-
Greetings Commander, want a more instant approach to your questions and need for help? Check out the Galactic Academy Discord server!
Feel free to join the Galactic Academy Discord server by clicking here!
Guide / Tutorial The popular guide to planetary landings
- Thread starter Lance 'Spacecat' D.
- Start date
Big thanks Commander! Kudos 2 u Sir!
Great Guide, spent an enjoyable 2 hours cruising around a .31g metal world last night mining and trying to learn how to use the wave scanner +1
Well, It's not OC altitude that's an issue, it's actually the DRP that crashes you out of supercruise. (I often do loops in OC altutide when I approached too fast in SC) Protip: don't let your ETA drop below 6 seconds unless you're very close to the planet, so drop your SC throttle to 50% when the ETA reaches 8-9 seconds. But what's the actual safe DRP speed? Excellent question.
Hey folks, this will require some testing! Care to help finding out the maximum safe 'DRP' speed?
To be honest, I'm not sure... On approach to the planet I use the method to be at 50% of the blue bar to be safe (5-6 seconds on timer), but it's actually making my ship rather slow for reentry. If I approach the planet from afar with 75% of the blue bar, it's too fast and I crash in. This means that the approach to the planet must be done in a controlled manner but then one can accelerate during the reentry... And to confuse the issue further, I've once used the 'high speed level flight' in orbital cruise to go faster to a settlement, nosed down, and I still had too much speed and crashed on reaching DRP altitude... So it's not an easy question to answer nor to test, but here's what I got...
-When approaching a planet, we have a blue bar on the left that reads 200 km/s as a safe orbital cruise approach. But that vanishes when in OC and I'm pretty sure that's not safe for DRP altitude.
-Your ship slows down fast when going from OC to DRP altitudes, I often use 75% to full throttle as long as my arrival speed was tame. So if you see your speed dropping near the single digits km/s, go ahead and apply full throttle.
I think if we use a bit of 'level flight' to accelerate then nose down, we can vary the entrance speed to find out this tidbit. Can folks make some tests and maybe I can write a much better page on planetary reentry done right?
Last edited:
Nice guide for new folks. I would add something at the end though for how to re board your ship, seems to pop up on the forums alot
Small update today, two new slides: One for Malek's request to explain how to reboard, and Surround's question reminded me I didn't explain the 50% throttle in -this- guide to avoid the loop of shame. So added slide 7 to explain how to avoid overshooting/going too fast in supercruise.
And snuck Spaceballs and Thunderbirds as references for good measure, because I can. XD
Great stuff!
That's a nice read. Thanks!
I've been away for a month and am downloading Horizons today. Your guide will help me get started.
Only thing I am not sure about and wonder if anyone can clarify.
I have the launcher open and can install Horizons (64-bit), and E: D (32 and 64-bit).
So do I need to install both Horizons and E: D (64-bit, obviously), or what?
Cheers and Happy New Year!
I've been away for a month and am downloading Horizons today. Your guide will help me get started.
Only thing I am not sure about and wonder if anyone can clarify.
I have the launcher open and can install Horizons (64-bit), and E: D (32 and 64-bit).
So do I need to install both Horizons and E: D (64-bit, obviously), or what?
Cheers and Happy New Year!
Bit off topic but, near as I can tell Elite Horizon is what you have to install and use, then you won't need the E 64. In theory that's the game minus planet landings.
And back on topic: I think I'll remove the guns from my 'proposed' explo/lander ship designs. I know one friend of mine met a goliath about 500 ly out, but those are nasty enough that one measly pulse laser won't make a difference. Fought one with another friend, we sent off our ships to save them, ended up tag-teaming the monster Goliath with our two SRVs... and even -then- I needed to use a repair synthesis. Those goliaths are well-named!
64. In theory that's the game minus planet landings.And back on topic: I think I'll remove the guns from my 'proposed' explo/lander ship designs. I know one friend of mine met a goliath about 500 ly out, but those are nasty enough that one measly pulse laser won't make a difference. Fought one with another friend, we sent off our ships to save them, ended up tag-teaming the monster Goliath with our two SRVs... and even -then- I needed to use a repair synthesis. Those goliaths are well-named!
Small update. With 2.1 engineers the controls for buggys changed a bit. I retook screencaps of my usual setup.
Small update today, now that using a surface scanner gives one the material list from the planet, it's definitely worth mentioning.
Update done for 2.2:
-Since coriolis moved to http://coriolis.edcd.io/ I adjusted all the ship designs.
