Anyone else finding SERIOUS problems with the SRV throttle?

[sgurr]

k thanks for replies, I do have it bound to throttle axis, so I'll try again with the switch to control forward/reverse motion and it that's not good for me I'll try with joy-axis.
I never had this problem in Horizons btw, and this is my first few days playing Odyssey..

I can't see if you've said you're drive assist on or off?
It's been a while since I've seen reports or tested myself but Odyssey drive assist on has been glitchy for some folk with an inconsistent response to throttle inputs from when Ody launched, and it was for me the last time I checked properly but that was over a year ago.

For drive assist off it's behaving as I'd expect for Odyssey and I drive in it all the time. It's a little different from Horizons/Legacy but not what you're describing.

… and, to be quite honest, I feel like the Scarab does not handle like a 400kg vehicle if you’re driving it on a .1G world. That, or it has a weirdly overpowered engine for turning that makes it really want to spin out.

It wants to spin out because the SRV is at its most stable going backwards, so any knock or skid often means it is likely to 180 to a stable position.

(I suspect this is because while FD are amazing technically (graphic/audio/coders) they designed a vehicle where most of the friction is at the front with the 4 wheels, they probably modelled that friction accurately and its much easier to pull rather push that friction hence it wants to go backwards.)

 

[Schattenmacher]

I used to like driving around in the SRV on moons to collect material.
With Odyssey, the developer completely screwed up the driving model.
It doesn’t matter whether the driving assistant is on or off.

 

[Schmack]

I'd suggest using the alternative Scorpion in EDO. It's much less likely to reverse ends. The SRV doesn't make a lot of sense, it's not a physical aspect of the vehicle as much as just a terrible software decision to make driving challenging. How anything like the SRV ever made it off the assembly line, never mind even getting into space, it's a mystery. It probably explains why there's a broken down SRV at so many different settlements.

 

[Fizzatron]

I never had much use for Scarab flying but I’ve occasionally used it in a more improvised manner now and then to get back to the ship. So I’m no expert at it.

Prefer the Scorpion to drive around really, so until/if they do (or don’t) add exobiology signals to the wave scanner, the Scarab is staying parked unless I need(want) to visit the shard sites. Or feel funny.

… and, to be quite honest, I feel like the Scarab does not handle like a 400kg vehicle if you’re driving it on a .1G world. That, or it has a weirdly overpowered engine for turning that makes it really want to spin out.

With drive assist off and thrusters bound conveniently in a hotas, you can treat the Scarab like a hybrid ground/hover vehicle. In many situations it's preferable to hop from hill to hill or over big rocks than try to navigate around them, and once you get used to that way to traveling it can be a lot of fun, almost like an open world version of Stunt Car Racer, if you are aware of that old classic 8/16 bit game. Even better if you take into account the ability to do flips and rolls etc.. The Scarab is something I think Frontier really did a great job with IMO, it rewards those who persevere with it.

 

[Schmack]

I never had much use for Scarab flying but I’ve occasionally used it in a more improvised manner now and then to get back to the ship. So I’m no expert at it.

Prefer the Scorpion to drive around really, so until/if they do (or don’t) add exobiology signals to the wave scanner, the Scarab is staying parked unless I need(want) to visit the shard sites. Or feel funny.

… and, to be quite honest, I feel like the Scarab does not handle like a 400kg vehicle if you’re driving it on a .1G world. That, or it has a weirdly overpowered engine for turning that makes it really want to spin out.

Flying to get out of a settlement (over the containers) after an assassination is my go-to maneuver. I only use the SRV because I can identify the target whereas the suit seems to not come with a contact scanner (whatever that is).

 

[GroG79]

Whatever everyone says

Drive assist on SRV is still broken.

It will go Full throttle and the SRV becomes undrivable. A fix is to go to the turret or reboard the SRV.

 

[sgurr]

With drive assist off and thrusters bound conveniently in a hotas, you can treat the Scarab like a hybrid ground/hover vehicle. In many situations it's preferable to hop from hill to hill or over big rocks than try to navigate around them, and once you get used to that way to traveling it can be a lot of fun, almost like an open world version of Stunt Car Racer, if you are aware of that old classic 8/16 bit game.

This, except for the Stunt Car Racer reference, I never played that

The Scarab is something I think Frontier really did a great job with IMO, it rewards those who persevere with it.

They did, it does reward perseverence and because of those thrusters I can make it do things that FD never considered possible, that's great design.

