Beyond did literally nothing to help the grind.

[AndiBcool]

Hmm did that new engineer stuff today for the new 7A power disruptor for the T-10.
This costs hell a lot of materials. Before i only needed 1-3 trys to get a decent mod now i spend a lot materials for just one module and the worst most are grade 5 mats.
Hey and special effects now also costs mats, unlocking Guardian modules costs mats, not sure about Anti Thargoid modules thought.

So this system does not reduce the material farming, it increases it.
Missions rather give useless engineer commodity instead of usefull data or materials and when it gives grade 5 it reduces the payout of credits by a lot. This was also better before.


As for me engineers are a big fun killer. Sure i like the mods but this materials and data farming is killing the most fun.
I would happily avoid this mess of gameplay but im forced to do it because deadly and elite NPCs use thease mods and without a good modded protection the NPCs will kill you in no time.

This new system is a bad joke.

 

[Red Anders]

I feel your pain. I’m in a similar position – a decent sized fleet of ships already engineered to G5. People talk about “trading down”, but how does that help in our position? The rate of 6-1 to exchange G5s is just too high if you're collecting mats the traditional way. Then there's the fact that we need to roll 10+ times, with that ba****d unpredictable final 1/16th that’s simply sadistic. Granted, once I finally complete a module the results are much better, but it’s proving inordinately time consuming.

Incidentally Red Anders, I’m collecting far more G5s as mission rewards, so I think that’s the game for people in our position now. I collected 35 units of G5 data running transport missions in my Beluga (the trip was about 40 minutes).

I'm very open to being shown the error of my ways though… please.

Yeah, for a lot of things missions are the way to go mate. To be honest even in 2.4 they were, I bagged more EFCs and CIF than I can count from missions and the rewards now are higher still. I've never seen the specific data type I was looking for as a mission reward though unfortunately, which takes us back to the 6-1 exchange rate for grade 5 to grade 5 across data types.

There's no way I'm even trying to convert most of my ships at the moment, I'm finishing the Orca off and that's it. I'll hope for a balancing pass on the exchange rates because some of them are just absurd.

G5 to G5 across type could go to 3-1 and still not be unreasonably generous, you're still swapping an entire drop of one type for a single unit of another at the same grade.

Even dropping the G4 to G5, G3 to G4 etc down to 5-1 would make a difference when you consider the cumulative effect, although I think the lower tiers could stand going to 4-1.

If G3 to G4 and below was 4-1 and G4 to G5 was 5-1 that would still be a 20-1 rate for G3 to G5 which is hardly the 'supermarket' someone suggested earlier in the thread - it would need 7 drops of a G3 material (21 units) to trade up to a G5. 36 units as it is now is just insane, that's 12 drops of a G3 material for a G5.

I've never had a problem with collecting G3 and below materials because it';s quick enough that it doesn't feel grindy and the issues around layers of RNG when looking for HGE etc don't kick in in any significant way. It's actually quite fun at that point, it's when you get into the HGE only materials and worst of all the ones that don't even always spawn in all HGEs when in the right system type, state, government, allegiance etc. Stuff like proto radiolic and military alloys. The tedium trying to find those reliably is just immense.

Agreed. The choke-points are still there and your description is typical of many others coming in. I think I was lucky in that my own build by pure coincidence didn't force me through many choke-points and, furthermore, I didn't suffer at the hands of the HGE USS spawn gods.

Concerning the latter, given the extent of the variations we are seeing from Cmdr to Cmdr, and how persistent problems are being reported by experienced RNGineers who know the rules of the USS gods, I really do wonder whether something is happening similar to the problems that used to afflict RES spawn (because the game didn't make an RNG check each time an NPC ship spawned, but rather did one RNG roll when we logged in, then put us on the applicable table, for better or worse).

This is the thing. I don't want the game to just throw high grade materials at me every time I log on because there's no challenge in that and as a result, no meaningful sense of achievement. However there was also absolutely rock-all sense of achievement in the six hours I spent hunting for data earlier. I wouldn't actually be surprised if there wasn't some form of bug or glitch at play for that specific situation because even by the standards of this game 6 hours is exceptional.

