EDSM isn't exactly accurate, is it :(

Piratescribe · Mar 10, 2021

So I decided to head off in a direction and fly til I find a system I'm the first to visit!
Getting farther than I ever have before, and glanced at my EDSM.net and it said I'd already visited 3 new systems! I went back to the closest one it says I discovered (Wregoe JE-O c20-8) but when I got back and looked at the System Map in the game, it's showing every body has "First Discovered By: MICHITO"

Man, I got so excited there

I'm really curious to see how far I do have to go before I legit discover something...

Ettanin · Mar 10, 2021

Not everyone uploads their data to EDSM.

Get out further. You'll be much more likely to find new stuff. You are still deep within well-known space.

If you want to maximize your chances, consider looking at the EDAstro (by CMDR Orvidius) exploration saturation map here: https://edastro.com/galmap/ (Top right, select layer, select Saturation)

LifesAJourney · Mar 10, 2021

Game database and EDSM database are not the same database. They're completely independent.

Mr T · Mar 10, 2021

Ettanin said:
Not everyone uploads their data to EDSM.

Yeah, this ^

That's why I made the decision to download EDDiscovery and use it when I go exploring. It will upload my data to the EDSM database so I'm actually contributing to it, rather than being one of "those" explorers who perhaps don't care about others.

You shouldn't have to go too far before you discover something new, just 2,000ly or so from the bubble should do it. Of course, it depends which direction you go too.

Piratescribe · Mar 10, 2021

Ettanin said:
Not everyone uploads their data to EDSM.

Get out further. You'll be much more likely to find new stuff. You are still deep within well-known space.

If you want to maximize your chances, consider looking at the EDAstro (by CMDR Orvidius) exploration saturation map here: https://edastro.com/galmap/ (Top right, select layer, select Saturation)

Whoa cool! .... oh.... oh eck. Based on this, it seems like the entire galaxy is already explored

Huh, what's up with Barnard's Loop? Why is it a bubble of... sparseness, I think, from what I can tell?

Piratescribe · Mar 10, 2021

Mr T said:
Yeah, this ^

That's why I made the decision to download EDDiscovery and use it when I go exploring. It will upload my data to the EDSM database so I'm actually contributing to it, rather than being one of "those" explorers who perhaps don't care about others.

You shouldn't have to go too far before you discover something new, just 2,000ly or so from the bubble should do it. Of course, it depends which direction you go too.

Yeah, I use EDD as well!!

I just assumed that EDSM got its into from ED, not from voluntary uploaders with EDD. :/ Oh well, I'm glad to know I'm contributing maybe

Hmm, I'm pretty new, only been playing for a few days, if I'm reading this right, I'm only about 400ly from Sol? Sol being the center of "the bubble"? So I have thousands of LY to go before there's a chance I my discover something uncharted....
Well, I guess I better dump the Hauler and get better stuff

Was hoping I could go rugged in a Hauler and find something new.

varonica · Mar 10, 2021

Piratescribe said:
Whoa cool! .... oh.... oh eck. Based on this, it seems like the entire galaxy is already explored
Huh, what's up with Barnard's Loop? Why is it a bubble of... sparseness, I think, from what I can tell?

Because you can't get in there, most of it and the surrounding area is permit locked. It's misleading, most regions have been visited but very little has been explored, in fact most of the galaxy is unexplored, according to its latest figures EDSM has recorded 0.015626% of the systems in the galaxy.

varonica · Mar 10, 2021

Piratescribe said:
Yeah, I use EDD as well!!
I just assumed that EDSM got its into from ED, not from voluntary uploaders with EDD. :/ Oh well, I'm glad to know I'm contributing maybe

Hmm, I'm pretty new, only been playing for a few days, if I'm reading this right, I'm only about 400ly from Sol? Sol being the center of "the bubble"? So I have thousands of LY to go before there's a chance I my discover something uncharted....
Well, I guess I better dump the Hauler and get better stuff Was hoping I could go rugged in a Hauler and find something new.

Of course you can go in a Hauler, my first trip to Colonia was in a 17ly Python, it just may take a little longer to get where you are going.