But that 180 behaviour is incredibly frustrating and off putting for too many players imo, that was a mistake and it's made worse by unexpected Odyssey surface collisions.

I'd love to see FD flip that so it is stable going forwards. and leave everything else alone.
It would be a win making it more enjoyable for casual drivers and leave the rest alone for those who want, or are able, to play with its abilities.

 

[Reggit]

I'd love to see FD flip that so it is stable going forwards. and leave everything else alone.

I'd love for FDev to add some SRV Engineering.
Something like this could surely be considered one of those 'low hanging fruits'

(Just let me play with sliders in exchange for mats - c'mon FDev!)

 

[stripealipe]

k, for me turning drive assist off seems to have done the trick. Using full range on the X52 throttle, forward for forwards, back for back with plenty of granular control. Thanks all for the suggestions!

 

[Fizzatron]

This, except for the Stunt Car Racer reference, I never played that

I'm not sure if you would be approaching it from having been around that time or via modern lenses, so I'm not sure how well it stands up now, but it was a glorious game to play, especially head to head with null modem linked Amigas.

But that 180 behaviour is incredibly frustrating and off putting for too many players imo, that was a mistake and it's made worse by unexpected Odyssey surface collisions.

I'd love to see FD flip that so it is stable going forwards. and leave everything else alone.
It would be a win making it more enjoyable for casual drivers and leave the rest alone for those who want, or are able, to play with its abilities.

I will concede the 180 thing can be frustrating, and it's not helped by drive assist actually being anything but. However, Frontier did tweak the handling of the SRV as could be experienced during the alpha, I think, but it was quickly reverted. As such, maybe it's best let as is at this point. The Scorpion is easier to drive, though of course without the scanner functionality of the Scarab, which I think would be good to have honestly, or possibly a third SRV variant.

 

[Fizzatron]

I'd love for FDev to add some SRV Engineering.
Something like this could surely be considered one of those 'low hanging fruits'

(Just let me play with sliders in exchange for mats - c'mon FDev!)

I literally thought about that last night when playing. Being able to engineer a heavier hull/frame, beyond the synthesis options, would be pretty awesome for Spire stuff.

 

[Fixitman]

I literally thought about that last night when playing. Being able to engineer a heavier hull/frame, beyond the synthesis options, would be pretty awesome for Spire stuff.

They'd have to implement a system to make each SRV uniquely identifiable, so we can select individual engineering for each. As it is now, SRV's appear to be handled as "Ammo" for SRV bays. That's probably the show-stopper for SRV engineering: Too much work to implement right now.

 

[sgurr]

I'm not sure if you would be approaching it from having been around that time or via modern lenses, so I'm not sure how well it stands up now, but it was a glorious game to play, especially head to head with null modem linked Amigas.

I had an Acorn Electron, it wasn't known for having the good stuff ported to it, except Elite

I will concede the 180 thing can be frustrating, and it's not helped by drive assist actually being anything but. However, Frontier did tweak the handling of the SRV as could be experienced during the alpha, I think, but it was quickly reverted. As such, maybe it's best let as is at this point. The Scorpion is easier to drive, though of course without the scanner functionality of the Scarab, which I think would be good to have honestly, or possibly a third SRV variant.

I'll put my hand up as being one of those who adamantly didn't want the alpha srv changes. What they tried was just to turn the 'stickiness' of the wheels up to 11, you could park it vertically on the side of a building and it would almost stick, sliding down very slowly. Yes it meant you couldn't spin but it also made a mockery of the driving model by making it redundant, the result was like replacing ED's flight model with the one from NMS. It didn't stop flyving but it ruined everything else about driving it.
There's still some remnants from those changes in the game, some of the self righting behaviour but also the wheels are stickier. Ironically because they are only a little stickier they make a spin more likely when only one wheel catches.

I'd love to see the 180 behaviour addressed properly, or as you say a 3rd srv, or even fix drive assist on and add the wheel stickiness there, but I think making it stable going forwards would address most of the complaints.

 

[Nekozji]

(I suspect this is because while FD are amazing technically (graphic/audio/coders) they designed a vehicle where most of the friction is at the front with the 4 wheels, they probably modelled that friction accurately and its much easier to pull rather push that friction hence it wants to go backwards.)

I don't doubt that you are correct.

What baffles me is not just adding some extra tyres to the back, or even just... entering a wider collision box for the inside of the wheels than is really present. I for one would probably never notice.

