Oolite Bulletins

Better...does he mean more realistic? I'm not sure, we might have such discussion before...

No, I don't mean that at all. I actually said in my last post that I'm not talking about realism.

Not really.. the lasers we bounce off the Moon now have only spread to a few metres wide at that distance... in theory a tightly collimated beam should have an effective range of much more than 25km in space.

I totally agree, lasers that are hooked up to a supercomputer designed to perfectly compute the lasers trajectory could split a hair. But strap that laser to a F-22 in a dogfight, and the situation changes.

And we have guys on this board who regularly snipe ships at that distance.. right on the edge of the scanner.. I haven't done it myself but from what I recall all you need is the right ship and a joystick in precision mode...just a matter of practice, practice, practice..

Actually, I've gotten pretty good with keyboard aiming. I've remapped the controls so I have full control of YPR+throttle, while also being able to simultaneously fire my laser, and my missiles are pretty accessible, too. Sure it can be a little jerky, but my point is, and this is my key issue, I have nothing to aim at.

I disagree about it being a skill issue. I'm not a twitch gamer, but I can hold my own in any FPS that I've played. I've also played flight games that are a lot more intense than this. Handling the ship isn't the problem. The problem is getting shot and then when I look in the direction the laser is coming from, there is nothing there (well, there is, but it's too far away for it to be displayed). No amount of practice is going to let me see something that isn't visible. And shooting half-blinded at a dark spot in space is not my idea of a fun game.

Combat is a lot like Enemy at the Gates, which is also known as One of the Worst WWII Movies Ever (after Pearl Harbor).

And just to make a point, here are off the top of my head two more techniques for combat that seem to have escaped you.

Actually, they didn't escape me. The problem with missiles is that I can't acquire a target and therefore get a lock unless the target is at least within 10km. However, I'm getting hit from 15km, and the ships are so slow that I'm half dead before I can even close the distance. As for fleeing, I basically started this thread talking about fleeing. The ships are slow. I can't get away before dying. I have yet to even come close to anything resembling an escape.

I think you just need to practice combat a little more. Combat in Elite/Oolite is very different to combat in Privateer, Wing Commander, X-Wing or FreeSpace.

Yeah, I've noticed. Frankly, I think Privateer, WC, and FreeSpace did a better job of it (I never played X-Wing, so I don't know what that game was like). I mean, I'm not trying to sound like I think the combat design in Oolite is absolutely terrible, but there is a vast amount of room for improvement.

At this point, the main reason why I'm playing this game is because I'm really in the mood for an open-ended space fighting/trading game and Oolite is pretty much the only one that will work for Linux. However, knowing me, I'll probably get too annoyed by the design and just move on to something else within the next few days or so.

punkbohemian wrote:

Sure it can be a little jerky, but my point is, and this is my key issue, I have nothing to aim at.

I disagree about it being a skill issue. I'm not a twitch gamer, but I can hold my own in any FPS that I've played. I've also played flight games that are a lot more intense than this. Handling the ship isn't the problem. The problem is getting shot and then when I look in the direction the laser is coming from, there is nothing there (well, there is, but it's too far away for it to be displayed). No amount of practice is going to let me see something that isn't visible. And shooting half-blinded at a dark spot in space is not my idea of a fun game.

<snip>

Actually, they didn't escape me. The problem with missiles is that I can't acquire a target and therefore get a lock unless the target is at least within 10km. However, I'm getting hit from 15km, and the ships are so slow that I'm half dead before I can even close the distance. As for fleeing, I basically started this thread talking about fleeing. The ships are slow. I can't get away before dying. I have yet to even come close to anything resembling an escape.

Ok.. Now I see where you're coming from.. the ol' "ships are too far away/too dark to see" issue.. yeah, that does take some getting used to... I've noticed that the ships are actually a little distance beyond the apparent origin-point of the laser beam.. as in, it's too narrow to actually see at that distance.. sweeping the area beyond the beam-end often results in me getting a lock at that distance.

Something else that may help you is to adjust your screen gamma. Assuming you're running an nVidia card, you can install the nVidia control panel for Linux, which will let you tweak your gamma for better visibility when dealing with dark ships in dark space... I forget the setting I use under Linux (I'm on XP atm) but I think it's around the 1.38 mark. On XP I set the nVidia Control Panel gamma at 100%. It really does make things a hell of a lot easier.

As for slow ship speeds.. as others have said, for combat you REALLY need to have injectors fitted... the bad guys generally have 'em, so you need 'em too. Along with an external fuel-tank for reserve or emergencies. Many ships in Oolite have a limited amount of missile-pylons, which is something of a problem when you need to carry a variety of ordinance. My solution for this was to spend a lot of money at a good shipyard to get extra pylons fitted to my ship. 3 additional pylons brought my Cobby up to 7 pylons, for a loss of 2 tonnes of cargo capacity. Now I carry 5 missiles and 2 fuel tanks, as a rule. That gives me much more flexibility in combat. Even if my tanks are almost empty on arrival at a system, if need be, I can bug out, or I can burn fuel like crazy if I get into a major fur-ball..

