It so happens that Frontier's Elite: Dangerous - the long-awaited sequel to David Braben's 1984 cult classic Elite, which served as inspiration to a lot of other popular space games such as Wing Commander or Eve Online - is currently undergoing Alpha testing. The project was largely crowd-funded via kickstarter, though similar to Shadowrun Online it may have suffered somewhat from bad timing, as the nigh-simultaneous kickstarter of Star Citizen managed to raise a lot more cash. Still, Elite managed to surpass its goal of £1.5 mio and, over the past 16 months, has been shaping up rather nicely. I've recently upgraded my initial kickstarter pledge to Alpha level (though I'm not entirely sure that this lulzy discount was working as intended), and so had the opportunity to once again sit down in the cramped cockpit of a Faulcon DeLacy Mark I Sidewinder Scout, about 15 years after having last piloted one. Nostalgia ahoy!
The first thing that will please many oldtimers familiar with the original is that Elite: Dangerous remains very faithful to its roots and oozes tradition, right down to the hint of the Blue Danube at the end of its very first trailer. All the ships from the previous games retain their characteristic geometric shapes, though additional detail has been added in order to update their looks for the graphics-spoiled gamer of the 2010s. Space stations still rotate, so manual docking remains a mildly challenging task - with added difficulty in that you are now actually able to fly into a port's innards and have to land on a pad that Station Control is assigning you. Ship functions such as toggles for lights and landing gear, and the amount of detail that went into designing the heart of the starbase (complete with moving cars and loudspeaker announcements warning visitors to heed station law) add a lot to the resulting immersion.
Aside from Docking and Outfitting, the only other feature currently available in the Alpha is Combat, which the game offers in the form of 8 segregated singleplayer scenarios as well as 3 multiplayer space zones (4 if you count the space station system - you never know if someone isn't crazy enough to start a fight right under the noses of a Federation Fighter Wing), the latter of which are all connected by a very rough first look at hyperspace travel (missing the translation FX, which have been announced for Alpha 4.0 and its Exploration module). Manoeuvering feels somewhat sluggish, though this may be the result of neither the Sidewinder nor the heavier Cobra (the only 2 ships that can currently be piloted by player characters) being true dogfighters.
Speaking of manoeuvers: Just like in Elite II, players have the option to use Newtonian physics in order to create a true space flight experience, allowing you to turn 180° with engines off to fly backwards in order to blast pursueing opponents with your forward lasers. By default, however, the onboard computer uses a Flight Assist mode and a series of small thrusters to simulate atmospheric flight - for example, if you cut your main engines, retro-rockets will automatically engage to slow your ship down. However, you can switch Flight Assist on and off at any time at the simple push of a button. The developers also married realism to convenience when they gave players the option to deactivate external sounds, which have been fluffed to be an artificial recreation of your ship for increased pilot awareness. As the following video will show, the ships will also have subsystems that can be targeted individually; blowing up a transport's cargo hatch will cause it to "leak" canisters full of precious loot, which can subsequently be picked up - provided your ship is equipped with a cargo scoop - and sold on the black market.
The final game will offer over 100 billion star systems, procedurally generated, using real life science data such as that gained by the Kepler mission to make sure celestial bodies and distances between them are accurately scaled. True to its sandbox roots, players will be able to slip into a variety of different roles, from traders to explorers, from pirates to bounty hunters, and mix or swap between them as they see fit (and their standing with local system law allows). The game will have both an offline as well as an online mode.
Elite: Dangerous also plans to feature an intricate background simulation to reflect player influence on economical, political and military issues, creating appropriate events in return. The level of detail will be such that, for example, there will be three different ways to manage heat dissipation (which directly affects how fast your ship will show up on active scans; this is already live in the Alpha), and as a slave trader you may sometimes even find systems willing to buy slaves killed by transport safety negligience as if you were selling "food" or "medical supplies".
As for me? I'm planning to become a bounty hunter in the Independent Systems, flying a decommissioned police Viper and bullying random transport captains into cutting their engines so I can scan them for outstanding bounties.
Elite: Dangerous will go into Premium Beta at the 30th this month. Anyone willing to pony up the cash to become an Alpha backer can still do so until the 25th and receive a lifetime 50% discount on ship insurances.
This actually sounds pretty freaking awesome. One part of it sounds like cowboy bebop and another sounds like 'eve online' (sort of).
Is there a lore to this game? If people get to fight in interstellar wars that sounds good to me as well.
So I'm not sure what I'd like to do. I don't know if I'd be a trader. I might pick something like pirate or bounty hunter just to give them a shot. Being a pirate sounds like being a d*ck though. What about scavengers? For instance you navigate debris and wreckage from destroyed space craft and pick up anything that might be valuable (spare parts from ships to re-use them). Not totally legal but similar to taking stuff off of a person's corpse and selling it. Still technically not a good thing to do because it probably belongs to whoever is in the person's will but hey it was going to waste in the vacuum of space.
The game has a lot of potential for story and a fantastic award winning story at that.
That bit makes me laugh somehow. It's probably a marketing strategy and you got totally owned by it ;P. I mean to be fair they give you discounts but getting a discount is something people tend to rush for if it's something they really want. Decisions made in haste tend to be bad ones when you think about them (for instance pre-purchases for games which turn out to suck *erm* aliens: colonial marines *erm*) and if they add an allotted time to it that just forces you to speed buy since you don't know when you'll get it so cheap again. I'm not sure if i heard about this correctly but somebody could also scam people into backing these games, not finish and then totally run off with cash you gave virtually (i think i heard about this happening second-hand).
I feel like this is part of where GW fails now. I mean they probably would've succeeded if they made a box set that was cheaper and added something nobody uses to insure people bought it with the box set and allowing the box set to be cheaper than the standard bunch but they totally seem to fail at marketing I'd think.
Then again keep in mind I'm no expert. It is worth noting these things are all possibilities though. I guess you just have to realize similar steps taken by good games and bad ones or scams to take your money.
Edit: Whoops i just checked the actual link rather than heard it. You got a huge discount?! Well they probably did that to force more people into buying it in a different way or backing things in alpha. It's a way of saying 'thank you' to people that helped in the beginning and possibly to force more people to be early backers.
Wow, That sounds absolutely amazing. Just from having a read it reminds me alot of playing Freelancer as a kid. Man I loved that game. Going to keep an eye on this!
Only dabbled in the original Elites as even back then my PC couldnt handle them too well.
This looks great so far. Hopefully they take it to completion, try and stay true to the genre and feel and work out any bugs/improvements needed.
flamingkillamajig wrote:Is there a lore to this game?
There is, though it's by far not as extensive and detailed as, say, Star Wars or Battletech, etc.
The two major galactic powers are the Federation and the Empire of Achenar, the latter having broken away from the former, first as an independent colony of people fed up with Federation bureaucracy and corruption, then (over time) turning into hypocrites and waging wars of conquest on their neighbours. A third larger faction is the Alliance of Independent Systems which attempts to eke out an existence between the two superpowers; a loose coalition of colonies who have banded together in an effort to not get annexed by either the Federation or the Empire, treading careful to maintain their neutrality and - hopefully - their independence. There will also be lots of truly independent colonies, some of whom will be under corporate control.
There is also an insectoid alien race called Thargoids that will return in Elite: Dangerous, though David Braben has not yet revealed in what capacity. By and large, the Elite universe has always been fairly human-centric in that most alien life is simply native animals. Also, there is an unofficial ban on true AIs, with the Federation and the Empire sabotaging and suppressing research into this area:
flamingkillamajig wrote:What about scavengers? For instance you navigate debris and wreckage from destroyed space craft and pick up anything that might be valuable (spare parts from ships to re-use them). Not totally legal but similar to taking stuff off of a person's corpse and selling it. Still technically not a good thing to do because it probably belongs to whoever is in the person's will but hey it was going to waste in the vacuum of space.
I suppose scavenging is possible, but dangerous. Most military and paramiltiary forces won't bother to pick up cargo and debris of destroyed ships (or rather, they won't be able to, as their specialised ships have sacrificed cargo space for additional armaments), and even pirates may not be able to pick up everything some huge transport "drops".
flamingkillamajig wrote:You got a huge discount?! Well they probably did that to force more people into buying it in a different way or backing things in alpha. It's a way of saying 'thank you' to people that helped in the beginning and possibly to force more people to be early backers.
Yeah, the thing is, I don't think the discounts were supposed to stack. My backer status was for the Standard Beta, and when I purchased Premium Beta access I got the (significant) backer's discount for already having invested into the game. However, there is also a discount for upgrading from Premium Beta to Alpha, which is what I did. And it looks like I got the Standard Beta discount again, and added to the Premium Beta discount.
All in all, I've spent £36 to upgrade from my £80 kickstarter pledge to the £200 Alpha access.
I actually think this is no longer possible, as right now you have to contact their customer support if you want to upgrade. Perhaps they've noticed the shop discount is buggy? Guess I got lucky.
Ratius wrote:I wonder will it be a huge timesink though? :(
I guess it has the potential for it, but ultimately it depends on you and what you want out of the game. You see, Elite: Dangerous is intentionally avoiding player-run corporations a la Eve in an effort to focus gameplay on individual pilots rather than huge guilds. You can still form ad-hoc teams with others, but you won't see the game directly support permanent "guilds" with hundreds of players and their own starbases or stuff like that. For some, this will be a disadvantage compared to Eve Online, but I believe this will provide a better basis for players who just don't have the time to commit to some huge guild in order to get the most out of the game. Instead, you simply log in whenever you feel like it, and then do your thing. How long? That depends on your own discipline. The important thing is that, unlike in Eve, you won't feel like you're "missing out" on something.
Elite: Dangerous also plans to offer user-defined instancing in that you will be able to play within the following parameters:
- All Players: the standard; you can end up with any other player in the same system
- Personal Group: the only other players you'll meet are the ones you add to a list of allies/friends. by removing every other player you can also set this list so that you will only encounter NPCs - Dangerous Group: like the All Players group, but reserved for "Ironmode" players (permadeath)
Personally, I'm already having a blast in the Alpha just by undocking, then warping to the Federated Bond Zone and shooting a couple pirates before I return to Port Zelada and park my ship in the station's bowels. I'm currently saving for a Cobra Mk III - only ~30.000 credits to go!
Spoiler:
The bow of Dreadnought Impeccable, the Federation Battle Cruiser from the Capital Ship Battle trailer. And yes, I could not resist the opportunity to fly through its tunnels either!
Spoiler:
Cool detail: This happens when you shut off everything that produces heat.
Lynata wrote: As for me? I'm planning to become a bounty hunter in the Independent Systems, flying a decommissioned police Viper and bullying random transport captains into cutting their engines so I can scan them for outstanding bounties.
I think I'd like to play with you. I'd pretend to be on your side as a buddy. Then i'd be the d*ck that when you scan for an outlaw I'd go right behind you and shoot your ship to death and then kill the outlaw or trader.
I can imagine it right now.
Lynata: "WTF?! Why'd you do that? Oh you son of a b*tch!"
other person: "Wtf is going on? I'm still confused what just happened but I know that it sucks."
I'll look at more of this when my final exam in my physics 2 class is done tomorrow. I'll be busy a while till then. This game looks like a lot of fun. Not sure what the docking station would be like. Is there stuff to do on foot?
Also just wondering but can you wait for a while after somebody leaves their space craft and then totally just jump into it and hijack it and fly it out of the docking station? Would that work or would it get shot down? I think I may be starting something really bad lol. Not sure if I would do that for later on vessels. I'd be a huge *sshole to do that.
At first I thought it was just a cheap version of star citizen and EVE. I watched someone play and all I really see (and saw from many other sources) was people going to the combat zones, getting money and upgrading their ship, rinse and repeat. Upon researching it lacked mamy things I liked from the space sim's and 2 specific from star citizen and we alike.
Generic space sim's
1. Lack of depth
2. Lack of roles (merchant, scammer etc)
3. Ship variety
4. Large amounts of people in an instance
EVE
1. Trading and economy, this speaks for itself
2. Factions and politics
Star citizen
1. Multiple players in a single ship, controlling different parts
2. Out of ship roles and play, star citizen promises ship boarding and FPS gameplay in many aspects
So overall I still feel it's simply a cheap version of the game, gonna wait still SC, but please do prove me wrong I'd like this game to be a cheaper earlier SC. Are these views just simply my perspective and what I'm seeing, is their info I'm missing?
It will have all the planets in 1:1 scale. That is, compared with your ship, the sun will be the size of the sun, and it's not even the largest star you can get to. You could even land on planets and go around cities and mountains, though that was more of a bonus and just something that could be done.
In terms of roles, you can be whatever you want. There's three 'main' factions that you travel around between their systems, and independent worlds. Each (at least should) have their own feel and background, with different things being legal or illegal in each, and different missions.
In terms of space sims, Elite is the great grandfather of them all too, but it remains to be seen if this lives up to the legacy.
This is on my list of things to throw money at, has been for a long time now lol.
Anyone else feel that kickstarter has resuscitated the space game genre? Between Star Citizen, Novus Aeterno, The Mandate, and Elite: Dangerous, chaos0xomega is going to have more star systems to explore than he has time left in his life.
The Dark Apostle wrote:At first I thought it was just a cheap version of star citizen and EVE. I watched someone play and all I really see (and saw from many other sources) was people going to the combat zones, getting money and upgrading their ship, rinse and repeat.
That's because they've just begun rolling out the game. At this moment, Star Citizen only has a hangar you can walk around in, yet you wouldn't assume this is all the game is going to be (I hope)
The Dark Apostle wrote:Upon researching it lacked mamy things I liked from the space sim's and 2 specific from star citizen and we alike. [...]
Wut? Okay, I'm not sure where you did that research, but I'll address your list point by point, posting a link to where you can get information about what you believe the game won't have.
Let's start with roles. The Design Discussion Archives on the Elite forums are full of information for various mechanics and gameplay elements, including those relevant to the roles you may slip into, amongst them:
Bounty Hunter, Explorer, Miner, Passenger Transport, Pirate, Smuggler and Trader.
That's all I was able to find right now, but since previous Elite games also included mercenary contracts for corporations and militaries as well as small courier jobs, I almost expect those to be present in ED as well.
I would say that these roles also tie in directly with depth, but would agree that they're not the only thing determining it. So here are DDA documents about the background simulation, injected events and meta-game as well as NPC interaction. For good measure, here is also a newsletter interview about how they're going to recreate the entire galaxy as a playing field using procedurally generated content.
For ships, there is this page that shows you the craft from previous titles, which all have a very good chance at making a reappearance. The Alpha in its current state only has three of the oldtimers (Anaconda, Cobra, Sidewinder) as well as an entirely new design (Federation Starfighter), but here is a newsletter extract where they're detailing how to expand the military of the Empire of Achenar, which is just one of the major factions.
As for players per instance, I believe right now it's capped at 32 plus AI ships, though they are experimenting with ways on upping the limit. That being said, for the type of game that Elite is, I'd say 32 is a good number already. Of course, the more the merrier, but it's sufficient. Keep in mind that Elite is intentionally avoiding huge player-run conglomerates, instead focusing on canon corporations and factions and keeping players' roles limited to that of agents. The advantage of this approach is that people who don't have a lot of time won't feel left out just because they cannot commit to the second life that is guild membership.
As far as out-of-ship gameplay is concerned, though, they have not promised anything. It's something they'd like to do later on, but it's not on their radar right now as they are focusing on the space part as a core element of the game. You could say this makes Elite the smaller project, but on the other hand it also means its release is already in foreseeable future, whereas with Star Citizen it looks like they'll still take years to finish, at which point they may have to re-work what they already have because the assets will no longer hold up to current (future) standards. I have no idea what the average SC backer is like, but based on what I read about their expectations I keep thinking "has everyone forgotten Daikatana already?" - maybe this is just me being cautious or not having enough vision, but by setting lower (if still high, compared to the rest of the industry sans Chris Roberts) goals, ED actually comes across as being much more level-headed and realistic. I hope I'm wrong about SC, though, as I don't actually see both games being real competitors, in spite of the shared genre. They take two different roads and can easily co-exist as they cater to different types of players, with ED being more sandbox but SC being more detailed. The same goes for EVE and its focus on huge player guilds, which neither ED nor SC will be able to recreate. Either way, after such a long dry spell, it's safe to say that space sim fans are looking at a bright future.
Oh, and I hope I'm not coming across as antagonistic or something - I'm just slowly becoming hyped about Elite now that I've had a chance to try it. If it manages to pull off only half of what the developers are working on (as per the Design Discussion documents), I'll be in spacer heaven. Already, the simple act of docking makes me feel like Mal Reynolds just because of how detailed everything looks and sounds.
chaos0xomega wrote:Anyone else feel that kickstarter has resuscitated the space game genre? Between Star Citizen, Novus Aeterno, The Mandate, and Elite: Dangerous, chaos0xomega is going to have more star systems to explore than he has time left in his life.
I guess so. Kickstarter enables developers to circumvent the "established industry wisdom" that dominates the publishing sector, stifling creativity by attempting to predict a game's success (and thus the amount of available funding) based almost entirely on recent sales and trends - thus leading to sequel after lame sequel rather than brave experiments that would actually move gaming forward. Space sims in particular have suffered from this "corporate approach", and I'm glad we have KS to save the day.
I've backed the Mandate, too. And Galactic Princess. Check out dat groovy music~
Oh, and I hope I'm not coming across as antagonistic or something - I'm just slowly becoming hyped about Elite now that I've had a chance to try it. If it manages to pull off only half of what the developers are working on (as per the Design Discussion documents), I'll be in spacer heaven. Already, the simple act of docking makes me feel like Mal Reynolds just because of how detailed everything looks and sounds.
Perhaps you should've started off with that. When I first read what you said in my head it sounded like you were getting really defensive. Calm down lynata we know you have the info to back up just about everything you say.
You mean Malcolm Reynolds from 'firefly'? I'd actually imagine his second in command is more like you. Tough woman and marries a funny pilot which I actually didn't enjoy too much but other people liked him. My favorite character was either the priest or Jayne.
In terms of multiplayer, is it kind of like a game where you can group up and hang around in the same 'world' while antagonists will be more like "Dark Spirit xXheRONbroDeAtHsMiLeSbObXx has invaded"?
Daba wrote:In terms of multiplayer, is it kind of like a game where you can group up and hang around in the same 'world' while antagonists will be more like "Dark Spirit xXheRONbroDeAtHsMiLeSbObXx has invaded"?
Hmm, not sure I understand the question correctly. Do you mean like laying claim to a system and killing any trespassers?
Elite Dangerous is kind of like an open world sandbox game - well, not truly sandbox, but in that it's entirely up to you how you pass your time and what role you want to play in space. Unlike with Eve Online, players won't have the ability to become political powers in their own right - but in theory you can group up with likeminded pilots and focus on a specific star system to do whatever you feel like, up to and including turning to piracy and hunting down anyone who drops out of hyperspace. Some systems - especially the ones on the frontier and in unexplored space - will lack an organised government, corporate entity or any other type of system authority that "cares" for what happens in the area, so you may not even get a bounty posted on your head. You can also hire AI wingmen to help you out - though criminally minded wingmen (the ones most likely to offer their services to a criminal player) may betray and turn on you! Of course, you can also choose to raid systems aligned with a faction, given that they are more likely to be well-travelled and better equipped with facilities to support your group - however, the game will react to your interference, sooner or later.
"For entities that belong to a faction (the Alliance, Federation and Empire) there is a safety net provided by those factions. When an entity attempts to generate an event and lacks the wealth to do so, it uses its faction’s lookup table to generate a faction event for the event type.
For example an Imperial system has been plagued with pirates; it has issued missions which no player has completed. This cycle continues, with more player pirates pushing the entity into a downward spiral. Eventually it is no longer able to generate missions and so receives a faction support event. This is an Imperial task force of a cruiser with several squadrons of fighters. These suppress the pirates and order is restored." - Design Discussion Archive: the Background Sim
These events can even attract and involve other players, as once a faction gets involved it may also generate missions:
"As the background simulation now has influence from the warring faction, it will generate events and missions linked to that war. If players complete missions relating to negotiating peace and ending the war, and react in the right way to events, they could stop the war and mitigate the effects of the Injected Event." - Design Discussion Archive: Injected Events
On a sidenote, just yesterday I experienced first-hand how system authorities can interfere with your plans! There's a minefield in the Zelada system that is used by NPCs to mine resources, which makes it a popular zone for player pirates to steal cargo. I noticed a Sidewinder Scout with a 100cr bounty on its head and proceeded to engage him - however, after the successful kill, I got both the 100cr added to my account ... and a 300cr bounty on my head because I apparently shot down someone who was under protection of Magnopolis jurisdiction (Magnopolis is an Imperial corporation that's active in the area). I was able to clear out before anyone noticed the price tag and got the bounty cleared at Port Zelada, but I had to pay 600cr, which means I made a loss of 500. Grr! Guess I should invest in a proper bounty scanner to prevent such mistakes in the future.
On the plus side, today I scooped up a canister of cargo that some pirate must've let behind (probably because their hold was full - even a Cobra cannot carry as much as an Anaconda, which is what most miners are using there), and managed to sell it as "Iron Ore (stolen)" for 1,000cr on the black market. Speaking of the cargo scoop ... it's surprisingly tricky! I'm not sure if this is because my small ship has such a tiny cargo bay door and the canisters are so large, or if I'm just lacking practice, but getting the canister aboard took me four attempts even with computer assistance (you get a small "widget" of sorts, an extra screen with crosshairs and a wireframe model of the cargo you want to bring aboard).
Uh, and a couple days ago I had a near-death experience in the Federal Combat Bond Zone! Some genius apparently just got their hands on a pair of gimballed beam lasers and wanted to try how fast they can burn through another player's hull - or more exactly, the canopy, for he was aiming directly at my cockpit! I had a decompression and had to switch into emergency gear, and opted to "play dead" by cutting my engines. Dunno if I fooled him or if he was just a sadist who wanted to see me suffocate, but he ceased fire and approached to scan me, and didn't notice the energy build-up of my hyperdrive. Fortunately, Port Zelada was only a single lightyear away ...
Spoiler:
See those cracks? But ... damn, what a landing! I don't think I've ever rushed into port at that speed. Made it with 45 seconds to spare!
@Lynata: So is this why you've been too busy to talk lately? Well at least you're having fun. This game sounds like fun.
Sounds like quick thinking on your part and a bit of luck he didn't just blow you to hell. Perhaps the person was going to inspect cargo or something? I wouldn't know since I don't know enough on the game.
For some reason your images are no longer popping up for me. I don't know why that is.
I don't spend more time on Elite than I did on previous games I played, I just spend less time on dakka by not posting on the background section anymore.
But yes, I suspect the other pilot was scanning for cargo. Not that I had any at that time - I've only begun doing salvage ops this weekend by picking up leftovers at the asteroid field. My biggest catch so far: a ton of Alcohol worth 5k credits.
