Fleet Carriers - Trading and Exploration Improvements (NPCs buying commodities & specific exploration FC modules)

[NeilF]

Again, if an Anaconda is doing more than 1000ly an hour you're TRAVELLING not EXPLORING.

But hey, I'll be getting one, feel free to not.

Sort of understood, but if we take the scenario of traveling to say a location 20,000ly away to explore the area around it? How long to get there?
An Anaconda? - Say about 6-7hrs or so?
An Exploration FC? - Say about 80-100hrs, along with the spoon feeding (mining) of Tritium 40+ times?

Who will want to spend 80+hrs getting an FC there, when if they used an Anaconda they could have got there most likely the day after they set off?

And more importantly, what is broken if the Exploration FC instead took 12-15hrs to get there? What gameplay aspect is broken/damaged? What is broken by actually making it more viable to take an Exploration FC to a location for exploration?

 

[Retropolitan]

There is only one true useful exploration service and thats UC- now, if you had that but kept the jump distance then I think that would be a fair compromise since you then have a giant mobile UC modem thats invulnerable.

There's also the fact that having other explorers sell data at your carrier would be a once-in-a-century source of income .

As announced yesterday an exploration carrier's only exploration features are repair/resupply and the ability to - once it finally arrives there- jump to systems on the fringes that couldn't be reached before now.

Back in August I tried to blue-sky uses based on the very little we were told, and I wondered about planting one or more base account alt CMDRs in T9's on the carrier's large landing pads. Their only job would be to sit in a ship full of carrier fuel and transfer it when needed. Great job, if they loved reading and playing cards. And, eventually, mining.

There's an unpopular but interesting area where I hoped to take one of these, for me and for anyone else who went out there. I just don't know now whether I'd want to do that.

 

[ADAMtheWELSHMANz]

Working now but look forward to picking this up when I finish.

 

[NeilF]

Seems a lot of folks (here, reddit, youtube) aren't impressed with the uber uber slow movement times of FCs. I'd suggest again, modules - which eat up a huge amount of the 25000units - should kick up transfer time to at least a reasonable fraction of that of say an Anaconda. Not faster... Not as fast.. But at least something around 25-50%?

 

[Crank Larson]

I've been recently accused of not being an explorer, which is silly, but I want to point out there are two methods of exploration in this game.

1) get there fast and take it slow. This is generally what I do. I find a spot I want to go look at, get there then spend a lot of time hanging out collecting information.

2) stop at every hobby shop, antique store and watering hole along the way.

The 2nd type will have little issue with the speed of the carrier if they chose to bring one.

I suspect that most explorers are more likely to be 1 rather than 2. I know I am. I'll travel as fast as I can to a particular location, then spend a long time exploring just that area.

However, I don't expect a fleet carrier to be able to do that. It is a mobile space station, not a spaceship. I'd quite happily trade a slower journey out to gain all the benefits of taking the FC with me.

 

[Quantis Trap]

Here's a suggestion I have in my Solution for FC exploring thread which was ignored:

It would be much simpler for FDev to implement than aspects of NielF's proposal.

What if FDev were to implement a faster multiple jump algorithm?

Simplest Algorithm Example:
What if there was the normal two hours of wait time on the first jump, then subsequent jumps executed within the cool down period could be much less. These sequential jumps would be cut down to as little as 10 minutes on either side with good timing by the captain. This would cut sequential layovers to as little as 20 minutes on each jump.

This algorithm, if done correctly, could become a Fleet Carrier jump optimization mini-game and we all know how Frontier like their mini-games.

Lore could easily be constructed to support this:

1. It could be said that Tritium drives not only need a cool down, but they need a warm up, so on multi jump routes it's more efficient to keep them purring.
2. The crew is already at stations. If you keep them there everything moves faster.

If Frontier did something like this, I think it would give explorers a tools without giving others an exploit or disrupting other mechanics.

What do you think?

 

[TheSisko]

Understood, but as I've said just a couple of times before, no one is suggesting an exploration FC should be the fastest means of travel, but are you able to explain the benefit of making them so much slower than a regular Anaconda (many many multiple times slower), so that they are all but pointless to take over long journeys for your average explorer due to their faff, what is added to the game?

In short, if an Exploration FC could travel at say 50% the speed of an average exploration Anaconda, WHAT IS THE PROBLEM? What mechanic is being compromised/damaged? What is the problem with CMDRs actually being able to use their exploration FCs for exploration?

