How to improve on dogfighting skills?

[Shallot]

So I’ve been playing this game religiously since I bought it. It’s fantastic. I ground out courier missions in the sidewinder until I got a cobra, then a graded my viper and worked over high res sites for the vulture. Frankly, I thought I was hot ♥♥♥♥. I rarely died in RES sites and was making great cash, but recently, I realized that my 1v1 dogfighting skills are quite trash.
I was intercepted by an orca on my way back to a station, and lost badly, on my way out I tried to pick a fight with a wanted player, and had to scurry off with low hull.
What’s the feel of dogfights? With any sort of combat there’s offensive and defensive states of movement. What’s the core of elite dangerous’s combat focused around?

[ZenZone1]

For the most part mastery of thrusters control is key. Secondly if you fly a slow turning ship, see if it has good placement for turrets and put that.

I avoid combat most of the time because of carrying cargo in an expensive ship. Practice combat in a cheap ship like Sidewinder or Eagle before risking the more expensive ones. I try to avoid big ships all the time.

[JinKo82]

boost, fa off, turn to face target, fa on. rinse and repeat until one of you is dead.

[caaront]

I suck at dog fighting in small ships, what I did was get ranked up and got a vette with on board fighters, now I just go and destroy and make money.

[AISTHESIS]

I know a little.
There are great tutorials on youtube.
Possition is key. Focus on Position.
Weapons loose effect at distance. Save your power for when you are closer.
Practice shifting power to shields,engines,weapons.
Turning is best in the blue.
You can boost turn and even boost down or to the side as a dodge.
Outfitting helps much when you have time.
If you can get ship launched fighter and a pilot. Have the pilot in the fighter and have it follow you. Then try to get behind the fighter. This is good hard worry free practice at possition.
Best bet is to you tube combat tips and watch technique.

[AISTHESIS]

Originally posted by JinKo82:

boost, fa off, turn to face target, fa on. rinse and repeat until one of you is dead.

This can cause a jousting type fight where the better shield wins.

[AISTHESIS]

With big slow ships defence on your side. With big ship vs little think of it like trying to catch a fast dog. You don't run behind the dog all day, you take your time and get into his path. Also you can try just flying backwards and let the attacker come to you. You will both take lots of hits so this is good if you think you can outlast the opponent.

[caaront]

Originally posted by AISTHESIS:

With big slow ships defence on your side. With big ship vs little think of it like trying to catch a fast dog. You don't run behind the dog all day, you take your time and get into his path. Also you can try just flying backwards and let the attacker come to you. You will both take lots of hits so this is good if you think you can outlast the opponent.

Exactly, in a huge ship with a great sheild generator, and shield boosters, it takes a while for anyone to get to your hull, then you have a bunch or hull mods in slots, you can take a lot more hits from their large, medium, and small weapons than they can take from your huge weapons.

Plus, since being as light as possible is a must for them most do not stock up heavily in their shields and hulls because they will lose manueverability and they cannot spare the power draw.

[JinKo82]

Originally posted by AISTHESIS:

Originally posted by JinKo82:

boost, fa off, turn to face target, fa on. rinse and repeat until one of you is dead.

This can cause a jousting type fight where the better shield wins.

welcome to ED

[caaront]

Plus in a huge ship you can have a fighter at your side with the freedom to protect you from all sides, and I am not sure what their weapons are rated at, but I get in the little fighters asnd take out big targets, they are veru powerful weapons.

[AISTHESIS]

So the request is better dogfighting more than survival. This and part 2 are great.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XjYeCs5MA18

[Shallot]

Thank you for theinfo, are there any tips exclusively for the vulture since I recently bought it. And how do I work on position? I use all my thrusters, but after a fight goes on for some time it always ends in a joust. Is there any way I can press myself closer to an opponent so that I can deny them the joust?

[Zackmar]

Originally posted by Onion Ninja:

Thank you for theinfo, are there any tips exclusively for the vulture since I recently bought it. And how do I work on position? I use all my thrusters, but after a fight goes on for some time it always ends in a joust. Is there any way I can press myself closer to an opponent so that I can deny them the joust?

What I did when I was using the Vulture was use double pulse lasers and just target the power plant of the enemy ship. The vulture can turn fast enough that you can stay in the blindspots of most ships, unless they have turrets. I was able to take out Anacondas like that by staying right underneath them at about 100 meters away, always shooting the power plant.

If your shield ever goes down, fire chaff and boost away until it recharges, Vulture's hull is quite squishy in my opinion.

[AISTHESIS]

Originally posted by Onion Ninja:

Thank you for theinfo, are there any tips exclusively for the vulture since I recently bought it. And how do I work on position? I use all my thrusters, but after a fight goes on for some time it always ends in a joust. Is there any way I can press myself closer to an opponent so that I can deny them the joust?

You will see the joust comming. Think of the running dog but you are on ice. If you run at each other you slide past each other. Let the dog run and slide but you slow down early and begin the turn early. Before you would go past and turn. Now you turn right behind. As you practice you will get more of it. It's not always easy and a good method is not always good. Thrusters and throttle are key to position and you need to feel it, knowing is nothing without the feel and that takes some time.

[Agony_Aunt]

Play to the strengths of your ship and outfit it accordingly.

Fast thin ships like the Cobra and FdL are jousters.

Small/medium manouverable ships are dogfighters. Vultire, Eagle, Viper, FAS.

Bigger ships which bad handling and lots of internals are tanks. Sometimes best as turret tanks. Beluga, Type 10, Anaconda, etc.

[Yoshikami]

I'm also grinding the most important aspect of the game right now: skill. So far so good except for fighting FDLs and FASs. How do you counter an FDL jousting maneuver as a Vulture? I can tail him for some length of time but there will be a point where he manages to break off and suddenly I'm fighting a jousting contest. It's a good thing it was just an NPC so I still win with engineering.