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Elite: Dangerous (Kickstarter)

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Congrats on getting the python :)!

The python is one of the best ships in the game, possibly the best all rounder if you don't want to go long distances really quickly, move lots of cargo, or move lots of cargo really quickly. However, that can make it feel very safe, like the vulture. I've been very successful in my Python, but have had more fun in the smaller ships. Having said that, I did lose one taking on a python and a federal assault ship and third ship while testing the limits of my new loadout, so they are not indestructible:p

If you can only just afford the python and a few addons, then it probably won't be as good as the ship you last had. This could make it more interesting as you have to be more careful which fights to pick. I like taking a DBS into a haz res for cheaper thrills.

You could try specialising in the kinds of craft you want to take down, maybe going for rail guns or cannons for bigger ships.

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From what I've seen, professional Python-eers use gimballed, fixed, or turreted beams to take down small (vulture and under) ships and put cannons or rail guns for larger ships only, targeting subsystems.

 

Wookiee, what's the fastest way to cycle through targeting subsystems on your current target? And are the power distributors still the subsystem of choice to aim at if you want to blow ships up the fastest?

 

Edit: Up to 80M loose credits; the third smuggling run I made failed when I got pulled out of super cruise by system security and, even though I activated hard points, I forgot to actually toggle to my guns and he got the scan off on me </sad trombone>.

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My python has 2 c3 turret burst lasers, 2 c2 gimballed multicannons and a c3 gimballed cannon :). Then again, I had an asp set up with 6 c2 gimballed multicannons to great effect.

Destroying the power plant has a small chance of instant destruction, but does cut the power, leaving the ships as sitting ducks. You can bind the cycling through of subsystems in either direction to any button you like.

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This week's Dev Update sheds a bit more light on the Engineers :)- here is the full thing: https://community.elitedangerous.com/node/371

 

-There will initially be about 30 Engineers scattered throughout human space, each with their own particular area of expertise

 

- Engineers will offer a range of services depending on their opinion of you; different actions will influence them depending on their own preferences. Some will be impressed by navy ranks, while others will be impressed by mining or smuggling prowess.

 

-Depending on your standing with them (how much they trust you), the Engineer will make available a number of blueprints, telling the materials and items required. They will do the work if you bring the stuff to them.

 

- Not all engineers will be available to every player, you need to pass a threshold before they will deal with you.

 

-They will be spread out over space according to their faction affiliations etc, but many will be secluded on planets... it's not clear to me if Season 1 players will be able to access any. I think it would be a big mistake to cut them off completely, of only because they won't know what they are missing if they don't get a taste of the good stuff. Obviously it's moot if all materials are planet-based, but FD said that materials would be extracted from all kinds of activities. 

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General question about scavenging planetary materials Wookie - Is the inventory for those things tied to your ship or do you carry that stuff with you from ship to ship to ship if you switch out? I assume it's the latter because it doesn't make as much sense to farm the alloys for modifications if you don't keep them when switching ships?

 

Also is there any limit on how many alloys you can carry?

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Materials go with you from ship to ship, and you can have a maximum of 300. I'm pretty sure they stay with you if you lose your ship as well; I think they are relatively small amounts so you could fit them in an escape pod.

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BREAKING NEWS: clickbait is saying that ED no longer supports Oculus.  Frontier have officially announced that they are currently focusing on supporting the Vive and Steam VR, rather than Oculus. However, they are actively working with Oculus, and have not signed any exclusivity deal. Apparently, steamvr had stable drivers earlier, which makes sense because Horizons launched with Vive support.

At least one user on the Elite forums, ghcannon, has access to a CV1 for work, and has played ED on it through steam VR

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aaaaand I haven't played this in a week. I don't know what makes my interest in this game so mercurial. I think I hit my Python goal, and lost interest.

 

I also got blown up by another dude completely randomly in a RES, came back, and most definitely blew him up. He denied even knowing. I suppose that's possible, since I turned off "report to security" on my ship while running snuggling missions.

 

He still fucking blew me up though, and now I'm right on the scary precipice of insurance credits where I was safe before.

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I only play when I am curious about something, or am working towards a specific goal. Right now I am trying to gain imperial ranks, which will take an absolute age; however, I am in no rush and play an hour or so every now and then. Missing a week is not unusual for me, especially when other games come out. When I achieve my goal, I often take a break.

