Newcomer / Intro Thinking of bying - Capital ships? Gunships? Drones?

[swatti]

Ive allways loved space games and just drooling over the Homeworld remake, Elite launch kinda slipped under my radar but it looks like its shaping up quite nice... Thing is, i like to play, "different" from others ^^

In most MMO's i play the summoner, warlock, or in EVE the carrier... Thing is, few years ago i had pretty bad racing related car-crash and my mobility hasnt been all that good ever since. I can write and type, even drive a car nowdays but FPS games and "accurate mouse usage" is kinda lacking, thus i doubt i'd enjoy nimble fighters. Recent attempt at playing Freelancer was quite "sad" to say the least and recent CoD-games i hade to play on easiest just for the story-campaign.

Is there large capital ships? Turret loaded gunships or drone-wingmen? Something i can use without relying on accurate mouse-movement...

You can call me, cheaty, or whatever, but i kinda like seeing NPCs do my dirty work while i manage them in the background. Hate me for it if you want, il take it as compliment.

 

[Karaaz]

I doubt it, as far as I know one-manned spacecraft are the only kind you'll be able to fly.

 

[andyraptor]

not knowing your full mobility ability..... can you operate a simple joystick ?.... if so I would contemplate that route for ship control and combat

and welcome

 

[Jaesic]

Elite, like any good flight or space simulation can't really be played with ideal precision using a mouse anyway (though I suppose a really masochistic pilot could run a purely keyboard control setup). In most cases, you'll want a decent multi-button flight stick. You CAN stick to trade ships, which will keep you out of a fair amount of combat... but pretty much any combat you're going to get in to is going to be closer to small craft maneuvering than capital ship stand and shoot action. How much success you'd have would depend on how much better you would be able to handle a stick compared to a mouse.

 

[Evyl Minkey]

If you can use a joystick and stick to exploring, trading, shipping missions. But you will need to run from fights and to get there you will need to deal with a small ship. If you can handle cod on easy it should be do able.

 

[willowfan]

I suppose that kind of gameplay is possible when you get to the big Cruiser type vessels like the Anaconda with turreted weapons systems and missiles. But they are vastly expensive to buy and run and it will be a fair while before you could even think of owning one.

 

[Dommarraa]

(though I suppose a really masochistic pilot could run a purely keyboard control setup)

Oi ! Nothing wrong with KB Only, its is groovy old stylee, only a few fiddly things that I cant really be bothered to do.

VoiceAttack can help those less nimble very very well (someone did a full trade run using voice control only), but at the end of the day, you still have to be able to point your ship vaguely at the enemy, at least at the beginning until you can afford a big ship with turrets.

 

[Derpster Frey]

Elite, like any good flight or space simulation can't really be played with ideal precision using a mouse anyway (though I suppose a really masochistic pilot could run a purely keyboard control setup). In most cases, you'll want a decent multi-button flight stick. You CAN stick to trade ships, which will keep you out of a fair amount of combat... but pretty much any combat you're going to get in to is going to be closer to small craft maneuvering than capital ship stand and shoot action. How much success you'd have would depend on how much better you would be able to handle a stick compared to a mouse.

I strongly disagree.
My HOTAS does nothing I can't do with keyboard and mouse. In fact, my aim is more accurate with my mouse.

It's more fun with HOTAS though

 

[Masta Squidge]

I strongly disagree.
My HOTAS does nothing I can't do with keyboard and mouse. In fact, my aim is more accurate with my mouse.

It's more fun with HOTAS though

Wrong. You don't have analog control over 4 of the 6 control axis with a keyboard and mouse, and a skilled pilot with full analog control can easily exploit that.

Just because your aim isn't as good with a stick, doesn't make it a fact.

can you exercise fine control with digital inputs? Absolutely. It requires fine, repeated button presses and full awareness of actual inputs to compensate in opposite directions. .

I agree that its doable with practice, because right now I use a xbone controller with 2 of the flight axis mapped to digital controls. It works reasonably well, but is far more clumsy than a well planned dual stick setup.
In fact I have a video of myself docking using the controller and you can see my short taps of the downward thrust to prevent full throttle down

 

[Tiamat]

It is rumoured that at some point we might be able to load small ships into Anacondas but no real ETA yet. I doubt we will ever be able to direct NPCs though as fleet-type features don't really fit with the Elite gameplay.

I would definitely try the combat demo using a stick if you can so you can get a rough idea. You can use gimballed weapons which track targets for you which would help a lot too. I use a HOTAS as well as keyboard/mouse and whilst the HOTAS does give you a slight advantage (more buttons at your fingertips at once) I have no issues playing mouse/kb at all.

