Oolite Bulletins

I have only recently gotten Oolite and, at least from being familiar with WC: Privateer, I think that getting used to combat in this game will take some getting used to, esp. with all the extra keys involved in flight and shooting. It does not seem gainly to reach A from the right side of the keyboard where the flight controls are and, though I suppose I could reconfigure the keymap, I would have to put thought into it when I'm still relatively unfamiliar with the game. Is there a mode in which I can be paired against hostile ships instantly for one-off fights? How does combat compare in intensity to WC: Privateer?

Hi, al.khwarizmi, and welcome to the boards! I don't have any experience of WC: Privateer (although I do have now-hazy memories of playing the original Wing Commander on an Amiga, ages ago [puffs on pipe, pats out random smouldering facial hair] ...). If you've got Oolite 1.80, there's a useful in-game tutorial available when you start a new commander, which should lead you through the basics of combat, docking, etc., starting off with stationary targets and working up to fighting against drone ships.

Disembodied wrote:

Hi, al.khwarizmi, and welcome to the boards! I don't have any experience of WC: Privateer (although I do have now-hazy memories of playing the original Wing Commander on an Amiga, ages ago [puffs on pipe, pats out random smouldering facial hair] ...). If you've got Oolite 1.80, there's a useful in-game tutorial available when you start a new commander, which should lead you through the basics of combat, docking, etc., starting off with stationary targets and working up to fighting against drone ships.

I was wondering why I couldn't find that damn tutorial and then I saw my current version of oolite is 1.77.1. Ubuntu has that problem sometimes. (At least I'm not running Debian.) I guess I'm going to have to compile from source. Will let you guys know if I run into any snags.

EDIT: Looks like you have generic binaries, should make things relatively painless.

al.khwarizmi wrote:

...At least I'm not running Debian..

Indeed, how low can you really go ? And welcome to the boards.

Hi al.khwarizmi, and welcome.
There is no need to compile, just grab the Linux port from Oolite.org

Welcome to Oolite! You will love it!

al.khwarizmi wrote:

esp. with all the extra keys involved in flight and shooting. It does not seem gainly to reach A from the right side of the keyboard where the flight controls are and, though I suppose I could reconfigure the keymap,

You can reconfigure easily by an Ingame Menu.
Honestly, don't you play with two hands? I steer with the right one (either Arrow Keys or Joystick) and I fire with the left one, so the mapping is just perfect. Though it might make sense to separate the fire key (A) from the accelleration / develeration (W,S) a bit to avoid unintentional firing.

As a help for targeting I'd recomment some OPX which indicate when a target is centered by a modified crosshair. Just have a look at the OXP list. "Auto Crosshairs" for example.

ralph_hh wrote:

You can reconfigure easily by an Ingame Menu.

Joystick, yes. Keyboard not yet.

ralph_hh wrote:

Honestly, don't you play with two hands?

I do; however, I've always used computer keyboards funny in general—generally speaking, my left hand is very dominant even though I am otherwise right-handed and my right hand is largely relegated to the arrow keys, Shift and Enter. For the purposes of oolite I have left hand in charge of yawing and right in charge of pitch and roll, obviously. While playing the combat tutorial I didn't have too much difficulty actually. The enemy ships did not manuever as devilishly as I am used to in the other descendant of Elite I am used to playing, but I was only dealing with borderline helpless Kraits so we'll see how things develop in the future.

Besten Dank für deinen Rat

Smivs wrote:

Hi al.khwarizmi, and welcome.
There is no need to compile, just grab the Linux port from Oolite.org

yeah, it runs fine (even) on GNU/Debian Linux.*g*

To be clear, I'm actually running Lubuntu. Looks like all the shared libraries are stowed with the app? I had no idea anyone was actually doing anything of substance with GNUStep...

al.khwarizmi wrote:

For the purposes of oolite I have left hand in charge of yawing and right in charge of pitch and roll, obviously. While playing the combat tutorial I didn't have too much difficulty actually. The enemy ships did not manuever as devilishly as I am used to in the other descendant of Elite I am used to playing, but I was only dealing with borderline helpless Kraits so we'll see how things develop in the future.

If you want a purer experience, don't use yaw: just stick with pitch and roll (it's the original Elite control mechanism, and it's all that the NPCs use). And if at any point you find yourself wanting a sterner challenge, try Cim's [wiki]Skilled NPCs OXP[/wiki].

Disembodied wrote:

If you want a purer experience, don't use yaw: just stick with pitch and roll...

<nods> I've never used yaw in Oolite - my RoE forbid it!

One of the biggest things I have found that greatly increases my survivability and also the number of dirty rotten pirates with no conscience (not looking at anybody here ) is getting familiar with the side lasers. Once you can effectively use them you will see a big difference.

<grins> I've recently adjusted my RoE to allow use of the aft laser (ain't used it for years), but I'll not use side lasers.
Some OXPs pretty much require the skilled use of all four lasers - but I don't do mission-type OXPs anyway.