Dumb limpets

[Hullreaver]

I stacked 4 "retrieve commercial samples" missions. On 2 of the missions, the collector limpet crashed into my ship destroying the sample. I was not at a complete stop, but I was not going very fast either (15-20). Luckily, I could log out of ED completely, log back in and as soon as I jumped into SC, the mission USS reappeared and I could complete the missions.

Are limpets that stupid that you need to be at a complete stop when picking up cargo? I never have had this problem picking up materials. I guess I have never noticed before, but maybe there is something regarding movement of the ship and retrieving cargo?

 

[Vedmo]

You shouldn't have to be at a complete stop. Did you have night vision on? Sometimes there's space trash at those locations, it could be you rammed part of an old blown up ship into your limpets (or they took a path through near, unnoticed debris), or it could have just been suicidal limpets. I've heard their suicide rate rivals that of Apple factory workers.

 

[Jaggid Edje]

I engage throttle all the time when my limpets are working and have never destroyed one. There's got to be more to what happened, like @Vedmo indicates.

 

[Hullreaver]

You shouldn't have to be at a complete stop. Did you have night vision on? Sometimes there's space trash at those locations, it could be you rammed part of an old blown up ship into your limpets (or they took a path through near, unnoticed debris), or it could have just been suicidal limpets. I've heard their suicide rate rivals that of Apple factory workers.

I did have night vision on and the odd thing was there was hardly any debris. In fact, the 2 samples in one of missions were completely clear of the debris field. Also, both times, it sounded like an explosion. I would say that it is always possible that the limpet crashed into debris, which has happened numerous times, but whenever that has happened in the past the limpet was destroyed, not the cargo.

 

[[VR] Enexemander]

Yes, they are that bad.
If you fly with FA: OFF, they are horrendously bad.
Something with the FA:OFF / FA:ON toggle does serious damage to their tracking. In my Type 9 (read, NOT a fast ship), if I launch a prospector limpet, it will strike the ship and die before it launches. The only time it doesn't do this is if I'm making an aggressive maneuver for it to not happen. If I just toggle FA:On for a second, launch the limpet, and then toggle it back off? It's fine and will work.
Something is busted.
The same will happen with collector limpets, but to a lesser degree. With FA: OFF, the limpets are much, MUCH more likely to strike the ship, even if moving less than 10 and completely stable on pitch/roll. While mining, if I don't want to lose any limpets to hull strike, I have to turn FA: ON just for the limpet AI. It's ridiculous.
That's before you even get to their stupid collecting behavior. Why do they grab something, and then decide the thing to do is plummet a kilometer below the ship and then come back up? They hit the very asteroids they're collecting debris from OFTEN if you don't account for this.
And then of course they will also ram into asteroid/debris as if they weren't there when collecting, causing more losses.
TBH, limpets are just in a sad, sad shape all around. They need to be much faster, but more than that they need to be much smarter.

 

[Vedmo]

Well then...

This might not be for everyone, but I've found when I name my limpets and offer them reassuring words of support and appreciation, they act no differently. It does make me feel like I have friends though.

 

[Stealthie]

TBH, I'm pretty sure there's a something bugged about limpets.

I've just spent the last couple of months mining regularly (in a Krait Mk2 and a Python) and my collectors have all operated exactly as I expected (slightly suicidal but generally okay).

Prior to that, however, I was routinely using collectors with my Corvette to harvest mat's at CZs and CNBs and they just flat-out would NOT successfully deliver cargo to my 'vette.
They'd deliver mat's no problem at all but EVERY time they attempted to deliver a cargo container I'd hear a dull explosion, I'd be down a limpet and no cargo would appear in my hold.
I was told that it was the result of my ship moving (which had never been an issue previously) so i tried stopping completely but the problem persisted.

Dunno if things have changed over the last couple of months but this was definitely a problem back then.

 

[lomac]

Last night in asp and python and days ago in Anaconda have no issues mining cores or collecting mats and cargo in haz res. Prospectors are good too as long as I’m not mov8ng too fast when launching them. Just a data point. Doesn’t mean you are not having issues. I am mostly stationary or using thrusters when collecting.

 

[Stealthie]

Last night in asp and python and days ago in Anaconda have no issues mining cores or collecting mats and cargo in haz res. Prospectors are good too as long as I’m not mov8ng too fast when launching them. Just a data point. Doesn’t mean you are not having issues. I am mostly stationary or using thrusters when collecting.

Uhuh.

I get the impression that occasionally something just loses the plot and then limpets stop working properly on that ship.

I dont have the same problem on other ships but, if my vette's still acting the way it was a couple of months ago, I just flat-out can't collect any cargo with it.
It wasn't something that was a big deal because I was mostly only collecting mat's with it but every time I tried to scoop any kind of cargo, it'd be destroyed.

 

[Jukelo]

TBH, I'm pretty sure there's a something bugged about limpets.

I've just spent the last couple of months mining regularly (in a Krait Mk2 and a Python) and my collectors have all operated exactly as I expected (slightly suicidal but generally okay).

Prior to that, however, I was routinely using collectors with my Corvette to harvest mat's at CZs and CNBs and they just flat-out would NOT successfully deliver cargo to my 'vette.
They'd deliver mat's no problem at all but EVERY time they attempted to deliver a cargo container I'd hear a dull explosion, I'd be down a limpet and no cargo would appear in my hold.
I was told that it was the result of my ship moving (which had never been an issue previously) so i tried stopping completely but the problem persisted.

Dunno if things have changed over the last couple of months but this was definitely a problem back then.

Limpets have never been able to collect cargo when you are moving (mats are fine), at least moving faster than ~20m/s. It's been brought up numerous times back when Sandro was asking for feedback on piracy, so I assume it's actually WAI.

 

[Sirulean]

I recently went from dsl to fiber optic internet, and somehow it seems the limpets behave much better. I could just be crazy high on gigbit internet, but i wonder how much network issues affect limpets.

 

[thistle]

Well then...

This might not be for everyone, but I've found when I name my limpets and offer them reassuring words of support and appreciation, they act no differently. It does make me feel like I have friends though.

I approve of this post.