Engineering: does it now take more attempts per grade than it did in January '25?

Highlightning · Saturday at 11:01 PM

Like so many of you, I bought the Panther Clipper Mk II and skipped off to have it engineered. First stop was FSD range. I was quite disappointed to learn that it took 3 attempts to complete grade 1, 4 for G2, 4 or 5 for G3, etc. Did something change in the last few months? I had been very excited when FDev reduced this last year or so and was frustrated that it is even worse than before. Or is this just because it's a PC Mk II?

Please help a commander to understand. o7

Edit: Okay, so I just engineered a scanner to G3 while I'm here at Madame Farseer's and it was much, much less costly. G1 took 1 attempt. G2 2, and G3 3. I am, though, still unclear on why the FSD took so much more.

Edit 2: I went to Farseer whom I had unlocked to G5 for FSD range about 3 years ago. That's why it caught me off guard when G1 for this new ship took 3 tries and 4 for G2. I thought another change to engineering had been done and not for the better.

aRJay · Saturday at 11:25 PM

I engineered an FSD last Tuesday and it took the now standard 1 click, 2 clicks etc.

You weren’t at a previously unused engineer were you and having to gain rank as well as get the module done? Last time I did that it took a lot of clicks.

Does a new blueprint take longer?

Highlightning · Saturday at 11:41 PM

aRJay said:
I engineered an FSD last Tuesday and it took the now standard 1 click, 2 clicks etc.

You weren’t at a previously unused engineer were you and having to gain rank as well as get the module done? Last time I did that it took a lot of clicks.

Does a new blueprint take longer?

Not a new engineer for me, no. Been to her many times, which is why it shocked me that it took so many attempts. I have the vast majority of engineers unlocked and opened to G5. Hopefully this was a one off and it won't be like this with the others when I go to have them engineer modules for me.

Kira Goto · Sunday at 7:32 AM

It's been fine for me at my already unlocked and 'maxed' engineers. The only occasional issue I run into is that the system has a brainfart and leaves a G4/5 mod (or maybe it's the G3, not entirely sure) at 99% which really bothers my perfectionist brain if it is the maximum available (and I have materials to complete it with).

Or when I don't pay attention and hit the roll button to "complete" the grade when the next one is already available. But that's more on me for not using the collection of neurons in this head.

PilotB · Sunday at 8:02 AM

It now takes more attempts to get to 98% bonus and fewer attempts to get a perfect 100%. All in all it was a nerf.

Aashenfox · Sunday at 10:05 AM

IMO grades 2 and 3 got a nerf (you could often get a 75% fill from 1 and 2 hits respectively, but grades 4 and 5 got a buff, completing grade 4 in four rolls was uncommon, and completing grade 5 in 5 rolls (even to 98%) was incredibly rare.

It's better now for one reason and one reason only. You can anticipate exactly how much you need and farm/trade appropriately without wasting mats or finding yourself at the engineer having run out with 1 or 2 hits to go.

To be clear on what changed, at some point in the last X months, the system was changed from random progress per 'hit' to the exact number of hits per grade being equal to the grade. If you had one take longer, then I can only suggest that you accidentally started on the wrong upgrade, or you had some kind of connection issue (if you have connection issues while engineering, it can fail to recognise the last mod applied and you do not lose the mats).

Helmut Grokenberger · Sunday at 10:12 AM

Aashenfox said:
IMO grades 2 and 3 got a nerf (you could often get a 75% fill from 1 and 2 hits respectively, but grades 4 and 5 got a buff, completing grade 4 in four rolls was uncommon, and completing grade 5 in 5 rolls (even to 98%) was incredibly rare.

I usually rolled 1-2-2-3-X with X being wherever I decided to stop. I never got a 1 on grade 2, but almost always a 2 on grade 3. Sometimes I got a 4 on grade 4, and sometimes full G5 with... six? rolls. The biggest change is the predictability of G5 not taking up to ten rolls to complete.

DjVortex · Sunday at 1:49 PM

Highlightning said:
I am, though, still unclear on why the FSD took so much more.

Did you engineer it with a fully upgraded engineer?

First time you use a particular engineer it takes more rounds.

oblivionmanman 2476 · Sunday at 2:07 PM

when you are at a engineer make sure you pin the module blue print the you can up grade from any station/fc.experimental effects require the enginner.