The downside: Just as I got enough cash to buy a Cobra, I took the ship out for a maiden voyage and immediately had it destroyed by a known bug. So much for my past 2 weeks of grind, I guess. Just my luck. Fortunately, the final game will offer a "safety net" in the form of insurances and debtors, though, so stuff like this wouldn't happen once it's actually live.
chaos0xomega wrote:LOL cute bobblehead on your dashboard there. I so need to get this game.
Thanks! It's one of two options currently available. I imagine the game will have more as cosmetic micro-transactions later on.
It's certainly a cute addition to the otherwise gritty, industrial look of the cockpit, especially due to how it accompanies ship movements and impacts.
On a sidenote, props to the Elite team for including all those movie quotes in their design discussion thread titles.
Lynata wrote: I don't spend more time on Elite than I did on previous games I played, I just spend less time on dakka by not posting on the background section anymore.
But yes, I suspect the other pilot was scanning for cargo. Not that I had any at that time - I've only begun doing salvage ops this weekend by picking up leftovers at the asteroid field. My biggest catch so far: a ton of Alcohol worth 5k credits.
The downside: Just as I got enough cash to buy a Cobra, I took the ship out for a maiden voyage and immediately had it destroyed by a known bug. So much for my past 2 weeks of grind, I guess. Just my luck. Fortunately, the final game will offer a "safety net" in the form of insurances and debtors, though, so stuff like this wouldn't happen once it's actually live.
chaos0xomega wrote:LOL cute bobblehead on your dashboard there. I so need to get this game.
Thanks! It's one of two options currently available. I imagine the game will have more as cosmetic micro-transactions later on.
It's certainly a cute addition to the otherwise gritty, industrial look of the cockpit, especially due to how it accompanies ship movements and impacts.
On a sidenote, props to the Elite team for including all those movie quotes in their design discussion thread titles.
I laugh at the idea you got a ton of alcohol. It's like if there could be any bigger stereotypes than you being in Ireland as a german selling alcohol to them.
I can't remember what game that bobblehead is from. I think it was called parrappa the rappa or something? I never played it.
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Yeah dakka is kind of boring to me which is part of the reason I'm only adding posts in your threads. I just don't know what to really be interested in since I'm mostly into warhammer fantasy and somehow I just am not as into it as I used to be. The only other threads I care to update in is the "what are you playing now" thread and not much else. I stay away from the off-topic as much as possible since people would just interpret whatever you say into something else or make something out of it that you didn't mean. I miss the off-topic in some smaller forums though where you could just talk to people and get to know them. Sure it was sometimes more hostile with the other posters but at least you'd talk about interesting things. Dakka doesn't have random topics for whatever you feel like talking about and with the size of the forum it'd just end up going in horrible places.
So yesterday, Frontier released Alpha 4 with quite a number of new features:
Frontier Development wrote:Alpha 4 vastly expands scale, scope and depth over the previous Alpha versions. Set within a 200 cubic light-year volume containing five star systems in contested space with spectacular sights such as an unusual quaternary star system and ringed gas giants.
With five ships to pilot and a huge choice of weaponry, Elite: Dangerous Alpha 4 offers total freedom as you trade your way through the star systems, pirate, hunt for bounties, and become immersed in exploration and combat.
They've refined a number of mechanics, and the new locations certainly feel nice and offer a plethora of new opportunities. The level of detail in particular continues to amaze me - they actually have different voice sets for automated station announcements, so depending on which port you're docking at you may hear different voices. Undoubtedly the best thing in the Alpha, however, is the sense of freedom and immersion you gain from the galaxy map and the hyperdrive. Zooming out of the map suddenly makes you feel incredibly insignificant when you notice that even those huge interstellar power blocs of the Terran Federation, the Empire of Achenar, and the Independent Alliance of Systems who control numerous worlds and are an almost omnipresent influence in your neighbourhood ... are really just a tiny little speck in some ass-end corner of the galaxy.
You can also do a bit of exploration, although caution is recommended - it seems there is a new pirate tactic that consists of small groups of raiders dropping beacons, only to engage the first ship that comes looking to run a scan.
I have to say the hyperdrive sequence almost feels a bit creepy, though, as if you're flying through the Warp.
Using the new hyper- and frame shift drives does seem to take a bit of practice, though. Translating back into realspace too soon causes you to drop out in a huge distance from your destination, whilst waiting too long runs a risk of your vessel becoming trapped in the mass shadow of a planar body and forcefully being pulled out of supercruise, potentially risking drive and systems damage. The same thing goes for attempting to drop out of supercruise without decelerating first. There's a safety mechanism that prevents you from accidentally disengaging the frame shift drive beyond a certain velocity, but by pressing the corresponding button twice you can force an "emergency stop", if you don't mind your ship spinning out of control as the bubble responsible for warping space and gravity collapses whilst the ship is still in transit. Since there is a certain risk of ship destruction, this is probably a button you do not want to press accidentally, but the ship's computer does warn you about this.
Also: dem rings!
Spoiler:
New ships are also available, such as the Eagle, shown here in the employ of corporate security:
Spoiler:
The craft which more or less defined 'light fighter' is still a viable choice for the courier or less-well-off bounty hunter. It is not a craft meant for prolonged combat, but is the very devil to try and nail with even a beam laser, so a skilled pilot will be able to survive much longer than you would otherwise think. The Eagle Mk II, produced by the Federal Military Research Directorate, was an upgrade to the ubiquitous Mk I Long Range Fighter. Although there was much hype at its launch, this was quickly overshadowed by controversy when the extent of the poor design became public.
The Mark II involved seven years of design work, and the released product was slightly larger and faster with debatably improved looks. However, the retro thrusters were poor by even shuttle standards at four gees.
Other deficiencies and inadequacies were found quickly. After a Mk II imploded on lift-off, killing the pilot, an inquisition was launched into the design. Although no 'smoking guns' were found, the Federal Military Research Directorate never fully recovered from the incident.
Notable Features The Mk II remains one of the faster small ships on the market, and has decent capacity for outfitting as a fighter. It is also highly manoeuvrable, making it hard to target in combat. Due to this small size however, it also cannot take much punishment.
Disadvantages The retro rockets are inexcusably weak at just about four gees. Most pilots will forgo the autopilot and do a manual flip at the centrepoint of their journey, using the craft's main engines to decelerate.
Another disadvantage of this craft is its size. You will not be able to fit a lot in there, and to try is merely to ask more of the craft than it is able to give.
In Elite II, it has a a hyperspace range of just 8ly with a class 1 hyperdrive, which isn't really enough. This makes it a horrible starting ship, since the standard class 2 drive won't fit and the military version will be beyond your budget for some time.
Verdict A perfect craft to learn any of the more aggressive trades on, the Eagle will give you long and distinguished service in any role you ask of it... provided you only ask it to be a nippy little pest of a combat ship.
So did you have any more updates on this game? I might be interested but there are just way too many games I would like to play and I dunno if I could very easily.
I am somewhat interested though but not as much as I was with shadowrun returns which was admittedly a lot.
Game looks neat and thanks for the write up OP Sadly (not really) I have thrown a lot of money into the development of Star Citizen so I am firmly in that camp, but I wish great success to all of the PC Centric reboots of our cherished Space Sims.
Yeah, I threw money at Star Citizen too, doesn't mean I cant spare $50-$100 on elite dangerous either.... although I would almost rather spend $100+ to get an Anvil Hornet (or variant) for Starcitizen, that thing just looks like sex with wings.
It is damn tough to get used to a joystick again after "flying" with mouse + keyboard for more than a decade. But I think I'm slowly getting the hang of it, after having remapped half the controls!
It's probably not a huge help that the X52p HOTAS I got specifically for Elite (although I want to give it a try at MWO too, whenever I'm getting back into the mood for it, probably at around CW starts) has like a bazillion buttons everywhere. Though I have to say that I've figured out a control scheme that is fairly intuitive to me now. Also, I absolutely love how I have to flip up a red safety cap for the DEPLOY HARDPOINTS button.
Trivial bonus: the Mark I Sidewinder's in-game cockpit has a joystick that looks exactly alike!
Well, the Coriolis-type (named after the coriolis force) is not the only space station one will find in Elite - but it is a legacy of the old games and will probably be the most numerous. Personally, I like that the game is sticking to its existing designs: not only does this give veterans a feeling of recognition and consistency, but I'd even argue that simple geometric shapes such as these are the ones most likely to actually find use once humanity really takes to the stars. Not that it won't have at least a few more "conventional sci-fi" looking ships, mind you. Such as the Eagle long range fighter that can be seen in the trailer, too.
The Torus-type from Elite II has been pretty much confirmed for ED as well, at least judging from this concept art / wallpaper. In fact, it seems Elite will feature a wide range of station designs all based on modular assets, while still adhering to basic scientific principles. It was explained in detail in a newsletter here, with some more images. I particularly like the possibility to see stations grow over time, partially based on player activity.
As for combat, personally I'd say the trailer showed enough - there really isn't a lot that can be shown on combat without greater explanation of all the little "behind the scenes" details such as power distribution, heat management and silent running, which would have reduced the cinematic feel of this teaser. I guess they could have shown how every single weapon looks like, but ultimately, whilst combat is an important part of Elite (to be enjoyed or dreaded, depending on the role you choose), I think the game's primary concern are immersion and the concept of possibilities. And this is what the trailer was all about.
As another fan put it: "one ship. one galaxy. 400 billion stars. where will your journey take you?"
Ok so we have cubes and wheels now ;P. I'm fine with that though I just have to joke about it.
I dunno the combat could be cool. I'm not really into ship to ship combat like this is mostly about but you seemed to be right on the money with 'shadowrun returns'. The only thing I didn't like about the first was the super camp of the inter-dimensional bugs but I could see how people might like it in a retro video game or comic type of sense. The rest of the game just felt serious and then bam fething spirit bugs.
Oh and this isn't entirely related to 'elite dangerous' but I thought it was very cool news indeed.
chaos0xomega wrote:Query: Will the game allow for player controlled battlecruisers like the one shown at the bottom of the newsletter?
I don't think so - that would be more in EVE's territory, or possibly Star Citizen. Elite is less about individual players gaining huge influence (usually by banding together in vast out-of-game guilds), but more about individual pilots making ends meet on the frontier of civilisation.
Less Commander Adama, more Mal Raynolds, so to say.
I believe the largest ships players will be able to pilot are corvettes and transports, as per these specifications.
The largest ship in the game so far is the Lakon Type 9. And it seems to be quite tricky to get her through the starport airlock; you trigger the PROX alarm every time you pass through. ^^
Ships like these will require multiple crew - in fact, the Cobra Mk III is a two-seater already. However, as of now the crew will be just NPCs. Other players manning stations may come after release.
Kind of. Don't really like how they always have to refer to Star Trek as if that was the only sci-fi out there, but I guess it gets them hits and thus poblic exposure.
Kind of. Don't really like how they always have to refer to Star Trek as if that was the only sci-fi out there, but I guess it gets them hits and thus poblic exposure.
Seems like I jinxed something with that post about the stations. The new newsletter officially announced the redubbed(?) Orbis-type, and it's going to be a beast at 8km in diameter and a lot more expensive to build than a Coriolis.
Spoiler:
The Orbis will see the light of day in the upcoming Premium Beta Build 2, together with new systems to explore - but unlike the ones currently available in the Beta, these new systems will be situated further away from the galactic plane.
Spoiler:
Also, I seem to have completely missed the Anaconda's introductory video!
"In trader parlance, the Anaconda is built as strong as a rogue asteroid, and steers like one." - from the 1984 Elite manual
And yeah, as you have seen they are tough nuts to crack! I had to take on one of those in a scenario, and required two wingmen to take it out from distance, continuously forcing it to shift its focus between the attackers.
With the right weaponry - turrets and missiles perhaps - I could see a militarised version providing a fine flagship for a small squad of law enforcers, with a couple other pilots accompanying this big support vessel with smaller, more nimble fighters.
Law enforcers ... or pirates, that is, if one were so inclined.
And with larger docking yards there are larger ships to come with it perhaps?
The smaller yards seemed to have a greater limit whereas these shipyards seem to have a higher upper limit.
It sounds like a band of ships can come together. I just now had the idea that if you were with a large ship you couldn't refuel the large ship but possible the smaller ships that come with it so going to these smaller stations may even be good if your escorting a bigger ship along. I don't know if it'd be possible to refuel a bigger ship with smaller ships though.
I am having plenty of ideas on this but I lack the knowledge of the game or what's been said for the most part to make the most well informed decisions. For some reason this game is interesting but it just doesn't feel like my thing.
I'm glad you're enjoying it though lynata. Then again it sounds like you have too many hobbies whereas I have too few. I need to find a game I'd like to play. Perhaps if you can find a good judge dredd game I'd totally get into it.
Correct me if I'm wrong, but whats the deal with the 'new systems'? I was under the impression that they were procedurally generated and there was technically an infinite number of them or some such?
flamingkillamajig wrote:And with larger docking yards there are larger ships to come with it perhaps?
Personally, I don't believe the ships will be getting much bigger - and I think part of the design vision is to keep the players thinking small in order to limit how much they can influence one another. I mean, it is possible that it could happen (there certainly are larger capital ships, and one of them - the Farragut-class Dreadnought - is already in the game), but I would not expect it as it would represent a pretty big shift away from the traditional Elite experience. Such vessels are manned by hundreds or thousands of crew, and that's just ... a different scope.
What I am expecting is more ships that "only just so" fit through the docking port. Here's the design concept of the Lakon Type 7 that's not in the Beta yet (look at that tiny bridge with the tiny terminals):
Spoiler:
There's also been talk at the E3 about the docking ports being electrically magnetised to assist with docking.
Speaking of docking - I just noticed today that most stations have a "green line" and a "red line", meaning you're actually supposed to fly on a specific side depending on whether you're entering or exiting. That ought to prevent a couple embarrassing encounters...
Also, from the forums:
I was docking at Dahan 30 minutes ago, doing 50% speed, lights on, full shields and on the green side when a fast sidewinder came up from behind and bounced off my Cobra into the cattle grid, didn't notice him after that as I was cruising through the slot on the green side with my outer shield scratched.
When I was inside, the station announcer said, "Kill your speed not your bank balance". Pity he couldn't hear it.
chaos0xomega wrote:Correct me if I'm wrong, but whats the deal with the 'new systems'? I was under the impression that they were procedurally generated and there was technically an infinite number of them or some such?
Well, about 400 billion - as much as our Milky Way has! However, at the moment the accessible space is still limited to a few systems - I imagine both because it's easier on their current tech as well as because they want us to actually meet one-another and conduct a foreseeable range of activities in order to detect any issues. It's hard to analyse the effects of human traders on markets if you've got all the participants scattered across human space (or beyond), and you can't balance PvP if no-one ever meets anyone else ... so for the purposes of the Alpha, people were restricted to only 5 star systems:
Asellus Prime (F7V main sequence)
Independent, High-tech, Corporate Governance
pop 40.000
Traveller's Note: this is apparently a good place to sell coffee
Dahan (K5V main sequence)
Federation, Refining, Colony
pop 4.000
Eranin (K3V main sequence)
Independent, Agricultural, Communism
pop 450.000
Traveller's Note: Eranin defence forces have recently clashed with the Federation Navy. stay outta trouble - or at least know whose side you're on before you go there, and act accordingly.
I Bootis (G0V quaternary system)
Federation, Industrial, Democracy
pop 2.2 mio
LP 98-132 (M2V red star)
Anarchy, Extraction
pop 1.500
Traveller's Note: piracy is rife in this region; the system's only station, Port Freedom, is pretty much the only place that has something resembling law
The next build of the Beta will open up a couple more systems that are situated a bit further away, possibly to test some new stuff - or simply to accomodate the new players that have flooded into the game when it switched from Alpha Access to Premium Beta. The final game will have the full galaxy, of course. Or even one of the last pre-release versions before it goes gold.
Of note, the "sky" in the game is already simulating the galaxy; all the stars aren't just a background box, but are accurately reflecting your position in the Milky Way. It's just that only a tiny percentage of them have been unlocked as hyperspace destinations.
[...] "And of course, as everyone reading this newsletter knows, with Elite: Dangerous we are taking another huge step for today’s hardware. Detail and accuracy has taken another great leap, but, we have a confession to make: Alpha builds 1, 2 and 3 have all used a ‘skydome’ – a static, painted backdrop around a 64 bit play space roughly 1 light year across. Within that all the planets and stars are still modelled, but the galaxy beyond was not. Until now.
Alpha 4 genuinely contains over 400 billion star systems. And they are all moving correctly; spinning, orbiting each other in an incredible astronomical ballet. We are also modelling interstellar molecular clouds, and though some of the detail in these (particularly for nebulae) will come after Alpha 4, wherever you are, the ‘night sky’ is accurate. Beyond our galaxy, perhaps surprisingly we do still have a ‘skydome’ - but it is now a staggering 100,000 light years away, containing all the other galaxies, including the Magellanic Clouds. That’s one heck of a draw distance…" - from the May newsletter
... in theory, it is possible to travel to nearby systems using the FSD aka SuperCruise, it'd "just" take days in realtime to get there, even at more than 10x the speed of light. I wonder what would happen if you would try to get to one of the "locked" systems this way?
But you'd probably just run into an invisible wall, if I am interpreting the "bubble" surrounding the currently available systems correctly.
flamingkillamajig wrote:And with larger docking yards there are larger ships to come with it perhaps?
Personally, I don't believe the ships will be getting much bigger - and I think part of the design vision is to keep the players thinking small in order to limit how much they can influence one another. I mean, it is possible that it could happen (there certainly are larger capital ships, and one of them - the Farragut-class Dreadnought - is already in the game), but I would not expect it as it would represent a pretty big shift away from the traditional Elite experience. Such vessels are manned by hundreds or thousands of crew, and that's just ... a different scope.
What I am expecting is more ships that "only just so" fit through the docking port. Here's the design concept of the Lakon Type 7 that's not in the Beta yet (look at that tiny bridge with the tiny terminals):
Spoiler:
There's also been talk at the E3 about the docking ports being electrically magnetised to assist with docking.
Speaking of docking - I just noticed today that most stations have a "green line" and a "red line", meaning you're actually supposed to fly on a specific side depending on whether you're entering or exiting. That ought to prevent a couple embarrassing encounters...
Also, from the forums:
I was docking at Dahan 30 minutes ago, doing 50% speed, lights on, full shields and on the green side when a fast sidewinder came up from behind and bounced off my Cobra into the cattle grid, didn't notice him after that as I was cruising through the slot on the green side with my outer shield scratched.
When I was inside, the station announcer said, "Kill your speed not your bank balance". Pity he couldn't hear it.
Well if there are bigger shipyards it may mean more NPC type ships. I mean just because you don't get to drive capital ships doesn't mean they aren't there. Perhaps they're only battleships or corvettes but something tells me some battles will exist. The one trailer you showed did seem to have larger ships even if they were probably NPC ships. So in a sense what you say and what I say could both be fulfilled. It's just all the larger ships would be NPC controlled and they're doing whatever they do (fighting battles, docking, in need of escort for something or whatever battleships need to do).
So there are jerks in the game just like in real life just as there will be jerks in the future too. It's kind of a constant of life. Sure things change but the general types of people will probably pretty much always be the same.
At least it sounds like the game is taking steps though to minimize the risk of huge crashes in the future. Oh and I saw that video. He spun out pretty hard but he killed the other guy totally by accident. He should've seen if that guy had a bounty or free loot to grab. Hey free loot and it's what I might do for causing me that kind of trouble.
Oh, sure, there'll be huge ships in the game. The aforementioned Dreadnought is already incredibly fun to fly around and/or through. Feels like a Star Destroyer or a Battlestar. I thought you were referring to playable ships now, since the Dreadnought was already in some of the videos.
Well I guess it'll be nice to at least see these ships out there even if to fight or to protect. Might be cool to see some boarding actions but I don't think the game has gotten that complex even if it's a bunch of pirates taking over a trade vessel or something.
Boarding is something that SC is planning to do, but stuff like that won't be in Elite. Or at least not at launch - giving you the ability to walk around is something Braben's team wants to take a look at post-release. For now it's baby steps.
Also, here's some music.
And a size chart for the player ships currently in the Beta:
Spoiler:
On a sidenote, who would've thought alcohol would be classified as contraband in I Bootis? Damn Feds, always sticking their noses into other peoples' business ...
Next time I've got a patrol telling me to stop for a scan, I'll either bail it or blast it.
Wow, I didn't know the Eagle class was so big. I thought it would be smaller (that is only a bit smaller than how big I would think the Viper would be).
What is the one between the Cobra and the freighter? Looks a bit big for an Asp, and doesn't quite have the silhouette for it.
Yeah, the Eagle's shape betrays its size. The frame and the cockpit window make it look like the "In Spaace" version of an F-17 or whatever, but if you take a peek at its rather sizable interiors...
Spoiler:
And that's just the cockpit section!
Also, here's a size comparison with the Big Ben. ^^
Spoiler:
Regarding your other question, do you mean the second ship from the left? That'd be a Lakon Type 9, a heavy cargo hauler:
Spoiler:
Spoiler:
Spoiler:
dat view. It's like your own personal supervillain blimp.
Right now, it's the ship with the most capacity, but it's slooow and huuuuge. Barely fits through the docking port and triggers the PROX alert every single time you try. People are waiting for two things tho:
- the previously announced docking computers and electromagnetic landing collars
- a light transport, because the Type 9 costs a million spacebux, so prospective traders are currently either "forced" to start as bounty hunters until they can at least afford a Cobra, or ... well, have fun playing delivery boy with just 4 tons of space in your Sidewinder's cargo hold)
I've been checking in to this game and one thing with the purchasing instantly struck me, pre order is €60 while beta is €120, paying normal price to test a game isn't alright, they're earning money off what was originally something they'd either need to pay to do or do for free, but paying DOUBLE is not right.
That question comes up a lot. It's because the Alpha and Beta truly are test phases, as opposed to the glorified demos that some other studios are presenting their betas as. This means they do not want every potential player in the game right away, but only those who are suitably invested that they actually "enrich" the testing process, rather than just playing the game as if it was already released. It saves the developer server resources, and makes sure that they receive more input from the players to refine the end product. It is also a nod to the original Kickstarter backers, where Alpha and Beta access were part of the higher backing tiers of the game, and it might feel weird to effectively sell these perks cheaper to anyone who did not have the faith to chip in right at the beginning, making sure the game actually gets made in the first place.
->
David Braben wrote:We knew how many people we wanted on the alpha, and it may seem like a cruel and merciless way of doing it. But that’s the way of getting people who are most likely to be dedicated and genuinely want it. Looking at it another way - what else is a good way of doing it? Looking at ways of doing that, that works the best. It may seem mercenary but it seemed like the very best way to do it.
Also, it's worth pointing out that the current price for Beta Access does include a lifetime pass for any potential expansion packs, such as the one that would add planetary landings and leaving your ship.
By the way, Premium Beta build 2 is live, together with the new station, the new ship class, and various other additions. Check out this trailer for some nostalgia potential and delicious sci-fi eyecandy.
