OS Neutral Elite Dangerous Tips

[Janichsan]

I just got my first ship (Cobra MK III) with the vanilla gear (not playing much, so it goes really slow for me). Could anyone post a nice weapons configuration for this ship ? Also, will there be any change/upgrade to the power core/distributor with this config ?

As mentioned earlier, I have two fixed beam lasers on the medium hardpoints and a single dumb fire missile launcher on one of the small ones. I haven't found the time to play the 1.1 patch yet, so I can't say if the missile launcher has been nerfed too much to be still effective, but before, that configuration worked well for me.

Regarding the power plant and distributor, I'm not quite sure what you mean. There definitely are better ones available than the default ones. I currently have the 4C power plant and the 3A distributor, and the difference to the original E rated ones is noticeable. Heat production is much lower and the systems recharge faster.

Also, gimballed or fixed ? I read that gimballed are slightly weaker than their fixed counterparts, but they do stay longer on the target, of course. In practice, do you guys see one type having a clean advantage over the other ? (if I had to guess, I'd say gimballed, but out there I prefer not to guess )

The advantage of gimballed weapons is that you can focus your fire better. Since fixed weapons more or less always fire straight ahead (there is a minimal amount of aim assist), it can happen quite easily that not all weapons actually hit your target. That's especially true when some of your hardpoints are situated far off the centerline of your ship.

Gimballed weapons normally swivel to all hit the same spot. However, I found they can easily lose their target lock. When your target has chaff launchers, gimballed weapons even completely lose their advantages.

Personally, I prefer fixed weapons, but as mentioned above, they are not always feasible.

 

[antonis]

Heat production is much lower and the systems recharge faster.

Thanks for this useful input. Yes, that's what I meant; recharge rate, as I find that even with the vanilla lasers I do have big pauses due to overheating (with 3 "dots" assigned to the weapons during dogfights).

The advantage of gimballed weapons is that you can focus your fire better. Since fixed weapons more or less always fire straight ahead (there is a minimal amount of aim assist), it can happen quite easily that not all weapons actually hit your target. That's especially true when some of your hardpoints are situated far off the centerline of your ship.

Gimballed weapons normally swivel to all hit the same spot. However, I found they can easily lose their target lock. When your target has chaff launchers, gimballed weapons even completely lose their advantages.

Personally, I prefer fixed weapons, but as mentioned above, they are not always feasible.

I think I'd prefer fixed weapons too. However, it also seems very useful the ability some of the opponents have, to shoot me while I'm passing beneath or above them during dogfight. I'd assume, though, that gimbaled make even more sense on a much heavier/slower ships.

How about cannons instead of launcher ? Although both must do wonders against a ship's hull.

 

[Janichsan]

I think I'd prefer fixed weapons too. However, it also seems very useful the ability some of the opponents have, to shoot me while I'm passing beneath or above them during dogfight.

I would guess that these are turreted weapons. The firing arc of gimballed weapons is not that huge, basically only a couple of degrees.

I'd assume, though, that gimbaled make even more sense on a much heavier/slower ships.

I would think so, too. Hitting a manoeuvrable ships like a Sidewinder or an Eagle with fixed weapons in an Anaconda or Type 9 is probably close to impossible.

How about cannons instead of launcher ? Although both must do wonders against a ship's hull.

Multicannons or cannons? I found MCs a bit underwhelming, but then I only tried very low rated ones (1F, if I recall correctly). Cannons are apparently really quite powerful, but I haven't tried them myself yet. The low firing rate probably makes it a bit difficult to hit a distant target, though.

 

[Huntn]

I just got my first ship (Cobra MK III) with the vanilla gear (not playing much, so it goes really slow for me). Could anyone post a nice weapons configuration for this ship ? Also, will there be any change/upgrade to the power core/distributor with this config ?

