Pilot

One requires brains and reflexes to be nicknamed Will Smith.

Intro

Pilot allows you to operate any air-based vehicle in HellMOO, from simple ultralights to heavily armed gunships. It is an excellent skill for those seeking to explore HellMOO, with some areas being exclusive to those who can traverse the skies.

Getting started

• Piloting is a decently dangerous activity. With low pilot skill, it's easy to spiral out of control with a very likely chance of you slamming into the ground with a fiery explosion. But fear not, there are a couple ways to raise your pilot skill relatively safely. Your first few levels in pilot should be grinded from piloting a boat, as attempting to grind pilot otherwise can be very dangerous.
• On top of that remember to purchase aviator goggles at Simon & Simon Aircraft for a +1 to pilot.
• At low pilot, fly at higher altitudes, you will have more time to level the plane if your pilot skill starts failing you. Also, you will be free of bad weather conditions.

Ownable aircraft

Currently, there are six types of ownable aircraft implemented.

• Mosquito ultralights: Incredibly cheap and has the highest bonuses to pilot rolls, your first air vehicle.
• Prion Gyrocopters: Runs off a much more efficient alcohol-based engine but slower than all holy hell. Craft-only.
• Cessna tiltrotors: An actual plane. Expensive, but with a high enough load to carry several people and an increased fuel supply.
• Cessna skywagons: The direct upgrade to the Tiltrotor, boasting an increased load weight, fuel supply, and speed. Craft-only.
• Patton Supaliftas: A cargo craft, boasting the highest load weight of any air vehicle in the game (that players can operate). Has four rooms, one of which is behind a nano-tube door. These are also slow as hell and consume fuel like crazy. Craft-only.
• Dragoon microzeppelins: Similar to the Patton, less load weight but with six(!) rooms, an increased fuel supply and fuel efficiency (a fully fueled Zep can hover for an IRL month) makes Zeps an excellent home-away-from-home, just be wary of some asshole chopping it.

Ownable aircraft get the benefit of being able to be modified. They can be purchased from Simon & Simon Aircraft (SS on the map) in northwestern Corpclave. It's HIGHLY advised that you buy an insurance module from the Insurance Office below Simon & Simon Aircraft and install it in the cockpit to guard your investment. In the event of the destruction of your aircraft, you get reimbursed for MUCH less than what your flyer originally cost, and around half of what the installed mods cost.

Tip: To name your craft, you can get a rotgut champage from Botany Bay to name it. To install a lock in your hatch, fly to a landing zone and "install lock in hatch of [plane id].

Prices

Simon & Simon Aircraft (Corpclave)

a mosquito ultralight                   $ 11,000 (3 in stock)  
a cessna tiltrotor                      $ 55,000 (3 in stock)

Insurance Office (Corpclave)

a cessna tiltrotor insurance policy module        $  500 (2 in stock)
a cessna skywagon insurance policy module        $  1,000 (2 in stock)
a patton insurance policy               $  4,000 (1 in stock)
a damage control module               $  5,000 (1 in stock)
a microzep insurance policy module      $  5,000 (1 in stack)

Inside the Lonely Hut (Kakuri Island)

a stereo module                         $  3,750 (1 in stock)       
a detonator module                      $  5,250 (1 in stock)       
a groundscan module                     $  9,300 (1 in stock)       
a FoF module                            $  9,750 (1 in stock)       
a dumper module                         $ 12,000 (1 in stock)       
a rangefinder module                    $ 15,000 (1 in stock)       
an eject module                         $ 15,000 (1 in stock)       
a sharpshooter module                   $ 18,750 (1 in stock)

Flying

Before you can even takeoff, you need to fuel your flyer. If you're in the same room as a gas pump, use fuel <craftname> with fuel pump or, for the prion, fuel <craftname> with alcohol pump. The only aircraft that doesn't take normal gasoline is the UFO. You can also fuel your aircraft with fuel from jerrycans, but you have to be outside the plane to do this. To start flying, enter the cockpit of your craft of choice and type takeoff. You'll go into a hover. Type ascend and you'll enter free flight. Each room while on the flyer map is one area. For instance, one room while in the flyer map could be the entirety of Freedom City. From here you're free to move about with fly <direction>. If you begin to lose control (I usually correct my plane if I dip below 8 control), level your plane. Be warned that there are flak guns that automatically attack you if you enter certain areas. These are located at the Skydock, which hovers over [[Ashen Valley]; the Necropolis' Heart and El track, which are at the far west of the flyer map, and surrounding the Panopticon Prison. Additionally, you have to be wary of adverse conditions such as bad weather and flying at night. Once you're ready to land, type descend to bring up a list of landing sites. Not all areas on the flyer map have landing sites. Once you've chosen a landing area, do descend <roomname> to break into a hover over that landing zone. While hovering, type land to stop hovering and bring your plane to a stop.

Commands and other info

When you're in a flyer, it gives you an information readout like: INTEG [|||||||||||||||] [ 100/100 ] FUEL [|||||||| ] [ 42/75 ] LOAD [ 97/150 ]

 CTRL  [||||||||| ] [ 9/10 ]  ALT [||                  ] [ 500/5000 ]

• INTEGrity is your plane's health, this typically won't change unless you fly into flak.
• FUEL is how much gas you have. If it hits zero while in the air, you're fucked.
• CTRL is how well the plane is stabilized. If it hits zero you go into a death spiral.
• ALT is how high you are. The higher you are, the longer it takes to hit the ground if you go into a death spiral.
• LOAD is the combined weight of all characters and items in the flyer, including held/stashed items. If the load is past the load limit you will be unable to takeoff.

Commands

This is a list of commands compatible with most flyers. Some commands require mods, while some mod-only commands are integrated into special aircraft.

 land - Lands the aircraft if you're hovering.
 
 takeoff - Takeoff into a hover.
 
 ascend - Ascend from a hover into full flight.
 
 descend <something> - Descend from full flight and hover over your targeted landing zone.
 
 fly <something> - Move in a given direction if you're in full flight.
   
 target <something> - Train your weapons on something.
   
 fire - Unleash your weapons on your designated target.
 
 gscan - With a groundscan module installed, scan for living creatures.
   
 evade - Take evasive action, making you harder to hit.
   
 level - Attempt to level and regain control.
   
 dock with <something> - Docking with structures like the skydock.
 
 sf - Shows aircraft modules.
   
 insurance - Checks the insurance status (if any) of the aircraft.

Sky map

You can find a detailed map of the skies here.