Decided to make a list of certain useful not so obvious empyrion features that I have discovered over the last year or 2 in no particular order. It is my hope some others and especially new players will find some of these useful. 1. THE O KEY The letter o by default will rotate your vessel to a level position (auto rotate). As senseless as it might sound this also works in space. It is useful to spawn a space base level to the plain of the solar system making it easier for ships to level out with the same key and dock nice and flat ! The O key works for jetpack also to help spawn objects level in space. Also as a combat helper I reassigned that key to the right mouse click. Now when flying and steering with mouse, only a mouse click is required to level me out at any time helping me perform decent manoeuvres easier with less risk of crashing and not having to move my hand to the O key. added thanks to @IronCartographer In addition to O, there is also Shift-O (lock orientation) Shift itself (fast flip to auto-level) for HVs. 2. PGUP/PGDWN KEYS IN FLIGHT These 2 keys will lower and raise your vessels camera height when you are in the pilot seat, brilliant in conjunction with the alt zoom feature for setting a custom view, it wont save though so you must reset it everytime. 3. DANGEROUS SHORTCUT KEYS Z key drops currently held item... L key switches off all lights on build including plants... Y key switches off main power... Easy to press these by mistake when trying to use chat interface resulting in dead plants spoiled food inactive turrets and lost valuables... If you want my advice REMOVE keyboard assignments for those 3 keys... 4. CONSOLE SHORTCUTS It is possible to make shortcut binds to activate a whole string of commands in console 1 custom command i made was ctrl +F1 or was it 1 XD to activate sbp/im/dm/gm all at once. Useful if i get bored or need to fix something in sp survival game. 5. CRUISE CONTROL New feature, once you are accelerating in the direction you wish to travel with whichever direction key or keys your using, hold the shift key for at least a second, release the direction key or keys, then release the shift key. The vessel now powers itself along in that direction, great for planets. Tap any direction key once to disengage. 6. AUTOBRAKE Triggered by the I key or the control panel switch. Basically cuts any braking thrust to all thrusters allowing you to travel in one direction without having to hold the thrust direction, great for hands free long distance space jaunts saving much power as opposed to cruise control. Not so great on planets but functional to a degree in some cases. 7. SHIFT MODIFIER CONSTRUCTOR (I may have the left and right mixed up here but you will figure it out for yourself) 1 mouselick left triggers 1 build 1 mouselick right in con que removes 1 build from the queue shift + mouseclick left triggers 10 builds shift + mouseclick right in con que removes 10 builds ctrl + mouseclick left triggers 100 builds. ctrl + mouseclick right in con que removes 100 builds. added thanks to @Xango2000 with recent patch. Ctrl+shift+ mouseclick left triggers 1000 builds. Ctrl+shift+ mouseclick right in con que removes 1000 builds. added thanks to @StyxAnnihilator Ctrl does not give 100 for everything. Like bio fuel give 50. 8. PORTABLE DRONE Even after having over 2400 hours playtime I still forget about this gem. On a starter planet dont ever jump down a mineshaft for ore, use your drone and dont break a leg or get stuck in a pit of despair. The drone is also useful for mining asteroids in space from say within a sv ? if you can squeeze the drone outside, this presumes you have not found an armour and an eva booster yet. The drone is also useful for recovering backpacks though wont usually work near an enemy base. The drone makes a useful building assistant too, you can use it to build in those hard to reach places, though it handles like a drunken mongoose making it a little tougher, encourages the use of a very steady hand. 9. REVERSE WINDOW TINT The multi tool in change mode can turn the tint around on those windows you had to invert so that you could build next to them indoors. Now its darker on the outside and easier to out from inside 10. SYMMETRY AND SHIFT MODIFIER DELETE (I must have done 1800 hours creative building before I found out about this) In creative & survival you can use symmetry to mirror the build your making, basically you focus building one side and the ai builds the other side to match. When you want to remove blocks no multi tool is needed in creative mode, just shift click the desired block and it will vanish along with its mirrored counterpart. Devices you place will also be placed in symmetry though some building block shapes like small flat triangle types will not be symmetrical and will have to be placed with symmetry off. 11. PLANT GROWING CURRENT FACTS Structure needs to be sealed from the outside environment and have power to maintain 22 degrees away from the outside world. The ground terrain is not airtight to the outside and neither are wooden grow plots used as floors. Use the N key for debug options show airtight blocks, anywhere that is not green allows air to pass through. You will only need a ventilator and oxygen if you are in space or on a planet with no o2. Ventilator has no purpose on an o2 planet apart from consume fuel and does not regulate temperature. 12. HV DRILL TURRET SUPER ZOOM HV drill turrets, I found out only yesterday that they can zoom in and out with the mouse wheel ! Not only that, it zooms in further than the sniper rifle, great for spotting poi turrets and other threats in the distance. Or maybe looking through your neighbours windows. It is almost like a periscope if you have the retractable turret and if you sit on the turret before raising it you sit in along for the ride as the turret deploys from retracted position. 