Oolite Bulletins

to be playing this game again! easily playable from windows xp and it works with a usb joystick

i have been waiting since the early nineties for this- pc elite was just a bit lame

are we allowed to say elite here? I'm new and don't know the protocol or form!

i haven't traded between isinor and quitiri since 1987, i instinctively remembered about the gift at 2000 credits. the enhanced dogfighting aspect of this game is a joy- very reminiscent of the bbc version.

i think the most compelling aspect of this game, is the fact that you are dropped in at the deep end- its not like world of warcraft or something where you only meet baddies that its in your power to kill. it is superb the way the game draws you in, you imagine when you start, that you are saving for docking computers- but invariably, its beam lasers that are the first big buy, but of course by then you are quite happy with pulse!

the only confusion i have come across, is the colour coding on the scanner thingy- i seem to remember purple(on the c64) meant a harmless ship- usually a fer de lance, and it was usually the first ship you encountered on arrival out of hyperspace

well, I've been at it the whole weekend, and have been dropping in on zaonce for the shopping- soon i'll need to find a tech level 15 world

i cant thank the developers of this software enough

Thanks for the kind words phonebook. Glad you are enjoying the game.

phonebook wrote:

i have been waiting since the early nineties for this- pc elite was just a bit lame

Couldn't agree with you more on this. I found it pretty bad and disappointing myself.

are we allowed to say elite here? I'm new and don't know the protocol or form!

I don't see why there should be a problem saying Elite. Oolite is an Elite remake, after all.

i think the most compelling aspect of this game, is the fact that you are dropped in at the deep end- its not like world of warcraft or something where you only meet baddies that its in your power to kill. it is superb the way the game draws you in, you imagine when you start, that you are saving for docking computers- but invariably, its beam lasers that are the first big buy, but of course by then you are quite happy with pulse!

You will find that running away is an option that will have to be considered seriously many times, especially at your early steps. Even when you become Deadly or Elite, you will find yourself in battles that suddenly turn out badly for you and even then you will have to consider running for your life. If you want a tip, get an ECM as first defensive equipment. You will increase your chances of survival tenfold at the beginning of the game.

the only confusion i have come across, is the colour coding on the scanner thingy- i seem to remember purple(on the c64) meant a harmless ship- usually a fer de lance, and it was usually the first ship you encountered on arrival out of hyperspace

For the next release there will be a much more complete reference sheet, where the color coding of the scanner - amongst other things - is explained in detail.

well, I've been at it the whole weekend, and have been dropping in on zaonce for the shopping- soon i'll need to find a tech level 15 world

i cant thank the developers of this software enough

Thanks and may your travels be profitable and your lasers on target.

thanks for that reply!- a good prac crit also takes me back to 1987

there is one thing i never quite understood however, in elite there is always a fairly reasonable (well not really) explanation for everything- the manner in which technologies work for example is consistent across the board.

how then, does the system you've hyperspaced to, know your legal status, if you haven't been there before, and you constantly fly away from your first transgression. after all- if the star systems could communicate like that, then there would be a commodity price list for surrounding systems- or there ought to be

the rpg game traveller made an attempt at dealing with the issue of communication, by a system of xpress boats and hidden couriers that could jump a little further than the norm, but still it acknowledged the time lag.

tho going down the comparison with traveller road is far too tricky in istelf- the cobra mark iii would be a truly impossible craft- at least 400 tons and requiring a crew of 7 or so at least, and thats at tech level 15

maybe I'll think something up and make a suggestion in the suggestions box!

Another survival tip:
When you come out of witchspace, turn about 90 degrees away from the planet, and fly on torus for about 5 seconds or so. Then head for the planet.
What that does is get you out of the 'space highway' between the witchspace beacon and the planet, therefore avoiding traffic - and hostiles.

Keep doing that until you've built up the kit to survive a battle. At minimum a beam laser, hardened missiles, ECM, a fuel injector, and a shield booster.

Otherwise known as milk runs!

phonebook wrote:

how then, does the system you've hyperspaced to, know your legal status, if you haven't been there before, and you constantly fly away from your first transgression. after all- if the star systems could communicate like that, then there would be a commodity price list for surrounding systems- or there ought to be

The system probably doesn't know, and it doesn't need to know your legal status. All matters of travel, spacelane security, and the stations, are dealt with by GalCop, not the individual systems and their governments. And the Galactic Police would be practically crippled, if it wouldn't maintain a central database with the wrongdoings of all pilots.

