Docking

[Haze]

I bought this game months ago, but only ever finished the tutorial. I just now updated to the latest patch and started playing.

After a 45 min escort mission I came back to the carrier to land. I called inbound, slowed, dropped my gear and as I enter the dock the camera changed and my ship is pulled in...

except it keeps going, rams the carrier, and I explode.

What did I do wrong? I have easy landings enabled.

Might be why I never got into this game..I remember having trouble landing on planets in the tutorial or demo. Frustrating to complete a mission, yet fail due to that.

[Gordon]

Hi Haze,

There is only one reason I can think of that may have caused you to crash.

You called for inbound but did you actually get the go ahead from the carrier to land, other fighters will be landing at the same time so you may have been on standby for landing. Did you notice if the carrier said you were cleared for landing?

[Haze]

It did clear me for landing.

I just tried a quicker mission, a patrol, and at the end I slowed to a crawl. When the camera changed views, I tried moving around and still had control. I also was able to throttle back to nothing as I glided in, gear down, brought the nose down a touch and this time it landed me.

Previously, I thought it was automatic as soon as I was in the "bay" so to speak. Maybe this was changed in the patch? Thought it auto-docked before once you were inside.

Anyways, mission success and on to the next day. Thanks for the reply.

[Burzmali]

I've experienced that bug happens from time to time as well. If I remember correctly I have noticed it much with the latest patch installed, but then again I haven't flown as many fighter missions. You can try backing out of the hanger and trying the other bay, that might work...

[Kuokkanen]

Or you could go to correct recovery bay in the first place. If you are unsure which it is, switch HUD to ILS mode. If you don't know what is ILS mode or how to get it on, then

Read the fine manual

[Burzmali]

No, the problem still happens, trust me I've played enough to testify to that. My best guess is that the program begins tracking too many components and "loses" the call to the docking routine...

[John DiCamillo]

Previously, I thought it was automatic as soon as I was in the "bay" so to speak. Maybe this was changed in the patch? Thought it auto-docked before once you were inside.

Just to clarify the point - no, that's never been the case. You are always in full control of your fighter right up til the point when the docking clamp grabs you and you see the "DOCKING COMPLETE" message. It only switches to the external docking camera so that you can see where you are going. It is hard to tell how close you are to the walls and floor when you are in the cockpit view.

If you have the docking point (X) lined up with your flight path marker -o- when you enter the bay, you should drift right into the magnetic clamps and dock successfully. Your ship will be hovering a meter or two off the floor, right around the center of the docking bay.

If it doesn't seem to catch, you can just use ESC+1 to end the mission. Of course, that might not work if the carrier itself is under attack... [:'(]