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Elite Dangerous

Started by Alberon, July 22, 2014, 09:19:25 PM

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Hangthebuggers

Quote from: wasp_f15ting on December 27, 2014, 12:50:33 AM
Any of you playing this, played EVE? Is it similar or is it more fun?

I play Eve but not Elite. Tempted though.

Although I don't think I'll ever recreate the glories days of putting a buy order up for 00.2 and receiving a 1.2 billion blueprint.


Alberon

Still playing and enjoying this. A week or so back I finally earned enough for a Cobra Mk III and I traded in my Hauler for it. The upshot of this is I'm now hunting pirates. I'm still rated Harmless in combat (though I'm up to Mostly Penniless and Mostly Aimless in the two other main ranks). I've mostly been up against Sidewinders and Eagles at the moment and they are quite easy to destroy. I've not been up against anything that fires missiles, so I should pick up a point defence turret or chaff launcher before I do.

The hardest battle so far was against a Federal Dropship which I fought as part of a Federation Navy advancement mission. It battered my hull down to 50% before I finally nailed it. I've lost a couple of ships that ran when their hull dropped too low, but you can target specific systems of enemy ships, knocking out drive systems for instance, to stop that happening.

Elite makes each ship at its most manoeuvrable at about half speed (represented by the blue part of the speedometer). At that speed it will turn much faster. So part of each fight is turning about each other trying to get the other in your sights. I've not really fought another player yet though. The only time I've attacked another player was back in the Beta. I followed him out of a space station and he wasn't paying attention, so as soon as I got beyond the no-fire zone I blew him up before he realised he was under fire.

I'm currently in a system with no space stations, only two smaller platforms. The advantage of platforms is that they don't scan you before you land, so if you have a bounty on your head you can safely dock and pay it off. If you want. In this system I'm currently in, one of the platforms belongs to the Federation and one is independent. If I pick up cargo dropped by other ships (which is always marked stolen) I take it to the independent platform to flog on the black market, and if I get a bounty I go to the Federation one to cash it in.

Thursday

I've given this a go and I really can't handle the controls, I feel like I'm missing something obvious. It seems like you've got the 2 speed options where you're in a normal mode and then supercruise mode, which allow you to jump from one system to another, but if you want to dock some cargo at another station, it's really, really difficult  to time it so you can come out of supercruise mode and you'll either zip past the station and suddenly be a couple of days away from it, or come out too soon and be half an hour away from the station. Am I missing some kind of obvious gear shift button?

Also I can't even pass the basic combat training test.

mook

^ son, you needed to hone the CRAFT on the keyboard of a bbc model b. it's too late for you now, for us old timers it's INATE. or something.

NoSleep

Quote from: Thursday on January 08, 2015, 02:37:36 PM
I've given this a go and I really can't handle the controls, I feel like I'm missing something obvious. It seems like you've got the 2 speed options where you're in a normal mode and then supercruise mode, which allow you to jump from one system to another, but if you want to dock some cargo at another station, it's really, really difficult  to time it so you can come out of supercruise mode and you'll either zip past the station and suddenly be a couple of days away from it, or come out too soon and be half an hour away from the station. Am I missing some kind of obvious gear shift button?

Also I can't even pass the basic combat training test.

Sounds like there's elements of the original Elite still present. You're not meant to pop out of hyperspace right next to your targetted system's space station in the original Elite, and that's because the journey, from where where you pop out of hyperspace to the targetted space station, is the heart of the game. That is where you meet pirates, police, other traders, asteroids, bounty hunters and start trying to earn that coveted "Elite" status.

Thursday

Fair enough, but it just seems like the journey was just slightly too long to the point where I wondered if I was doing something wrong. I'm playing solo mode at the moment anyway just while I get used to it and learn the basics.

