Anyone ordered Elite?

[Mat Linnett]

Debug camera was added in the last release, and allows for purtiness:

[lvlshot]http://cloud-4.steamusercontent.com/ugc/529511938013673863/5A513F31C6ED1511C290782BC76A1DF69F1AEE62/[/lvlshot]

That ship's my Vulture, another thing added recently. It's a dedicated fighter that's nimble and durable and packs one hell of a punch for a ship that size.

[Transient]

The game just showed up on Steam the other day for $60.

[Mat Linnett]

Time lapse footage:

[youtube]fFJbK5Ryygw[/youtube]

[Doombrain]

Waiting for the mac version now. had to remove it from my work laptop otherwise the world would have ended.

[Mat Linnett]

It's available for beta testers, i.e. those that backed the game at that level.
Recommended specs seem a little... high.
But then I suppose that's just the development team saying "Well we've had it running pretty well on this machine".

[LawL]

Gotta be better than the Sidewinder!
I think I tried the Adder briefly during Beta.
From what I understand after full release, they make a nice step up from the Sidewinder for trading and exploration.
I just know my Cobra tends to chew them up and spit them out.

Looking at the stats, you get one medium hardpoint and two small ones, as well as two utility hardpoints.

I'd suggest splitting those hardpoints into two buttons in the same firegroup, with either a medium pulse laser and two small multicannons, or a medium multicannon and 2 small pulse lasers. Gimballed if you can afford it.
Use lasers on their own to strip shields and then use both to attack the hull once shields are down.

The only limiting factor there may be how the hardpoints are positioned, and I can't comment there as I've not flown one seriously.

The upside of ships and gear in Elite is that they retain 100% resale value, so you're not losing money while using the Adder as a stepping stone to something better.

For your utility mounts, well I wouldn't be without a chaff launcher now, as chaff scrambles the auto-aim of gimballed and guided weapons.

The second one? That's dependent on role.
I have a Kill Warrant Scanner in mine. That allows you to scan ships for bounties across multiple jurisdictions, and is the Bounty Hunter's bread-and-butter.
A ship that says Wanted may have a basic Federation bounty of 19,000 credits on it. But the Kill Warrant Scanner may reveal that the same ship is also wanted in the Alliance and the Empire, potentially tripling the reward.

If you're more concerned about survivability, the Point Defense is a small turret that takes out incoming missiles and torpedoes.

The Frame Shift Wake Scanner's for piracy really, and the Heat Sink Launcher is for stealth, which to be honest is not really necessary. Stealth is mostly for avoiding System Authority vessel scans so you don't end up with fines for illicit cargo, but these are easily evaded with decent piloting skills. Even if a scan starts while you're docking, if it doesn't complete before you're through the letter -box it fails as you've broken line-of-sight.

Sorry, bit of an info-dump there, but from playing myself I know that any info you can get is valuable.
This game doesn't tell you much!

You should try this thing called 'sex'.

[xer0s]

Which mod is that?

[Mat Linnett]

You should try this thing called 'sex'.

Having an off-day LawL?
I mean, that's basically "Jonny's First Flame from the ABCs of Trolling".

[LawL]

I'm not trolling.

[MKJ]

So is this game funs? I got it as part of the Xbox Preview program, wondering if I should shell out for the full version.

[Mat Linnett]

Depends.
I find it's a great game to dip in and out of, but it gets a little dull when played for extended periods of time.
They're continually adding stuff mind you, so there's always something new to try.
Best advice I can give is don't treat it like an MMO or other RPG. Don't view the ships as being progression, but rather expressions of different playstyles, and you'll be fine.

I switched to open a while back now, but my home system's well off the beaten path, so I rarely see other players.
But the recent update changed up the mission system, so the most profitable ones will quite often place you in a situation where you'll incur a bounty in some other system. It adds a nice frisson to the game knowing that in certain systems you may very well have a high bounty value, making you a tempting target for any players passing through.

[Doombrain]

yeah, it's a slow burner but i do love coming back to it.

i'd try and build up a good friends list so you can get into wings.

[phantasmagoria]

So I nabbed an unused HOTAS (saitek x55) from work that was gonna end up in a skip and decided to give it a spin with this game, I have no fucking idea what I'm doing, I ran through the tutorial missions (and couldn't do the one with spawning waves of enemies, think I got to the 8th wave) and now I'm just pottering around delivering data and stuff, wondering what's next.

I've died a few times trying to complete a contract I took on to kill 4 pirates, I don't quite understand how I'm supposed to do the contract, I've been going to res sites and stuff (says to do that in the mission dialogue) but there aren't any dudes there or anything, I've found some pirates flying around when I'm in the hyperspace thing, but I can't seem to catch up with them

[Doombrain]

Yeah it's like that when you start. It's all about fine tuning your ship to a task, and also getting the right people to play with. Single player it's an awful game but get into a wing with a good ship it's a right blast

[Mat Linnett]

I'll agree with you there DB. My time with the game is now exclusively spent playing with friends. That, at the moment, means a couple of hours on a Sunday morning.

