Bring back the down arrow to turn the ship around.

[xobes]

Is there an existing issue for this?

• I have searched the existing issues

Describe the bug

Down arrow does not turn my ship around.

Steps to Reproduce

Get in your shuttle, depart, go forward ... hit the down arrow to whip around so you can stop. Fail.

Expected Behavior

hit the down arrow to whip around

Screenshots

No response

Link to save file

No response

Operating System

All

Game Source

Other (please describe)

Game Version

0e3faf2

Additional Information

No response

[TheGiraffe3]

This is because of the reverse thrust integrated into your Shuttle's forward thrusters.

[xobes]

Yeah. I don't want that, though.

[xobes]

What I'm getting at is myriad:

• I cannot slow down as quickly with the pathetic reverse thrust provided by default
• I disagree with the concept that forward thrusters inherently provide reverse thrust
  • If you insist that there be reverse thrusters all the time, then I don't know how to make it work sensibly

In the case of the Star Barge, it's more convenient to continue at full speed, flip around, and then stop. The down arrow conveniently oriented my ship 180° to the current motion vector and allowed me to flip a 180 without thought.

I use all the time and prefer not to have reverse thrusters if I can get a ship with a good turn radius.

Yes, I understand reverse thrust gives a bit more control of forward speed while retaining orientation on a target with forward guns. But even then, only if your target is directly in your path. This is why turrets are a thing.

If the thrusters are always applied based on the ships orientation (0 and 180) then reverse thrust is only useful if your orientation has not changed relative to your motion. The only button that allowed for automatic alignment of the ship relative to motion was the down arrow (aimed at 180° to motion). Now no button aligns orientation with motion.

[Zitchas]

Thanks for your feedback, it is appreciated.

Delta is currently experimenting with significantly increased mobility controls. Whereas upstream basically only has "forward" and "turn" (and, once in a while, on a few rare ships, "reverse"); Delta has forwards, reverse, left, right, and turn. Due to experimental nature (and the lack of artists to produce artwork on demand) it was decided to have lateral and later reverse thrust as a built-in part of the main thrusters. After all, full control like this isn't just a luxury, it's effectively a requirement for travel in space.

Admittedly, this has caused some problems with the AI as well as with the "point directly opposite my trajectory" use of the reverse key. We're working on them, but there's effectively two people actively coding on this (with a couple more that offer excellent advice but don't directly do PRs), so it may take some time to resolve.

There's also the triple problem of not having enough reverse thrusters to properly calibrate them for the size of ship; not wanting to significantly increase the amount of outfit space on ships, and not having a graphic artist on-hand to create imagery for all the new reverse thrusters that would be necessary.

So basically, the imposed reverse & lateral thrust was an initial step to start experimentation and work with a more diverse motion repertoire; but it isn't necessarily the endpoint. The more player control, the better.

Probably the ideal solution is going to be multi-pronged, including:

• Ability to use modifier keys within keys for commands.
• Splitting "reverse" and "against momentum" as two separate commands.
  These two things would allow people to, for instance, have "s" as reverse thrust, and ctr-s as "spin around to point opposite momentum". Or vice versa.

In the interim, the following would be useful for players, and long-term useful for the AI:

• Smarter decision making as to when to automatically use reverse thruster or spin around.

As always, I hope you enjoy playing Endless Sky Delta, and thanks for taking the time to offer your thoughts on it.

edit: While you may already know this, just in case you don't" The ship direction indicator in the top right can be modified to also show your track - which is to say your momentum. It doesn't solve your problem, but it does provide a visual indicator of the relative position of your ship and its momentum, which could make it easier to fly. Settings for that are in the preferences, with the options being "ghost", "arrow", or "both." I personally prefer both.

[xobes]

Delta is currently experimenting with significantly increased mobility controls. Whereas upstream basically only has "forward" and "turn" (and, once in a while, on a few rare ships, "reverse"); Delta has forwards, reverse, left, right, and turn.

I had no idea - not sure how I was supposed to learn that, either. Where do start?

After all, full control like this isn't just a luxury, it's effectively a requirement for travel in space.

Sure.

So basically, the imposed reverse & lateral thrust was an initial step to start experimentation and work with a more diverse motion repertoire; but it isn't necessarily the endpoint. The more player control, the better.

I like the sound of that.

As always, I hope you enjoy playing Endless Sky Delta, and thanks for taking the time to offer your thoughts on it.

Sure. I haven't played it much past that first time I ran it. I do like that this is the proving ground for new ideas, and I have some ideas (https://github.com/xobes/endless-sky/wiki/Idea-list) and would like to contribute.

If there's a problem of particular import, I'd me interested in helping out, not just complaining providing feedback.

[Zitchas]

If you don't mind, I'd like to keep this issue open until we have some way of reliably using the "counter-momentum" behavior working properly.

As to how to help.... I suppose that depends on what your skills are, and more importantly, what you are interested in doing.