I think the main difference between both games is that Star Citizen is going for a smaller but more detailed area with "handcrafted" planets and stations, whereas Elite wants to depict the entire galaxy but relies mainly on procedural generation and modular construction steered by a background simulation.
In a way, you could say it's "Quality vs Quantity", though quantity here also means the freedom of having the entire Milky Way open for exploration, and actually being able to get lost somewhere "out there", with other players far away.
Other than that it's chiefly a matter of date of implementation. SC is planning to go live with a host of features that Elite only plans to implement over time:
Elite Dangerous newsletter #29 wrote:We do intend to release small, free updates after launch, but expansions that include significant new features and content will be charged for separately. For example, our current roadmap is to add (in no particular order):
- Landing/ driving / prospecting on airless rocky planets, moons & asteroids
- Walking around interiors and combative boarding of other ships
- Combat and other interactions with other players and AIs in the internal areas of star ports
- Accessing richly detailed planetary surfaces
- Availability of giant ‘executive control’ ships to players
Alpha and Premium Beta customers, and those who have already bought the £35 expansion pass alongside either Beta or the full game, will have access to all these features and updates for as long as we create them at no further cost.
That said, SC is also much farther away from release than ED. It is entirely possible that Elite introduces the last of these features the moment Star Citizen goes live with all features available at once.
I am not sure what options SC is going to offer in terms of multiplayer, but Elite can be played as singleplayer offline, singleplayer online (receive updates from the multiplayer galaxy), or multiplayer with friends, or multiplayer with everyone.
I was also impressed by the amount of detail that goes into the aforementioned background simulation, and how players can kick off a chain of events that sees entire worlds having a food crisis, or seeing the military deploy to curb pirate activity, or new space stations constructed in recently explored and annexed territory. And I know this sounds incredibly macabre, but I like how you can even sell slaves not as slaves, but foodstuffs or medical supplies. And turn passengers into slaves. In theory, you could make a living from being a scum spacer who offers cheap trips to distant worlds, but then sells the cryo-frozen passengers to a secret laboratory for experiments, like in Alien 4.
There are also subtler differences between both games such as the flight model, the amount of science behind stuff, and the visual designs of the starships. All of this is very much a matter of personal preferences, though. For example, some people like the classic sci-fi look of SC's fighter jets with all sorts of wings and stuff sticking out of the hull and think ships like ED's Cobra are "boring", others prefer the toned down "blocky" naval design of most of Elite's ships and think SC fighters look silly for spaceflight. Although it should be mentioned that both games have some ships that would qualify for an overlap.
Well, they just released the launch date for Standard Beta: July 29th. By then, you could play for €60.
That being said, the Lifetime Expansion Pass (valued €40, sale ends July 29th) is only included with Alpha and Premium Beta, so technically at this point you could just wait until the game goes gold and get it for the standard price of €40.
I certainly agree that Alpha and Premium Beta come at a steep entry price, but so far I'm really glad I chipped in. Elite Dangerous is shaping up nicely, and it's great to see the game grow so fast. Now I just need to get better with my joystick ...
Also, a cool streamer vid demonstrating the new station and testing the new Hauler-class transport. It certainly sounds neat.
[edit] Just stumbled over this and thought it'd be shareworthy. David Braben talks about the importance of gravity, stellar configurations, and the effects of player actions on galactic politics:
Seeing this, I'm getting the impression that SC may have a stronger focus on combat/action, whereas Elite aims for greater attention to detail when it comes to simulating the background as a whole.
Players discovering and naming new star constellations? That's just sweet.
Elite Dangerous is one step closer to its final release - but (perhaps more importantly) this new build also brings with it a host of new features/content:
Spoiler:
- Added Viper
- Added Imperial Fighter (AI only)
- Added Lakon Type 6
- Added text chat
- Added voice comms
- Added missions
- Added fuel consumption
- Expanded playable bubble to 21 ly radius (@50 systems)
- Add support for friends management
- Allow matchmaking through jump to specific island
- Supercruise supports multiplayer
- Add RandomEvents to the current interdiction functionality. Random locations will now be spawned in front of the player while in supercruise
- For new bounties & fines, adding a "Local Security Office" to the contacts menu
- Added server moderated bounties vouchers
- Docking computer added
- Added trade route visualisation to galaxy map
- Add system connections based on fuel to galaxy map
- Added new paintjobs
- Gas giant features dervived from stellar forge data
- Chaff launcher stops scans and confuses tracking weapons but doesn't effect missiles
- Added new station variants
- Updated trade commodities
- Smuggler AI behaviours added
- Art updates for Orbis station
- Latest audio updates and balance pass
- Hauler art tweaks/updates
- Added new pilot animations
- Large Plasma Accelerator added
- Eagle art updates
- Added 'rich' station interior variant
- Added support for much larger accessible bubbles
- Fix up the last of the unsafe GOH use in ShipComponents
- Updated Sidewinder ship art
- Added beacons and associated traffic
Also, a pretty neatepic video:
Fast forward to time index 3:30 if you're only interested in explosions (you're missing out on the Bladerunner music tho).
I've noticed from the wiki that the ships you get to fly aren't specifically classified as any type of hull (i.e. frigate, cruiser, etc.)
But I did see those hulls listed farther down the page, so they're being included. I may have missed it, but are you going to be able to own a large scale ship like that?
Frankenberry wrote:I've noticed from the wiki that the ships you get to fly aren't specifically classified as any type of hull (i.e. frigate, cruiser, etc.)
But I did see those hulls listed farther down the page, so they're being included. I may have missed it, but are you going to be able to own a large scale ship like that?
I think the Anaconda classifies as a Cutter, considering its size and armaments.
(for comparison, left to right: Panther, Sidewinder, Eagle, Anaconda)
But any class larger than that? I recall it was on the table, but I wouldn't expect it. From how I understood the design vision, Elite is very much about you being Mal Reynolds or Han Solo rather than Admiral Adama. There are ships that need multiple crew and/or have turret emplacements, and shared ship control has already been announced, but I don't think we'll ever be able to have our own cruiser or carrier, if that's what you mean. Apart from it possibly undermining the setting's realism (think of the time it'd take to get the thousands of trained crew together alone, not to mention how the actual factions are going to look at independents buying battleships). The devs seem to intentionally wish to avoid turning Elite into a sort of EVE where groups of players are able to amass so much firepower that they can essentially dominate entire sectors of space and dictate terms to other players. That's something the official factions (be it governments or corporations) are meant for. This game is about you surviving out in the void, on one of the many paths you are able to choose from.
The Anaconda (pretty much a gunboat) and the Lakon Type 9 (heavy freighter) are currently the largest ships in the game, and they barely fit through the docking port of the starbase (in fact you trigger the PROX alert any time you fly through ). Anything larger than this would require shuttles to transfer cargo or personnel - but that is not to say it may never happen, as David Braben hinted at here. Either way, it's stuff for a future expansion, and planetary landings as well as shipboard personal combat will be released first, especially as those have already been confirmed.
The studio just released a new trailer to go with Beta 1.0, by the way:
And here is another short vid from Scott Manley, talking about some of the new additions to the game, helping out local authorities in a random encounter, and managing to drop out of FTL really close to his destination.
Also, I just managed to scrape together enough credits to trade in my Sidewinder for a Zorgon Hauler. Huzzah!
Spoiler:
behold: the Space Van
That courier run from Eranin to Dahan really paid off. Someone desperately needed that coffee!
Some more eyecandy:
Spoiler:
new modular station interiors include "rich" templates
the Viper Patrol Craft - what I'm really saving for
You're right about the larger hulls and all that, it wouldn't fit what I've seen for the game setting. Even so, the ships you can fly are pretty massive (the Anaconda appears to be downright sexy).
Think I might have to pick this up when it launches, are they going completely sandbox (i.e. no story for single player) for both MP and SP?
Frankenberry wrote:are they going completely sandbox (i.e. no story for single player) for both MP and SP?
Yup! The game's slogan is pretty much "one ship, one galaxy, 400 billion stars - blaze your own trail".
So there is no story, but lots of opportunities to make your own, if you will. Adventure will come your way regardless of which of the many possible roles you pick, and your actions, combined with those of other players, will be able to (re)shape the geopolitical structure of the galaxy.
There is a background simulation in place that governs the effects of player and NPC actions on the individual systems, and so-called injected events will be used to represent these consequences in the game world, offering new opportunities for you to participate in.
Here is the relevant article from their design archives.
An excerpt:
"The repercussions of injected events could cause long term changes to the background simulation in a system. Players may also get opportunities to mitigate changes to a system through events in the background simulation.
E.g. an Injected Event causes two factions to go to war with each other in a system. As the background simulation now has influence from the warring faction, it will generate events and missions linked to that war. If players complete missions relating to negotiating peace and ending the war, and react in the right way to events, they could stop the war and mitigate the effects of the Injected Event.
Players will be able to influence this system, since the meta-game will feed off of changes in the simulation from many different sources, including players. For example:
Missions – generally these will have the largest positive or negative effect on the system, depending on faction, success or failure, nearby enemies or allies, the importance of the mission undertaken, and various unforeseen consequences.
Trade – player trade will have a minor effect on the system, although a star system already under the effect of an injected event may be exploitable (i.e. food sold to a star system suffering from a famine would fetch a very good price).
NPC interactions – attacking, defending, interacting and killing NPC’s within a star system or faction will have an effect. The everyday NPC’s met won’t be high level, so their influence will be limited to small changes. For example, killing a trader will negatively affect the wealth of his faction or star system, but not to a vast extent.
Exploration – discoveries made by players, once sold into the system, will be unlocked for the system to use for injected events."
I think/hope that with just a bit of creativity, you can pretty much build your own story around this stuff! For example, in the area currently playable in the Beta, the Federation is at the moment pushing into Eranin space, an independent agri-world under communist governance. Their "Intervention Fleet" is based around the Farragut-class battlecruiser Impeccable, but minor skirmishes occur throughout the system.
The developers have accompanied the evolving situation there with fluff snippets in the game's newsletter:
"Eranin: This system includes the outdoor world Azeban, with an extensive agricultural economy specializing mainly in grain and livestock, with tea and coffee plantations in the equatorial regions. Its territorial borders are currently being contested by an aggressive Federal expansion programme originating from Dahan; traders are advised to avoid conflict zones." - Sidewinder Owner's Manual
"Eranin Tension Continues
Skirmishes between the Eranin Defence Force and the Federation continue.
Many contract bonds for assistance have been placed by both sides, making it a profitable ongoing opportunity for Elite Pilots Federation members." - Newsletter #30
"The ban on the trading of Progenitor Cells was lifted after new batches were given the ‘all clear’ everywhere except Eranin. This depressed the black market, but Progenitor Cells have so far failed to regain their previous dominance of the trade markets as lingering public concern suppresses demand.
Conflicting reports on social media include a statement attributed to a ‘Freedom Freda’ – believed to be a self-appointed spokesman for the rebels on Eranin, where she claims Progenitor Cells are used by “blood-sucking capitalist scum, unnaturally extending their lives to keep underpaid hard-working proletarians in their places”.
Progenitor Cell manufacturers are rumoured to be preparing legal action against the beleaguered Federal government in Eranin for lost profits, citing failure to control the Eranian left wing militants (‘terrorists’, as they are described in the draft claim we have seen) widely believed to be behind the initial contamination." - Newsletter #33
The game hasn't even really started yet, but already I'm wondering what will eventually become of Eranin - especially as I decided early on that my character would be a freedom-loving spacer from the Alliance of Independent Systems, who is quite sceptical of the two superpowers' (the Terran Federation and the Empire of Achenar) aggressive expansionist tendencies. And this is just one world out of thousands that make up mankind's colonies. Who knows what we'll find once we can actually begin exploring beyond the frontier!
[edit] The new newsletter had a cool screenshot of a docked Anaconda. I hadn't even noticed the prow "observation deck"-style windows before:
Frankenberry wrote:So a 'true' sandbox sort of game where you can actually have an effect on the galaxy around you...
Pretty much! Though the influence of a single pilot alone will, of course, be somewhat limited. Depending on how active you are and what you do, anyways. The Design Discussion Archives mentioned stuff like important NPCs travelling around, so in theory, even a single player could leave a huge mark if they somehow manage to, say, assassinate an important ambassador. Other than that, it pretty much depends on what the "local playerbase" in a system does as a whole .. such as the "Freedom for Eranin!" people on the ED forums possibly managing to thwart the Federation's expansion, if they manage to put up sufficient resistance against the Feds and Federation-allied players.
The tools are there; it's up to the players to build up sufficient pressure to have it mean something.
Here are some interesting design documents regarding how the background simulation works: http://forums.frontier.co.uk/showthread.php?t=6305 The many factors and their effects on other aspects of the game are pretty cool. I'm possibly repeating myself when bringing this example, but the idea that famine could have local markets start buying slaves as if they were foodstuffs is both sick and pretty cool!
Frankenberry wrote:Didn't these guys raise like 50 or 60 million in crowdfunding-ness?
Nah, that was Star Citizen - Chris Roberts' project that ran a kickstarter at roughly the same time as Elite. SC, whilst also being about you as a pilot in space, is aiming for a much higher level of individualised detail (highly detailed, handcrafted levels as opposed to procedural generation, but at the cost of featuring only about a hundred "world maps" compared to a 1:1 replica of the Milky Way), and it follows a different philosophy when it comes to ship designs and flight model, but together with Elite it promises to be a brilliant comeback of the PC space sim genre, and indie as well.
I'm a bit sceptical as right now SC still seems to be more of a PR media campaign than a product in development and I foresee their use of Cryengine requiring a lot of reverse-engineering in order to allow all the stuff they want to push in, but I still think it will eventually become a cool game, too - just offering a different experience to Elite. Which is actually a good thing, as it means there isn't any real competition between them and they'll simply appeal to different demographics, much like EVE will retain its niche in spite of ED and SC. In fact, in a bit of symbolic cross-promotion Chris Robers and David Braben even pledged some cash for each other's kickstarter.
Anyways, Elite "only" managed to raise about $2.6 million in the original kickstarter, but they're bound to have some more cash now due to subsequent Alpha and Beta access sales via their webstore. The game's eventual release in Q4 2014 will probably mean another cash influx that would allow them to keep working on already-announced expansions such as planetary landings etc.
Rayvon wrote:Purchased this for fifty quid last week and i have not been able to leave it alone !
Welcome aboard, Commander!
What have you been doing so far? I've finally managed to get my hands on a Viper just two days ago and kitted her out with two class 4 pulse lasers and two class 1 auto-tracking multicannons, plus a bounty scanner. I did notice a severe drop in jump range, though! I think those huge lasers in particular must have cost me like two lightyears.
Yeah, it was taken out of the shop the day Standard Beta launched (29th) - I think it was available up until midnight, as a window of opportunity for new Beta players who were convinced by what they saw, but now it's gone for good.
They did warn about this in their last four or five newsletters, too.
That being said, I don't think it's something to get miffed over. Sure, if you really like the game, ultimately you end up saving some cash - but considering the rate at which these expansions are going to be released, and their presumed price, it's safe to say that it would have only started to "pay for itself" in two or three years from now. I really don't think these expansions are going to cost much, so you can just as well play it safe and buy them as they are released.
PS: found the new conflict zones at Eranin 3 and Eranin 6. lol'd at the communist militias pwning Federated fighter wings whilst flying refit Sidewinders and Type 9 freighters.
Poor Feds blow up like TIE Fighters in their cheap short range fliers! Knock out their shields and they're as good as gone. Then again, what can you expect from a pilot seat strapped to a set of engines.
How do the weapon classes work? I remember in Frontier you have them rages in MW and have pulse and beam choices, and in original you just went pulse->beam->military.
Weapons are differentiated by Class (1-8 so far), Mount and Type. With class 1 being the smallest, they get larger, heavier and more damaging the further you go up. For example, a Class 1 pulse laser only weighs 4 tons, but the same system in a Class 2 variant clocks in at 9 tons already. With the total weight of cargo, modules, weapon systems affecting jump range, this can have a significant impact on your operating range - resulting in very heavy, fully kitted-out ships often being "locked" into a fairly small constellation or "island" of stars. A lot of people think this is annoying, but personally, I find it an interesting aspect of the game, as it keeps the cheaper models including the Sidewinder more viable even at later stages of gameplay. If a pilot wants a ship specialised for combat, they simply have to see how much range they are willing to sacrifice.
My Viper still can do the jump from Aulin to i Boötis ... if I don't load more than 4 units of cargo. So I suppose I can still do courier jobs next to the bounty hunter business. The galaxy map now includes a slider with which you can simulate your ship's load and have the navcomp hide jump routes you are too heavy to use.
At a later stage during Beta, the devs will introduce the ability to upgrade jump drives, so this should help as well. I'm almost expecting a bigger jump drive to come with drawbacks of its own (aside from their cost), though, such as reducing cargo space.
Anyways, another interesting aspect of the game are gimballed weapons. These are auto-tracking, particularly useful for people who are not as good with manual aim or for taking out specific subsystems such as the FSD. Tracking is not perfect (it basically "brushes" over the target back and forth, still including a small chance to miss), but the main drawback is the additional bulk of the gimbal system resulting in less damage potential. Basically, gimbal weapons always add +1 to a weapon's class, so a Class 2 Pulse Laser becomes a Class 3 Gimballed Pulse Laser .. and can no longer be mounted in a Class 2 hardpoint. With hardpoints only coming in equal numbers, this effectively means you have to sacrifice a Class 4 hardpoint.
In short: if you opt for auto-aim, you're paying a price in DPS. It's a fairly clever idea that seems to work nicely so far, or at least few people are complaining about it.
Another available mounting system next to gimballed joints and standard (fixed) mounts is, of course, turrets, though these only become available on the larger ships.
Other than that, I have heard some people talk about "stealth lasers" that cause less ambient heat.
Weapon types now offer variety in terms of individual advantages and disadvantages, rather than a clear progression from one system to another.
Cannons: they sneaked this one into the Standard Beta launch; they still aren't widely known and few people have tested them, but they appear to be a sort of "space artillery" with low rate of fire, high damage
Multicannons: the classic gatling gun that needs to spin up before firing. wrecks hulls, but has a significant spread over longer engagement ranges
Beam Laser: as with the original Elite, a coherent beam of light that does damage as long as you keep contact. Its disadvantage is that it heats up pretty fast
Burst Laser: a bit like pulse lasers, but each pull of the trigger fires a quick burst of three shots
Pulse Laser: probably the most common laser in use right now; each shot results in a single zap, with a short cooldown period (0.5 seconds or so) afterwards. Fairly efficient cooling in lower classes
Missiles: come in a dumbfire and heat-seeking version, as well as different "calibres". Different launchers may share the same calibre, but differ on how many shots they hold. Also, missiles are friggin' expensive!
Torpedoes: not in game yet, but as per newsletter #13 will probably be carried individually, occupying an entire hardpoint by themselves
Railgun: not available in gimballed version, and have a very high energy draw. They do tremendous amounts of damage if you do manage to score a hit, though.
Plasma Accelerator: weapon of mass destruction, used by the military to take out entire city blocks. So far the Anaconda is the only ship in the game capable of equipping this beast as it requires a Class 8 hardpoint.
There's also some "pseudo weapons" like the point defence system, chaff launcher, heat sink launcher, or the bounty scanner, but as they are merely using the weapons interface but are not offensive armaments themselves, they probably do not require listing here.
Lastly, you can now also equip different types of armour reinforcement for your ship's hull - the standard being lightweight alloys, and available upgrades spotted so far being mirrored surface composite (improved resistance against lasers), reactive surface composite (improved resistance against bullets), and reinforced and military composites (general resistance upgrades). As far as I can see, these hull upgrades are generally the most expensive things you can buy for your ship, as their cost is much higher than the ship itself!
Ratius wrote:However it seems like a seriouuuuuus time sink?
I'd say that depends on the player. Elite Dangerous is primarily a singleplayer experience with (optional) multiplayer, in a persistent galaxy driven by player activity and injected events. Technically, you could do as I've been doing the past week and just log in for half an hour every day, doing a single trade run with a bulk freighter, as a way to relax by playing space trucker with some oldschool rock music on the webradio. There's a big risk in getting sucked in deeper, however, simply because everything looks and sounds so gorgeous and Braben's team keeps piling new features onto the game.
On a sidenote, I made some nice cash recently by, uh, "liberating" a couple slaves and saving them from certain doom. Went to investigate a signal contact with my Viper and found a Hauler getting shot at by the Feds - a scan revealed that the pilot was not only wanted, but was also transporting stasis pods with slaves in her cargo hold. Being a bounty hunter, I of course went to intercept and crippled the Hauler with my twin-linked sets of pulse lasers and m-cannons. Unfortunately, the Fed cop in his Eagle stuck around to investigate the scene and collect evidence, which meant that I had to delay scooping salvage as he'd immediately fine me for handling stolen goods.
I minimised my heat signature by shutting down the main engines and the shield generator, lurking in the void, until finally the Eagle jumped into hyperspace - unable to collect all cargo with its minuscule hold. With the witness gone, I was finally free to power up my systems and deploy my cargo scoop. Fortunately, the slaves were still in "mint condition" in spite of the battle, but can you believe it took me three jumps until I finally found someone who would buy 'em? All the while evading patrol craft and scans, fearing they'd go Judge Dredd on me if they find out what I'm carrying. Anyways, I finally managed to cash 'em in on a black market, and it was worth the effort.
Spoiler:
I now managed to sort-of-upgrade to a Lakon Type-6 with a capacity of 100 tons. Steers like a drunken cow, but it's got a glorious glass canopy with 180° view that lets you feel like a crane driver, and I felt like I mix up my combat with a bit of hauling once in a while.
Also, I now get assigned the large pads in the stations. Immediately made me feel more important.
Also, it seems someone on the forums caught the Feds prepping for another incursion into Eranin airspace, using the binary system of Dahan as a staging area:
Right now, not that long. I think the Connie costs about 2-3 million, but you can get there within a couple days if you are really desperate and active, jump to the larger freighters as soon as you can afford them, and make use of various tools such as that fanmade trading app that looks up the most profitable routes for you in order to maximise your profits (supposedly there's a route that nets you 400.000 in a Type-9, although you need to have a big wallet before you can afford to acquire those more expensive goods).
Pretty sure that's going to change, though, as the devs have hinted in the last newsletter that the next patch is going to introduce dynamic galactic markets:
Rumours of potential supply-side restrictions are starting to reach us. Well-placed sources indicate that galactic macro-economic factors may soon start to affect the recent stable trading market, forcing members to look beyond the familiar routes, or to new activities, for continued profit.
We will of course issue a high priority info-alert should as soon as we uncover any more solid information.
Once interdictions are possible for players, it may become even harder, unless you know someone willing to escort your freighter in a nimble fighter, or hire some NPCs to do it.