Meanwhile despite how late I am to this thread, I regularly have the same problem as the OP. Tap the throttle. Wait. Now the engine kicks in. Be really nice if it actually responded to input when the input was given rather than having a bit of a think about it and checking if I am sure...

 

[sgurr]

I don't doubt that you are correct.

What baffles me is not just adding some extra tyres to the back, or even just... entering a wider collision box for the inside of the wheels than is really present. I for one would probably never notice.

I've no idea how hard this stuff would be to code, but yeah those could be ways of doing it. I mean driving straight vs a few extra or wider wheel tracks, I'd make it my business not to notice

Meanwhile despite how late I am to this thread, I regularly have the same problem as the OP. Tap the throttle. Wait. Now the engine kicks in. Be really nice if it actually responded to input when the input was given rather than having a bit of a think about it and checking if I am sure...

It's worth trying drive assist off (and maybe binding the handbrake)

 

[jojon]

Umm, if anybody finds the torque of their SRV anemic, have you checked how much power you have assigned to those motors?

...and if I find myself without control when putting the pedal to the metal, how much control do I expect from a vehicle in real life, given various amounts of velocity, terrain ruggedness, traction, acceleration, inertia, etc, even where gravity is a familiar quantity..?

 

[Markov Chaney]

Yep, feels exactly like a slightly over-torqued AWD car on a bad surface to me. Have you people never played Richard Burns Rally? (Or driven an actual Quattro on snow, though it sadly it was only the road car not a competition chassis)

On a low grav ice moon that is obviously going to be 10,000 times worse, so, turn the engine pips down to zero and you have much more throttle control and a useful throttle range, which understandably introduces a bit of lag.

I think people's various complaints about it really depend a lot on the controller and how you have all the controller tweaks set up, but however you do it it's never a wheel and pedals so it will always feel a little bit odd compared to an Earth vehicle. If you think of it as an explorer with a command console then the lag suddenly makes a lot of sense and you'll start driving (commanding) it that way...

TL;DR if you keep spinning because you hit an unanticipated rock, simply don't hit rocks, or anticipate better.

"Well, maybe I should have braked a bit earlier a few  times!" - Ari Vatenen

 

[Walter2]

Not sure what the problem is exactly, whether it is to do with the 'drive assist' but the throttle on my SRV's has a serious 'mind of it's own problem. I didn't really play Horizons so I don't know if it has always been as it is, whether it's changed or whether it's just me?

The Scarab is insanely fast. On a good level, surface it will reach about 38 m/sec, which works out at:

On a decent slope it's relatively easy to make the higher speeds, even without the speed bonus that flyving can add. If your throttle has a short throw, it's bound to be difficult to maintain fine control of your speed - it's always so easy to over-compensate even with a long-throw throttle. As others have pointed out, the mechanical arrangement of the vehicle doesn't aid stability - hitting anything at those sorts of speeds is going to have consequences.

(Fortunately, some of the smaller rocks are "transparent" to the SRV's wheels. Unfortunately, it's impossible to tell the difference by sight between those which will cause a problem and those which won't. Hitting anything at least half the size of an SRV wheel is going to hurt.)

The Scarab is also insanely tough. Mostly.

I've had SRVs thrown into the air and damaged by gently rolling over a material I was collecting, and completely destroyed by hitting an object at just the wrong angle. I've also jumped off the edge of a Callisto crater wall, fallen 35km and landed safely at a speed of well in excess of 150 m/sec with just 20% loss of vehicle integrity.

It's difficult to know if this behaviour is by design. Was the SRV intended to trundle quietly around a planet's surface like the rover of the moon landings? Is the actual performance an artefact produced by pilots taking the vehicle beyond the expected working parameters?

We've got what we've got, and for those of us who can tolerate the frustration and exhilaration of the SRV's good and bad habits, jumping, racing, climbing, falling and going into orbit is all just good fun.

 

[varonica]

It's difficult to know if this behaviour is by design. Was the SRV intended to trundle quietly around a planet's surface like the rover of the moon landings? Is the actual performance an artefact produced by pilots taking the vehicle beyond the expected working parameters?

Because the Scarab has a weapon that can be used in combat against other SRV's and on foot enemies, as well as flying things at wrecks and bases this was probably by design. It might need to get in and out of combat range fast!

 

[Schattenmacher]

The SRV has become unusable.
Material disappears when picked up or the vehicle shoots into the starosphere.
It's no fun anymore.