Change Wake-Scanning for Quality of Life improvement

[Mphoenix92]

Current system:

You can't scan wakes unless you have a wake-scanner. Get within 4km of a wake you have selected as your target and hold the fire button for the wake scanner to scan it.

Proposed system:

Without a wake scanner, fly within 2km of a targeted wake in order to scan it with your ship scanner for data. This does not allow you to follow the ship that made the wake, or learn where it went. It just gives you the engineering materials.

With a wake scanner, all wakes produced within range of your sensors are automatically scanned for wake-related encoded data. Otherwise, identical to current system where you must fly within 4km to scan it down manually if you intend to follow the ship that produced the wake or learn where it went.

 

[Vardaugas]

Automatic wake scanning? So you could just sit outside of a station afk for a night and wake up to a filled wake data inventory? I don't see that happening.

 

[Northpin]

I'd be happy with them fixing the current wakes so they are fixed as they were before some Odyssey update broke them last year and again this year (IIRC)

 

[SteveWW57]

I'd be happy with them fixing the current wakes so they are fixed as they were before some Odyssey update broke them last year and again this year (IIRC)

I spent yesterday evening (just for something to do) sat outside a station wake scanning. I have upgraded the scanner to G4 with a 7.84km range. I must have gathered about 27 successful scans to give 81 DWEs and had no problems. With the longer range I only moved a km or two. I did not notice that anything was broken. What have I missed.

Steve 07.

 

[Brrokk]

Why expect to scan wakes without a wake scanner? It's not as if ships don't have plenty of utility slots.

 

[zikolach]

Somehow related to the wake scanner, more like a question - how would you like the ability to switch FSD destination target when FSD is being/already charged?

So basically while you scan someones wake signal you can pre-charge FSD.

The other use case is to charge FSD while looking for the star system which is not obscured by planet/star.

And another question - what if planetary rings (n SC) and other objects (like stations not in SC) would obscure destination, preventing player to make a jump?

 

[SteveWW57]

Why expect to scan wakes without a wake scanner? It's not as if ships don't have plenty of utility slots.

This thread is similar to a number of others that we have had recently. I believe it started with "all ships should have two cargo capacity in the cockpit (to allow ships without cargo holds to collect black boxes and escape pods". This mutated into "all ships should be able to interact with all random events on at least a basic level". Followed by "SRV cargo capacity should be available to the ship and not restricted by the ship cargo carrying capacity".

And all because (at least I believe), so as not to use module slots for non-combat related items. Basically, money for nothing.

Steve 07.

 

[Brrokk]

Somehow related to the wake scanner, more like a question - how would you like the ability to switch FSD destination target when FSD is being/already charged?

So basically while you scan someones wake signal you can pre-charge FSD.

The other use case is to charge FSD while looking for the star system which is not obscured by planet/star.

And another question - what if planetary rings (n SC) and other objects (like stations not in SC) would obscure destination, preventing player to make a jump?

AFAIK if you've scanned a wake and have it still targetted, your FSD tries to jump to the system indicated by the wake rather than one you previously set. I've not actually done this but I've had it tell me it was going to do this and interruped it by deselecting the wake.

It does seem a bit weird that you can jump through rings and stations, but not planets or stars. I guess the number-crunching might be a bit much; planets and stars have the advantage of being circles.

 

[zikolach]

It does seem a bit weird that you can jump through rings and stations.

It only looks weird until you think of witch-space travel as moving through another dimension. But it still feels inconsistent, why would some objects were blocking hyper-jumps, while the others weren't. Either one or another imo.

 

[varonica]

It only looks weird until you think of witch-space travel as moving through another dimension. But it still feels inconsistent, why would some objects were blocking hyper-jumps, while the others weren't. Either one or another imo.

I would suggest that planets and stars disrupt the targeting of the FSD due to gravitational lensing and other effects, whereas stations and rings aren't themselves massive enough to do that. It's not blocking the jump, it's blocking the targeting.

 

[Northpin]

What have I missed.

The fact that some wakes are not fixed but they move (which shouldn't happen)

 

[varonica]

The fact that some wakes are not fixed but they move (which shouldn't happen)

If they are outside the influence of the station and you are still inside would that make a difference, they are stationary and you are in orbit with the station?

 

[Northpin]

If they are outside the influence of the station and you are still inside would that make a difference, they are stationary and you are in orbit with the station?

at 5-10 km away from the station they should share the same influence and be in the same frame of reference.

I dont remember seeing speeding wakes in Horizons
In Odyssey they appeared at some point, they were fixed and now it appeared they're wandering again

 

[Ian Doncaster]

Why expect to scan wakes without a wake scanner? It's not as if ships don't have plenty of utility slots.

Sure, but the only major purpose of the wake scanner is to collect engineering materials - almost every other piece of equipment you can fit has an actual use and often a variety of actual uses, which can result in engineering materials as a byproduct of using it but aren't the primary reason 99% of them are bought and fitted.

Like HGEs (also should be scrapped) which again only exist as convenient sources of high-grade manufactured goods, it encourages grinding - fit the wake scanner, collect a bunch of wakes, replace it with something actually useful again - rather than collecting materials as you go along.