Imo · Sunday at 2:22 PM

The biggest change for me was when the mission rewards were changed. Normally you could run many of those assassination missions to gain grade 5 materials and data to be traded for engineering, but nowadays they most often offer nothing valueable and you have to run quite time consuming missions instead if you find one that drops grade 5 mats or data.

aRJay · Sunday at 2:29 PM

Aashenfox said:
IMO grades 2 and 3 got a nerf (you could often get a 75% fill from 1 and 2 hits respectively, but grades 4 and 5 got a buff, completing grade 4 in four rolls was uncommon, and completing grade 5 in 5 rolls (even to 98%) was incredibly rare.

It's better now for one reason and one reason only. You can anticipate exactly how much you need and farm/trade appropriately without wasting mats or finding yourself at the engineer having run out with 1 or 2 hits to go.

To be clear on what changed, at some point in the last X months, the system was changed from random progress per 'hit' to the exact number of hits per grade being equal to the grade. If you had one take longer, then I can only suggest that you accidentally started on the wrong upgrade, or you had some kind of connection issue (if you have connection issues while engineering, it can fail to recognise the last mod applied and you do not lose the mats).

X months being just under 12, the change was introduced when the Type 8 was released for Early Access.

Dougie · Sunday at 2:40 PM

I went mad remote engineering a PC2 yesterday - every module went 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 so something else must have happened to the OP.

oblivionmanman 2476 · Sunday at 4:26 PM

i did the same as you on remote engineering my pc,pays to have youre mat storaged almost maxed then a trip around getting the experimental effects,the pc has a good travel range.

GraXXoR · Sunday at 4:39 PM

Yes. I have carefully monitored my engineering since returning in April and as everyone is saying in the thread above, the number of engineering clicks to increase grade goes up linearly with grade: 1,2,3,4,5

I did get a shock once when it took 3 attempts to max out grade 1 and I was like WTH??? But I realised it was with a minor engineer whom I hadn't got to rank 5 with yet.

aRJay · Sunday at 4:51 PM

Kira Goto said:
It's been fine for me at my already unlocked and 'maxed' engineers. The only occasional issue I run into is that the system has a brainfart and leaves a G4/5 mod (or maybe it's the G3, not entirely sure) at 99% which really bothers my perfectionist brain if it is the maximum available (and I have materials to complete it with).

Or when I don't pay attention and hit the roll button to "complete" the grade when the next one is already available. But that's more on me for not using the collection of neurons in this head.

I have had this failure to get 100% it was definitely not for G5 but either G3 or G4 I think it was 3. To be honest I liked it as it added a little bit of interest to the process.

aardappelianen · Sunday at 6:59 PM

Every grade now has a fixed number of rolls however there is a slight bug where you could possibly roll a grade and it wouldn't complete, like a grade 3 now takes 3 rolls but if you dont pay attention to this you might put a 4th roll in the 3d grade and it would be a waste of materials since you could skip this roll and go to the next grade.

That being said i dont like how the first rolls in any grades gets you 100% of the negatives and then you roll to increase the positives of that grade.

Im guessing Op got r0bbed by one of these "ghost" rolls

Helmut Grokenberger · Sunday at 7:01 PM

aardappelianen said:
Every grade now has a fixed number of rolls however there is a slight bug where you could possibly roll a grade and it wouldn't complete, like a grade 3 now takes 3 rolls but if you dont pay attention to this you might put a 4th roll in the 3d grade and it would be a waste of materials since you could skip this roll and go to the next grade.

That being said i dont like how the first rolls in any grades gets you 100% of the negatives and then you roll to increase the positives of that grade.

Im guessing Op got r0bbed by one of these "ghost" rolls

Can confirm, I've noticed that too - G3 leaves a teeny tiny gap to the completion of the circle, and would allow for a fourth roll, but G4 gets unlocked as expected.

PilotB · Sunday at 9:25 PM

OPs problem is they're not maxed out on that engineers rank.

it's 5 rolls for whatever your top tier is. If you have that engineer at g3 welcome to 5 roll g3s. You can either fly to the engineer and finish ranking up or pay the tax.

aRJay · Sunday at 11:16 PM

PilotB said:
OPs problem is they're not maxed out on that engineers rank.

Not according to the OPs later post.

PilotB said:
it's 5 rolls for whatever your top tier is. If you have that engineer at g3 welcome to 5 roll g3s. You can either fly to the engineer and finish ranking up or pay the tax.

bryth65 · 2025-07-28T05:39:44+0100

I took a DSS to Bill Turner yesterday and it took more rolls than 1,2,3,4,5 to get it up to G5. I pinned the blueprint (my whole reason for going to Bill - I was already G5 with him) then returned to my FC. I then engineered a few more DSSs on my FC and they took 1,2,3,4,5 rolls.

IIRC G1 at Bill's took 3(!) rolls, but G2-G5 took 2,3,4,5.