MickyG1982 · Mar 10, 2021

I trundled from Robigo to the Omega Nebula, just under 300 jumps in my completely unengineered Dolphin. Maybe a quarter of the places I jumped into were unexplored, some even near the bubble.

Sometimes it can be an advantage to not wring the backside out of the FSD for maximum range. Also sometimes a good idea to remove any filters too, as most "Explorers" seem to limit themselves to the KGBFOAM stars.

Piratescribe · Mar 10, 2021

varonica said:
Because you can't get in there, most of it and the surrounding area is permit locked. It's misleading, most regions have been visited but very little has been explored, in fact most of the galaxy is unexplored, according to its latest figures EDSM has recorded 0.015626% of the systems in the galaxy.

Well wait a minute... again, I'm new, so I don't know what's functional terminology and what's semantics.... What's the difference between "visited" and "explored"? Is "explored" mean surface scanned/mapped?
(I guess first to Surface Scan something is kind of cool... but I was hoping to be able to be the first to visit something new

)

MickyG1982 · Mar 10, 2021

Piratescribe said:
Well wait a minute... again, I'm new, so I don't know what's functional terminology and what's semantics.... What's the difference between "visited" and "explored"? Is "explored" mean surface scanned/mapped?
(I guess first to Surface Scan something is kind of cool... but I was hoping to be able to be the first to visit something new )

There is both a first scanned by & first mapped by tag if that is what you want.

Piratescribe · Mar 10, 2021

MickyG1982 said:
Sometimes it can be an advantage to not wring the backside out of the FSD for maximum range. Also sometimes a good idea to remove any filters too, as most "Explorers" seem to limit themselves to the KGBFOAM stars.

Oh no, I thought of that... I thought I was being clever by possibly finding something new by going to a non-KGBFOAM (that I could reach without running out of gas)... but alas, every system I could find was explored by others first heh

Piratescribe · Mar 10, 2021

MickyG1982 said:
There is both a first scanned by & first mapped by tag if that is what you want.

So, first "visited" is same as "first scanned"? And most of the galaxy has been scanned/visited? But almost none of it has been "mapped"? Is that right?

MickyG1982 · Mar 10, 2021

Piratescribe said:
Oh no, I thought of that... I thought I was being clever by possibly finding something new by going to a non-KGBFOAM (that I could reach without running out of gas)... but alas, every system I could find was explored by others first heh

You could definitely do with a better ship and a decent fuel scoop. I chose the dolphin because although its jump range isn't huge (around 20-25 ly, depending on configuration, without any engineering) it can literally sit on a star and refuel without fear of overheating. That alone makes it a great beginners explorer so it's what I used for my first trip.

varonica · Mar 10, 2021

Piratescribe said:
So, first "visited" is same as "first scanned"? And most of the galaxy has been scanned/visited? But almost none of it has been "mapped"? Is that right?

Umm, no but it's complicated....

Before the FSS it was quite common for explorers to jump into star system but not tag it, you had to stop and point the ship at the star to record it and get your name on it, and you could only record the close stars. The FSS honk these days will tag all stars in a system. You also only got your name on a planet or moon if you got close enough to it, around 5ls and let the DSS record it.

You will find as you go around systems with the main star and ELW WW and Ammonia worlds tagged but heaps of other planets and moons with no names on them. So there are systems around that have been visited but not recorded. If a pilot was in a hurry he might make hundreds of jumps without tagging anything. So some has been visited but not scanned, some has been visited and only partially scanned, very little has been mapped because you actually have to fly to each body to do that and these days explorers only do that for interesting or valuable bodies.

So, complicated!

Piratescribe · Mar 10, 2021

MickyG1982 said:
You could definitely do with a better ship and a decent fuel scoop. I chose the dolphin because although its jump range isn't huge (around 20-25 ly, depending on configuration, without any engineering) it can literally sit on a star and refuel without fear of overheating. That alone makes it a great beginners explorer so it's what I used for my first trip.

Oh that does sound pretty handy

But I've got a 3A Fuel Scoop on my Hauler, so I've been doing great topping off at each star. But best I can figure, it's going to take about 40 jumps to get to an area that MIGHT start having a chance at new stuff....

