Elite: Dangerous

[Azazel]

Trade is already fucked again, everyone with the cash on hand bought a Hauler and immediately flattened the economy.

 

[Bradylama]

I got owned tonight. The combat AI is also rebalanced and I lost all my cash on insurance. Combat victories are slim pickings, and the sidewinder now feels like a paper box while it felt like it had some staying power in the first Beta.

My bank account got drained because I was unfortunate enough to get interdicted by a measly Sidewinder that just so happened to have a gauss cannon. My shit was wrecked so hard. On the bright side I experienced a canopy breach. You lose your aiming reticle and just stare into the void and the sound is remixed so you can't hear anything outside of your pilot's suit.

 

[Ulminati]

Canopy breaking is really neat. I saw it on scott manlys video of the last beta. Every so often he'd rotate his ship so his destination waypoint was behind one of the remaining shards of glass to reaffirm his heading.

 

[DDZ]

If your previous experience was just Freespace then I'd hold off on the Beta. The primary appeal of Elite Dangerous is the exploration aspect, and while combat is great it's not likely to be the core part of gameplay for a lot of people. Right now the exploration just isn't implemented so it's all combat. I also understand that trade was rebalanced, so what I said before about profit margins is apparently no longer applicable. Apparently the Hauler has just enough cargo space to turn a decent profit while getting you lots of docking practice.

Keep playing IW2. It's really fun to play and the Newtonian flight model will get good practice for the Newtonian elements in Elite.

I just really want to branch out and do some trading and mining. I having 2 Eve accounts, one miner and one hauler, lots of fun.

Not in it for the combat.

 

[Bradylama]

They really did buff the combat AI, as other posters on the Frontier forums confirm. The NPC pilots show some real sense of self-preservation and are much more aggressive. It feels like having a single pulse laser is better than two, because keeping up a constant rate of fire once their shields drop is more likely to spook the AI.

The best way to make money at this point is to just fly the default sidewinder and fight until you die to get a free one.

 

[Dexter]

I'm kind of slowly getting hyped for this, keep hearing how great this game is supposed to be from many people and how it is one of if not *the best* Oculus Rift experience so far that people can spend entire hours immersed in but I'm still not really willing to pay 120€ for a Beta, might get the 60€ one later this year.

How are the controls overall, does it need a joystick or is a X360 GamePad or similar sufficient (gotta also get a G27 Racing Wheel at some point for games like EuroTruck Simulator 2, Assetto Corsa, Project CARS etc.) and is it really that good?

And if I wanted to get one of them HOTAS Flightsticks, what would be a good bang for the buck that doesn't come off as cheap-ish but doesn't exactly cost half a fortune?

From looking around:
Thrustmaster T.Flight Hotas X - seems to be on the cheap side and looks too plastic-y for ~40€
Thrustmaster Hotas Warthog - looks rather professional and great but a bit out of the price range of what I'd pay for something like that at ~300+ €
Saitek X52 Flight Control System - looks interesting and somewhere right in the middle at somewhat over ~100€ (or the Pro at ~200€ which is about at the upper range of what I'd be willing to pay)

 

[MadMaxHellfire]

holy shit! controls are terrible with mouse and keyboard, and the whole interface "i don't like cursors because it's so automan" is a sorry excuse to play hide and seek with the right keystrokes to accomplish even the most basic commands as traveling around.
maybe all this mess will make sense later, right now it doesn't.

 

[Bradylama]

The flight model is a bit more complicated than the one in say, Freespace, so mouse users are not going to have the fine control that they would expect. Yaw is also not as powerful as your pitch, so using the mouse to roll and pitch is going to be much more difficult than simply using the arrow keys on your keyboard.

The better way to play this game is with a joystick, and the best is with a HOTAS setup. Gamepads are servicable, but you're not going to have the fine control you would have with even a joystick+keyboard setup.

 

[MadMaxHellfire]

so a joystick should be added to the minimum specs.
not fair, even frontier had the double mouse control system.

 

[potatojohn]

You shouldn't need a joystick to play space games. I finished IW2 and a good chunk of IW1 with a keyboard.

If Elite requires a joystick it just goes to show how poorly designed it is.

 

[Azazel]

Newsletter #29 is out

Standard Beta launches 29th of July, expansion pass will stop selling at that time as well.