Also, gimballed or fixed ? I read that gimballed are slightly weaker than their fixed counterparts, but they do stay longer on the target, of course. In practice, do you guys see one type having a clean advantage over the other ? (if I had to guess, I'd say gimballed, but out there I prefer not to guess )

At first on the Cobra I had fixed pairs of weapons and hated them because of convergence. With the Sidewinder I had a single gimballed laser, which was always great when pulling the nose towards the target, you could shoot early. And I had a fixed multi-cannon for finishing the target after shields were down.

On the Cobra because of pairs of weapons, fixed weapons suck because if you are not at the right range, some of your shots miss. Both gimballed burst lasers and multi-cannons are great because they have no convergence issue and even when the target is 1.5 km away, accuracy is very good. You may have seen my earlier post, but the gimballed multi-cannons go on the upper medium hard points. I have yet to find them on for the small bottom hard points. If I had a choice, I'd put them on the bottom, and lasers on top because as I pull the nose to the target, I can be knocking down their shield with the lasers, before bringing the cannons to bear. However as is, it's workable. Having a missile to throw out now and then could be nice, used to replace one of the Cannons. However, I'll say that when I'm shooting a Sidewinder with its shields down using multi-cannons, they die fast, even Cobras take a beating and seem to expire quickly.

My impression because of their automated nature, turrets have a tendency to accidently hit the good guys which disrupts your flow.

Tip: when you have Authority ships in on the fight, once you have registered damage, you get the bounty. Unless the patch has changed things, I don't believe bointy size is based on how mugh damage you inflict, so you can safe some bullets unless you are in a hurry.

 

[antonis]

Thank you both, the insight offered in this thread turns out to be really great.

Making more damage than the initial one (the one that will turn red the opponent) might still be useful, though. If not for other reason, because if another player (commander) hits the same target, I think the one doing most damage will be registered for the kill. Although rare, happened to me

I'd go for the fixed lasers, but since Combra has this "issue" with fixed hardpoints, I'll try the gimballed burst lasers / multicannons combo first and see how it goes.

 

[garnerx]

I fixed my problem with the deleted control configs. Turns out they've added a new control in 1.1 - sensor range axis - which the game hadn't appended to my existing config file.

I had to dig through to the hidden folder where the game keeps the user files and add the missing xml tags to my config. Talk about user friendliness!

Noticed that they've ramped up the heat production from lasers to an insane degree. Keeping your finger on the trigger with two or three lasers blazing makes the ship overheat very rapidly. Something to bear in mind when choosing weapons.

 

[Huntn]

Thank you both, the insight offered in this thread turns out to be really great.

Making more damage than the initial one (the one that will turn red the opponent) might still be useful, though. If not for other reason, because if another player (commander) hits the same target, I think the one doing most damage will be registered for the kill. Although rare, happened to me

I'd go for the fixed lasers, but since Combra has this "issue" with fixed hardpoints, I'll try the gimballed burst lasers / multicannons combo first and see how it goes.

Just to clarify, you got what I'm saying- The issue is strictly because more than likely you'll equip dual lasers or dual cannons each in their own fire groups. Due to the location of their mounts (offset from centerline), they angle inward so there is an ideal distance from the ship to be shooting stuff, where those streams converge. I can't really say what the ideal distance is, but I want to say it's about .5km. This really comes into play with the guns and the leading reticle. With gimbaled cannons, they just hit the target. No need as when they are fixed to point the reticule at the lead circle.

I fixed my problem with the deleted control configs. Turns out they've added a new control in 1.1 - sensor range axis - which the game hadn't appended to my existing config file.

I had to dig through to the hidden folder where the game keeps the user files and add the missing xml tags to my config. Talk about user friendliness!

Noticed that they've ramped up the heat production from lasers to an insane degree. Keeping your finger on the trigger with two or three lasers blazing makes the ship overheat very rapidly. Something to bear in mind when choosing weapons.

I've yet to update and play 1.1. What is it that happened with your config file- did it trash the entire file or did it just leave something off? I need to see if there is a way to backup the config file before I update the game to 1.1.

