Fighting with the controls- worth getting a joystick?

[Commander McLane]

Interesting that JohnnyBoy uses basically the opposite tactics to me. How do you stay alive taking an entire swarm's laser fire on your front shield while you slooooooooowly close with them?

Simply because they don't aim better than you do. So most of the swarm's fire is not on your front shield, but somewhere next to your front shield most of the time. If, however, three of four of them actually land a couple of hits, you tend to be in trouble. (Turn around fast, and <see Disembodied's and DaddyHoggy's posts>. )

Although you can certainly hit a python more easily than a Cobra Mk I at long range I find it a bit pointless to do so since they can take an entire cold->overheated blast of military laser right on the nose and still be alive.

No. No Python will survive a full military salvo, provided it actually hits (been there, done that; literally hundreds of times).

Personally I also prefer the slow-down-and-use-your-front-lasers-first tactics. But I'm rather indiscriminate as far as a specific order of killing is concerned. My philosophy is basically: Who gets into the crosshairs first, dies first.

Although I try to spare the Python. But that's simply because I find it more convenient to kill it last from short distance and scoop its entire load together, as opposed to kill it first and have its cargo containers spilled all over the place, where I have to hunt them down one by one later.

[Disembodied]

My philosophy is basically: Who gets into the crosshairs first, dies first.

That's generally a good rule, I find, if one's sniping skills are up to it: as LittleBear says, having a big edge in laser range is often good! Mind you, it's also worth taking the time to have a little scan around to see exactly who you're up against, and making a careful selection of target numero uno. Some of the multi-laser ships -- Iguanas, Wolf IIs, Cats etc. -- can be nasty if they get a bead on you (I once saw an Iggie pop a Behemoth; presumably the Iggie's friends had done a bit of damage too, and bought the farm in the process, but even so it was impressive that he was able to finish the Behemoth off on his own). If I'm up against any of those I prefer to pop them first off.

Even for those without reversible brains, Monty Pythoning has the added advantage of stringing out a pursuing pack, as some are faster than others. A five- or six-ship gang can often be turned into five or six easily survivable one-on-one duels, just by heading off in the opposite direction.

[JohnnyBoy]

Mind you, it's also worth taking the time to have a little scan around to see exactly who you're up against, and making a careful selection of target numero uno.

Yes, there's nothing that provokes me to scream rude expletives quicker than discovering that I've just wandered into the crosshairs of a Basilisk or Hydra.

[Thargoid]

What's that "doesn't work in Oolite"-stuff? The only thing you have to do is to properly learn manoeuvering with any of the views engaged. Don't they teach that anymore in the Flight Academy at Lave? (Oh, considering where you're coming from, you probably never underwent the proper academy training? (But then, what are you complaining about? Thargoids use turreted lasers. No reason to aim at all! ))

Anyway, I never ever have used "mirror controls" in any version of Elite. Therefore I can kill my enemies from all angles, in all views.

Just try it. It's really not that hard.

This was back in the days of the ZX Spectrum (yes I'm an old alien), when you were lucky if the keys didn't get themselves wedged under the plastic and drove you all over the damn place.

Now just have the "fun" of using a Dell laptop for it, so the screen resolution ain't that great to do the long-shots (zap that pixel!). Methinks the suggested clearskies OXP may need investigating, especially given some recent frame-lag after adding some other OXPs.

[LittleBear]

You may also need to turn up the brightness (the physical button on the monitor) as Oolite looks very dark on some systems. Turned up to full on mine gives windows a very washed out look, but is necessary to see what I'm doing on Oolite.

[flimflam_machine]

Although you can certainly hit a python more easily than a Cobra Mk I at long range I find it a bit pointless to do so since they can take an entire cold->overheated blast of military laser right on the nose and still be alive.

No. No Python will survive a full military salvo, provided it actually hits (been there, done that; literally hundreds of times).

Fair enough, my aiming's probably not perfect. However, they certainly are tougher than smaller ships and I find that the tendency of small ships to come apart more easily more than compensates for their being more difficult to hit. Plus, if a Python is left in the ensuing melee it's lack of agility means that it's less likely to be able to draw a bead on you. Plus, as you say, it's more convenient to have all its containers in one place, so leave it till last.

