Discovery I've traveled 0.25 light years

[Htorne]

I'm currently moving at 2501.72c, and traveling at nearly 0.01 light years each 2 minutes or so. Heading to a near by star that we can't hyperjump to. Due to the difficulties in calculating distances and so forth. I was wondering if any one could help me understand the speed.

As I understand it 1c equals to 1% of the speed of light ? Am I correct in this speculation? Also in case you wondered I'm using a parallax method to find my destination star.

It will be interesting to see if the other star systems are just a wallpaper backdrop or if I make it. I will keep you posted.

Finally the maximum speed of the frameshift drive in the sidewinder is 2,501.72c - I've been documenting my travel and will post pictures if something interesting happens.

It must be a bug that federation security pulls be out of frameshift drive 0.25 light years away from nearest star.

 

[Mephane]

No, 1c = 1x the speed of light. 2500c = 2500x the speed of light.

But you won't see anything at the destination, you can fly that far, someone tried it in the Alpha 4 and where the star system should have been there was just nothing.

 

[John Adams]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Speed_of_light

1c = 299,792,458 metres per second

 

[mladenkovacevic]

No 1c is exactly 100% the speed of light.. So you are currently traveling at 2,500 times the speed of light. Please make sure the trays are in the upright position

 

[Tinman]

I'm currently moving at 2501.72c, and traveling at nearly 0.01 light years each 2 minutes or so. Heading to a near by star that we can't hyperjump to. Due to the difficulties in calculating distances and so forth. I was wondering if any one could help me understand the speed.

As I understand it 1c equals to 1% of the speed of light ? Am I correct in this speculation? Also in case you wondered I'm using a parallax method to find my destination star.

It will be interesting to see if the other star systems are just a wallpaper backdrop or if I make it. I will keep you posted.

Finally the maximum speed of the frameshift drive in the sidewinder is 2,501.72c - I've been documenting my travel and will post pictures if something interesting happens.

It must be a bug that federation security pulls be out of frameshift drive 0.25 light years away from nearest star.

1c means "1x the speed of light" so right now you are traveling at 2500 times the speed of light. Yes...space is big.

The other stars are in one way real and in another way wallpaper. When you jump into a system the starfield is rendered accurately based on the galaxy map. So every star is where it suppose to be while being at that position in the galaxy. But you can't actually fly to them the way you are trying to do now. I'm afraid you won't see anything when you "arrive" since FD haven't programmed for this simply because you won't be able to do this later anyway when the fuel mechanics are in place.

 

[Htorne]

hmm time to turn off life support. It was a good idea posting on the forum before spending another 4 hours

 

[Retrac100]

hmm time to turn off life support. It was a good idea posting on the forum before spending another 4 hours

LOL, but you can just hyperspace back to somewhere right?

 

[Winterwalker]

I'd like to put in a request here ...

Hyperspace .. as this thread points out .. is actually a "transition" designed to look "seamless" but in fact isn't .. you're lifted out of one solar system and planted into the destination system.
At the moment you spawn close to the destination star.

I have also heard (above) that it's not possible to supercruise from one system to the next because the areas are distinct from each other .. but I don't think this poster is the first player to try to do it, won't be the last, and it seems to me to be a little bit of shame that, certainly at the moment, you can't. (at least that is if Beta/ build is not what's stopping it).

Deep space may not be everyone's cup of tea but I feel this type of travel could be implemented from what I understand of the game so far .. if the graphic's engine knows where you are in relation to your current star .. and you set off in a direction .. the chart could calculate which star that you would reach next (direction) and easily arrive at a LightYear/ AU distance.

There would be a long journey time ... but on reaching the halfway point you could transition, as you do now, instantaneously into the next star's system. You are a long way from the star that you are newly relative to, at a position calculated, from the starmap (complex geometry but very doable) and will have to continue your supercruise in order to reach the star .. you only spawn a long way from it.

