Newcomer / Intro Fuel indicator

[BadassBird]

I find myself many times wanting a simple indication on the HUD to tell me if I have enough fuel to reach my destination. We have this technology in 2016, but somehow in 3300-ish there seems to have been a global technological lobotomy and simple indicators like this are apparently beyond the ability of the ship builders...

There are many simple ways to do this without taking up HUD space - my humble suggestion would be to change the fuel bar to a stripy (barber pole) if I don't have enough fuel to reach my target.

I assume this has been suggested before.. but should it be on the list of requested features?

cheers,
Bird

 

[Para Handy]

I find myself many times wanting a simple indication on the HUD to tell me if I have enough fuel to reach my destination. We have this technology in 2016, but somehow in 3300-ish there seems to have been a global technological lobotomy and simple indicators like this are apparently beyond the ability of the ship builders...

There are many simple ways to do this without taking up HUD space - my humble suggestion would be to change the fuel bar to a stripy (barber pole) if I don't have enough fuel to reach my target.

I assume this has been suggested before.. but should it be on the list of requested features?

cheers,
Bird

You will have noted that the fuel bar in the HUD gets a blue segment which shows what fuel is to be used for the next hyperjump, I assume that is not what you want though.

To see if you have enough fuel for a multi-hop trip, you need only look at the plotted route in your galaxy map. The route line is solid for those jumps for which your current fuel load is sufficient, any jumps beyond your fuel load are shown as dotted lines. This way you can see if you need to scoop fuel or look for a refuelling stop before it goes dotted.

Hope that helps.


[alien]


(EDIT - P.S. In fact if you look at your galaxy map whilst fuel scooping, you can see the lines going from dotted to full. )

 

[BadassBird]

Thanks - I guess I should have said that I'd been playing for a couple of months now, worked my way up to an anaconda by doing lots of different stuff, visited a few engineers as well. So I think I know how some of the game works.

My suggestion was aimed at *avoiding* to use the galaxy map - am I the only one who finds its interface clunky and annoying? Especially if you have a 500ly route plotted...

Anyhow, I reckon the simple "do I have enough fuel to reach my target" needs to be shown on the HUD. There is no sane reason to force us to use the galaxy map for that.

cheers, Bird

You will have noted that the fuel bar in the HUD gets a blue segment which shows what fuel is to be used for the next hyperjump, I assume that is not what you want though.

To see if you have enough fuel for a multi-hop trip, you need only look at the plotted route in your galaxy map. The route line is solid for those jumps for which your current fuel load is sufficient, any jumps beyond your fuel load are shown as dotted lines. This way you can see if you need to scoop fuel or look for a refuelling stop before it goes dotted.

Hope that helps.


[alien]


(EDIT - P.S. In fact if you look at your galaxy map whilst fuel scooping, you can see the lines going from dotted to full. )

 

[Winterwalker]

I think this is a suggestion thread really?

You can work it out because when a new system is target the left panel shows how many jumps, remainder on route, and distance to next star while the top section of the fuel tank shows in blue, for how much fuel next jump will use. This gives a sense of, "will need fuel in two or three jumps' time" which gives the chance to manage, by making sure there's a scoopable star within two or three jumps' time.

Once a route is plotted in galaxy map, you can also run your mouse over each star on route, to check if you have sets of non-scoopable stars. You might see something, the next 5 are FOG KBAM (KGB FOAM, scoopable stars) but after that will need to monitor more carefully because T Taurus etc.

So I don't think you need to go into the galaxy map for every jump, just sticky bits. I quite like that it's a little clunky to go into, because reading the map gives a sense of actually doing 'interstellar' navigation. That's not to say I wouldn't like a more instantaneous galaxy map load, but I think fuel management is almost a game feature, so it would be a shame to make it too fool proof.

 

[Chris Simon]

Umm. You say you want to know if You reach your destination without looking at the galaxy map?

How did you plot the route, then?

 

[BadassBird]

Hi Chris, you can plot a route to a system without having enough fuel to actually get there. So you have to fuel scoop along the way, but it would be neat to see (directly in the HUD) when you have scooped enough fuel. I know you can see this in the galaxy map, but we should be able to see it directly in the HUD.

