X3 Reunion - Dogfighting Tutorial

[whiteknight2255]

This is a nice little tut. I didnt strafe at all before this, and the fight command software is a useless piece crap unless you're a Nova hunting a buster.

But I gotta say its quite tough to strafe and aim at the target with the mouse, really do need a joystick.

[LakaeosAngelus]

It's painfully ironic that I stumbled across this only when my computer's been down for months and I can't play X3 anymore. I've been craving a chance to pick it back up and this just made it worse.

Having said that, you really impressed me! I'm a semi-casual player, and throughout the first half I was sorta thinking "hay, I can do all this, I feel pretty good", but taking down two Novas in an underarmed M4? I'd struggle with one!

You gave me some things to think about though. Thanks a lot!

[riddler251]

By all Rights, the Mako is technically the best all around M4. It is flat out average with the best weapon selection of the top 5 M4s. Note, by average, I mean it is never at the bottom on the stats, and generally closer to the top. Note, that other than in cargo, this ship doesn't take #1.

[JakeWantsYouDead]

@riddler251

I prefer the Solano. Never played X3R though, only TC, so I don't know if it's exclusive to TC but M3 level shielding on an M4 is quite strong.

[riddler251]

@JakeWantsYouDead I think the Yaki suzanoa or something like that has 25MJ sheilds on their M4, but I forget exactly what it is called. There is no Solano in X3R as far as I remember, been a while since I last played.

[JakeWantsYouDead]

@riddler251

They are an M3 in TC. The Solano is hard to outfit though, as there is no EQ dock in OTAS HQ.

[OMGitsFMA6666]

I know this is old but, The mako is a GREAT M4. Use APBE's to strip shields and silks to roll over their hull. With an enormous cargo capacity of 170 (for an M4), You can easily carry around 40-60 silks at a time. I'd be willing to bet the Mako could take a M1 by itself.

[thamasteroneill]

X3 really is most fun when faced with enemy's at least a class higher than your current ship

[chronosifter]

With an IRE I find it's much more effective to just fly straight at your opponent, strafing in a large spiral to dodge incoming weapons fire, then at the last possible moment, like right before you slam into them pitch up real hard so you flip the ship over 180 degrees. As long as you can stay close to their speed you'll be so tight up against them that they will take fire not only from you, but from their own allies trying to blast ya off their tail. Works best in a small ship like a Mako.

[UncleArti]

really nice dogfighting skills, I have to admit :) I used to play this game with just a mouse and a keyboard and it was pretty hard to dogfight with a mouse... now I got a joystick. not too expensive and no z-axis - so I still have to do my barrel rolls with my keyboard :D... but it works fine... and makes fighting a lot easier.

[ParadonNethendril]

is there a way to have a 3rd person view like in freelancer? or is it it the way you have it all the time?

[jjoshaugh]

@ParadonNethendril You mean see you ship in front of you? Yeah, its one of the F1 view options.

[EffectDeadly]

@jjoshaugh

dude how do you got that target and to see where your bullets are going?i cant see a fucking thing wherever im shotting or what im shooting for some reason

[jjoshaugh]

@EffectDeadly

Well its in the ket options but... Press T to target whats in your reticle. Shift t to only target things that are red to you. Press K once to activate a leading indicator, and again to activate your autoaim. Shift H to remove the HUD and again to bring it back.

[EffectDeadly]

@jjoshaugh thx and how do you repair ships?i kinda crashed into a ship and only 1% hull left-.-

[jjoshaugh]

@EffectDeadly In X2 reunion the only way short of a player headquarters (which you can only get pretty far into the game) is to dock to a shipyard and pay through the nose for repairs. In X3 terran conflict you have a repair laser on your spacesuit that can repair ships slowly.

[EffectDeadly]

@jjoshaugh i have x3 reunion patch 2.0.0.1 where is that shipyard?

[jjoshaugh]

@EffectDeadly You can repair ships at any shipyard, such as the one in argon Prime or Kingdom End. If you are talking about the player headquarters you receive it when you complete the Bala Gi missions. You can download the X3 handbook or visit the Egosoft forums for more info on that.

Even when you get the PH though you have to feed it with products to repair and build ships.

[theexpelled027]

this game is just way to complicated for me. . ..i have no clue what to do or were to go, i spent a hour just getting used to the controls. . and i cant seem to find a decent tutorial anywhere =\

[jjoshaugh]

@theexpelled027 Search for "A NOOBS GUIDE FOR MONEY" and the X3 handbook. Those should explain everything.

[danielmacroberts]

Not to correct you or anything but your doing very little if any strafing. Your more just staying a steady direction while mowing one guy down. Strafing would be moving around to avoid fire(you do this once every 2 mins or so). Them missing doesnt not mean your strafing lol.