Piratescribe · Mar 10, 2021

Frillop Freyraum said:
Not at all! Look closer: there is a huge region around the core that is pitch black, largely unexplored. This map also shows a major misunderstanding (or a surprisingly common mistake among explorers, if you will): the most extreme regions at the edge look almost completely explored! Mainly because the stellar population here is very thin and the selection is getting smaller. The core on the other hand has the densest star population. The same goes for very high or low from the galactic plane. If you set a route here, you will see that it is actually harder to find an unexplored system, even though you may think that these regions are harder to reach.

When I'm looking for unexplored systems, I generally do 2 things: first, leave the civilisation bubble (obviously), then look for the densest star population, which you can already roughly guess from the Galmap.

Oops sorry, wrong quote. This answer was meant to your post #5

That seems weird... why is the core so singularly unexplored? It would seem like explorers would flock that direction! Never risk not being near a scoopable star, easy to point to.... Is there a reason it's so strikingly unexplored?
Well, I'm still holding out hope for getting some bragging rights by getting some "First discovered by"s in a Hauler

but a trip to the core in a Hauler... mmm, that's a LOT of jumps!!

Piratescribe · Mar 10, 2021

varonica said:
Umm, no but it's complicated....

Before the FSS it was quite common for explorers to jump into star system but not tag it, you had to stop and point the ship at the star to record it and get your name on it, and you could only record the close stars. The FSS honk these days will tag all stars in a system. You also only got your name on a planet or moon if you got close enough to it, around 5ls and let the DSS record it.

You will find as you go around systems with the main star and ELW WW and Ammonia worlds tagged but heaps of other planets and moons with no names on them. So there are systems around that have been visited but not recorded. If a pilot was in a hurry he might make hundreds of jumps without tagging anything. So some has been visited but not scanned, some has been visited and only partially scanned, very little has been mapped because you actually have to fly to each body to do that and these days explorers only do that for interesting or valuable bodies.

So, complicated!

OK so, sorry

I'm both newbie and dense.... When I look in the System Map in game, and see every body has a "First Discovered by: Name", that's the result of someone Discovery Scanning the system at least? ("Honking" it?) But... you have to actually fly near to... what exactly? Which is different from Surface Scanning (which gets its own "First Mapped By: Name" in the system map, right?

Sorry

what can I /should I look for to see if some worlds in a system have not been flown near enough, despite having a "First Discovered By" credit in the System Map?

Thank you for all the help and feedback!

Mr T · Mar 10, 2021

Piratescribe said:
That seems weird... why is the core so singularly unexplored? It would seem like explorers would flock that direction! Never risk not being near a scoopable star, easy to point to.... Is there a reason it's so strikingly unexplored?
Well, I'm still holding out hope for getting some bragging rights by getting some "First discovered by"s in a Hauler but a trip to the core in a Hauler... mmm, that's a LOT of jumps!!

There are roughly 400 billion systems in Elite Dangerous. Even if everyone playing the game explored the galaxy 24 x 7 there wouldn't be enough time in our lifetime to explore every system. As Frillop says the density of systems increases as you get closer to the core so there are a lot more systems out that way.

Hawk of Battle · Mar 10, 2021

Piratescribe said:
That seems weird... why is the core so singularly unexplored? It would seem like explorers would flock that direction! Never risk not being near a scoopable star, easy to point to.... Is there a reason it's so strikingly unexplored?
Well, I'm still holding out hope for getting some bragging rights by getting some "First discovered by"s in a Hauler but a trip to the core in a Hauler... mmm, that's a LOT of jumps!!

What people are trying to say is that, players have been everywhere, but since there's so many stars in the game, most of them have never been visited. For instance, there are heatmaps that show where players have been over the time the game has been running, which show what looks like every square inch of the galaxy being visited, but the galaxy is so densely packed that in actual fact, it's still almost nothing.

This site shows what I mean. They track the movement of ships and every region of the galaxy has been visited countless times, but still barely a fraction of a % on the 400 billion stars have been directly jumped to and catalogued.