Build fighters in space

This is a so-called 'mission 9', a race-specific special mission. All special missions (rob, hiss, build fighters, selfrepair, dark sense) are executed in order of ship ID. That is to say that Host checks each ship from ID 1 to 500, and per ship checks if that ship should perform a special mission or not. So Lizard ship #16 would hiss before Privateer ship #237 would rob it, but that Privateer ship #237 will rob Lizard ship #418 before that ship would get around to hissing.

The Rebels, Robots and Colonies of Man are all by default able to build "free" fighters in space by placing 5 supplies, 3 Tritanium and 2 Molybdenum units for each new fighter that they want to build on a ship with at least 1 fighter bay.

"build fighters" mission fighterbuilding
The Robots and Colonies of Man can set their ship mission to "Build Fighters In Space" in order to build the fighters, and manually load the resources onboard the ships. The Rebels can just load the appropriate resources and then do not need to set a particular ship mission to build fighters - the Rebels don't even have the "build fighters" mission, they have RGA instead- which leaves the ship free to perform some other mission while the fighters are being made. As with any mission a ship needs fuel onboard to perform the "build fighters" mission.

As can be deducted from the host order, it's possible to beam fighters that have just been built to other ships in the very same turn. Since this requires a special friendly code this can only be done if the fighters are built through the "build fighters" mission (or ofcourse from Rebel ships) and if the resources are loaded manually during the client-side phase of the turn.

"lfm" fighterbuilding
Rebel, Robot and Colonial ships with a friendly code of 'lfm' will automatically load the minerals and supplies onboard the ship to build as many fighters as possible and build fighters, regardless of the ship's mission. Even when the resources to build fighters are loaded manually, a friendly code of  "lfm" is enought to build fighters - the "Build fighters in space" mission does not have to be set with this friendly code. Here too, to build fighters, ships need to have fuel onboard.

The code "lfm" can be used over a planet that has you set as an ally, or at least if an official alliance is offered through the ship alliance friendly code by the player who's planet will supply the resources. To be able to use the "lfm" friendly code over an allied planet, the alliance does not have to be complete. As long as the races owning the planet has offered an alliance the "lfm" friendly code will work. The

If for example the Rebels want to build fighters over a Birdmen planet, only the Birdmen have to set an alliance with the Rebels. The Rebels don't necessarily need to ally the Birdmen for this to work. Once an alliance has been offered, the planet's friendly code does not have to be "lfm". It is impossible to use the "lfm" friendly code to beam up resources to build fighters with from enemy planets, even when both the planet's and the ship's friendly code are "lfm". The "lfm" friendly code will not work over unowned planets.