Actually, on a side note, it'd be cool if I could plot a route to destination for one of my transactions directly from the transaction list without needing to open the galaxy map. Again I get the feeling that we're being forced to use the galaxy map for no good reason...

cheers, Bird

Umm. You say you want to know if You reach your destination without looking at the galaxy map?

How did you plot the route, then?

 

[Alex D]

Hi Chris, you can plot a route to a system without having enough fuel to actually get there. So you have to fuel scoop along the way, but it would be neat to see (directly in the HUD) when you have scooped enough fuel. I know you can see this in the galaxy map, but we should be able to see it directly in the HUD.

Does your car tell you (by providing information next to your available gasoline meter) if you will reach your destination on current tank?
Exactly, it does not

 

[Hell Razor5543]

Your ships cannot read your mind. You may well decide to stop off at some stations along the route to purchase fuel and to do some business, and fuel scoop at some stars where there are no stations in the system. The only way that the system can show you what your ship is capable of (fuel wise) by use of the solid/dotted line in the Galaxy Map.

 

[Para Handy]

Thanks - I guess I should have said that I'd been playing for a couple of months now, worked my way up to an anaconda by doing lots of different stuff, visited a few engineers as well. So I think I know how some of the game works.

My suggestion was aimed at *avoiding* to use the galaxy map - am I the only one who finds its interface clunky and annoying? Especially if you have a 500ly route plotted...

Anyhow, I reckon the simple "do I have enough fuel to reach my target" needs to be shown on the HUD. There is no sane reason to force us to use the galaxy map for that.

cheers, Bird

Ah right, since you posted in the Newcomer's Forum I assumed that you might just have missed something.

There is actually a forum for making suggestions (I don't know how useful it is, the Asp's bright lights are still mucking up the cockpit for example) and of course if you just want to see if there is support for your notion amongst the player-base there is always the Dangerous Discussion forum (or one of it's sub-fora).

You are quite correct that the galaxy map at the moment is "clunky" - (it is a disgrace that it's bugs are still there in my opinion) - it looks much better in the beta for 2.2 with features like ensuring scoopable stars etc but it still takes an age to load.

BTW - I don't think your idea appeals to me personally, the HUD is "busy" enough already and to be honest you can "guestimate" your remaining range by knowing the number of jumps left and how much your blue sections have been biting off the gauge - personally I fit a scoop for long journeys and just scoop anyway. Also, in the next update there are hyperspace "boosts" from White Dwarfs and Neutron stars - I don't see how your gauge would be of any use then.

[alien]

 

[Alex Brentnall]

Oooh I'm late:

If your current target is selected the fuel bar will go blue to show what fuel will be used in the jump, if the entire bar is blue you can't jump. Obviously that just covers your singular next jump. For routes you use the galmap as below:

 

[aRJay]

Oooh I'm late:

If your current target is selected the fuel bar will go blue to show what fuel will be used in the jump, if the entire bar is blue you can't jump. Obviously that just covers your singular next jump. For routes you use the galmap as below:

https://fuelrats.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/10/FilteringScoopables_instructions.jpg

Next month when the new version comes out there will be a button in the galaxy map filters that will make the route plotter only use the stars shown by the filter.

 

[Alex Brentnall]

Next month when the new version comes out there will be a button in the galaxy map filters that will make the route plotter only use the stars shown by the filter.

I know, fuel rats are already discussing who will recreate that image

 

[Chris Simon]

Hi Chris, you can plot a route to a system without having enough fuel to actually get there. So you have to fuel scoop along the way, but it would be neat to see (directly in the HUD) when you have scooped enough fuel. I know you can see this in the galaxy map, but we should be able to see it directly in the HUD.

Actually, on a side note, it'd be cool if I could plot a route to destination for one of my transactions directly from the transaction list without needing to open the galaxy map. Again I get the feeling that we're being forced to use the galaxy map for no good reason...

cheers, Bird

Yes, that kind of makes sense, but I'm afraid that getting to this level of "quality of life" features will be impossible or take a long time, unfortunately.