I didn't know that the different lasers had different ranges. Perhaps the tinyness of my monitor (12") means that I can't actually hit anything at reeeeeeeeeeeeaaaaaally long range (>15km) and end up head-to-head with multiple ships at <10km, all of which are chewing away at my front shield with their inferior lasers. Perhaps that's why I've developed the tactics of sending missiles out first against weaker targets and then boosting in towards them to break up their fire.

[Thargoid]

You may also need to turn up the brightness (the physical button on the monitor) as Oolite looks very dark on some systems. Turned up to full on mine gives windows a very washed out look, but is necessary to see what I'm doing on Oolite.

Greetings,

Already done, it doesn't help much I'm afraid (the joys of a small-ish laptop display), although here the scanner targetting enhancement is my friend. That said I can usually find them eventually, just follow their puny laser beam back to source...

[Cmdr. Maegil]

Anyway, I never ever have used "mirror controls" in any version of Elite. Therefore I can kill my enemies from all angles, in all views.

Waaay back then, I used to turn the joystick around when in the rear view... Less than ideal, but it helped.

This was back in the days of the ZX Spectrum (yes I'm an old alien), when you were lucky if the keys didn't get themselves wedged under the plastic and drove you all over the damn place.

Ohhh, the nostalgia!
I remember that problem on a friend's Speccy with hard keys, sometimes they'd wedge under the plate; but not so much on my own rubber-keyed machine. IIRC, the rubber keyboards also needed less force (or rather, the fingers' weight would already leave the keys half depressed, as one does when preparing to pull a trigger).

Now just have the "fun" of using a Dell laptop for it, so the screen resolution ain't that great to do the long-shots (zap that pixel!).

Resolution? What are you talking about, the Speccy's pixels were much bigger precisely because of the lower res...

[TGHC]

I used to use to turn the joystick upside down with my old Amstrad.

What I did find using a joystick against highly manouverable ships like sidewinders was that I felt like I was going to snap the stick off the base.

I guess the sticks of today must be a lot more robust.

[Thargoid]

Resolution? What are you talking about, the Speccy's pixels were much bigger precisely because of the lower res...

1024 x 768, full screen.

I'm still shooting pixels half the time, at least the fighter HUD helps with the aim...

[JohnnyBoy]

1024 x 768, full screen.

I'm still shooting pixels half the time, at least the fighter HUD helps with the aim...

I was running Oolite at 1024x768 on a 15-incher for a long while. Really makes me appreciate this 20-inch Iiyama that I'm running at its native 1600x1200!

[flimflam_machine]

What does the fighter HUD have that helps with long range aiming?

Any other recommendations for HUDs out there?

[caracal]

Pfft, don’t believe these people. Mouse control is vastly superior for fine aim.

Does the mouse not work on the Linux version? I tried Shift-M to no effect. Am I missing something? Running oolite svn version from 17 June under Ubuntu 7.10.

Not that the keyboard and joystick together are letting me down, but when you said "fine aim" my ears perked up. Since the precision-toggle bug is preventing my joystick from allowing fine control, and as far as I can tell there's no precision toggle at all for the keyboard, I have had to learn how to "nudge" the aiming point onto my target when I'm sniping from long range. Which I do a lot.

[caracal]

What does the fighter HUD have that helps with long range aiming?

Any other recommendations for HUDs out there?

For me, the red dot in the middle of the mil-spec HUD makes all the difference. Other HUDs may be pretty, but having that aim point is something I grew attached to within about five minutes, and now can't live without. As pointed out elsewhere, the dot isn't always where the laser will hit, but it's a reference point, and not having it makes me a lot more sloppy when aiming.

Only took me about half an hour to find out how to replace a new ship's custom HUD with the mil-spec one. The new G-HUD and Medusa look like they might be worth a shot too.

[Thargoid]

Greetings,

I was referring to the disc with the hole in it (doughnut, polo mint, call it what you will in human language), which does much the same job as the red spot.

Not as good as self-aiming Thargoid lasers of course, but allowances have to be made when flying human ships