Huh? Man, I get the feeling they are messing with us. I'm currently using dual burst lasers, it's hard to say how much use I get before they overheat, maybe 10 sec or so. So that's slashed now?

 

[garnerx]

I've yet to update and play 1.1. What is it that happened with your config file- did it trash the entire file or did it just leave something off? I need to see if there is a way to backup the config file before I update the game to 1.1.

Huh? Man, I get the feeling they are messing with us. I'm currently using dual burst lasers, it's hard to say how much use I get before they overheat, maybe 10 sec or so. So that's slashed now?

It just didn't list my custom controls in the control menu, only the default ones. I found that the file was still there but the game couldn't load it. There was a file called loaderrors.log in the same location, with a cryptic explanation of what had gone wrong ("Failed to find semantic: RadarRangeAxis"). So I dragged the file out of there, loaded the game and edited the controls to generate a new custom file, and copied in the missing data back into the original one.

No explanation whatsoever in the game. How is anyone supposed to figure that out if they don't know much about digging around on PCs?

You can back up the file if you like. It's at Users\(your user account)\AppData\Local\Frontier Developments\Elite Dangerous\Options\Bindings\Custom.binds

Obviously! (appdata is a hidden folder, so clearly the ideal place to store things like that)


re Laser heat, it's the heat of the entire ship that goes up fast. Like when you fly close to a star.

 

[Huntn]

It just didn't list my custom controls in the control menu, only the default ones. I found that the file was still there but the game couldn't load it. There was a file called loaderrors.log in the same location, with a cryptic explanation of what had gone wrong ("Failed to find semantic: RadarRangeAxis"). So I dragged the file out of there, loaded the game and edited the controls to generate a new custom file, and copied in the missing data back into the original one.

No explanation whatsoever in the game. How is anyone supposed to figure that out if they don't know much about digging around on PCs?

You can back up the file if you like. It's at Users\(your user account)\AppData\Local\Frontier Developments\Elite Dangerous\Options\Bindings\Custom.binds

Obviously! (appdata is a hidden folder, so clearly the ideal place to store things like that)


re Laser heat, it's the heat of the entire ship that goes up fast. Like when you fly close to a star.

Thanks for the info. I'll let you know if my custom settings took a dump. Regarding laser heat,those things are external. The ship should be designed to either handle the power load or not. They are messing with us.

 

[Huntn]

Bounty Hunting has definitely been nerfed in the 1.1 patch. Damn it. Not happy. Honestly I did not see much difference in traffic, but bounties have been cut in half. Previous to the patch Sidewinders ran from $2200-4500. Tonight I saw some $400 bounties, with most coming in below $2000!! Cobra's, when I could find any were easily half priceed. Right now, I'm discouraged with this game. It's shoving me the wrong way.

 

[Janichsan]

Bounty Hunting has definitely been nerfed in the 1.1 patch. Damn it. Not happy. Honestly I did not see much difference in traffic, but bounties have been cut in half. Previous to the patch Sidewinders ran from $2200-4500. Tonight I saw some $400 bounties, with most coming in below $2000!! Cobra's, when I could find any were easily half priceed. Right now, I'm discouraged with this game. It's shoving me the wrong way.

I accrued bounty vouchers of about 50,000 cr in 30 minutes at a nav beacon yesterday. I got the feeling that all the ships spawned a bit less frequent, but there was always at least one criminal in all kind of ships - Sidewinder, Eagles, Adders, even a couple of Fed Dropships, with bounties ranging from about 1000 to 20,000 cr.

Unfortunately, I could not collect these bounties, since things went a bit downhill from that point on: while chasing a dropship, I was firing a bunch of dumbfire missiles at him from a distance of a few hundred meters. Somehow, a Fed Security Eagle must have managed to squeeze at this moment between me and my target, and ate one of the missiles. So, a bounty on my head, Fed Sec hostile to me.

