Manual:Basic flight

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Ships screen

Manual

Advanced Flight

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Basic flight instructions by Major Dwight Somlen

... In training with Major Dwight Somlen (ret) of the Confederation of Inhabited Worlds military...

(background, low volume) "What makes you think that these wet behind the ears can learn anything? Do you really think they have the b-" (sounds of interference erupt from your PAD) "to be able to pilot a craft ... what? We're live?"

(full volume speech) "Greetings pilots! I've been requested by the control authority to provide some pointers for newbie pilots on how to fly their brand spanking new spacecraft. The good thing is that no matter what craft you're flying - whether a Llama, Goddard, Ox, Mule or whatever - your interaction with the flight controls is the same. Now, many newbies love to jump in, start moving, and figure out the controls as they go. That's fine, and I'll listen to your space debris hitting my shields when I pass you by. The smarter pilots learn their controls beforehand, as that half-second difference in flight control manipulation could mean becoming a smear on the side of a station, or a twisted hulk after tangling with an Areus.

"Now, first things first. How do you move. If you want to change your direction of movement, you need some sort of flight instrument to relay your commands. Let's refer to your instrument documentation -" (low volume mutter, as though to someone beside him) "they DID get that didn't they?" (full volume) "There are three forms of control: joystick, mouse and keyboard. The joystick is pretty self explanatory. Push the joystick forward, and your ship's nose points 'down'. Pull back and you point up. What? Yes, yes you can invert the controls if you want. Push the joystick from side to side, and your craft will turn on the vertical axis. Some advanced joysticks will even let you roll if you configure your ship correctly. Now your mouse does the same job in two ways. First, we have mouse warping. That's where moving your mouse in a direction, moves your ship in that direction. Keep moving your mouse - yep, that's right - and your ship keeps turning. Mouse gliding, on the other hand, means that moving your mouse pointer away from the center moves your ship in the direction of the pointer." (low mutter) "Me, if I don't have my joystick in my hand, I prefer to glide." (full voice) "Lastly, you have the keyboard. Both the joystick and mouse imitate the keyboard. Use your cursor keys to move up, down, and sideways, and keys to roll left and right. You can also use the keypad to do the same thing: , , , and , to roll.

"OK, so now we're spinning around, going nowhere. What we need is thrust - Can the laughter, you lot up the back! To move anywhere, we need to have velocity. Velocity is determined in relation to the current system's sun. In Combat Mode (the other modes will be discussed in a later lecture) use the equal or and minus or keys to alter your velocity. Notice that you can have forward and reverse velocity. To obtain maximum combat velocity, use the backslash key. Use the key to reduce your velocity to zero. Essentially, what these commands provide is a Requested Velocity Vector, otherwise called a 'set' velocity. A Requested Velocity Vector is the speed that your craft will always try to move at. At times, like when turning, your velocity may vary up or down; but your craft will always try to return to this Requested Velocity Vector.

In Combat Mode your maximum set-velocity is limited to a predefined value. There are a few ways that let us get around the set-velocity limit though. For those of us lucky enough" (sotto voice) "- rich enough -" (full voice) "to have Overdrive capability on our craft, you can use the key to activate it. Overdrive capability gives your craft a greater velocity than your maximum combat velocity alone. The downside is that you have to hold the key down to maintain overdrive, and you only have a fuel limited time for Overdrive use. Where you don't have an Overdrive, you can still use the key to accelerate to your maximum set velocity, just like the key. In this case, though, releasing the key will then reduce your velocity back to the 'set' original. The other modes will be discussed in a later lecture.

"That's enough for now. You've probably heard enough of this old f- I know, I know, no swearing. Have a think about what I've just said - it just might mean that I'm NOT hearing your space dust on my shields."

Velocity and Physics

The velocity limit on ships in VS is C, as far as the VS engine is concerned. This is the only hard limit on velocity. Adherence to governor settings is not enforced by hacks to physics, but by the code responsible for responding to user inputs - that is, the part concerning translating setspeed and steering into engine thrusts in particular directions.

The range of setspeed magnitudes that can be directly requested varies by the current status of the flight computer, and is one of:

• A) very low (Maneuver Mode, the default) so as to allow for ease of stopping, maneuvering, and limited fuel consumption when coasting. This limit is a property of the governor settings for the given vessel, not in any way a hard limit for the velocity of the vessel.
• B) somewhat higher, namely 1000 times as high, (Travel mode, switched on/off with 'y')
• C) unconstrained inertial flight (Auto-compensating Flight-computer switched off/on via '~'). Both overall governor settings for linear velocities and current setspeed magnitudes are ignored, and the "flight computer" will make no attempt to correct your course (that being why you can't normally continue to thrust arbitrarily in other modes - the FC forces you to obey your own setspeed/governor settings unless explicitly turned off). Thrust is under manual control, you can go as fast as you want.

We have long had six-axis thrusting functions defined, but they are not mapped to any keys by default.

See also

• See Manual:Keyboard layout for the necessary command keys.

Ships screen

Manual

Advanced Flight