[edit] Just because, here's some info on the three currently biggest factions in the game:
The Solar Federation, aka the Federation
To an outsider, the hierarchy of Federation society is based on democratic principles - people vote within their system/state to elect Congressmen, and a President with an 8-year term and a ‘vote of confidence’ after the first 4 years. However, corporate loyalty oils the machine, and Federation space is a battleground of commerce. Commercial organisations compete as aggressively as the law will allow for the time and attention of the Federal citizen, who goes through life bombarded by advertising. Corruption is not unusual – individuals defend it shamelessly when caught as ‘getting one over the system’. Social class is only determined between ‘haves’ and ‘have-nots’. There is a lot of poverty about, as well as conspicuous wealth.
The huge gross domestic product (GDP) of the Federation economy funds a large, well-equipped Federal Navy which projects its values and influence. Culturally the Federation is tolerant of some things (like religions) but utterly intolerant of drug-taking, political activism, and certain cultures. A great many things are illegal, like slavery, cloning and certain narcotics. Federal law is based on an agreed Constitution. People have rights and freedoms, enshrined by this agreement. Local ‘state’ law prohibits other trafficking to a greater or lesser degree. Things like ship-based weapons, personal weapons, other milder drugs and alcohol are banned in some systems.
The media drives a culture of celebrity. Top ranking politicians, social commentators, entertainers and super-rich all command a great deal of media attention. This provides a massive distraction for the populace, to the extent that foreign wars conducted by the Federation on their behalf get little media attention. This has gone on for many hundreds of years, and there is no sign of it changing.
The Empire of Achenar, aka the Empire
Originally founded by Marlin Duval, who led the colonization of the Achenar system in the mid 23rd century, the Empire is based on a ‘cliens’ system. Society is strictly stratified, with people being able to move between strata (lower strata particularly) based on money, patronage and influence. The Empire values both status and honour very highly indeed, so whilst it is acceptable to flaunt wealth, treating people well is a question of honour – and this includes slaves. Having an unpaid debt is seen as utterly dishonourable; an honourable Imperial citizen would sell themselves into slavery to clear a debt they couldn’t otherwise clear.
Law is seen and enforced very differently in the Empire. Senators are responsible for enforcing the Emperor’s laws, but the Senators themselves are above the law. They can order executions, and can even kill people themselves, though sometimes (rarely) they may be held to account for their actions by the Emperor. Some Senators are warlike and may take over systems in the name of the Empire, to get the spoils, and they may get a good deal of support as a result. Some Senators do not tolerate slavery, and regularly speak out against it – but from the basis of honour, not suggesting it should not be legal.
In the Empire, very little is illegal, but many things are frowned upon, like excessive use of narcotics.
The Alliance of Independent Systems, aka the Alliance
The Alliance arose out of a need for cooperation. Centuries of warfare and both Imperial and Federal meddling in a great many otherwise peaceful independent systems caused various small alliances to form and then get broken up over the centuries. The Alliance formed from a number of culturally different systems with a unified goal: to provide a stronger voice in the galaxy for its member systems and ultimately to defend them against unwelcome attention from the big powers. The Alliance is culturally very varied and leadership of the Alliance (the presidency moves between member systems annually) has been described as ‘challenging’. Seeking agreement between the member systems is generally a tortuous process, usually ending up with a great deal of compromise.
Militarily, cooperation has been more successful. Each member system contributes a portion of its navy to the Alliance Defence Force – the total contribution proportional to its GDP. It is led by the six-strong Council of Admirals (one from each of the largest member navies), but they can act swiftly without government approval, which has proved very effective, and over the years there has been little disagreement between the admirals.
Contributed vessels generally bear the decals of their own navy, but have an additional Alliance Defence Force decal applied while they are with the group, so the culture of identity and independence (and rivalries) applies here too.
Daba wrote:Is Lave going to be in its historical location, and fully independent?
It looks like Lave is part of the Alliance. As there has been no mention of the Gal Co-Op so far, it's possible that this organisation either merged with the Alliance, or that both factions have been retconned into being one and the same:
Spoiler:
That being said, it's also possible that Lave's allegiance to the Alliance of Independent Systems is a recent change of affairs, as the novel "Lave Revolution" tells of a rebellion shortly before the start of ED:
Lave.
A single planet, orbiting a dying star. For centuries, spacefarers have visited, docked at the space station and left, with no thought for the people on the planet below.
Bad luck at cards means bad luck all round for Pietro Devander, who journeys half way across human controlled space to this ancient planet, whose name is barely remembered.
What he finds is resistance. What it becomes, is revolution.
In 3250 (Frontier First Encounters) - Dictator Doctor Hans Walden is absolute ruler of Lave and has been for more than fifty years. He seems ageless. His secretive government ruthlessly control the planet and its population.
In 3300 (Elite Dangerous) - Lave is a Democracy. What happened?
Elite: Lave Revolution tells the story of those brave men and women who risked everything to bring freedom to the people, a story of spies, dictators, revolutionaries and assassins in space. Who will lead a free world into a bright interstellar future?
If you're interested, amazon offers a preview for the e-book edition here. From all I've heard (here is one example review), it seems to be a nice story - on its own two legs, and as an addition to the lore of Elite.
So I bought in on the beta a few days ago (not so much for the beta as the discounted insurance for life, etc.) and have been mucking about a bit... so... what exactly does one do in Elite: Dangerous? Thus far I've been aimlessly wandering about in my Sidewinder/Eagle basically going station to station looking for employment opportunities that are worth a damn (thus far I've made about 20k credits off of 4 about jobs). I know the game is about exploration and whatnot, but thus far I've only managed to find a couple asteroid belts and got interdicted once or twice... It really doesn't seem like there is that much in the way of content that I can see.
I'm having the opposite experience. I've kitted my eagle out as a scout/explorer and I'm kicking around the dark parts of the universe, occasionally popping into an orbital to get paid for all my survey data. It's brilliant fun.
Evidently I'm doing something wrong... whats your fitout like? Also how do you get into the 'dark parts' ? I have like an 8 ly jump range, at this rate it'll take me a few weeks real time to jump a sufficient enough distance away from civilization to do stuff.
Also, anything cool to see out there aside from asteroid belts?
The total of human colonised space is about 250 lightyears, including all factions and independent worlds. Yesterday, I made a journey from Shinrarta Dezhra (the pilots' union homeworld) to my old base at Eranin Orbital that was about 80 ly, and it took me about half an hour including one stop to refuel. Assuming you haven't started smack in the middle of the core worlds, you should be able to reach the edges of civilisation within an hour or so, though I do understand the journey itself can be a bit boring. Don't forget that even colonised areas pay small amounts for scans as a means to refresh local charts, though! I made about 5k profit just from selling the data I gathered during the jumps from SD to Eranin. The independent worlds in particular are pretty much Wild West, after all, even though they maintain outposts or even colonies with anything from a couple thousand to a few million inhabitants.
But definitely play the tutorials anyways! Elite is a bit more complex than most games, and the tutorials provide a good introduction into various mechanics.
chaos0xomega wrote:Also, anything cool to see out there aside from asteroid belts?
Though "content" really is subjective. Elite doesn't take your hand through some sort of prefabricated story that's the same for everyone - it just gives you a sandbox and a shovel and says "enjoy". Me, I'm getting my fun out of feeling like Spike Spiegel or Starbuck when I'm pulling wanted criminals out of frameshift to collect their bounties, with a hint of Han Solo when smuggling recovered stolen goods to the nearest black market, or Mal Reynolds when I play courier to make small amounts of cash to cover my expenses or just to get into good standing with one of the factions. The "story" I have chosen for myself is to lend support to the communist government of Eranin to stop the Federal incursion into independent airspace, which means harassing assault wings launched from the Feds' Farragut cruiser, or shipping medical supplies for the people on the ground.
It definitely takes a fair bit of imagination to just make up stuff to fill in the blanks, but with the game's beautiful scenery and all the things you can do, I'd say it certainly encourages you to be creative about it. Also, there's a lot more background to the setting than you may spot at first glance, though much like with GW it can be a bit difficult to find if it's from the older titles of the franchise. You can actually learn a fair bit of real astronomy just from reading the descriptions on the galactic map, though.
That being said, there are rumours that the developer is preparing to kick off the background simulation on Dec 16th with a succession crisis within the Empire of Achenar, where all players may involve themselves in the struggle of who becomes the next Emperor. I'm curious how that'll work out!
Speaking of the Empire, did y'all watch the live stream from the premiere event?
The entire stream (about 1h long) is available here.
Lynata wrote: The total of human colonised space is about 250 lightyears, including all factions and independent worlds. Yesterday, I made a journey from Shinrarta Dezhra (the pilots' union homeworld) to my old base at Eranin Orbital that was about 80 ly, and it took me about half an hour including one stop to refuel. Assuming you haven't started smack in the middle of the core worlds, you should be able to reach the edges of civilisation within an hour or so, though I do understand the journey itself can be a bit boring. Don't forget that even colonised areas pay small amounts for scans as a means to refresh local charts, though! I made about 5k profit just from selling the data I gathered during the jumps from SD to Eranin. The independent worlds in particular are pretty much Wild West, after all, even though they maintain outposts or even colonies with anything from a couple thousand to a few million inhabitants.
But definitely play the tutorials anyways! Elite is a bit more complex than most games, and the tutorials provide a good introduction into various mechanics.
chaos0xomega wrote:Also, anything cool to see out there aside from asteroid belts?
Though "content" really is subjective. Elite doesn't take your hand through some sort of prefabricated story that's the same for everyone - it just gives you a sandbox and a shovel and says "enjoy". Me, I'm getting my fun out of feeling like Spike Spiegel or Starbuck when I'm pulling wanted criminals out of frameshift to collect their bounties, with a hint of Han Solo when smuggling recovered stolen goods to the nearest black market, or Mal Reynolds when I play courier to make small amounts of cash to cover my expenses or just to get into good standing with one of the factions. The "story" I have chosen for myself is to lend support to the communist government of Eranin to stop the Federal incursion into independent airspace, which means harassing assault wings launched from the Feds' Farragut cruiser, or shipping medical supplies for the people on the ground.
It definitely takes a fair bit of imagination to just make up stuff to fill in the blanks, but with the game's beautiful scenery and all the things you can do, I'd say it certainly encourages you to be creative about it. Also, there's a lot more background to the setting than you may spot at first glance, though much like with GW it can be a bit difficult to find if it's from the older titles of the franchise. You can actually learn a fair bit of real astronomy just from reading the descriptions on the galactic map, though.
That being said, there are rumours that the developer is preparing to kick off the background simulation on Dec 16th with a succession crisis within the Empire of Achenar, where all players may involve themselves in the struggle of who becomes the next Emperor. I'm curious how that'll work out!
Speaking of the Empire, did y'all watch the live stream from the premiere event?
The entire stream (about 1h long) is available here.
Err, Im about 27ly away from Sol, how far out from the edges am I?
Hope to fire up my gamma access on my laptop when I get home - looking forwards to just heading out into unknown space and going all James T Kirk with the locals
chaos0xomega wrote:Err, Im about 27ly away from Sol, how far out from the edges am I?
Well, Sol is about 46 ly from my current position at Eranin, if that helps put things into perspective.
Just open the galaxy map in the navcom menu to your left in your cockpit and have a look around. In maximum zoom, one square stands for one lightyear. Once you zoom out, blocks of ten of these squares get replaced by bigger squares representing 10x10 ly. If you zoom out further, ten of those get replaced by other squares that are 100x100 ly, and so on. You'll quickly notice how the names for important or "popular" colonised areas (such as Lave or Achenar) will run out at around the 100 ly mark around Sol.
chaos0xomega wrote:Also, how does one interdict?
You need an Achilles Aerospace FSD Interdictor Module (stations in high-tech systems occasionally stock these) which can be slotted into one of your internal compartment spaces.
Once you have an interdictor installed, you need to link it to one of your fire groups, which you can do in the appropriate menu in your cockpit to the right. For example, in my bounty hunting Eagle, I have a secondary fire group just for the interdictor (left mouse button) and the warrant scanner (right mouse button), and I switch into my primary fire group (burst lasers on LMB, gimballed multicannon on RMB) after I have finished the scan. Of course, if you have a mouse with more buttons, feel free to try and jam everything into one group - your choice.
After you have installed and configured the module, you need to line up behind the target you want to pull out of supercruise. Due to how the mass shadows of various planetary bodies affect the ships' supercruise velocity, you should try to intercept them either directly at the navigation beacons of the local star as they just begin to pick up speed (usually only pirates do this, as the bounty scan takes a tad too long for it), or you can try to intercept them on their path towards their target destination by flying a shallow curve from their flank to their rear. If you do try to pursue them from the local star but fail to pull them out in time, they will (depending on their engine) most likely accelerate faster than you, because they are further away from the center of gravity. However, once they get closer to the target planetoid, they will be slowed down by its gravity, and you will be able to close distance.
Once you are within range - a dozen lightseconds or thereabouts - and the interdictor signals readiness, try to match speed and then trigger the module. The interdictor will establish a frameshift tether with the other ship and begin disrupting its space-time contraction field, effectively pulling it (and you) out of supercruise. Due to the forces at work, the target vessel will begin to veer off-course, but you must keep it within range and arc of the module to maintain the tether until the interdiction is successful. Unless the target vessel is on autonavigation, the pilot will be aware of this attempt and have an option to either submit to interdiction (slowing down to about 30 km/sec) or attempt evasion, which means pursuing an "escape vector" and making it significantly harder for you to maintain the tether, basically resulting in a duel of sorts, where the victor is determined both by piloting skill and ship agility. You can keep track of the interdiction's success by following the blue bar that pops up as soon as you trigger the module. The red bar to the other side represents the target.
If the target vessel submits to interdiction, both you and your target exit supercruise in normal fashion and close proximity to one another. If the target did not submit, but had to be forcefully yanked out of frameshift by the module, both ships will still exit supercruise in close proximity, but there is a chance that they incur a small amount of damage in the process, depending on how stressful the exit was. If the target successfully escaped interdiction, it will remain in supercruise, but the tether breaks down and your ship is violently ejected into realspace, meaning only you take damage and you find yourself alone in the void with your FSD on cooldown.
Do note that some players do not take kindly on being pulled out of supercruise, especially as many will suspect piracy if it's not done by an authority vessel!
SilverMK2 wrote:Hope to fire up my gamma access on my laptop when I get home - looking forwards to just heading out into unknown space and going all James T Kirk with the locals
SilverMK2 wrote:Hope to fire up my gamma access on my laptop when I get home - looking forwards to just heading out into unknown space and going all James T Kirk with the locals
Apparently I'm in Gamma Access, so I'll be downloading later today (though probably won't get to play until tomorrow). Is it playable with Mous control, or should I try and dig out my flight stick and try and make room on my desk for it?
Daba wrote:Apparently I'm in Gamma Access, so I'll be downloading later today (though probably won't get to play until tomorrow). Is it playable with Mous control, or should I try and dig out my flight stick and try and make room on my desk for it?
Have you just preordered the game or kickstarted it? If the former, you'll only be able to access the tutorials (Braben announced on the premiere event that anyone who has preordered will have access to them starting today). I vaguely recall gamma access was a KS perk, too, though, so I guess you may have full access!
And it's definitely playable with M+KB, too, though you should plan for about 10-30 minutes setting everything up.
My recommendations:
- activate the mouse widget (displays a small arrow on the HUD when you move the mouse)
- set mouse thruster burn to "continuous" rather than bursts (by default, the mouse curser auto-centers once you stop moving, meaning you'd have to keep scrolling and scrolling in a dogfight, which sucks)
- set mouse control scheme to "pitch/yaw" rather than "pitch/roll", and assign roll keys
My own thruster keyboard controls are:
W/S for acceleration/deceleration
A/D for rolling left/right
Q/E for horizontal thrusters (required for landing, otherwise optional)
R/F for vertical thrusters (required for landing, otherwise optional)
Enjoy, and welcome to the Milky Way in the year 3030.
Veeeeeeery slowly downloading the game. Though my laptop seems to no longer have wireless, so I had to find a network cable and plug it into the router. I'm living in the dark ages here!
ive been messin around with the exploration angle and getting more into it, its kind of almost fun, just wish there was more interesting stuff to discover and also more "logic" to the exploration mechanics. Currently it seems discovering things is a function of luck more than skill, my most successful runs have been the result of setting off in the right direction and pinking off with my scanner until i get returns (ive managed to find a few planets this way).
Meanwhile Ive now been to two or three systems that were ostensibly binary stars yet I could never find the second star despite searching desperately in the logical area for it to be located (based on the presence of thd primary stars orbit). In onr case I searched for it for so long that my speed was just shy of 1000c and I was about 500,000ls away from the primary star, yet I still hadnt even come close to reaching the far end of the stars orbit, after about 2 hours of searching I gave up and called it a night. Beyond that, it seems like there really is no way to determine if youve fully explored a system or not.
It would be nice if there was some module available which could increase scan distance, and/or provided some sort of astrometric data, information such as estimated number and size of orbital bodies, estimated eccentricity/declination etc of their orbits, etc. I mean, we can currently determine most of that stuff from earth in our quest to find exoplanets, you would think that by the point that weve established intergalactic travel they might be able to do a bit better a job of it. For a game that seems to incorporate so much science and physics its astounding to me that such an essential core area of the game is so incredibly dependant on luck and guesswork, rather than method.
Hell a "probe" system would be cool too, as in you can launch probes to search areas for gravitational anomalies etc. so that you can cover more ground faster in some of these larger systems.
Another thing that kind of rubs me the wrong way is the presence of stations in orbit around unexplored planets or moons (or stars), you would think that scanning these things down before establishing a population center would be the first order of business, but evidently not.
In any case Ive prolly made about 15k exploring thus far, about half of that from a single system, not sure if that was an anomaly or if it was unusually large or if i was just the first to scan it completely or what.
SilverMK2 wrote:Edit: Wait, it is putting an early copy of the game on my basket and telling me it is out of stock
Maybe a leftover from an earlier visit? I still had a now "out of stock" Founder's Decal for € 0.00 in the basket.
Also used the 50% discount to get the Sidewinder Blue Mojave (because it fits to my Eagle), Sidewinder Orange Mojave (because it reminds me of Star Wars) and Hauler Yellow Terrain (because it looks like a school bus) paintjobs, though.
"That's how they get you", I suppose!
Also, quick video about the Sol system, which you can now visit (if you have a valid permit .. stinking Feds and their oppressive restrictions ):
Terraformed Mars looks awesome. See you at the party, Richter!
chaos0xomega wrote:ive been messin around with the exploration angle and getting more into it, its kind of almost fun, just wish there was more interesting stuff to discover and also more "logic" to the exploration mechanics.
There is! It just isn't explained very well, which means you have to find it out yourself (ideally via deduction from real life science) or get help from fellow explorers on the Elite forums and/or reddit.
chaos0xomega wrote:It would be nice if there was some module available which could increase scan distance, and/or provided some sort of astrometric data, information such as estimated number and size of orbital bodies, estimated eccentricity/declination etc of their orbits, etc.
Higher class scanners do extend maximum detection distance! Scanner quality yields more data that sells for higher prices.
- Basic Discovery Scanner - Has a 500 LS range and costs 1,000 cr - Intermediate Discovery Scanner - Has a 1000 LS range and costs ~500,000 cr - Advanced Discovery Scanner - Has a system-wide range and costs ~1,500,000 cr (according to the fan-edited wiki, anyways)
chaos0xomega wrote:Hell a "probe" system would be cool too, as in you can launch probes to search areas for gravitational anomalies etc. so that you can cover more ground faster in some of these larger systems.
This is part of the design document and thus may in fact see implementation in the future.
chaos0xomega wrote:Another thing that kind of rubs me the wrong way is the presence of stations in orbit around unexplored planets or moons (or stars), you would think that scanning these things down before establishing a population center would be the first order of business, but evidently not.
Nah, those systems are discovered and you likely will be able to purchase their data from those ports. It's just that they still pay you a bit for updating and confirming their charts, depending on how established that outpost is, and how detailed your scans are.
chaos0xomega wrote:ive been messin around with the exploration angle and getting more into it, its kind of almost fun, just wish there was more interesting stuff to discover and also more "logic" to the exploration mechanics.
There is! It just isn't explained very well, which means you have to find it out yourself (ideally via deduction from real life science) or get help from fellow explorers on the Elite forums and/or reddit.
Thats not the type of logic I was talking about, I meant process logic. Given the game is procedurally generated, there would obviously be system design logic, such as binary stars orbiting a common center of mass (even though outside of 1 or 2 instances I've never been able to reach the second star, either because I was heading towards the wrong object or just didn't go out far enough). By process logic I mean a more scientific and technologically detailed means to locating things. IRL, scientists use different methods such as searching for gravitational anomalies, changes in luminosity (probably the wrong world), radiation, etc. to locate things such as exoplanets, stars, comets, and other stellar phenomenon. In the game, for the most part, we are left solely with our own eyes to spot tiny dots that move differently relative to the background in order to locate objects around the star, woe be unto you if you have an inadequate monitor (or hell, if its a small enough object you wont be able to see it anyway). Scientists IRL have been able to determne in a few instances, by whatever black magic voodoo they do, that there is 'missing mass' in a solar system or that an orbit wasn't behaving according to a scientific model, and that there therefore must be an unknown object floating around. In Elite, we are left to assume, after sufficient flying around whilst squinting at pixels, that we've 100% discovered everything in a system. In other words, by process logic I mean that there really isn't a system for exploration, just the ability to explore, and given the amount of "science" put into the rest of the game, that just sucks.
Higher class scanners do extend maximum detection distance! Scanner quality yields more data that sells for higher prices.
- Basic Discovery Scanner - Has a 500 LS range and costs 1,000 cr - Intermediate Discovery Scanner - Has a 1000 LS range and costs ~500,000 cr - Advanced Discovery Scanner - Has a system-wide range and costs ~1,500,000 cr (according to the fan-edited wiki, anyways)
For further information (and sale value) yield, purchase a Detailed Surface Scanner.
Ah, good to know, I dont think I've seen anything but the Detailed Surface Scanner for sale, but I might not have been paying attention. In any case that is well outside my price range, and I would argue that the Basic/Intermediate scanners have too low a range, while the advanced discovery scanner is stupidly high.
This is part of the design document and thus may in fact see implementation in the future.
See thats what I'm talking about, that has logic. What is currently in the game... doesn't. At least not *good* logic. TBH, based on that doc, I'm inclined to believe that the system in game is currently incomplete, which sucks since it seems to be a major component of gameplay, and AFAIK the game is supposed to release in a month, so its kind of annoying that it hasn't been implemented.
Nah, those systems are discovered and you likely will be able to purchase their data from those ports. It's just that they still pay you a bit for updating and confirming their charts, depending on how established that outpost is, and how detailed your scans are.
Ah, okay that makes sense. Would be nice if they used a different tag instead of 'unexplored' though. Like 'outdated' or something.