It wouldn't matter that this transition would not be strictly "seamless" because you have no point of reference and, as a beside, it would probably happen at T+6 hours when you're having a cup of tea and therefore wouldn't notice any "glitch", or could at least put up with it, even if it lasted a whole second.

For this reason I would like to add my +1 to this OP, and to the intrepid explorer who raises it, because although hyperspace makes trading possible and is absolutely the main mechanic, the alternative, to just head out there and see what you drift into would also give a real sense of exploration in my view.

Thanks FD for listening,

CMDR Winterwalker

EDIT: The geometry of this is potentially a PhD (final year project) waiting to happen;

 

[ZaphodBeeble]

I'm currently moving at 2501.72c, and traveling at nearly 0.01 light years each 2 minutes or so. Heading to a near by star that we can't hyperjump to. Due to the difficulties in calculating distances and so forth. I was wondering if any one could help me understand the speed.

Just done a quick calculation:

Speed of light, C = 299,792.46 km/s

Speed of your ship, S = C x 2500 = 749,481,145 km/s

Distance covered every 1 hour, D = S x 3600 = 2,698,132,122,000 km/h

Now to get your speed in ly/h using D, above:

One light year = 9,460,730,472,580.8 kilometres

D / 9,460,730,472,580.8 = 0.285 ly/h

Travelling at supercruise between stars is definitely not impossible at the moment if you want to fly your ship at full speed for a couple of days!

 

[Dante80]

I'd like to put in a request here ...

Hyperspace .. as this thread points out .. is actually a "transition" designed to look "seamless" but in fact isn't .. you're lifted out of one solar system and planted into the destination system.
At the moment you spawn close to the destination star.

I have also heard (above) that it's not possible to supercruise from one system to the next because the areas are distinct from each other .. but I don't think this poster is the first player to try to do it, won't be the last, and it seems to me to be a little bit of shame that, certainly at the moment, you can't. (at least that is if Beta/ build is not what's stopping it).

Deep space may not be everyone's cup of tea but I feel this type of travel could be implemented from what I understand of the game so far .. if the graphic's engine knows where you are in relation to your current star .. and you set off in a direction .. the chart could calculate which star that you would reach next (direction) and easily arrive at a LightYear/ AU distance.

There would be a long journey time ... but on reaching the halfway point you could transition, as you do now, instantaneously into the next star's system. You are a long way from the star that you are newly relative to, at a position calculated, from the starmap (complex geometry but very doable) and will have to continue your supercruise in order to reach the star .. you only spawn a long way from it.

It wouldn't matter that this transition would not be strictly "seamless" because you have no point of reference and, as a beside, it would probably happen at T+6 hours when you're having a cup of tea and therefore wouldn't notice any "glitch", or could at least put up with it, even if it lasted a whole second.

For this reason I would like to add my +1 to this OP, and to the intrepid explorer who raises it, because although hyperspace makes trading possible and is absolutely the main mechanic, the alternative, to just head out there and see what you drift into would also give a real sense of exploration in my view.

Thanks FD for listening,

CMDR Winterwalker

EDIT: The geometry of this is potentially a PhD (final year project) waiting to happen;

I used to play a space browser game called astroempires with a crazy dude called winterwarrior and/or deathwalker. You are not by chance him, no?

Regarding your proposal, the problem is moot imo. You see, as soon as we get something like this in the game it would become impossible to frame shift from one star system to the other. The only reason someone is trying to test this now (1,2) is because the game is..cheating..XD

I understand that you want to feel you are traveling in a seamless universe, but the super cruise mechanic is intended to be used for in system travel, not for traveling between systems. And you need very high speeds like 2500c since some star systems are many thousands of AUs in diameter.

 

[Winterwalker]

I used to play a space browser game called astroempires with a crazy dude called winterwarrior and/or deathwalker. You are not by chance him, no?

