![[VR] Merkir](https://forums-cdn.zaonce.net/data/avatars/m/141/141091.jpg?1553527154){kind=avatar}
And with those two simple sentences, you have summed up the loss many here feel.
FSS vs. ADS – and Alternative or Additional Options for Compelling Gameplay
- Thread starter WR3ND
- Start date
And with those two simple sentences, you have summed up the loss many here feel.
The new exploration mechanics would seem to be the perfect opportunity to improve the ship crew and introduce certain roles for them.
Find the scanning tiresome? Employ a crew member to take care of scanning duties.
From the players perspective it would be a return to the old system in essence,with a cut of any profits going to the crew member and finally put someone in the empty seat.
It's perfect and nobody needs to get nailed to anything!
Find the scanning tiresome? Employ a crew member to take care of scanning duties.
From the players perspective it would be a return to the old system in essence,with a cut of any profits going to the crew member and finally put someone in the empty seat.
It's perfect and nobody needs to get nailed to anything!
![[Diplomacy] Carnegie](https://forums-cdn.zaonce.net/data/avatars/m/123/123809.jpg?1553527149){kind=avatar}
The fact that the FSS scans the bodies, rather than just locating them (as the ADS did) is why I don't want to have to use it. Having a crew member perform the scan doesn't address the issue for me.
It would populate the system as before,all be it with a rather awkward pause.
@ cheesenbiscuits: Funny you should mention crew. We do already have the ability to invite player crew to do that for us. It would be a nice way to help out folks, and a reason to fly a ship with a second and even a third seat... but ever since the feature was introduced in the Chapter Four beta, crew members haven't been rewarded for their work with anything. No credits, no rank progression. (No tags either, but that's the way it should be.)
I haven't yet checked if they perhaps did a stealth fix on this in the April update, but given that the bug has been reported over multiple versions, I'm not holding my breath. I will post here to correct this if they had, though.
I would have liked to host others. Back around the update's launch, there was real demand too: I don't think I ever had the crew search open for more than five minutes. However, whenever I warned those who joined that they won't be rewarded with anything, pretty much everyone left. I'm not faulting them in any way for this, of course.
I haven't yet checked if they perhaps did a stealth fix on this in the April update, but given that the bug has been reported over multiple versions, I'm not holding my breath. I will post here to correct this if they had, though.
I would have liked to host others. Back around the update's launch, there was real demand too: I don't think I ever had the crew search open for more than five minutes. However, whenever I warned those who joined that they won't be rewarded with anything, pretty much everyone left. I'm not faulting them in any way for this, of course.
The trick is to look at the distribution of gas giant signals on the WSA. Unlike smaller bodies, which cluster together in a tiny band, gas giants are distributed across a wide band, and the signal tends to reflect where in the system they formed. Wide separation between signals tends to indicate solitary gas giants, while two or more signals close together tends to indicate binary+ gas giants.
It’s not 100% guaranteed success, I get surprised occasionally by both false positives and false negatives, but I like being surprised. 100% success is a sterile experience IMO.
I very rarely fully resolve bodies in the FSS these days. I use it to give me an initial bearing on the first binary+ gas giant I see in the system, and while flying out there I keep an eye on the inner solar system, to resolve those bodies on the way.
Resolving bodies this way requires a different type of flying than flying to body I have navigation data for, especially if I don’t want to waste time slowly decelerating, or losing my bearing by overshooting, should I decide I want to probe it. I consider it much more fun.
I’m still experimenting with fly-by probing techniques, myself. I try to land on at least one body per system I take the time to explore, just to keep my SRV flyving skills sharp. The “surface samples” are a bonus.
In a way, I agree with you, but only in the sense that minimizing my time in the FSS means I’ve gotten good at reading the FSS without spending time resolving bodies, letting me fly straight to an interesting part of the system, while keeping an eye out for opportunities along the way.
It’s like Supercruise in that way. I love Supercruise, but my goal has always been to minimize my time in it, by flying skillfully to my destination.