[raeka4eva]

i got 1 question, how on earth do you shoot the pirates down when you're on the planet surface, mission 2 i think it is

[jjoshaugh]

@raeka4eva Uh...just put your mouse over them and shoot... I think. Been a while. I juts shot wildly and got through it first time. Remember, you are not flying the ship, just a turret in the back.

[Ilamarea]

I wish It had a cocpit view.

Meaby I would play then.

[Avenger4343]

u can play it with mouse right ? i mean it looks like a mouse playing

[jjoshaugh]

@Avenger4343

Yes you can play it with a mouse. I just prefer a joystick.

[Avenger4343]

@jjoshaugh this game = realy hard or aima noob -_-

[jjoshaugh]

@Avenger4343

Dont be so down on yourself. mate. Go to the Egosoft boards and ask questions there. There are a ton of people who love the game and will be more than happy to help you out. That's what I did :)

[Avenger4343]

@jjoshaugh tx  dude ;) realy apreciate

[veiakas]

@Avenger4343 he's using joystick I guess, seeing as the the movements are jabbed.

[Anacronian]

@Avenger4343

It's not like the game is hard, It just got the worst interface known to man, If Egosoft had bothered to fix that they might have had an hit on their hands because that is one powerful engine.. but alas they don't care to make their games actually playable.

[Avenger4343]

@Anacronian so u are saying that this game its actualy verry complex right?

[Anacronian]

@Avenger4343

It's actually no more complex than say freespace 2, The perceived complexity comes from the stupendously bad interface.

[Avenger4343]

@Anacronian lol...i can say that i better play free space than this game lol thats easyer :|

[nusferatum]

nice dogfighting dude. i agree with u regarding the joystick, my maneuverability decreased once i started using it. kind of hard to strafe and manage speed at the same time with the joystick. i only use it because my GF bought the damn thing.

[jjoshaugh]

@nusferatum

You missinderstand. My joystick was faulty and I had to create a huge deadzone to stop spinning in space. I actually prefer the joystick in most situations.

[LukewMorgan]

A little target fixation at 1:37, hehe

Is that Elena's Fortune where you take on the Novas? Their turrets are a pain because they mount a BHEPT, the Corvette favorite.

[JeckAubrey]

press space, dude

[benythebot]

hey. any x3 veterans that can help me?

So i was about to transfer the best buy, and best sell finder thingyes to my mercury just as a squadron of argon fighters flyes by and blow the best sell thingy to oblivion... any ideas where i can find a new one? ^^

later the autopilot managed to bump my mercury into a asteroid. no matter how much i've searched i cant find a way to fix it. annoying...

[jjoshaugh]

As far as I remember you can buy them at Teladi Equipment docks and at Terracorp HQ in home of light. Maybe at pirate stations too.

Check the Egosoft forums for autopilot questions. As far as I know its a problem with SETA. If everything is sped up the computer cant handle the calculations necessary to avoid asteroids. It can also ram you into stations! :s Thankfully its just an occasional problem and can be avoided by slowboating though heavy asteroid ed areas.

[Treelor]

I would say the best way to fight in X3 is with your mouse - not your joystick. With the mouse, your other hand is free to use WASD and strafe out of the way of incoming fire. Of course, you could do this with a joystick too, but the mouse allows far more finesse with aiming.

[gavinhas1]

I was like "OMG, where is the music from? It makes me feel all nostalgic... Dark Reign 2!"

*reinstalls*

[franzferdinandable]

hmmm i think i preffer x3reunion.. its more thik.. in TC there is to much fighting... and every station protecting mission i need to take down a corrvet damn.... now im expert in taking them down... cerberus watch yourself :)

[jjoshaugh]

I agree with you to a certain extent. I stopped playing X:TC as there seemed little point in building a factory trading empire, and there were little annoyances, which made me think it was a good idea to go back to it in a year or so when the community has had a chance to thrash it to bits with mods.

Seems like a good time to try it now then :D

Thanks for the comment mate :)

[Altair565]

Do you still have to make billions of credits before you can get a decent combat ship in this game? Becase i played X2 The Threat and man... i just can't describe it, things were so fucking expensive... T_T

[jjoshaugh]

Depends what you want to do. The Pirate Buster is probably the best M4 in the game and you get it by capturing it. Yeah it can take a few days to get to the M3s. But thee are free ship scattered about in space that can really get you a nice pile of cash if you hunt them down/look up where they are on the net.

