This is unusual. I received a message from my little cousin Kira. Well, not quite so little anymore. We haven’t spoken for a while, although we were close when we were kids. I didn’t even know she had a pilot’s license.

You can read it on her own feed.

Are you bored yet with my entries about button configurations, dear logbook? Well, but that’s what you are for! To record all those space flight basics for me to look up in the future. So there!

The onboard Galaxy Map is a strange beast. I’ve learned to fly my ship through hoops and nooks and crannies. I can dock and undock without an autopilot. I topple my SRV only rarely. Yet I can’t seem to navigate through the map in the same natural way.

I tried different input devices, different bindings, I listened to experienced commanders, I engrossed myself in the “Galaxy Map for Dummies” VR experience… still, I fell uncomfortable selecting a new star system or looking for specific stuff in my vicinity.

These are my current input controls. They may change in the future.

Rookie pilot Lhorndra signing off to get some sleep.

Huge thanks to EdCardRef and GIMP.

Ugh. I've been doomscrolling Galnet for far too long. Anyway, I distracted myself with my still ongoing, rather insignificant task to understand and configure my vehicle controls. I’m still new to this, my Cobra is still new to this (it even smells new!), my SRV is still new to this.

I’ve been practising scanning systems with my onboard Full Spectrum System Scanner (FSS – why not FSSS?) for a few days and finally feel quite comfortable using it. So I bought a Detailed Surface Scanner (DSS) and practised scanning planets. Gas giants with rings are still tricky for me, but I’ll get there.

This is the configuration I’ve been using for the scanners. I think everything in there is self-explanatory.

Rookie pilot Lhorndra signing off to clean my cockpit windows.

Huge thanks to EdCardRef and GIMP.

So, my very first geological field trip went swimmingly. The landing was quite difficult, though. Lots of ravines, gorges and canyons. Well, I suppose if you want to see something out of the ordinary, you have to try harder.

(Actually, it wasn’t really that extraordinary, it was right in the middle of the very ordinary Veroandi system. But hey, It’s still special for me, having received my Commander’s licence just last month.)

On the surface of Veroandi AB 3 b, I had my first shot at driving my SRV. “Surface Recon Vehicle”? I mean, who comes up with those names? As I wrote in my previous entry, I was not too happy about the default button bindings in my Cobra. That’s true for the SRV controls as well.

I want to be able to control the SRV turret with my stick while still being able to steer, so I mapped steering to the RZ axis of my throttle and turret pitch/yaw to my stick. That works reasonably well, but I don’t know how it’s going to be in a tough fight. Driving in reverse is not optimal, though: holding the steering axis while pressing my reverse button is uncomfortable. Ah well, I can think about that some other day.

Everything else is very similar to my ship controls. I could’ve mapped all SRV functions to discrete buttons easily, but I wanted some consistency, so the red modifier button appears again. At first, I mapped the turret mode onto the POV hat of my stick, which seemed the most logical position: weapons & targeting are there anyway. However, I decided to leave this POV hat blank. In contrast to my Cobra, there are no elaborate target selection functions in my SRV yet, but that may change with other SRV models in the future. So, forward compatibility for the win!

Rookie pilot Lhorndra signing off to wash my SRV.

Huge thanks to EdCardRef and GIMP.

This is not a proper log entry. This is quite the opposite of a gripping tale of space adventure. It’s what my parents always told me:

Lhorndra, you always organise and rearrange everything so many times around that you’ll never get any real work done.

Like killing pirates.

(OK, they didn’t say that last bit.)

I don’t know what it is with these ship controls nowadays. Don’t like them. Took me hours to reconfigure them. Well, days actually. Apparently, the controls on my Cobra Mk III and my Scarab SRV aren’t manufactured by Faulcon deLacy or Vodel themselves, but rather by a third-party supplier called Thrustmaster. Don’t know them, probably one of the millions of Federation companies. Their throttle & stick feel okay, I suppose. With the exception of the left hand POV hat, alas.

Anyway, I like my cockpit to be arranged logically by function, if ergonomically feasible. My left hand on the throttle controls the engines, vehicle systems, utilities and – if I can afford them one day – fighter pilots. My right hand on the stick steers the ship, of course, and is responsible for hardpoints and targeting. That’s why I balance my power distribution pips with my left thumb, not the right one like many others.

As I said, the POV hat on my throttle just doesn’t feel right. It’s… too sensitive, maybe? I put the pip distribution on the D-pad below, just to be extra sure. That D-pad feels soooo comfortable. Mmmmmh. Could touch it all day. The bottom D-pad is for countermeasures and the likes. It feels like an angry warthog anyway.

Moving on. Beneath the stick, the six buttons on its left still belong to the systems & utilities group. On its right side we have travel, nagivation and exploration grouped together. I put the less critical functions there, because I can’t see these buttons during flight and would probably miss them in a hurry, embossed or not. As important as the galaxy map may be, it’s not during combat.

Speaking of combat: on my flight stick, I put the secondary fire on button 3, not on the more usual button 2. Simply because it feels more comfortable for me pressing buttons 1 and 3 simultaneously in combat than pressing buttons 1 and 2.

So here they are, my button bindings. Oh, I almost forgot: There’s a modifier button on the throttle. If I hold it while pressing another button, the red coloured functions will be triggered. If I’m poking around the user interface, the blue stuff applies. Also, I copied a lot of the functions to my old-fashioned keyboard, because in space, you’ll never know on what kind of odyssey you’re going to be. And did I tell you how comfortable that D-pad on the throttle feels?

Now, I’ve seen a lot of different targeting bindings. For me, it only makes sense if I use a DOWN arrow for a SUB system and an UP arrow for the HIGHEST threat. So there.

Rookie pilot Lhorndra, signing off to bind more buttons.

Huge thanks to EdCardRef and GIMP.