(edited to fix a misplaced /quote )
I have no issue with that myself. I’ve tried it a few times myself on previously explored systems, and if your only goal is your resolved body per hour count, it’s faster to just play the “minigame.”
But if I cared about my RBpH, I wouldn’t be spending so much time exploring via parallax.
Its nice how its done via the nav panel though, the process lets you suspend disbelief about being taken out of the cockpit. I don't mind it anyway
I play in VR. I’d like to be able to see a gas giant and it’s rings through the cockpit windows as I fly through the gap between them, while checking out its moons.
Last edited:
It does seem to be created for multi crew although the fact you have to throttle down to perform the scans seem like an error as the pilot could be heading for interesting planets and poi's.
Yea. I guess that's what some comments here (not yours) boil down to in the end. We need an adanced ADS, which scans every system within 15k LY. But to make it a challenging task, you have to hold the button down for a massive 15 seconds.
You could give the crew a voice,they could suggest interesting targets.
It seems compelling at least. I'm just coming to the opinion that the new scanning system isn't the problem,just that it could be framed better.
It seems compelling at least. I'm just coming to the opinion that the new scanning system isn't the problem,just that it could be framed better.
For everyone interested, We have covered a lot of ground on similar subject in Our thread
Here.
We have put forward arguments as well as possible solutions as to such compromise could be achieved whilst satisfying both sides.
We believe the key is to retain FSS and re-introduce ADS, albeit in altered form to allow more gameplay options for explorers based on their preffered playstyle.
Be Our guest.
Here.
We have put forward arguments as well as possible solutions as to such compromise could be achieved whilst satisfying both sides.
We believe the key is to retain FSS and re-introduce ADS, albeit in altered form to allow more gameplay options for explorers based on their preffered playstyle.
Be Our guest.
Well why not? Thats the logical progression of the thing. The hubble telescope can see back to the dawn of time, 15kly is nothing. This is the slippery slope ED is now on thanks to people who didnt want to fly their ships. Its just about the stupidest thing i can imagine in a game thats about flying ships.
Which is more or less what You currently have to do to get information on how many bodies are in the system.
If the decision process was actually good, I'd have no problem in spending more time figuring out what was there but that's simply not the case for me, IMO it's easier to ask for the return of the ADS (or similar) than to ask for a revamp of the FSS.
Your rhetoric fails because the FSS is not challenging, neither is the ADS.
The problem I always had with the ADS is that once the system map is populated, there wasn’t much worth investigating anymore. Generating the system map in the first place is the most interesting part of investigating a system to me. Everything after that is minutia... at least outside of the Bubble.
As long as using the ADS was an optional step, I agree with you. I think the FSS makes a great basic level scanner, but I wouldn’t object to more tools in the explorer’s toolkit.
Sorry to hear that. I’ve been exploring since the Beta, and I’m still “suffering” from one more system syndrome.
Optional is good.
That's essentially it, though I would say it's more like I use the FSS to form a mental map of a system, until I spot something interesting, something worth flying to, and then fly to it, exploring the rest of the system along the way. Once I arrive there and poke around, I'll use the FSS until I spot something else interesting in the system, and fly to it, again exploring the rest of the system along the way. Rinse and repeat until I've run out of interesting things, run out of bodies to discover, or run out of time... whichever comes first. If there's still bodies left, I'll use the FSS to "clean up" the system, and then jump out.
That's interesting, because I've always felt the FSS provides more complete information at a glance than the ADS. I've used it to spot potential eclipse candidates, roche-worlds, fast orbiting bodies, rare planetary alignments, and a lot of other things that simply don't show up on the system map. The ADS is superior for identifying rare bodies, and quickly obtaining a system's orbital heirarchy, but not at the specifics of a system's layout, for that you needed to fly out there and take a look, or read the system map's information about a body.
If something similar to the old ADS module is reinstated, let it be a black body display, as many have suggested. Enough to hint at what may be in a system, without revealing the entire thing.
How do you spot roche-worlds/fast orbiting bodies without a scale for reference?
