Actually we have green space and depending on your relative position between the sun/the suns color and the roids... the roids do appear different colors.

Send 100 USD to...

Luca King
67 South Main st
Gardner MA
01440

And I will give you detailed instructions on how to set up any controller you like.

Ryan, just in case that's a genuine address, generally it's not a good idea to post your physical address on an open web forum, for the same reason it's not a good idea to announce your in game location on channel 100.

genka: LOL... good troll... no more treats! Now, get back in your box.

(For the record, I don't think analog inputs work properly with ship thrust when FA is off).

Thx slime... glad I'm not the only one.

BTW: for anybody that wants to learn, http://quest.nasa.gov/space/teachers/liftoff/newton.html

PS: Link above not intended for genka, since he knows everything already.

HuntrCkr, I don't think anyone takes issue with your love of physics, it's more your condescending tone. I think genka's point was that it would be a note of humility to recognize that the flight model of VO has been the way it is now for a while, and that there is a reason for everything. You are implying that the current model is the result of lack of knowledge of physical concepts which are in fact centuries old, and failing to see that there could be a rational, logical explanation for current ship behavior. Your choice of words doesn't help your case, either. It makes you sound frustrated and immature.

Newtonian mechanics are a beautiful thing, but consider that in a 45th century universe humans would likely have a vastly different understanding of the world around them. Even in present day NM works only within a very narrow range of energy and momentum, it falls apart on the relativistic level and the quantum level. Therefore rather than suggesting the game world as presented is "stupid" because it doesn't match what you view as rational (dare I say sacred?), perhaps it's better to suspend disbelief for a while and eventually arrive at your own conclusion as to why things are the way they are. Like Max Planck said "We have no right to assume that any physical laws exist, or if they have existed up to now, that they will continue to exist in a similar manner in the future." Or, as genka's suggested Problem Exists Between Keyboard And Chair.

I'm from physics background... and read the backstory.

Our engines are NOT reaction ones. That is why we don't need fuel. Neither propelent as an ionic engine.

Reverse-engeneering, I see the engines as able to focus gravitic waves, or gravitons if you prefer a particle model. The engine folds the universe toward the ship, the same way it does for FTL/warp jump but more subtle, so that is why it have exactly the same acceleration in any direction.

While turboing, the whole gravitic field is focused forward, so you go much faster. But when disengage turbo you "open the focus" to all directions, so you slow back again to cruise speed (max).

What you think are trusters exits are actually the heat exchangers. Note there are no side /spin/attitude trusters also, spin is also ensured by the omnidirectional gravitic mode.

But Phaser, if I don't give my real address... how will he send me my payment for teaching him to set up his flight stick?

Honestly... I'm far to old to worry about folks knowing where to find me. besides, whats the worst that might happen? I suppose Peytros could stop by or PoL could show up in person to try and convince me of his brilliance... but overall, I'm not concerned.

Phaserlight: I am curious, where did I seem frustrated and immature? (genka post does not apply... see bottom of post for reasons) I had simply stated that I have a problem with the thrust of my ship having no effect on my movement in physics mode. Plus, pizzasgood had asked me what I would "fix" in the flight model.

Therefore rather than suggesting the game world as presented is "stupid" I don't think I ever said this... I said the turbo is stupid in a physics sense, like something a Hollywood movie would come up with to help the "good guys" escape. The game world is quite enjoyable actually. Even the Physics mode is not my gripe... the fact that my joystick is useless in it is.

As I said in my post, I am in no way trying to achieve game changes. I am not even frustrated to a point of quitting or anything. I understand the reasons for the speed caps, the movement allowances with strafing in Physics mode, and the trade-offs made in regards to combat being fun. I even read the thread where Incarnate himself explained the flight model as currently implemented. It just kills me that there is no way for me to fly my spaceship using an analog-axis joystick in physics mode(or alternatively, allow me to cut engines to 0 in FA mode without stopping, and use "brakes" instead). Once again, if somebody does know a way to set up the joystick, please be so kind and explain it to me.