13. FACTORY RESOURCE INPUT When you create a factory blueprint there is always a time for how long it takes, if you use ingots and the rawest of the materials required, the time will be longer, however if you put complete ready made devices and blocks and weapons and such into the factory on your bp, the build will finish much quicker as you have taken out the time it takes to turn those ingots into devices and blocks. Useful for servers when you want a ship quicker to get off starter, loot all those devices you find in poi containers and throw them in the factory if they contribute. 14. BLUEPRINT PLACEMENT (added thanks to @ravien_ff) When placing a blueprint: Pageup/pagedown raises/lowers it. Home/End moves it closer or further away. Ins/Del rotates it. You can also place blueprints using the drone to help you get a better view. 15. SP CREATIVE/SURVIVAL COMMANDS added some of these thanks to @Myrmidon comment. god mode In creative mode it is often useful to type gm in console (godmode) which allows you to fly in all directions and also at great speeds when held with the ctrl + shift keys. You can also pass right through structures walls and see how close your sensitive devices are to the outside, it is also useful for building to prevent lagshot for hardcore pvp vessels. time of day (creative mode) If you press escape and click the last option at the top menu, you will have a debug options window allowing you to set the time of day and pause time, which is pretty useful when you are working on a project for many hours. bp spawn in sp survival for testing If you want to test your creative builds quickly in a survival environment, first create or join an existing survival game you have made and then type sbp into console. You will now be able to spawn your vessel immediately. item menu If you need instant fuel and ammo for your sp survival ship test, type im into console. This will allow you to open a creative build menu using the H key. you can also type dm into sp survival games to activate the daytime settings as described further up. You can then make it daytime for your testing or night time if you need. 16. WEAPONS SYSTEMS added thanks to @IronCartographer Using a sv you can fire tracking/homing rockets that lock onto enemy. Click at the exact moment your cursor is over a valid target (not the square box created by the HUD) Weapons all now have power switches, weapons are also consuming power by being powered on so turn them off when not being relied on to save power. You can group weapons into signal groups or device groups and make control panel switches to say open only the minigun turrets, or the plasmas instead of just using the turret switch to pop out all at once. Each automatic mounted turret has an interface to select its individual targeting options. With that you can choose exactly what sort of targets each weapon will shoot at in any given combat situation. It is wise to check all your mounted weapons to make sure there best weapons are set to the best job 17. POWERSAVING FEATURES Thrusters and RCS as well as ventilators and gravity generators, constructors, furnace fridges, consume a lot of fuel, so anytime these things are not being used you should try and turn them off, again use control panel to make signal groups and device groups to better organise the power structure of your base or ship. 18. MAP AND NAVIGATION The map is becoming increasingly more useful thanks to eleon For while now there has been a feature not too well known. You can use the map on a server to publicly display a waypoint if you want a friend to find you or meet you somewhere. a. Once you make a regular map marker way point, click the button marked A in this picture to see the list of your map markers b. Click the button marked B to share that highlighted waypoint public. c. You can then click the button marked C to switch between the list of your personal waypoints and the available public waypoints. When you make a public waypoint, it is temporary and only displays to players on the same playfield as you when you clicked the button. So make sure your friend is on that same playfield before publishing a map marker. 19. THE REGISTRY Online players are more familiar with this, the registry gives you a list of all your entities both faction and private. You can use the registry to interact with any entity on the same playfield as yourself. Entities in other playfields cannot be accessed but within the same playfield you can command the control panel from any entity you own. This can be useful sometimes to switch off a sv that has stuck floating in the air out of reach, making it fall to the ground. Also useful for activating weapons systems on your nearby bases and ships if you get a surprise attack. You can get to the registry after accessing the P menu, or by clicking F2 F3 F4 or map button to bring up any window that has this menu bar displayed below. added courtesy of @Pach In the registry when you select an item, there is a "waypoint" option. Clicking this will put a waypoint for that item always on your HUD. Great for always finding your way home on a new planet, or being able to find that mining HV you keep forgetting and leaving out in the wilds somewhere... or just "everyone remember where we parked!" If you have one to add please comment and I will add it here
7.: Ctrl does not give 100 for everything. Like bio fuel give 50. I do several remapping of keys, so those used often are close to main position of hands, depending on in input devices. Also remaps less used functions to keys to my logic or/and farther away. Some more in https://empyriononline.com/threads/your-top-10-survival-starter-tips-for-new-players.38479/ 0.9 have added some changes though, and not the only thread with tips/guides.
