You're aware that u can set a waypoint to a destination, dude, and ya ship will head towards that? Will even navigate ok in a debris field?

I LOVE being a freighter pilot. I like to load up all my best weapons on my rear firing turrets, as that's where I see the most action, in my rearward firing arc. Countermeasures and a Minedropper are essential.

I've mapped my "Turret View" key to an easily accesible location. When u get jumped, lock in ya autopilot to the nearest trade lane, swap to turret mmode, and start blasting at the bad guys behind you. I like to keep switching to the nearest target, as my turrets are usually quitepowerful but have a short range. If the opportunity presents itself whjere you need to manuever, flick back to normal mode and go from there.

Generally turrets are for defensive purposes only. Most of the time I just run

You could try the inertia trick that I learned on this forum: go to cruise then press Z (default) to shut down your engines, now you can fire at cruise speed. Although you will eventually slow down. Use AB to boost but not until the speed drops below 200.

Also go into turret mouse flight should help (press h then space). I don't even bother with targeting, just shoot the red dot indicating the lead on each enemy ship.

in my brief experience, I've only used turret mode when I wasn't in control of my ship.

And in combat, I generally like to be in control of my ship, because it helps keep bad guys from shooting me

So that leaves only times when I'm in formation, or waiting to dock at a base / jump gate (which is a pretty brief window).

And once or twice I have been able to get a kill on a criminal ship in the 8 or so seconds it took to line of for the jump gate, with lucky use of mines and rear-firing turrets.

Course, i was hoping turrets would autofire (even if poorly) when I first got them, too.

The good news is that most turrets tend to face forward, so you can dogfight with them pretty well.

ER

Turret mode sucks. Traveling in a straight line = very easy target. If you are trying to escape your time would be better spent juking a bit, shooting at them won't make them go away and will make you an even bigger target.

-Stregone

Maybe someone could come out with a patch/mod that will make all turrets auto fire at nearest enemy.. It would be really neat...

Sounds like the biggest consensus here is that there needs to be a patch (or a few patches...) Anyone care to hazzard a guess at how we can promote a unified patch with certain things we all can agree upon? I think auto-turrets would have to be a must, along with some of the other great suggestions in other posts.... Perhaps we could get the ball rolling towards Microsoft?

Just a thought... Carry on with the turret discussions

"'When you go out your door, it is like seeing an enemy.' Since you are a professional warrior, you should never forget the spirit of combat at any time. A warrior who does not put the spirit of combat into his heart is nothing but a merchant wearing the skin of a warrior." - from Bushido Shoshinsu

If you check the weapon_equip.ini file you will notice that every weapon has a auto_turret = flase option. I haven't tried changing it to true yet to see if the turret will automatically fire at nearest opponents. you might wanna give it a try.

I've had some trouble flying the freighters myself. I tried out a clydesdale in the SP but the Molly's just tore me up right away when I was trying to just fly away from them in turret mode. However, I'm not entirely convinced that auto turrets would be the answer.

Really, freighters were meant to haul crap from point A to B, not get into fast dogfights with tons of light fighters and expect not to get eaten up. But, they put so many turrets on those things that one is really tempted to go out and pick a fight. I just think that flying a freighter means you gotta deal with the fact that it handles like a pig and it's damn hard to dogfight with. There's probably some really good means by which to use turret mode and dogfight successfully, just, no one has really come forward, to my knowledge, with the real inside info on this style of flying.

Next time I get a freighter (I'm in Kusari space now so I might to earn up my level then go back to a heavy fighter), I think I'm going to really put some time into learning how to fly a freighter successfully in a fight. I'm thinking that it would probably be a bad idea just to go straight through the enemies and sit in turret mode. At least, that's what I've learned from experience. I'm thinking that just when you're doing swoops past the enemies, just to get in the extra couple of shots, you could switch to turret mode, use the strafe buttons to avoid a little fire and then, after the pass and extra hits, switch back to mouse flight to turn yourself around and dodge.

But, like I said, it's just darn difficult to make a large freighter do well against really nimble fighters. I think auto turrets would just imbalance the game and make them the super ships people always crave but ruin the game. Right now, barring a really good guide to dogfighting with a freighter, I'd say use them and travel with a convoy if you're not sure on your abilities. Or, use them online with buddies watching your back.

I've spent most of my time in freighters, and there's a few things I've learned about turrets.
1.) Know your freighter. The bigger it is, the more important it's turrets become. Not because they turrets become more powerful, but because the ships become less manueverable. The Rhino is manueverable enough that you can chase a light fighter and do a half-descent job of keeping it targeted. A Humpback doesn't stand a chance of keeping up - even against a Rhino.
2.) If you are greatly out-numbered, stick to flight-mode, not turret-mode. If you're trying to chase down an opponent, it makes you much harder to hit. Keep rule #1 in mind, however. If you can't get a target to shoot at, there's no sense just flying around getting shot at - use turrets.
3.) Never fight unless you have to, or you're certain of victory. Obviously this doesn't apply if you're taking combat missions. If your trade lane gets disrupted, target the waypoint and hit F2. Then switch to turret mode until the cruise engine kicks in.
4.) If the enemy is using cruise disruptors, fight or flight, it's your call. I've had about equally dismal success rates with either one. If you're stuck with a big freighter, chances are you're screwed. Heavy fighters carry cruise disruptors, meaning they can take the hits and punish you. Since you can't maneuver with them, you're stuck going in a nice, easily targetable, straight line while in turret mode.
5.) Just because you're in turret mode doesn't mean you're dead in the water. You can speed up and slow down to confuse targeting. You can also strafe left and right. If you're strafing one direction, be careful about suddenly switching to the other direction. You might strafe back into incoming fire.
6.) Slow down to about half speed if you plan on sticking around and using turrets. This gives you a little defense and keeps fighters from sitting on your tail. Fighters don't like to slow down. That means they'll keep overshooting you. When they do, they're no longer shooting at you - AND they're placing themselves in your powerful forward arc. If you're going full speed, then you're placing yourself in their forward arc 100% of the time while they chase you.
7.) If you want to practice turret combat, stick to the New York system. Your opponents are at their weakest there. You might take difficulty 1 combat missions to help insure your safety.

As powerful as the freighters might seem when looking at the numbers, expecting them to perform well in combat is a pipe dream. They're big, easy targets, that can only bring a few guns to bear on an opponent at any one time. They're lethal against any opponent who gets in front of them, but that is a rare and treasured moment...often missed by the suprised and excited freighter pilot who can't believe his dumb luck.

Edited by - Ether Dragon on 10-03-2003 23:17:03

drop counter measures while your cruise engines are charging. Works most of the time. Just tap the button every second.

-Stregone