(On a sidenote: that was only my third friendly fire accident, despite having been in numerous combats by now, and the only one that I could not have avoided easily. Both others were due to me being reckless.)

Anyway, that wasn't much of a problem at first, but after a while the Fed Sec radioed that reinforcements were incoming. And that reinforcement unfortunately included one Elite Anaconda. If I had ran at that point, I would have saved my bounty vouchers, but I got greedy. I still wanted to kill that dropship (17,000 cr on his head) and stayed around. Well, I have no idea what exactly the Anaconda fired at me, but when my shields were gone, I almost instantly died.

Derp.

Lost my bounties and my cargo, but nothing grave. I still had 400,000 cr on my account, so rebuy costs weren't a problem.

What happened then was a bit weird: When reaching my next destination after respawning, I noticed I had - either again or still - a dormant 300 cr bounty on my head. Not sure where that came from. (I was interdicted on route to the next station, but that guy was wanted.) While flying towards the station's entrance, I got scanned by the circling Fed Secs. They noticed my bounty and attacked. (That's the way this is handled now in version 1.1. The station only attacks you when you attack it itself or when you block the traffic.) The thing is, they fired at me through the letterbox: I was already inside the station on my way to the landing pad, the Fed Secs were outside. I survived that, but that was really odd.

 

[garnerx]

The new galaxy route finder is excellent. I decided to explore so I set a course for a distant nebula and the route came up instantly.

I'm currently floating next to Kappa Canis Majoris, which is a giant blue star. Feels like I'm a long way from Earth (about 700 light years) but I can plot the route all the way back home without setting waypoints. Somebody else was here first, though.

Tried a bit of combat. Fought against a Viper pirate, who came hurtling towards me. I didn't even get to open fire on him before he hit me head-on and exploded. B6 shield wasn't even dented. This thing feels invincible!

 

[Huntn]

I accrued bounty vouchers of about 50,000 cr in 30 minutes at a nav beacon yesterday. I got the feeling that all the ships spawned a bit less frequent, but there was always at least one criminal in all kind of ships - Sidewinder, Eagles, Adders, even a couple of Fed Dropships, with bounties ranging from about 1000 to 20,000 cr.

Unfortunately, I could not collect these bounties, since things went a bit downhill from that point on: while chasing a dropship, I was firing a bunch of dumbfire missiles at him from a distance of a few hundred meters. Somehow, a Fed Security Eagle must have managed to squeeze at this moment between me and my target, and ate one of the missiles. So, a bounty on my head, Fed Sec hostile to me.

(On a sidenote: that was only my third friendly fire accident, despite having been in numerous combats by now, and the only one that I could not have avoided easily. Both others were due to me being reckless.)

Anyway, that wasn't much of a problem at first, but after a while the Fed Sec radioed that reinforcements were incoming. And that reinforcement unfortunately included one Elite Anaconda. If I had ran at that point, I would have saved my bounty vouchers, but I got greedy. I still wanted to kill that dropship (17,000 cr on his head) and stayed around. Well, I have no idea what exactly the Anaconda fired at me, but when my shields were gone, I almost instantly died.

Derp.

Lost my bounties and my cargo, but nothing grave. I still had 400,000 cr on my account, so rebuy costs weren't a problem.

What happened then was a bit weird: When reaching my next destination after respawning, I noticed I had - either again or still - a dormant 300 cr bounty on my head. Not sure where that came from. (I was interdicted on route to the next station, but that guy was wanted.) While flying towards the station's entrance, I got scanned by the circling Fed Secs. They noticed my bounty and attacked. (That's the way this is handled now in version 1.1. The station only attacks you when you attack it itself or when you block the traffic.) The thing is, they fired at me through the letterbox: I was already inside the station on my way to the landing pad, the Fed Secs were outside. I survived that, but that was really odd.

How did you know it was a $17k bounty?

The new galaxy route finder is excellent. I decided to explore so I set a course for a distant nebula and the route came up instantly.