I've told you- FCs are not playthings like Sidewinders, they are mobile menus that bring facilities with them. They are not gameplay on their own, they extend what you can do. So, for the cost of time and energy you get whatever you refit your carrier with. This extends what you can do in your ships, designing them differently, or being more confident with mishaps.

So, again, you aren't you able to just explain what gameplay benefit there is in making them so slow they are practically unfit for purpose?

I'll make it really simply for you. Here you go:-

If an Exploration FC took only TWICE as long to travel somewhere compared to an Anaconda that would break the game because _ _ _ _ _ ?​

​

Clearly, it needs to take TWENTY TIMES as long because this befits the game with _ _ _ _ _ ?​

I'll await your answer with interest...

ps: "or being more confident with mishaps." - What exactly have you gone through all the "work" for, to earn and invest 5bCR, if not to have a bit of a benefit of perhaps be a bit more "confidence with mishaps"?

Source: https://media.giphy.com/media/KziKCpvrGngHbYjaUF/giphy.gif


....for the record, I agree with Rubbernuke.

 

[rhiz]

Remote repair, refuel, restock, thats a pretty neat thing when you lose your last SRV on the edge?

And can an Anaconda make new SRVs or repair a powerplant out there? Whats the time to come back, and the risk?

I have around 3000 hrs in the game and a fair amount of that time has been spent exploring. I’ve never had to perform repairs that couldn’t be handled by a couple of AFMUs, or lost an SRV. I know of course that it could happen, but when you measure the effort to risk ratio Fleet Carriers don’t make a great deal of sense for explorers, based on what we know. Drop a UC module into them and they suddenly become rather compelling. The omission doesn't make any sense to me - but there must be a reason.

 

[NeilF]

I suspect that most explorers are more likely to be 1 rather than 2. I know I am. I'll travel as fast as I can to a particular location, then spend a long time exploring just that area.

However, I don't expect a fleet carrier to be able to do that. It is a mobile space station, not a spaceship. I'd quite happily trade a slower journey out to gain all the benefits of taking the FC with me.

So if it would take a week to get to the region you want to explore using an Anaconda, you'd be happy spending three or more months to get a FC there? And then the same back again? So two weeks travelling to/from the region in an Anaconda, something like six months of jumping the exploration FC to/from the same region...

You see that as a sensible timescale? You don't envisage a lot of explorers seeing that too (needlessly) costly time wise?

 

[Crank Larson]

So if it would take a week to get to the region you want explore using an Anaconda, you'd be happy spending three or more months to get a FC there? And then the same back again? So two weeks travelling to/from the region in an Anaconda, something like six months of jumping the exploration FC to/from the same region...

You see that as a sensible timescale? You don't envisage a lot of explorers seeing that too costly time wise?

It won't take that long to get to places, and you aren't stuck in the carrier for all that time either - you can use your ships and explore each point you stop off at while waiting for cooldown/warm-up. Exploring is about the journey, not the destination. When groups of players get involved, I am expecting to see FCs spread quite quickly out across the galaxy - it would only take an hour or two for a small group of miners to refuel - the first of which would be cool-down time anyway.

In fact, thinking about it some more, some groups are going to have great fun with seeing just how fast they can get FCs to distant places. At optimal speed, I reckon you could jump one every two or three hours. With a large enough support group it could be refueled during cooldown/warmup (or at least, the mining could be done even if the tritium can't be transferred during those stages). We'll see an FC near Beagle Point. At least, I hope so. I'm quite near there myself.

 

[Maolagin]

Contrary opinion: I think the carriers are largely fine as described.

It's expected that the large majority of individual pilots won't need or have a Carrier of their own - that's the whole point of making them expensive. They're always going to be more useful to groups than individuals.

For a good use of Carriers for exploration, see Fleetcom's announcement today trying to organize deployment of a Carrier with repair/refuel capability to every galactic region. Why lug a huge slow carrier around with you, when you can bounce around and use the services of a network of Carriers set up by other players?

And of course, that's also why Carriers can't offer UC services. Even if you don't install it on your own Carrier, other players will on theirs. And then you're right back in the place Frontier has tried to avoid, where the dominant way to explore is selling your data out near Beagle Point or wherever and then taking the suicidewinder back to the bubble.

 

[Crank Larson]

And then you're right back in the place Frontier has tried to avoid, where the dominant way to explore is selling your data out near Beagle Point or wherever and then taking the suicidewinder back to the bubble.

