oh, thats quite sad, but then, what would actually happen if one tries? a sudden wall? or would he arrive in empty space?
A to B with no SC?
- Thread starter Stealthie
- Start date
oh, thats quite sad, but then, what would actually happen if one tries? a sudden wall? or would he arrive in empty space?
Just empty space.
Not tried it. From what I've read, the distance reduces to zero, but the destination objects don't appear. Once apparently there, you still need to high wake to get actually there, and I think this high wake uses as much fuel as if you hadn't just SC'd for several hours.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XY7E0DEp5yI <- moon to planet, no sc)
PS not a response directly to your post, but related
LOL unbelievable! Fifteen hours! Earth to the moon in a bog-standard ship in previous Elites took about an hour.
Yes, that's one hour, from the surface of Earth to docked at Apollonius city on the far side of the moon.
With a very fast or "engineered" (via BUFFET) ship, you could probably do the round trip in about the same time. 90 mins tops, there and back, incl. docking at both ends.
Standard high thrusts in FE2/FFE are around 30 G. Top-end is around 60 G. And you can swallow the handwavium 'inertial damping' for the pilot, cause 60 G is 12x more awesome than 5 G.
But even if you only had a 5 G ship - hell, even sub-1 G - if you're allowed to actually use your thrusters, all the way there, regardless of velocity, simply reversing thrust at the half-way point, it'd still take only a few more hours. No way near 15, that's for certain!
I'm curious now, may try a 5 G moonshot in FFED3D later, see how long it takes..
Edit: here's a 30 G moonshot, in exactly 1 hour:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X4SImcbOm2o&t=369s
(and before any numpties chime in, yes, this is without using Stardreamer - just basic mechanical flight, in real-time).
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There is fully functional orbital mechanics for ships in game. Scott Manley put iEagle into orbit around a small planet on one of his streams I believe
Or should I say - somewhat functional. Still quite impressive.
An emphasis very much on "somewhat", i'm afraid - all that is possible in ED is an enforced, ie automated perfectly circular orbit, and even then, only around sufficiently small and low-mass bodies. Any deviation from perfectly-circular orbit would mean an ellipse, and would thus conflict with ED's "space speed limit".
The last two games had naturalistic, emergent and chaotic gravity play, none of this enforced, top-down, stiffly-choreographed charade we're served up in ED. You could orbit low and fast, high and slow, geo-stationary, or anywhere in-between - executing extreme low-pass manoeuvers, slingshotting around white dwarves, high-efficiency transfer orbits between neighboring bodies, aerobraking manoeuvers, etc. etc. - none of which is hard-coded, scripted or rigorously hand-held (ie. no mode-switching or transitions, countdowns etc.) - all of it flows seamlessly from the interaction with the basic background physics model.
I've posted a few high-dive and orbital play vids here:
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCrny-ysVxM-DSn3mh-R9Sww/videos?sort=dd&view=0&shelf_id=0
...and all of this kind of traditional Elite gameplay is utterly precluded in ED. Otherwise, i'd be playing it instead of FFE still... Spaceflight's supposed to be the whole point of the game. What little freedom remains of it in ED is just soul-destroyingly naff. After playing previous Elites, the ships in ED simply do not respond to inputs. They just make groaning noises when you try to rotate, and the thrusters sputter out the moment you open the throttles. It's a kludgy slideshow compared to the free-flowing unparalleled liberty we're accustomed to in the previous games..
"Orbit" in ED is served up in the same rigorously-scripted manner as "interdiction" and general combat. It's a mere sop to what it's supposed to be. In the previous games everything blended seamlessly, "orbital mechanics" wasn't a separate thing in its own right, there was no interfering "orbital cruise" mode switching and associated fanfares / lockup transitions. You just slide into orbit around a planet, and if your speed was increasing then you must be falling, and if your speed's falling you must be rising... so you could trim your velocity to achieve perfectly stable speed and thus circular orbit at any altitude. Fully unscripted, emergent and seamless.
Sorry, but trying to show by comparison that ED can even come close to what the previous games offered just further underscores how hopelessly restricted it is.. Orbit / gravity play used to be a basic aspect of flight, not some special thing in its own right, only possible within a narrow range of edge-case and utterly futile, boring scenarios..
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What not Benny Hill theme tune?
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