- This game is the beezneez. Thanks again for the primer guys, saved me a couple aborted games I bet. Ill be back after I save the universe. I must say though, NOT ONE HITCHHIKERS GUIDE JOKE YET??? Theres gotta be one coming up... the petunias Ive seen on some planets do not count, as they were bowl-less.

I was flying when fwippo blew up.  Mainly b/c I coulndt tell which way he was facing. A targetting reticle about an inch out from the ship would rule, a la Crusader No Remorse.  In general, thanks for the replies. As I said - !!!VIBRANT COMMUNITY!!! - I look forward to impending atomization at the hands of you fine folks once I get a grip on the combat part of the game and wade into the IRC scene. BIG thanks for the map tip, just printed a high res one out for the scrapbook.

Peace - Havanaradio

VIBRANT COMMUNITY YOU HAVE HERE!
Somehow I missed this game back in the 90s, but its shaping up to be as good as XCOM, makes me wonder what else i missed...  I have played for about 5 hours, allied with the ZFP, killed a shofixti (oops), and established trade with the capitalist pigdog Melnorme. I bought a lot of info and up to just before the gun tracking mod in improvements. I have an Ion cannon(the 2nd gun you get) with 3 Generators (please forgive improper nomenclature but im not going to flip furiously through the wiki every time i forget the exact name of the somo-flange or whatever), 4 Crew quarters', 2 tanks, full thrusters/jets, 2 cruisers, and ample trunk space. SO -

1 - the Cruiser is totally worthless right? I cant even beat the probes with it, which i take to be the standard of spaceworthiness.

2 - i seem to be a rockstar in the exploration and zoological parts of the game, but when it comes to the probes and UrQuan in combat i am facing what i consider to be steep losses. (these are with the mothership, I have given up on the cruiser) - probly 25% of the time the probe ends up on top of me and kills me. I feel like a retard when this happens. 50 % of the time i get away from it, but suffer maybe 40 casualties due to its dodginess. The rest of the time i hit it 3 times right away and blow it up. Is this normal? should i be using the only other ship that was available to me, the eluder? Mine died a cowards death early on. These things seem ridiculously hard to me is what i'm saying.

3 - Against the UrQuan i usually lose 50. Again, how am i placing on the old learning curve?

4 - I am being super thorough in exploration (not harvesting from 6+ hazards nor harvesting common or corrosive ores), but the going is kinda slow. Is this the kinda game where such a strategy is ultimately futile, but necessary for you to know what to skip the second time through? I hate that.

5 - AIM - I can compete pretty well with the cpu on medium in melee mode, but im having aiming problems a lot. I think im an above average arcader, but is the cpu just always gonna out-arcade me? also, im using a gravis pad, is keyboard better? other options?

6 - EVASION - The success I have had seems to come from me running away form the enemy and letting him run out of energy by barely missing me. Then i can miss 5 times and hit once and its worth it cos he wont slaughter me. I feel the presence of the Dark Side when I string out cpu opponents until the AI breaks down... should I?

7 - Rank in importance - *Finding Allies - *Melnorme Goodies - *defeating neighboring thrall species - ****GOOOOOOLLD!**** - *Questing for far off relics and wormholes and things the Melnorme tell you about. - *other.

thats it for now, i may edit. thanks for the time - PLEASE DONT TOTALLY SPOIL THE PLOT! - i know it seems like im asking for it, but cmon.