Regarding your proposal, the problem is moot imo. You see, as soon as we get something like this in the game it would become impossible to frame shift from one star system to the other. The only reason someone is trying to test this now (1,2) is because the game is..cheating..XD

I understand that you want to feel you are traveling in a seamless universe, but the super cruise mechanic is intended to be used for in system travel, not for traveling between systems. And you need very high speeds like 2500c since some star systems are many thousands of AUs in diameter.

No relation to the people you mention, though I was looking for a strangely-familar-yet-none-the-less-new-to-the-community-type commander name. So that's a result.

Definitely take your point about fuel (and the Centauran Herald I also think is excellent) .. but I believe it's possible to reach superluminal speeds with your flight assist off (1) . So you'd be talking about making very well considered corrective burns to try get between systems, and to a dock.

Navigating too, to get off on the right heading .. would be very VERY difficult.
As it stands you might need to learn the alien constellations, represented accurately in the starfield (if only graphically, as quoted this thread, above) stars as seen outside the ship. Maybe proposal could go a little further, a toggle overlaid from the galaxy map on the stars, as my iphone kind of does today., and points out "Orion on the horizon" .. that way ..

Due to the distances involved it really would be some achievement, wouldn't it? If you actually made it on a single tank (2).

So while it may very well be a "second star to the right and straight on 'til morning" type maneuvre, and proposal, I still feel it would be great to make it at least possible. Even better if some kind of log threw it into a newsfeed, or earned a "navigator" decal or similar, to prove that someone had not only gone ahead and done the next to impossible but had actually survived the experience. Otherwise it's could just make for a very tall story for the forums.

I'm still convinced about the potential for it to be at least possible, though you'd have to be half mad (sorry to the OP) to attempt it, and most commercial pilots still use hyperspace, because it's "quite a lot" quicker!

 

[Yaffle]

.

I have also heard (above) that it's not possible to supercruise from one system to the next because the areas are distinct from each other .. but I don't think this poster is the first player to try to do it, won't be the last, and it seems to me to be a little bit of shame that, certainly at the moment, you can't. (at least that is if Beta/ build is not what's stopping it).

Now is the closest we'll get. Fuel consumption will kill the idea.

Hyperspace is far, far more fuel efficient that supercruise, so the (say) 10LY jump from system A to system B could use less fuel than the 1,500LS from the star in system B to its planet in orbit.

Sort of - hyperspace is a motorway in 6th gear. Supercruise is thraping the engine in first at 40mph.

Problem is, I am stoned if I can find where I read that.

 

[Winterwalker]

Now is the closest we'll get. Fuel consumption will kill the idea.

Hyperspace is far, far more fuel efficient that supercruise, so the (say) 10LY jump from system A to system B could use less fuel than the 1,500LS from the star in system B to it's planet in orbit.

Sort of - hyperspace is a motorway in 6th gear. Supercruise is thraping the engine in first at 40mph.

Problem is, I am stoned if I can find where I read that.

That's OK, I get what you're saying, but can you not get to speed then flight assist "off"?

Travelling at supercruise between stars is definitely not impossible at the moment if you want to fly your ship at full speed for a couple of days!

Could it be more possible in a different piece of the galaxy?

Stars are closer packed in high density areas; Globular Clusters

 

[Greebie]

Nope, flight assist is related to thrusters and main engines. Frame shift doesn't use these engines but a completely different propulsion systems that "bends" space in order to propel you at FTL speeds.

You can't get up to speed then switch it off like you can your engines.

 

[Winterwalker]

Nope, flight assist is related to thrusters and main engines. Frame shift doesn't use these engines but a completely different propulsion systems that "bends" space in order to propel you at FTL speeds.

You can't get up to speed then switch it off like you can your engines.

In that case, fair enough ..

'Elite: Dangerous' Alpha 4.01 - Supercruise with Flight Assist Off seems to have mislead.

If you can't trade or raid fuel from interstellar NPC's then marooned in space you'll be .. forever!!

Right on commander

 

[Greebie]

Fuel can be scooped from stars or stellar gas clouds, you just need the right equipment to do so.

