Exploration honk.

CMDR Jowley

C
I feel like I may be walking into another minefield with this one.

I really like the new scanner stuff. I would just change one thing.

When you jump into a system you still have to honk, why isn't that scanner just automatically always scanning, passively?

It seems to for objects which are close and even IDs the type and even scanner continuously looks for USS no matter the distance.

I think it should just ID all objects in the system for me then go ahead and fully scan in that new scanning mode to see which objects are what, without having to press a button before that can be done.

Great tools though
 

M0rty

M
honk honk

But seriously though, the scanner does act passively to a degree. If you jumped into a system without honking, it will discover whats available in the immediate area be it an asteroid field, some rocky moons and a gas giant and the station that orbits it. If you flew around the system for an undetermined amount of time and found there was another star 30k light seconds away, the ship would detect the bodies around it once you got close enough.

If i jump into a "new to me" system and honk it, it'll show as "undiscovered body" or whatever until i fly there and scan actively when the body is targeted OR use the FSS to discover the planet. Generally though, if i'm jumping into a system i haven't been to, it's usually because i have some rich jerk on board who wants to see ice vents on a high gravity world and they usually have the system data.

the FSS was designed as an option for people who want the system data but don't want to spend an extra hour and a half or more flying through the system. keyword here is option
 

M0rty

M
well, i guess what i meant was you don't have to slow down and open the FSS if you don't want to. You can fly to each of the undiscovered planets found through a honk, sit there for 10 seconds while the ship does its thing and fly to the next. I doubt you'd get any extra points in the cartographics for flying to the planet vs using the FSS, but it's certainly more than simply honking the system and moving on

I think the FSS is sorta cool. Gives you that "I'm Lieutenant Uhura and i'm picking up strange readings" feel.

Still don't gotta use it if you don't want to. Would you rather spend $1m+ credits on an Advanced System Scanner, or a free Full Spectrum Scanner?
 

CMDR Jowley

C
I think I have been misunderstood.

I mean I dont want to have to press a button to do what the scanner is doing passively anyway. I feel like it's an extra step.

For example, when you jump into a system with nothing but the star, before your scan is complete the passive scanner tells you "system scan complete"

So it knows what's in the system anyway without me even pressing the button. I dont understand what people mean by choice because you can't uninstall the scanner from your ship? Everything will still be undiscovered without the new scanner mode where you tune it.. what ever it's called.

So to recap. I like the scanner where you have the pick the signal and zoom in but I dont understand why I have to scan the system before that even though the scanner is doing it anyway.
 

Faded Glory

Faded Glory
CMDR Jowley said:
I think I have been misunderstood.

I mean I dont want to have to press a button to do what the scanner is doing passively anyway. I feel like it's an extra step.

For example, when you jump into a system with nothing but the star, before your scan is complete the passive scanner tells you "system scan complete"

So it knows what's in the system anyway without me even pressing the button. I dont understand what people mean by choice because you can't uninstall the scanner from your ship? Everything will still be undiscovered without the new scanner mode where you tune it.. what ever it's called.

So to recap. I like the scanner where you have the pick the signal and zoom in but I dont understand why I have to scan the system before that even though the scanner is doing it anyway.
Click to expand...

Actually, now you mention it, that's true. If you drop into a system with just a single star, then it will indeed say system scan complete before you honk or charge the FSS, so yes, clearly the FSS does indeed know that there's something else or nothing else there. Never crossed my mind before LOL!

But presumably, because it's a game, FD came up with a process...

What the honk does, is populate the energy spectrum, and the energy spectrum tells you not only that something is there, but tells you to a large extent what is there, which gives you the info you need to decide if you want to stay and explore or scan the system. Of course, that could be done passively, as it's hardly great gameplay pressing a button for a few seconds, but then pressing a button for a few seconds is also not terribly challenging or time consuming.

Personally, it wouldn't bother me much if FD automated the 'honk' (not that I'm exploring now anyway), but no doubt you'll have a few who come along deriding you for wanting an easier life... ;) I wonder if they'll be the same people who complained that the old ADS honk was terrible gameplay? :ROFLMAO:
 

M0rty

M
this discussion has come up before.

When thing goes "System scan complete" there really may not be any more planets or whatever in the system. Honk anyway just to make sure.

The Honk used to be limited in range and only by upgrading your "System Scanner" as it once was could you scan the entire system at once.

