Official FAQ

Official FAQ from the developer, answering common questions that new players have.

Introduction

This FAQ answers basic questions about how to play Endless Sky. For complete documentation and more information, please consult:

• The player's manual[github.com] for more details on game mechanics and controls.
  
• The wiki[github.com] for information on modding and for back story.
  
• The forum[groups.google.com] for making bug reports or sharing user-generated content.

Basics

Is this a multiplayer game? No, it's single-player. So nothing you do to any of the ships you encounter will make a real human being angry. :)

Is this game really free? Yes, no in-game purchases or anything. Faced with a choice between making a mediocre proprietary game limited by my own skills and free time, versus creating what could potentially become an excellent open source game with a community contributing artwork and other content that is far better than what I could create, I chose the latter.

Saving "snapshots" of your game: Every time you take off from a planet, your game is saved. In the Load / Save... panel, you can also create a backup "snapshot" of the current state of your game. For example, I'd recommend creating a snapshot right before you buy a new ship or attempt a difficult mission, in case you don't like the outcome. A special snapshot called "autosave" is updated whenever you reach a new milestone in the story line.

Where are the saved games stored?

• Linux: ~/.local/share/endless-sky/saves/
  
• Windows: C:\Users\yourusername\AppData\Roaming\endless-sky\saves\
  
• Mac OS X: ~/Library/ApplicationSupport/endless-sky/saves/

Getting started

Creating a player: Enter your player's first and last name in the text boxes next to the words "First name:" and "Last name:". You can press <tab> to toggle between the two text-entry fields, or just click on either one of them. Then press <return> or <enter> to continue.

Starting ships: The Sparrow interceptor is offered as an option for advanced players who want to be fighting pirates right away, but the other two ships are much better options for earning money early on.

Controls: Click "Preferences" in the main menu to view the key bindings for all the controls. Click on any key binding to change it. You can bring up the main menu while playing by pressing "Escape."

Hyperspace travel: Press the 'M' key to bring up your map and click on the system you want to travel to. (Each line between two systems represents a hyperspace link.) Then, close the map by clicking "Done," and press 'J' to activate your hyperspace autopilot.

Finding a path to a system: You can buy a local map in most outfitters. Otherwise, you will not know what is in a star system until you have visited it. If you have a mission that tells you to go to a system that is outside the region you have mapped, you will need to explore hyperspace routes in that direction until you reach your destination.

Landing: Like making a hyperspace jump, landing operates on auto-pilot. So, in most systems, you can just press 'L' to land. If there are multiple planets in the system that you can land on, pressing 'L' will toggle between them.

Why am I losing money? You start the game with an exorbitant loan that you must make daily payments for. Eventually you will pay off the loan; you can also click on the "Bank" button on any planet to pay off your loan early. Once you have a larger ship that requires more than one crew member, you will also have to pay crew salaries each day.

Trading and Mining

What's the best way to earn money? Early on, try to take on multiple missions at a time, and pick missions with destinations all in the same part of the galaxy (or ideally, on the same planet). The farther you have to travel for a mission, the more it pays. Rush missions and tourists pay extra. Once you have enough money for a mid-tier ship, plundering pirates can be very lucrative. (For example, you can buy a Blackbird, hire lots of extra crew, and use it to capture interceptor-class pirate ships and sell them.)

Buying commodities in bulk: Hold down the Shift, Control, or Alt / Option key when clicking "buy" to buy 5, 20, or 500 tons at a time. (The "x 1" text above the "buy" and "sell" columns will change to reflect this.) The modifiers combine, so holding down all three has you buy 5 x 20 x 500 = 50,000 tons of cargo at a time. These same modifiers work for buying ships and ship outfits, and for hiring crew.

Are commodity prices dynamic? The commodity prices in each star system will fluctuate up and down by 100 credits or so. If you sell a huge amount of a particular commodity, its price may drop in that system over the next few days.

Minable asteroids: Most asteroids (the ordinary grey and brown ones) cannot be destroyed. But in some systems you will find asteroids that look different, and that circle around the star in a clockwise elliptical orbit instead of moving in straight lines. Shoot at one of these enough (ideally with a weapon that does a lot of hull damage) and it will split open, pick up the fragments that remain behind to harvest them. Your "outfitters" map will keep track of which minerals you have harvested in each system. Some are much more lucrative than others.