I am also a massive Homeworld fan but after the last few videos I have seen I am not quite as drooly anymore. It does look good but much of the background lists are still textures rather than proper lights so it isn't the massive upgrade I was hoping for. I will still be playing it though.

 

[Derpster Frey]

Wrong. You don't have analog control over 4 of the 6 control axis with a keyboard and mouse, and a skilled pilot with full analog control can easily exploit that.

Just because your aim isn't as good with a stick, doesn't make it a fact.

can you exercise fine control with digital inputs? Absolutely. It requires fine, repeated button presses and full awareness of actual inputs to compensate in opposite directions. .

I agree that its doable with practice, because right now I use a xbone controller with 2 of the flight axis mapped to digital controls. It works reasonably well, but is far more clumsy than a well planned dual stick setup.
In fact I have a video of myself docking using the controller and you can see my short taps of the downward thrust to prevent full throttle down

What? You can't tell me my opinion is wrong.

Do tell what analog control there is on the HOTAS there isn't on my keyboard, besides the joystick and throttle.
UP and DOWN thrusters is mapped to buttons on both HOTAS and Keyboard. I can't see how I can control 6 at once with just joystick and throttle without sacrificing throttle.

My throttle doesn't have any analog sticks, so they have to be buttons. Just like a regular keyboard.
I can't control 6 axes at once with just 1 joystick.

And yes, it IS a fact my aim is better with a mouse than with a joystick.
Maybe YOUR aim isn't, my it's fact MINE is.

 

[swatti]

So is the Anaconda the only ship using automated turrets? I think i got an old MS sidewinder joystick somewhere, i should be able to move about but i doubt i'd be any good at aiming at anything bigger then an asteroid the size of... Well, huge.

(Do notice, i have NO IDEA what so ever how this game plays yet, just looking at stats, hardpoints and such)

Theres few games ive dropped forward mounted weapons for all sorts of other stuff to boost shields, turrets or whatever and let the AI do its thing with turrets while i try to turn the fireworks-show away from most celestial bodies.

Mouse control "like freelancer" would be optimal as in "point mouse that way, ship turns" and rest with keyboard. Thats how i usually do it. Im too oldschool for voice-commands and other fancy stuff.

 

[ME-tan]

Most if not all ships can use turrets. It's just not cost effective to use them on smaller ships.

 

[Hilight]

I have a friend who uses the mouse and keyboard in the game and he bounty hunts with the setup, so KB and mouse are quite doable although I must say I use a joystick with a throttle

 

[Darkcyde]

I had a stroke almost 6 years ago (I'm only 42 now, so it was quite a surprise even for the doctors). Unfortunately it left me partially sighted, about 60% of my visual field is simply not there, blank (I know, it's hard to explain to a fully sighted person). Anyway, I play using a HOTAS setup and I use gimballed weapons all the time so that I only have to point in the rough direction of my target to hit it. Using fixed weapons would be almost impossible for me as I lose the target ship very easily if it goes outside the little vision I have left.
.
I'm currently running a Cobra with small gimballed beam lasers and medium gimballed multi-cannons and I find this setup extremely easy to use in combat. As and when I can be bothered to upgrade to something bigger and better then I'll consider using turreted weapons as they can fire in most directions.
.
The downside to gimballed and turreted weapons is that you can only fit smaller versions on the hard points, fixed weapons are bigger and have more power than the 'mobile' variants. Of course, if you're going to bolt the 'mobile' ones on to an Anaconda or Python, or the new Cruiser which is coming, then it won't matter so much, although these larger ships are slightly more sluggish to handle in combat.

 

[halo jones 101]

Ive allways loved space games and just drooling over the Homeworld remake, Elite launch kinda slipped under my radar but it looks like its shaping up quite nice... Thing is, i like to play, "different" from others ^^

In most MMO's i play the summoner, warlock, or in EVE the carrier... Thing is, few years ago i had pretty bad racing related car-crash and my mobility hasnt been all that good ever since. I can write and type, even drive a car nowdays but FPS games and "accurate mouse usage" is kinda lacking, thus i doubt i'd enjoy nimble fighters. Recent attempt at playing Freelancer was quite "sad" to say the least and recent CoD-games i hade to play on easiest just for the story-campaign.

Is there large capital ships? Turret loaded gunships or drone-wingmen? Something i can use without relying on accurate mouse-movement...

You can call me, cheaty, or whatever, but i kinda like seeing NPCs do my dirty work while i manage them in the background. Hate me for it if you want, il take it as compliment.

Mostly you should have a look at some youtube videos to see if its your type of game, then if it is there are a multitude of control options avalible there will also be loads of info on youtube about that too.