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[whatshisface]

Whats the difference between a military drive and a hyperdrive?

The Military Drive wastes much less with in a Jumpgate.

[bahman]

Originally posted by whatshisface@Nov 29 2005, 01:16 AM
Whats the difference between a military drive and a hyperdrive?

I think military driver uses some sort of radiactive fuel, so first it is smaller and also its feul require less space, the best choice for cambat ships. One has to save space of combat ships for weapon, shield, etc.

[Eva02Soul]

Military drives use Military fuel, which is more expensive and causes dangerous radioactive byproducts. You can jettison the radioactives, but that can bring you a nasty fine in civilized systems. The drive itself is much smaller than the same class hydrogen drive, but anything over a class 3 drive is military restricted and not allowed for public use.

[bahman]

Where can I find class 8 military deriver?

[Eva02Soul]

short answer: they don't exist

long answer: You cannot buy class 8 drives, period. They are so massive that they must be pre-built to spaceship design and fitted. The only way to have a class 8 hyperdrive is to buy a ship that has it.

The thargoid drive counts as a class 8 or 9 military drive. All military drives are better than their equivalent number regular drive, so the thargoid drive is the best drive in the game. But to get it, you must do almost all of the available hardcoded missions. (It takes about 3 game years do to fixed starting times on some of the missions)

My basic trading loadout:
Atmospheric shielding (so I can land on planets)
Drive (military or thargoid, smallest that will let me run the route in under a week)
1.5 times the fuel neccessary for the route (so I have backup)

No auto pilot since I fly and dock on manual faster than the autopilot could, using minimum delta t transfer orbits. (I practice with Orbiter, a space flight sim than NASA endorses as the most realistic you can get without being in the space flight business :whistle: )

The money edit isn't worth it. This is one game where having unlimited money doesn't help if you are no good. And editing the ships gives the computer more of an advantage than it gives you, since the computer uses the exact same basic ships you do, and it can react more quickly. I edit the game to make it harder. (or sometimes to get more range so I can just go exploring the galaxy to see the sights, but that one also makes it harder to play the game)

Most of the best stuff, and the plot, is in the hardcoded missions. And you can't get most of them unless you start at the default start, in The Aliance space. There are also softcoded missions and plots that are only available through the military missions. And sometimes they are mutually exclusive. Especially once you get up to the higher military ranks, and find that some missions are unavailable because of ones you did for the other side. (basically, anything that shows up in the journals, is a major part of the game, and will affect your options, so it is worth buying 10 year subscriptions to each of them, and past those 10 years, there aren't any working hardcoded missions)

Unlike Elite II, the goal of FFE is the hardcoded missions, instead of becoming elite. Do you help the Empire, or the Federation? Squashing the Alliance in the proccess, of course. Or do you help the Alliance contact the Thargoids? And then find out about the shadowy conspuracy run by the INRA. (better be pretty high in the military so you can get nuclear missiles) Do you help the Thargoids, being labeled fugitive by the INRA, and get their technology? Or do you ruthlessly destroy them for the INRA and get labeled elite, and get the highest ranks in both the Empire and the federation?

And I say again. Look it up for yourself on jades.org since they have a lot more than I will put in here, including links.

[gregor]

Another way to make money is to collect radioactive waste on civilised worlds (you get payed for that) and then you go through hyperspace and jettison the cargo. :-D

just don't jetison it too fast cause it can backfire and damage your shields and hull.

Ugh too bad i didn't know about hardcoded missions so much. i am too far in the game now i guess.... oh well i still enjoy a flight now and then. only thing that bothers me is i left two mining maschines and now i can't find the system where i left them. there should be some search in the game or at least the coordinates should be written next to systems name. cause after playing trader i want to become a miner. i am still on the lookout for the asteroied as it appears they are more profitable than mining maschines.

[balacay]

Nice game!!! Gave'd it a 5!!! k: k: k:

However, can anybody give me the smallest clue, how to detect solar systems with lots of asteroids. I found one day some asteroids and I had a mining laser, and when I returned to a space station with 200t of gem stones (I did't knew that gem stones where so expensive) I was.... , but when I whent back for more gem stones the asteroids where gone, I was in a diferent part of the solar system this time .

Can anybody tell me if it's true that all planet's with the same fizic have the same ore deposits. I found in every solar systems only water deposints

And how do you become a real soldier? I read the manual that you can do small missions for the military and be free, and thet you can sign a contract and from that second on you are "a slave" of the army(you can't do anything, exept military stuff).

Haven't seen that personaly, but then some of the hardcoded missions are mutually exclusive with the very high military ranks, so I don't know. I only get high enough rank to get the missions that allow me to use nuclear missiles, (anti base missiles!!!) since They are needed in some of the thargoid missions.

For the asteroids, remember that they tried for realism. Asteroids are few and far between, except sometimes for rings around planets. The planets and asteroids actually do orbit their respective primaries. (normally suns, but sometimes larger planets or brown dwarfs) If you sit still on a planet surface, and set time compression up high, you can watch sunrises and sunsets, and if you wait long enough, (planet year) you can watch the constellations move around the sky. Stuff doesn't stay still and wait for you to come by, so you have to understand some of the physics of orbits if you want to find something small, or do manual flying.
To find an asteroid belt:
1)use your solar system map and zoom out until you can see all the planets orbits.
2)look for the missing orbit where the asteroid belt is supposed to be.
3)fly to that orbit using the map
4)fly around that orbit with time compression on one of the higher settings, but never flying very fast. (so that if you fly past something, you can get back to it easilly by pausing and then targetting it, and then using cockpit view with targetting tunnels activated in settings)

Best mining strategy, is to get a light exploring ship, and go outsided colonised space untill you find a good planet or system. If you have mining machines with you, drop them off, and write down on paper the location where you put them. (include any extra details that may help, such as which planet in the system, and where on it) go back to a civillised system, and get the largest ship you can, and outfit it with the bare minimum. (include autopilot in this case since it doesn't take nuch room, you obviously don't care about time spent, and it saves work and doing over if you mess up) Then start following your impromtu trade route.