2801

Glad to hear you found a scheme that works for you gameover, it’s all down to individual preference.

Finally figured out how to use the fuel scoop effectively without causing massive hull damage that costs more to repair than the fuel would have been to buy! It will certainly pay for itself fairly quickly. Having less luck otherwise; I’m currently in an anarchy system looking for black boxes, and I keep getting interdicted by npcs. “Hand over your cargo!” and “I want it all!” they say… except my cargo bay is completely empty dudes! Bugger off! Not sure what’s going on. The last one to interdict me was a Lakon Type-9. Holy crap, FSD! FSD! Except he ended up ramming me (possibly not entirely deliberately), killing my shields and half my hull in one hit. Damn. It took ages to get away from that one, but I limped back to Gilgamesh nursing a headache. Since I sold the Sidewinder I’ve gone from making 50-100k a day on a mix of bounties and missions, to actually losing money or barely scraping 5-10k profit. Going to be a long haul to get back in the “game”, so I feel like some movie action hero who’s just gone through the second act setback before coming back stronger than ever!

2802

There is a weird bug with searching the galaxy map for Frey. As you mentioned, when you search, you get Freyr, which is way the hell away from Frey. However, if you hit search again, though, it goes to the Frey you want.

2803

The search returns things in an alphabetical order. So when I was searching for a system that started with 37, it first showed me a system 37 A…, then pressing it again and again, I got to the system I was looking for, which had 37 G…something something. So when I searched for Frey and got Freyr, I automatically hit the button again to get Frey. The search algorithm just considers r to come before a space or carriage return or null or whatever they have in the database for Frey after the letter y.

2804

Following those tips I easily found Frey and began my trip…and then ran out of gas about halfway. So I’m in an unexplored system with less than one bubble of fuel. I was aware of the fuel issue…just figured I’d be able to fill up on the way I guess --lesson learned.

I’m sure I’m done for and will have to start over…is there any way to ‘hit a reset button’ or do I have to literally run the ship out of fuel and wait to croak?

There’s not even any other ships around to sacrifice myself to.

2805

Hit 4 to bring up the panel to your right, in the last section there should be a way to self-destruct your ship.

2806

Here’s my problem: I suck in combat. “Suck” is defined as: can’t even beat the ship in the first combat tutorial.

I am using a (new) T.Flight Hotas, just getting used to it. Suffice it to say that I wasn’t even close to handling dogfighting in my few weeks with mouse and keyboard.

I’m fine if I never get good at it. But I’d love to be able to do some easy bounty missions at some point. I’m not going to try in-game combat, though, until I can complete the tutorials. When I’m interdicted in-game, I run for the hills (and I usually do escape).

When I play the tutorial, I have my ship moving at about half maximum speed. Finding the opponent is not a problem – I’ve OK with making use of the scanner to orient my ship properly. The real problem is simply targeting as the bad guy zips by. He’s just too fast and my reflexes are too slow.

Any suggestions?

2807

Make sure you are at the optimal speed for maneuverability. Active speed management I’ve found is key.

I started with K+M and got really good with it. I picked up a gamepad and can’t decide what I like better. I think I might actually be erring back to the keys.

2808

More coffee? or other stimulant? Or in more serious tone, how many of those great play guides/tutorial video’s have you followed? I know in the older Elite games it took a while for combat to click (and that was full Newtonian combat) but there was a specific technique to it and as they say practice makes perfect, it’s just that some people have to practice more than others.

Those guides i mention are on the main elite forums, i think now in the ‘New comers’ section?

2809

Combat takes some getting used to, to be sure. I wasn’t great at combat in the beginning either, with with practice I’ve been getting better.

Now is the problem initially targeting him, or is it keeping him lined up so you can hit him?

2810

Thanks for the tip. I’ll pay more attention to being in the blue zone.

Thanks, I’ll try to find some guides. And, I guess I just need lots of practice.

Do you folks usually keep Flight Assist on during combat? Or does that hinder maneuverability?

2811

Brian I’m not sure I understand the difference between those two.

2812

Keep flight assist ON unless you really feel like trying to go pro. I use it, but just in limited bursts when trying to make a quick maneuver (I still suck at it). I couldn’t imagine using it off the majority of the time.

2813

Not really applicable to the first combat tutorial (possibly the second?), but for the game, buy and equip gimballed guns. They’ll generally track things more or less in the center of the screen so you don’t have to have the super-fine motor control of your youth.

2814

I love the idea of turning flight assist off to strafe enemies, but it throws the roll and pitch sensitivity waaaay off (which makes sense I guess) and I end up flailing around until I switch FA back on again!

The main problem with M&K I find is throttle control. I really want to change throttle a lot during combat, to speed past enemies, then back into optimal turning speed, etc, and while I can do this ok on a keyboard it’s certainly not as fluid as having it on a stick or dedicated throttle control. I think that alone will push me over the edge into getting a stick when I get back to Darwin.

2815

On your right panel, you’ll find a self destruct button under your systems (landing gear, ship lights, etc. Should be near the bottom.

2816

I never tried M+K but I’m doing pretty good with the 360 controller. I went with the “Gamepad with yaw” config. I plan to try the advanced gamepad setting soon, but I’m generally terrible at games where too many combos are on the controller, so I’m hesitant.

I’m going to order the Thrustmaster T-Flight when they become available again. I hate that I missed all the BF/Holiday sales, but who knew I was going to get hooked on a space sim? :)

2817

I had a shameful amount of trouble with it too. He won’t shoot until you do, so just get on his tail and practice staying there. Pretty soon your eyes will start flicking to the distance indicator. When you feel comfortable following him, open fire. At that point you should be ready with the throttle to adapt to him. He may try to boost away. Boost after him. If things should mess up, keep throttle around the blue zone. If things REALLY mess up, all power to engines and boost away until you can come back on him.

2818

Thanks deanco for the tips.

I just watched a combat tutorial video. The guy used Voice Attack which was actually very helpful because I could hear what commands he was implementing during combat, so I learned a bunch.

Question: this guy constantly alternated between Power to Weapons and Power to Shields. Is this an approach that’s vital to success? Or does it matter little?

2819

When you’re pitching up to bring him back into your sights, applying vertical thrust upwards will help to bring the nose up faster. Same applies to any other direction of course.

2820

I’d say it vital to getting good. Depends on the weapons you’re using as well; with laser weapons they’ll overheat much more slowly if you have full power to weapons, but then you have to sacrifice the others. I tend to have full weapons when in close-up dogfight, then to sys if my shields start taking a beating, and eng if I need to get the hell out of there. I’ll sometimes have partial weapons and partial shields as well.