CW-Colony Hopper

Colonizing Worlds - colony hopper (light utility transport/scout)

A 2 man VTOL ship for light transport and colony support. The ship has a programmable autopilot; player can enter the altitude/speed/heading for the autopilot to follow. Autopilot also has terrain/obstacle avaidance capabilities. Player can send the ship to land at a selected target, or tell the ship to land anywhere; the ship will scan terrain for a suitable spot, place a target icon, then fly and land there.

The ship can be flown like a helo (by tilting it with roll/pitch/yaw) or with translation controls; for extremely accurate control over the ship.

It has plasma thrusters and turbo fans. So it’s usable in atmospheres and no atmospheres. You can fly it on any planet/moon.

Action Groups:

-AG1 - level assist
-AG2 - hover assist
-AG3 - engines
-AG4 - doors
-AG5 - retract legs
-AG6 - lights
-AG7 - travel to a selected target
-AG8 - autopilot (will ask for alt/heading/speed) input
-AG9 - tell ship to land (it will scan terrain for a site/place a target/and proceed to it)

Controls:

Roll/pitch/yaw - helo style controls, tilt to move (have level assist turned off)
Translate up - move forward/reverse (have auto level on for translation flight)
Translate right - move left/right
Translate right on left side (aka EVA turn) - turn ship left/right
Slider 1 - collective up/down
Slider 2 - camera zoom

Notes:
Autopilot will default any altitude below 100 m to its 100 m minimum. There are no other limitations on it, you can tell it to fly dangerously. A guideline example for inputs is: in the mountains around the village, min safe altitude 500 m at a max speed of 100 m/s. Faster speeds are safer at higher altitudes.

The obstacle/terrain avoidance is pretty good. It got me across the entire mountain range at 500 m Alt @ 100 m/s, without crashing. However is not as extensive as the autonomous ships.

For flying the translation controls are far superior to using the helo (tilt) style of control.