(translation: I edited my shipdata.plist, removing 2 tonnes of cargo-space and adding 3 missiles. Then I edited my game-save and deducted what I felt was a reasonable amount to pay for such a conversion.. 20k Cr, in this instance..)

punkbohemian wrote:

I totally agree, lasers that are hooked up to a supercomputer designed to perfectly compute the lasers trajectory could split a hair. But strap that laser to a F-22 in a dogfight, and the situation changes.

I've only flown combat flight simulations, not the real thing. But those always were much more difficult in that respect, as there the pilot has to compensate for the slow speed of bullets, similar to the problems of CCIP bombing. With lasers which travel at the speed of light, that issue would be gone. I bet most modern pilots would be happy if they could exchange their guns for a laser.

punkbohemian wrote:

Actually, they didn't escape me. The problem with missiles is that I can't acquire a target and therefore get a lock unless the target is at least within 10km.

That's really strange. I've been playing with RS/OSE which come with insanely small ships, then I also am annoyed of this, as those ships with sizes of a cargo canister really don't show up. In plain oolite, the ships typically do show up when they are in the range of their lasers. It's sometimes just a little dot on the screen, but the eyes easily adapt to find such things.

If you were using Windows, I'd now be asking wether you use ATI, but maybe on Linux there's a similar problem with other vendors? While I was using ATI/Windows config, I often had the cards drivers bugs to kick in, leaving all (or almost all) ships entirely black. Then it was also difficult to fight anything, even at a relatively close range...

For your problem to get a target lock at all, maybe you should try the target auto-lock oxp! If you use that one and do not have an active lock, it instantly locks onto the first ship hitting you. That can make things easier, especially at distance.

However, I still believe that you suffer from something else:
1) your ship isn't yet equipped for combat, as you're just in the process to earn the money to enhance it. Thus you should be avoiding combat at all until you've made a few trade runs and used the money to enhance it.
2) somehow you're still in the trading lane. I fail to understand why. As I said a few times, if you are outside the lane, there are no ships. There won't be any. Impossible. I made over a hundred thousand credits without ever having to fight any ship, as I did avoid the lane. The system populator only adds ships to the lane, and except deep space pirates, there's nothing that would create pirates in the emptyness of space.

Could it be that you are ambushed not in the first seconds of travel to the planet, but a bit later on? If so...I am sure that it would help not to move your ship to flying to the planet directly, but continue on a planet radius away of it. Then, while on torus drive, search for the space station. It's often visible from almost the witchpoint entries distance. Don't head for the station, but still a little away from it and the planet. Just in the last few moments of the flight, turn towards the station. Using that tactic, I've often came out of torus drive right beside the station, sometimes I even had to make sure that I don't ram it while the ship is still in slow-down process. Even if you're outside the lane initially, it might be your problem that the flight path converges too quickly with that of the traders and pirates on the lane if you fly towards the planet or station directly, instead of trying to keep a parallel flight path until the last moments.

Screet

I bet most modern pilots would be happy if they could exchange their guns for a laser.

Well, yeah, but to be fair, everyone wants lasers! I'd get them for my car if they were street legal. And who wouldn't want laser beams for eyes.

But seriously, I'm not saying it wouldn't be easier w/ lasers, but being in a controlled situation vs. a combat situation changes things. For example, I'm a pretty good shot at 30'. It's not uncommon for me to get a solid 3" grouping, depending on the weapon. A friend of mine, a police officer, is a much better shot than me. Some time ago, he got into a gunfight, in an elevator with some drug dealer. They both emptied their clips on each other (at least 24 rounds total), never touching each other, and neither of them managed to hit the other.

Then, while on torus drive, search for the space station. It's often visible from almost the witchpoint entries distance

Ok, I'm starting to think it's a draw problem with Linux. The soonest I've ever seen the station has been about halfway between the witchpoint to the planet. Often times, it's only shortly before I drop out of torus drive before it shows up. I've even have had to orbit planets from time to time to find it.

've often came out of torus drive right beside the station, sometimes I even had to make sure that I don't ram it while the ship is still in slow-down process.

I wish I had that problem. That's never happened to me. I always drop of torus drive long before I'm in danger of hitting anything. On average, I'd estimate that I drop out about 3-4 minutes from anything I could crash into. And, I usually have to fly for about half that directly at the station before the nav buoy even appears.

