Newcomer / Intro New Player Tips from an Old Pro

EtherDragon · Dec 9, 2016

So, I started a second account to see what the new player experience is like, now that 2.2 has been running for a while, and here are the top 10 things you need to know to enjoy Elite Dangerous your first time out!

1. Do ALL the tutorials first - they really help you get a grasp on how to do everything you will do often in Elite.
2. Customize your key bindings - nothing is more frustrating than not knowing what key does what, so set yours up your way (probably during tutorials).
3. Stick to Private Play at first - Open Play is fun, but unfortunately, there are PvP Trolls* in the common places that new players typically start.
4. Remember your starting ship is FREE - try stuff, get blown up, it doesn't matter because your basic replacement sidewinder is always free.
5. Upgrade your sidewinder - before buying a new ship make the most out of your sidewinder as it's highly customizable and capable little ship!
6. Save up Full Price for a new ship - this way your old ship's trade in ensures you have enough for a couple upgrades and insurance should you blow up your brand new ship.
7. Do lots of missions - they are profitable, and usually pretty strait forward. Just make sure you read the full text to understand exactly what they want you to do!
8. Go Explore! - Don't be afraid to travel around to look for profits; get out away from your starting location and see the sights!
9. Learn how the economy works - supplementing mission runs with free market cargo hauls is a great way to money up, but you have to have enough cash on hand to buy the right cargo.
10. Join Open Play - after you have enough $$ saved to cover insurance a few times join us in Open Play. The vast majority of us are really cool, but you might find the occasional Troll* - it's nothing that your insurance fee can't take care of, so make sure you can cover it before joining.

*Note Trolling (e.g. abusing a new player's lack of knowledge about the game) and Piracy (a legitimate style of play, where your goal is to obtain by force or coercion some of another player's cargo) are NOT the same thing.

Alex Brentnall · Dec 9, 2016

Sounds like good advice.

I'd add to #6 or change it so that when buying new ships there is spare cash for upgrades.

Also I kinda disagree with #3. Trying open early on with lots of other new starters can be very fun.
My advice to new players is always: get into open, have fun, mess around, break things, die a lot and learn. Attack that station, loiter, block the mailslot, violate the no-fire zone, see what happens and learn. Then after a few days when you feel like you understand the game hit the reset button and start properly. At that point I'd agree with #3

Anyway. Good advice nonetheless

2Karl · Dec 9, 2016

I've got 50 hours on record and I've flown all over federation space, and in all that time I've only ever seen two other players. Where are these "lots of other new starters" and "PvP Trolls" you speak of?

through the hole backwards · Dec 9, 2016

Given the size of universe it not surprising that random encounters rarely happen. Hang around the core systems or the locations of community goals and you will encounter more "real" people. Where stuff happens people are. Trust no one though! Some people just seem unable to resist the urge to pop a laser in your stern just for the giggles. Well trust some people , but choose your friends wisely !

Rob_the_Sparky · Dec 9, 2016

Yeah, always be suspicious of hollow symbols on the radar. Mostly they will have no interest in you, some will want to chat or wing up and others just want to kill everything. You might even meet a player pirate but given how hard this role is to currently play it is unlikely.

Alex Brentnall · Dec 9, 2016

2Karl said:
I've got 50 hours on record and I've flown all over federation space, and in all that time I've only ever seen two other players. Where are these "lots of other new starters" and "PvP Trolls" you speak of?

LHS 3447, a week or so ago with some friends I chased out an Anaconda that had been attacking sidewinders. At the same times there were reports of another doing the same.
Eravate is also a magnet. There are player actively attacking starters there, there are also others trying to defend them with mixed success rates, mostly good though.

If you get out of the initial 2-4 systems that spawn new players you are good. It's not a big deal but lots of new players stick to the systems they know for a long time. I was still around Sun Taskua or however it's spelt after nearly 3 weeks from my first ever loadup and I'd played almost every day.