As for the video with FA Off in Supercruise, I'm not sure how they managed that, my FA toggle button has no effect in SC mode unless it was removed in a later Alpha update or there's a separate section for assigning control overrides within SC mode.

 

[Htorne]

Just done a quick calculation:

Speed of light, C = 299,792.46 km/s

Speed of your ship, S = C x 2500 = 749,481,145 km/s

Distance covered every 1 hour, D = S x 3600 = 2,698,132,122,000 km/h

Now to get your speed in ly/h using D, above:

One light year = 9,460,730,472,580.8 kilometres

D / 9,460,730,472,580.8 = 0.285 ly/h

Travelling at supercruise between stars is definitely not impossible at the moment if you want to fly your ship at full speed for a couple of days!

I am one of them people who like to fly from Scandinavia to Brazil in flight simulator in real time, I'm pretty sure I would not mind flying a few light years at 0.285 ly/h. In fact using my homegrown navigation methods, I'm sure it would be possible.

Here is how I attempted to do it earlier today.

Well there was a bit more too it than just whats on the picture, but you get the idea.

 

[Ayo]

Fuel can be scooped from stars or stellar gas clouds, you just need the right equipment to do so.

As for the video with FA Off in Supercruise, I'm not sure how they managed that, my FA toggle button has no effect in SC mode unless it was removed in a later Alpha update or there's a separate section for assigning control overrides within SC mode.

You can turn flight assist off in beta 1.0 using the systems panel.

 

[Keybuk]

I'm afraid you won't see anything when you "arrive" since FD haven't programmed for this simply because you won't be able to do this later anyway when the fuel mechanics are in place.

So I was wondering about this... why couldn't a Lakon commander use all 440 units of cargo space to store fuel and refuel along the way?

The main tank must have enough fuel to be able to do a full hyperspace jump into a system and travel around 1,000 ls once inside the system.

Assuming that the jump range is 15 ly, that's 15 units of fuel. We can assume "minutes" of consumption in Supercruise, if it's 10 min to travel, that could be another 10 units of fuel at 100%. (Figures made up on spot)

So 25 units of fuel in a tank seems a minimum for a "one trip, refuel" kind of flight.

In Supercruise at 2500 c, how far can you go on 1min/unit ?

At 1c, every second, we're doing the same distance as one light second. ie. 1c = 1ls/s (not 1ls²)
At 2500c, every second, we're doing the same distance as 2500 ls
So in one minute, you go 150,000 ls
That's a fraction of a lightyear ... 0.0048 in fact
So the most you can hope to go on a 25 unit fuel tank, would be 0.12 ly

The DDF doesn't seem to allow refueling from your own cargo bay, so this does seem to limit the supercruise to in system only.

But what if it did? You get to add the 440 units on top of that 25, so you could travel 2.23ly. Are there stars that close together?

According to "Our Neighbor Stars", Thomas Hamilton, Strategic Books, 2012, page 20 ... 31,500 years ago Epsilon Eridani passed less than a lightyear from Luyten 726-8.

So the chances are there are.

 

[Herro Zaber]

As for the video with FA Off in Supercruise, I'm not sure how they managed that, my FA toggle button has no effect in SC mode unless it was removed in a later Alpha update or there's a separate section for assigning control overrides within SC mode.

Before you go into super cruise - switch to FA off.

Or even easier while in SC - right hand panel where we used to toggle landing gear. That FA on/off toggle still works. Its all still a bit wonky though. While in SC - travelling away from a star - at full acceleration your speed climbs the further you are from the gravity well (as expected). but turn the engines off in faOFF and the acceleration stops. Turn the engines on (with null accel) and faON and you slow down. The combination of engine on/off accelaration (and then the pips!) just feels off right now.

But its late, maybe tomorrow it makes more sense.

I'm in SC now, FA off, about 5000ls left to Asellus Primus B (was .14ly) in silent running with my engines off.
(Edit to add, made it, nothing there but heartache)

Still having to recover from crappy interdictions.