Lasers

[davidmpratt]

I am having great difficulty in getting a kill using even a military laser. When I played Elite on the BBC B, I found reducing speed helped to kill using lasers. This does not seem to work with Oolite. What am I doing wrong? Will things improve as my rating improves (I am currently armless)?

[Smivs]

Silly but obvious question...you are hitting the target aren't you?
A military laser should dispatch any of the 'core' ships relatively easily. You will know when you are hitting your target by a change in the sound of the laser, and if you are close to the target you will see the 'hit' as well.
Reducing speed will help your aim (but not the efficiency of the laser), and your rating also does not affect the lasers, it only reflects how skillful you've been with them

[DaddyHoggy]

In the original Elite the laser "magically" went to the exact centre of the screen, so if you were exactly on the dot - you hit your target.

In Oolite, the laser has a specific, actual position and the camera view (of your Forward view) has an actually position too - they're not in the same place (otherwise you'd be looking down the inside of the beam) - so there is a genuine parallax between where your laser goes and where the centre of the screen is for your camera - it's not much - but it's enough to miss a small target at long ranges unless you learn where you actually need to aim to take into account the parallax.

Hope this helps.

(Note: on the C64 version of Elite - there was a point where a potential threat went from being a single point (which was actually 2x2 pixels and therefore quite big) to actually rendered/calculated polygons, which was actually smaller and therefore harder to hit - so the trick was always to get a ship at a range where it was close enough to be seen, but still far enough away to be a solid 2x2 array of pixels)

[cim]

Certainly some of it is practice.

A few things which might help you, assuming the problem is "not hitting your target enough":
- there is a different sound for "laser hit" and "laser miss" to give you a bit of feedback. In the default Oolite soundset, though, the difference is fairly subtle. Installing a soundset OXP (or BGS) with more distinct sounds may help you know when to keep firing and when to stop and re-aim
- at long range, a Scanner Targeting Enhancement makes aiming a lot easier. If you've already got one, then some HUD OXPs (or you can also get it as an independent piece of equipment with the right OXP), enable "target reticle sensitive" which makes the targeting box turn red when your aim is good.
- lower speed does generally help in dogfights by improving your turning circle, and at range by giving you more time before you're no longer at range. The effect is subtle, though.
- the Lave Academy OXP lets you chase some weak but small drone targets. Worth doing with a pulse laser once you've got the hang of doing it with a beam laser, to really check your aim is good
- similarly Combat Simulator OXP will let you rapidly run through a series of fights tuned to your preferred difficulty without having to leave the station and fly down the spacelane hoping to get a fair fight.

If you are consistently hitting your target - and most ships from the core game other than freighters, Thargoids, and the occasional toughened fighter will die after a second or so of military laser fire - then something might be up, and it might help to post your OXP list from Latest.log in case you've accidentally installed something that makes the fights much more difficult.

[Diziet Sma]

In Oolite, the laser has a specific, actual position and the camera view (of your Forward view) has an actually position too - they're not in the same place (otherwise you'd be looking down the inside of the beam) - so there is a genuine parallax between where your laser goes and where the centre of the screen is for your camera - it's not much - but it's enough to miss a small target at long ranges unless you learn where you actually need to aim to take into account the parallax.

And on some ships, the parallax can be considerable.. the Falcon being a case in point. What ship are you flying?

[davidmpratt]

Thanks cim, the Scanner Targetting Enhancement helps. I am now mostly harmess!