NoSleep

Perhaps there's something similar to this in Dangerous:

In Elite, it was possible to shorten the journey from the edge of the system to the space station by using the "jump" command, which only worked if there were no other craft within a certain proximity of your own. This could, of course, prompt you to destroy even innocent traders in your proximity, just to speed your journey to the space station[nb]Well, I know I have.[/nb].

mook

Quote from: NoSleep on January 08, 2015, 04:07:33 PM
Perhaps there's something similar to this in Dangerous:

In Elite, it was possible to shorten the journey from the edge of the system to the space station by using the "jump" command, which only worked if there were no other craft within a certain proximity of your own. This could, of course, prompt you to destroy even innocent traders in your proximity, just to speed your journey to the space station[nb]Well, I know I have.[/nb].

as i remember you didn't get to use the "jump" command until you'd earned enough cash to pay for the automatic landing gizmo, by which time you'd mastered getting the ship through the rotating letterbox anyway. mind, it was many, many years ago now so i might be mis-remembering it.

Alberon

There are effectively three speed modes in Elite Dangerous. You've got your basic hyperspace jump between systems, your frameshift drive for moving around within systems and normal pootling around for docking and combat.

As I said above, for pootling around[nb]That is it's official name.[nb]Or at least it will be if I ever end up running the game.[/nb][/nb] you have to stick to the blue section of the speedometer for maximum manoeuvrability. In frameshift drive the same blue part of the speedometer is there, but here you need to stay within the blue part or you will overshoot the target. When you get within 1 million meters of the target, and you are going slow enough, a blue message will pop up saying something like 'destination locked'. At this point you hit J and drop out of frameshift and you'll be just 10km from the platform or station.

Then it's just a matter of docking without making a horrible arse of yourself and you're sorted.

Apparently it is possible to just use the Frameshift drive to reach other star systems, but that would take many many days to do.

NoSleep

Quote from: mook on January 08, 2015, 05:20:42 PM
as i remember you didn't get to use the "jump" command until you'd earned enough cash to pay for the automatic landing gizmo, by which time you'd mastered getting the ship through the rotating letterbox anyway. mind, it was many, many years ago now so i might be mis-remembering it.

It wasn't equipment in the original game. I just checked the manual of the NES version and it's available from the out but is described as a kind of "fast-forward" until you fly into an area where there are other ships in your proximity.

If that's the case it couldn't happen in an online version of the game, although they could reintroduce it as a piece of equipment with a similar local jump ability[nb]As described in Alberon's post[/nb].

Thursday

I'm getting the hang of this now although the police are now willing to kill me because I didn't know how to pay off the fines for some accidental docking infractions.

Also I've not found where you can buy better ships and equipment, they don't seem to be at stations. And I don't understand how to trade with the seeking luxuries ships.

Okay so I'm not getting the hang of it but I am finding it compelling despite being shite.

Alberon

Fines can be paid off by going to the smaller platforms and going to the contacts menu.

To pay off Federation fines, for example, you do have to be at a Federation platform.

You can see what each station provides in each system by going to the Galaxy map and then looking at the system view for the star you're planning to go to. Most stations have outfitting centres (though they don't all have the same modules) but only relatively few  have shipyards.

I don't think there is anything you can do with the luxury seeking ships. Yet. Or, if there is, I haven't worked it out.

NoSleep

Can you blast them to smithereens and scoop up the booty?

mook

can you scoop up fuel by skimming a sun?

Alberon

Yep, but you have to buy the module for it.

There are whole stretches of the Galaxy that aren't colonised. So to travel through those gathering exploration data its a must.

Thursday

YAASSS I got a couple of bounties. I mean it was only an NPC, and the police were doing most of the work, I just got the final shot but still.

Cold Meat Platter

I'm just fannying around trying to get to grips with this thing at the moment but does anyone fancy doing some CaB space truckin'? Not actually been online yet, just trying to get enough for a Cobra Mk.III.

I am commander CRABSANTLER, feel free to add me as a friend and I'll see you online once my skills are up to par.

Alberon

Sounds like a good idea. Maybe even get a group going in time. I'm Commander ALBERON on there. At the moment there doesn't seem much use for playing with friends, but there is some talk of a new feature coming soon of player Wings (which sounds like grouping in other MMOs).

