Pilots Guide
Introduction
This guide is designed to help a new or experienced pilot get the most out of their spacecraft. It uses the Falcon Delacy Sidewinder as an example but the concepts are applicable to all spacecraft in the universe of Elite: Dangerous.
Your Cockpit
Centre Area (from left to right)
(1) Current target info - shows textual info on your current target, e.g. their name, currently targeted sub system. If no target selected then it shows information on the system and shows a planet in the target holo.
(2) Current Target Holo - shows a holo of your current target, this shows shield strength info, displays where on the shield and hull your strikes are hitting. Also displays the hull health of the target.
(3) Internal Temperature Gauge - Displays the total temperature of your ship. Normally your ship runs with vents open and this allows this to be kept in check by the ship. If you are in Silent Running Mode (see later) this will climb depending on the systems that you have active on your ship (again see later).
(4) Scanner - Displays the surrounding area, objects are displayed depending on their position to your ship. Colours denote hostile targets, neutral and also show other large objects such as large asteroids. The contacts on the scanner are picked up by a combination of heat and distance. So the more hotter a ship is, it can be picked up at a much further distance than an other ship that is cooler.
Scanner Icons are as follows:
- Green is friendly.
- Yellow is neutral.
- Red is hostile.
- Red flashing white is shooting at you
- Square means weapons not deployed.
- Triangle weapons deployed.
- Solid is NPC.
- Outline is player.
(5) Speed Gauge - Shows the current speed of your ship. The indicator that moves is the speed you set, the bar then rises and falls as the fly-by-wire system matches the ships actual speed with the one that you have set. (NOTE: When you boost the speed goes above the speed max speed of the ship for a short while - but then when the energy runs out it then returns back to the level that is currently set by the indicator.)
When moving forward, a blue zone will appear on the speed guage This shows the speed range within which your ship is most manoeuvrable (generally around 50% full thrust).
(6) Ship Holo - A holo showing the current state of your ship, its orientation, shield status, hull health.
(7) Power Capacitor Gauges - There are 3 bars: SYS / ENG / WEP. Each bar represents a capacitor in the ship. Energy in the bar allows the connected ships system to charge faster, overheat less or provide more energy. You can allocate how the power from your power unit is allocated to these capacitors by setting the 'pips', the more 'pips' the more power is allocated to this capacitor.
SYS - Shield and ships systems take energy from this capacitor. The more energy here the faster your shields will recharge.
ENG - Engines - the more energy available here the more you can boost. When you press boost you will see a chunk of energy disappear from this capacitor. You can only boost again when this capacitor has the available energy again.
WEP - Weapons - the more energy in here, the slower your weapons overheat. When you fire an energy weapon the energy comes from this capacitor. So the more energy you divert here the less your guns will run dry.
(8) Signature - This shows how "visible" you are on another ships scanners. The flatter the line the less visible you are. Going to silent running will mean that this bar stays as flat as possible - provided you are not firing energy weapons.
NOTE: Silent running - when you are in silent running mode your ships vents are closed so the heat cannot escape - but it still builds up. (See temperature gauge). If this temperature gauge hits 100%+ you start to take damage and your weapons cannot fire as they are classed as overheated.
NOTE2: Heat Sinks - if your temperature gets too high whilst silent running, you can eject a heat sink and this will reduce your internal temperature to zero, but it will start to build up again until you turn off silent running again and open your vents
Left Side Panel (Contacts Panel)
This panel shows Contacts and Subsystems for the selected contact. On this panel you can select a target that is on your scanner (just like target select from your controller). On here it shows the type of target, the hull health and shield health.
The Subsystems panel shows more information on the selected target (but it does have to have been a selected target for a few seconds). Here you can target a specific sub-system (and see the health etc. of the others).
Right Panel (Systems Panel)
There are two sub-panels here: Modules, Fire Groups
Modules - This panel shows each system module on your ship. The type and the amount of power it draws from the power planet (this translates in to heat generated). From here you can turn off/on systems. Only systems that are turned on contribute to your temperature (so the more systems off- the less your temperature increases when silent running). Priority tells the the system the order in which to shut down systems if there is not enough to feed all systems (by default they are all set to the same for a balanced power distribution). The health of a module is also shown.
The total power usage and total heat generated are shown below the list.
Fire Groups - You can have multiple weapons installed, e.g. a Beam weapon, Missile Launcher, Heat Sink. Here you assign the weapons to fire groups. Yellow squares represent the primary, blue the secondary. You can create multiple fire groups - e.g. missile as primary, beam as secondary in fire group 1, heat sink as primary and beam as secondary in fire group 2. You can then switch fire groups on the fly using the cycle fire group button.
On the first mission there is only one fire group with both weapons assigned as primary - so they both fire when the trigger is pressed. You could set up another fire group and assign only one gun to each fire group. Have a play with it and you will figure it out.
Centre top
(9) The two elongated white panels (with the red lights in) actually flash red or yellow depending on if you are in proximity to another object, like an asteroid. These panels may be in a different loction or have a different shape depending on the spacecraft.