Anyway, after some more mucking about for not so much gain, I decided to hang up my Eagle and Basic Scanner and jump back into my Sidewinder. I dumped the weapons and a bunch of extraneous equipment (shields, scanner) and upgraded the cargo hold so it could carry 10 tons, in the span of 1 hour after that I made more money than in my entire first week in game. My plan is to run cargo for a little bit to build up my funds until I have enough credits to jump into a ship with 1. A longer jump range, 2. More capacity for scanning gear (and hell, also better scanning gear while Im at it). I'm thinking the Cobra Mk III would be good as its cheaper than the Asp but offers good all around performance otherwise. While running missions though I had a near heartstopping moment though, I was approaching a station with about 30k creds worth of cargo when some donkey-cave tried to interdict me, since I had sold my shields I figured I was pretty much screwed if he caught me luckily I managed to get away, but then when I got to the station, I wasn't able to dock (for whatever reason the landing crosshair display wouldn't show up for me) so I had to cancel the request, and try again, directed to a new pad, still no joy, I was starting to freak out since I had about 18 minutes left to deliver the goods or get hit with a fine and otherwise useless cargo, so I jumped to the next system over, then jumped back, reapproached the station, and finally was able to dock, all the while praying nobody else tried to interdict me...
I mean, I dont know why I worry so much about being interdicted, I've only successfully been interdicted twice, and both times I was able to outrun the would-be pirate and get away, but still.
chaos0xomega wrote:By process logic I mean a more scientific and technologically detailed means to locating things. IRL, scientists use different methods such as searching for gravitational anomalies, changes in luminosity (probably the wrong world), radiation, etc. to locate things such as exoplanets, stars, comets, and other stellar phenomenon. In the game, for the most part, we are left solely with our own eyes to spot tiny dots that move differently relative to the background in order to locate objects around the star, woe be unto you if you have an inadequate monitor (or hell, if its a small enough object you wont be able to see it anyway).
Ah, I see!
Well, I'd argue that whilst such a system would be more realistic, it would also be less fun. I mean, from how it sounds you basically want to replace oldschool mk-1-eyeball discovery - "trailblazing" if you will - with the push of a button on some computer that then simply tells you where to fly, instead of leaving it entirely in your hands and brains? Or did you have something else in mind? I think there certainly should be a sort of challenge for the human part involved, but of course there could be alternatives such as various minigames that combine a specialised UI with the exploration mechanic, similar to FSD interdiction.
chaos0xomega wrote:Ah, okay that makes sense. Would be nice if they used a different tag instead of 'unexplored' though. Like 'outdated' or something.
Yeah, that's a good point.
I mean - it makes sense insofar as they are unexplored for you, because your onboard navcom doesn't have the maps, but it's still misleading in that the primary interpretation should refer to exploration by humanity as a whole.
Something for the forums, perhaps.
chaos0xomega wrote:My plan is to run cargo for a little bit to build up my funds until I have enough credits to jump into a ship with 1. A longer jump range, 2. More capacity for scanning gear (and hell, also better scanning gear while Im at it). I'm thinking the Cobra Mk III would be good as its cheaper than the Asp but offers good all around performance otherwise.
If you want to haul cargo for a bit I'd recommend taking a look at the Zorgon-Peterson Hauler. It's a very cozy means of affordable transportation. Comes in at about 44k credits, and has a cargo capacity of up to twenty tons or so, depending on how you juggle internal compartment space and whether or not you want to keep the shields (I would, as Haulers are also juicy targets).
The Cobra is the perfect allrounder, though, pretty much a straight upgrade from the Sidewinder in that she's just as much of a multirole ship, just that she surpasses the Sidey in pretty much anything except agility.
At about 300k or so the Cobra is also fairly affordable and something you'll probably stick with for a while. Frontier cargo transportation, smuggling, piracy, exploration, the Cobra can do those nicely.
I assume you already got the free paintjobs?
chaos0xomega wrote:While running missions though I had a near heartstopping moment though, I was approaching a station with about 30k creds worth of cargo when some donkey-cave tried to interdict me, since I had sold my shields I figured I was pretty much screwed if he caught me luckily I managed to get away, but then when I got to the station, I wasn't able to dock (for whatever reason the landing crosshair display wouldn't show up for me) so I had to cancel the request, and try again, directed to a new pad, still no joy, I was starting to freak out since I had about 18 minutes left to deliver the goods or get hit with a fine and otherwise useless cargo, so I jumped to the next system over, then jumped back, reapproached the station, and finally was able to dock, all the while praying nobody else tried to interdict me...
Ouphh, I had that bug twice already, too. You do not have to leave the system - just keep cancelling and re-requesting until it works. The longest so far was three failed approaches at a Dahan mining outpost, but at the 4th attempt the pad that was previously bugged suddenly worked again. *shrug*
Glad to hear you already had a thrilling encounter, though.
Lynata wrote: Well, I'd argue that whilst such a system would be more realistic, it would also be less fun. I mean, from how it sounds you basically want to replace oldschool mk-1-eyeball discovery - "trailblazing" if you will - with the push of a button on some computer that then simply tells you where to fly, instead of leaving it entirely in your hands and brains? Or did you have something else in mind? I think there certainly should be a sort of challenge for the human part involved, but of course there could be alternatives such as various minigames that combine a specialised UI with the exploration mechanic, similar to FSD interdiction.
No, I definitely don't want a push button solution, just something a bit more scientific and concrete rather than squinting hard at a computer monitor, the minigame w/ ui type deal is more along the lines of what I imagined.
Yeah, that's a good point.
I mean - it makes sense insofar as they are unexplored for you, because your onboard navcom doesn't have the maps, but it's still misleading in that the primary interpretation should refer to exploration by humanity as a whole.
They don't even show up on your system map until you search them down, even if you otherwise have the system data available. To me that makes no sense whatsoever.
If you want to haul cargo for a bit I'd recommend taking a look at the Zorgon-Peterson Hauler. It's a very cozy means of affordable transportation. Comes in at about 44k credits, and has a cargo capacity of up to twenty tons or so, depending on how you juggle internal compartment space and whether or not you want to keep the shields (I would, as Haulers are also juicy targets).
The Cobra is the perfect allrounder, though, pretty much a straight upgrade from the Sidewinder in that she's just as much of a multirole ship, just that she surpasses the Sidey in pretty much anything except agility.
At about 300k or so the Cobra is also fairly affordable and something you'll probably stick with for a while. Frontier cargo transportation, smuggling, piracy, exploration, the Cobra can do those nicely.
I assume you already got the free paintjobs?
Theres free paintjobs?
I considered the hauler actually, Im just not sure how profitable running trade routes will be and whether or not the 50k credit investment will actually increase my profits. Currently I have trouble keeping my 10 ton sidewinder capacity well utilized since most of the missions ive run (and indeed it seems most of the missions in the game that I have seen) don't require more capacity than that. I know I can just run trade routes for goods on the marketplace, but the lack of eve-online style market data has me wary of dumping too many credits on stuff and hoping that I can sell it all elsewhere for a small profit.
Ouphh, I had that bug twice already, too. You do not have to leave the system - just keep cancelling and re-requesting until it works. The longest so far was three failed approaches at a Dahan mining outpost, but at the 4th attempt the pad that was previously bugged suddenly worked again. *shrug*
ah good to know, I probably tried about 3 times myself before jumping out. I think part of it too was that another player was directed to the same pad. I was going in for the landing and another ship cut across beneath me and landed where I was directed to go. I had to wait for him to enter the station before the pad was available for me to land on, and at that point the targeting thing just wouldnt show up.
chaos0xomega wrote:They don't even show up on your system map until you search them down, even if you otherwise have the system data available. To me that makes no sense whatsoever.
Well, Universal Cartographics wants you to buy their maps!
chaos0xomega wrote:Theres free paintjobs?
I mentioned it earlier - they're running a sort of Black Friday promotion where this new pack of six Cobra paintjobs is available for 0.00 on the webstore if you "buy" it before Monday. Also, all the other paintjobs are currently at a 50% discount, so if you want to grab some fancy colours for any of the ships you like, now's the time.
chaos0xomega wrote:I considered the hauler actually, Im just not sure how profitable running trade routes will be and whether or not the 50k credit investment will actually increase my profits.
Well, compared to the Sidewinder you basically make money twice as fast. It comes down to what you haul, but if you also consider courier missions, which sometimes pay hefty amounts of credits if you manage to arrange bulk transportation, I'd say there is definite potential here.
There's also some trade tutorials available in regards to how to read the routed on the map, what sort of goods tend to pay the most profits, or which systems would usually look for what sort of resources, and so on, but I confess that even though I did play space trucker for at least two weeks or so, I didn't really do any in-depth research. Especially as I also had "political motivations" regarding the conflict around Eranin, which saw me shipping medical supplies for the commie government trying to keep them pesky Feds at bay.
On a sidenote, the way the various explorers, traders, smugglers, pirates etc give each other tips and slowly probe how the game works is a pretty cool thing. You can really see how there are communities within the community forming. Just hours ago, I was bounty hunting in Eranin, and I got hailed by another random bounty hunter who just happened to take a look at the same nav beacon. We exchanged greetings, talked about local bounties, then went our separate ways to take down bad guys. All in a day's work.
But, I worry that if I get it, my skeleton will be found in months time by someone breaking in to my house to find out why I haven't been seen or heard from again..
Out of interest, is it on general release yet or is this still a 'beta'?
But, I worry that if I get it, my skeleton will be found in months time by someone breaking in to my house to find out why I haven't been seen or heard from again..
Out of interest, is it on general release yet or is this still a 'beta'?
Beta closed, its now in 'gamma' before a release around the 16th of December.
Is there a bug in hyperspace travel? I'm doing the 'travel' tutorial, and when I go to Hyperspace, I stay there and can't even go to the 'Escape' menu to exit the tutorial (I have to close it in task manager).
Combat seems fun, though the ships feel more sluggish than they were in Frontier, and ArcElite.
I have the option to 'start' though I haven't done that yet. Also, I only seem to have one pilot, though I had a few startup packs to pick from. Does the 'pirate' one start in Lave, or did you need to back more for that?
Pacific wrote:But, I worry that if I get it, my skeleton will be found in months time by someone breaking in to my house to find out why I haven't been seen or heard from again..
I can see how that could happen.
Daba wrote:Is there a bug in hyperspace travel? I'm doing the 'travel' tutorial, and when I go to Hyperspace, I stay there and can't even go to the 'Escape' menu to exit the tutorial (I have to close it in task manager).
Hmmm. I had that happen once, but it's not supposed to happen anymore. Supposedly it had to do with the connection to the server. Does it happen every time? And only in this tutorial mission?
Daba wrote:Combat seems fun, though the ships feel more sluggish than they were in Frontier, and ArcElite.
Yeah, it's more dogfighty. Depends on the type of ship and your thrusters, too, though; a nicely kitted out Eagle can fly circles around other ships!
Daba wrote:I have the option to 'start' though I haven't done that yet. Also, I only seem to have one pilot, though I had a few startup packs to pick from. Does the 'pirate' one start in Lave, or did you need to back more for that?
Hmm, as far as I recall, the starting spawn should be mentioned in the packet's description to the right side on that screen. With exception to the Kickstarter specials who start on Shinrarta Dezhra (the pilot union's homeworld), I think all the packs offer random spawns in various specific regions ("somewhere in the Federation", "somewhere in the Empire" and "some independent frontier colony on the fringe").
chaos0xomega wrote:I dunno, I feel like the Hauler presents a bigger risk since its more likely to attract attention than my sidewinder, and isnt as fast or maneuverable
That's certainly true. It's a bit "risk vs reward", though there are ways to minimise danger (you can avoid interdiction if you keep an eye on the scanner and/or are willing to fly detours rather than a straight line from the nav beacon to the destination world). It's only got a single weapon hardpoint, too, though it is located on the belly which means you could install a turret. But basically, if you get into trouble, it's a question of trying to make the shields hold until your hyperdrive is fully charged.
chaos0xomega wrote:They arent one time use only are they? Should Inorder multiple sets? I mean they are free... lol
Naah, no worries, they are basically unlocks. The (other) paintjobs would be pretty expensive otherwise, and few would buy the "exclusive" ones!
Daba wrote:I saw (well, one turned up on nearby ships) an Asp outside station, but I take it you can't buy these yet?
You can, but it'll cost ya! The larger, newer hulls tend to go in the millions, as opposed to small second-hand ships like the Sidey or the Eagle that don't even get produced anymore. Once you do have the necessary funds and want to acquire one, high-tech industrial manufacture systems are always a good bet for ships like the Asp or the Anaconda, etc. I think there is a list on the forums where people post what they've spotted where in order to create a community-authored shipyards overview.
And don't worry about the map, you'll get used to it fairly quickly. The only thing I'm really missing is waypoints...
Spoiler:
Also, because it looks really pretty ... terraformed Mars:
Spoiler:
"See you at the party, Richter!"
Oh by the way .. that bug you encountered with getting stuck in the tutorial?
"Fix for travel tutorial getting stuck in hyperspace" -- v1.03 patch notes
Started with the Imperial Bounty Hunter package (Eagle with some upgrades, starting in random Imperial colony)
Went into the actual game yesterday. Went to an 'unexplored' system in Imperial Space, though there were a couple of outposts there. Got paid a bit for exploring, more than trading did (albeit, the Eagle is really not suited to it, but I ran a ton of goods between the systems) and more than the bounty I got when interdicted on the way back. I actually need to cash in that bounty though.
Is it safe to fire on anyone with 'wanted' (outside of no fire zones of course), regardless of their affiliation? Also, how do you interdict?
Do you generally need to travel longer routes for trading to be lucrative?
I'm also considering putting yaw back on the mouse for the precision, or maybe it isn't needed? I have roll on it, and yaw with the keyboard (it's how you play with the VTOL craft in Planetside 2).
What determines whether they will pay for your exploration data, or if it is newly explored by you, do you always get paid something for up to date data?
Im looking to score a Saitek X52 Pro flight stick/throttle on sale so I dont have to deal w the mouse/keyboard combo... now if only someone would put it on sale.
Daba wrote:Started with the Imperial Bounty Hunter package (Eagle with some upgrades, starting in random Imperial colony)
I took the same package, except with a different starting location. That Eagle has some pretty nice upgrades that give her an impressive 12ly jump range! Perfect for pursuing a bounty, except that it's missing a hyperspace wake scanner and an interdictor.
Daba wrote:Is it safe to fire on anyone with 'wanted' (outside of no fire zones of course), regardless of their affiliation? Also, how do you interdict?
Right now there's a sort of bug with the dynamic background and reputation mechanics where local authority ships will open fire on you if you shoot a wanted guy and he was part of the same faction. Most systems have at least one faction as the established "authority", which means they control the primary starports and send out patrol craft to enforce whatever laws exist in that place. This seems to have collided with the recent expansion of reputation mechanics, where ships that share the same faction are counted as allies, and since both players as well as NPCs can grind rep with factions .. including the local authority .. well.
Frontier are aware of it, though. I think they are currently working to have authority ships disregard faction status if someone is wanted.
Daba wrote:IDo you generally need to travel longer routes for trading to be lucrative?
Not generally, except if we're talking about unique Rare Goods such as Eranin Wine (which tend to increase in value the further you move away from their point of origin). All in all, the markets are simply governed by supply and demand, which refers to the mixture of production capabilities, resource requirements, and supply lines of the starport in question. Most of the time, short journeys are less profitable simply because they tend to be frequented by other traders (both players and NPCs), but it's not a hard rule.
A dedicated trader could probably explain it in more depth than me, though.
Daba wrote:II'm also considering putting yaw back on the mouse for the precision, or maybe it isn't needed? I have roll on it, and yaw with the keyboard (it's how you play with the VTOL craft in Planetside 2).
Well, it's a personal decision - whatever works best for you - but I too have pitch/yaw on my mouse, and roll on the keyboard. See the first post on this page for my thruster control scheme, which I think works very well, at least for my taste.
Daba wrote:What determines whether they will pay for your exploration data, or if it is newly explored by you, do you always get paid something for up to date data?
I think you always get paid something, but only the first data makes the most money. The rest is simply supplementary information or updates, and the more data people throw at Universal Cartographics, the smaller are the payouts they get.
chaos0xomega wrote:Im looking to score a Saitek X52 Pro flight stick/throttle on sale so I dont have to deal w the mouse/keyboard combo... now if only someone would put it on sale.
[edit]Ah, nevermind, looks like it's out of stock already - plus they only ship to Europe (though maybe you would've had relatives or whatever that could serve as intermediates ...)
I got mine from a bulk reseller on ebay; maybe that would work for you?
chaos0xomega wrote:Even on ebay Im only looking at $10 off retail
Oh, you meant "on sale" as in "cheaper", whereas I thought you just wanted to buy one, period.
The X52 has become a bit of a rare commodity because it's not being produced anymore (or at least not in big numbers) but is widely regarded as being the best choice for a "middle class" HOTAS that gives you decent quality for a price below those lulzy $500 luxury kits. I assume that this rarity would also affect their price, so if you did find an offer that is below retail price, that's actually pretty fortunate already, considering that in most stores, you can't even get it in retail anymore. I wouldn't be surprised if the price goes up instead of down.
Hmm, maybe they've produced another run due to the popularity? I only know that when I looked, they were sold out almost everywhere (barring places that would charge you an arm and a leg in shipping), which is why I felt so lucky when I finally found a shop on ebay that sold these. It could certainly explain how the folks from Frontier Development managed to secure a batch for their online shop.
And I absolutely agree about the stick's performance. From what I can tell so far, the positive reviews are justified. No wonder it's become so popular.
And even in the year 3030, the X52 is still the preferred flight stick for space ships.
SilverMK2 wrote:Grrr... Wife has been using the laptop for the last two days so I've not been able to play.
Sounds like the perfect excuse to blow some cash on a gaming PC.
"Look what I got us, honey! Now we no longer have to squabble about who gets to use the laptop!"
On a sidenote, just had two awesome bounties. The first was an Asp Explorer with a 20k price on its head. Interdicted her as she was pulling away from the local star. That beast had two missile racks and four burst lasers, two of them turrets, which promised an interesting fight, but that bounty was just a tad too juicy and I knew my Eagle should be able to outmaneuver her. Twice I got into the firing arc of the turrets, but my shields held, if only barely. A minute or so into the fight as I was happily plinking away at the Asp's thick skin, three new contacts popped into the system. As they were barely inside sensor range I was unable to identify them, but of course I immediately assumed the worst and figured that the gal in the Asp has summoned her buddies. Turns out however that (due to the reset from Beta to Gamma) my emergency transponder was still active, which means my ship has notified the local authorities. Apparently my target was so popular that they sent two Vipers plus an Eagle with concussion missiles! Fortunately, the combined fire from my burst lasers and the m-cannon managed to kill the Asp before the cops got closer, though they did manage to launch two missiles at her, each striking for about 4% hull damage.
Lesson for other prospective bounty hunters: Disable the "Report Crimes against Me" feature in your functions tab to the right! If you are hunting down a mark, the last thing you need is a bunch of coppers swooping in to steal your kill.
The second bounty was a Cobra with an 8k bounty; fairly standard fare, but it seems that guy was a smuggler rather than a pirate, for instead of fighting me he immediately turned away and tried to flee. Needless to say, I diverted some power into the engines and pursued, targeting the Cobra's frameshift drive as I opened fire. After taking some damage, the wanted pilot panicked and started jettisoning his illegal cargo, one canister after another, opening comms and pleading to me that I should let him go. That Cobra was like a giant piñata; the more I shot it, the more sweets poured out of its cargo hatch. Being in an Eagle, however, I'd only have room for four tons of stuff anyways, so I continued the pursuit and finally blew him up, my computer logging the kill and issuing the customary bounty chit, to be redeemed next time I'd dock at a Federal outpost. Still having some of that white cloud of cargo canisters on my scanner, however, I deployed my cargo scoop and got me some stolen domestic appliances, which I was able to cash in for a nice bonus in the black market at Eranin Orbital.
Star Citizen has been far better managed in terms of fund raising. Roberts now has to deliver, and he has made very big promises.
Still I have to hand it to him, if he can manage to seel access to play just one ship in his new game for over a hundred dollars I have no doubt he knows how to make money.
Still I think in the future the slow and steady sequential release of the dream, making things big, but in other ways limited so you don't bite off more than you can chew, and sticking to developer schedules means that I think Elite is going to be the big winner here.
In the end both games will take us to the same place, space plus ground settings in first person. However they are travel;ling very different roads. I have a suspicion that Elite is the better of the two projects for being built around hard efficient coding and that there is a chance that Star Citizen may run into practical problems with its multi billion dollar promises.
But, I worry that if I get it, my skeleton will be found in months time by someone breaking in to my house to find out why I haven't been seen or heard from again..
Out of interest, is it on general release yet or is this still a 'beta'?
Beta closed, its now in 'gamma' before a release around the 16th of December.
Many thanks for that.
Think I'm going to do a pre-order from the site, goodbye world!
Woo! Managed to land and shoot some cannisters - though as I could only find the broken mouse I am finding it hard to shoot the ship as the mouse keeps dropping out
Edit: And no matter what settings I change the fracking Y-axis will not let me play inverted controls
Orlanth wrote:Star Citizen has been far better managed in terms of fund raising.
From a business point of view, that is absolutely true. As a gamer, its "aggressive hype" was what actually drove me to Elite, though.
Don't get me wrong, I think SC has great potential, and in the end I'm just lucky that the genre has been revitalised by these two giants. And I am quite sure that I'll at least take a look at SC once it's out. But it just felt more like a big PR stunt rather than a game in development, and I have more trust in Elite's slow, gradual expansion rather than SC's attempt to deliver everything at once by splitting development between a dozen different studios as if the game was some big puzzle. The good thing is that SC has raised so much cash that I'm sure they will ultimately be able to deliver something good, in spite of what I'd consider inevitable waste and chaos. I mean, with a budget like that, they could theoretically start over completely multiple times, and they have wisely chosen not to commit to a deadline.
I also like how not only both games have committed to a different development style, however, but also different design aesthetics and different gameplay styles. This should ensure that there is (a) hopefully less rivalry between their fans and (b) people who enjoy space games get to pick from a greater spectrum of variety. Just like I foresee a continued future for Eve Online, because I expect that it too will be able to maintain its niche due to its focus on social features and communities.
Pacific wrote:Think I'm going to do a pre-order from the site, goodbye world!
Sweet! The Mercenary (aka preorder) Edition will not only net you a small discount, but also an Eagle fighter and a couple goodies. Welcome to the year 3030, Commander.
SilverMK2 wrote:Woo! Managed to land and shoot some cannisters - though as I could only find the broken mouse I am finding it hard to shoot the ship as the mouse keeps dropping out
That sounds like something you should fix! The idea of a broken mouse conjurs horror images of a Hauler loaded chock-full with progenitor cells smashing against the docking ring due to a "thruster malfunction".
Orlanth wrote:Star Citizen has been far better managed in terms of fund raising.
From a business point of view, that is absolutely true. As a gamer, its "aggressive hype" was what actually drove me to Elite, though.
