Fire Groups.

Am i correct in assuming that in these Fire Groups you set "Energy Priorities" for your Ship Systems?Also having more than one fire group enables you to have a "hot key" so to speak?For example,one Group has priorities for Combat based systems at No1,and non essential systems are rated 2 or 3.The you can have the other group set up for Exploration so that energy priorities are mainly engine based.By having more than one fire group you can switch between the two instantaneously?
 
No fire groups control weapons and devices that can be fired (e.g. Discovery Scanner, Wake Scanner, limpets and so on). You might have one with lasers to take down an enemies shields on fire group 1 button 1, cannons on fg 1 button 2 and then have say mining lasers in fire group two.

Pip management controls system/engine/weapon power and is done with the arrow keys (if using a keyboard).
 
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PaUzZZze

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Okay so!

There seperate tabs first of all, modules and fire groups. Think of fire groups as kind of you loadout. You can put two burst lasers on the R2 position and then two muti cannons on L2 and go ham. You can switch fire groups very easily by holding square I believe (if it's the same on Xbox, we'll see) and press L1 or R1 to switch back and forth from let's say your weapons fire group as I mentioned above then maybe you have a kill warrant scanner and a maybe a shield storage cell on your second fire group. Hope that helped.

In the modules section you control the amount of power going to your ships systems, weapons, etc. For example ill usually put less important things like the storage hatch or maybe scanners at 5 and thrusters, shiels and things you think are more important for a given situation at 1. This is more for when you have your ship overloaded. By that I mean to many things equipped but not a powerful enough "power plant" to handle it. When this happens modules start shutting down so you gotta start setting modules to much lower priority's, depending on how over the power limit you are. And don't be afraid to set things at 2 or 3 either like weapons even. Again depends how over the limit you are.

Hope this helps! Reminder, Frontier will be utilizing the touchpad for several controls on the PS4 so controls I mentioned above may be much different.
 
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Okay so!

There seperate tabs first of all, modules and fire groups. Think of fire groups as kind of you loadout. You can put two burst lasers on the R2 position and then two muti cannons on L2 and go ham. You can switch fire groups very easily by holding square I believe (if it's the same on Xbox, we'll see) and press L1 or R1 to switch back and forth from let's say your weapons fire group as I mentioned above then maybe you have a kill warrant scanner and a maybe a shield storage cell on your second fire group. Hope that helped.

In the modules section you control the amount of power going to your ships systems, weapons, etc. For example ill usually put less important things like the storage hatch or maybe scanners at 5 and thrusters, shiels and things you think are more important for a given situation at 1. This is more for when you have your ship overloaded. By that I mean to many things equipped but not a powerful enough "power plant" to handle it. When this happens modules start shutting down so you gotta start setting modules to much lower priority's, depending on how over the power limit you are. And don't be afraid to set things at 2 or 3 either like weapons even. Again depends how over the limit you are.

Hope this helps! Reminder, Frontier will be utilizing the touchpad for several controls on the PS4 so controls I mentioned above may be much different.

I'll be using a ps4 HOTAS. Can you assign the buttons however you want or are they set and not changeable?
 
I have a Fer-De-Lance with 4 Medium Fixed Pulse Lasers, a Huge Multicannon, and Shield Cell Banks. On one fire group, I have my lasers (1) and Multi Cannon (2) , on the second I have both of my Cell Banks (1+2). Now... The thing about Shield Cell Banks is that firing off too many will cook your ship and cause damage due to heat build gain as they spin up. I DO NOT recommend firing off multiple SCBs at the same time unless you are either: Flippin' crazy or in dire need of shielding. My Imperial Eagle, though, is a different story. I have a fire group for a missile launcher and Plasma Accelerator (2+1) , the other missile launcher and the Plasma Accelerator (2+1), Both launchers (1+2) and one just for the Heat sink (1).
 
On one fire group, I have my lasers (1) and Multi Cannon (2) , on the second I have both of my Cell Banks (1+2). I have a fire group for a missile launcher and Plasma Accelerator (2+1) , the other missile launcher and the Plasma Accelerator (2+1), Both launchers (1+2) and one just for the Heat sink (1).

I'm a little confused so bear with me.

I assume the number in parentheses (1) is the fire group assignation. i.e. lasers assigned to fire group 1. Then you also have cell banks assigned to fire group 1. I assume, and perhaps this is me getting lost in here, that when you hit the button mapped for fire group 1 it fires BOTH your lasers and your Cell bank at the same time - every time you hit the button? I was under the perhaps misguided assumption that a cell bank needs its own fire group to be fired independently of the weapons. In such a scenario then ALL you weapons need mapped onto fire group 1, and your cell banks, and perhaps heat sinks, on fire group 2?

am I lost or just confusing myself...?
 
I'm a little confused so bear with me.

I assume the number in parentheses (1) is the fire group assignation. i.e. lasers assigned to fire group 1. Then you also have cell banks assigned to fire group 1. I assume, and perhaps this is me getting lost in here, that when you hit the button mapped for fire group 1 it fires BOTH your lasers and your Cell bank at the same time - every time you hit the button? I was under the perhaps misguided assumption that a cell bank needs its own fire group to be fired independently of the weapons. In such a scenario then ALL you weapons need mapped onto fire group 1, and your cell banks, and perhaps heat sinks, on fire group 2?

am I lost or just confusing myself...?