What I'd like them to go for is:
1) Scrap (among many others) wake-collected engineering data materials. There's already way too many different types of engineering material, it really wouldn't be a problem or even noticeably less immersive if FSD/FSDI engineering used e.g. the Emission data class instead. There's not a special Power Distributor Data class for that module, and no-one complains.
2) Add more reasons to scan wakes - e.g. if you scan a wake you can follow it without using fuel / beyond your normal jump range / without a 15-second countdown / etc. - e.g. FE2-style assassinations where the target starts off on a landing pad and if you don't want to take on the main station guns you have to wake scan to follow it - e.g. spy missions where you have to follow a target from system to system to discover something

 

[Northpin]

Like HGEs (also should be scrapped) which again only exist as convenient sources of high-grade manufactured goods, it encourages grinding - fit the wake scanner, collect a bunch of wakes, replace it with something actually useful again - rather than collecting materials as you go along.

My traders/haulers and mission runners have wake scanners. And i usually scan some wakes after exiting the station before jumping to destination
IIRC i've been in a Famine center only a several of times after they were reintroduced some 2? 3? years ago - as i said i usually get my wakes by playing, especially during trade CGs

 

[Ian Doncaster]

My traders/haulers and mission runners have wake scanners. And i usually scan some wakes after exiting the station before jumping to destination
IIRC i've been in a Famine center only a several of times after they were reintroduced some 2? 3? years ago - as i said i usually get my wakes by playing, especially during trade CGs

Oh, likewise, when I need them I just fit a wake scanner and use it on the way out of stations for a few weeks, then swap something more useful back into the slot, so it's not grindy as such ... but I'm very definitely just using it to get materials, not because knowing where the NPCs are going is of any use whatsoever.

 

[Northpin]

not because knowing where the NPCs are going is of any use whatsoever.

IIRC i've used the wake scanner for that purpose only once (within a gaming objective context and not for fooling around)

I think it was during Bridging the Gap interstellar initiative when i was scanning npc to nick their holds of guardian stuff.
But since they were clean, i used to let the cargo ships wake away, scan the wakes and pirate them in the next system which was not populated.
Fun times those Interstellar Initiatives, even tho it was a dry year otherwise


Edit: so i dont disagree with fitting a wake scanner only to get materials, but i'm not sacrificing anything else.
Plenty of slots on my shieldless Cutter, even with 4 PDT fitted
And even my Python can easily spare a slot for the wake scanner (i usually run 2 shield boosters, wake scanner and PDT or if i go shieldless i use heatsink, 2x pdt and wake scanner)

 

[DemiserofD]

Current system:

You can't scan wakes unless you have a wake-scanner. Get within 4km of a wake you have selected as your target and hold the fire button for the wake scanner to scan it.

Proposed system:

Without a wake scanner, fly within 2km of a targeted wake in order to scan it with your ship scanner for data. This does not allow you to follow the ship that made the wake, or learn where it went. It just gives you the engineering materials.

With a wake scanner, all wakes produced within range of your sensors are automatically scanned for wake-related encoded data. Otherwise, identical to current system where you must fly within 4km to scan it down manually if you intend to follow the ship that produced the wake or learn where it went.

Automatic scanning is probably too easily automatable, but how about this instead; give wakes a clear visual presence; a distortion and slight glow, vaguely similar to a thargoid wake. When players fly through it, it gives them a small credit Bond, and immediately scans the Wake for data.

The idea being, players will see it, and curiously fly through it. They will get credits from this, as well as data, but data they won't know what to do with. Without the credits, they would probably just ignore them from then on, but if it gives them credits, then they will happily fly through them every time they see one as they are leaving a station.

Even better, it makes the whole collection process a lot more fun. Now, rather than just sitting there and scanning things, you have to zoom around the area, flying through a bunch of procedurally generated targets.

Of course, you could still scan at range if you had a wake scanner, but even then, you would probably be better off if you were to scan one wake at the same time as flying through another.

So not only have we helped newer players get started on collecting engineering materials earlier, we have also created new and fun content for experienced players!

 

[Fizzatron]

This thread is similar to a number of others that we have had recently. I believe it started with "all ships should have two cargo capacity in the cockpit (to allow ships without cargo holds to collect black boxes and escape pods". This mutated into "all ships should be able to interact with all random events on at least a basic level". Followed by "SRV cargo capacity should be available to the ship and not restricted by the ship cargo carrying capacity".

And all because (at least I believe), so as not to use module slots for non-combat related items. Basically, money for nothing.

Steve 07.

We need.. FDEV Plz.

 

[Mphoenix92]

The purpose of this for me is just to allow for the natural earning of wake-data over the course of playing the game naturally.

Personally I think that earning engineering materials should just be a natural function of playing the game, and not something you have to go out and explicitly farm for hours for.

With commodities, you're out of luck unless you have a carrier because there's no long-term storage, but with materials you have large amounts of long-term storage, so a natural accumulation over the course of playing the game would really be fantastic.

Before anyone says "But you do" no you don't.

With manufactured material, every single ship you kill drops 4-6 materials, but with wakes you only get 1 or 2 per scan, which is basically zero in the grand-scheme of things--worse, most players blow up dozens of ships per hour playing Elite Dangerous, but most players DO NOT naturally hang out in areas where dozens of ships per hour are jumping in and out of the area unless you're explicitly farming for Wake data, which is what I want to avoid. With manufactured materials you will basically always accidentally accumulate enough of several materials to do something useful, but with wakes and other data this just does not occur. Any other solution to this problem would be fine in my eyes, just as long as it increases the natural, passive rate of engineering material accumulation without having to go out of our way to farm them.

The worst thing in this game is dedicated, repetitive, log in/log out farming for materials, and the best, most player-friendly way to remove that gameplay loop is to make it obsolete by making regular gameplay give our sufficient amounts of what we all need.