Before you shoot me down: I simply believe pressing and holding a mouse button down for an arbitrary amount of time is not engaging gameplay.
This is especially true with an unlimited range scanner.
Remove the need of making a fire group for this, and make it charge up and honk (don't wan't to lose that sound!) automatically as soon as something unknown is within its active range.
The bar can be shown on the UI along with Heat Sinks and Point Defense. If the scan doesn't get all of the astronomical bodies in the system, the bar returns to empty to show you still need to look; once everything is found to bar stays filled and "Completed", just like Kill Warrant scans. This would actually make shorter ranged scanners more usable for new players.
As for passive range: make it so it does the same as a targeted scan, without the target. This way you can actually multi-task while exploring, scanning bodies while still heading towards a specific destination. A targeted scan could still be done at a greater range than passive. However, Passive range might need to be brought down a bit so it only works on celestial bodies very close to you.
But, aside from being able to multi-task during exploration, it doesn't make scanning more engaging now does it?
Well, in addition to the automated honk, you could also have something like the SRV wave scanner to eliminate the need for unlimited range scans: you see the scan isn't complete and follow the bars on the wave scanner towards a gravity distortion until the discovery scanner charges up again and you find something new in the black.
So you don't have the noise on all the time, the wave scan would only show bodies that aren't picked up by the scan. This could include the new "anomalies" FDev want to add in Beyond. It would also help lead in new players to SRV scanning by making space discovery similar to ground discovery.
This is just an example of what an automated discovery scanner could open up - aside from a fire group configuration.
What about you guys, do you think it's super important that we have to charge up the scanner manually?
If you don't like the idea of a wave scanner in space, what do you think it could open up to automate the Discovery Scanner?
Oh, also on the subject of scanners: shouldn't we have a Class 2 scanner that combines the Discovery Scanner and the Detailed Surface Scanner by now?
This is especially true with an unlimited range scanner.
Remove the need of making a fire group for this, and make it charge up and honk (don't wan't to lose that sound!) automatically as soon as something unknown is within its active range.
The bar can be shown on the UI along with Heat Sinks and Point Defense. If the scan doesn't get all of the astronomical bodies in the system, the bar returns to empty to show you still need to look; once everything is found to bar stays filled and "Completed", just like Kill Warrant scans. This would actually make shorter ranged scanners more usable for new players.
As for passive range: make it so it does the same as a targeted scan, without the target. This way you can actually multi-task while exploring, scanning bodies while still heading towards a specific destination. A targeted scan could still be done at a greater range than passive. However, Passive range might need to be brought down a bit so it only works on celestial bodies very close to you.
But, aside from being able to multi-task during exploration, it doesn't make scanning more engaging now does it?
Well, in addition to the automated honk, you could also have something like the SRV wave scanner to eliminate the need for unlimited range scans: you see the scan isn't complete and follow the bars on the wave scanner towards a gravity distortion until the discovery scanner charges up again and you find something new in the black.
So you don't have the noise on all the time, the wave scan would only show bodies that aren't picked up by the scan. This could include the new "anomalies" FDev want to add in Beyond. It would also help lead in new players to SRV scanning by making space discovery similar to ground discovery.
This is just an example of what an automated discovery scanner could open up - aside from a fire group configuration.
What about you guys, do you think it's super important that we have to charge up the scanner manually?
If you don't like the idea of a wave scanner in space, what do you think it could open up to automate the Discovery Scanner?
Oh, also on the subject of scanners: shouldn't we have a Class 2 scanner that combines the Discovery Scanner and the Detailed Surface Scanner by now?
