∞ probes?

[CMDR Redcrest]

In the new update you won't need to cruise around and scan planets anymore, sorry to spoil your fun, but you could choose to visit each planet and it's associated moons in person if it means that much to you. It would be like asking players to pretend that their probes aren't infinite if it bothers them.

The new system still works for me.
Cruise around the galaxy.
Fire probes at planets.
See something interesting go investigate.
I've been wanting a means to discover stuff that is accessible to joe average player for a long time. Messing around with graphics settings and flying around planets eye balling everything in tedious fashion is just not fun for me.
This sounds like I can get more into exploration and get more out of it in terms of satisfaction.

 

[seko]

You do it or you don't, good call by FD, always some twonkers, who compllain for complanings sake, this thread is just in ridiculous

 

[andrewg_oz]

Arguing for infinite probes is not arguing for less gameplay.
It's stating that non horizons players can take part in this CORE new mechanic, it's really simple.

Also, I don't count yet more material gathering for something that is a pre-requisite under the new system to be gameplay anyway... It's just tedious nonsense, people wanting to add a pointless extra grind just because they want "realism", despite the fact that:
A) you need an srv, many explorers might not have one.
B) any number you put on probes is either too low that it becomes totally repetitive just having to stop scanning every tenth planet while you go do yet another material hunt, or too high that it's meaningless anyway.
C) NON HORIZONS PLAYERS CAN'T LAND ON PLANETS (I think that's been mentioned before maybe).
D) for the love of God, fdev have already decided based on their own research into this, let's not go down the ship transfer route again please.

If you want more gameplay from material gathering you have more than enough opportunity already, knock yourself out. Personally, I'd rather that any extra gameplay came from more new, different things to do, rather than yet another rehash of the same thing.

So, count me in for infinite probes, and well done fdev for taking the most sensible decision on this

A) Wrong. Mining of asteroids is proposed.
B) Wrong. A number is what brings in the additional gameplay.
C) True. But completely irrelevant (I think this has been pointed out before)
D) Frontier started out with finite probes. They got it right the first time.

 

[Tarman]

A) Wrong. Mining of asteroids is proposed.
B) Wrong. A number is what brings in the additional gameplay.
C) True. But completely irrelevant (I think this has been pointed out before)
D) Frontier started out with finite probes. They got it right the first time.

D.2) They actually said in the stream that they didn't, so there's that. >____>

 

[Iron Golem]

I quite liked the 'lore' suggestion of micro particles being collected by the DSS, handwavium enough to be passable.

As for more realism, how far do you want to go.... should it take years to go between planets, and dead would mean dead...

And for having a reason to dive down to a planet in your SRV, I do that in most systems with landable bodies, just because I find it fun to do so, no reason needed apart from the fact 'it is there'

To each of us our own way of playing, I'm certain others would find my way tedious and boring!

(edited bad grammar)

I'm having a good laugh imagining a game where once you die its so hardcore and immersive you get to buy the game again, oh imagine the fidelity. Shhh don't tell CR.

 

[andrewg_oz]

In regards to OAs poll. True story:

Australia is a constitutional monarchy. A few years ago we had a referendum to maybe change to a republic for which there was a lot of popular support. But it wasn't a simple yes/no question. The prime minister of the time was a staunch monarchist so the options were:

A) Remain a constitutional monarchy.
B) Become a republic with a president selected by Parliament.

The republican movement had some people who were happy with parliment selecting the president, others wanted the president directly elected by the people.

Option B successfully split the republic vote and the PMs desired outcome resulted. We're still a constitutional monarchy.

I see a lot of that in OAs poll. I would have put the options as:

A) Infinite probes with no additional gameplay
B) Finite probes with mining gameplay similar in intensity to refuelling/rearming an SRV

I wonder how that would have turned out?

 

[CMDR Redcrest]

In regards to OAs poll. True story:

Australia is a constitutional monarchy. A few years ago we had a referendum to maybe change to a republic for which there was a lot of popular support. But it wasn't a simple yes/no question. The prime minister of the time was a staunch monarchist so the options were:

A) Remain a constitutional monarchy.
B) Become a republic with a president selected by Parliament.

The republican movement had some people who were happy with parliment selecting the president, others wanted the president directly elected by the people.

Option B successfully split the republic vote and the PMs desired outcome resulted. We're still a constitutional monarchy.

I see a lot of that in OAs poll. I would have put the options as:

A) Infinite probes with no additional gameplay
B) Finite probes with mining gameplay similar in intensity to refuelling/rearming an SRV

I wonder how that would have turned out?

I wish the UK could have a referendum on the monarchy...