After playing with the big ships, I had great fun going back to the smaller ships just to play around in them... taking a viper or DBS to a RES, or interdicting pirates, is tremendous fun when you know that you are not automatically safe and have to work to stay in one piece (with small buy backs if you lose).

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BREAKING NEWS: clickbait is saying that ED no longer supports Oculus.  Frontier have officially announced that they are currently focusing on supporting the Vive and Steam VR, rather than Oculus. However, they are actively working with Oculus, and have not signed any exclusivity deal. Apparently, steamvr had stable drivers earlier, which makes sense because Horizons launched with Vive support.

At least one user on the Elite forums, ghcannon, has access to a CV1 for work, and has played ED on it through steam VR

 

Well I guess I'm glad that I didn't order an Oculus since this was the main killer app I wanted to play with it. That's really sad.

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Dewar, there's a followup from Braben saying "No, of course we're supporting the Oculus. We said that we were waiting until the final version of Oculus was ready because then we wouldn't have to devote resources to each new prototype."

 

So they're supporting it.

 

Source: http://arstechnica.com/gaming/2016/01/dont-worry-elite-dangerous-is-still-coming-to-the-oculus-rift/

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It's true that they no longer have the Oculus badge on their advertising, so maybe people were alarmed by that. I know that current players with DK2s felt a little abandoned for a few months after FD stopped supporting new SDKs, but it certainly makes sense not to invest too much effort on such shifting requirements.

I'm in no position to do so right now, but I definitely plan on getting at least one of the headsets (and boost my PC again)! Since my current PC has a small form factor I may need to wait until the next generation of GPUs that are expected this year, or buy a whole new PC; I've been looking at ludicrous "VR ready" PC builds that should also play everything else for a long, long time :P. It might even run star citizen :P!

However, maybe I'll get a headset and I'll be fine with my current set up; after all it meets the Oculus recommended specs IIRC, just not the Horizons ones. FD have said that their quoted specs are for 90 FPS at 1.4 x super sampling, but people's tolerance for low frame rates vary considerably. I borrowed a DK1 during the early alphas and felt sort of OK with 30-40 FPS, but suddenly really sick when the station dropped it to 15. I certainly don't want that to happen again! Also, something called asynchronous time warp looks like it can soften the blow of reduced frame rates in VR by distorting the image according to the expected changes between frames. Or something!

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That's a really excellent write up! The community has created a huge amount of emergent gameplay, with Frontier providing a galaxy size play pit.

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That's awesome. I'm not really sure where to start with this game. Really I just want to be a miner and/or space trucker.

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In the latest newsletter, FD presented a rough roadmap for Season 2:

2.1 The Engineers, Spring 2016... Loot and crafting, another mission revamp with persistent contacts, more huge weapons

2.2 The Guardians, Summer 2016... Ship Launched Fighters

2.3 The Commanders, Autumn 2016... Create a unique avatar for your commander and play with multiple humans on the same ship

2.4 ????? Secret so far :)

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Frontier have made some changes to how you can buy the game: Horizons is now a season pass, priced at £24.99, which is £10 cheaper than before for people who have the base game already; also, the arena mode is available separately for £4.99.

It's a but weird that they removed Horizons as a separate steam item given that they previously justified it due to different system requirements. It might be due to the more negative steam reviews by people who didn't realise most of the content is still to come.

Also, they've given some more info about mission changes for 2.1. Interestingly they are moving rank requirements for accepting missions; instead, ranks indicate mission difficulty and level of reward. The aim is to have a wider range of missions available, and also to make the types of mission available in a given system more predictable.

Missions associated with USSs will generate in specific locations that will be revealed by a system scan. Scanning Nav Beacons will also reveal mission locations and undiscovered planets.

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Helped one of my friends start Elite over the weekend. Turns out Search and Rescue missions can really get you started (Sidewinder > Hauler > Cobra MkIII in short order). Favorite quote: "Oh, I forgot gravity existed."

 

2.1 comments from the Newsletter preview https://community.elitedangerous.com/node/388 :

 

1) I love being able to scan the USS sites; I never really went to any of those because it felt like it took so much time to hunt USS after USS (and I didn't want to lose my ship if it turned out to be a trap). I also love that there's a proper use for Nav Beacons now, and it eliminates needing a system scanner if you want to min/max your ship for other functions.

