Cadet II/Ship control

Steering your ship using Alleg physics

One of Allegiance's charms is its semi-realistic physics engine. It is not truly Newtonian space physics but is "Newtonian enough" to capture some of the essence of flying in space. This lesson is intended to clear up misconceptions, and recommend some strategies for proper steering in Allegiance.

Basic concepts

Drag

How "drag" affects your speed

In "true" Newtonian physics, an object in space will drift forever after being pushed in some direction. To change direction, an object must first "bleed off" all the speed it has gained in its original direction. For instance, executing a "U-turn" requires that the object first accelerate in the opposite direction until it stops; further acceleration will get it moving the other way. An object under constant acceleration will constantly gain speed without ever reaching a maximum speed.

Allegiance physics functions pretty much the same, except that Allegiance space has an incredible amount of space debris that acts as "drag" on your ship (you can turn on Debris under the graphics options). This drag means that your ships require constant acceleration to keep moving, if you turn your engines off then your ship will drift to a stop. You also have a top speed when the drag against the front of your ship equals the propulsion from your engine.

Note One of the best analogies for how Allegiance ships work is that they are all flying underwater.

Throttle vs thrusters

Your throttle controls how much your propulsion your ship generates, which is always vented out of your ship's forward thruster. It's effectively a 'cruise control': at 50% throttle, your ship will accelerate forward at half the rate it normally would, reaching a top speed that's half its normal top speed.

Your ship also has four side-thrusters that allow you to travel left, right, up, and down, and a rear thruster for traveling backwards. These side-thrusters are usually less powerful than your forward thruster. Depending on your ship and faction, these side-thrusters can range from 25% to 100% as powerful as the main engine. As will be explained below, these side-thrusters automatically fire under a variety of conditions. You can manually engage a thruster, however, by pressing a side-thruster key. When you do that, your throttle it overridden to 100%, and all of that power is diverted to the less efficient side thruster. If you engage two side-thrusters at the same time, then the power is split so that each thruster expels the same amount of thrust.

Tip: Overusing your side-thrusters constantly diverts power from your main engine, greatly reducing your speed and turning you into a sitting duck.

Auto-engaging thrusters

In some situations, your side-thrusters will automatically engage to control your movement. Unlike manual side-thrusting, they don't override your throttle or necessarily rob your forward thruster of all of its power. One situation automatically uses your thrusters is vector lock. Engaging vector lock causes your thrusters to maintain your current direction of motion, despite the direction you are facing. If you face the same direction as your vector lock, then it will use 100% of your powerful forward thruster. If you face some other direction, your less efficient side-thrusters will maintain your direction of motion, resulting in a loss of speed.

Tip: Many veterans avoid vector lock. While you can shoot in once direction while moving in another, vector lock ensures that you're moving slowly in a straight line making you an easy target. To achieve the same effect, most veterans use their side-thrusters.

Changing your throttle will also auto-engage thrusters. When you reduce throttle, not only does your main engine cut power, but your rear thrusters will automatically engage to slow your ship at the maximum rate. Similarly, your rear thrusters will auto-engage whenever your current forward speed exceeds your throttle setting. This is why bombers with good acceleration (such as tf) are difficult to ram: they are very good at slowing down to their normal speed!

Tip: Manual thrusting overrides any automatic behavior, which is helpful in a variety of situations. For instance, if you are flying a bomber and want to maintain speed after a ram, then hold down your forward thrust. This will prevent your rear thruster from trying to slow you down

Turning and the G-indicator

A common operation that automatically engages thrusters is turning. Turning engages your side thrusters to cancel your old vector, while your main thruster begins propelling you in a new direction. As a result your speed drops (less forward thrust) and your ship carves out a little arc in space.

The G-indicator (also known as "momentum vector" and shown as on the screen) always indicates the direction your ship is currently "drifting". The location of the G-indicator can give you a clue as to how close you are to completing a turn. When it is centered, the turn is finished. If it's a long way off the screen, then most of your thrust is working to cancel your old vector, and you'll probably lose a lot of speed! How fast you execute a turn is a function of your ship's agility, acceleration, side-thrust efficiency, and how drastic the turn was.

Tip: Holding on forward thrust when you turn will override the side thrusters auto-engaging. This means you won't lose as much speed as you turn, although on the other hand your arc will be a lot wider. It can be useful if you're trying to loop around a sector while someone is chasing you. Just don't side-swipe a rock: you'll look silly

Acceleration vs agility

Agility is a measure of how quickly your ship can change the direction it is facing. Acceleration is a measure of how quickly your ship can change the direction it is moving. Ships with high acceleration can make tight turns, and start/stop on a dime. It doesn't take long for their G-indicator to align with their nose of their ships. Interceptors have very little mass and generate a relatively large amount of thrust, giving them great acceleration. Ships with high agility can whip around much faster than other ships, making it easier to keep the enemy in front of their crosshairs. However, an unwary pilot can find that they have turned their ship too far away from their G-indicator, engaging their side thrusters and slowing themselves down.