At the point you've gone to the effort of travelling to Beagle Point, I don't see that there's a problem with being able to sell the data and suicidewinder back. If someone has travelled there (rather than explored), they won't have got that much data anyway. There are enough systems in the game that FD really don't have to be concerned about this kind of thing at all. Ever.

What's the difference in going to Beagle Point and selling data there, and going half-way to Beagle Point then back to the bubble to sell the data? Same amount of effort.

 

[ADAMtheWELSHMANz]

Not really, if you take neutron jumps into account. Even though it's not everywhere available, in denser regions they are and routing is easy. Bears the question if jump rate per hour can neglect this fact, as FCs don't have any form of jump range booster. When in doubt, I would beat an FC with ease in my DBX (without Guardian boosters!) and when only looking at distance per hour. Even without Neutron jumps and even if FC's would only have a delay of 1 hour instead of 2, in a race I still would win.

And then your argument is moot anyway as you aren't exploring as well when jumping 500 Ly...

Not sure how my argument is moot as I said several times a FC would roughly keep pace with an EXPLORER, but not someone TRAVELLING, or as you put it RACING, ahead.

 

[NeilF]

It won't take that long to get to places, and you aren't stuck in the carrier for all that time either - you can use your ships and explore each point you stop off at while waiting for cooldown/warm-up. Exploring is about the journey, not the destination. When groups of players get involved, I am expecting to see FCs spread quite quickly out across the galaxy - it would only take an hour or two for a small group of miners to refuel - the first of which would be cool-down time anyway.

In fact, thinking about it some more, some groups are going to have great fun with seeing just how fast they can get FCs to distant places. At optimal speed, I reckon you could jump one every two or three hours. With a large enough support group it could be refueled during cooldown/warmup (or at least, the mining could be done even if the tritium can't be transferred during those stages). We'll see an FC near Beagle Point. At least, I hope so. I'm quite near there myself.

The best it can do (even ignoring mining to refuel) is 500ly per 2 hours... An Anaconda can do that in a dozen mins... That's ten times worse, and it will most likely be more than that!

While the FC's travel speeds are fine for the bubble (maybe), an exploration FC will make little sense for any exploration of regions a reasonable distance from the bubble. ie: Why take a month to get to a region to explore it with a Exploration FC, when you can get there on a couple of days in an Anaconda? Especially when you'll have to mine over, and over, and over, and over... and have the same issue returning?

What would be the problem with being able to upgrade your Exploration FC, at huge expense to your 25000 units (eg: meaning no, or limited shipyard etc), to allow it in effect to travel at say 50% of the speed of an Anaconda? What harm is being done making an Exploration FC, more appealing to use for exploration?

 

[NeilF]

Why lug a huge slow carrier around with you, when you can bounce around and use the services of a network of Carriers set up by other players?

If we agree 90+% or so of the community can't even afford a Fleet Carrier, those folks might clearly like to make use of the service above... Great!

But what point it there is forcing the 10% of the community who can afford to have a Fleet Carrier not to use one when exploring? Surely FCs are being added for the 10% of the community who can afford them? To give them new toys to play with?

What is the goal in making them (Exploration FCs) so pointless for exploration, people who would like to you use them for exploration, won't use them?

ps: It's going to take someone three months to get a FC to Beagle Point for example, playing for 3+hrs a day, every day! And that's ignoring mining over, and over, and over, and over, a hundred or so times.

 

[VR SenseiMatty]

Allow a (very large) FC module to produce Tritium using solar arrays. More efficient the nearer to a star, and how bright the star is etc. ie: Choosing which star to jump to now has some importance!

It was my understanding that if you park your FC in the orbit of a planet with icy ring it will slowly refill the Tritium alone.

 

[NeilF]

It was my understanding that if you park your FC in the orbit of a planet with icy ring it will slowly refill the Tritium alone.

That's news to me! Sounds interesting... If so, I wonder what timescale "slowly refill" means?

 

[VR SenseiMatty]

That's news to me! Sounds interesting... If so, I wonder what timescale "slowly refill" means?

With the current values defined by FDEV it could be days

 

[NeilF]

With the current values defined by FDEV it could be days

So, as per my original suggestion, allow a module for Titrium to be generated (scooped?) much quicker? Ie: To make an Exploration FC more suited for exploration?

 

[VR SenseiMatty]

So, as per my original suggestion, allow a module for Titrium to be generated (scooped?) much quicker? Ie: To make an Exploration FC more suited for exploration?

You know FDEV, they will never add requests coming for players. The best we can guess is that they reduce slightly the costs and the jump time.