Hello,
I am a completely new player, have the game less than a week. I purchased the Elite Dangerous: CMDR Deluxe Edition. I have some experience playing the old game 'Freelancer', but this game does not compare to Elite, it is much simpler. I have no experience in other flight simulations and therefore was quite helpless in Elite, and expecting this. Before I purchased the game (and afterwards) I did read a lot about it, and looked at a lot of YT videos.
When I had the game, I started the training mission to get a feel for the controls. I am on PC, using mouse and keyboard. I will always play this way, because I do not have enough space for a joystick (plus mouse and keyboard).
The training missions are nicely done, but I think there are several things missing. So here my suggestions from the perspective of a total newbie:
So I would suggest to put a bit of work in these missions, and look at them from the perspective of a total newbie! It is very important IMHO, that new players, who do not know the game in any way, and have no experience with similar games have a chance to enter the world a bit more prepared! (I had experience with the Freelancer game, which did help a lot, or I would possibly have given up.)
Also what comes to mind: There a a lot of veteran players, who have the game for years. Every addition since the Beta - and there are quite a lot judging from miscellaneous sources - for them was a new thing to learn and master, after they already knew the game well. For players who enter now it is absolutely overwhelming! I personally like the complexity very much, it is one reason I purchased this game! But a bit more help would be in order, I think.
PS: I write this to celebrate me winning the (damned) Basic Combat Training for the first time, with 25% hull remaining, but alive
I am a completely new player, have the game less than a week. I purchased the Elite Dangerous: CMDR Deluxe Edition. I have some experience playing the old game 'Freelancer', but this game does not compare to Elite, it is much simpler. I have no experience in other flight simulations and therefore was quite helpless in Elite, and expecting this. Before I purchased the game (and afterwards) I did read a lot about it, and looked at a lot of YT videos.
When I had the game, I started the training mission to get a feel for the controls. I am on PC, using mouse and keyboard. I will always play this way, because I do not have enough space for a joystick (plus mouse and keyboard).
The training missions are nicely done, but I think there are several things missing. So here my suggestions from the perspective of a total newbie:
- The first Training Mission (Basic Flight) is ideally suited to optimize your controls. I decided what to use (Yaw-Version or Normal) this way and fine tuned my settings. There is 'free time' to fiddle with the settings when you are asked to fly to the station and nobody nags, when you take your sweet time for it. Good!!
- The second Training Mission (Docking) is also well done, and was actually quite easy for me, even on the first try.
- The Basic Combat Training mission is a real problem:
- The first enemy is much too easy, practically a wimp.
- The second enemy is much too strong for a newbie. It is frustrating to try this out several times and always have to endure the talk and the first enemy, before having a second try on the real challenge.
- The Training Missions have one general problem: Keys and controls do not work until you are told so. In this mission it really confuses a new player! Firstly, you have no control groups at all, so looking to check at the beginning, when you have time, shows nothing. Two weapons, but no control groups at all!
- This leads for example to the problem, that if you are on the 10th try to do this mission, you still cannot deploy your hard points, because the key for it is locked until Baines tells you to deploy, and the screen hint shows.
- When the second and hard enemy appears, he is much too fast. He fires at the confused player. I always lost 1-2 rings of my shield, while Baines told me to switch my fire groups. But the key to switch them does not work before she says it, and before the hint shows. This is very confusing and was the reason I had no chance at all!
- Next Baines talks and talks - which is very distracting - and tells you something about energy distribution, while the trainee (me) was already at half hull strength and still fighting with the damned fire groups!
- It is absolutely unclear, why I have to use fire groups, when I have two weapons, which after switching fire groups still need two different mouse buttons. Everybody who has read the manual carefully will be completely confused by this!
- If you wish to do this, there should be a much longer pause before the second enemy appears, or confusion will ruin the fight. In the game I have it all organized before I even leave the base.
- The Mining Training is sort of buggy and very confusing! Baines tells you to fire the pulse lasers, and immediately after firing she says, that a junk of ore has broken loose, you should target it. But there is no junk of ore. It cost me over one hour to find out, what was wrong! This is mentioned in a post here, and a player made YT video about this mission helped. I thought I was looking somehow wrong, and asked myself where this damned ore thing was. Please keep in mind, that people like me never have seen how this looks, so when you let Baines say, that a junk of ore is here, s/he will believe it!! Also - switching off the shields is not the best solution, prioritizing equipment to switch off is much better, but does simply not work. The training script hangs despite power is okay, because it expects you to switch off the shield! This is confusing, if one understands what happens, can solve it, and it does not work.
- SRV Training worked well, until I changed to the SRV. But I had watched a lot of ship landings on a planet before that, else I would have crashed my ship several times. But when I started driving (I had not lost my orientation, but some will without doubt) Baines kept talking about 'way points'. What are way points? There is a target marker, but you cannot select it, you just follow it. Way Points to me are a sequence of points to follow in sequence, not a marker which shows the way. And arriving at the base I needed again a YT video to find out what the 'generator' was, which I should destroy, without the video I would never have found it! Also I suggest not to end the mission when the scan is complete, but let the player return to his ship and board the SRV, because this can also go wrong and it would help to have tried it in a Training Mission!
- FSS could use a training mission too! I had the wrong key in mind, and it never worked in game, until I found out. If you add SRV Training, FSS should deserve a small mission too.
- Generally I think the game could use a 'Generic Training Mission', without hand holding by Banes, and blocked keys, so that the new player can try out some simple things not covered in the rest of the Training Missions, like for example FSS. To try them in game is not always possible.
So I would suggest to put a bit of work in these missions, and look at them from the perspective of a total newbie! It is very important IMHO, that new players, who do not know the game in any way, and have no experience with similar games have a chance to enter the world a bit more prepared! (I had experience with the Freelancer game, which did help a lot, or I would possibly have given up.)
Also what comes to mind: There a a lot of veteran players, who have the game for years. Every addition since the Beta - and there are quite a lot judging from miscellaneous sources - for them was a new thing to learn and master, after they already knew the game well. For players who enter now it is absolutely overwhelming! I personally like the complexity very much, it is one reason I purchased this game! But a bit more help would be in order, I think.
PS: I write this to celebrate me winning the (damned) Basic Combat Training for the first time, with 25% hull remaining, but alive