I got lucky with a bounty the other day. On a whim I went to a Resource Extraction Site (where you can mine things, though I don't have a mining laser at the moment). There were a good few miners, federation patrol ships and pirates around. There was this Anconda with a bounty on it there, and I was planning to give it a wide berth as it is the largest ship in the game currently that can be flown by a player, when I noticed the Federation ships were already engaging it. So when its hull was down to about 30% I opened up on it as well. The Anaconda did turn its attention to me, ripping through my shields in seconds, but in the end it got destroyed before it could seriously damage me. I got about 140K for it as well, which more than offset my repair costs.

Hobo

My laptop exceeds the minimum requirements in all but one thing, the CPU. I have Intel Core i7-4500U CPU @ 1.80GHz rather than a 2 GHz quad core.

I have GeForce GT 750M and 8 gig of RAM.

Can I play? Is the CPU that important to running the game? (I genuinely don't know).

Thanks.


Hobo

I have, it's just the processor that's not up to scratch, but I don't know enough about computers to know if this is a definite no, or that it'll stutter on occasion but still run. Someone please educate a poor ignoramus.

Alberon

I've only got a Duo core running at 3Ghz, 4GB RAM and an Nvidia Geforce GTX 570 and I'm running with most of the graphics settings[nb]actually, it might be all of them[/nb] on high. It seems to run very smoothly the vast majority of the time. I might see the odd bit of sluggishness if I'm in a system with a lot of planets and ships in, but it's rare.

Hobo

Thanks. Unfortunately I don't think it's worth the risk. I will try trawling some gaming or Dell forums to see if anyone's got it running on this model though.


Alberon

Had a slightly odd experience yesterday when I ran into myself. One of the Kickstarter benefits was having your name chucked in the NPC pool, though I don't know the odds of encountering it.

I dropped in on a Unidentified Signal Source (basically random encounters in each system) and there was me in an Eagle flying about. He had no bounty, but since it was in an Anarchy star system I could have blown him up without picking up wanted status. But, sucker that I am, I let him go.

Bump.

This is on sale at Steam for £9.89, which seems reasonable. How is it these days?

I'm a bit busy with Fallout 4 and thinking it might be as cheap or cheaper come Christmas but tempt me.

Ignatius_S

Quote from: The Region Legion on November 26, 2015, 06:52:22 PM
Bump.

This is on sale at Steam for £9.89, which seems reasonable. How is it these days?

I'm a bit busy with Fallout 4 and thinking it might be as cheap or cheaper come Christmas but tempt me.

The first expansion pack is about to launch and until 1 December, there's a preorder bonus of ship paint jobs. Although it's Black Friday, I suspect that's the reason it's on sale at the moment - to try and give the install base a boost so there are more people to potentially pony up for the expansion. It may well be that at Christmas there might be a similar deal - and wouldn't be surprised at all - but I doubt it would be lower than this and suspect it'll be a bit higher.

Personally, I like it a lot and think it'll be well supported by the developers, but found it required a lot of time investment - although I enjoyed my time with it, took a break as there were other games I wanted to play and although have been meaning to return, haven't got round to it. If you do pick it up, I would go in with a view that you will spring for the expansions eventually.

Alberon

I've got back to playing this recently after a few months off. Finally picked up a cheap joystick which does improve the experience a lot. The new expansion that lets you land on airless worlds and drive about finding resources, going to bases, and other stuff which looks interesting.

Hangthebuggers

Bought this last night, played for a bit but don't remember much because I was bollocksed on about three litres of ale.

Once I've shaken off this hangover, I'm going to give it another blast.

What are people using to control it? Keyboard or controller or what?

Hangthebuggers

I've only done a few of the training missions thus far, but fuck me, the sound effects are amazing..... Zzzzzzzmmmmmm pew pew

Steven

Quote from: Hangthebuggers on November 27, 2015, 02:35:27 PM
Bought this last night, played for a bit but don't remember much because I was bollocksed on about three litres of ale.

Bloody irresponsible, hyperspace jumping drunk! You might hit a dwarf star or skid on a black hole..