Cadet I/HUD

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The HUD (Heads Up Display)

Quick, reliable info

Your Heads-Up Display tells you everything you need to know at all times. Being aware of all information quickly is crucial to knowing what is going on around you and how to react properly. We will cover each section in turn.

Info about your ship

In the centre of the screen, easily seen at all times, is information about your shield and hull strength, your thrust power and amount of fuel left in the booster, your levels of ammo and energy. This info is presented as bars - a fully coloured bar is at 100% strength, a dark bar indicates 0%.

Between these bars, at the bottom, is your speed (in metres per second, mps), signature (as a percentage), and killbonus (in the coloured circles). Also there are icons that display whenever you are cloaked, are on autopilot, are on course lock mode, or eyed by the enemy at the bottom left, top, top and bottom right respectively.

Also between the bars coloured arrows appear, depending on the situation. A green arrow points to a waypoint, a red arrow points to your current target, and a yellow arrow points towards your current order.

Finally, there is the motion indicator, . Most of the time this will be near the centre of your screen but sometimes it won't. For, you see, the motion indicator indicates the direction your ship is moving which may not always be the way you're facing. In space, you can't change direction on a dime so even though you turn 90 degrees, you still have some momentum from your previous direction. This is why avoiding collisions is a little tricky, and why newbies have been known to crash into asteroids a tad more often than trained pilots.

You can press F4 to bring up your ship's inventory. This was covered in an earlier lesson.

Info about your surroundings

The HUD displays icons next to every object in space. You can press "i" to adjust the level of detail you wish to obtain, from no icons at all to an icon, health status, distance and label on every object (where applicable). The default level of detail is not this maximum, changing it is not a bad idea although all this extra info can be overwhelming for beginners. Most veteran pilots always change the amount of detail to maximum right as they begin playing. It can however, in crowded sectors, block your view of what is important and actually reduce your frames per second.

Tip: By hitting the i key you cycle through four settings: None, Enemy ships only, Default and All.

Objects get an icon by their actual position. If they go off-screen, the icon remains visible on the side of your screen, indicating in which direction to turn if you wish to view it on your screen. It is thus essential to situational awareness.

Info about enemy ships

The targeting system allows you to know the type of ship you targeted, its hull and shield strengths, its speed and distance from you, and the pilot's kill bonus as well as his name. You can only target an object if the object has been detected by you or your teammates' sensors. Any object can be targeted. Learning how to use this system will be covered a little later.

Info about the game

In the top right your HUD tells you what sector you're currently in. The top left shows what was the last order you received, and the last order you accepted. At the top of the screen is the chatbox that we covered two lessons ago. Pay attention to it to know what your team is up to! By pressing F7 you will bring up the minimap in the bottom left. The minimap is critical to knowing what is going on in the game, and is covered in full during a later lesson.

Sounds

A tremendous amount of sounds allow you to gain information without having to look for it. Combining both visual and audio information allows you to maximize your knowledge of what's happening near you. On this site you can hear samples of important sounds that may go unnoticed, but which are important for you to catch.

The software HUD

Condense This article is too long

This lesson has been marked for being reduced in wordiness. It talks a bunch of guff in places.

You can help by improving it!

The software HUD will change your HUD from the one displayed above to the one displayed below. The information is conveyed very differently on the two HUDs. Software HUD is accessible in your options by changing the Graphics Options > Style from the value "Normal" to the value "Software" (shortcut key: Esc-O-H)

The software HUD leaves a lot more space in the middle of your image, but removes the important information from your near-peripheral vision to your far-peripheral vision. It also keeps all the information in a very tight arrangement and so requires you to be familiar with exactly each ship detail is rather than having each labeled clearly. Another difference is that your kill bonus now indicates the color of your team, instead of the gauge labels.

Software mode with autopilot on

Software mode with cloak engaged

As for the information about enemy ships, it is just as complete and also indicates the colour of the team to which your target belongs behind the kill bonus indicator. However, again, the information is much more compressed and also there is no picture showing your target's orientation (although there is a software HUD mod to remedy this).

As such, it can be observed that the software HUD saves visual space on your screen by compressing information, but does not include any other tactical advantage. Some players prefer it so they can see more when they are dogfighting, others like to use it when they're turreting or piloting slower ships that don't require fast reaction times, such as capital ships.

Weapon tools in the HUD

Your HUD tells you if your target is in weapons' range, if you're aiming correctly, and if you have a missile lock. Note that all this information is relative to your target. The missile lock can only be established on your target not on anyone else; the reticule will indicate whether you're aiming correctly at your target, regardless of any other intervening ships.

Note Due to discrepancies in weapon mountings and ship hitboxes sometimes the reticule will appear green even though your shots are actually missing. Zoom in slightly and watch where your bullet stream is going to verify that you are hitting.

First, weapons range. A round reticule will appear in the center of your HUD when your target is in range. It will be red if you're aiming incorrectly, and will slowly turn to green as your computer calculates that the position of your crosshairs will allow your bullets to hit. If the target is not in range, or if you have no weapons mounted, no reticule appears.

Second, lead indicators. Some ships have onboard lead indicators, which indicate where you must aim your reticle in order to hit your opponent. The lead indicator is red when you are not in range, and green when you are in range.

Tip: Don't be distracted by the lead indicator. Continue to zoom in slightly and watch your bullets to ensure they're hitting your target

Third, missile locks. When you get in missile range of your target, yellow brackets will appear around the target, slowly locking in on it. It is recommended, in most (not all) situations, to only fire when you have a full missile lock (which is when your lock produces a little beep).

Tip: For missiles with slow lock times, centre the target in your screen to hasten lock time