What does however frustrate me is the general condescending tone everyone in the forum has... Why does everyone assume you are a child simply because you are new? Would it surprise you to know that I am married with children, a top specialist programmer for embedded systems and industrial control applications, and on top of that graduated top of my class both in high school and for my university degree? (Does giving my job and academic achievements make me a braggart and condescending again?)

I doubt very much if any of the above will give me any more respect from anyone here. The game is, after all, about who can fight the best, not program or study the best.

As for genka, it's within my sphere of entertainment value to mock and generally evoke reactions from trolls on forums all over the net. I just can't get enough of their special brand of humor. Plus, if they have me as a target, at least some new users might actually make it through unscathed ;-)

Alloh: I like that :-)

"Would it surprise you to know that I am married with children, top specialist programmer for embedded systems and industrial control applications, and on top of that graduated top of my class both in high school and for my university degree?"

Honestly, yes... not being condescending or anything but, a "top specialist programmer" and you can't figure out a flight stick? Our resident 12 year old has figured it out and he's a thespian not a programmer.

ryan: It's not that I don't have my joystick configured. That's simple enough. I do in fact use it for FA mode all the time. To fly in Physics mode however is another matter. You can't set up X-axis to replicate W,S behavior, and Y-axis for A,D behavior. You can't use the thrust slider for speed control.

So, in effect, you use the keyboard for flying, and the joystick for targeting. And then, using the mouse just becomes more effective 90% of the time. So, I readily admit defeat at this point... How can you use joystick only in Physics mode?!?

"Would it surprise you to know that I am married with children, a top specialist programmer for embedded systems and industrial control applications, and on top of that graduated top of my class both in high school and for my university degree?"

Nah. I mean, just look at davejohn: he's further along in life than I care to think about, and he's still a goddamn newb.

PS: Who's an ooogabooga baby? Who's my oooga-booga? Who da oooga-booga? Are you da oooga-booga? Aaawww yes, you da oooga-booga. Yeah, that's right, you da ooga-booga! Yes, that's a cute little oooga-booga! Aww, I just love your little ooga-booga feets and your little ooga-booga arms with those pudgy little ooga-boooga pingers, and your cute little ooga-booga face, with that scruffy little ooga-booga neckbeard! Aaawww, I'ma gonna tickle my oooga-booga! Yes, I'ma gonna tickle yah!

But one thing I agree, we should have option to add a "GLIDE" mode, when you simply disable the gravitic engine and keeps momentum... the FA mode is perfect for gaming, but Physics mode could be improved slightly...

Joystick did not worked for me. Good for dodging, sucks for aiming, so I ended up with keyb+jstk+mouse ... gave up stiick, only keyb+mouse now

Honestly, it's been a while since I've used a joystick, I prefer a handheld game controller, but when I tried it I had success using 2 joysticks, each with a Z-rotation axis. The game automatically recognized six axes of control (forward/reverse, side-to-side, up and down, pitch, yaw, roll). When I was in FA mode all I had to do was push forward on the left stick to increase throttle, or pull back to slow down. In physics this became thrust forward and thrust reverse. It seems you would be able to do the same on 1 stick using a d-hat or some combination of buttons.

There's a fairly detailed list of commands that VO recognizes here:
http://www.vendetta-online.com/manual/app_commands.html

Play around with the key settings (under options) to find out the names of the buttons on your joystick (should be something like JOY0BUTTON10 etc.) and then use /bind <key> <command> while in the chat interface.

"that is why it have exactly the same acceleration in any direction. "

Except that we don't have exactly the same acceleration in any direction, only in the six cardinal directions. When you move diagonally, your thrust vector is the addition of the individual thrust vectors, rather than just the same vector pointed in a different direction. So if you hold forward, right, and up, for example, you will accelerate significantly faster than if you only held forward.

So it would seem that we have three gravitic thrusters, plus whatever our rotations use.

As for the joystick, I did not realize that the slider didn't work in physics mode (actually I suspect it does and you're making a mistake somehow. Maybe I'll play with mine later today). I never use it because it would require my other hand to be near the joystick. What I do is use my left hand on the nostromo and my right hand on the joystick. I strafe with the d-pad on the nostromo, and I operate my forward/backward thrusters with the hat switch on the joystick. (I can also operate my lateral thrusters with the hat switch if I need to take my hand off the nostromo for a moment.)