 

2) More mission types, increased granularity on how it affects your reputation, being able to accept alternate missions without dropping out of supercruise - yes please. They really needed to smooth out the progression path here and this is a good stepping stone.

 

3) The mission generation overhaul (system emergency missions first, then the economy of the starport, then missions that make sense for the system government) will also aid progression naturally. Looking forward to the finished product.

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I agree with all of your comments. The ability to get a system map by scanning the nav beacon makes exploring colonised space far more accessible, as there's no danger of missing stations (especially planet side ones). More variety and less hassle when doing missions can only be a good thing too.

I recently broke a cardinal rule and traded slaves, but only to take them to the refuge set up by Aisling Duval for the CG :P. I went for nearby slaves rather than more distant profitable ones to maximise the number of people freed rather than profit; still a 22.5 million credit completion bonus ain't bad! CGs are about the only time that I use my anaconda any more, it's almost too good (and also slow)... fun for a while, but I tend to prefer smaller and nippier ships.

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Frontier boss David Braben showed up in person on Reddit to assuage player fears. “What it means is that 2.1 is pushed out by around 6 weeks,” he says. “This is to push the quality up, which is a good thing for the game. It’s ready when it’s ready. It does mean you’ll have to wait a bit longer, but it will be worth the wait.”

 

Fine with me. I just got my Python and am slowly improving it.

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Given that there was no release date, I can't be too disappointed by a 6 week slip :P! It sounds like the beta for 2.1 will be in May.

The latest dev update revealed that rewards for missions will no longer be confined to credits. They could include locations of treasure caches, rare materials and items that would normally only be available through salvage.

I haven't played much recently, but have been pottering around helping community goals and building imperial rank. I almost toasted my anaconda during one planetary delivery mission: thanks to 2.8g gravity, I landed with 18% hull!

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http://arstechnica.com/gaming/2016/03/confirmed-elite-dangerous-will-have-official-native-oculus-rift-support/

 

(Edit: From the article:)

In a Skype interview with Ars Technica, Frontier Developments founder and CEO David Braben was finally able to make the formal announcement he’s been waiting to make. "We’re going to be on the Oculus store," he confirmed. "We’re supporting [the Oculus Rift runtime] one point naught and the consumer release at launch, which is March 28."

 

...HTC Vive fans shouldn’t feel left out, either: Elite already natively supports SteamVR and the Vive, and it will continue to do so. (Anecdotally, I can confirm that the game indeed works effortlessly with the Vive Pre.) It’s inevitable that consumers will side with a favorite VR headset—perhaps some folks prefer how one feels on their head versus the other or are swayed by one VR headset’s exclusive content—but Elite will work very well on both.

And that led to the first of two questions that Braben wouldn’t answer: which VR headset does he prefer for use in Elite? When we asked, he paused for several seconds. "Both parties have treated us very well," he said with a Cheshire Cat smile. (We expect we’ll form our own opinion on Elite in the Rift versus Elite in the Vive in the next few weeks, once we have final hardware in hand for both headsets. Stay tuned.)

The second question, of course, was whether or not console players can join PC players in VR—we asked, specifically, if Elite might be coming to the PlayStation 4 and PlayStation VR. The only answer Braben would offer on that was a quick, cryptic "no comment."

 

(Edit: Personal comment - Considering the dominance of the PS4 in Europe where a lot of the original Elite fanbase resides, it would be foolish not to adapt it for the PS4 if possible.)

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Great news about OR :).

I remember FD saying that they were planning on a PS4 version about this time last year; I was being a volunteer ambassador for Elite at PAX EAst, and the announcement was made at GDC, which was happening at the same time.

Now I am less sure which head seat to go for. It might depend on where in the UK I get my next job; I could afford an extra room for the Vive in some areas but not others.

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 This week's newsletter includes concept art for an Engineer base:

 

026e180e5b0f331f03ca067aa8b754442578be56

 

We will be able to trade data, commodities, and materials for "unique" ship modules :).

 

Here is the first engineer to be revealed (was shown about a month a go) Todd "The Blaster" McQuinn,(yes really) which seems a bit Bald-Gruff Space Bro; he looks pretty good but I hope for more diversity

 

982b40dc23bde11349ad01005b4d7249.jpg

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