By the way: A galactic jump does clear your status. It seems the communication between the different charts is still lacking something.

Also by the way: You even can ask some friendly helpers to erase your record in GalCop's central database, provided you have Anarchies.oxp installed and manage to find these helpers. (Hint: You may be rewarded with a hint during a gunfight with one of their fellows.)

Trade, however, seems to be a different issue. While the transactions themselves are carried out under GalCop protection on the GalCop-run stations, the prices are probably made by the individual systems. Of course that doesn't exactly explain why they are not communicated outside the system. Probably due to executive meddling? Perhaps the legislation for chart-wide price announcement (the GalCop Trading Commodity Information Act) has been stalled in the Galactic Concil for the last 150 years due to the various lobbyists' influence? Things happen, you know...

Commander McLane wrote:

Trade, however, seems to be a different issue. While the transactions themselves are carried out under GalCop protection on the GalCop-run stations, the prices are probably made by the individual systems. Of course that doesn't exactly explain why they are not communicated outside the system. Probably due to executive meddling? Perhaps the legislation for chart-wide price announcement (the GalCop Trading Commodity Information Act) has been stalled in the Galactic Concil for the last 150 years due to the various lobbyists' influence? Things happen, you know...

Quoting from the original Elite manual, page 44, Advice to Traders:

The Manual wrote:

Demand for goods varies widely and prices within planets
fluctuate, but galCop regulations prohibit planets from advertising
their requirements or announcing their market prices beyond
their own System Space. Any trader, therefore, approaches all
transactions with a certain financial risk.

There you go, no need to invent reasons. It's as simple as that.

another_commander wrote:

The Manual wrote:

Demand for goods varies widely and prices within planets
fluctuate, but galCop regulations prohibit planets from advertising
their requirements or announcing their market prices beyond
their own System Space. Any trader, therefore, approaches all
transactions with a certain financial risk.

There you go, no need to invent reasons. It's as simple as that.

But of course we could ask ourselves how a provision so hostile to trading made it into the GalCop regulations...

Maybe to avoid flooding of markets, with subsequent shortages on others, when certain systems announced sudden need for particular goods?

Bah, whatever, I don't normally question GalCop's decisions

... and to prevent the undercutting of one planet by another, keeping trade wars to a minimum. The Co-operative is not – much to the disgust of the Corporate States – tremendously interested in the free market; not when it has its hands full keeping more than 2,000 worlds rolling along with a minimum of interplanetary war ...

pb wrote

..the most compelling aspect of this game, is the fact that you are dropped in at the deep end

You are indeed, and in those depths is a very realistic space panorama. Raw data (via "dtn" e-mail from actual planets having orbiting or surface robots) and colour photographs (=the raw data after processing) are forwarded automatically by NASA to anyone on their mailing lists (one mailing list per planet). I often download these while playing Oolite: it is very difficult to tell one from the other -- although there are not normally Thargoids attacking Saturn!

That is quite an achievement, I think, on the part of everyone who has contributed to the game

the game is still asking packets of information to travel faster than a ship jumps through witchspace

ok, it can, fair enough, but then, if the information travels faster than your ship (or anybodies ship) then why the feature that after a few jumps your legal status starts to revert

the other reasonable explanation is that your status is logged by your own ship somehow, and is transmitted to galcop in the system you are in- after all you must have a computer that communicates with Galcop in the system you are in, otherwise you couldnt get bounty

however the jumping to clear the legal status is a valid critisism of this too

i mull it over and really cant reconcile the fact that when you jump a certain number of times your legal status gets cleared- unless of course you are forever given a shot at redemption- and the only way to show redemption is to not get caught committing a crime. but somehow, galcops with their shoot to kill on the spot policy do not strike me as redemers!

GalCop has a lot on its plate, what with endemic piracy and the Thargoid war ... I think the attitude is, if you've managed to keep your nose clean (or at least your crimes undetected) for long enough, they'll turn a blind eye to past indiscretions. Co-operative law is pretty rough and ready: you can be summarily executed, legally, by anyone, if you have just one measly credit's bounty on your head, after all. If there wasn't some sort of statute of limitations in operation then the outlaws would rapidly overwhelm the lawmen and the whole system would likely collapse.

I couldn't have put it any better, Disembodied.

@phonebook: Here is a piece of beauty of this game: If you do not like getting your record gradually cleared when jumping, you can always install an OXP (Anarchies in this case) and this will maintain your legal status throughout jumps. You will need to plan your moves very carefully though.