There is no measurement beyond the distance and temperature that I could see. The zoom bar on the FSS does go up, but I thought this just represented how many zoom levels you are currently in (wait, are zoom levels actually fixed levels of zoom that have specific arc-seconds/minutes/hours degrees across, well then I can see that being useful, though not quite as nice as having a horizontal & vertical distance scale (You would have to get the calculator out each time to work out the distance between the two bodies with degrees instead of distance scale)).
If it comes back at all, I think it should come back completely unchanged as an optional module.
While a black-body display would serve my purposes well (I still would prefer to see more useful information make it's way into the FSS, as I don't like giving up optional slots), there are certain explorers that I recall required the visual aspect of the ADS to decide whether a system was worth investigating (Not just the type of body, but the look of planets/moons themselves).
I think your method of exploration is pretty interesting, so I can understand bringing back the ADS as an integrated option would really be quite terrible for you, but if it is bought back as an optional module does it really matter if others have more information for which to discover what is of interest to them? I mean it sounds like you aren't sitting there at the entry point just zooming in and identifying everything in the system, preferring to fly to things of interest instead, so does it bother you that others might do that with the current FSS?
Not taking a stab BTW as I like your positivity on the FSS; just trying to get a better idea of why there might be opposition to the return of the ADS module (with full functionality) that existed in 3.2 if it was made optional.
There's also another not 100% generalisation that if there are hmc's, these in the great majority occur closer to the star than the gas giants will. Not sure if that's real solar system formation theory or not. I personally don't like the not 100% nature of this extrapolation use. I usually prefer to put in the effort and know how to use something. The idea of living in probabilities due to only having unintended use available is not the best. Of course the other option is to only be interested in finding credits and placing my tag when i go in.... oh no.
I tried that out of desperation as well in beta to avoid the spoiler... try to remember the panning travelled from start and possibly the starfield in the direction and without discovery / targeting fly there anyway. That was too much of a stretch. Flying there in theory wouldnt be that hard, just zero throttle the instant you flash discovered something and go past it, that's the quickest way to undo a loop of shame anyway. Will give it another go i guess, but my flying style is more travelling under the speed limit so as to forget about overshooting, and instead visually look at the body rather than the one number on the target reticule. A horrid way to play looking at "6" forever. Without the supercruise breaks applied by the target setting im not sure it will be a good time.. but then again.. maybe not.. thanks for the idea.
Do you fly in ever increasing circles around the star until you hit a gas giant? Personally not going to do that. My ocd like that is reserved by tweaking reshade settings. None left for that kind of panning for gold activity
I’m still experimenting with fly-by probing techniques, myself. I try to land on at least one body per system I take the time to explore, just to keep my SRV flyving skills sharp. The “surface samples” are a bonus.
I always drop out, but looking back the majority of my time is spent cruising around at about 20mps over a mountain range or valley looking out of a canopy. My exploration ships are usually the type 9 / 10 or beluga for that reason (disclaimer there are quite a few more but off topic, hint type-7... so good). The other thing i do is jump out in the fighter and stretch my legs boosting around, trying to stay as close as possible to the ground. I usually only stop the ship and srv when about to log out. Not an extremist for jump range.
Yeah i don't mind it either. Figured it was the game and found headlook. Its a sandbox though, so while often upsetting, its quite okay if someone wants to do hundreds or thousands of hyperspace jumps just for the credits. We can't say they're wrong. So it sounds like you only use the fss for the spectrum or an aid when what you usually do is too hard or you might have missed it.. fair enough. For me its closer to what ziggy is suggesting. Thats even after learning to live with the reward issues from the fss that steal the majority of the value of everything you do after it.
Just in case.. not using the fss doesn't make it a good thing....
Last edited:
Yeah just noticed your 55 page strong thread in Suggestions. That's where things go to die and frontier can pay even less attention to them. I think its funny though that your stable of white knights are going on about the 'same few people' here, yet the same few white knights are living in your thread not in DD. They don't like our logic much i think. There's not much of a response to 'why not have the option so everyone can be happy' than to be rude, assert frontier can do no wrong or make personal attacks.