By the way your point about the exact modules we're upgrading is a valid one. I could probably do a few of my combat ships relatively painlessly. Hilariously, the upgrade I needed the abnormal compact emissions data for was a grade 5 long range detailed surface scanner... I've also done my shield on the same ship (enhanced low power with the mass reduction secondary) and it took me about 20 minutes to pick up what I needed for that, although admittedly I did have some of it already.

 

[rhiz]

Yeah, for a lot of things missions are the way to go mate. To be honest even in 2.4 they were, I bagged more EFCs and CIF than I can count from missions and the rewards now are higher still. I've never seen the specific data type I was looking for as a mission reward though unfortunately, which takes us back to the 6-1 exchange rate for grade 5 to grade 5 across data types.

There's no way I'm even trying to convert most of my ships at the moment, I'm finishing the Orca off and that's it. I'll hope for a balancing pass on the exchange rates because some of them are just absurd.

G5 to G5 across type could go to 3-1 and still not be unreasonably generous, you're still swapping an entire drop of one type for a single unit of another at the same grade.

Even dropping the G4 to G5, G3 to G4 etc down to 5-1 would make a difference when you consider the cumulative effect, although I think the lower tiers could stand going to 4-1.

If G3 to G4 and below was 4-1 and G4 to G5 was 5-1 that would still be a 20-1 rate for G3 to G5 which is hardly the 'supermarket' someone suggested earlier in the thread - it would need 7 drops of a G3 material (21 units) to trade up to a G5. 36 units as it is now is just insane, that's 12 drops of a G3 material for a G5.

I've never had a problem with collecting G3 and below materials because it';s quick enough that it doesn't feel grindy and the issues around layers of RNG when looking for HGE etc don't kick in in any significant way. It's actually quite fun at that point, it's when you get into the HGE only materials and worst of all the ones that don't even always spawn in all HGEs when in the right system type, state, government, allegiance etc. Stuff like proto radiolic and military alloys. The tedium trying to find those reliably is just immense.



This is the thing. I don't want the game to just throw high grade materials at me every time I log on because there's no challenge in that and as a result, no meaningful sense of achievement. However there was also absolutely rock-all sense of achievement in the six hours I spent hunting for data earlier. I wouldn't actually be surprised if there wasn't some form of bug or glitch at play for that specific situation because even by the standards of this game 6 hours is exceptional.

By the way your point about the exact modules we're upgrading is a valid one. I could probably do a few of my combat ships relatively painlessly. Hilariously, the upgrade I needed the abnormal compact emissions data for was a grade 5 long range detailed surface scanner... I've also done my shield on the same ship (enhanced low power with the mass reduction secondary) and it took me about 20 minutes to pick up what I needed for that, although admittedly I did have some of it already.

I was wondering whether the type of material rewards that a station gives is tied to the system state in some way. All of the rewards from my local haunts seem to be of the same type. At least with this method exchanging for G5s feels doable though – it’d take an age to harvest enough of them in the traditional way.

I agree – 2-1 or 3-1 would be reasonable for G5. All they need to do is tweak the ratios to perfect the system and really alleviate many of the issues that people have with engineering. This would allow those who struggle to find G4s & G5s to trade up, and the rest of us to exchange G5s without feeling ripped-off.

I’ve always enjoyed engineering and never really had a problem finding mats (even liked some of it), but this new system just feels excessive. They’ve introduce some great things in principle, but in my view the balance is off.

To be fair to FD, they’re probably judging the grind in relation to the average number of rolls that it took to get a god-roll in the previous system. That said, when you can see the finishing line and know that there’s a discrete number of steps to reach it, it’s human nature to feel that the task is unfinished, and so it just feels like more grind. In the old system I’d try my luck as and when. I also miss the variation a bit, engineering feels somewhat perfunctory now - but that's a different thread.

 

[Lee Archer]

I could have filled my ship with exquisite focus crystals from the boards. Sadly today I'm looking for abnormal compact emissions data. Just spent 30 minutes in a CZ scanning every ship. Total obtained = none. Now about to fly around looking for encoded emissions whilst praying for Anacondas to scan and then praying that the RNG gods smile on me if I do find some ...
Actually the best advice around is to seriously stop categorising people wanting to actually use the new content delivered by this update as 'obsessing'. I get that you don't care about it, really I do, I mean you've mentioned it enough times now. Frankly though, your own preferences don't have anything to do with what is objectively poor design.
I swear if Sandy came round and took a crap on some people here's living room floor, all they would do is compliment him on texture and volume.

