Flight

Flight owns two things: where the ship is, and where it is pointing. Almost everything else on the bridge depends on one of them. Weapons need a firing solution, scans need range, docking needs an approach — all of that is your console.

Flying

You have attitude control in three axes — yaw, pitch and roll — plus a throttle. Larger vessels also have strafe and manoeuvring thrusters for the sideways, up and down movement you need when you are trying to hold station or line up on a bay door.

The throttle is latched. It stays where you put it; it is a setting, not a pedal. Ships hold their commanded speed and take time to reach it, so plan your deceleration in advance. There is no handbrake.

Attitude, by contrast, ramps and settles. A big hull turns slowly and keeps turning after you stop asking, which is why new pilots overshoot every target they aim at. Start your turn early and stop it early.

Keyboard defaults

These are defaults, not laws — rebind them, and your bindings are remembered. A gamepad or joystick is worth having for this role specifically: yaw, pitch, roll, throttle and FTL throttle are all available as analogue axes, and holding an axis is better than tapping a key.

Actions worth binding

Beyond the basics, Flight can bind: speed burst, cruise mode, orbit mode, peek aft, toggle docking, toggle FTL, next waypoint, autopilot on / off / toggle, and a full set of target‑selection actions — nearest and next object, enemy, station or planet, plus intercept target and clear target.

Intercept target earns its key. It sets a course to whatever you have selected, which saves a great deal of manual pointing when the Captain says "get us to that freighter".

Waypoints and autopilot

Your waypoint list has several sources, on separate tabs:

• Mission — where the mission wants you to go. Start here.
• Active — the queue you are actually flying.
• Nearby — points of interest within reach, which is how you find the station nobody told you about.
• History — where you have been. Useful for going back.

Engage the autopilot and it flies the active queue. The engage control is only available when there is something to fly to, and turning it on hands over your attitude and throttle until you turn it off.

Autopilot is for transit, not for combat. It flies the route, not the fight, and it will happily hold a straight predictable line through somebody's firing arc.

Your displays

• Radar — the full 3D picture. It has map modes and a zoom, and learning to move between a close view and a wide one is most of situational awareness.
• Forward and rear relative radar — two small displays showing what is ahead and behind. The rear one is the reason you notice you are being chased.
• Viewport — the actual view out. Switch between it and the radar depending on what you are doing.
• Heading, speed and target information — the numbers you read out loud.
• Drones — if your vessel carries them.

Being good at it

• Ask what the manoeuvre is for. Closing for a scan, closing for a shot and closing to dock are three different approaches. Knowing which one you are flying is the difference between arriving and arriving usefully.
• Range is your gift to Sciences. Scans complete faster the closer you are — substantially so. If Sciences is waiting on a scan, closing the distance is the fastest thing anyone on the ship can do about it.
• Keep the damaged shield away from the enemy. Shields are per facing. When Tactical says the forward segment is collapsed, turning is a defensive weapon and it is yours.
• Call your speed and heading unprompted. Nobody else has these numbers, and half the bridge wants them.
• Flight and Tactical hold separate targets. Yours steers, theirs shoots. They are not the same selection and they diverge constantly — say which one you are on.
• Do not fight on autopilot. It is predictable, and predictable is what a gunner wants.