 

[insanephoton]

In regards to OAs poll. True story:

Australia is a constitutional monarchy. A few years ago we had a referendum to maybe change to a republic for which there was a lot of popular support. But it wasn't a simple yes/no question. The prime minister of the time was a staunch monarchist so the options were:

A) Remain a constitutional monarchy.
B) Become a republic with a president selected by Parliament.

The republican movement had some people who were happy with parliment selecting the president, others wanted the president directly elected by the people.

Option B successfully split the republic vote and the PMs desired outcome resulted. We're still a constitutional monarchy.

I see a lot of that in OAs poll. I would have put the options as:

A) Infinite probes with no additional gameplay
B) Finite probes with mining gameplay similar in intensity to refuelling/rearming an SRV

I wonder how that would have turned out?

Leading questions is one of the reasons they removed polls from the forum.

[video=youtube;G0ZZJXw4MTA]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G0ZZJXw4MTA[/video]

 

[akaliel]

In regards to OAs poll. True story:

Australia is a constitutional monarchy. A few years ago we had a referendum to maybe change to a republic for which there was a lot of popular support. But it wasn't a simple yes/no question. The prime minister of the time was a staunch monarchist so the options were:

A) Remain a constitutional monarchy.
B) Become a republic with a president selected by Parliament.

The republican movement had some people who were happy with parliment selecting the president, others wanted the president directly elected by the people.

Option B successfully split the republic vote and the PMs desired outcome resulted. We're still a constitutional monarchy.

I see a lot of that in OAs poll. I would have put the options as:

A) Infinite probes with no additional gameplay
B) Finite probes with mining gameplay similar in intensity to refuelling/rearming an SRV

I wonder how that would have turned out?

You might want to look at the options in OAs poll again. There were no leading questions. Everybody knew what he was asking. 11% dude. We dont want it. Let it go.

 

[[DOOK] Droogie]

You might want to look at the options in OAs poll again. There were no leading questions. Everybody knew what he was asking. 11% dude. We dont want it. Let it go.

Collecting materials to re-arm and refuel is just busy work. It's a battle against RNG hoping the stars align, you took the correct route home from work today, and patting your head while running your stomach in order to finally get that rock with the stuff you need to spawn.

That's really what I'm sure a lot of people (including me) don't want. I'll take infinite, please, so I can do the interesting gameplay.

 

[Stealthie]

I feel sorry for FDev to be honest. They keep trying to reign in some of the worst excesses of the seemingly desperate need some players have for everything to involve some form of grind, presumably because they realise it limits the game's appeal, but it seems there is a cohort that are determined to trash it.

Just to go back to this...

No idea if it's a deliberate choice or, perhaps, the result of a lack of imagination or limitations of the software but it seems like FDev have fallen into a bit of a "rut" with the way they allocate a level of difficulty to obtaining things in the game.

Everything related to mat's simply works on a linear scale of effort (which should not be confused with challenge or entertainment) vs reward.

Personally, I can't help wondering if it'd be possible to just get rid of most of this (almost) entirely.

How about if, instead, FDev looked at all the stuff we need mat's for and then came up with a variety of ways to achieve the same things?

Mat's (possibly in conjunction with a re-imagined refinery module) would be used to create all the things you require to re-supply your ship and nothing more.
An explorer (or anybody else) could fit an "Advanced Refinery" along with an AFMU and it'd allow them to "live off the land" almost perpetually.

For engineering, mat's would no longer be required.
Instead, visiting an engineer would get you involved in a variety of things that would reward you with the appropriate upgrade upon completion (with no RNG involved).

 

[andrewg_oz]

You might want to look at the options in OAs poll again. There were no leading questions. Everybody knew what he was asking. 11% dude. We dont want it. Let it go.

If doing a few minutes of mining every couple of hours is unwanted grind and busy work, how is firing an infinite number of probes at a planet and waiting for the scans to complete every couple of minutes any different? Sounds even *more* grindy to me.

I think the option people are really looking for is Zero Probes. Just press a button and get the surface POIs you're looking for immediately.

 

[Vash627]

It seems there has been a huge misunderstanding about the probe limit. It's not infinite, there's just a glitch and that is a number 8 that fell over onto it's side. We're supposed to just have 8 total probes, but due to the glitch it won't count down and FDEV have decided to pretend it's infinite for the time being until the glitch is fixed and it begins to count down from the originally intended 8 probes.

 

[M00ka]

It seems there has been a huge misunderstanding about the probe limit. It's not infinite, there's just a glitch and that is a number 8 that fell over onto it's side. We're supposed to just have 8 total probes, but due to the glitch it won't count down and FDEV have decided to pretend it's infinite for the time being until the glitch is fixed and it begins to count down from the originally intended 8 probes.