Well put- the inability to really influence to rate of drop, by skill, smart play, charisma, previous time invested- thats what kills me, no advantage due to previous work in game- not much anyways.
Ah but some like a strong leader, big brother.

Crucial
Is this.
I do not find scavenger hunting for materials enjoyable- at all. If you do, then this has a different timbre to you.
None of it. Personal preference- for me it’s a negative good- like Shoveling Snow, yes it’s great when it’s done but, any reduction is appreciated.
Surprisingly little really organized form talk about how to short circuit the grind. Dav’s hope yes, but few hints Ive gotten was from this official forum. Maybe bad blood between shill apologists and putative ‘whiners’.

 

[Kenneth McGrew]

To me, "supercruise" has hopelessly unintuitive and uninteresting velocity control, that captures absolutely nothing at all of the sense of being invested in stupendous mechanical momentum, so i simply don't use it.

..?

How do you get about?

Its true SC can induce a slight dribble and send the most sane person into a coma (hutton orbital a beacon for the unemployed or down right insane) but the only other way to get to your destinations is at circa 400m/s (ship dependant) and that's got to be on par with watching paint dry.

 

[Truesilver]

Incidentally Red Anders, I’m collecting far more G5s as mission rewards, so I think that’s the game for people in our position now. I collected 35 units of G5 data running transport missions in my Beluga (the trip was about 40 minutes).

I'm very open to being shown the error of my ways though… please.

No error, 35 x g5 data in 40 mins sounds like a jolly decent min/max to me.

How do you get about?

Dunno because not played them but I think that the earlier poster is referring to Elite 2 or 3, in which the ships accelerated continuously in normal space to the sorts of speeds we see in SC (I think??)

 

[Chrysophylax]

Dunno because not played them but I think that the earlier poster is referring to Elite 2 or 3, in which the ships accelerated continuously in normal space to the sorts of speeds we see in SC (I think??)

I don't think you could go FTL but I never really tried it. More importantly than FTL tho was time compression. Something like a day per second at max compression. Made even a run to Alpha Centauri a lot faster than your average supercruise flight

 

[Spacecat]

This new system is a bad joke.

I didn't really think it was that terrible for one module, but now that I bought a Chieftain, I'm faced with having to come up with
hundreds of materials to upgrade it. Wee! Who came up with this system? The increased material limits don't help, only allow you to store/trade the massive amounts of materials needed. They should have just tweaked the old system and left it alone, but once FD implements a bad gameplay idea, they stick to it.

 

[lovely lovely]

The grind is horrendous now if you have a fleet of ships switch from legacy.
They say use the traders - yeah right - maybe for 1 or 2 swaps from lower to higher G, however when you need (say on average) 10 rolls to max out G5 this doesn't fly - then multiply by the number of ships!

I've spent since the "upgrade" countless hours and so far FSD and Shield Gen are the only things I've managed to upgrade across my fleet. Lets not forget it's only 1 level we're talking about here - sparing lots of thoughts for those starting unengineered!

Tot it up for yourselves

Number of Modules * Number of Ships * 30 Mats (of various G and ave 10 rolls to max G5)

Without weapons there's what somewhere around 13 modules (Core/internal/utils) in a ship (some more, some less)?
Say 10 ships (small number n a fleet)

13 * 10 * 30 = 3,900 Mats minimum.

At least with the old system you got some sort of upgrade (non god like) with just one roll at G5 - here with the new system fleet owners are going to be weeks if not months fafing about lugging ships / modules around just to get their fleet upgraded.

What is the point of this game again? Cant be to just fit and upgrade ships all the time? you need to use them for something surely?

 

[Spacecat]

This is why all my grandfathered builds are staying as is. Ain't nobody got time for this #&$%! There was a reasonable balance between collection and upgrades before. Now, it's 90% collection.

 

[Red Anders]

So, has anybody found a HGE USS anywhere since this patch today?

I logged on at 11.30pm, it's now 2.15am. I've spent about an hour of that time messing about on a planet. I've spent the other hour and 45 minutes looking for HGEs and I have found none. That's checking in five or six systems, all of which had populations of 20m+ with the most recent being 13.3bn, flying in deep space the entire time.

