Oolite Bulletins

Hi

a quick question....

Am i getting old at the grand old age of 34, have my reflexes gone to mush, have i been spoiled by "easy" modern games

OR is oolite REALLY hard?

i have downloaded 250mbs worth of oxp's (perhaps there is my mistake)

in the classic elite i managed to get to elite and also deadly on multiple occasions, however i am finding it blooming hard!.

Simply my 1st mission trying to take food and textiles from lave to Zaonce

i have yet to make it!. hell i can barely even kill a single enemy before being killed, and finding it tough to even hit them (though its easier to control than frontier at least!!!)..

please someone tell me i am not THAT inept!.

cheers

M.

Hi,

in those 250 mB of OXP's there's bound to be the Ubership or two...

Anyway, when you start out, you should avoid fights as much as possible anyways, your ship isn't equipped to meet strong adversaries. Upgrade in shields and defensive stuff, then heavier guns etc.

i remember my first dogfight, it took aaaaages to win, because of the 'bare' ship I was flying. But that made it sooooo special an experience

In Oolite, knowing when to run away from combat is a requirement for progression. You should make careful judgements at the beginning, when your ship is still fragile, whether you should take on the potential opponents or not. Even a group of three pirates can be a very tough battle for a 100-Cr-Pulse-Laser-Only Cobra.

i tried running away, however i think i have added a few too many "good" ships.

the ships attacking me were pretty damn fast and took me out from behind.

last time i played this game i was deadly. i guess i need to walk before i run (and mayhap remove a few oxps for a little while )

even without oxp's I avoid everything ( interms of troublesome systems and fights), as much as possible, until I have an ecm, and then it's still pretty tough, but rewarding...

You're dying at Zaonce from behind? Do you have Eagle2 OXP installed? If so, that's your problem Theres a leftover test file there that spawns ALOT of Eagles at Zaonce.

Hi Bigmike.

First, welcome to the Ooniverse.

Nope you are not inept. I recon you have just stuck too many oxpers in your addon folder to be starting with. There are a lot of mean ships out there, even if you have an iron ass ship of your own.

Best bet is to avoid battle till you have some basic gear, like an ECM, shields and fuel injectors. Just for the times it's better to run away

There are heaps more upgrades here than ever in Elite, and the npc ships can have them too.

A great tip for starting is;
Don't try to fly straight to the planet, angle away at at least 45 degrees for 20 or so seconds, this gets you off the main space lane and are less likely to meet bad guys.

Dump the OXPs and only add a few.
I started with Fuel Stations, Commies, FTZ and Dictators. Then try it again.

Chrisfs wrote:

Fuel Stations, Commies, FTZ and Dictators.

Recently I've been using Planet Fall OXP which gives some very interesting prices on occasions, but needs heat shields and the purchase of the Planetary Landing Capability. Could that be afforded - by selling Cobra Mk III and getting a cheaper ship?
needs: heatshielding
needs: docking computers
..so yes it could easily be afforded after downgrading to Cobra Mk I, and I'm just trying out a few planetary landings with a new Jameson, but not sure how many sleazoid trade opportunities will present, planetside. System Redux would provide more opportunities (to land on other heavenly bodies), but whether this is an equitable trade-off..........?

In the meantime, I bought Jameson a passenger berth, and a certain In Bevs, travelling to Xeesle is messing up the arithmetic; however after a crook trade down to Cobra Mk I, there were ¢4,720 available to splash around on
exotic women and loose intoxicants additional equipment and bullion, producing rapid PROFITS

(so I haven't actually bought the PLC, as per plan, yet) (but seems like an OK plan so far..)

..so eventually I got rid of my passenger & got 'round to buying PLC

Although buying platinum (because sometimes there's a lot of it @ cheap) is a good way to accumulate galactic credits, it does require
a certain amount of c a p i t a l (wot an "orrible wurd) to make
p r o f i t s (eeuuurrrgh ! ! ! ! even wurse) and yes, planetary landings might sometimes yield these vile things, but the outlay impedes progress elsewhere .. .. .. .. but what about after the first maintenance overhaul???????????

(better go and check that out..)

Alex wrote:

I recon you have just stuck too many oxpers in your addon folder to be starting with.

A great tip for starting is;
Don't try to fly straight to the planet, angle away at at least 45 degrees for 20 or so seconds, this gets you off the main space lane and are less likely to meet bad guys.

Good advice, unless you have installed Deep Space Pirates.oxp, in which case leaving the space lane between the witchpoint and the coriolis can get you face to face with bad guys pretty quickly

after Jameson's 1st maintenance overhaul on a Cobra Mk I (downgraded from the Mk III to get better credit balance) the lower spec ship - which had cost ? ¢100,000 - was still only worth ¢79,000, meaning that the planetfall OXP wouldn't be worth the expense at this stage of the game

Generally downgrading ship does not pay off financially. You only ever get 75% of a ships value, so going from cobra 3 to cobra 1 and back will waste a minimum of 1/4 of each of their value.

bigmike20vt;

I am relatively new to the game myself (I installed it around 25 DEC 2009).

For a "VANILLA" game (no OXPs), I find that I could start "holding my own" in anarchies once I got at least a beam laser (1000 Cr), and an extra energy unit (1500 Cr), and sometimes I would survive enough to make it back to dock and make repairs. Better, with practice. Fuel injectors, too (600 Cr).

Even better with a shield booster (14750 Cr). EVEN MUCH better with a military laser (6000) Cr (and practice to use it properly and efficiently - it overheats), and a military shield enhancement (47500 Cr, from a Tech Level 14+ system).

I NEVER take ANY damage now, and I can apparantly take on anything. My attitude will probably change with the 2nd Native Mission; a certain hostile ship is very likely to change me into Tossed Pilot Salad the first time I try the mission.

Getting a cheaper ship was a big solution for me as well.
Even if I didn't get full value, going from a Cobra III to a Moray Star Boat, left me with plenty of money left over to outfit it rather nicely. Using Gold, Platinium and gems a lot helped and I got a passenger berth, because they tended to pay well and I could travel across the galaxy rather than simply doing the smae run back and forth.

I looked at the Cobra I but I liked the Moray better. After some passenger runs, I made enough money to buy my Cobra back again and all the stuff as well.