Community Event / Creation Buckyball Run A*: What do you do when a mountain is there? Move it.
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We've got over 2,000 posts in this thread now. What do we need to do to get our own subforum?
This is similar to Esvandiary's original 'knock off a bit' theory and my 'round your range down to a whole number' variation.
It's very interesting as your results are very similar to mine. With my range of 36.54 though I need to round down to 36 rather than 36.5 before multiplying, my 'magic number' within the core itself is definitely 372, rather than 385.5.
However... The reason that I know that 985.5 doesn't work for me is that during my 10h37 run I hit nav problems further out than I'd expected. I couldn't get fast plots across the final 'badlands' area before entering the core until I found a new magic number of.... 985! That worked for two legs, which got me into the core, then I had to switch to 972 (which hadn't worked in the badlands).
This kind of fits in with Esvandiary's awesome algorithm, except that the answers that the algorithm gives me don't usually plot quickly (for me), but they are very close to numbers that do instaplot.
I do have one small additional bit of information, that might account for the difference in responsiveness between our Galmaps.
Last night my ISP went offline just after I'd started playing without me realising. I went to the Galmap and when I moused over a star I heard the 'ding' that indicated that the star was selected, but the info-box never appeared. I switched stars several times with the same result (no info-box) so I waited to see if one would appear eventually, which resulted in a matchmaking error and the main menu screen.
Since some of the Galmap functionality is obviously handled server-side I guess that UK based players may get a more responsive map than others.
At least when their ISP is online!
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I have been trying to get a feel for why the 'knock off a bit' theory and 'round your range down to a whole number' worked. Looking at this I had noticed the consistency of the last 3 jumps being shorter nearer the core (and I think it tends to be 4 the further out you are) so have been playing with this in spreadsheets to find 'my' magic numbers.
This also ties in neatly with Esvandiary's algorithm and your observations of the number changing with distance. I am expecting the 90% in my "last three jumps at 90% of max range" will slowly reduce as I get further out from Sag A* and at some point star density will mean 4 rather than 3 jumps. Whilst we don't need to worry about plot times that far from the core, it can still have an impact on optimising number of jumps.
I did think that rounding down to nearest 0.5 would fail if you are very close to it already, so your results make sense to me. I think it only gives an approximation of the 3 jump calculation, and I only tested that it worked within that, rather than with actual plots.
Finally, I did wonder if my flaky, rural BT connection was having an impact on the GalMap...seems that it could be then based on what you saw. Guess I need to run some CAT6 the 80 odd miles down to Cambridge to fix both my GalMap and witchspace transitions
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That's understandable considering the street value of these things.
So far it's been pretty good luck on the deliveries. I've only had one person so far that seems to have not received their sticker so I sent out a replacement. We'll see if #2 makes it out there.Someone also asked further up about the Bumper Sticker outage. Pointing the finger at Senator Hairpiece aside, I just plain ran out. I can get more printed, but doing them one at a time costs about $5 a pop and as much as I like spreading happiness through the world via the magic of Buckyball Bumper Stickers, it comes out my own pocket. If I order another 50 the rate drops in a huge way, but it's a question of interest... There's gotta be people finishing the Run to make it worthwhile. A few more finishers have trickled in (reminds me, gotta update the Big Board) but I'm holding off on making that order until a more substantial number finish. I just don't wanna be stuck with 47 BBRA* bumper stickers at the end of the day.
Meanwhile, back to the clock conundrum. First, thanks to all the monkeys who tried to bang out a solution! Raiko made some educated guesses on what my intentions are and was pretty spot on. There were a couple interesting solutions as well. The reason I've been doing the clock-screenshots was because it was a method that required no additional software, hardware upgrades or even any special effort on the pilots other than hitting the F10 key. Quick, easy and painless, it pretty much allows anyone to race and is still completely viable as long as the race checkpoints are stations or arrival points.
Mandating Recordings: Probably the simplest solution from my standpoint, but as Alec rightly pointed out, this will crush older PC's and also requires additional software and hardware.
Use of an overlay: Gets rid of the overhead of the recording software and allows timestamped screenshots anywhere in the galaxy. The downsides are that it still requires external software and additional setup, plus the added complication of adding the local timezone of the user. It's nice for everyones' clocks to show GMT, though in practical terms this isn't a big deal since everybody races separately from one another.)
Timestamps from screenshots: Probably the most reliable method, but this requires that users actually upload the graphic files to a shared drive instead of posting them or sending them as attachments, and would require extra work to download/unzip/etc. Whine whine whine, I know, but if you have to do it for 50 people it adds up.
I'm still pondering, and in the mean time hoping that in the next two weeks or so FD puts a nav marker on the sysmap for current position or puts a permanent dash clock somewhere in the cockpit.
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That's understandable considering the street value of these things.
Someone also asked further up about the Bumper Sticker outage. Pointing the finger at Senator Hairpiece aside, I just plain ran out. I can get more printed, but doing them one at a time costs about $5 a pop and as much as I like spreading happiness through the world via the magic of Buckyball Bumper Stickers, it comes out my own pocket. If I order another 50 the rate drops in a huge way, but it's a question of interest... There's gotta be people finishing the Run to make it worthwhile. A few more finishers have trickled in (reminds me, gotta update the Big Board) but I'm holding off on making that order until a more substantial number finish. I just don't wanna be stuck with 47 BBRA* bumper stickers at the end of the day.
