Advanced Discovery Scanner.

Anyone able to tell me how the advanced discovery scanner works..?

I've read on here that the advanced scanner is supposed to locate every body in a system yet even though I have one on my ship it doesn't.

I scan the initial star but it locates nothing else and everything else is still trial and error...

Is this a glitch or am I missing something..?
 
To use a Discovery Scanner (Any Type), you need to assign it to a fire group. Once you do that, when you enter a system you can use it to discover new bodies. IT takes a few seconds of holding the scan button down for it to work, you should see a little progress bar on your Fire group you have set it to.
 
1. You have to send out an active ping. Are you holding down the trigger? Is it assigned to a firing group?
2. Discovery scanner can sometimes passively discover things when really close, like stars, so that can be misleading if you haven't fully used them before.
3. Some systems are just that empty, with no planets to speak of. But that's not too common, so try it on a different system.
4. There's a difference between the discovery ping (which finds new objects and lists them as "unknown") and the detailed scan (that changes "unknown" to the name of the object). Discovery uses the discovery scanner, the detailed scan uses a surface scanner.
 
I've got it assigned to a fire group but I take it me error is not keeping the trigger depressed for a long while.

Thanks all I'll give that a go..!
 
1. You have to send out an active ping. Are you holding down the trigger? Is it assigned to a firing group?
2. Discovery scanner can sometimes passively discover things when really close, like stars, so that can be misleading if you haven't fully used them before.
3. Some systems are just that empty, with no planets to speak of. But that's not too common, so try it on a different system.
4. There's a difference between the discovery ping (which finds new objects and lists them as "unknown") and the detailed scan (that changes "unknown" to the name of the object). Discovery uses the discovery scanner, the detailed scan uses a surface scanner.

Additional question related to this as someone who doesn't yet have the Surface Scanner.

is it deployed and used like a weapon (and the discovery scanner) or more something that happens as part of the normal scan turning an "unexplored" body into a known body.
 
it seems to me that the Advanced Discovery Scanner kills the entire point of discovery. Kind of a game killer actually.
I have no plans on buying one...ever
 
Additional question related to this as someone who doesn't yet have the Surface Scanner.

is it deployed and used like a weapon (and the discovery scanner) or more something that happens as part of the normal scan turning an "unexplored" body into a known body.

Surface scanner works automatically during normal scan, you don't need to do anything special to use it.
 
Tuxer, When you use it on a star system and it pings back 77 astronomical bodies, some of which are 10,000+ ls from the star and >5000 ls from any other orbit, you'll realize how pointlessly your time is spent flying around and around in various orbits playing hide and seek with that last missing planet. When you ping it and discover that third star is 910,000 ls away, is it really worth the 20 minute flight for 1200 more credits? You still have to fly to and scan everything for the real money, after all. The Advanced Scanner just lets you prioritize. Believe me, after 100 systems of doing loops hunting down virtually invisible specks moving against the background, it rapidly becomes worth it.
 

Sargon

Banned
Tuxer, When you use it on a star system and it pings back 77 astronomical bodies, some of which are 10,000+ ls from the star and >5000 ls from any other orbit, you'll realize how pointlessly your time is spent flying around and around in various orbits playing hide and seek with that last missing planet. When you ping it and discover that third star is 910,000 ls away, is it really worth the 20 minute flight for 1200 more credits? You still have to fly to and scan everything for the real money, after all. The Advanced Scanner just lets you prioritize. Believe me, after 100 systems of doing loops hunting down virtually invisible specks moving against the background, it rapidly becomes worth it.

Definitely worth it. I only surface scan the worth while bodies... No more SC'ing out half a million Ls just to scan a star with icy only worlds for me.
 
most easiest way to put it..

It's a gun, you're supposed to shoot it, It finds everything in every direction.

I hope lvl 2 and 3 scans make exploration more worthwhile delta to time consumed.
 
Surface scanner works automatically during normal scan, you don't need to do anything special to use it.

But you do. You need to point your ship at the body you want to surface scan, then get close enough and wait for the scan to finish. Scanning range varies depeding on the body in question.
 
Definitely worth it. I only surface scan the worth while bodies... No more SC'ing out half a million Ls just to scan a star with icy only worlds for me.

How do you determine which bodies are "worth it"?
I've so far been unable to see the difference between an ice planet and a different kind in the system map.
 
Does the Advanced actually make more credits in terms of discovery turn ins than the basic? Using the basic I make 200-3k per system scanned. So will the Advanced increase those pay outs? Problem is that Advanced Scanner is like 500k right? So the return on investment is pretty long?
 
I've so far been unable to see the difference between an ice planet and a different kind in the system map.

Long experience. Planets and moons worth trying: Molten looking, red, yellow, brown, mottled are at least "rocky" and often "metal-rich". Gas giants are always worth it, and you can scan them from a long way out. Planets and moons ignorable: small white dots without rings.

Does the Advanced actually make more credits in terms of discovery turn ins than the basic? Using the basic I make 200-3k per system scanned. So will the Advanced increase those pay outs? Problem is that Advanced Scanner is like 500k right? So the return on investment is pretty long?

The advanced scanner doesn't make the individual planets and stars worth more, but since it finds them all, you won't lose out on ones you'd have a very hard time ever finding without it. The only scanner that makes the planets and bodies worth more is the Detailed Surface Scanner. All the better discovery scanners do is make them easier to locate in the first place. And the advanced scanner is 1.5 million. Intermediate is 500k.
 
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Does the Advanced actually make more credits in terms of discovery turn ins than the basic? Using the basic I make 200-3k per system scanned. So will the Advanced increase those pay outs? Problem is that Advanced Scanner is like 500k right? So the return on investment is pretty long?

No. The DISCOVERY SCANNER, as the name implies, only finds/discovers planets. The better the scanner, the better the range. It does not improve the details of the planet/body, but it lets you find them more easily.
The SURFACE SCANNER gives you more details about the planet/body, and thus increased the payout/value of per planet/body scan.
 
If you have both the advanced scanner and discovery scanner, do you need to still be within range of certain bodies for the discovery scanner to do its job?
 
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