I don’t think this is possible but figured I’d ask since it would be helpful.
Assume a fleet that includes a tanker and a supply ship, both set to refuel/resupply the fleet (respectively).
My hope was when the tanker (or supply ship) got below a certain level (% or absolute) of fuel or MSP supplies, that it would automatically peel off, return to home, load itself up, and then return to the fleet.
I don’t think its possible since orders seemingly can only be applied to an entire fleet (and not for example a subfleet) but thought I’d ask.
You are correct. You could maybe approximate this with underway refueling and a tanker fleet separate from the fleet it’s supporting. Then it could have separate conditional orders, maybe use a fleet waypoint and come back. But if the supporting fleet ever moved on you’d have micro to get it back in place. And you’d have to reinstate the refuel order every time or every system traversed.
To me, the micro sounds awful. So I think I’d wind up with “not doable” even if technically you might be able to get close.
Yes, it’s a shame too given how critical logistics are. It would require a conditional that when triggered dropped a ship from fleet (with a limited selection of fleet ships) and then the ability to assign orders to an as-yet created fleet to RTB, refuel/resupply, then rejoin prior fleet. Tricky but I’d imagine doable.