Ok, I'm starting to think it's a draw problem with Linux. The soonest I've ever seen the station has been about halfway between the witchpoint to the planet. Often times, it's only shortly before I drop out of torus drive before it shows up. I've even have had to orbit planets from time to time to find it.

What graphics card do you have?

punkbohemian wrote:

Some time ago, he got into a gunfight, in an elevator with some drug dealer. They both emptied their clips on each other (at least 24 rounds total), never touching each other, and neither of them managed to hit the other.

That really does sound impossible...lucky guys! However, shooting with aiming is much different from reaction-shooting. Playing paintball, we were playing with dutch soldiers. At 10-15m range they could hit something the size of my palm without aiming!

punkbohemian wrote:

Then, while on torus drive, search for the space station. It's often visible from almost the witchpoint entries distance

Ok, I'm starting to think it's a draw problem with Linux. The soonest I've ever seen the station has been about halfway between the witchpoint to the planet. Often times, it's only shortly before I drop out of torus drive before it shows up. I've even have had to orbit planets from time to time to find it.

I just made an image of a station being visible from the W beacon. This isn't the case for all planets. The station can be seen almost in the middle of the planet. It's original visibility in oolite is much better, as the jpeg format blurs the image pretty heavily and also creates artifacts. I leave it full-scale because it would suffer from shrinking even further.

Don't bother finding stations at that distance though...getting just a little bit closer, oolite starts to show the reflection differences when the station rotates, which makes it much easier to tell them from other distant objects. For example, in the screenshot I've taken, there's a distant asteroid (must be 50km or so away) in my sights, which does look pretty similar to the initial view of the station.

The larger, more asteroid looking thing slightly below my sights is a rock hermit, better not to be mistaken for something to mine, unless you like the taste of fried rock hermits

punkbohemian wrote:

've often came out of torus drive right beside the station, sometimes I even had to make sure that I don't ram it while the ship is still in slow-down process.

I wish I had that problem. That's never happened to me. I always drop of torus drive long before I'm in danger of hitting anything. On average, I'd estimate that I drop out about 3-4 minutes from anything I could crash into. And, I usually have to fly for about half that directly at the station before the nav buoy even appears.

If you come too close to the planet, it also does mass-lock the ship. So there's a real benefit from flying not directly to the planet or station initially, as that also prevents the planet from mass-locking. How close a player can come does also depend upon the engines powers of the ship. Ships with little power need a much longer distance before they come to a stop, thus coming closer to the object which mass-locked.

EDIT: proceeding further towards the planet, I got a chopped cobra in my sights. The image shows the visibility of a ship smaller than a common CM3 at almost maximum scanner range. At such distances the exhaust from the engine makes it much easier to spot them.


Screet

punkbohemian wrote:

As for fleeing, I basically started this thread talking about fleeing. The ships are slow. I can't get away before dying. I have yet to even come close to anything resembling an escape.

As I said earlier, fleeing is not only trying to run away at maximum speed, it sometimes involves hyperspacing out to another system. Keep always an emergency escape target planet on your short range chart screen for this case.

I think Privateer, WC, and FreeSpace did a better job of it (I never played X-Wing, so I don't know what that game was like). I mean, I'm not trying to sound like I think the combat design in Oolite is absolutely terrible, but there is a vast amount of room for improvement.

You will have to allow me to disagree. Oolite does not try to be like FreeSpace or Wing Commander, it is a remake of Elite and follows its flight model closely. There will be no further improvements to it (well, OK, maybe on the AI a bit), because combat in Oolite is already what it used to be like in Elite and that is what the project was aiming for. Having the extra benefit of yaw control, which was not present at the original Elite, is as far as it will get.

Action.Chime.In

Did you guys remember the movie Leon? "The rifle is the first weapon you learn how to use, because it lets you keep your distance from the client. The closer you get to being a pro, the closer you can get to the client. The knife, for example, is the last thing you learn."

In Oolite, it's quite different - at least for me. I learned sniping only after I had a fully rigged cobra and the said military laser. Simply approaching a pack of enemies at full speed, constantly performing a kind of barrel roll caused enough of their lasers to miss to close the distance to a turning mélee distance. Still, trouble arises if a snipey pirate emerges from beyond the scanner range at that point... and yes, the pirates are still accurate as hell, so combat should probably be avoided until you have at least some upgrades.

It appears that Python Class Cruiser is slightly less maneuverable than a cobra. So, playing with keyboard, it was easier to snipe when the target moves slightly less with each keypress. With a SuperCobra, sniping is still possible, but sometimes frustrating. I'd pay some credits to get a maneuverability inhibitor device :)

p.s.

Personally, I'm a big fan of the WC (Wing Commander) and X-wing series of games. As we all know, you mostly shoot projectiles at the enemies at close range. Red Dragons (OXP) do just that, from their rear turrets... so of course I think that it would be nice to have similiar front weapons in Oolite, but it might be hard to hit an opponent, especially as they tend to evade a lot in distance less than 1km.

