Oolite Bulletins

Your Torus Drive get an upgrade to reach the Sun much faster - practical when an addon moved the Sun farther. Your other travels will be slightly faster also.

If you are enough far from the planet then you can earn up to 8 times more speed to compensate  Realistic Stars where the sun is moved 8x farther.

Download in the  wiki.

Requested by mossfoot here.

This is cool, makes the torus act more or less like Vegastrike's SPEC insystem drive. It's useful for more than sundiving, as it turns out; it makes trips between oxp stations quicker, for traders who fancy taking advantage of the sometimes better deals available at those alt stations.

I think this needs a price tag and resale value, say about the same price and tl as a fuel scoop, +- 100cr.

Hi Commanders!

As I recall there is already Far Planets OXP that provides buyable equipment that helps to reach distant locations quicker.

Not sure yet about the difference with this one.

Cheers,
Vsfc

Not sure about it needing to be buyable equipment since the main purpose of it was to make OXPs involving distant suns and planets more usable - basically to counter those great distances in an appropriate way for gameplay balance. Fiction wise it takes the idea that the Torus drive's speed is limited by relative mass, so the farther you are from a planet or star, the faster it is.

If it was the price of a fuel scoop I woudn't mind, but if you're playing straight up without distant stars and planets its usefulness is going to be limited I would think

Can't wait to try this out

Idea: perhaps on the MFD you could have it show a multiplier next to ship speed when Torus is engaged, showing the current multiplier. This would both give you a way to mentally scale speed based on what the norm is, plus give you a sense of your approach to the current star (multiplier is dropping = more than halfway to star)

I didn't see it listed in the wiki, but does this also take into account proximity to the nearest planet if you happen to be going from planet to planet?

This is a great idea, I tend to avoid sunskimming and alt stations just because of the time it takes to get there. Can't wait to try it out.

Cool!

Can I edit where it displays "Torus" to say "Warp factor" ?

I love the idea. Will grab it as soon as I'm back to my own computer.

Idea: perhaps on the MFD you could have it show a multiplier next to ship speed when Torus is engaged, showing the current multiplier.

Oh yes please!

Cmdr Wyvern wrote:

I think this needs a price tag and resale value, say about the same price and tl as a fuel scoop, +- 100cr.

Done in  v1.1, thank you for the feedback.

Please uninstall the v1.0 in "Remove expansion pack" menu before install v1.1. I mistyped the identifier in the manifest which is now fixed, but this mean the game will not recognize as an update and leave in the old one, sorry.

vsfc wrote:

there is already Far Planets OXP that provides buyable equipment that helps to reach distant locations quicker.

Yes but only if you are in the outer system. Those drives give very high bonuses but need very low gravity to work (intentionally, to leave untouched the speed mechanics of inner systems).

This drive give is designed to give a small bonus in the empty space between planet and sun, which result a bit faster travel in the main lane also, but only about 2 times in average due to the bonus is decreasing to 1x near the planet.

mossfoot wrote:

without distant stars and planets its usefulness is going to be limited

If limited to about 2x in a rock hermit travel then still worth some credits, so cost is implemented.

mossfoot wrote:

on the MFD you could have it show a multiplier next to ship speed

Show in CombatMFD  v1.5, thank you.

mossfoot wrote:

does this also take into account proximity to the nearest planet if you happen to be going from planet to planet?

Yes.

Knotty wrote:

Can I edit where it displays "Torus" to say "Warp factor" ?

Yes, in the 8. line back from the end of Scripts/torustosun.js .

Just been playing with this. It is awesome! It can considerably speed up withcpoint > Station travel too. You have to be careful not overshoot if you were planning to visit that salvage gang / rock hermit / pirate cove though.

> [Made buyable] in [EliteWiki] v1.1, thank you for the feedback.

Boo Think I'll stick with v1.0 unless there is some other reason to upgrade...

Potential Debris wrote:

You have to be careful not overshoot if you were planning to visit that salvage gang / rock hermit / pirate cove though.

True that those stations don't show as stations on the scanner, and don't masslock. But they usually have some traffic around them, and those ships will masslock.

Potential Debris wrote:

Boo Think I'll stick with v1.0 unless there is some other reason to upgrade...

It's only 500cr. When you're starting out with a shiny new Cobra and only 100cr in your pocket, 500 seems like a hefty chunk. But once you're established as a trader, 500cr is loose change you dig out of the cushion of your pilot chair.
For the usefulness of this kit, the price is an absolute bargain IMHO. Spacers have paid more for way less useful devices: docking computer for 1500cr anyone?

Perhaps fiction-wise it could be seen as unlocking the GalCop regulated limiter on the Torus Drive. For Health and Safety reasons the Torus is factory set at a fixed x1 setting, but can be easily unlocked.

Definitely going to try this with more distant suns. Wonder if the additional planets and moons OXP can be spaced out a bit more so they don't feel quite as unrealistically crowded (not saying make it realisitic, just less unrealistic I'm sure if the scales in Oolite were made real it would be difficult to play to say the least.

Didn't seem to be working for me. I have Realistic Stars installed, along with the update MFD which should have shown the multiplier... didn't. Sending you my latest log in case you can see the problem there?

I have the latest of this, the latest combat MFD, the latest realistic stars, all working perfectly.

Hey Moss, did you try holding down shift when starting the game?

Cmdr Wyvern wrote:

I have the latest of this, the latest combat MFD, the latest realistic stars, all working perfectly.

Hey Moss, did you try holding down shift when starting the game?

Several times. My ship stays at a steady 7680m/s the whole trip planet to sun.