Meanwhile, back to the clock conundrum. First, thanks to all the monkeys who tried to bang out a solution! Raiko made some educated guesses on what my intentions are and was pretty spot on. There were a couple interesting solutions as well. The reason I've been doing the clock-screenshots was because it was a method that required no additional software, hardware upgrades or even any special effort on the pilots other than hitting the F10 key. Quick, easy and painless, it pretty much allows anyone to race and is still completely viable as long as the race checkpoints are stations or arrival points.
Mandating Recordings: Probably the simplest solution from my standpoint, but as Alec rightly pointed out, this will crush older PC's and also requires additional software and hardware.
Use of an overlay: Gets rid of the overhead of the recording software and allows timestamped screenshots anywhere in the galaxy. The downsides are that it still requires external software and additional setup, plus the added complication of adding the local timezone of the user. It's nice for everyones' clocks to show GMT, though in practical terms this isn't a big deal since everybody races separately from one another.)
Timestamps from screenshots: Probably the most reliable method, but this requires that users actually upload the graphic files to a shared drive instead of posting them or sending them as attachments, and would require extra work to download/unzip/etc. Whine whine whine, I know, but if you have to do it for 50 people it adds up.
I'm still pondering, and in the mean time hoping that in the next two weeks or so FD puts a nav marker on the sysmap for current position or puts a permanent dash clock somewhere in the cockpit.
I have yet to receive my sticker either but I'll wait a bit before we jump to conclusions. Also, what's happening in the next two weeks or so? Next buckyball confirmed xD
As for the recording and stuff like that, I'll take a look into a few more solutions.
This kindasortamaybealittlebit jived with what I experienced, though the results had me wondering about something else, based on Esvandiary's algorithm. I never got a chance to test it, largely because I was more concerned with getting to Sadge quickly and working with the one thing that was working, rather than spending precious minutes trying to plot a route that wasn't going to plot anytime soon.
See, what worked for me was the round-down bit as mentioned here, but only to 11 jumps and no more, and it makes me wonder about something else Esvandiary said. The source of Esvandiary's algorithm said that the plotter basically used a quick "get it in the area ASAP" algorithm, then used a "get to this star system ASAP" for the last few, with 3-5 jumps estimated. When I was trying to plot, beyond 11 jumps tended to stall, which makes me wonder... does it work in groups of 5, then try to get to the target star system? In other words, is the optimal number of jumps some multiple of 5, plus one? Just some idea to experiment with...
Thanks for this, interesting observations - I will definitely have a play with your multiples idea. I am currently getting 27 jumps but maybe a multiple plus the last 3 or 4?
This also made me go back and validate my last '3 jumps' assumption - on my Type 6 run, with a 29.something range, I was getting the last 4 jumps as shorter but I wasn't using magic numbers, I was plotting as close to 1000 as I could. The additional short jump could be because it had an 'awkward' distance at the end. Looks like I need to pay more attention to the jump distances on each segment to see how many shorter jumps I am getting.
I know from my first run (where I was plotting legs as close as possible to 1000LY, with a 31.23LY range) that there were up to 6 shorter jumps at the end of a leg.
There's probably something about the proportion of jump range and fuel saving which means the plotter knows to try looking at spreading the difference (from perfect multiple of jump range) over more jumps.
On my more recent run, in the core areas (ie anywhere closer to Sadge than Sol), with a 36.45LY jump range my magic number was 973LY for 27 jumps. That's effectively 36.0LY a time, which makes sense as there wouldn't always be a star in the right place to get both a full length jump and it on the direct straight line. Further out it was more like 980LY for 28 jumps.
Starting my run about now, if anyone wants to see what desert bus in space looks like, steam broadcast on ID SF_Uberfish
Finally murdered enough pirates to kit Zarathustra to perfection, as well as licked enough Federation boots for that Sol permit.
She launches on her maiden voyage tomorrow.
No cargo space though, so I'll have to store my drinks in the overhead compartment. At least (hopefully) this run should be faster than my first.
She launches on her maiden voyage tomorrow.
No cargo space though, so I'll have to store my drinks in the overhead compartment. At least (hopefully) this run should be faster than my first.
Starting my run about now, if anyone wants to see what desert bus in space looks like, steam broadcast on ID SF_Uberfish
Good luck and fly safe CMDRs!
Any way to auto navigate in the core? I;m horribly slow now since I have to do each plot one at a time, if I try to autoplot the route, it lags to hell and sticks at 98% or something. Even for two jumps! D:
EDIT* Found out if I pick a star almost exactly 994LY away it calculates very fast using information from earlier in this thread.. I hope this keeps up
EDIT* Found out if I pick a star almost exactly 994LY away it calculates very fast using information from earlier in this thread.. I hope this keeps up
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Just finished! 14 hours, 6 minutes and 44 seconds! PC crash and galmap errors really didn't help but, I did it!!!!
Gonna sleep before I make the official submission. so sleepy and sad no more stickers, oh well
Here's a selfie before I sleep...
View attachment 47032
Congratulations Uberfish. Not too shabby, not too shabby at all! It's quite an achievement isn't it!
P.S. your selfie wasn't working for me.
Just finished! 14 hours, 6 minutes and 44 seconds! PC crash and galmap errors really didn't help but, I did it!!!!
Gonna sleep before I make the official submission. so sleepy and sad no more stickers, oh well
Here's a selfie before I sleep...
View attachment 47032
Congrats Uberfish!
Buckyball 8? *drums fingers impatiently on wooden dashboard of new Python*
Postcard from London
Now there's something you don't see every day!
Now there's something you don't see every day!
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