I've always used a combination of sniping and tailing their sixes.

I got used the the pixel-ships after a few days and could spot em even if they were a speck in the inky night that is space. I then line them up and smack them good with bursts from my mil laser. Naturally they close in and what I do is to close in too, with injectors, firing several bursts and then pulling out in a steep climb/dive. A favourite technique of mine is to inject towards a faraway ship lasers blazing, then quickly decelerate and come to a stop and snipe some more (usually, the AI will try to pull away from you when you come too close, and they are VERY easy to snipe as they tend to fly away in predictable trajectories when doing so)

another_commander wrote:

Also, seeing that you have mentioned lack of ability to load during flight, next release will have the option of restarting the game mid-flight. This will give you the chance to exit a battle you can't win and reload if you want.

There is the Escape Pod too, off course it costs 900 cr and it does not work in Witch space.

Cheers Frame...

Welcome to the forums and to Oolite/Elite.

It's been frustrating for you to face opponents who fly better and shoot better and have equipment giving them more options than yourself.

First suggestion, get rid of all your OXP's.
Play the 'stock' version of the game to gain valuable experience in manuvering and to improve your survival chances.

Secondly, avoid combat engagements until you've made enough money through trading to fully equip your ship.

Third, a number of forum members and you yourself have postulated useful ideas for combat engagements. You'll develop your own style based upon the capabilities of your ship and your ability to fly it. It'll take time to hone your techniques. That's normal.

Fourth, use a joystick.
A number of pilots are able to take better advantage of their ship's capabilities by improving their interface with the ship. A decent joystick provides that interface. You'll be able to manuver and aim more precisely in most instances.

Finally, combat engagements are often expensive. Missiles, Q-Bombs, Energy Bombs, equipment and ships can be expended, damaged or destroyed. While it costs money to replace them, any lives lost cannot be replaced.

It's a game. It's meant to be played for enjoyment. Relax and have fun learning how to play it well.

Good luck.

What graphics card do you have?

NVIDIA. I wish I could tell you more than that, but Linux doesn't have dxdiag and I've yet to figure out how to get the specs of my video card (other hardware, no problem, but not my video card).

You will have to allow me to disagree.

Well, this is really just a matter of taste, and I respect your right to have a different opinion.

Oolite does not try to be like FreeSpace or Wing Commander, it is a remake of Elite and follows its flight model closely. There will be no further improvements to it (well, OK, maybe on the AI a bit), because combat in Oolite is already what it used to be like in Elite and that is what the project was aiming for. Having the extra benefit of yaw control, which was not present at the original Elite, is as far as it will get.

That "there will be no further improvements to it" bit is a little disheartening. It's like saying, "we know there's some room for improvement, but we're not going to do anything about it." Also, my jaw dropped a little when I saw yaw control being referred to as an "extra benefit". That's what's wrong with these young whippersnappers today, they're all spoiled with yaw control. You know, in my day, we didn't have z-axis rotation, and we liked it that way.

But, I'm not bagging on the project. People have fond memories of the original game. I'm the same way (with other games, obviously). While I would love to see someone make an updated Privateer (that works on Linux), I would also appreciate a restored version of the original (that actually works, and hasn't been over-tweaked by over-creative devs), despite the fact that the original game had some room for improvement (as any game does). With that in mind, it would be nice for a dev to say, "Hey, we remade Oolite, mission accomplished. Enjoy. Now we'll move on to Oolite 2, and kick it up a notch with the design."

I've always used a combination of sniping and tailing their sixes.

Yeah, the same one of two solutions to everything is not terribly exciting to me. Not to mention that combat being a game of find-the-pixel is so not in the spirit of space combat.

I'm a little uneasy about this discussion. Surely, the whole point is that Oolite is not and never has been merely a shoot 'em up. You start out with nil skills and hardware to match, and the aim of the game, initially, is to use your head to build up the missing skills whilst also building up the money to be able to afford the ship upgrades which will put you into a position to hold your own against attackers. During those early stages, the only sure-fire evasive manoeuvre is to stay out of the way - avoid the main lanes.

Later on, the combination of better lasers, energy bombs, Q mines, better shields, changing velocity, hitting the injectors, and even ramming (and not forgetting the oft-discussed on here skill of luring your opponent into a head-on collision with a station) must provide not two, but hundreds of different ways of dogfighting. And that, of course, ignores the number of other ways of making life interesting in the Ooniverse.

If you're meeting traffic outside the main lane, then you have something loaded which puts that traffic there - vanilla Oolite doesn't.

Mike

You can't forget Captain Hesperus's cargo ejection cannon method. Your cargo can be a very deadly weapon under the right circumstances.