Don't get me wrong, I think SC has great potential, and in the end I'm just lucky that the genre has been revitalised by these two giants. And I am quite sure that I'll at least take a look at SC once it's out. But it just felt more like a big PR stunt rather than a game in development, and I have more trust in Elite's slow, gradual expansion rather than SC's attempt to deliver everything at once by splitting development between a dozen different studios as if the game was some big puzzle. The good thing is that SC has raised so much cash that I'm sure they will ultimately be able to deliver something good, in spite of what I'd consider inevitable waste and chaos. I mean, with a budget like that, they could theoretically start over completely multiple times, and they have wisely chosen not to commit to a deadline.
I also like how not only both games have committed to a different development style, however, but also different design aesthetics and different gameplay styles. This should ensure that there is (a) hopefully less rivalry between their fans and (b) people who enjoy space games get to pick from a greater spectrum of variety. Just like I foresee a continued future for Eve Online, because I expect that it too will be able to maintain its niche due to its focus on social features and communities.
I agree with your assessment, down to qualifing what specifically Roberts has done better to earn so much more backing. Hype is the best way to describe it.
My main problem is that the hype absorbs revenue as it generated revenue, and with big devel;opment funding comes big development costs. I just hope Roberts is as good a manager as he is a fund raiser, not game producer, manager. His management skills will be critical to the project now. One of the great truths of project development is that workload increases to fit the budget, tenfold funding doesn't necessarily mean a tenfold productivity. However expectations will be tenfold because people have already got their wallets out.
Roberts has done games before, with decent results. *If* he can keep the budget reasonable *cough*WCIV*cough*, then hopefully we should get a good game. And since SC is an MMO with a single player campaign attached, and Roberts's past issues have revolved around stuff that's more specific to single-player games, hopefully he can pull off a good product.
We'll see, though.
My brothers have the dogfighting module for SC, and seem to like it. I haven't been able to check it out (or this, for that matter) due to a need to replace my computer. So I can't comment on it personally.
From what I understood, Freelancer was originally planned to be an MMO - but then again, according to that article those features were cut at the behest of Microsoft, and only because the development team had already overshot both its budget and the schedule, neither of which should really be a problem for SC. As you say: wait and see.
In regards to the dogfighting: according to the videos on the web, and from how I've seen SC players describe it, its flight model seems to be more open and thus slightly more newtonian (like a mixture of Elite's Flight Assist Off and On, with the newtonian physics of the former but utomated spin stabilisation of the latter), though this has led to what people call "turreting" and gameplay that supposedly feels like "point and click", whereas Elite's default flight model (Flight Assist On) feels more like atmospheric flight and thus somewhat less realistic - a concession the developer felt was necessary to preserve fun, as they already foresaw the "turreting" issue SC has been going through.
I had thought that both games would stick to their flight models, which would further distinguish between the two games (as I'm sure each model has its share of fans), but lately I've seen comments that SC supposedly moved closer to ED's model in response to the criticism. Not sure how to feel about that - on the one hand it means less of a difference between both games, but on the other I have to admit that I like the feeling of ED's flight model a lot, and that I'd welcome if SC would feel similar whenever I get to try it out a couple years from now. Plus, if we are honest, "atmospheric flight" is quite simply what we are used to from all those sci-fi movies.
Back to Elite ... someone on reddit found a nice pop-culture reference hidden among the thousands of inhabited systems.
"I have seen things you people wouldn't believe ..."
On the Imperial Eagle, is there anything to drop for an interdictor device, or do you think assassinations are going to be beyond your capability with one of the starting ships? A single one would net me 5x the money I currently have.
For making money, my ship isn't really suited to hauling or mining.
When buying a new ship, do you move your hardpoints over or are they sold off with your old ship/lost?
I have to say, having had Lynata exalt my posts on FFG, I fully trust her judgement so seeing a positive review on this game, together with the chance to score some free paint schemes, has had me jumping in on the pre-purchase!
Haha, I kinda wish exalts would be visible on dakka, too - it'd be nice to (a) have the person you exalted know you did and (b) know which dakkanauts are sharing your line of thinking. Anyways, hope you like the game! Did you already try the tutorials?
chaos0xomega wrote:Those c-beams man, they sure do glitter in the dark
Daba wrote:On the Imperial Eagle, is there anything to drop for an interdictor device, or do you think assassinations are going to be beyond your capability with one of the starting ships? A single one would net me 5x the money I currently have.
You should have sufficient internal compartment space to slot an FSD interdictor, at least if you don't have stuff like a discovery scanner or something like that.
That being said, I've heard the assassination missions being quite challenging in that you may be faced with an Anaconda or something like that. Personally, I wouldn't take on something bigger than a Cobra or an Asp, at least if I'm flying alone. It may depend on just how much the bounty is, though; I'd expect smaller ones to be less challenging. If I ever see one for about 40-60k, I'm gonna try it, but those 180k ones just sound a tad too heavy for me. I tend to catch my bounties by patrolling a star system, scanning other ships and checking for fugitives, then pulling them out of supercruise.
Daba wrote:For making money, my ship isn't really suited to hauling or mining.
Courier jobs can pay nicely!
Daba wrote:When buying a new ship, do you move your hardpoints over or are they sold off with your old ship/lost?
I'm fairly sure everything gets sold. Personally, I'd wish for there to be an option to store equipment in a garage of sorts so you can either install it in a new craft or keep it for later, but so far that's only a suggestion on the forums.
I've started them, just completed the 1V2 - not sure my setup is quite right yet though - the yaw rate on my mouse seems low (hard to track targets off to left/right) - maybe I need to go get a joystick again...
eddieazrael wrote:the yaw rate on my mouse seems low (hard to track targets off to left/right)
I think that's intentional. If you have a target breaking off to the sides, you need to roll and then pitch after them. Yawing is really just there for minor corrections (usually just shooting/docking/scooping/thatsortofstuff), whereas roll is for changing course entirely.
For what it's worth, it does look better that way.
Well have pre-ordered the game from the website. Played through the tutorial combat missions which were a lot of fun.
So, I assume now I need to wait for December 16th, at which point I will be able to download the full game?
Also, another question if I may; While the combat was fun, I primarily like the idea of playing as a kind of trader/transporter, and more of a low tempo affair while enjoying some of the gorgeous-looking graphics. Will it be possible to play the game like this, and if so do you get structured 'missions' as such (as part of the main game) or can you just buy and sell whatever? Is it possible to hire NPCs to protect me (launch drones, as in EVE?), or is that even necessary?
Pacific wrote: Well have pre-ordered the game from the website. Played through the tutorial combat missions which were a lot of fun.
So, I assume now I need to wait for December 16th, at which point I will be able to download the full game?
Also, another question if I may; While the combat was fun, I primarily like the idea of playing as a kind of trader/transporter, and more of a low tempo affair while enjoying some of the gorgeous-looking graphics. Will it be possible to play the game like this, and if so do you get structured 'missions' as such (as part of the main game) or can you just buy and sell whatever? Is it possible to hire NPCs to protect me (launch drones, as in EVE?), or is that even necessary?
As I understand it
Yes it's very doable to take on that role
You can do both, have it structured by the game or play the market
Not yet, but larger transports can install turrets
Pacific wrote:Also, another question if I may; While the combat was fun, I primarily like the idea of playing as a kind of trader/transporter, and more of a low tempo affair while enjoying some of the gorgeous-looking graphics.
Absolutely! I've done so myself for a part of the Beta, and it is a very relaxing way of playing the game - excluding those moments where a pirate attempts to steal your cargo, of course. There's a number of dedicated freighters in Elite, and you can do both cargo missions (get X from A to B) as well as buy stuff using your own budget, and try to make a profit by selling it at another port. In face, some blogs and website have taken to calling Elite "Space Truck Simulator 2014", either charmingly or because they thought it was boring. Personally, I liked doing civvie stuff with a Hauler for a change .. http://www.pcgamer.com/the-pleasure-of-space-trucking-in-elite-dangerous/ http://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2014/11/19/the-elitist-part-five-hunting-dogs/
Pacific wrote:Is it possible to hire NPCs to protect me (launch drones, as in EVE?), or is that even necessary?
And yeah, I guess now you can only wait - fortunately, launch is only ~2 weeks away, and in the mean time maybe you can have fun browsing the reddit or something like that.
Originally I had thought that the tutorials people can play would include the non-combat stuff that has been added lately, but I guess they only released the "old" combat tutorial .. oh well.
eddieazrael wrote:So, flying is old-school dogfighting in SPAACE then! Makes no sense from a reality basis, but rule of cool always wins! (And that's fine with me.)
Yeah, that's exactly what the devs said, too. They're very big on adding realism wherever possibly, but at the same time they said that gameplay must come first. They tried full newtonian flight in Elite II, and it just wasn't as much fun, seeing as it resulted in a combat model that more resembled jousting than anything else.
Daba wrote:What's your favourite weapon configs?
Not that I can afford them though...
For my Eagle .. two burst lasers on the belly, and a multicannon topside. I'm currently trying to find one of those variants, such as focused burst lasers, or a high impact m-cannon that has a lower RoF but more punch behind each bullet.
The basic models of these weapons are fairly affordable, though, I think you could get the whole set for about 50k.
What ship and which weapons do you currently have?
I have the Eagle with two burst lasers and a multicannon on top
I'm thinking of what to go with when I upgrade. I might skip the Viper and go straight to Cobra. I seem to be doing mostly exploring, and I don't really want to sell my scanner as it's how I make the most money at the moment. Maybe the cargo hold, but I do make a little money from that, though I don't have enough space for most delivery missions.
I keep getting jumped by people who don't have a bounty on their head. They open fire , because we're in an anarchy zone with no civilisation and die for it, but it still costs me in ammo.
Daba wrote:I have the Eagle with two burst lasers and a multicannon on top
Oh by the way, according to people on reddit, equipment you sell at a station stays there - which would be one way of swapping stuff from one ship into another, I guess.
Daba wrote:I'm thinking of what to go with when I upgrade. I might skip the Viper and go straight to Cobra. I seem to be doing mostly exploring, and I don't really want to sell my scanner as it's how I make the most money at the moment. Maybe the cargo hold, but I do make a little money from that, though I don't have enough space for most delivery missions.
Sounds good. The Cobra is definitely more suited to exploration than the Viper; the latter has a default jump range even lower than the Eagle iirc. I'd argue you could make more money flying a Viper than an Eagle due to the increased loadout and/or cargo space, not to mention it isn't nearly as flimsy, but if you want to get a Cobra ASAP then sticking with the Eagle might indeed be smarter.
I'd definitely keep at least 2-4 tons of cargo space, though. In my experience, a lot of transport missions are just about 2-3 tons of stuff .. plus you'd hate to come across a canister of gold or palladium in deep space (either from an USS or some ship you shot at) and not have the room to pick it up.
On that note: I pulled 4 units of "trade data" out of a wreck I came across in Asellus Primus. Sold 'em for 3k on the black market.
Daba wrote:I keep getting jumped by people who don't have a bounty on their head. They open fire , because we're in an anarchy zone with no civilisation and die for it, but it still costs me in ammo.
Yeah, m-cannon ammo can be quite expensive, depending on where you buy it. I'd probably suggest either just using lasers here, or jumping out - depending on how tough the target is.
Sweet. I thought they'd only air it in the UK or something. Not sure the game needs that much exposure - as I don't believe it is suitable for every kind of gamer - but on the other hand, I suppose it's not a bad thing if it reaches those who may be genuinely interested in its take on space sims, yet haven't heard of it so far.
By the way, patch 1.05 is out. Aside from the bugfixes, I really like the bit about a pilot's actions now generating GalNet news posts. This should make the background sim a lot more transparent!
For some reason I'm really interested to play this game.
I haven't played any space sim (except some old star wars sim, i gave up on the docking tutorial) and I was wondering if this game has a huge learning curve?
How well does this game run? (i think the game uses ut engine so comparing it to something bl2 would be nice)
FPS with vehicles, yes but flying vehicles usually mean that I get in, take off, fly until I reach destination and then jump off (the vehicle usually doesn't survive the trip).
I did pass the flight school in gta:sa with all gold.
illuknisaa wrote:I haven't played any space sim (except some old star wars sim, i gave up on the docking tutorial) and I was wondering if this game has a huge learning curve?
I wouldn't say "huge", but the game is certainly a lot more complex than other contemporary products - both due to its increased depth, and unfortunately also flawed documentation. There are some tutorials that will teach you the basics, as well as an official PDF quick start guide, but many systems' functions and details are left unexplained and for yourself to discover, or to ask on the forums/reddit. This may all be adressed by a proper manual later on, though, but for now it can be a bit tricky. Anyone who managed to get used to EVE should have no problems with ED either, though, and you do not exactly need to know everything to have fun either.
Exact gameplay experience will depend on the individual gamer - I'm the type who enjoys to discover how things work by themselves, so I did not mind.
Flight mechanics are primarily "atmospheric" like, say, War Thunder, explained in the game as a Flight Assist mode which intentionally limits manoeuvrability to guarantee a more intuitive handling of the ship a la Star Wars X-Wings. You do have the option to turn Flight Assist off, however, for a more newtonian experience, allowing you to fly manoeuvres like the Star Furies in B5, with turning on your tail and shooting backwards whilst maintaining directional velocity. See here for an in-game example. Some pilots like Isinona get crazy skilled in this mode, and occasionally you may catch people trying to practice in the bowels of a rotating Coriolis-class station. Myself, I'm mostly flying with Assist On and only switch it off for quick turns, or when I'm feeling like drifting through space a little.
illuknisaa wrote:How well does this game run? (i think the game uses ut engine so comparing it to something bl2 would be nice)
Elite uses the in-house Cobra engine - the name is a reference to the famed Cobra starship from the Elite franchise, though I think the current version of the engine actually premièred in the studio's Zoo Tycoon game ... a hint at how well it might do at planetary environments later on?
As a consequence, however, this also means that (with the exception of Frontier's other games) there is nothing you could compare it to in this regard. However, personally I find the Cobra engine to be incredibly efficient when it comes to system resource allocation. My machine is now 3-4 years old, and whilst it is struggling with Dragon Age Inquisition (at least on higher settings), it runs Elite Dangerous like a charm.
It would be tricky to make any predictions for other PCs, of course. I assume you've already taken a look at the official system requirements on the website?
I loved Elite as a kid, I hope this is a worthy successor, it looks fething amazing of course, but sadly flashy graphics are no guarantee of quality, look at Hollywood!
I have it on the Z key. Best check your options to make sure, though.
You should do that anyways because there's a ton of potentially useful buttons and settings in there.
mattyrm wrote:I loved Elite as a kid, I hope this is a worthy successor, it looks fething amazing of course, but sadly flashy graphics are no guarantee of quality, look at Hollywood!
Agreed!
So far I'm stoked, though. That being said, a number of features outlined in the design documents are still missing. Personally, I'm not really worried about that, as the studio has shown itself to be extremely productive over the Alpha and Beta phases, though. As long as they keep adding stuff, it'll only get better. But I can certainly understand people who wish to wait some more "on principle".
An area that is settled but marked as "Unknown" essentially just means that your ship's computer doesn't know it, not that it's unknown to humanity as a whole - or rather any of the big factions, as they collect data independently from one another. That being said, I was under the impression that they should always pay at least a token amount for the effort, so perhaps it could just be a bug. Maybe try again at a later time?
Right, I have enough money to buy a Viper, but is it worth it? I heard that they need a lot of work (upgrades bought) to come into their own, combined with a horrible stock jump distance and increased fuel costs I'll probably not be any more profitable than in my Eagle.
How much stuff do you need to make them worthwhile or shall I stick to the plan of skipping it? (especially as I found a place to upgrade my cargo capacity to 4T now, so I won't even get more of that on a Viper).
I went deeper into the Empire, but none of the locals trust me to do package runs for them here.
Hmm, depends on what you want to do with it. For bounty hunting, I'd say it would not be more profitable, but you would be more survivable. Unless you're a real good pilot with the Eagle.
The Viper is less manoeuvrable, but quite a bit faster and capable of carrying more and heavier weapons (although you really need a better power plant for this). Good Eagle pilots may be able to outmanoeuvre you, but that's part of the balance (and you could just boost away if things get hairy), and on the other hand you may be able to take on bounties that are harder to crack. Maybe even an Anaconda? Okay, that one's only recommendable if you're flying with friends, though. But a Python, perhaps. I've heard that even though they are slow to turn, their engines are super-powerful, so you may need a fast ship to keep up with them.
Spoiler:
I ... I want one of these. <3
But it should not be forgotten how the Viper offers more slots for equipment, too. For example, you could mount a Cargo Scanner in addition to the Warrant Scanner, to check if anyone is carrying illegal goods and thus discover smugglers, or alternatively an FSD Wake Scanner to enable you to pursue targets through hyperspace.
Also don't forget that it has 4 internal compartments compared to the Eagle's 3, so you could add an additional cargo rack, or perhaps a shield cell bank, or a field maintenance unit.
It's definitely a trade-up, albeit not mandatory for bounty hunters as the Eagle maintains its edge in agility. It depends on your play- or rather piloting style, and how exactly you want to make your credits.
[edit]
I think the dynamic background sim needs a few more templates for certain types of factions...
Should I park it, get my Eagle back out then sell it off, or try and make money somehow to get those heavier weapons?
I didn't factor in the hidden costs as well as I should have so all the class 2 weapons are quite expensive. Might just put pulse laser in and save up for gimballed m-cannons or something.
What exactly are you regretting about it? If it's just a case of missing weapons and low cash, then I'd say just grind a few bounties or courier missions and gear it up. Or don't you like the way it's handling?
Pacific wrote:Wow that is awesome.. what was going on in the vid, who are all the ships fighting it?
I've not been there personally, but from what I can gather it's some sort of uprising, either independent of or as a direct result of the conflict at Eranin. Kotigen is a Federal system, but if you look closely you can see that the FNS Kracer and its escorts are fighting ships of the System Defence Force, which means Feds against locals. I noticed that the background sim has recently been kicked into the next level so that players can now promote or harm factions (I myself have contributed to the Eranin People's Party now spreading its operations into the surrounding systems), so maybe this has led to a shift in power within the local authorities?
The Kracer isn't alone in the system, either. If you want to feast your eyes on a Viper's suicidal attack run on the FNS Damocles, click here!
Feds are out in force today, it seems.
Spoiler:
[edit] Looking at the 2nd vid where the player is about to set his IFF transponder, it seems the fight is between two local factions, and the Feds are intervening on behalf of the one fighting against whoever controls the KSDF right now? Curious.
I think it's the money hit really and the cost it will be to equip it well and have a reasonable jump distance. Once I get some more cash I'll put an interdictor on (replacing the exploring sensor), but I think the equipment is going to be more than double the ship cost...
On the plus side, it is fast. I encountered a deadly asp and was a bit worse for wear fighting it with stock pulse lasers to I turned and ran and got out. Was much cheaper than the insurance I would have needed.
Daba wrote:I think it's the money hit really and the cost it will be to equip it well and have a reasonable jump distance. Once I get some more cash I'll put an interdictor on (replacing the exploring sensor), but I think the equipment is going to be more than double the ship cost...
Eh, maybe if you factor in an improved reactor and such. But keep in mind that any investments you make here will add to the ship's resale value, so even if you trade up again later on, you'd already have reached a higher stepping stone, and save up less cash to afford the other ship.
Unless you wish to keep and store that Viper, that is.
Umm, I think it's quite a bit away (70 LY from Eranin where I am now), but you can easily check for yourself by opening the Galaxy Map and then entering "Achenar" in the search box on the 2nd tab.
That being said, even long journeys can be completed within half an hour or so. I once travelled from Shinrarta Dhezra to Eranin and that was 160 LY or so.
In other news, Frontier just released a sneaky surprise patch - Gamma 2.00 is here!
Personal Highlights:
- 2 new ships (ZP Adder Utility Craft + Lakon Type-7 Transport)
- Waypoint Plotting in Galaxy Map (if set, your navcomputer now automatically selects the next system of your route as soon as your ship has finished a jump - very comfy for longer journeys)
- a much more seamless transition between frameshift and realspace - expanded missions (now including corporate salvage and faction military) and deep space encounters
- slavery (in economy, as well as appropriate missions)
- general improvements to sound and visuals for added atmosphere/immersion
- cool new main menu (animated - and with an easter egg)
- another easter egg
I also noticed that Azeban Orbital - the outpost where I've set up camp - has gotten a big bigger and added two new modules.
On the downside, however, a "Brotherhood" from a certain nearby Anarchy system has begun operating in Eranin - thanks to player pirates I'm sure - and they seem to be so successful that they've started to displace the Eranin People's Party when it comes to mission availability.
I'm now making it a point to interdict wanted ships from the Brotherhood faction in particular. Go back to Freeport, criminal scum!
Also, another minor new goodie from Gamma 2.00 - decals! I'm not actually sure this was an intended feature as it was not mentioned in the patch notes, and so far there is only a single decal to choose, but ...
Spoiler:
Arr! Well, I suppose it kind of fits for mercs/bounty hunters as well, Riddick-style.
I'm feeling a bit better about the Viper now (despite crashing and blowing up once), now I've got some more equipment (2 x Gimballed Class 1 m-cannon, 2 x class 2 Pulse Laser, fast enough to go ~10LY still). I might upgrade the Pulse Lasers sometime along the line, but I need to find something suitable in the slot (I haven't found class 2 burst lasers yet, and I'll probably need a power plant upgrade too). Normal cannon seem a lot more expensive than the M-cannon - do they represent that much of an improvement?
Also might be something to do with landing 30k worth of bounties in a couple of fights too (though I lost reputation with the issuing faction for some reason despite them paying me the bounty...)
Daba wrote:Hordes coming from Morgor?
Did someone leave the Ring in Eranin?
Hah, nah, I meant LP 98-132.
From the navcomputer entry:
Spoiler:
LP 98-132 is an anarchic system with a solitary small M2V type dim red star. There isn’t a lot here, though there is some mining of valuable minerals like cobalt, rutile and coltan, and very occasionally of gold. Piracy is rife here with pirates on the look-out for those high value cargoes. There is the station Freeport operated by a group of locals, and this is the nearest thing to law that exists in the system.
I have temporarily relocated from my home on (read: over) Azeban to Lugh in support of the Crimson State's uprising against the Federal occupation force .. but as I left, the "Brotherhood" from LP 98-132 was responsible for about 90% of the missions offered in Eranin. It makes me worry to think the pirates may be taking over. I'll see what I can do to help the Eranin People's Party once I'm back from my stint at Lugh.
As you may have already seen, the players who are currently trying to plunge Lugh into a civil war even made it into the official newsletter now as an example for player-driven narration and the dynamic galaxy. Lugh is quite a bit away from Eranin, but thankfully this was also a golden opportunity to try out the new course plotting feature, and it worked like a charm in conveniently leading me to my destination. The only thing I had to do was keep an eye on the temperature gauge in order to prevent heat damage to the drives by jumping too soon/often, and I had to make a single stop at a station to refuel my Eagle.
