Elite: Dangerous PvE - Mobius

LionOfNarnia wrote:A docking computer, in a Python?
Words fail me!

Well it's a trading Python isn't it? And traiding is much better with DC
If you pluck it out you can get another 4 tonnes cargo

P.S. I understood background of your Python's name just yet

Try making a 'polar approach' to planets then planing out to the station orbit from maybe half a tick away. Works every time. I set up my approach as soon as I drop from interstellar jump, so I fly around 200 ticks below (or above) the ecliptic (orbital plane) of the target planet & start curving in towards the pole from about 120 ticks out. Doing this means it doesn't matter which side of the planet the station is on, you always get a high-efficiency approach with minimum hassle from the gravity well of the planet. Bonus from this is it keeps you off the 'straight line' approach that pirates like to frequent

Spare slots? What are those???

LionOfNarnia wrote:Try making a 'polar approach' to planets then planing out to the station orbit from maybe half a tick away. Works every time. I set up my approach as soon as I drop from interstellar jump, so I fly around 200 ticks below (or above) the ecliptic (orbital plane) of the target planet & start curving in towards the pole from about 120 ticks out. Doing this means it doesn't matter which side of the planet the station is on, you always get a high-efficiency approach with minimum hassle from the gravity well of the planet. Bonus from this is it keeps you off the 'straight line' approach that pirates like to frequent

Spare slots? What are those???

What are the chances of getting you to post a video of your station approach method?

I have pretty good luck getting close to dropping in on the mail slot side (give or take 90*) but would be interested in seeing your method. I can't seem to wrap my head around your explanation. Maybe it's old age, or maybe it's because I'm preoccupied with watching my download progress bar for Horizons.

Yeah, I'll try. Gimme a couple of days?

It's always that "give-or-take 90*" you mention, I've experimented enough to prove that your 're-emergence' is on one face of a 'virtual cube' (probably a more complex geometry, but let 'cube' suffice huh?) surrounding the station, dependant on your approach vector. WHERE on the face seems to have no correlation to the accuracy or velocity of the approach, nor does the 'drop' distance (tested from 997Km down to 231Km) so it's probably an RNG mapping to an 8x8 (guess) grid on the face.

In any case, you can see the slot right away, aim the nose for a point 3km in front of the axis, hit the booster, go to systems & set up to trigger permission to land at 7.49Km, then as soon as the distance-to-target slows right down or stops - turn to the target marker & Voila! Lined up on the slot

What would you folks recommend for a good loadout for a trading Python?

OK, as promised above, here's a wee video of my 'polar approach' method of getting from a sun to a station.

Disclaimer:-
This is actually my first 'warm-up' attempt at the vid, I shot what would have been a far better version (like saying 'ticks' instead of 'clicks' *facepalm*) but for some reason I haven't fathomed out yet, all the subsequent attempts had to be deleted coz the audio was just an annoying discordant tone

https://youtu.be/j0yDH3CZg7M

That is exactly how I have been doing approaches to stations for a hell of a long time. Saw it in a video a long time ago and been doing it all the same.

Although sometimes when I am being hounded and chased I aim for the back of the Obris stations. Coriolis I still try to get to the front of the station.

Good video explanation for anyone that doesn't know the best way to approach it. Thanks Lion.

Good video! My approach is usually about 50% accurate to get a straight into letterbox drop - I'd read about the approach and best converted it to my attempts - I shall take what I have learned here and see if I can achieve 100% like mr lion!

Thanks for posting the video, Lion. I've been using a very similar approach method.

'Great minds think alike'?

...Or 'Fools seldom differ'?

I've tweaked the 'landing permission' macro since then too - now twice as fast!