[LordNiper]

Gegen 5-6 Nova zu fighten ist kein Ding, auch gegen 20 nicht sofern du genug Laderaum für Raketen hast :D

Scripte die KI mal auf ne anständige Feuer/Trefferrate und du wirst sehen das du viel zu wenig Ausweichmanöver fliegst... Für den Anfang nicht schlecht, aber wenn du mit nem M4 Jäger nen M2 Zerstörer mit sauguten Turretscripts schreddern willst und dabei 10-15 M3 und 20-30 kleinere Schiffe im Nacken hattest weisste erst was Dogfight wirklich heisst ;) - Raketensperrfeuer FTW :P

[Diatomus]

But I wan't to notice that fighting several Novas and other m3's is nothing special to me. The thing to fear is Ion's which sometimes Novas have and those badass rings (sorry, haven't played for a while lol), though rings are not as bad as Ion's. Well, sudden rockets are troublesome too sometimes lol.

However had to dump this game as it lagged ridiculously in big sectors, or with m1/2 fighting :(

[Diatomus]

I did this "dogfighting", as it's called for some reason here, too, and on Boron Mako as well, because no matter how big your shields are, if you can't avoid, you will eventually die while fighting several ships.

[Abendmahl23]

das is der preis wenn man jahre nur wow zockt, man kann keine anderen spiele mehr bedienen^^

[jjoshaugh]

Danke :)

[Abendmahl23]

mich würde ja mal interessieren, wie man dieses spiel zu spielen lernt. komme gar nicht klar, weiss nicht was ich machen soll und vor allem wie, die anleitung und tutorial sind miess.

[Wolfsblut51015]

ja alpha ISE sind die besten laser zum Kapern von Schiffen (nova) da macht man schnell und flott ein paar schiffe von den Piraten klar ;D

[Epictutorialstudios]

meh just downloaded this game off usenet.

i had it working on vista but did not know how to play a while back, desided to re-download it.

[jimmybloodyjimmy]

bought this game, but vista wont let me play it!!! feel like screaming lol, does anyone know how i can work it on vista?

[jjoshaugh]

No, but if you register at the Egosoft forums and ask questions there they should be able to help you.

[gun844]

yee buy a windows prof.that work better.Vista is shitty.

[Kenjineering]

This is the only game that I own in which I can study for uni whilst playing ahhaha.

[talveer2]

Man this game is hard.

[zerst0rung]

Aw man, Dr2 had such awesome soundtracks as well as great gameplay. I remember a while back when i found out how to get that editor working but had no idea how to use it XD. gotta see if i can find these music tracks for download agian.

[trashcrate]

First heard this song in Dark Reign 2 and ever since I've heard it popping up in games and on vids like this, does it have a name?

[jjoshaugh]

That's where I got it too. I really dont know if it has a name, its probably just a custom piece for that game. The latin they chant is "Agnus Dei" or Lamb of God if that's any help.

[trashcrate]

Cheers mate.

[Neccrow84]

IRE is really accuracy However it takes a long time to taking down M5 and M4 ships. Dont even thinking about use IRE to taking down M3 fighters.

If you taking long time to kill enemy ships other enemy is easy to targeting you and lock you on behind. Fast kill and Fast evade is life saving for dogfighting skill.

If you take M3+ class fighter like Example 'Eclips' i usually setting up 8HEPT and turret for bPAC. it awsome to taking down a lot of enemies in short time

[Neccrow84]

Try to use bPAC i dont know the class of mako Mako is M4 i think. Do not use APBE becuase it takes so much energy

[punica456]

Is it possible to become a real pirate in X3 Reunion? I mean, can you improve your pirate reputation?

What race is a good "victim-race" or do you attack everybody?

[XkohanX]

how do you move so fast forward, when i press "z" its like im not even moving

[jjoshaugh]

You sure you have Z as accelerate?

The Mako is quite a fast ship, but you also have to remember that a lot of the time the enemies were flying towards me and our speeds combined in my view.

[juledude124]

is there a way to land in this game? i mean how do you buy ships and stuff like this?

[reka10]

you got a joystic? O.O

i hated using those

[jjoshaugh]

Um.. I'm not sure what you mean... Oh you mean you can see the nose of my fighter in front of me? Yeah the Buster has the cockpit right in the front if the fighter. Pretty much every other ship though has the view point more to the rear so you can see the fighter nose in front of you. It still irritates me when I think about it.

I guess you could fly X3 freelancer style if you moved the camera a little, but its not designed that way

[humandefense]

How do you compare this with freelancer? I want to play this game but I played the demo and freelancer is easy piece of cake compared to x3. Also is a joystick really required to play well? Cause that was one good thing about freelancer I could play fine without it. This game from the demo seems really amazing but I don't get the controls when you are docked like I don't get how to switch ships and stuff.

[Selvec]

Not to mention cockpit few is achived via and optional mod pack. It's not included by default in X3: Reunion, and on older computers it may reduce FPS by a lot.

[Grynn89]

I have anyway now my M7 and im cleaning the Xenonsectors up now =D

[FTS0892]

this game looks fuckin awesome!

are there more views like cockpit view or only this camera view? *****

[jjoshaugh]

Yeah basically this is the default view, though you can have an over the shoulder view if you want, and there are various camera angles you can view your ship. Thee is now real "cockpit" view, though I believe there is a mod to give you one.

