Tim Paul

Elite Dangerous Tips

Power management #

Modules use power. Your ship has a total power capacity, determined by your power generator module. Bigger and better modules use more power.

You can manually turn modules off to conserve power. So if you’re trying to max jump range you could get a lightweight, underpowered power generator and manually manage power distribution.

If you exceed your power capacity then modules will start to disable, starting with those in priority group 5, then 4 etc. Deploying hard points increases power consumption.

Engineering #

Dotted around populated space are ‘Engineers’; individuals who can pimp out the modules of your ship for you. You have to unlock each one. The first one, Felicity Farseer, will email you after you’ve travelled a certain distance.

Unlock tree

To pimp out your modules, Engineers need materials. Materials are like a whole separate category of thing to your usual ship cargo. They don’t take up cargo space and you keep them if you die. There are loads of ways to get them, depending on what they are. For example you can check a planets mineral composition from the system screen, then fly down to it and go mineral hunting in the buggy (SRV).

It can be pretty fiddly to find what you need. One option is to get a load of high value materials from a reliable source, then ‘trade down’ at a material traders to get the ones you need. You can find your nearest material trader on the INRA website. Note, you can only trade for other mats of the same type - eg. raw, manufactured, data or alien.

Where to get high value mats:

If you engage in the Powerplay system you'll be given 'care packages' whenever you progress about 5 ranks - these often include lots of materials.

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Pre-engineered SCO FSD #

An awesome pre-engineered warp drive.
Sometimes called the PESCO drive.

You will need:

Tips:

Mass Manager #

An experimental mod for the PESCO drive.
You will need:

Supercruise overdrive (SCO) #

Finding things in the SRV #

Find things with the scanner. It’s that weird sonar thing above the usual circular scanner. Distant signals are all smooshed out. They get narrower and stronger as they get closer. Natural resources have a signature in the bottom quarter of the scanner.

Combat #

Combat is HARD! But you can make it easier:

Escaping interdiction #

To effectively escape an hostile encounter:

  1. Submit to the interdiction
  2. Put 4 pips into Engines (ENG) and Boost away
  3. While boosting, select a new star system from your Nav panel and initiate the jump.
  4. Turn your ship to align with the jump target just before the FSD completes charging to execute the jump.

Prioritise Speed & Shields

Ships #

Modules #

For the best prices on modules, look for systems controlled by Li Yong-Rui, which offer a 15% discount on ships and modules. High-tech economies generally have the best inventory.

Good systems for buying modules:

Upgrading suits and guns #

The materials you need for upgrading suits and guns can only be gotten from ground-based missions. I tried the ground-based training mission and got my ass handed to me - partly because my Mac just can't handle ground bases in 4k (and partly because I am crap at shooty shooty).

Luckily, the supply stores in stations sometimes offer pre-engineered and levelled up suits for sale! Once a person buys them though, they are GONE. So you have to be fast and lucky, or you have to check this thread, where lovely people post tip-offs about the location of suits and guns they don't need themselves.

Stores are restocked on Thursday mornings, some time after 7am UTC - so be ready.

Playstyles #

Exploration #

Best ships #

Kit #

Exploration data can be sold as long as you’re 20ly from where you got it. It doesn’t go up the further you go, so don’t worry about that.

https://edastro.com/mapcharts/galaxy.html

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Nebula to visit: CD-26 1339, Eskimo, Fine ring, Messier 78, Bubble, Heart, Soul, Veil, Spirograph, Hind, LBN 623, Trapezium Sector, Sade, North American, Pelican, Elephants Trunk.

Nebula to avoid: (unless you like Thargoids) Pleiades, Witch Head, Coalsack, California, Orion, Barnards Loop.

Exobiology #

You'll need an Artemis suit.

If it's a blue zone with Frutexa, but there's no mountains nearby, you can look until you're grey and won't find it. Same with Osseus. Many plants only/mostly grow on mountains.

Osseus usually grows on rocky formations, on hills maximum, but they usually not located on mountains -on sides of mountains yes. But that is rarer.

Some biologicals for example prefer hard soil (according to the Codex), which means you will only find them on top of mountains.

Others prefer frozen lakes. Others prefer volcanic soil.

Mining #

Best ships #

Politics #

3 Superpowers; Federation, Empire and Alliance.
There are thousands of smaller factions.
Some are aligned with powers or superpowers.
A majority of systems are independent though.

Powerplay #

It’s a chance to get involved in galactic politics. Basically, there are about 12 competing powers (and thousands of smaller ones). You can align to one of them and then do stuff to support them. The more you do, the more benefits you get. You can shore up established systems, or destabilise rival ones within your chosen powers sphere of influence. There are weekly cycles, at the end of which systems may change hands, depending on what’s been going on.

To initial join a power you need to do five specific missions. It's totally worth it, especially early game. You get good credits and also materials, and different powers give different bonuses. I went with Li Yong-Rui, 'cos he gives good discounts on ships and payouts for exploration data.

Crime #

If you do an illegal you will get a fine in the system where you did it. You can pay it off in that system.

If you do a violent illegal you will have a bounty put on you, so people will want to kill you. It'll be worse in places controlled by the faction who controlled the place where you did the crime.

If you pay off a bounty in a system aligned with the faction you did the crime in you’ll be taken miles away to a prison ship.

Unless you pay it off in an anarchy system.

Bounties and fines never expire. Bounties are attached to ships, so you can have a ‘crime’ ship to do illegals.

Use an interstellar factor to pay off a bounty in a non-bounty faction system

Smuggling #

You need to get your heat below 20%. Enter a station on silent running (you’ll have no shields). Turn things off.

Do it fast - try to align with the mail slot whilst in supercruise. Ideally fly in manually at 2-300 m/s then hit x to stop and auto dock. Once you’re in the station you are safe.

Use a heat sink to break an active scan.

Authority scans are more likely in high security systems.

Smuggling to star ports is safer than outposts or planets.

Tips #

If you lose all your shields you can put all your pips into SYS and do a reboot and it’ll give you 50% back. Just make sure you’re somewhere nothing can get you.

Supercruise assist is slower than it needs to be, so only use it once your ETA is 4-7 seconds.

Pioneer Supplies in stations has pre-engineered gear.

Heat sinks or silent running masks the heat of your ship, which means people can’t scan you. So you can evade detection in combat or when landing. Silent running increase your temperature though.

Plugins #

Meta gaming #

Elite is complicated and opaque. It leaves you figure out a bunch of stuff.

A key challenge in Elite is FINDING stuff. Finding that earth-like planet, that rare resource, that material trader, can be a real effort. There are always clues to follow, things that increase the likelihood that a system or planet has what you need. But beyond that you just need to go there and start looking. Which can be fun or infuriating, depending on your mindset. It’s also not very realistic - spacefaring humans would obviously have a website that told you where all the stuff was. And actually those websites exist, made by fans who’ve hacked the elite API. So is it cheating to use them? Honestly, I think they can be treated as a canon in-game resource at this stage. Grindy farming of mats does break the roleplay element, but wasting hours NOT finding that one material you need is also not fun.

Useful websites #

Tim Paul