 

[bertram_tung]

You shouldn't need a joystick to play space games. I finished IW2 and a good chunk of IW1 with a keyboard.

If Elite requires a joystick it just goes to show how poorly designed it is.

It really doesn't need a joystick. I played the beta for two weeks with keyboard and mouse and actually got pretty comfortable with that setup.

 

[DDZ]

Really enjoying it.

But my T Flight Hotas doesn't have enough buttons.

Might buy one of those Saiteks?

 

[potatojohn]

I have a saitek and it's crap. It barely functioned then after a month the rudder stopped working. And this was after spending hours searching sites for the joystick with the last bad reviews

You're better of buying a controller. I hear those at least are built to last longer than a goldfish

Or you could, you know, just be a man and use your keyboard

 

[DDZ]

I have a 360 pad, but that also lacks button.

It's quite fun to use a joystick.

I can also afford the Warthog, but not sure if it's worth it.

 

[J_C]

Or you could, you know, just be a man retard and use your keyboard

Fixed for truth.
Using keyboard instead of a joystick in a spacesim/flight sim game is just as retarded as using a controller for an FPS.

 

[DraQ]

holy shit! controls are terrible with mouse and keyboard, and the whole interface "i don't like cursors because it's so automan" is a sorry excuse to play hide and seek with the right keystrokes to accomplish even the most basic commands as traveling around.
maybe all this mess will make sense later, right now it doesn't.

Really?

What a fucking shame. Frontier was notable for its flexible and intuitive control scheme allowing for nearly full mouse control. Even I-War 2 could be gotten out of its terrible mess of KB+M binds and turned into something intuitive and perfectly serviceable with some .ini editing.

And I will consider buying a joystick for spacesim games when there actually are some spacesim games.

 

[J_C]

holy shit! controls are terrible with mouse and keyboard, and the whole interface "i don't like cursors because it's so automan" is a sorry excuse to play hide and seek with the right keystrokes to accomplish even the most basic commands as traveling around.
maybe all this mess will make sense later, right now it doesn't.

Really?

What a fucking shame. Frontier was notable for its flexible and intuitive control scheme allowing for nearly full mouse control. Even I-War 2 could be gotten out of its terrible mess of KB+M binds and turned into something intuitive and perfectly serviceable with some .ini editing.

And I will consider buying a joystick for spacesim games when there actually are some spacesim games.

You can buy a decent joystick for a few dozen of bucks, it is not such big of an expense, even if you don't use it that much.

 

[DraQ]

holy shit! controls are terrible with mouse and keyboard, and the whole interface "i don't like cursors because it's so automan" is a sorry excuse to play hide and seek with the right keystrokes to accomplish even the most basic commands as traveling around.
maybe all this mess will make sense later, right now it doesn't.

Really?

What a fucking shame. Frontier was notable for its flexible and intuitive control scheme allowing for nearly full mouse control. Even I-War 2 could be gotten out of its terrible mess of KB+M binds and turned into something intuitive and perfectly serviceable with some .ini editing.

And I will consider buying a joystick for spacesim games when there actually are some spacesim games.

You can buy a decent joystick for a few dozen of bucks, it is not such big of an expense, even if you don't use it that much.

If all I'm going to use it for is one game, then it should either come bundled with it or GTFO.

 

[potatojohn]

Fixed for truth.
Using keyboard instead of a joystick in a spacesim/flight sim game is just as retarded as using a controller for an FPS.

What? A controller is just a stunted joystick.

Man the logic of you joystick peasants boggles my mind

 

[DraQ]

Fixed for truth.
Using keyboard instead of a joystick in a spacesim/flight sim game is just as retarded as using a controller for an FPS.

What? A controller is just a stunted joystick.

Man the logic of you joystick peasants boggles my mind

The logic behind a joystick is mimicking the control method of simulated vehicle. Still I don't really see why a joystick should top the mouse in a spacesim when it comes to results.

 

[potatojohn]

Well space ships have never been flown with a joystick, they're flown with a flight computer following a script that was made months before the launch

And that script? Written with a keyvoard

 

[DDZ]

SPACESHUTTLE

 

[potatojohn]

That's for landing after reentry, not any space flight

There's never been a manual space flight. Even the very earliest flights were all automated.

Unless you believe Laika was a really smart dog?

 

[DDZ]

Just buy a goddamn stick, John.