Now, they've said "the system scanner just scans the entire system and you have to fine tune it to find this and that stuff."

So i enter a large system i've never gone before, i'm gonna get a whole bunch of stuff on my list that says "Unexplored." Should i open the FSS and look, eventually i'll learn about what's in the system.

It becomes passive when you have to fly around the system and look for the stars the old fashioned way. See first quote in my sig.
 

[Diplomacy] Carnegie

[Diplomacy] Carnegie
M0rty said:
well, i guess what i meant was you don't have to slow down and open the FSS if you don't want to. You can fly to each of the undiscovered planets found through a honk, sit there for 10 seconds while the ship does its thing and fly to the next. I doubt you'd get any extra points in the cartographics for flying to the planet vs using the FSS, but it's certainly more than simply honking the system and moving on

I think the FSS is sorta cool. Gives you that "I'm Lieutenant Uhura and i'm picking up strange readings" feel.

Still don't gotta use it if you don't want to. Would you rather spend $1m+ credits on an Advanced System Scanner, or a free Full Spectrum Scanner?
Click to expand...

Ahh. You've never been out of the Bubble.
 

CMDR Jowley

C
M0rty said:
guilty. But I'm a filthy casual so i'm not worried about it
Click to expand...
Okay cool!

Well when you go out exploring you will happen upon systems which you are the first to explore. When this happens the passive scanner (without press and holding the button) will only show close objects on the tuning scanner. This is the part I dont like because I know the scanner already knows without me pressing the button what is in the system.
 

M0rty

M
i know what you're talking about, i experience this in bubble. I may not be the first to explore it but my navicomputer sure thinks its a new system. I don't scan nav beacons, i don't have that kind of time.

I mean think about it this way: If you're on a boat in an ocean and for the purpose of the example, it's a Navy Destroyer. The ship can turn on its radar to "actively" to search for anything in range. If they turn it to a "passive" mode, it'll only pick up objects that get "bounced" off another transmitter. SONAR takes the "passive" aspect of this, but resembles more of echolocation as used by bats. Without graphics, this is pretty tough to explain.

While i can't say officially how the radars and scanners work in ED, i suspect "honking" is your active radar and sends out a ping across space that if it finds anything that's not empty space it'll tell you "hey, something is here" encouraging you to open the FSS or fly on over there. I totally understand where you're coming from on this issue of "how can it tell me this is all in the system when i haven't pinged it?" and you're right, it doesn't make much sense. I generally don't rely on the center radar on the dash to tell me who/what is in my immediate area.

Maybe it's a legitimate bug, maybe it's to encourage the CMDR to go "well...hold on maybe something is up with this piece of junk, lemme honk it to make sure." Maybe the ships we fly are just smarter than we think? Maybe the ship just needs a quick boost of power to send the ping signal far enough.

My advice? Don't be a "Muh-immurzun" types and just enjoy the game :)
 

[Diplomacy] Carnegie

[Diplomacy] Carnegie
M0rty said:
i know what you're talking about, i experience this in bubble. I may not be the first to explore it but my navicomputer sure thinks its a new system. I don't scan nav beacons, i don't have that kind of time.

I mean think about it this way: If you're on a boat in an ocean and for the purpose of the example, it's a Navy Destroyer. The ship can turn on its radar to "actively" to search for anything in range. If they turn it to a "passive" mode, it'll only pick up objects that get "bounced" off another transmitter. SONAR takes the "passive" aspect of this, but resembles more of echolocation as used by bats. Without graphics, this is pretty tough to explain.

While i can't say officially how the radars and scanners work in ED, i suspect "honking" is your active radar and sends out a ping across space that if it finds anything that's not empty space it'll tell you "hey, something is here" encouraging you to open the FSS or fly on over there. I totally understand where you're coming from on this issue of "how can it tell me this is all in the system when i haven't pinged it?" and you're right, it doesn't make much sense. I generally don't rely on the center radar on the dash to tell me who/what is in my immediate area.

Maybe it's a legitimate bug, maybe it's to encourage the CMDR to go "well...hold on maybe something is up with this piece of junk, lemme honk it to make sure." Maybe the ships we fly are just smarter than we think? Maybe the ship just needs a quick boost of power to send the ping signal far enough.

My advice? Don't be a "Muh-immurzun" types and just enjoy the game :)
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Noooo mate, it's worse than that.

