Yeah, and for an MMO, I get that. And if I understand Elite history correctly, there used to be a single-player, offline game, but that's been removed. (That would be another way to get what I'm after, I suppose: single-player mode with a God cheat...)
You're right, it did used to be an offline game with a save/load function, which would probably alleviate your trouble if such a function still existed.
A similar logical request for single player cheat was made a month or two ago, and generated quite a bit of debate at the time. The argument was, basically, that seeing as someone's paid for a game with all this content in it, then they should be able to access all of that content (ie: Anacondas) if they didn't have much time to play.
This is unlikely to ever be implemented though.
Another part of Elite's history which is unchanged is that at its core it's a space trading and combat game. Those are the two base tenets of Elite, Frontier Elite 2, Frontier: First Encounters, and Elite: Dangerous.
It's telling that these two feature are also the most fully fleshed-out features as well. Mining is still a pain, and exploration is its own reward (if you're into that sort of thing).
I've seen a couple of replies in this thread about watching the security level of the system you're in. Hadn't noticed that before; that seems like a reasonable part of the learning curve, although a) seems a bit tedious to have to hop into the map before jumping, to make sure you actually want to go there, and b) isn't it rather impossible to get around, if you're sticking to high-security systems?
a) it is a little bit tedious, given the long loading times of the maps, but a few minutes you spend gathering information, planning your route etc, before you take off will save you the pain of getting blown up in an anarchy system.
b) yes and no. in your starter Sidewinder with E-grade FSD - yes, you can find yourself in a position where you have to go through the bottleneck of an anarchy system, or plot a long route around it. but as soon as you increase your jump range then anarchy systems are easy to avoid.
(...one difficulty I have at the moment is finding anarchy systems with decent amount of player traffic for me to interdict!)
I've never even bothered to try out Eve, due to hearing repeatedly/constantly that you just never take any ship out that you're not prepared to lose. And the further I get into Elite, it seems like there's a similar game design, with the advice being given of not flying anything but a stock Sidewinder, unless you have funds to cover the insurance.
Yes, it is similar, but different:
Elite: always fly with insurance, but insurance is automatically issued at a very high level (95% cover) and both ship and its modules are insured.
EVE: always fly with full insurance, but you have to purchase insurance and only the ship hull is insured.
Regarding system security, EVE has a much more well-developed security system than Elite at this stage in both games' developments:
Elite: system authority ships take ages to show up if you're attacked, sometimes not bothering to turn up at all. Being 'wanted' in a system results in a slighter higher NPC interdiction rate (other CMDRs usually don't bother) and a need to race into the station before being scanned, but that's about it.
EVE: in systems with a high security level, system authority ships appear almost instantly, locking their target in place and destroying them. Some players will still try to attack you in high security systems, usually in groups flying cheap ships outfit for maximum damage over the few seconds that they can get hits in before being destroyed.
This usually only affects people flying soft high value targets and using autopilot though.
As in Elite, in EVE there are ways of flying (ship type, certain modules, warping to bookmarks) which can make it very difficult to ever lose your ship.
At this point, I think I'll head back into lurk mode. Again, thanks to everybody for the replies.
Man
If you haven't tried flying with someone else in open mode yet, then send me a private message on the forums and I'll be happy to fly with you until you get a better ship.
And if you're still not getting on with Elite, then maybe try some older space games: Freelancer has had some impressive graphics mods released for it since it first came out, and is worth revisiting.
There's also the open source Descent Freespace project, which also has some impressive full conversion mods (the Babylon 5 one is very well done), but it's another space game all about combat.
And X3: Albion Prelude is a good game if you want a space game with less of a combat focus: you can have AI-controlled craft protecting you as you trade and build a manufacturing empire.