I only learned about this through watching builders on YouTube. Thank you, @LiftPizzas ! Funniest thing was when I was joking with a friend while helping him paint his giant CV, that there would be symmetry or flood-fill or something in the next update just because we were taking all that time. The next week, symmetry and larger brush sizes were, in fact, added. ---- In addition to O, there is also Shift-O (lock orientation) and Shift itself (fast flip to auto-level) for HVs.
When placing a blueprint: Pageup/pagedown raises/lowers it. Home/End moves it closer or further away. Ins/Del rotates it. You can place blueprints using the drone to help you get a better view.
got that one at the top somewhere from iron cartographer. I still dont know how to lock on when firing rockets guys, lets add the hows about it
Be firing homing rockets Click at the exact moment your cursor is over a valid target (not the square box created by the HUD) Also: I didn't realize until yesterday that the Lock button existed in the N menu for building. It doesn't grab a copy of the shape of the target block, but it does apply texture/color when you are building...so every new block will match.
When the player starts in creative mode should have in bar T2 multi tool texture tool and color tool. The God mode should on and the time stopped.
Thanks guys keep it up ! Lets have more tips regarding weapons systems things that are not obvious, I will write something up on power usage for weapons and grouping for switches etc. I will also add something regarding making public map markers as not many people are too familiar with those. More map/navigation welcome.
You can set waypoints to things you or your faction own via the Registry, no matter where they are. There isn't a hotkey for the registry, but it is one of the icons you see when you open the PDA/factory/factions/logicistics/tech tree/control panel. When you select the registry it shows all items owned by your faction (and a switch to show personal vehicles/structures, which is OFF by default, so you have to flip it ON in SP), and when you select an item, there is a "waypoint" option. Clicking this will put a waypoint for that item always on your HUD. Great for always finding your way home on a new planet, or being able to find that mining HV you keep forgetting and leaving out in the wilds somewhere... or just "everyone remember where we parked!" You can also access the control panel (or you used to; haven't tested this in A9 yet) for any structure in the same playfield via the registry. "Oops, the turrets are off on the CV, and it's taking fire!" pop into the registry, and flip the turret switch... Also handy for SVs that are stuck in the air for some bug or another: go into the registry and cut their power to make them drop...
No, you never could do that. Would be nice if it is a future feature. But at least you can access the CP switches that way now.
will add a section later explaining the registry, thanks guys. This is also interesting because the registry is a useful feature but does not have a hotkey, maybe we need one or a more accessible/noticeable option to access it.
Assign map waypoints in categories, like loot for mineral deposits, POIs for well POIs etc. The player should be able to make active waypoints per category, i.e when the POIs only are needed to be active on map there should be a feature to activate only those waypoints.
yeah waypoint categories would be useful. Has this been in suggestions thread yet ? I might go there and suggest new way to interact with registry.
Turns out we have many ways to reach registry button, it is just not obvious as a feature. Added more shift modifiers with constructor, the removeal side. Added and made a few other changes too. Gonna research inventory splitting shift modifiers next with the general shift click feature usage.