-Added a link to the Elite Dangerous Community Developers, big kudos to them. I'm a huge fan.
-Most useful to planetary landers: I added two pages explaining how to handle planetary coordinates and ship's heading. What heading to use to approach certain latitude and longitude!
As an incentive to do the exercise, I offer the coordinates to the ancient ruins found near the bubble as an example.
-Since coriolis moved to http://coriolis.edcd.io/ I adjusted all the ship designs.
-Added a link to the Elite Dangerous Community Developers, big kudos to them. I'm a huge fan.
-Most useful to planetary landers: I added two pages explaining how to handle planetary coordinates and ship's heading. What heading to use to approach certain latitude and longitude!
As an incentive to do the exercise, I offer the coordinates to the ancient ruins found near the bubble as an example.
Brilliant guide although the font seems to squish in IE on the phrase "you're xxxx".
Also the added pro-tip use flight assist off on high G worlds, appeared underneath the screen examples on page 19.
Just looked in Firefox and it all looks ok there, so probably just IE.
Finally and unrelated to the guide, the URL associated with your signature image in the forums, points to aislings-angels.enjin.com/forum, which appears to not exist. If you edit your signature, you could update it, there is a tag. Well done again - off to read the prospector's guide. C
Also the added pro-tip use flight assist off on high G worlds, appeared underneath the screen examples on page 19.
Just looked in Firefox and it all looks ok there, so probably just IE.
Finally and unrelated to the guide, the URL associated with your signature image in the forums, points to aislings-angels.enjin.com/forum, which appears to not exist. If you edit your signature, you could update it, there is a tag. Well done again - off to read the prospector's guide. C
Gack! I had a defective sig for -months- and just now someone mentions it to me! (raaaaaahhhr!)
The page 19 IE bug I don't know how to handle, there's no feature in google slides to tell text to avoid pictures.
edit: Belay that, I saw the same font-size-issue in my IE, managed to tweak it better.
The page 19 IE bug I don't know how to handle, there's no feature in google slides to tell text to avoid pictures.
edit: Belay that, I saw the same font-size-issue in my IE, managed to tweak it better.
Last edited:
Great guide again. The 50% approach proved especially useful, as I was struggling to figure out a good speed to use when coming out of gravity wells. The 50% works well, even when ETA numbers drop like stone when leaving star's gravity well for approach for close station/planet or whatever.
Also notice that deeper you come in, closer you are to your target point at the end. Come in at 30 degrees and you are some 8 km out, come in at 50 and it is only 3-4 km to the aim point/surface port at the end of the glide. This is due the glide end altitude being always same. Useful for smuggling as coming in at 50° when bringing in some contraband reduces the distance between you and the landing pad and the time the local fuzz has to scan you.
Also notice that deeper you come in, closer you are to your target point at the end. Come in at 30 degrees and you are some 8 km out, come in at 50 and it is only 3-4 km to the aim point/surface port at the end of the glide. This is due the glide end altitude being always same. Useful for smuggling as coming in at 50° when bringing in some contraband reduces the distance between you and the landing pad and the time the local fuzz has to scan you.
Small update today:
After experimenting, I found that keeping a throttle around 7-8 seconds is good for planetary landings. Whereas you want 6 seconds for a space target. I wrote that in.
Also, skimmer massacre missions have this really nonintuitive peculiarity where you're better off chasing skimmer -around- the target settlement, and not directly at it. It lets you chase wanted ones if you do it through the nearby POIs. So I put in a page in there explaining it.
Mind, there's plenty of 'get rich quick' schemes explained out there, regarding those skimmers. But I'm focusing on the basics, as always.
After experimenting, I found that keeping a throttle around 7-8 seconds is good for planetary landings. Whereas you want 6 seconds for a space target. I wrote that in.
Also, skimmer massacre missions have this really nonintuitive peculiarity where you're better off chasing skimmer -around- the target settlement, and not directly at it. It lets you chase wanted ones if you do it through the nearby POIs. So I put in a page in there explaining it.
Mind, there's plenty of 'get rich quick' schemes explained out there, regarding those skimmers. But I'm focusing on the basics, as always.
And I've done an update for 2.3.
It's not much, but I can thank the Radio Sidewinder crew that made a care package with a hilarious method of remembering wave scanner results, it's all there on page 30.
Nothing like a fast-food mnemonic, eh?
It's not much, but I can thank the Radio Sidewinder crew that made a care package with a hilarious method of remembering wave scanner results, it's all there on page 30.
Nothing like a fast-food mnemonic, eh?
Awesome resource !