True but lets be honest here. If FD didn't have the infinity sign on the screen this thread would only run to about 20 posts, and 19 of those would be arguing what the actual number of probes carried is.

 

[Vash627]

True but lets be honest here. If FD didn't have the infinity sign on the screen this thread would only run to about 20 posts, and 19 of those would be arguing what the actual number of probes carried is.

I don't think we need any of that honesty stuff here. (Or do I? Was I being dishonest about not wanting honesty too?) [wacky]

Seriously, it's a glitch with a sideways 8 that prevents the ammo from depleting. It'll be fixed during the beta and a show will be put on to make it look like a very vocal minority influenced the devs into putting a finite limit on the probes. Totally true* story.





*not really

 

[Tarman]

I don't think we need any of that honesty stuff here. (Or do I? Was I being dishonest about not wanting honesty too?) [wacky]

Seriously, it's a glitch with a sideways 8 that prevents the ammo from depleting. It'll be fixed during the beta and a show will be put on to make it look like a very vocal minority influenced the devs into putting a finite limit on the probes. Totally true* story.





*not really

I thought it was a shoutout to the Mobius group.

 

[Stealthie]

I think the option people are really looking for is Zero Probes. Just press a button and get the surface POIs you're looking for immediately.

I keep saying the same stuff, so I'm just going to do that again....

I've been playing a bit of KSP again recently.
It's got a funky mod' available called "ScanSat".
ScanSat comprises a bunch of modules which you unlock gradually and allow you to map planet surfaces.
You can just nail the modules to a ship, fly around and get a map of the bits of planet you fly over.
A more involved method is to build satellites fitted with all the modules and then build a ship to deploy them.

You unlock the science to gain access to the modules.
You then design and build the satellites.
You then design and build a ship to carry and deploy them.
You then figure out a procedure for launching them (different altitudes and orbits to scan a planet more thoroughly) and recover them efficiently.
Finally, you can sit back and wait while the satellites compile a detailed map of a planet surface.

The whole process, from start to finish, is involving, challenging, requires skill and is rewarding.

Obviously, you probably wouldn't want something too similar to this in ED cos nobody's going to want to wait around for half an hour while "probes" do their thing but FDev could learn a lot from the challenging and rewarding nature of the process.

FDev only seem to know how to make players accomplish things using "brute force".
You want upgrades, keep pounding the engineers until you get them.
You want mat's, keep pounding USSs and other POIs until you gather them.
And now, if you want to discover things, keep launching probes until you find them.


Personally, I'd rather have a system that's more nuanced and rewards skill and experience.
Why not have something like the "honk" which reveals basic information about a system and then allow players to use their judgement and experience to decide whether there's anything IN that system worthy of further investigation?
And then they have to use some skill to locate POIs in an efficient manner.

Which brings us back to unlimited supply of probes.

FDev made a big deal about how it'll be possible to do all sorts of clever things with probes in order to maximise their potential usefulness.

What's the point of that if a player has an unlimited supply of probes available?

If one player makes the effort to learn how to do all sorts of clever things with probes so they can scan a planet using only a few of them, how does that grant them any kind of reward for their skill if any rock-ape can just dump probes like confetti and achieve the same result?
I thought the whole point of games was to reward skill, rather than try and negate the usefulness of it?

 

[[VR] Mad Mike]

There are other inconsistencies in the game as it is, off the top of my head stuff like we have Telepresence for multicrew and instant data transfer for getting fines and bounties but can't remote either pay them off or collect them. We have magical cargo boxes that hold materials that don't get destroyed but our data does. Soon we'll have our Codex being updated with every other players exploration data too. Our equipment or modules if you prefer get instantly changed as well. Escape pods instantly appear at stations. NPCs with unlimited ammo. The list goes on. If we can accept all of these, infinite probes shouldn't really be such a big deal.

Indeed this is a good point. I wish most of that was better thought out as well . Telepresence ... Iirc that was another 50 pager back in the day)

 

[[VR] Mad Mike]

Its a myth that NPC's have unlimited ammo.

Pretty sure they have *some* infinite ammo. They also always initially spawn with full iirc. Other "fun" mechanics are ships which can jump further than they should (maybe this was a bug and is fixed now?)

 

[[VR] Mad Mike]

You do it or you don't, good call by FD, always some twonkers, who compllain for complanings sake, this thread is just in ridiculous

This is a fair view to take -albeit rude on a discussion form- but only assuming you have never complained about anything in the game....... If you had that makes you a hypocrite which is far lamer than either wanting the new infinite probes or the initial 200 probes