[FTS0892]

thx ALOT men i decided to buy the reason why ii didnt buy so far is cause soemone tell me this is strategy lol..nice video btw

[ArchAngel379]

Damn, you are really good at strafing. Good job.

[jjoshaugh]

Thank you. As I say I was a little out of practice and had a faulty joystick to contend with, so anyone can do the same.

Anyway glad you enjoyed the vid mate. :)

[Grynn89]

Nice vid and the music fit's very well to that game. Ur tactic's are even good but i think.... im am still using the "Split strategy" (attacktheenemywithallweaponst­illhesdead)^^

I have sometime's problem's to defead a M3 Nova (Pirate) with a Buster cuz their backweaponslot is really annoying.

[jjoshaugh]

Well the second half of this vid is for you, because I do exactly that. The real trick is not to get too close as that back turret will fire its bolds right into you before you dodge if you do.

[Saiien3]

Good movie!BTW is the music from EVE online?Cuz they all use it in games like this.

[jjoshaugh]

Thank you for the comment! No, the music is from an old game called "Dark Reign 2." I know Eve's Music and some of it is very good, but I've always loved that piece from DR2. I sometimes dig out the old CD and have a listen. The other song is by Sarah Brightman.

[blacksheepwall79]

Do you have any M4 tactics for use against M3's with PSG's? Novas with PSG's are extremely difficult to take out. Usually I strafe heavily to one side and turn at an almost 45degree angle on approach, to minimize the PSG shield damage. But that requires TONS of patience. Sometimes I just load up whatever missile I have and throw it.

[jjoshaugh]

I've never really had many problems with PSG ships to be honest. I generally whiz around taking out the rest of the ships. The PSG doesn't do a lot of shield damage to an M4 as you are a small target so it washes over you really fast. Once the escorts are down you can hammer away at it. Besides you have the speed advantage as Pirate Novas are slowboats, if your shields are getting low move away for a minute and let them come back. Basically don't slow down keep running at full speed.

[jjoshaugh]

Its probably the one time strafing is not advisable as if keeps you in the psg cloud longer.

I think people get so fixated on the PSG that it effects their flying Remember that taking a Nova on an M4 is difficult anyway. Just dive through it as normal and if you need to recharge go for it.

Dunno if that helps at all :)

[blacksheepwall79]

I use the Scorpion Raider, so the shields are basically paper. Not too bad though. Thanks for the response.

[blacksheepwall79]

You're pretty good, I use Keyboard and mouse, I also use the Mako Raider for my M4. 2xBIREs and 4xBPACS. I use the BIRES against light fighters, And I swap in two of the PACS against mediums, then I switch to only 4xPACS against heavies. Waiting on the recharge is a pain, but you can tear some stuff up.

[markcainz]

Good hunt, I´m starting in the game, it´s a amazing game, but the economic system is very complex, and the simulator is most easy than air combat simulator, in this I don´t suffering the gravite.

[jjoshaugh]

All I can say is that take everything in bite sized chunks. It can be daunting but it generally falls into place fairly quickly.

Anyway thank you and glad you enjoyed the vid.

[jacci08]

Is it possible to get friends (NPC`s) on your side fighting?

[jjoshaugh]

Yes if you capture or buy ships you can have them protecting you or assign them as your wingmen and give them direct commands.

[jacci08]

Ok, thanks.

[Nuotykis]

Cool, i will try to get my hands on one of those pirate busters. I tend to use 6 ray emiters (from terracorp HQ), they don't use alot of energy, pretty good for me, good dogfighting (not against nova's, lol)

[Nuotykis]

Damn, are you here exterminating a pirate sector? So many good and expensive ships destroyed... Lol, i don't really know if pirate busters are that worth the capturing, since im a noob on X3, it's kewl anyway, most of the time i trade, my shitty buster can't handle Xeon and pirates, you know?

[jjoshaugh]

Pirate busters are pretty good. They have more weapon energy than some heavy fighters and are faster than the buster with more cargo space. I tended to use 2 APAC and 4 BIRE on my pirate buster.

[JamaicanMan18]

i havent been in a dog fight for months.. like fighter on fighter.

if i ever go into a pirate sector, its never with less than my hyperion, if i had to i would take an m3+, an eclipse for sure. but usually i take either my hyperion, one of my two carriers, or one of my 5 destroyers.

[jjoshaugh]

No reason why you cant get into a fighter for a change even if you have an entire fleet. I personally think its some of the best fun the game offers.

[xuerebx]

very nicely done! 5 stars

[sonofhendrix]

very good!

[jjoshaugh]

Thank you. I'm glad you enjoyed it.