Missions

Where do I pick up the main story line? Keep clicking the Spaceport button on planets in the southern part of human space (the Rim, the South, and the Dirt Belt) and you will eventually be offered Free Worlds missions. There is not yet a story line for joining the Republic or the Syndicate.

How do I join the Navy? Sorry, so far only the Free Worlds story line is implemented. (That also means there is no way to buy a Navy ship, although it is possible to capture them.)

How can I get escort / bounty hunting jobs? Your combat rating needs to be at a certain level to get these jobs. Every time you disable an enemy ship, your combat rating increases a little bit.

I took a job to hunt down a pirate, but I can't find the pirate ship. Your target will always be within two hyperspace jumps of the star system where it was "last seen."

How do I install a thruster on this asteroid, for the terraforming mission? Just target the asteroid and press 'B' to board it.

How do I steal equipment from a surveillance drone? In and near the systems that are now controlled by the Free Worlds, you will occasionally see Navy ships jump into the system, launch some drones, and then jump away. You need to disable one of these drones, board it, and take the Surveillance Pod. This will make Republic ships and their allies angry, but if you leave the system they will calm down, because attacking a ship that has no crew members does not permanently affect your reputation.

What happens if I fail one of the main story missions? If it's one of the intro missions, you may be offered a second chance. Otherwise, you may be out of luck. I recommend saving a "snapshot" of your game in the Load / Save... menu every once in a while, so you can back up if you accidentally do something that you regret. There is also a special saved game called "autosave" that is updated each time you make progress in the main story line.

I bought a new ship, and some of my active missions disappeared when I left the planet. This will happen if your new ship has less cargo space or fewer passenger bunks than your old one. When buying a new ship, you should check how many passengers you're carrying (in the "Hire Crew" panel) and how much special cargo you have (in the "Trading" panel).

Game Mechanics

Time: Every time you make a hyperspace jump or take off from a planet, another day passes in the game world. Time does not pass while you are just flying around in a system. This means that if you have a rush mission, you can calculate exactly how many days it is going to take to reach the destination, factoring in an extra day for each time you will need to land to refuel.

How do I scan a ship? Install an Outfit Scanner or Cargo Scanner on your ship, depending on what sort of scan you want to do. Then, target the ship, fly close to it, and hold down the "scan" key, which is 'S' by default. (You can check the key binding in the preferences panel.) If you manage to stay near the ship long enough to complete the scan, a dialog will pop up showing the results of your scan.

Turrets: As of 0.9.7, if you do not have a target selected or have set turret firing mode to "opportunistic" in the settings, turrets will each track whatever target they can most easily hit. If you select "focused fire," they will point forward when no hostile ship is present and track your target if you have one selected.

My guns are not firing! Everything except beam weapons requires some stored energy to fire, so make sure you have some sort of battery (or a Supercapacitor). Also note that anti-missile turrets fire automatically (and only when missiles are in range), and secondary weapons must be selected in order to fire them.

Reputation: If you attack a friendly ship, it and all its allies will become hostile toward you until you either bribe them to leave you alone, leave the system, or land on a planet. However, there is no permanent reputation change unless you disabled, boarded, or destroyed the ship (in which case the change in your reputation depends on how many crew members the ship had).

Interference plating: If your ship is scanned while you are carrying illegal items, your chance of getting caught is 1 / (1 + interference). So, 2 layers of Interference Plating gives you a 50% chance of getting fined, and 6 layers gives you a 25% chance.

Shield recharging: When your shields are at less than full strength, your "shield generators" will pump energy into them to recharge them - 1 unit of energy turns into 1 unit of shields. This means that recharging shields is a drain on your ship's energy, so a ship that flies fine with full shields may run out of power when recharging.

Capturing ships: Each of your crew members can wield one hand-to-hand weapon, which gives them bonuses to attack or defend. On top of that, each attacking crew member adds a strength of 1, and defenders have a strength of 2. For example, if you have four crew members and four laser rifles, that gives you an attack strength of (1 + .6) * 4 = 6.4. If you're attacking a ship with 2 crew members, they have a strength of 2 * 2 = 4. Your odds of winning the first round of combat depend on your relative strength: 6.4 / (6.4. + 4) = 61%. Whoever loses each round loses one crew member. The boarding panel reports your chance of defeating all the enemy crew, and the expected number of crew members you will lose.