Even if my thrust slider was in a position where I could reach it easily, I wouldn't use it, because it's very rare that I want anything other than full or zero thrust, and I need to be able to switch from full forward thrust to full reverse thrust in an instant for effective dodging. The travel time on the hat switch is much less than that of the slider.

Alloh, I don't know what you mean about a glide mode. Disabling FA and letting go of all controls will cause you to "glide" already, assuming you are not exceeding your standard velocity cap.

Disabling FA and letting go of all controls will cause you to "glide" already, assuming you are not exceeding your standard velocity cap.

Exactly the point. You glide at speeds <=Max, far below Turbo speed. Considering existing engines workings, it should be possible to glide at turbo speed, simply switching off the engines!

That would result in a "less dense" universe and a better usage ot turbo/tab key. Reasoning:

+Improved engines/physics "Glide" mode:
-Engage turbo (press [tab]) until you reach desired speed and direction (movement vector)
-Release [tab] in Glide mode will switch gravitic engines to 'idle' mode,and you keep current speed and direction (vector).
-Press [tab] again or use any directional trust engage engine again and ship slows down to cruise speed (<=max, non-turbo).
-You can spin/aim in any axis while gliding without changing movement vector (i.e., speed)

+Active engine ( existing now )
-Engage turbo (press [tab]) until you reach desired speed and direction (movement vector)
-Release [tab] and speed drops to <= Cruise

This could be implemented as an engine enhancement instead of a physics fix. Add a better explanation on how engines work, compare to improved ones and ok.

It also changes almost nothing to game balance. The practical changes are that you no longer have to keep [teb] pressed, or create a bind, to use Turbo Speed in desired direction, while it allows us to effectively spin/turn the ship at turbo speed.

Would change very little the combat conditions, simply increasing the max speed possible at the cost of 'stright line trajectory'. Not a good move for combat situations. For all other situations it simply results that we can relase turbo and keep movement vector while aiming and shooting at turbo speed in steady direction...

Disabling FA and letting go of all controls will cause you to "glide" already

You just proved my point.... even if I have my thrust set to 100%, and I enter physics mode, I just keep "gliding" no matter what direction I face. Effectively, the thrust setting becomes irrelevant. While I understand the reason it was done this way (for combat), it doesn't change the fact that it's weird.

Alloh's gravitic engines explanation is actually the most accurate thing RP wise that could explain the behavior...

In physics mode, you are in complete control... In FA mode, you are deceived into thinking you have a forward thrust setting, but actually it's just your ship's advanced flight control system controlling the gravitic engines to emulate "standard" flight principles.

As for the D-hat idea for thrusters, strafing, etc... I tried it after it being suggested, and it just feels weird to me. Maybe I would get use to it after a while, but for now, the keyboard and mouse is working fine for me for combat. FA mode with joystick for other flight. And Alloh's gravitic engines explaining the Physics mode rather has me content.

Who says that flying will always be done on a joystick anyway?

indeed, nothing better to fly a heavy loaded moth than keyboard only...

I think you'd have to set your throttle axis to Accelerate to make it do something in physics mode. It's still not gonna be all that usable though. Shifting the throttle up will make you accelerate forwards, down backwards and leaving it centered makes you drift.
It works better if the axis springs back to the center position.. like on a gamepad.

I use the hat switch for forwards/backwards and buttons on the base for strafe/roll/turbo.

I might not have been clear enough about my control scheme. I don't use the hat switch for strafing normally. Under normal circumstances I only use the up and down directions of the hat switch, for forward/backward thrust. My left hand controls all strafing. I just keep the option of strafing left/right with my hatswitch for emergencies when my left hand is busy e.g. removing a cat from my desk.

Hat switch placement is a factor of course - on my stick, it's smack dab in the middle, so using it for forward/backward thrust is pretty natural, and makes it easy to still reach all the buttons while holding it (they are placed around it, so I just kind of roll my thumb over to hit them).