If I play on my own for very long, the flaws become apparent and I feel myself start to drift off. Bounty hunting with a buddy however is great fun, especially when they get a little too big for their boots and things start to get complicated.

These days, I fly a Fer De Lance, with some very basic engineering mods on the weapons. I'm usually baby-sitting my friends in their Cobra MkIIIs.

Phant:
The mission system at the moment is a hot mess and completely disrespectful of the player's time. Don't bother with it. You can make more cash with a Kill Warrant Scanner in a RES. Unless you do the trading ones that is, but to do those, you REALLY have to like looking at hyperspace.

As for catching "Wanted" ships in Supercruise, there's a few things to bear in mind:
Firstly, you'll need an FSD Interdictor, which triggers the mini-game that pulls your target out of Supercruise.
If you start chasing a target whilst close to a gravity well (star / planet / moon), they will get a head-start on you, and you'll only be able to interdict them over the halfway point to their destination.
The best time to interdict someone is when you're approaching a gravity well, as the closer they are to it, the slower they will be going.

And pirates in RES zones? Anyone who scans you saying something along the lines of "What are you carrying?" is a pirate and will be Wanted. In addition, when they scan you, their name becomes visible in your contacts list, so if you don't know where they are, you can quickly find them.

Also, there are a few ship types that will almost always be pirates in RES zones, such as (in increasing likelihood) Sidewinders, Asp Explorers & Scouts, Eagles, Imperial Eagles, Vipers MkII & MkIV, Imperial Couriers, Diamondback Explorers & Scouts, Vultures, Fer De Lances, Federal Drop Ships & Assault Ships, and finally the Imperial Clipper, which is ALWAYS a pirate in a RES.

The ones lower down the list are frequently going to be escorting miners and will therefore be clean, so always make sure to complete the initial scan before opening fire. But that goes the same for any ship, as even if you KNOW someone's a pirate (they've messaged and scanned you), if you open fire before completing the basic scan that reveals their Wanted status, you WILL get a bounty on your head, and every security vessel in the zone will target you.

Oh, and try not to attack wings if you're on your own.

[phantasmagoria]

Yeah I realised I needed the interdiction doobry, after I got that I managed to track down my targets and it was pretty easy.

I don't really know if the game's for me. It already seems a little repetitive (FTL jump FTL jump FTL Jump objective, then grab another mission or two and I guess some supplies to barter if you have a nice big hold then go back, collect reward and then rinse and repeat). As far as exploration's concerned I don't have a massive desire to explore outer regions of procedurally generated systems and after the disappointment of realising I couldn't land on planets I'm reluctant to spend another £20 to be able to.

For now I'm still enjoying mastering the mechanics of the controls and there are some really cool elements like the docking procedures but everything else seems a little too samey to really hook me, I dunno. I think if some of my nerdy friends played it then it'd be good to just chill out with and use voice comms, but then we do that in GTA most of the time.

[Mat Linnett]

The voice comms are REALLY cool. They add all sorts of pops and whistles that add a layer of authenticity to proceedings.

But essentially, as you're realising, the game's got the basics nailed (simulation, sound design, look and feel etc.), there's just not actually that much game there.
And unfortunately it looks like recent development decisions are being influenced heavily by the MMO players in the community, so more of the elements that are being introduced are actually quite shallow, but require a lot of repetition to get anything out of.
I hope they can turn it around, but it's going to take a lot of work.

[Κracus]

Yeah, they really need to introduce somekind of mission system that actually causes the user to use the various features in the game. They also need to implement FPS mode asap and include those on missions. Like go to x planet, and do x. Maybe include a storyline with it to move things along and create a living breathing universe instead of just a universe... The political stuff they had LOOKED like it was going to be cool but it turned out to be a huge turd and not worth your time. In fact most of the missions and tasks you get in the game or pointless and not at all rewarding.

Only thing really worth doing are trading missions from Sothis/Ceos but I guess they're nerfing those soon.

[Mat Linnett]

Oh, and I've also realised as time's gone on that backing away from the offline version was quite possibly the worst decision they made for this game's longevity. If they'd fully embraced Steam Workshop and released modding tools, I think the community would have filled a lot of the gaps, and we'd be seeing some truly amazing user-generated content by now.

[Doombrain]

Shits getting real

[Κracus]

Jump range is shit on my fdl... no way I'm going to perseus or whatever it's called.

[Transient]

I finally managed to get enough credits to buy an Anaconda a few weeks ago. I've been slowly upgrading it by bulk mining some pristine rings. I think I'll max it out and go bounty hunting or something, haven't really tried combat yet.

[Κracus]

Yeah I'm not sure what I want when I get to that stage. Is the clipper comparable to an anaconda?

[Transient]

I've only flown the Cobras, Type 6, Type 7 and Anaconda so far, so beats me.

I can say the Anaconda isn't as hard to fly as I thought it would be, though it's lumbersome and I plan to use turrets if I ever take it into combat.

[Doombrain]

DW2 anyone?