2Karl · Dec 9, 2016

Out of interest, are the Xbox servers separate to the PC servers? I play on PC. I'm wondering if the "horrendous PVP" I've been hearing so muh about is a console-only thing? I'm also in the UK. Perhaps there's more american players, or americans are more prone to PvP ganking (they tend to be a competitive lot in my experience). I'd love to see some sort of stats on this. Sometimes it feels like I'm playing in solo - I haven't seen any of the stuff everyone seems to be complaining about, or indeed, any real human contact.

BigBANGtheory [VR] · Dec 9, 2016

I'd give two pieces of advice:

1) Realise everything in the game can be yours in time. It's your knowledge, experience and the choices you make that dictate how these goals are achieved. As long as you are learning don't worry about making mistakes or earning large sums of credits because with knowledge on your side you can get what you want when you want.

2) Get a handle on the value of materials in particular learn to spot and acquire those materials that are hard to come by so you can stockpile them on your travels for the future rather than passing them by or worse disposing of them.

Alex Brentnall · Dec 9, 2016

2Karl said:
Out of interest, are the Xbox servers separate to the PC servers? I play on PC. I'm wondering if the "horrendous PVP" I've been hearing so muh about is a console-only thing? I'm also in the UK. Perhaps there's more american players, or americans are more prone to PvP ganking (they tend to be a competitive lot in my experience). I'd love to see some sort of stats on this. Sometimes it feels like I'm playing in solo - I haven't seen any of the stuff everyone seems to be complaining about, or indeed, any real human contact.

Pc and Console are separate game-spaces/instances so we can never meet but the background galaxy is the same

CMDR Mr. Boombastic · Dec 9, 2016

You tend to get more players around the starter systems, community goal stations, engineer bases.
Maybe there will be fewer PvPers at the moment as the 2.2.03 beta (which lasts about a month) is more PvP focussed.

EtherDragon · Dec 9, 2016

2Karl said:
I've got 50 hours on record and I've flown all over federation space, and in all that time I've only ever seen two other players. Where are these "lots of other new starters" and "PvP Trolls" you speak of?

I started a new account to see what the new player experience was like as of 2.2 - I was given the standard newbie mission to deliver a message to Erevate. I got immediately interdicted and destroyed upon entering Erevate by some troll destroying all sidewinders who entered "his space."

I think it's cool that someone would steak a claim and defend it - but the ONE system that everyone who does the introductory mission is supposed to visit? Come-on... Anyway, that's why I said play Private at first, to get a sense for the game.

Although it turns out he's attracted the attention of a dedicated PvP armada who regularly patrol Erevate for exactly that kind of crap.

2Karl · Dec 9, 2016

EtherDragon said:
Although it turns out he's attracted the attention of a dedicated PvP armada who regularly patrol Erevate for exactly that kind of crap.

See, THIS is exactly what I hoped would happen. Judging from other forum posts it might be an edge case, but I like to think that not all PvPers are the in game equivalent of Audi drivers, and that some of them might actually do it so that they can help out other people, either by flying escort for them or exacting bloody vengeance.

Alec Turner · Dec 9, 2016

On a similar subject, there's a terrific video series from an old timer who's started out afresh. Recommended viewing for new players.

https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLfWbIi9YGRbdxeiOWS9Pkxnxp4FboSQm6

Evil_Merlin · Dec 9, 2016

I'm going to say have at least 2x the buying price of a new ship so that you can make it actually useful.

Nothing worse than dropping millions on a new ship only to need millions more to make it more viable.

Sure you can run with 3E shields and FSD's but do you REALLY want to?

I'd also add another recommendation. If you are going to play Open, try to find a "home base" far away from the rabble as possible. I've found a little place with several good stations that have a great supply of ships and hardware as well as close zones for both resources and bounty hunting and have, in about a year of playing run into exactly one other CMD out in my neck of the woods. Too many "goons" out there that just want to make your life frustrating because they get enjoyment out of just that.