Loans and credit scores: The game tracks your net worth over the most recent 100 days of game time, in order to estimate your daily income. That determines how big a loan you can qualify for. Your credit score goes up one point each time you make a payment, and drops by 5 when you miss a payment; the credit score controls the interest rate you are offered.

Is the universe dynamic? The star systems, commodity prices, and factions are all hard coded, but can change in scripted ways in response to events or missions. Mission locations and destinations can be randomized. Commodity prices fluctuate over time, and selling a huge amount of a commodity will cause its prices to drop in that system over the next few days.

Strategy

Combat feels like there is no skill involved! The only way to defeat a more powerful ship in combat is by maneuvering in such a way that you can hit them with all your weapons, but they cannot. This means that if your ship is not maneuverable, there is indeed very little skill involved in fighting. (Also, no matter how good a pilot you are, your $0.5M interceptor is not going to destroy a $20M capital ship.)

Avoiding Missiles: A ship at least as fast as a shuttle (speed 400) can dodge meteor missiles by flying towards them and dodging to one side as they approach, and can nearly outrun torpedoes. Sidewinder missiles are harder to dodge, but do less damage; anti-missile turrets are your best bet against them. A very fast ship (or a ship with an afterburner) can simply outrun all missiles.

Strafing: If you approach a target at full speed and pass by it at just the right distance, then begin thrusting continuously while aiming at the target (easiest if you have auto-aim turned on), your ship will circle around your target in a continuous loop. If the target turns slowly, this means you can continuously fire your front guns at it while it can only respond with turrets.

Blindside attack: If your ship only has turrets and your target mostly has guns, and if you are much more maneuverable than your target, you can just stay "behind" it and destroy it with your turrets. (A Blackbird works great for this trick.)

Jinking: The AI takes your position and velocity into account when firing, so if you are getting peppered with enemy fire from a distance (say, by particle cannons) you can reduce the damage significantly by weaving back and forth ("jinking").

Destroy weak targets first: If fighting multiple targets, focus your fire on the weakest target first unless you have a special weapon like the Ion Cannon that can take the strongest target out of the fight completely.

Divide and conquer: Fighting four ships one at a time will damage you a lot less than fighting four ships at the same time. If you are under attack by a bunch of different ships that have different top speeds, run away from them so that you can take out the fast, weak ships first, then deal with the heavy, slow ships alone.

Large battles: If you're taking part in a large battle as a part of the story line, pick your battles well. You can help your side win by concentrating your fire on whichever ship most of your allies are attacking, or by taking out the missile boats before they can unload all their ammo, or by trying to lure a bunch of enemy ships away from the battle, or just by packing your ship full of anti-missile turrets and using it to shield your allies.

Asteroids: Asteroids can shield you from missiles, but it's really hard to direct the missiles so precisely that they hit an asteroid. On the other hand, if you're hunting pirates and your own ship does not use missiles, picking a system with lots of asteroids to do your hunting in can give you a big advantage.

Avoid the system center: If you are hanging out right where ships jump in and out, you may be winning a battle and suddenly have reinforcements jump in... or have the Militia show up and destroy that Pirate you were about to capture. Instead, try leading your targets a fair distance away from the system center before starting your brawl.

Hidden Features

I have multiple ships in my fleet. How do I change which one is my flagship? In the Shipyard or Outfitter panel, you can click and drag one of the ship icons to reorder them. You can also do the same with the ship names in the Player Info panel, but only when you are landed on a planet. The first ship in the list is your flagship.

Changing weapon hardpoints: In the Player Info panel ('i'), if you are landed on a planet, you can click on a particular ship in your fleet listing and then click and drag weapons to reorder them. This is useful, for instance, if you want your weapon turrets to be farther forward and your anti-missile to be the turret farthest aft (for firing at missiles while running away).

I am trying to buy a particular outfit or ship. How do I figure out where it is sold? If you press 'M' to bring up the map, you can click the "Outfitters" or "Shipyards" button on the lower right. This shows you a list of all the outfits (or ships) that you know about. You can click on any one of them to see the star systems that sell that particular outfit highlighted in yellow.

Equipping multiple ships at once: In the outfitter, you can shift-click or control-click to select multiple ships and buy or sell outfits for them all at the same time. This is handy, say, if you want to buy ten escorts of the same kind all at once and outfit them in a certain way.