I'm currently floating next to Kappa Canis Majoris, which is a giant blue star. Feels like I'm a long way from Earth (about 700 light years) but I can plot the route all the way back home without setting waypoints. Somebody else was here first, though.

Tried a bit of combat. Fought against a Viper pirate, who came hurtling towards me. I didn't even get to open fire on him before he hit me head-on and exploded. B6 shield wasn't even dented. This thing feels invincible!

I have a desire, which maybe a common desire to move to Earth's vicinity. But I have mixed feelings as it could be conjested, that is if I ever play again.

 

[Janichsan]

How did you know it was a $17k bounty?

Local bounties are shown on the left-hand screen when you select the (scanned) ship under "Contacts". When you have the Kill Warrant Scanner, you can also see if your target has bounties in other jurisdictions.

 

[Huntn]

Local bounties are shown on the left-hand screen when you select the (scanned) ship under "Contacts". When you have the Kill Warrant Scanner, you can also see if your target has bounties in other jurisdictions.

Good to know.

I'm such a wimp when it comes to PVP/ganking in a sandbox. Altough I've been playing a PVP game for over 2 years, where encounters are controlled as far as level ranges, and you'll always have help. In WoT, it would be like a L1 being one-shot by a L10.

Maybe described as love hate, for sandboxes I like seeing other people, just don't like dealing with *****s who can swat me like a fly. In WoW, I played exclusively PVE servers. To some degree it bothers me to continually operating in instances and it makes me wonder how easy it really is to do joint efforts in the game? I understand group friendly features are being worked on, but can you only see 30 people max at a time?

 

[garnerx]

I have a desire, which maybe a common desire to move to Earth's vicinity. But I have mixed feelings as it could be conjested, that is if I ever play again.

Exploring has rekindled my enthusiasm for the game, but I think maybe I should have changed my loadout before setting off. Now I'm torn between the desire to press on and the worry that maybe I really should have bought different equipment.

It's like when you've left the house and 10 minutes (or 700 light years) later you wonder if you remembered to lock the door.

Also, I just noticed that my insurance premium is now bigger than my bank balance. Hull integrity at 95%...

 

[Huntn]

Exploring has rekindled my enthusiasm for the game, but I think maybe I should have changed my loadout before setting off. Now I'm torn between the desire to press on and the worry that maybe I really should have bought different equipment.

It's like when you've left the house and 10 minutes (or 700 light years) later you wonder if you remembered to lock the door.

Also, I just noticed that my insurance premium is now bigger than my bank balance. Hull integrity at 95%...

Not good! Can you find that info in the games UI? Go back home and get the less expensive fighter out.

 

[quagmire]

I have a desire, which maybe a common desire to move to Earth's vicinity. But I have mixed feelings as it could be conjested, that is if I ever play again.

SOL is empty. Haven't run into a player while in SOL. Filled with NPC's mostly.

 

[garnerx]

Well, that was a really nice trip. I decided to return to inhabited space, via Betelgeuse - which I'd wanted to visit since the beta but found it was just too arduous a journey with the old slow route planner.

Some holiday snaps:

Kappa Canis Majoris. Looks cold, is quite hot.

A triple star system. This was very nice looking, but how did that Adder get here? It's 350 light years from the nearest station and he has no fuel scoop.

Betelgeuse. I wasn't sure how they'd convey scale in this game - after all, a star is just an orange ball on screen - but this one looks suitably fat. I'm in fuel scooping range here, which is 2,500 light seconds away (most stars it's about 5 ls). It's 640 times the size of the sun.

 

[Huntn]

Bounty Hunting has definitely been nerfed in the 1.1 patch. Damn it. Not happy. Honestly I did not see much difference in traffic, but bounties have been cut in half. Previous to the patch Sidewinders ran from $2200-4500. Tonight I saw some $400 bounties, with most coming in below $2000!! Cobra's, when I could find any were easily half priceed. Right now, I'm discouraged with this game. It's shoving me the wrong way.