Immediately after arrival (and being greeted by two dozen contacts - there is a lot of traffic at Lugh!) I was heading to Knight Dock to rendezvous with my contact of the Crimson State Group when I noticed an Unidentified Signal Signature in the vicinity. Deciding to check it out I dropped in, and caught a lone Hauler in the process of spooling up its jump drive. Perhaps she had just exchanged cargo with another ship? A quick scan of the vessel marked it as belonging to "Lugh for Equality", a local faction whose name initially hinted at a potential ally in the fight to liberate the system from Federal oppression, but the computer quickly informed me that this faction was aligned with the Federation rather than Independent - undoubtedly it was some sort of political puppet, or its leaders had lined their pockets with Federal credits. Either way, their allegiance marked them an enemy of the cause, and thus my first target.
Needless to say, the Hauler was not exactly equipped for resisting the unbridled aggression of an upgraded Core Dynamics Eagle Long Range Fighter, and vented both shipment and pilot after a few salvos of burst laser and m-cannon rounds. I also noticed that my lower left burst laser once again malfunctioned, snapping off another shot as the system was just in the process of cooling down. Something for the mechanics at Knight Dock to take a look at - I suppose I should have taken better care for the ship's Wear & Tear condition. Either way, in addition to a bounty chit (to be redeemed somewhere in the Empire, apparently), the Hauler also spilled a bunch of cargo canisters. Most of them were just rations, but amidst the salvage I also discovered two tons of battle weapons, no doubt intended for the garrison of the Federal occupation force. I vaguely remembered their price on the open market, so with heavy heart I dumped two of the four rare artwork canisters (scavenged them from the wreckage of an Imperial Clipper in a USS) to scoop up the battle weapons. After all, a preliminary briefing had informed me of the existence of a black market in Lugh where I could transform these hot goods into cold, hard credits.
If anyone feels like participating in the liberation of Lugh, here's a crosspost from the ED reddit containing all you need to know:
Spoiler:
Fellow Pilots, Traders, Explorers and Independent Entrepreneurs (Pirate is such an ugly word),
I call upon you to come to Lugh (44 : -6 : 27) and join the cause to free Lugh from the Federation and make it independent again. We are making good progress and expect a civil war to break out by sunday. Freedom and Fortunes await!
What is the goal?
The goal is to raise the influence of the "Crimson State" faction in the system. Currently they have an influence of 24,4% (up from 17% wednesday and 14% tuesday evening). We want to achieve an influence of over 55% to take over the system. We are curious to see the event system in place. We hope for interesting spawns of conflict zones and a civil war in the system.
Current standing:
*** UPDATE 12.12.2014 - 21:20 GMT ***
The Crimson State Group is now the strongest faction in the system!!!
Crimson State Group: 38,9%
Lugh for Equality: 38,3%
Lugh Defence Force: 17,5%
Fed 43 % Lugh Defense 24.4% Crimson State Group 24.4 %
How to participate? Come to the Lugh system. Position is (44 : -6 : 27), about 60 ly from Sol
Take missions for the "Crimson State" faction (be careful not to take other missions)
Hand in exploration data at Crimson State stations.
Trade with Crimson State stations.
Pirate non-Crimson State vessels.
Sabotage non-Crimson State missions (by abandoning them).
System information Lugh is an agricultural / industrial system with 15 Billion people. It is currently unlawfully occupied by the Federation (they took over some time between patch 3.9 and version 1.0). It is about 60 ly from Sol in a dense area with plenty of inhabited systems and trading opportunities around.
Crimson State Faction Stations Knight Dock, Lugh 5 - Wealthy, very large industrial station
Read Gateway, Lugh 7 - Wealthy, very large industrial outpost (all services)
Seega Port, Lugh 8 - Wealthy, very large industrial outpost (all services)
Maclean Hub, Lugh 11 - Wealthy, industrial outpost (all services)
Mission Information You can get missions at all Crimson State Stations
You can get pirating missions at Read Gateway
Mission Completion Information *H.E. Suits: Zeaex
*Microbial Furnaces: ?
*Fish: LHS 3167
*Wine: Mari
*Non-Lethal weapons: Arth
Black Market Information Hartsfield Market, Lugh
Exploration Information Valuable exploration targets:
Mikir, 40k (16 high metal planets around 3 suns, with advanced + detailed surface scans)
Karnarki, 12k
Jinoharis, 12k
Outfitting Information The Crimson State station, Knight Dock, has all kinds of modules (all of them) for easy outfitting. It furthermore offers a wide range of ships, and the new Lakon-7.
Daba wrote:Normal cannon seem a lot more expensive than the M-cannon - do they represent that much of an improvement?
I'd say it's situational. They have a much lower rate of fire, but pack more of a punch. They are good for delivering "burst damage", if you manage to account for their slow projectile velocity, and absolutely wreak havoc on internal components. Against smaller, faster targets it would be difficult to ensure a hit, though. But that's what the fragmentation variant is for, I guess.
Daba wrote:Also might be something to do with landing 30k worth of bounties in a couple of fights too (though I lost reputation with the issuing faction for some reason despite them paying me the bounty...)
Did the ships you shot down belong to the same faction, by any chance?
Either way, congrats on the bounties.
If you like bounty hunting, Patch 2.03 will probably have you rejoice.
Pacific wrote:Already got my 2001 soundtrack at the ready
Finally got a Cobra. Was helped a little thanks to getting a 100k(!) bounty for a wanted Imperial Clipper (albeit, combined Empire and Fed bounty after scanning).
I will miss the Viper (I sold it off). After flying it, and then the Cobra for a bit, the Viper was really nippy and had fantastic Yaw (for this game), and the light hard point placement is a lot better. I might have to see if pitch-down turning works well as gimballs on the Cobra seem to favour 'down' rather than 'up' like on the Viper. Maybe once I'm rich I'll but another Viper to play around on. The real killer for it is how hard it is to get a good jump range.
Now, if only I could find a 4D power plant. Only seen 4Bs around...
Found an independent world with almost all the Cobra upgrades (apart from weapons of course) and got the D4. Going to start doing some more hunting, and maybe some trading as I have a lot more cargo space than I'm used to...
Congratulations on Frontier Developments and team. I had reason to be confident for this products ability to appear with high quality and on schedule. braden (and Bell) did an excellent job squeezing every byte out of the storage available in the first game, the sequels fit on floppies in a time when everything was moving to CD. With a past of efficiency I can see this project adding more and more stuff in a timely manner and yet with explosive content.
Well done, well done indeed.
Something concerns me though.
The launch sequence, just five hours ago.....
Downloading now..... super excited, especially as I've spotted that the joystick on my amazon Christmas list has been bought......
And now installed, training done! Brings back my childhood - except I'm not looking at a wireframe cobra..... And have also brought back memories of bits of paper with keybindings stuck to the keyboard.....
I'm using paper for some system notes, to keep track of some of the black markets and equipment stations about. I lost the one that sold overcharged M-Cannons. :/
I'm trying out gimballed Cannons now, but I might try fixed M-Cannons (or cannons) in my Class 2 slots and try some Gimballed beams once I upgrade my powerplant...
Whew, that was a smooth launch! I also heard the pre-order goodies will be unlocked by the end of the week, for those who own the Mercenary Edition here.
Nice co-op action here, showing how fun things can be with friends:
Daba wrote:I will miss the Viper (I sold it off). After flying it, and then the Cobra for a bit, the Viper was really nippy and had fantastic Yaw (for this game), and the light hard point placement is a lot better.
Yeah, the Cobra is a great allrounder, but if you want to hunt, either the Viper or the Eagle might have been better options. Then again, all that cargo space gives you a lot of options for "alternative income".
Orlanth wrote:The launch sequence, just five hours ago.....
Hahah, voice from the rear at the end: "God help us!"
Love how the button is wired to a Raspberry Pi tho. Nice detail, and a tie-in to one of Braben's other projects.
eddieazrael wrote:Brings back my childhood - except I'm not looking at a wireframe cobra.....
Spoiler:
Better?
Orlanth wrote:Remember gimballed guns can be countered by EW.
You can still fire them manually - they just won't track their target, and they'll obviously still do less damage than their fixed counterparts.
I actually used the extra cargo space to stock up on rare goods to take up to cash in my alliance bounty. And the better jump range to actually get there.
Played the game for a few hours now, really enjoying it!
Couple of questions about the game, don't know if anyone can help?
- Trading commodoties. I can't seem to make sense of it! I've looked at the galactic map, you can look at the info to see flows of goods (and types) from one system to another. This makes sense a lot of the time - for example food from an agricultural world to an industrial one. The agri world sells foodstuffs so I fill the cargo hold and set off. But, when I arrive at the other place they offer me less than the buying price!
I've noticed some systems have lists of imports if you look on that screen - is that the only way of finding out what a place wants, and so the 'flow' diagrams on the map useless? I quite like the idea of being a star-faring space trader, but other than the missions I have been given have had very little success (probably lost money!) trying to do it myself.
- Black markets. Is there any way of finding which systems have these, other than stumbling upon them and recording it? I assume you can dock at these stations with stolen goods, without being scanned?
Black Markets need to be discovered with 'luck'. Note that you can still be scanned if the station is run by a 'reputable' faction, but if it's on an outpost there is seldom anyone to scan (I have never been scanned at a small outpost).
Some of the trade routes are quite odd; I think it has to do with NPC traders (or maybe players) flooding the market so the goods are no longer wanted.
Yeah, the trade routes displayed on the galaxy map are (afaik) effectively just paths taken by other traders, which always means you're following in someone's footsteps. Most of the time this is not a problem, but I think when the target world has a low population and thus low consumption, you may arrive on a market that is already saturated with the goods in question! Likewise, watch out that the stuff you are exploring is sold on the local market at High Availability. Even if stuff is locally produced and exported to other worlds, it may well be that it's expensive because production is low. Supply and demand dictate the price, and thus the profits you make when selling that stuff elsewhere.
A piece of paper and a pen really help in this game.
I made 60k+ yesterday with just half an hour bounty hunting in my Eagle. Got a 20k contract to rid a system of pirates, whose collected bounty added up to another 35k. Plus 5k from salvage I was able to sell on the black market. It was a good day.
PS: Today is newsletter day! Wonder what'll be in it this week.
PPS: Where are y'all located? Anyone planning to participate in the upcoming throne succession struggle (and for whom), or otherwise want to do some co-op some time?
I'm in Zeta Fornacis (hometown). I'm now officially an Outsider to the Empire, and have friendly status there.
I'm kind of annoyed there's no Class 2 bursts, as it's going to be quite expensive and power draining to put fixed class 2 beams on. I'm currently running an all-gimballed setup, despite my love of manual aim.
I made 60k in 3 mins yesterday running a slave mission from one system to another, ive never actually seen a slave mission where they give you the slaves to transport... usually you have to source your own slaves first lol.
I found an interesting anomaly in the trading routes/commodities market as well. I had a mission to source combat stabilisers for the Fed Navy, so I bought some trade data which showed that two systems were importing their combat stabilisers from a third system. So I set off for the system that was exporting the stabilisers, there were only two stations in system, and neither of them sold the stabilisers, in fact one of the two prohibited them entirely. Confused, I pulled up my galactic map to confirm I was in the right system, I was. Checking the system map, both stations exported the other 3 types of medicine, but neither of them listed combat stabilisers. So i flew to the other 2 systems that were supposedly importing their stabilizers from that system, the stations were all buying them, and all of them listed the first system as the system they imported from, so I went back to the original system, revisited both stationa, and STILL could not find combat stabilizers for sale anyway... eventually I just gave up, but I cannot explain why it was displaying evidently false info. Just in case I submitted a bug report.
That is weird. Good call on the ticket, who knows what was up with that.
Though I suppose one possibility is that at least one of those stations did produce these goods previously and either doesn't do it in sufficient quantities to always have them available, or they've somehow lost the capability, or someone else sold these goods to the station's market, where they were re-purchased and shipped further away. I suppose this would be uncommon, but if there are no other sources for combat stabilisers nearby ...
It would also explain why the system is generating missions to get them: normal trade doesn't suffice for local demand.
Guess I'll start to head to Imperial space - once I've got over the shock of being blown up for the first time! (Yanked out of FSD by an Imperial Clipper, with rather more firepower than I was prepared for!)
I've run into the same problem: got a mission to get some personal weapons, scoped them from a nearby system that I had trade data with. But, despite it being listed as an 'export' from that system station, they weren't found there.
Thanks for the info about high/low production Lynata, was very useful. If I'm doing some kind of courier mission and with a few empty spaces left in cargo I often try and take something along the route.
Was thinking of getting a 'hauler' type vehicle for my next type, something that can carry a fair amount of freight. Could anyone recommend an upgrade from the Eagle I'm using currently?
Pacific 590733 wrote:If I'm doing some kind of courier mission and with a few empty spaces left in cargo I often try and take something along the route.
Pacific 590733 wrote:Was thinking of getting a 'hauler' type vehicle for my next type, something that can carry a fair amount of freight. Could anyone recommend an upgrade from the Eagle I'm using currently?
You mean aside from the Hauler?
The new Adder might be an option. Lower jump range (due to a heavier hull), but similar cargo capacity and more weapon hardpoints (3 instead of 1). It's probably better for mining (and self-protection) than trade runs, though, unless you are doing short trips in pirate-ridden space.
There's still a bunch of ships missing/coming later, and I expect a slightly heavier transport would be among them, but the next "true" freighter would be the Type-6 at about 1 million credits. Thus I'd recommend getting the Cobra for ~300k, as even though it is a multi-role ship it still offers a lot more room for cargo racks.
Daba wrote:If the police scan you on the way in, do they open fire?
Depends on the system and its laws, but 99% of the time you'll only be fined. If you don't pay your fines, they get converted into bounties over time though. Then you'll be wanted and both the coppers as well as bounty hunters will be after you.
Don't get caught hauling onionhead out of Kappa Fornacis, as it seems the Federal Navy is currently shooting smugglers on sight there.
Spoiler:
Rumour among pilots says the Feds are moving in capital ships for planetary bombardment to get rid of those farms, so don't get caught in a prolonged fight if you're making this route, as backup will only be a few light-seconds away.
Lynata wrote: That is weird. Good call on the ticket, who knows what was up with that.
Though I suppose one possibility is that at least one of those stations did produce these goods previously and either doesn't do it in sufficient quantities to always have them available, or they've somehow lost the capability, or someone else sold these goods to the station's market, where they were re-purchased and shipped further away. I suppose this would be uncommon, but if there are no other sources for combat stabilisers nearby ...
It would also explain why the system is generating missions to get them: normal trade doesn't suffice for local demand.
No I picked up the mission in another system prolly 13-15ly away. Also I had just purchased the trade data which as I understand it shows the current flow of supply and demand aggragated from the previous 24 hr period.
Automatically Appended Next Post: Anyone else think interdicting is pretty much a waste of time? I have yet to be successfully interdicted by another player... like not even remotely close. If anything its at best a minor nuisance for me, since people only ever seem to try to catch me when im slowing down and on final approach to my destination, and really all it accomplishes is ruining my speed/heading, causing me to take a bit longer toreach my destination... I suppose it wouldn't be so bad if the game provided me with some manner to taunt the fools who inevitably waste my time by failing to catch me.
In other news, the slave trade is highly lucrative. Made a few credits running some slave missions... but lost a few credits too.... I was doin my smugglers run into a station, set up on the slot about 13km out, killed a bunch of power to various systems to drop my heat signature down, throttled up and hit my afterburner, once I got to about 8km I rigged for silent running and kept burning in towards the slot, I was aligned flawlessly and killed silent running just as I hit the forceshield, which coincided perfectly with the point that my heat buildup hit 100%, for all intents and purposes a perfect entry into the station, I let out a whoop of joyand prepared to settle into my berth... then I realized... I forgot to request docking permission. Killed my engines just in time to keep my ship from splashing against the bulkhead, turned around and jetted out the slot as quickly as I could as every possible warning and klaxon lit off against me, trying to minimize my fines and reduce the risk of being marked for trespassing, but to no avail, as soon as I cleared the shield the stations guns lit into me, rendering my ship molten slag. Ah well, only lost 2 slaves, and thanks to having an insurance policy that would make even the most ardent socialist blush, my total fees to replace my ship + modules and pay off all my fees to the feds, etc for my infraction came out to about 1800cr
Automatically Appended Next Post: Also, coriolis stations are the worst, can never find the friggin slot on them
chaos0xomega wrote:No I picked up the mission in another system prolly 13-15ly away. Also I had just purchased the trade data which as I understand it shows the current flow of supply and demand aggragated from the previous 24 hr period.
Yeah, see the addendum in the post above. AI traders wrecked the markets good - maybe in your case they they snatched up all the stims a market had to offer, hence there was no supply when you came. I know it worked smoothly in alpha and beta so it must've been one of the gamma changes that messed it up.
"- Fixed a bug that was sometimes causing a market to flip from being a net consumer to a net producer when the AI traders supplied significantly more into that market than the market demands. This will mean that many commodities currently listed at a low level of 'demand' will revert back to the 'not interested' price, as they should have been.
- Fixed a small set of bugs that were working together to cause the AI traders to significantly over supply an import market in a specific set of circumstances.
This bug fix will increase the demand numbers being offered to Commanders for consumed commodities where there isn't a large exporting market nearby supplying that demand. Where large exporting markets are nearby, the AI traders will now respect their import caps and leave some demand for Commanders. In that situation, the exporting markets should see a slightly increased level of supply available for Commanders to purchase.
These bug fixes together should also sort out some of the 'backwards' trade route data over the next day or so when the data next update.
For the trading the changes in demand should propagate quickly but for the trade routes may take a day or so. This has uncovered an issue with split markets stacking rather than being netter out, although this effect is minor compared to the previous issue. We'll then record the stats over Christmas to identify what further tweaks are needed."
chaos0xomega wrote:Anyone else think interdicting is pretty much a waste of time? I have yet to be successfully interdicted by another player... like not even remotely close.
I dunno, it seems to depend on what ship you're flying. I have not been interdicted a single time in my Eagle so far (came close twice tho), but a player in a Cobra did manage to pull out my Hauler once as it feels a lot more sluggish in supercruise.
So far I've only interdicted NPCs, but this I am doing daily. Maybe some day we can make an experiment and see if I manage to catch you.
chaos0xomega wrote:In other news, the slave trade is highly lucrative.
Slaver scum, huh?
jk, are you Independent (as in: real slaves) or Imperial?
chaos0xomega wrote:Also, coriolis stations are the worst, can never find the friggin slot on them
Protip: Coriolis stations always turn counter-clockwise, so if you approach from the side:
- station turns "up", the docking port will be on the left side
- station turns "down", the docking port will be on the right side
- station turns "right", the docking port will be on the upper side
- station turns "left", the docking port will be on the lower side
If you see it turning clockwise, congrats, you've just won yourself the long sightseeing trip all around the station.
Awesome tips re: Coriolis, thanks, I'll have to look at its rotation more closely next time, as to me it feels like every time I look at one its rotating around multiple axes simultaneously (more of a 'tumbling' than a 'rotating' i suppose).
Re: slaves, yes real slaves. I've seen the Imperial option around, but I'm pretty solidly in Federation territory (I even have a Federation rank lol), so there really isn't much point to bothering with them imo.
Automatically Appended Next Post: BTW, any idea why I cant disable flight assist (in my sidewinder)? I cant do it through the menu, and hitting 'z' to disable it gets me the flight assist off voice notification immediately followed by 'flight assist on'
Automatically Appended Next Post: NVM, figured it out, it was sent to 'hold' rather than 'toggle'
And yeah, the bit about the Coriolis may be awkward at first, but you'll eventually get used to it. It's really just experience - I know it took me a couple weeks or so as well.
Is anyone else considering to participate in the upcoming struggle for control of the Achenar throne? I can see factions starting to emerge now, and I bet the Federals will try to covertly push the claims of Harold and Aisling, as this would appear to result in a weaker Empire and the abolition of slavery. Senators Torval and Patreus will surely pull strings to prevent that from happening, but at the same time both may try to make a play for the throne themselves. Don't get me wrong - I'm pretty much Independent For Life, but I'm thinking about backing House Lavigny, on the basis that it'd maintain the Empire as a counterbalance to the Feds. Given recent GalNet feeds, I'm sure future Crown-Princess Arissa is shrewd enough to offer clandestine missions for making sure both the Emperor as well as her mum actually make it to the wedding ceremony .. undisturbed from potential would-be assassins paid by the other Imperial sub-factions or even the Federation's intelligence branch.
Things are certainly heating up.
On a sidenote: "found" this on a pirate. Eeewww!
Spoiler:
Very 40k, though. And it goes for 8k on the black market.
pic doesnt display for me. Ive kept out of the politics, im only interested in credits, and even that interest will only last me long enough to get a ship fitted out with the best scanning gear and fsd that money can buy so i can go explore the other e d of the galaxy
Automatically Appended Next Post: Bought myself a hauler, upgraded to 16T cargo cap w the best available FSD and an autolander (since im flying shieldless, I figured it would be intelligent lest I smash my ship into the side of a station and lose all my cargo).
I don't know much about Arissa, but she seems most 'status quo' of the choices. She might be the favoured choice but I have the feeling something will happen after 30 days.
Patreus seems competent but shady, and ambitious
Torval is a straight up Disney villain
Aisling/Harald is lacking in the brain department (apparently)
A question about larger ships: Do you need to start trading to maintain these things, and their insurance costs? It seems like Trading scales up, but other sources of income don't.
Currently saving up to fit 2 Class 2 fixed beams, though I've been running an all-gimballed setup recently (Class 2 multis, class 1 bursts/beams) and it seems quite effective...
I've not seen any 'modified' weapons since release. Have they been removed from the game?
I would imagine it wouldnt be an issue, if youre reaching the point you can afford the largwr ships it means you have a strong enough income to pay insurance fees, especially considering that a larger ship should result in fewer losses owing to increased shields/hull, as well as weapons.
But yeah, ive noticed that it doesnt seem like income in the game scales all that well in general.
chaos0xomega wrote:Bought myself a hauler, upgraded to 16T cargo cap w the best available FSD and an autolander (since im flying shieldless, I figured it would be intelligent lest I smash my ship into the side of a station and lose all my cargo).
Do they still take forever to dock, or have they improved them somehow in the past couple months?
As for the image, it should show if you keep reloading it. The hoster isn't very reliable it seems, but after imageshack is no longer an option this was the next best thing. :/
Daba wrote:I don't know much about Arissa, but she seems most 'status quo' of the choices. She might be the favoured choice but I have the feeling something will happen after 30 days.
Or before. It seems like a time window for opportunists. After the marriage, succession is firmly established. Prevent the marriage from happening, and all bets are off as to who will become the next Emperor.
Daba wrote:A question about larger ships: Do you need to start trading to maintain these things, and their insurance costs? It seems like Trading scales up, but other sources of income don't.
It probably depends on what you want to do with those ships. Bounty hunting in Anaconda only makes sense if you go after other "heavy" targets. Some kill missions pay out 150-200k. But if you just want to take out Eagles and Cobras, a smaller ship makes more sense, especially as you can't really dogfight in a frigate and would only put yourself in needless danger.