Tip: Your cargo can add to your mass and decrease your acceleration. Try packing your scout full of large shields and launching from base - it's an experience not to be missed!

Boosting

Your ship's booster (if it has one) simply provides additional forward thrust at the cost of fuel. It is a "strap on" component, rather than an integrated part of your ship's thrust system. You can not divert booster-generated thrust through a side thruster.

Note The retro-booster is an exception to this, it pushes thrust out of the rear thruster. In fact, you must hold on back-thrust (or have throttle set to zero) for the retro-booster to work at all.

Holding down the boost key will prevent your side-thrusters from automatically engaging, just like holding down forward thrust does - even if your current ship doesn't have a booster installed. Since your side-thrusters do not function while boosting if you wish to make a turn you must aim your ship much further into the turn to compensate. This is most commonly a problem when you are trying to intercept an enemy or race for an aleph while you're being shot at.

Tip: Imagine a boy racer drifting around a corner for an idea of how to aim your ship to make turns while boosting.

You can use this behavior to your advantage.

• Hold down the boost key just before you start to ripcord. Instead of spinning and slowing down, your ship will coast forward for most of the ripcord sequence.
• If you are out of fuel (or reloading fuel), you can hold down the boost key to replicate vector lock.
• As long as you're not boosting, you can throw yourself in one direction and use the boost key to "slide" in that direction while you turn your ship to engage an enemy. This isn't quite like vector lock (the drag in space will cause you to stop), but it is a quick/handy trick for those who master it.

Common flying problems

Over-steering

As we discussed, turning engages your side thrusters to cancel your previous direction of motion while your forward thruster propels you in a new direction. However sometimes you want to turn around quicker than this, for instance if you are trying to whip around a base to get in your green door.

You can do this by oversteering, which is turning farther than you intend to go. The more you oversteer, the more your main engine is pointing away from your old momentum vector and the quicker the engines can cancel it. Once your main engine has bled off most of your old momentum you can swing your nose back around to point in the direction you want to go (otherwise you really will oversteer!). You can tell when your old momentum has been bled off by keeping an eye on your g-indicator, when the g-indicator is pointing in the direction you want to go simply swing your nose around to face it.

Tip: Boosters are of great help while oversteering, since the additional thrust will let you almost-instantly cancel your old vector.

Of course, the question of "how much to oversteer" is important. You typically don't want to oversteer so much that your intended target is off screen, otherwise you can't keep an eye on your g-indicator to know when it lines up. But as you get to be a better pilot you can start oversteering at much steeper angles.

Example In this example the middle ship is turning normally, while the top ship is holding on forward thrust to maintain a higher speed, and the lower ship is oversteering.

Overboosting

If you are trying to get to a target quickly then you want to use your booster to get there as quickly as possible. However, use the booster too long and you will gain too much speed and you will go shooting past the target!

This is a very common rookie mistake, mostly when they are trying to kill a bomber, and it is made worse if the target is flying at top speed in the opposite direction than you (i.e. the bbr flys towards the base you are flying from).

To avoid overboosting, simply don't hold on the boost key too long. Release it when you are about 1.5k out from your target and just coast the rest of the way. After all, you can always tap the boost key a few more times to speed up again, but it is a lot harder to lose speed.

Tip: As you coast in towards your target, reload fuel so you're ready and primed for action by the time you're in gun range!

Intercepting a target

The ship on the left aims directly for the target, but takes longer to get in range. The ship on the right intercepts the target quickly, but overshoots. Ideally you want to compromise between the two extremes in order to get on your target's six.

There are many situations where you want to meet up with a target moving laterally across your screen, such as a stealth fighter wanting to intercept a miner traveling across the sector, or an interceptor wanting to kill a scout before it reaches the aleph. Plotting an intercept course with a distant target is not a trivial task for a human. However, with a few easy tips, you can improve your chances of "crossing the t" of an enemy's target (to use naval jargon).

Don't aim directly at your target because you will end up constantly turning to track it. Turning is slower than flying in a straight line. If your target is a long way off, you should be able to change to F3 view, look at your position, look at their position and movement, and get a rough idea of where you can cross their path. Quickly give yourself a waypoint to that point then change back to cockpit view.

If you don't have time to change to F3 view, then your best bet is to lead the target. How much to lead is difficult to say, but your best bet is to keep your target on the edge of your screen and as you close the distance swing your nose around to get the target in the centre of your screen. (Effectively, this is the same as aiming directly at your target except in this case you are oversteering.)

Ideally you want to end up directly behind your target and moving at approximately the same speed, this will allow you to unload your bullets at leisure. In unideal situations you will end up falling behind the target, overshooting the target, or trying to twist your ship to shoot the target while you fly past at right angles.

This is a difficult skill to master, you have to be very aware of your own speed, direction, and your ship's ability to accelerate/decelerate. You also have to keep an eye on your target's position, speed, and whether they are accelerating/turning/whatever to try and avoid you. What you are trying to do is aim your ship in an curve that will flow in nicely into the target's direction of travel. It becomes a compromise between intercepting them as quickly as possible and managing your approach to get on their six.