Fix Materials Please!

[Gavin786]

Dear Frontier,

It is really ludicrous, there is no easy, consistent way to get certain materials. Now it is just impossible to find pharmaceutical isolators and improvised components. The farming of HGE has now been 'nerfed' (3.3.02) without a corresponding balance patch.

After the removal of board flipping, the competition between commanders for missions now, and no correspondingly increased spawn rate of missions, certain other materials are very difficult to consistently get, biotech conductors springs to mind.

I also strongly suspect there is a hidden competition between commanders for HGEs. That they are not per-instance-per-commander but the new 'mission server' tracks them globally.

This whole situation is ridiculous, especially since money has now been significantly buffed.

May I suggest a compromise. There seems to be a 6-1 ratio of trading one category of thing for another in material trader. Missions price a G5 material at 500k credits. Could we perhaps BUY materials from the trader at say 3M apiece? Right now with mining it would be worth it and allow a consistent farm rate of engineering materials.

Buying and Selling G5 and other materials is a way around all of this mess.

And right now, things are a total mess. It really infuriates me that the whole HGE farming was just nerfed without a corresponding buff elsewhere to balance things, has happened so many times that things get more difficult for cmdrs with often only a token improvement elsewhere to compensate. Massacre Missions when they were a thing(one of the most fun gameplay mechanics to wing with friends and go hunt for really nice payouts, gone without a not to anything else), Board Flipping with a measly increased spawn rate and competition between commanders eliminating missions. These are just a few things off the top of my head, there have been many more. Every single one of these things hurts long-standing commanders just increases the grind, makes life more difficult. You have just major buffed money. Allow us to spend some of that to engineer our ships. So many long-term CMDRs have left the game, and often reason cited is having to grind to get anywhere. People have lives outside Elite and when it is as tough as it is to get mats it encourages people to leave game. Truth is I am pretty unhappy/ about eliminating HGE farming without balancing elsewhere, and without letting us know it was coming up and giving time to stockpile/do what engineering we wanted. It is not even in the patch notes that you have done this.

50 G5/hr is the right collection rate. @ 500k/G5 equivalent rate this is 25 mil/hr. It is reasonable. Make it easy for us, make it happen. And make it happen soon.

Signing off,

CMDR Gavin786

 

[Stealthie]

Personally, I'd urge FDev to completely ignore the presence of mat-traders during any consideration of how mat-gathering works.

Mat-gathering should be viable as a single operation. Look for mat's. Find them. Use them.

If you actually need mat-traders to make mat-gathering functional, the system is broken.
Mat-traders are handy but they shouldn't be a necessary, intrinsic part of the operation of mat-gathering.

*EDIT*

Also, I sat in a Boom system for 3 hours last night, scanning every new USS that appeared there.
In 3 hours there were 2 HGE USSs.

In the beta, I couldn't throw a rock without hitting half a dozen HGEs in pretty-much any Boom system.

Working as intended?

 

[Auronio]

Can't comment on finding rare mats via USS cause I didn't visit them recently however the mentioned biotech conductors are still available via some missions and pharmaceutical isolators along with other high grade mats still drop from Anacondas.

May serve as workaround until the other issues are fixed.

 

[Bigmaec]

While I disagree to buying mats, the current rate for HGE seems way off. Beta was fun, you could equip any ship with a small collector limpet and gather stuff on the fly - or even just scoop, but now it's more tedious then ever. Fix please.

 

[xxThe_Dice_manxx]

How to get materials:

Combat method.

Go to a system with plenty of factions and take the massacre missions in a nearby system with red sites.
Goto red site and kill all anted ships then collect dropped mats with limpets, you can also get data here.
Turn the n missions get mats and data.

Evac method.

Find a damaged station in the map and set up a ship with passenger cabins eco class.
Do the evac mission and get mats and data as reward.

Passenger mission method.

Go to Robigo and take a ship that has passenger cabin all types.
Do the passenger missions and get mats and data as reward.

Fill up on grade 4 and 5 then off to the mat trader you go and trade for what you need most.

It couldn't be easier.

 

[Bigmaec]

How to get materials:

Combat method.

Go to a system with plenty of factions and take the massacre missions in a nearby system with red sites.
Goto red site and kill all anted ships then collect dropped mats with limpets, you can also get data here.
Turn the n missions get mats and data.

Evac method.

Find a damaged station in the map and set up a ship with passenger cabins eco class.
Do the evac mission and get mats and data as reward.

Passenger mission method.

Go to Robigo and take a ship that has passenger cabin all types.
Do the passenger missions and get mats and data as reward.

Fill up on grade 4 and 5 then off to the mat trader you go and trade for what you need most.

It couldn't be easier.

While viable, it's only a workaround, as you can't control the drops of destroyed ships and missions give only a few different materials.

 

[xxThe_Dice_manxx]

While viable, it's only a workaround, as you can't control the drops of destroyed ships and missions give only a few different materials.

Did you miss the part where you trade for what you need?

Combat method works by increasing combat rank /reputation in systems/fed or imp rank and shed loads of credits as well as loads of mats.

It is the best way bar none.

 

[Kaocraft]

Personally, I'd urge FDev to completely ignore the presence of mat-traders during any consideration of how mat-gathering works.

Mat-gathering should be viable as a single operation. Look for mat's. Find them. Use them.

If you actually need mat-traders to make mat-gathering functional, the system is broken.
Mat-traders are handy but they shouldn't be a necessary, intrinsic part of the operation of mat-gathering.

*EDIT*

Also, I sat in a Boom system for 3 hours last night, scanning every new USS that appeared there.
In 3 hours there were 2 HGE USSs.

In the beta, I couldn't throw a rock without hitting half a dozen HGEs in pretty-much any Boom system.

Working as intended?

This. People lauded the Mat Traders when they were added but it should have been recognized for what it was: Frontier giving themselves a "get out of jail free" card when it comes to game balance.

 

[Bigmaec]

Did you miss the part where you trade for what you need?

Combat method works by increasing combat rank /reputation in systems/fed or imp rank and shed loads of credits as well as loads of mats.

It is the best way bar none.

Did you miss the 6 to 1 part and the part that it is a workaround?

 

[Aashenfox]

Did you miss the part where you trade for what you need?

Combat method works by increasing combat rank /reputation in systems/fed or imp rank and shed loads of credits as well as loads of mats.

It is the best way bar none.

It's not the best way for almost any materials, even now in 3.3.02 or whatever patch it was they shafted us with the HGEs, and I honeslty don't mean any offense when I say that posts like this, intimating that there is no big problem, in the current climate of frustration from people who are deep into the mechanics of this game, aren't helpful. I still do perhaps 30-40 G5 rolls a week and I have never used combat as a source of materials (despite being 99% a combat pilot), I literally ignore the mats floating after a ship is killed. Sorry mate, I don't mean to have a go, I know that the factual part of what you say is accurate, but it's like saying...'Oh, the wheel on your car is broken? Here, use this frozen pizza instead.'

For G5 manufactured the best way continues to be to farm any random HGE you can find until you have a decent number of things you don't need, then trade them, OR run passenger missions out of Ceos for Biotech Conductors and Exquisite Focus Crystals and trade those

For G5 data, the best method is to farm the Jameson Cobra for AECs and trade those, OR run passenger missions out Ceos for MEF and trade those.

For G5 raw, there's only one way so no need to elaborate. Fortunately, it is decently rewarding for effort spent no further comment needed.

All G4s should come from those via trading (not because it's a gameplay workaround, simply because it's more efficient).