable the launch reminder, upon setting a reminder it will ask if you want to auto launch your fleet if presets are enabled. If you select yes, then when the reminder goes off, it will change to the launch page, fill in your presets, and then launch the fleet.

AutoLaunch only works on 1 fleet at a time, as this is different than AutoMove that works on any number of the fleets you have at the same time. AutoLaunch is an add-on to the Fleet Reminder which only works on 1 fleet but this will launch from any page with AE Tools running.

One thing to note about AutoLaunch is they don't expire like AutoMoves. You can come back a day late and AutoLaunch will try and launch immediately. This was put in as a feature and not a limitaion. AutoLaunch was designed for mass movements within the guild. These are either heading into battle or leaving a hot zone. Either way, you don't want to forget the move or you want it to happen asap if something went wrong. So, if you loose power in the middle of the night and your computer was shut down, as soon as you get up and login, you fleet moves immediately without your need to remember. Either way, you'll notice the move taking place and you'll see the results. Hopefully the message isn't 'no fleet to move' cause you got derbed when you left your RCs on the pile while you slept...

Redirects are disabled for both so you can see your move results. You must follow all the same rules as a regular move. If you enter a bad destination or have too many fighters for your hanger space, you will see the error on the fleet page shown after any move. You will see a message in large print letting you know this result was from an automated launch/move. The fleet id show on the message will be from the originating fleet. If the whole fleet did not move, this will not match the fleet in movement, but the fleet it left from.

AutoLaunch and AutoMove can both be run on the same fleet as there are safeguards in place to allow this to happen. Just make sure they are in seperate windows/tabs and you can see both clocks running. The move page with AutoMove running will disable AutoLaunch and Fleet Reminders on that page only, while the AutoLaunch will disable AutoMove if it opens the page itself to launch. If you do have both running on the same fleet, put the AutoLaunch on a page other than the move page.

** This may sound strange to have 2 different auto tools, but concerns with system overhead for users with 'not so new' computers and the need to have more that 1 fleet auto set, led me to this point. For example, the constant hashing of what fleet to move, which has priority to move, and which window/tab you have open does the move occure so they don't all clobber each other or try to move the fleet for each tab, etc. This would put a lot of processor time on every page you view. So this is why we have only one AutoLaunch. The AutoMove can run on many pages as its basically just a timer counting down to zero, then launch.

Tips on use of automatic movement.

AutoLaunch has one great purpose.

- A coordinated landing time for your guild -

• The leader posts an arrival time.
• Everyone enter the arrival time into the time helper below the move button.
• Enter the ships and destination and save the preset.
• Click calculate depart time, then click set reminder.
• Select 'OK' when asked to turn the launch reminder into AutoLaunch and walk away.

Now... All guild fleets will land on the location at the arrival time regardless of starting location or fleet speed. If the launch time has past when you enter an AutoLaunch, you will launch immediately but looks like you'll be a little late. Also, if you were not logged on or did not have AE Tools running during an AutoLaunch, it will launch immediately upon login or AE Tools start.

How about if you have 2 more hours to wait for your RCs to sweep up. Set the AutoMove on that fleet to move 5 seconds after the sweep up of debris. This will help you not pick up too much of the debris pile and make sure to get those RCs to safety.

If you do have to leave a fleet vulnerable and go offline, split up the AutoMove into sevaral smaller moves/fleets. This way if you get only slightly damaged and loose maybe a fighter or 2, this will not cause an error on moving all your fleet, some will get away at least.