Does anyone actually enjoy engineering?

Bill Clement

Bill Clement
Serious question. I don't mean 'do you enjoy having an engineered ship' or 'do you enjoy trying out different engineering modifications', I mean do you actually enjoy the process, the things that you do to get to that engineered module?

Acquiring vast amounts of materials, trading them when (inevitably) you don't have the one you want, at a massive loss, getting a series of lousy rolls that eat all your mats before you complete the mod you're aiming for?

I read posters on here stating that they've engineered whole fleets of ships in next to no time. I believe them- why wouldn't they tell the truth?- but I'm not enjoying anything like the same rate of progress. I decided to fully engineer my mission runner, an 'A' rated Python, back in November. I'd been tinkering with it for a while, I had what I thought was a huge amount of materials stockpiled and I'd unlocked a few engineers. I gave up half way through December and, in spite of having a whole week off at the end of the month, I didn't even flash Elite up. I just couldn't face it any more.

For most of the last four years I've put in a couple of hours a night, two or three times a week. Not exactly a power player, but not 'casual' either. Now I'm watching ED videos instead of playing- what kind of saddo does that? :eek: It's over a fortnight since I last played and I don't have any particular urge to change that.

Each completed mod has been a revelation. The Python is transformed. I really can't express how much of a difference the engineering makes- it's vastly more than finally installing 'A' class modules when I started the game.

But that's just hacking me off. It's painfully obvious just how pants stock ships are compared to engineered ones. I've got a whole fleet of vanilla ships that are a real struggle to just survive in. I don't mind running away every now and then, but the AI is balanced against much tougher kit than I'm flying. I can see where the 'git gud' crowd are coming from- my partly engineered Python is just melting AI opponents! But I'm about as 'gud' as I'm going to 'git', my fleet needs a ton of work and yeGodsinHeaven I'm burned out just getting one of them up to scratch!

I'd love to try out some of the newer ships, but I know that stock, even 'A' rated, they'll be easy pickings for dumb as a brick AI with ridiculously strong weapons and shields. It's not about skill, or lack thereof, the game's set-up is suffering from power creep. I wouldn't object to that, if engineering to the new standard wasn't such a massive pain in the posterior for me.

Am I looking at this all wrong? Is engineering actually a fun activity that I'm just not 'getting'? [uhh]
 

Sysmon

Sysmon
I enjoy it as a way to focus my scavenging gameplay (when I scavenge). I don't own that many ships, although I've played since the game went live. Each of them have a specific purpose, though, and I go tweak their engineering from time to time.

My scavenging ship is a Krait mk II. Nice all-rounder.

:D S
 

Vedmo

Vedmo
Engineering is honestly one of my favorite aspects of this game.

When I started out in the old system, the unlocking process often times was not enjoyable, as well as collecting materials back then when just about everything I wanted to do required a bunch of materials I had little to none of. Once they changed the process though, and once I already had a few ships engineered how I like them and decided to be less laser focused about acquiring materials, it turned into something I really enjoy. My mission running ships carry a collector limpet controller and a wake scanner, so most of the time when I'm running around I scan a wake or two then drop into some USS en-route. I also never pass up a reward of materials of any grade. I don't do much mining, but I pick up some materials there when I do, and otherwise I just occasionally set aside a couple of hours to hit some planets and stock up, which can be a nice change of pace. I have a couple of combat ships with collection limpets as well, and will hit up a hazres for some bounty hunting then drop limpets when I get a medium or large ship down, often times also letting the shields regen. If I play like that for a while without doing any engineering, it's just a quick trip to some material traders to level things out and I've got 100's of grade 1 & 2's, 50-100 of 3 & 4's, and 25-50 grade 5's on hand. The trick for me has been getting to that point, then I can maintain without much effort.

So far as the engineering process itself, I seriously love it. I've spent a lot of time trying different things out with different ships, have my storage almost full of engineered modules, and have at least twenty fully engineered ships, yet I'm still always buying new ships and doing more. I think the small ships are the most fun, as you can really get a lot more out of them in many different ways. You can have a Viper speedster to drop mines to destroy shields and kill thrusters, or a viper with crazy resistances and couple k health with plenty of distributor to run a couple of cytoscramblers that melt shields close range a pair of class 2 rails that destroy modules. It adds so much more depth to the game for me, and I can't imagine playing without it now.
 
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Phisto Sobanii

Phisto Sobanii
It'll be a real long time before I forget the feeling of hitting boost on a G5'd FDL for the first time. Flew around my home station like a goofball. And this was when Engineers first came out! I had a little AspX to carry the drives and commodities all the way out to Maia and back!

I think these days two things help make Engineering enjoyable.