I have to start wondering about bugs at this point because I have never experienced anything like this, nor would a game designer with even a shred of their sanity remaining actually code it.

 

[Darty]

but once FD implements a bad gameplay idea, they stick to it.

Unless they can come up with some way to make it worse

But seriously, they do seem to get too attached to their mistakes.

 

[MrFailfactory]

The grind is horrendous now if you have a fleet of ships switch from legacy.
They say use the traders - yeah right - maybe for 1 or 2 swaps from lower to higher G, however when you need (say on average) 10 rolls to max out G5 this doesn't fly - then multiply by the number of ships!

I've spent since the "upgrade" countless hours and so far FSD and Shield Gen are the only things I've managed to upgrade across my fleet. Lets not forget it's only 1 level we're talking about here - sparing lots of thoughts for those starting unengineered!

Tot it up for yourselves

Number of Modules * Number of Ships * 30 Mats (of various G and ave 10 rolls to max G5)

Without weapons there's what somewhere around 13 modules (Core/internal/utils) in a ship (some more, some less)?
Say 10 ships (small number n a fleet)

13 * 10 * 30 = 3,900 Mats minimum.

At least with the old system you got some sort of upgrade (non god like) with just one roll at G5 - here with the new system fleet owners are going to be weeks if not months fafing about lugging ships / modules around just to get their fleet upgraded.

What is the point of this game again? Cant be to just fit and upgrade ships all the time? you need to use them for something surely?

Yes, fleet owners should indeed expect to spend a fair amount of time if they want to fully upgrade their entire fleet in the new system.

Expecting otherwise would be, quite frankly, a ridiculous expectation.

Additionally, if you didn't have God-roll G5's (but had solid rolls) pre-3.0, then you will likely surpass what you had with the third G5 roll in the new system. Not the tenth.

If you did have those rolls, then you will likely surpass those on the fifth roll in a lot of cases. Again, not the tenth.

As I mentioned earlier in the thread, it is quite likely that people who already had fleet-deep investments in Engineering are not the intended primary benefactors in the new system.

If I am right, then that distinction would belong to new Commanders, and tenured Commanders who previously did not Engineer much, if at all.

Riôt

 

[Xious]

Hmmmm... as opposed to "figuratively" nothing?

 

[rhiz]

As I mentioned earlier in the thread, it is quite likely that people who already had fleet-deep investments in Engineering are not the intended primary benefactors in the new system.

No s@!t!

(That said, I'm getting better results across the board)

 

[rhiz]

So, has anybody found a HGE USS anywhere since this patch today?

I logged on at 11.30pm, it's now 2.15am. I've spent about an hour of that time messing about on a planet. I've spent the other hour and 45 minutes looking for HGEs and I have found none. That's checking in five or six systems, all of which had populations of 20m+ with the most recent being 13.3bn, flying in deep space the entire time.

I have to start wondering about bugs at this point because I have never experienced anything like this, nor would a game designer with even a shred of their sanity remaining actually code it.

I had a pretty good run finding Proto Heat Radiators in Gliese 9029 yesterday (Boom State, pop 3.7 billion) – the HGE rate seemed to be as high as 1 in 4, with a 50% chance of Proto Heat Radiators or Imperial Sheilding. I ended up with around 27 within an hour or so. What are you looking for specifically?

 

[Electric Kite]

If you think being able to swap materials for the ones you actually need at material traders is "LITERALLY NOTHING" then im sorry, but you have an issue using your brain.

 

[zarrazee]

OP.
I think FD haven't acknowledged there is a problem with ENG, cos there isn't one. In fact as I said on another post, ENG has never been easier.

 

[Electric Kite]

OP.
I think FD haven't acknowledged there is a problem with ENG, cos there isn't one. In fact as I said on another post, ENG has never been easier.

Agreed.

 

[Blackcompany]

OP.
I think FD haven't acknowledged there is a problem with ENG, cos there isn't one. In fact as I said on another post, ENG has never been easier.

I've "only" ENG 1 ship under Beyond - I'll get around to my other ships before the end of the year. No rush.

RNG mat grind is crap.

Scanning wakes us crap.

Shooting rocks is laughably awful.

RNG upgrades is bad.

I'd say those constitute problems.

Outside of this precious little safe space echo chamber, this game and it's design are laughing stocks. There's a reason for that.