One of my escorts was disabled. How can I repair it? Select the ship by clicking on it, and then press 'B' to board it. This also works for other friendly ships that are disabled. (And, they will occasionally give you money to thank you for repairing them.)

How can I take over the whole galaxy? If you have a very high combat rating, you can hail a planet (press "L" to target the planet, then Shift + 'T' to talk to them) and click the "Demand Tribute" button. They will send out their defense fleet to destroy you. Defeat the entire fleet, and you can hail the planet again; this time when you "Demand Tribute" they will agree to pay you daily tribute. A planet you have dominated in this way will always allow you to land regardless of your reputation.

How do I find a given planet or star system in the map? Press F to bring up the Find... dialog, then enter the name to search for.

"Parking" ships: If you want to keep a ship in your fleet but not have it follow you or cost you money for crew, you can "Park" it on a planet by calling up the Player Info panel ('i'), clicking on the ship, and clicking the "Park" button.

Renaming ships: In the Player Info panel ('i'), click on a ship to bring up its info page, then click on its name in the top left corner to rename it.

Frequently Requested Features

Is there Workshop support for modding? No, because the Steam libraries are not compatible with the GPL license that the game is released under. I will eventually be working on making the plugin system more usable, though, including having it automatically pull a list of available plugins from a server and letting you install those plugins in-game.

Any plans for supporting controllers? The big challenge here is that the game has about 20 different hot keys for pulling up the various dialogs, sending commands to your fleet, etc. I'll be working to make it possible to perform some of those actions using a more limited set of keys, e.g. by adding ways to navigate the planet menus using just the arrow keys.

Any plans for multiplayer? There are already quite a few multiplayer space simulation games out there. My goal with Endless Sky is to provide something different from those games: in particular, a game with a real story line, and where every player has the chance to be at the center of that story.

Known Bugs

OpenGL version: Endless Sky uses some OpenGL features that are not available before OpenGL 3.0, and you may encounter issues if you have outdated graphics drivers even if you have OpenGL 3 support. Updating your graphics drives can usually fix this. (This bug also shows up as other errors, like "Shader compilation failed.")

[MeniliteZ]

@trivial
I asked that on the forums, too.
The answer I got was it can wait as long as you need. Some guesswork was involved, I think, though (its been a while).

Once you've accepted the mission, though, there certainly may be a timer.
Make sure you don't decline the mission, either.

[callmetrivial]

can i leave a story line quest "waiting" at a spaceport indefinitely? or after a few months will the faction eventually just deal with it themselves? korath harvesting void sprites just before command gives me a fleet to hunt the hunters

[MeniliteZ]

You cannot board using escorts.

You can, however, eject your flagship's cargo while on top of your escorts while your escorts are in gather mode to have them pick it up (with risk of NPC ships picking it up instead). If they have the cargo space.

I still recommend the forums for questions.

[ClavTheImpaler]

anyone know how to board with escorts (it would be very helpful as I would like to be able to aquire more jup drives by boarding but I don't have the cargo space required. I would use a Baccy but A falcon with 4 plasma cannons and 2 quad blasters can defeat practically anything)
been trying ad looking around a while but cannot seem to find a solution.

[MeniliteZ]

Yeah, it'll take quite a while with all that negative rep you've obtained.
I'm sure they despise you less!
I don't think giving up tribute of a pirate planet/station will help anything. Unless they were Independent rather than Pirate? (they do change at one point in the story, but if you're still a Merchant that shouldn't have happened yet.)

There is a cheater's way to change your rep with save file editing.

PS. This thread would be easier in the forum. More people likely to chip in advice. I don't know all the details of the cheater's way.

[ClavTheImpaler]

ive been blasting pirates for thirty minutes, captured both thule and smugglers den, and the reps still despise me. shouuld I relinquish tribute?

[MeniliteZ]

They'll come at you in a large swarm. If you want to try that, I would make a save first in case you lose those ships you captured.

Then again, if you don't have enough rating, they may just laugh at you.

[ClavTheImpaler]

should I tribute or not

[ClavTheImpaler]

thanks for the help @Menilite

[MeniliteZ]

@Clav
Kill Pirates.
If you do it next to Free Worlds space you won't have to worry about having to defend yourself against angry Republic ships.

West of Solace seems like a good place for you.