Ok, today when I logged in today, there was a patch. Tonight my bounty hunting was much better. I could find Cobra's and made about $200k in an hour or so. Now that's much better. I wonder if there is more variation in spawning of pirates with the 1.1 patch, or they made an adjustment? Can't say. I can say it's much improved over last night.

 

[Meteorbs]

Last time when I played Sniper Elite:Nazy Zombie Army2, I smashed the controller...
I hate zombies.

 

[Janichsan]

SOL is empty. Haven't run into a player while in SOL. Filled with NPC's mostly.

Since Sol itself requires a permit, that not too many players have, that's understandable. In the systems around it however, it can sometimes become a bit crowded. For instance, I have seen something like 12–15 players in Barnard's Star (about 5 ly from Sol) when there was a civil war going on a while ago. And in my experience you'll often find at least one player in many of the colonised systems within 10, 15 ly around Sol at all times. That's quite a lot for Elite.

That said, I have the impression that even more players are hanging around in the Empire or at the Federation/Empire border. But I haven't been there myself yet.

 

[garnerx]

Try the system that's advertised in the Galnet text, where 'legendary robot barman' Jaques is hanging out. I went there for a look yesterday and it's riddled with human players. 570-something ships in 24 hours.

 

[quagmire]

Since Sol itself requires a permit, that not too many players have, that's understandable. In the systems around it however, it can sometimes become a bit crowded. For instance, I have seen something like 12–15 players in Barnard's Star (about 5 ly from Sol) when there was a civil war going on a while ago. And in my experience you'll often find at least one player in many of the colonised systems within 10, 15 ly around Sol at all times. That's quite a lot for Elite.

That said, I have the impression that even more players are hanging around in the Empire or at the Federation/Empire border. But I haven't been there myself yet.

Yeah understanding why there are a lack of players in SOL. The permit isn't hard to get, but not profitable. Before 1.1, I loved BH in SOL since I didn't have to scan people. It would tell me if they were clean/wanted by looking in the contacts page. 1.1 took that away so have to scan now.

I wanted the permit because I found it cool to be in our own solar system. If only they didn't terraform Mars....

 

[Huntn]

Since Sol itself requires a permit, that not too many players have, that's understandable. In the systems around it however, it can sometimes become a bit crowded. For instance, I have seen something like 12–15 players in Barnard's Star (about 5 ly from Sol) when there was a civil war going on a while ago. And in my experience you'll often find at least one player in many of the colonised systems within 10, 15 ly around Sol at all times. That's quite a lot for Elite.

That said, I have the impression that even more players are hanging around in the Empire or at the Federation/Empire border. But I haven't been there myself yet.

Yeah understanding why there are a lack of players in SOL. The permit isn't hard to get, but not profitable. Before 1.1, I loved BH in SOL since I didn't have to scan people. It would tell me if they were clean/wanted by looking in the contacts page. 1.1 took that away so have to scan now.

I wanted the permit because I found it cool to be in our own solar system. If only they didn't terraform Mars....

For you ED players, my Plan:
I currently have $1.6m in the bank. My plan is to save up $2M by bounty hunting in my Cobra, then start moving towards Earth. I'm getting a little bored hunting out here in the boonies at Boswell (LTT18486). I'd like to find another good place which would be in the vicinity of Earth, with both opportunities for bounty hunting and trading, trying to figure out the best central location, move there and buy a Type 6 hauler. Is there a center of the developed galaxy or is it all spread out? The goal would be able to jump from a fighter to a hauler without having to travel more than 9LYs, possible?

Is the permit for SOL still worth it? If so, if you would not mind explaining the best way to get the permit. As I recall, you said something about doing missions on the edge of SOL to gain their trust?

How about Open vs Private Play. I'm mostly playing is a private guild group which means mostly I don't see anyone in game. I'd like to see people, but I wonder how many *******s are out there? If you kill another player, is all you get a measly 600 Cr fine?