Yo

[ThisTree4Real]

What's up guys? I've technically been playing orbiter for a while, though with enough gaps in between to make me learn only very little about the mechanics and acquire barely passable skills. However, this term at school is going to be more relaxed so I figured I'd get myself a relatively cheap joystick and try out some flight/space sims. Specifically the free ones. As in the ones that don't cost any money.

I've been a huge follower of the space program for a several years and I'm kind of excited to get to try out some of the missions that may (or may not occur, depending on our highly scientific Congress with it's proven resolve and foresight ) occur in the coming years. Kinda like a teaser trailer for the future of spaceflight.

Anyway, like I said I'm very poor at this sim as of yet, but I'll have at least a few months of relatively relaxed schedule, so I'll try to be active and read-up as much as I can.

I'm mostly excited about the new version of Go Play in Space that I've read about, (while I was creeping around the forums, obviously :embarrassed since the lunar flight from KSC to Brighton Beach described therein was the first tutorial that I actually successfully completed. By "successfully" I of course mean smashing into the moon about 100km off target, with just barely enough fuel to limp over to Brighton. At least I got the correct celestial body right?

Anyway, look forward to checking out the addons and tutorials at the this fantastic site.

-Dave O. (ThisTree4Real)

 

[RisingFury]

Welcome to the forum!

Orbiter supports a wide range of addons, realistic and fictional. You can fly the Apollo missions to the Moon or take a cruise around the solar system in an Arrow freighter. You can find pretty much all addons on www.orbithangar.com and I suggest you look through the recommended addons (Cummunity tab above -> Recommended addons).

Don't forget to read the Orbiter manual and the Go play in space tutorial

 

[Carmen A]

Hi Dave, welcome to the new Orbiter - if you're bored with calculating interplanetary trajectories you can always try

and [ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f9q2-tL-KqU"]multiplayer dogfights[/ame] Orbiter many years ago wasn't this fun to pick up and get addicted to!

(I'd rather launch huge space stations than play Fallout 3 now).

 

[Tex]

Hi Dave, welcome to the community!

As RisingFury kindly linked you to places to get some cool addons above, I'll just point you to our tutorials section I'm guessing you may have already found, but just in case! I have also made some video tutorials myself which you may find useful, linked both on the tutorials page and in my signature below.

Happy Orbiting!

 

[River Crab]

Are you for real? :lol:

Anyway, to the forums, and have fun! Happy Orbiting!

 

[Rtyh-12]

to the forums! Carmen A is right, our most recent important add-on is Orbiter Multiplayer! I need to download and play it, see you there! (and on the forums!)

 

[Tycho]

Welcome aboard!

 

[ThisTree4Real]

Thanks for the welcome guys. Yes I am aware of the existence of Orbiter Multiplayer and am itching to try it out, but in all honesty all I would do is prove how terrible my skills at this sim are as of yet. I've managed to relearn a bit about getting into orbit in the past couple of days and I'm hopping to try an ISS flight soon, but until I can get a successful docking SOMEwhere, I'd rather not humiliate myself in front of people who actually know what they're doing.

Quick question: There's basically two ships in "vanilla" orbiter 2010 capable of atmospheric flight, the Delta Glider and the Shuttle Atlantis. That's like going from crawling straight to sprinting as the stock DG is almost too easy to fly but the space shuttle's a bear. What might be a good intermediate ship that I could try out?

 

[Carmen A]

I went into multiplayer only knowing how to operate thrust vector and other 'interesting' controls and my first successful orbital launch was also in multiplayer

It's very easy when you can have a navigator (hire one ) and let him coordinate the ascent profile. Following gliders in a huge XR5 is fun!

As far as ships are concerned you can get some very nice spaceplanes here, and these are my preferred craft for both atmospheric and orbital training use (for non historical scenarios).

http://www.dougsorbiterpage.com/

While some say the XR2 is not the most maneuverable ship on the planet, you can use the engine thrust for some incredible post-stall supermaneuverability action

 

[orb]

There's basically two ships in "vanilla" orbiter 2010 capable of atmospheric flight, the Delta Glider and the Shuttle Atlantis.

There is also Shuttle PB capable of it, but it's rather a demonstration of a basic vessel, and it's even easier to fly it than Delta Glider.

 

[PeterRoss]

Quick question: There's basically two ships in "vanilla" orbiter 2010 capable of atmospheric flight, the Delta Glider and the Shuttle Atlantis. That's like going from crawling straight to sprinting as the stock DG is almost too easy to fly but the space shuttle's a bear. What might be a good intermediate ship that I could try out?

You should try XR fleet which you can download from the site pointed by Carmen A, also you may download DeltagliderIV-2 from here: http://orbiter.dansteph.com/index.php?disp=d
These vessels may look like the stock Deltaglider (especially XR-1 and DGIV-2), but you'll find it quite a challenge to fly with all these advanced damage models and complex internal systems control.