In a system that you're the first person EVER to visit, you don't get any 'Unexplored' items in the Nav Panel and the System Map remains blank. The only things that show up are stars and anything within 30 Ls of where you are.

So your 'options' are to use the FSS to locate everything, or fly around using parallax to find bodies then getting to within 30 Ls of them (for 5 seconds). People have requested an actual option - that of fitting an ADS in addition to the FSS so that they get the 'Unexplored' items back, but FDev told them to suck it.
 

lenna

lenna
DrewCarnegie said:
Noooo mate, it's worse than that.

In a system that you're the first person EVER to visit, you don't get any 'Unexplored' items in the Nav Panel and the System Map remains blank. The only things that show up are stars and anything within 30 Ls of where you are.

So your 'options' are to use the FSS to locate everything, or fly around using parallax to find bodies then getting to within 30 Ls of them (for 5 seconds). People have requested an actual option - that of fitting an ADS in addition to the FSS so that they get the 'Unexplored' items back, but FDev told them to suck it.
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As far as some of us are concerned FDs answer is unacceptable. They are in for a shock if they think the FSS/DSS mechanics are a reasonable or acceptable replacement for existing mechanics that have been well established for so long.

One of the main critiques of the new mechanics is that the "learnable" reasoning is based on elements of the mechanics that are only audible - no visual equivalent - unlike surface exploration with an SRV. That is not the only critique but it is a key one when considering FD's overall attitude regarding the FSS/DSS mechanics (neither of which deserve interpretations that could not be considered NSFW) and their resistance to changes that would either correct or mitigate the current blatant design flaws.
 
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CMDR Jowley

C
M0rty said:
i know what you're talking about, i experience this in bubble. I may not be the first to explore it but my navicomputer sure thinks its a new system. I don't scan nav beacons, i don't have that kind of time.

I mean think about it this way: If you're on a boat in an ocean and for the purpose of the example, it's a Navy Destroyer. The ship can turn on its radar to "actively" to search for anything in range. If they turn it to a "passive" mode, it'll only pick up objects that get "bounced" off another transmitter. SONAR takes the "passive" aspect of this, but resembles more of echolocation as used by bats. Without graphics, this is pretty tough to explain.

While i can't say officially how the radars and scanners work in ED, i suspect "honking" is your active radar and sends out a ping across space that if it finds anything that's not empty space it'll tell you "hey, something is here" encouraging you to open the FSS or fly on over there. I totally understand where you're coming from on this issue of "how can it tell me this is all in the system when i haven't pinged it?" and you're right, it doesn't make much sense. I generally don't rely on the center radar on the dash to tell me who/what is in my immediate area.

Maybe it's a legitimate bug, maybe it's to encourage the CMDR to go "well...hold on maybe something is up with this piece of junk, lemme honk it to make sure." Maybe the ships we fly are just smarter than we think? Maybe the ship just needs a quick boost of power to send the ping signal far enough.

My advice? Don't be a "Muh-immurzun" types and just enjoy the game :)
Click to expand...

I was enjoying your comment up until the send sentence there. This is the suggestions section of the forum?
 

MK Regular

M
Honestly, I would be perfectly fine with an optional module that automatically lists undiscovered objects from the system honk in your nav panel, so long as the only details about the objects being given to the player are thr number and location(s) of the objects. This means that no images of the objects should appear in the system map, and no in-depth information (object type, composition, surface temp, atmosphere, etc...) should be available to the player. I would probably draw the line at players being given mass, object radius, and orbital data, as these parameters would conceivably be very easy to obtain from the system scan.

TL;DR I don't see any reason why we couldn't get the old ADS back as an optional module with all of its original functions (with the exception of pasting inages of objects in the system map).
 

CMDR Karrde Sun

CMDR Karrde Sun
Burke said:
Six months later one of them rolls up and goes "na, nothing wrong" They all but gave you the finger.
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Frontier are from the UK, apparently the 2 fingers finger is just as bad or worse than the one finger. So I like to imagine they gave us 2. Apparently its from some war with archers where if you were caught they chopped off your finger so you couldn't do it anymore.. and sticking up 2 fingers was a ha ha I've still got my fingers?

I have no idea could be completely random fiction I just wanted to add that.

I don't mind the honk.. except when I started, like the devs I thought it was the dumbest term for what that was. Today completely not an issue. If you don't like the honk, it might be worth taking a look at HCS voice packs and 'exploration mode on'. Its pretty nice.
 
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