At least until January when player wings come, and with them an increased ability to do co-op with shared bounties. An Anaconda and two Eagles working in tandem in a resource extraction site should work well together, with the Eagles pulling and pursuing targets whilst the Anaconda acts as an "anchor" of the battle zone, providing covering fire with its turrets or using its heavy primary weapons whenever the fighters meet stronger opposition.
Mining should scale due to having a higher capacity for cargo and refinery bins. Exploration doesn't actually seem to be very dangerous, so your only expenses should be fuel costs - and not even that if you have a fuel scoop (which you should, as an explorer).
Daba wrote:I've not seen any 'modified' weapons since release. Have they been removed from the game?
I dunno, I never used the autolander before, but my first go with it was pretty smooth, much better than I would have done under the circumstances.
Also, idiots shouldn't be allowed to fly big spaceships. Some dumbass blocked the slot to the station I was trying to land in with his type 9 and everyone was trying to get in around him resulting in a lot of collisions and me almost losing my ship.
Automatically Appended Next Post: In other news, trading just got sexy, the changes that Frontier implemented means theres actually demand for stuff, I wonder how that will affect piracy as a viable career choice though, I imagine there will be a lot less loot to score off of npc freighters now.
Automatically Appended Next Post: After making 200,000 over the past couple hours (probably could have made double that but I spend a lot of time staring at my screen in station saying to myself "please let it stop, I dont want to do this anymore, how many more times do I need to do this?"), I can say that trading is dull as dirt, if not lucrative. This hauler is getting swapped out for a cobra as soon as that becomes a possibility. I need MOAR MONEY
Automatically Appended Next Post: Bought myself a cobra, fit it up to carry 40tons while still being armed and shielded, its a nice ship in and of itself, but its a nice thing being able to carry double the capacity of my hauler while still having the benefit of weapons and a shield...
Prolly should have held off a bit longer, as ive been running a pretty lucrative route with my hauler (making about 50k per round trips, only 2 jumps each way), I had enough for the ship and cargo capacity mods, but not enough to really upgrade my FSD, so now its taking me 2x as many jumps to go the same distance...
I just ran the first leg of that trade route and refueled at the station (like I always do) and HOLY gak it cost me almost 3k credits!!! No idea if thats normal or what but damn. On the plus side I had about 50k in profits just from that run (and I didnt even have a full cargo hold lol).
Fuel prices vary from station to station depending on supply and demand, but just like with cars, some ships are just more thirsty than others. The Viper is a notorious guzzler, too, though that fits perfectly to its engine sound.
I got myself a Cobra now, too, and I'm gearing her up for a nice little private war against the encroaching Brotherhood from nearby Freeport in the hopes of stalling their expansion into my beloved Eranin.
Class 2 fixed lasers, class 1 laser turrets, ECM, shield cell bank, warrant scanner and of course a frameshift interdictor. I just need to find another of those fat pirate transports hauling tons of gold ... it really hurt last time as I had to leave a dozen canisters behind because Eagle. Already found a bunch of important looking stuff in Morgor tho! \o/
Spoiler:
Love this "80s sci-fi" look.
Optio wrote:What is the download size of the game? I'm getting really tempted but dont want to sit through 40+ Gbs of downloads.
Not sure about the download, but my installation folder is 3.75 Gig
By the way, looks like Zemina Torval managed to squash the slave rebellion on nearby Sorbago -- 79% system control for Mastopolos Mining, by the latest reports. Not very surprising, though; there was a bunch of Imperial players just itching for an event like this.
Anyone know how the Feds are doing in their "war on drugs" right now? Y'know, apart from generating public outrage on social media due to images of dead families and burning animals. "Pinpoint modern weaponry" my space ass.
I have yet to partake in combat... I like having lots and lots of credits (though it is terribly boring). Just need to keep on keeping on until I have enough for an asp (or anaconda).
Personally I'm surprised, in 2 days of concerted effort of playing the game (probably for no more than 4 hours a day) I've sized up from my sidewinder/eagle twice, and multiplied my income by roughly 8 times.
As for the feds, didnt even realize there was a war on drugs going on... although... I think they became tolerant of slaves, since the station i'm at (Kanwar Station in Cerno) is buying Slaves on the Commodities Market despite being controlled by a federation aligned faction.
chaos0xomega wrote:I have yet to partake in combat... I like having lots and lots of credits (though it is terribly boring).
See, there's your problem.
Combat is awesome. Go kill some pirates!
chaos0xomega wrote:As for the feds, didnt even realize there was a war on drugs going on... although... I think they became tolerant of slaves, since the station i'm at (Kanwar Station in Cerno) is buying Slaves on the Commodities Market despite being controlled by a federation aligned faction.
Well, as long as the system itself isn't Federal, its laws do not apply there. All it shows you is how hypocritical politicians are.
A lot of pilots are still smuggling onionhead out of the blockaded system and I hear they're making quite some cash doing so. If you like to trade, perhaps you should give it a try as well?
And make sure your paintjob is shiny; I hear ship appearance affects the likelihood of being pulled overscanned by the fuzz.
Can anyone recommend a good system or area for doing Empire missions? I've been hanging around in some Empire-affiliated systems but have yet to see any specific missions, in the same way that I had previously seen the odd Federation mission.
Do I need to perhaps do some missions in affiliated systems that are allied with the Empire?
Quite like the way the accents and words of the station tannoys change depending on where you are in the system.
And make sure your paintjob is shiny; I hear ship appearance affects the likelihood of being pulled overscanned by the fuzz.
That is awesome! I keep my eagle quite shiny, but deliberately like to keep my transport ship un-repaired in that area. Is there any way of getting an external view of the ship, other than when you are outfitting in a station?
Pacific wrote:Do I need to perhaps do some missions in affiliated systems that are allied with the Empire?
How do you mean? A system cannot be both affiliated with and "merely" allied to the Empire .. can it?
Afraid I don't have any good hints there are I'm independent, though. I can only suggest to keep looking and sticking to Empire worlds (red on the galaxy map).
Oh, and keep checking the GalNet newsfeed in the station menu! There was a slave rebellion on Sorbago over the past 4 days or so, where you would have been able to participate on behalf of and score points with the Empire:
GalNet News 25-12-3300 : Slave Rebellion Crushed
Pacific wrote:Is there any way of getting an external view of the ship, other than when you are outfitting in a station?
Nope. They've intentionally omitted a 3rd person view to preserve immersion - however, there was talk about adding a "camdrone" feature, with the in-setting justification of using it to look for external damage on the ship.
For the time being, all you could do would be to ask others to make screenshots of your ship, I suppose.
Btw:
chaos0xomega wrote:Awesome tips re: Coriolis, thanks, I'll have to look at its rotation more closely next time, as to me it feels like every time I look at one its rotating around multiple axes simultaneously (more of a 'tumbling' than a 'rotating' i suppose).
Cheers Lynata, will keep an eye on the news feeds.
Also, didn't realise there was an air limit within my ship! Guess I must have been lucky with the length of trips I have been taking with my ship so far.
Pacific wrote:Also, didn't realise there was an air limit within my ship! Guess I must have been lucky with the length of trips I have been taking with my ship so far.
No need to worry about that - the ship itself has unlimited air. However, if there's a loss of cabin pressure, your pilot's suit automatically switches to its RemLok™ emergency mask, which has a limited supply of oxygen.
Usually it's around 5 minutes or so, but when you upgrade your life support, you can extend that to up to half an hour or so.
Given how life support needs to be powered to maintain the ship's atmosphere, there are even some pilots in ships with small reactors (such as the Eagle) who deliberately switch to emergency oxygen in a fight just to divert more power into weapons.
And once again thanks for the tip Lynata - didn't realise it was possible to alter power-levels for different areas of the ship!
Think that possibly saved my skin yesterday when I jumped into a system full of law enforcement ships, and they weren't too pleased with the contents of my cargo hold! Just gave me the engine speed to pull clear of them and make the jump to cruise speed.
Out of interest, has anyone had luck upgrading their weapons? I still have the starting pulse lasers on my Eagle, although have since added a missile rack which helps somewhat. A lot of the options in outfitters seem comparable or in some cases even inferior to the weapons already fitted.
Oh yeah, there's two different ways to divert reactor power:
One is the capacitor you see on the right to your scanner, where you can rebalance the pips in System (shields), Engine (main and thrusters) and Weapons (cooling). This doesn't shut any of the systems down completely, but just affects how much juice gets transferred from the reactor into both the different systems' "active batteries" as well as their direct draw. For example, if you want to boost, the engine capacitor needs to be at least ~80% charged (the exact number may differ depending on engine type), but the pips also affect how much power the engines draw from the reactor directly, thus increasing top speed and manoeuvrability.
Another is the systems tab to your right, which lists all your modules, their health, and how much energy they require. You'll notice how you can change their priority, which will determine which systems get shut down first in the event of power shortage, either due to the ship not being able to cope with the demands of all the systems you've slotted (the Eagle is notorious for having difficulties running three weapons with its default reactor, and many new pilots found their ships going dark as they wanted to deploy hardpoints), or because of damage to the reactor or power couplings itself. Modules with low priority get shut down first.
My own list:
Spoiler:
Priority 1 (systems deemed critical for immediate survival)
- ECM
- Life Support
- Power Plant
- Power Distributor
- Shield Generator
- Thrusters
Priority 2 (systems deemed important for optimum combat efficiency)
- Missile Racks (x2)
- Pulse Lasers (x2)
- Sensors
- Shield Cell Bank
Priority 3 (systems deemed important when hardpoints retracted)
- Frame Shift Drive
Priority 4 (systems deemed unnecessary in combat)
- Cargo Hatch
- Cargo Rack
- Frame Shift Interdictor
- Kill Warrant Scanner
You can also selectively switch individual modules off and on, which you can use as an alternate way of silent running - just that instead of closing all your heat vents, powering down modules means less heat will be produced, lowering your thermal signature and thus increasing your chance to disappear from your enemies' sensors.
Of course you can also combine silent running with powered down components in order to increase the time you can stay "locked up" without taking heat damage. Especially useful if you lack a heat sink launcher. Veteran pilot Isinona displays this nicely in their smuggler video.
Exact priority settings should be defined according to a ship's exact capabilities, as some ships would only require a list of things you don't mind shutting down when taking damage, whereas others need you to juggle their modules for maximum efficiency, deliberately shutting down non-critical systems to power others because the reactor cannot keep everything online simultaneously. I've had that with my Eagle, where I had to put my Warrant Scanner into a higher priority just to be able to use it at all, and each time I deployed my weapons both the FSD and the Interdictor system went offline (intentionally, as they were the two things I didn't need in combat). You can also afford some less important systems on a higher priority based solely on them just requiring a small amount of power ... it's up to you!
None of this is truly necessary, but I love how the game allows you to do it.
Pacific wrote:Think that possibly saved my skin yesterday when I jumped into a system full of law enforcement ships, and they weren't too pleased with the contents of my cargo hold! Just gave me the engine speed to pull clear of them and make the jump to cruise speed.
Hahah, nice!
You could also do a Han Solo and drop any illegal cargo once you notice a scan being initiated, but of course this would mean suffering their loss.
Pacific wrote:Out of interest, has anyone had luck upgrading their weapons? I still have the starting pulse lasers on my Eagle, although have since added a missile rack which helps somewhat. A lot of the options in outfitters seem comparable or in some cases even inferior to the weapons already fitted.
Availability depends a lot on the individual system. As a rule of thumb, the more high-tech a system is, the more likely it is that you find good components for sale at their starports. Most ports specialise in one or two areas, though, so maybe there's one station that has loads of weapons, but no shield generators, whilst the next one offers a bunch of sensors and drives, but has no cargo racks whatsoever.
I'm kind of missing the "variant" weapons from the last Beta - stuff like high impact m-cannons or overcharged burst lasers. I wonder if they are just rebalancing them, or if they're now intended as special rewards, or if they are just ultra-rare? I hope they didn't take em out completely.
I have just got a Cobra Mk3 myself Soladrin! Seems nice so far, big increase in size though to the Eagle I was flying about in before.
Today's question! How on earth does reputation work? I've spent ages in Empire space doing Empire missions - courier missions, pirate killing etc. However, my faction rating with them (despite having an 'up' arrow next to it for ages) has actually gone to 'unfriendly'. Now, unless my understanding of the English language isn't the same as this game, surely that is below the normal Neutral rating? The air traffic control people seem to think so as well, saying "finish your business and be on your way!"
Does anyone know how the rep system works, is it worth persisting with it?
So, I've gotten so into this game I actually want to get a joystick.
So, since I've not owned a joystick since playing Commanche Gold 15-20 years ago, I will be needing some advice.
Any tips/first hand experience with a good midrange joystick? Let's say, 30-100 dollar range.
Edit: So, just did my first mining run in the Cobra MK3. A full cargo hold netted me about 275k. Mining platinum paladium and gold. Oh, and an additional 80k from blowing up pirates who thought they could steal my gak.
How big is your hold, and how long did it take? I might need to think about trying some other income method. I've been bounty hunting since release and I don't see too much money from it.
To add insult to injury, I haven't hit expert yet despite 600+ bounties claimed.
Playing M+KB at the moment.
I'm using Railguns (class 2 on the Cobra, might as well use the extra power the Cobra gets over the Viper), but the expense makes me want to swap them out... I don't know what to put as a secondary weapon yet.
I recently got a "Cyborg F.L.Y 5" joystick for £50, new.
It has 12 buttons and a throttle.
Docking is so much easier now, as the hat handles up/down and side-slide thrusters.
Flying is odd, as the default stick functions are dive and roll, being more like actual aircraft, I assume. Twisting the stick handles horizontal turns.
Skinnereal wrote: I recently got a "Cyborg F.L.Y 5" joystick for £50, new.
It has 12 buttons and a throttle.
Docking is so much easier now, as the hat handles up/down and side-slide thrusters.
Flying is odd, as the default stick functions are dive and roll, being more like actual aircraft, I assume. Twisting the stick handles horizontal turns.
Well, that should all be rebind-able though.
And Daba, my hold is 18 tons (though I recently downgraded it to 16 to get an interdictor)
Just do the math, though, Platinum sells for 19,5k in Cleve hub (erivate system) Paladium for 14,5 en gold for 9,5. Also so far Cleve Hub has been my main home base where I always park. I mostly mine the astaroid belts in the LHS 3447 system since they constantly get checked by the feds which keeps pirates away.
Hmm, I never did any mining but I might give it a go, on a second ship maybe. My spare Adder is up in Alliance space though, away from my normal area (around the Fed/Empire border side of Achenar).
I might try my hand in trading. I have enough money to get a Type-6, some upgrades and capital to start trading. The question is finding good routes. I've mainly done rare trading when heading to Alliance space to redeem vouchers there so might as well make some cash with the rares.
Parked my beloved Cobra to pick up a Type 6 to see the world of commerce. Might go back to do some big game hunting with it, if this gets a bit too humdrum in the transporter.
Agreed, its also hard to feel like you're really accomplishing anything until you can start moving more than 20T of cargo per load, even then it doesn't really feel worthwhile. Making the jump from hauler (22T) to Cobra (40T or more without shields) was huge. Personally I think there needs to be a freighter type that is in between the hauler and Cobra (and by extension the Type 6 which is a massive increase in capability over the Cobra itself, and an even more massive increase over the Hauler). There should also be more options in between the Cobra/Type 6 and the Asp. Thats a pretty big jump in costs
I really love this game so far, but I just can't see how mining is profitable. I tried it, but it just takes so much time to collect all those little pieces and refine them. The prices for the refined minerals are just not high enough considering the time you put into them.
Guess I am back to stealing other people's stuff.
Yar har fiddle-dee-dee... being a pirate is all right to be!
Can't wait for when they will add explorable planets, stations and ships etc.
chaos0xomega wrote: Did you at least have enough money to cover the insurance expenditure on your ship + enough to do start trading again?
Oh yeah, I was on my way to 2mil. Insurance was only 70k for my 1,2mil Cobra. Got most of the money back in about an hours worth of space trucking and then went on to buy myself a Lakon Type-6 without selling my Cobra. Though, will probably kick the cobra to the curb and get a viper for my combat needs.
My type 6 doesn't even have weapons. Just 88 cargo bays, fattest FSD and power coupling. SPACE TRUCK.
AdeptSister wrote: Is it possible to convoy in this game? Or is it more each merchant for themselves?
Not yet. AFAIK they will be implementing a squad system that will allow synced jumps and such. They are still implementing most of the social features of this game.
chaos0xomega wrote: Did you at least have enough money to cover the insurance expenditure on your ship + enough to do start trading again?
Oh yeah, I was on my way to 2mil. Insurance was only 70k for my 1,2mil Cobra. Got most of the money back in about an hours worth of space trucking and then went on to buy myself a Lakon Type-6 without selling my Cobra. Though, will probably kick the cobra to the curb and get a viper for my combat needs.
My type 6 doesn't even have weapons. Just 88 cargo bays, fattest FSD and power coupling. SPACE TRUCK.
You're living my dream....
I would keep the Cobra though, but then again Im not quite sold on the Viper. It looks cool but it seems its too constrained by fuel/energy capacity to really do anything other than fly around locally.
chaos0xomega wrote: Did you at least have enough money to cover the insurance expenditure on your ship + enough to do start trading again?
Oh yeah, I was on my way to 2mil. Insurance was only 70k for my 1,2mil Cobra. Got most of the money back in about an hours worth of space trucking and then went on to buy myself a Lakon Type-6 without selling my Cobra. Though, will probably kick the cobra to the curb and get a viper for my combat needs.
My type 6 doesn't even have weapons. Just 88 cargo bays, fattest FSD and power coupling. SPACE TRUCK.
You're living my dream....
I would keep the Cobra though, but then again Im not quite sold on the Viper. It looks cool but it seems its too constrained by fuel/energy capacity to really do anything other than fly around locally.
The reason I probably won't keep the cobra is because it's as agile as my toilet. The viper is going to be my dedicated combat ship until I can afford a Python.
Blacksails wrote: Reading this thread and the official website has piqued my curiosity.
I was once an Eve Online junky, and I'm curious how much this game has in similarity, or if anyone else who plays E: D once played Eve.
Are there character skills that need to be trained, or is it all player skill and acquiring money to progress?
Eve player here. The two games are not the same. Elite is 100% 'twitch' based, the only skills that matter are your own personal skills with a keyboard/mouse or a flight stick.
Blacksails wrote: Reading this thread and the official website has piqued my curiosity.
I was once an Eve Online junky, and I'm curious how much this game has in similarity, or if anyone else who plays E: D once played Eve.
Are there character skills that need to be trained, or is it all player skill and acquiring money to progress?
Eve player here. The two games are not the same. Elite is 100% 'twitch' based, the only skills that matter are your own personal skills with a keyboard/mouse or a flight stick.
which is how it should be. Though, there's also quite a bit of micromanagement during combat. Redirecting power to systems, using your side screen to target sub-targets etc.
Also, tip for anyone who finds themselves in a fight with an Anaconda, target the powerplant and the things go down reasonably well. I've killed like 5 in my cobra now. They fetch upwards of 100k for bounties and contracts.
I found the Cobra pretty agile (agile enough anyway), except for the Yaw boosters which seem pretty poor.
The Viper is nippy, but don't expect to get very far in it as it's FSD-challenged.
I'll probably buy back a Viper sometime though, maybe after I've paid off the type-6 I have (about 600-700k left to go). Maybe take it into some warzones.
Daba wrote: I found the Cobra pretty agile (agile enough anyway), except for the Yaw boosters which seem pretty poor.
The Viper is nippy, but don't expect to get very far in it as it's FSD-challenged.
I'll probably buy back a Viper sometime though, maybe after I've paid off the type-6 I have (about 600-700k left to go). Maybe take it into some warzones.
Like I said, it's for combat purposes only, hell, if possible I'll probably even downgrade the FSD if it gives me less mass and energy use. My space truck can jump 22 LY (unladen) anyway.
Eve player here. The two games are not the same. Elite is 100% 'twitch' based, the only skills that matter are your own personal skills with a keyboard/mouse or a flight stick.
Cool, that's the comparison I want to hear.
Is a flight stick recommended, or does M/K work fine?
Looks beautiful from the screenshots. Ships look cool too. Hopefully my laptop can run it.
I do it with M/K and it's certainly doable, that said, I am looking into getting a flight stick because I think it it will be better for combat especially.
The mouse is very precise, but I'm used to it as pitch/roll on mouse was what I played in an old Elite game, and used in Planetside 2 for the fighters.
Problem with flight stick is I'll probably only be happy with a pricy one :s
The best setup I've found in terms of immersion/feel is the Saitek X52, with full throttle control. Think you can get those for £60-70 if you are prepared to buy second hand, around £100 for new but well worth it if you're going to play this game a lot or flight sims.
But, I share a computer with other people - if I want to jump on and off for 30 mins or so, I've started using just a PC controller with the keyboard. Like most analogue controls these days it's remarkably precise. Means I can just throw it to one side if I need to alt-tab because someone else wants to check what their ebay stuff is finishing on..
So, Fer de Lance concept art was revealed in the newsletter.
I want 3.
So, I've decided that the Federation is not my thing and have GTFO'd to Imperial space. I am now getting rich off trading Imperial Slaves. 15m and counting. Also started doing the occasional reputation and rank mission so I'm now at the first rung of the Imperial Ladder. I want to get my hands on a Clipper.
Soladrin wrote: So, Fer de Lance concept art was revealed in the newsletter.
I want 3.
So, I've decided that the Federation is not my thing and have GTFO'd to Imperial space. I am now getting rich off trading Imperial Slaves. 15m and counting. Also started doing the occasional reputation and rank mission so I'm now at the first rung of the Imperial Ladder. I want to get my hands on a Clipper.
Please give me some of your secrets!
I'm busting my ass for even 250k or so at the moment, and that's with a fair amount of time spent studying trade routes.
Also completely given up on reputation, I've done tons of missions for the Imperials and can't seem to get above 'unfriendly' (which I'm assuming is actually lower than the 'neutral' you start on!) Rapidly running out of tenacity, and my finger was hovering over Wasteland 2 today..
Well, all you need to do is find two ports within about 3 jumps of each other where you buy low and sell high to each other. I don't do any trade runs with a profit lower then 1k per ton.
And for those of you who get reputation missions where you need to fetch Combat Enhancers or Personal Weapons. Go to any system that's in Anarchy. They always sell the good stuff.
Are the rankings messed up / easier for Merchant ranks?
I made more money getting 'Expert' doing bounties (which is secondary I thought) than I made profit from trading, yet I hit the trading equivalent 'Merchant' with a smaller number?
Right, got the Asp and it's much nicer to fly than the Type-6. Can also pop into a nav bacon and fight some pirates too, and can have fun with 4x burst lasers. Anyone got one of the bigger ships yet?
Sometime later this month or early next, we are getting proper subfactions that you can align yourself to and wage war on others, which sounds like fun.
I'm over 7k LY away at the moment, so it all seems a bit distant. I did get that Fer-de-Lance though.
How long does it take to get used to a joystick after playing iwth M+K for a while?
The important thing is that, unlike in Eve, you won't feel like you're "missing out" on something.
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