You get a primary and secondary button in a fire group. You can map those buttons to be anything but on a Hotas it make sense to use fire button 1 and 2. Then you can have as many fire groups as you want.

I think PenguinActual has

Fire group 1
Button 1 = lasers
Button 2 = multicannon

Fire group 2
Button 1 = Cell bank
Button 2 = Cell bank

You wouldn't want to fire both 1 and 2 (cells) off at the same time due to heat but when button 1 cells are completely gone you can fire button 2 cells.

That's my interpretation anyway.
 
Fire groups are simply how your weapons are grouped and determine which weapons, scanners and/or accessories activate when you pull each trigger. You start with one fire group (SYSTEMS panel> Fire Groups) and more are added as you add weapons and scanners to your ship. Since most of us only have one or two triggers there are only 2 available buttons per weapon per fire group, trigger (1) and trigger (2) and so only 2 weapons per fire-group. I usually put 2 scanners in fire group one with my Advanced Discovery Scanner on trigger #2 (because of Voice-Attack software) since I usually fly in a default pattern of jump, honk, jump. If using mines I will put those in fire-group (2) because IMO those are first-attempt "running away" weapons, otherwise lasers since shields need to be knocked down before hull can be effectively attacked. If in a small ship with only two weapons then laser on trigger #1 and multi-cannon (or other) on trigger #2 for simplicity. o7
 
Oh and if any new players are reading this...

When you buy a weapon/scanner/limpet controller well anything that can be fired you get a warning on exiting outfitting to set a fire group. However you don't get one at the start of the game even though you have a basic Discovery Scanner installed as standard when you start.

Go into the right hand menu and navigate to fire groups. Set the discovery scanner to a fire group/trigger and fire it off when you get to new systems (you can sell the data).
 
You can play around with firegroups to put things in the same Firegroup and save switching between groups (i think you can have up to eight firegroups).

For example, things that only work in supercruise (interdictor) can be put on the same group as stuff that doesn't work in supercruise (weapons).

If you want to run a kill warrant scanner, you can put it on the same Firegroup as a weapon (scan as well as kill to save time). Of course, you might not be able to do that if running lots of beams (if you have to ease off trigger for heat probs, the scan might not complete, so can always have it on a separate trigger/group too).

I always keep it on a second Firegroup anyway if I have to be picky on available targets ;)

There are many combinations that might work for you. Just have a play around and see what you can come up with that you enjoy using. Not long now ps4 Cmdrs
o7
 
A little newplayer tip that might be actually obvious to some, but perhaps not all. Don't refrain from adding the same weapons to different groups, you're not limited to adding them to only one group. And so you don't need to add your weapons to a firegroup and your KWS to another group so you get forced to either shoot or sit and wait for scanning to be done.

Let's say you have 3 lasers for taking down shields, 2 cannons or multicannons or similar kinetic weapon to shoot the hull when shield are down. And a kill warrant scanner. You can do this:
Firegroup 1
Button 1 - All lasers
Button 2 - KWS
Firegroup 2
Button 1 - The same lasers again
Button 2 - Your cannons

So you can KWS your target while having an option to shoot whenever you want and if you do, by that time your targets shields are down, surely the scan would be finished and you could switch to your other group. Even while you are holding down the button 1 when you are switching the firegroup you'll get a smooth switching experience, in this case, your beams will still be shooting continously without interruption.

Or not just KWS. You could have something like this too;
Firegroup 1
Button 1 - All the lasers
Button 2 - All the multicannons
Firegroup 2
Button 1 - All the lasers again
Button 2 - Mines

So you won't have to completely stop your fire just because you want to lay mines. Etc :p
 
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Cheers guys - clarity and explanation appreciated. I have a feeling we (the PS4 virgins as I am calling us!) are the tuna heading into a sea of marlin...
 
Oh and if any new players are reading this...

When you buy a weapon/scanner/limpet controller well anything that can be fired you get a warning on exiting outfitting to set a fire group. However you don't get one at the start of the game even though you have a basic Discovery Scanner installed as standard when you start.

Go into the right hand menu and navigate to fire groups. Set the discovery scanner to a fire group/trigger and fire it off when you get to new systems (you can sell the data).

When you look at the star map does it tell you where the new systems are? If not how do you find them?
 
The systems are visible you just wont have much information on them until you go scan them. But it still allows you to plot jumps to them. Unless of course they are permit locked!!
 
When you look at the star map does it tell you where the new systems are? If not how do you find them?

Yes, there are various icons when you hover over a star, one is the system map. If this is red then you haven't been to that system.

I'd also say the basic Disco (discovery) scanner has very limited range but when you arrive at a system if you look in the left menu it should still list stations and so on. If you scan when you arrive and the system map still doesn't show the stations and planets you can target a station (from the left menu), fly out to it and scan again when closer.

It's not a vast amount of credits though, some systems you can pick up just a few 100 Cr in others it can be 20,000 Cr + for the data and you have to be 20 LY away from that system before you can sell it. Still, early game play, it can make a big difference if you're not really into combat and just want to explore.

Oh and it's not unknown systems as in ones no one has explored but just new to you, to get really new systems be maybe 1,000 to 1,500 Ly away from the bubble, but get at least a Hauler with an A rated FSD for those kind of journeys (although people have been to the other side of the galaxy in a sidewinder!).
 
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