1) Once you've unlocked something (like, say, Palin?) you never have to do it again. There's virtue in eating your vegetables, in other words.

2) You don't have to hardcore grind and beeline to the ship you want. I know plenty of folks that take it easy and collect materials as they go. They'll make the rounds at the Engineers and upgrade what they can.

All this said, if you want to get into PvP it's engineer or die. Put your mind to the grind and just accept it. [haha]
 

Old Duck

Old Duck
I enjoy engineering, but I'm not a min-maxer. I've only unlocked about half the engineers, and usually the only things I G5 are the FSD and certain weapons. If I felt compelled to G5 every single component on my ship, well that would probably ruin the experience for me.

Speaking of weapons, while it's nice to improve their efficiency or range or focus, the thing I really enjoy playing with is the special effects.

Oh, one last note - I'm a bit of a minimalist, so despite being rich, my fleet is very modest in size, therefore it's fairly rare I even visit an engineer these days. It's too bad we can't trade materials between players, because I've got mats to spare!
 
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{SAS}Stalker

{SAS}Stalker
Its 100% hands down the sole reason I quit ED. Its taken a long time for them to correct the terrible implementation of a feature that could have been enjoyable and rich. The current iteration is bearable and the material agents are welcomed but its still half baked and lacking in depth despite its potential.

On a side note I have returned :p
 
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Villeruff

V
Not even a little. Before the change to predictable results and implementing material traders, it was a hateful experience spending hours upon hours to get nothing of worth, if anything at all.

Now it's just boring, silly and comparatively short. Tolerable.

{SAS}Stalker said:
Its 100% hands down the sole reason I quit ED.
Click to expand...

Wasn't my sole reason for quitting, but it was a big factor. I am also back. :p
 
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CMDR Karrde Sun

CMDR Karrde Sun
Yeah as someone who doesn't really care about the outcome of best engineering, i like it.

If i was zero'ed in on the spec increased based on engineering, it would torture.

To balance it out, it comes from frontiers probably (not so excusable today) naivety in game design. See the old pre nerfed rep grinds were obvious immediately coming from other games.. they were progression similar to dailies.. except frontier forgot to implement the daily cap. I think the same applies to engineering, same with the 'i feel dead inside' effects of overdoing it.

Second grade elite dangerous stuff. Back then people were throwing around "10 year plan" etc which is a little bit different now. Frontier themselves have broken their schedule, and nerfed so much of the game to immediate completion parameters.. there's no greater statement than that.
 
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60mm

60mm
Overall, certainly. I particularly enjoy the fact that each Weapon/Module can be built in a variety of ways. I have different kinds of Railguns, of the same Class, that I use for different tasks for example.

The process only has one glaring issue imho and that is unless you engage in Combat and Mining, you can't get all the Mats you will need.

Combat Players like myself can easily collect Manufactured/Encoded Mats while we play, but practically no Raw Mats. And the process of Mining Raw Mats is time consuming enough that if FD were to get rid of the Mat Sites like the crashed Ships, Engineering would instantly become intolerable for me. I'm not about to have a side Career I do not enjoy to collect Mats. I do nothing but Combat Missions with a sprinkling of Bounty Hunting and I have only ever collected Raw Mats when completing Mining Reqs to unlock Engineers and when making an evening of collecting Mats by re-logging at a Mats Site.

Could be easily solved by making Raw Mats a possible Reward for all Mission Types.
 
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Julio Montega

Julio Montega
I enjoy generally tinkering around and testing out stuff,
which led me to discovering a method for piracy that works,
but is hard to do.

Engineering in itself?
Hmm i still don't enjoy the necessity to travel around,
to change pinned recipes and grab materials to pay the engis.
It has been improved a lot, but there is still much there to tweak,
like recipes and experimental just not being attractive at all.

Engineering allows to hitpoint and res inflate ships,
so that part i outright hate.

Mixed bag in the end, with a tendency to not liking engineers.
 
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Xious

Xious
It's something to do I guess... the whole process.

I do like going to the engineers and leaving with an improved module.

I just wish the Engineers were more than just a picture, some text, and a robot voice.... pretty cheezy...
 

Ozram

Ozram
I hate the engineering requirements. I want to test stuff out all the time and often do but just as often my hairbrained ideas don’t work as intended and it’s a lot of time wasted to test things out. I feel like FD punishes experimentation. At the very least we should be allowed to sell back engineered goods for their materials.
 

avow555

avow555
For what was touted as a crafting system originally, well it's just a pure rng grind.

Totally hate the process and never feel satisfied even when I have maxed a part.

It puts me off playing and has since it patched into ED.
 
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