Newcomer / Intro Vertical Distance Lines in Supercruise

[Exsomnis]

Hi, being a player of Frontier: First Encounters, I discovered Elite Dangerous recently. As a new player, I would like to learn about all the concepts of the game, even if they are just details. One of them is: vertical distance lines which change speed as the ship speeds up during supercruise. As far as I observed, there are always 6 lines in view on each side ofthe hud, and as you pick up speed, the faster lines slowly fade and a new set of lines appear behind them. These lines are smaller in perspective than the previous ones. Also, they seem to be 10th power of the previous one, for example if the first set of lines are marking 5 Ls, the ones picking up after increase in speed are 50 Ls each. What I am curious about is: what is the distance between each of these lines? Also, is my 10th power assumption correct?

 

[Krieger]

Welcome back to the Elite Galaxy commander!

To be honest I never paid much attention to those vertical lines in the HUD. As far as I know they are there to give an indication of speed. Without them in supercruise you have no clue of speed unless you're close enough to a star/planet/moon to see their relative movement.

Below are some resources that contain a lot of information on the game. Have a look at them and in any case don't hesitate to ask questions here in the forum.

In-game help is available in the form of menu links to the Pilot's Handbook and the Codex (right-hand cockpit panel 1st tab).
For a very good beginner's guide see: An in-depth beginner’s guide to Elite: Dangerous.
Tutorials covering all aspects of the game, many of them in the form of YouTube videos, are available from ED Tutorials.
There is a wealth of useful information available in these forums spread out over hundreds of threads. Thanks to commander @Alec Turner you can access all of that information and more via a single thread: Alec's best of the forum (and elsewhere) [v2].
Here is a good guide on the background simulation (BGS) that simulates the economical and political changes caused by player actions in inhabited systems.
Also check out the inara.cz and eddb.io websites with (almost) realtime info on practically everything in the game.
The coriolis.io and edsy.org websites let you design your ships before buying them.
There are many more Tools and Websites created by fans that make life in the galaxy better.
And last but not least, the Elite Dangerous Wiki contains extensive information on nearly all aspects of the game.

o7

 

[Tyres O'Flaherty]

I'd agree. I don't think they are actual measurements, just a graphical representation of movement. I'd like the ability to switch them off - which is apparently doable although complex.

 

[Codger]

As far as I know they are simply a visual indication of speed, but not anything precise. I personally dislike the clutter and find them useless, so I've got them turned off via a graphics mod.

 

[Para Handy]

Quite frankly I don't even notice them any more.

 

[Exsomnis]

Welcome back to the Elite Galaxy commander!

To be honest I never paid much attention to those vertical lines in the HUD. As far as I know they are there to give an indication of speed. Without them in supercruise you have no clue of speed unless you're close enough to a star/planet/moon to see their relative movement.

Below are some resources that contain a lot of information on the game. Have a look at them and in any case don't hesitate to ask questions here in the forum.

In-game help is available in the form of menu links to the Pilot's Handbook and the Codex (right-hand cockpit panel 1st tab).
For a very good beginner's guide see: An in-depth beginner’s guide to Elite: Dangerous.
Tutorials covering all aspects of the game, many of them in the form of YouTube videos, are available from ED Tutorials.
There is a wealth of useful information available in these forums spread out over hundreds of threads. Thanks to commander @Alec Turner you can access all of that information and more via a single thread: Alec's best of the forum (and elsewhere) [v2].
Here is a good guide on the background simulation (BGS) that simulates the economical and political changes caused by player actions in inhabited systems.
Also check out the inara.cz and eddb.io websites with (almost) realtime info on practically everything in the game.
The coriolis.io and edsy.org websites let you design your ships before buying them.
There are many more Tools and Websites created by fans that make life in the galaxy better.
And last but not least, the Elite Dangerous Wiki contains extensive information on nearly all aspects of the game.

o7

Thanks for the info, commander.

o7

 

[Exsomnis]

Hi, being a player of Frontier: First Encounters, I discovered Elite Dangerous recently. As a new player, I would like to learn about all the concepts of the game, even if they are just details. One of them is: vertical distance lines which change speed as the ship speeds up during supercruise. As far as I observed, there are always 6 lines in view on each side ofthe hud, and as you pick up speed, the faster lines slowly fade and a new set of lines appear behind them. These lines are smaller in perspective than the previous ones. Also, they seem to be 10th power of the previous one, for example if the first set of lines are marking 5 Ls, the ones picking up after increase in speed are 50 Ls each. What I am curious about is: what is the distance between each of these lines? Also, is my 10th power assumption correct?

I have been to Katzenstein Dock, which is roughly 4.2 Million Ls from arrival point of 36 OPHIUCHI system. The journey took about 40 mins, so I was able to observe the mentioned lines both at the highest and lowest level. I now can confirm there are 5 tiers of lines, starting from idle supercruise upto 1700c speed. The first tier of lines are the longest, then becomes shorter with each tier. The highest tier (the smallest lines) distance lines were rougly 500 Ls, which is actually around 1 AU, the distance of earth from the sun. I need to confirm 4.th tier, which seems 20 Ls. I still think these lines are not arbitrary.

 

[colprice2002]

IIRC from the first beta, the lines are there as:-
1) a guide to whether you're in supercruise or not (the lines don't appear at sub-light velocities)
2) a visual guide to your speed -without using the actual numeric display.
Really, don't worry about them!

 

[Pug]

Hi, being a player of Frontier: First Encounters, I discovered Elite Dangerous recently. As a new player, I would like to learn about all the concepts of the game, even if they are just details. One of them is: vertical distance lines which change speed as the ship speeds up during supercruise. As far as I observed, there are always 6 lines in view on each side ofthe hud, and as you pick up speed, the faster lines slowly fade and a new set of lines appear behind them. These lines are smaller in perspective than the previous ones. Also, they seem to be 10th power of the previous one, for example if the first set of lines are marking 5 Ls, the ones picking up after increase in speed are 50 Ls each. What I am curious about is: what is the distance between each of these lines? Also, is my 10th power assumption correct?

I'm not sure about the super-cruise increments, good point. They do also indicate when your going to fast when going towards a targeted object/instance etc.
As the line speed matches the sound when you overspeed towards a target.
Pug

 

[Exsomnis]

I have been to Katzenstein Dock, which is roughly 4.2 Million Ls from arrival point of 36 OPHIUCHI system. The journey took about 40 mins, so I was able to observe the mentioned lines both at the highest and lowest level. I now can confirm there are 5 tiers of lines, starting from idle super cruise up to 1700c speed. The first tier of lines are the longest, then becomes shorter with each tier. The highest tier (the smallest lines) distance lines were roughly 500 Ls, which is actually around 1 AU, the distance of earth from the sun. I need to confirm 4.th tier, which seems 20 Ls. I still think these lines are not arbitrary.

After another observation, I can confirm these numbers with some margin of error: The highest tier line distance is 500 Ls, around 1 AU. Every tier down means distance is 1/20 of the previous one. So: 5th tier - 500 Ls distance between two vertical lines, 4th tier - 25 Ls, 3rd tier - 1.25 Ls, 2nd tier - 0,0625 Ls = 18737 Km, 1st tier = 936 km. Numbers can be confirmed starting with idle super cruise at 30 km/sec and measuring the time between two lines at lowest tier, and also with maximum available super cruise speed travelling to a station with at least 50,000 Ls distance and observing lines and distance from the station; and iterating in between tiers.