Engineers Are there any clues or is the player forced to google?

[Snooch leBooch]

Yeah, this might work only in Mobius or open so i'm kind of just thinking out loud here, fully aware that it doesn't solve the obvious issue, but - the following just as an example, there have been quiet a few GalNet posts about a certain group of CMDR's that play around with the 'science' surrounding Meta Alloys, Barnie's etc. - and where to find them - there even was a 'grab this system for this group to help with MA 'research'' CG. There's also the odd mission involving MA's available around the 'hotspots'
It is very likely that one is able to at least find a cmdr ingame who might know where to find this particular group or share otherwise valuable knowledge - if one is not inclined to use outside resources and hasn't seen the galnet articles or taken part in any avaliable MA and artefact CG/missons/events.

While i still agree that the needed information for this type of search/quest/grind? could be presented better - i do also think that some ways to get what you want ingame are already in place and just being missed. The 'fall back on hive knowledge to gain some more info' thing can work without outside help - granted you have to meet the right guy.

And yeah it would not be a bad thing to get some more breadcrumbs thrown out ingame via npc's or whatnot - if anything solo mode could definitely use it.

 

[Rob Galaxy]

No Need to Google... Use the serch function in the forum... ...and then set a browser bookmark for the intersting topics.
For example you will find these:
https://forums.frontier.co.uk/showthread.php?t=63119 - About Rare Goods
https://forums.frontier.co.uk/showthread.php?t=122593 - About Systems Permit
https://forums.frontier.co.uk/showthread.php?t=227901 - About Barnacles, UA and Meta-Alloys
And to find a particular item /word in these lists, use the search function of your browser...

 

[Brian of Ardagh]

You know how sorry that excuse sounded?

As for clues I suggest to pepper NPC chatter with hints and suggestions for players. It is nice way to extend mechanic and give players ideas.

I second that suggestion. A game I used to play called Escape Velocity allowed you to hail NPC players, they would talk to you, give you hints, etc. I think the hints were like "I heard the selling price of aluminum in system X was really low." I find the NPCs in Elite to be snobbish, you can hail but they ignore you!

I actually read that Escape Velocity was patterned after Elite, although it was a top down view, no first person.

 

[Brian of Ardagh]

Google is your friend

Kind of ruins the immersion in game though. I get around that by having a small monitor in portrait mode (900x1440) on my right side with a number of useful sites open, the forum, coriolis, eddb, etc. That way I can pretend that it's a communication panel in my cockpit. Like to get a bigger monitor but can't justify it right now. I wish eddb.io had a dark theme.

MB's suggestion about chatting at the station is good, assuming they will answer. I saw a few in open recently, hailed but no response. One guy I hailed was sitting there so I got real close, turned my lights on and off and used my thrusters to maneuver around his ship, look inside the cockpit, etc. He boosted away and then jumped out. Some people just don't want to be bothered with I guess.

 

[Soon(TM)]

There is definitly a need for some kind of encyclopedia inside the game where players can get background information about all these stuff, including a brief history about the major factions and other important characters, summaries of important stories, general lore etc.
Refering to GalNet articles does not work since you can only access articles a few months old. New players are totally on their own.

Unfortunatly, some time ago David Braben said that althought this would be cool thing, it would be too much work.. I hope they will change their mind some time..

How about spending some cash on an Intro to the actual game instead of just the Elite Logo coming up every time?

Doesnt have to be full CGI like the YouTube trailers (although it would reach a bigger audience considering the amount of money it must cost to make those trailers just to put on YouTube!)

Maybe some kind of back story with a bit of dialogue about factions and stuff, could be done in the same fashion as Homeworld was, with nice artistic drawings with a voice over.

I would love that, some sort of back story added to the game, especially for new starters!

 

[atekido]

all the information regarding soontil relics and metal alloys have appeared in galnet. problem isn't that people have to refer to out-of-game 'god-like' sources of information. problem is that people are using these god-like sources to find places like robigo to grind instead of playing the game.

That is because people who work for a living do not want to grind.. they want to play a GAME. Also fact that if ED/Frontier was not LAZY and actually made sure the CORRECT way to get META not metal... alloys was not broke by implementing that in the beta that also would have solved some issues. Fact is ED/frontier has got complacent with letting the community fend for itself. But the problem is there is not a cerntral community driven place that has ALL the information. it is a fractured community that has more of a buckshot pattern with tidbits of information spread all over. I am pretty sure people didn't spend money to waste more time reading forums than playing the game. and lets face it.. take away the mind numbing flying to this station or that planet and just include doing specific missions and or dog fighting and the ratio of being in game and out is not that far apart. Maybe if all the community information was centrally located and easily found it wouldn't be such a PITA but in its current setup it is a broken system.