Guardian Materials...where did they go?

[Scoob]

Hey all,

I did the grind for Guardian Weapon Blueprints literally years ago now, but never ended up unlocking any of them at a Tech Broker. I had loads of materials, hundreds of Wreckage Components and Technology Components. Going to check out a Tech Broker today - I'm building a basic AX ship to play with - I noticed that I've only enough Technology Components to unlock two Guardian Weapons at best - I have 52, weapon needs 26 to unlock. I thought I must have miss-remembered how many I collected of those Tech Components, but I thought it was hundreds. Then I recalled a conversation I had in-game with a buddy where we were comparing how many of each we had, live, going through the materials inventory.

I've not unlocked any other Guardian modules in years now. I did the grind for and unlocked the Guardian FSD Booster, Power Plant and Distributor and left it at that. I then did the work to unlock the weapon Blueprints. Well, strictly-speaking I did the work to get enough BP's to unlock ALL Guardian Weapons (same as I did for Modules) but, unfortunately, due to bugs I was regularly denied the prize at the end of the circuit, or something broke part-way through the circuit so I had to relog to fix - resetting any progress of course. I still cannot bring myself to go back, I found the whole process so frustrating.

What I DID do though, was collect every material I could find at the various sites, even when I wasn't ultimately going for a BP. Hence I had quite a collection. Is there anything else that can consume Guardian Materials outside of the Guardian Modules / Weapons / SLF's? As I have distinctly less today than when I was comparing stuff with my buddy a few months back. I've had an extended break from the game a chunk of this year, only popping in briefly every so often - I was unlocking PP Weapons and did not play in the interim four to five weeks before doing the merit runs.

It may well just be me not remembering correctly, but I don't think so as I recall my buddy and I going through what we had - I generally had a comparable amount to him, and he's gone on to unlock various guardian tech. I did not anticipate a material shortage when I visited the Tech Broker today.

I do think something may sometimes go screwy with Materials storage levels. I recall last time I was playing, I was rolling some Heavy Duty Shield boosters for the AX build. However, I was almost out of materials so had to stop at G3. I log in today and I've plenty of materials to roll G4 - yet I've not been playing the game. Likely I'm just going crazy, so I wonder whether anyone else has every noticed weird anomalies when it comes to materials counts.

I suspect I'll just have to go get more Guardian materials - and maybe some of the missing BP's - at some point, but I really don't want to and fear it'll bug out on me again like it did so many times in the past. Like I said, I've not played for quite some time and was hoping Update 14 would be my path back to enjoying the game again.

TL DR : I appear to be missing some of the Guardian Materials I'd previously collected.

Btw: I read about some Pre-Engineered Guardian / AX weapons, are these CG rewards only, or can they be unlocked at a specific Broker?

 

[Jack Winter]

Did you synth any ax ammunition?

 

[Scoob]

Did you synth any ax ammunition?

Oh, good thought, but no, I've never done that, I just used the regular stuff.

 

[Jack Winter]

If you feel like doing some detective work you might find when it happened in your journal files. Then a request to support with the appropriate logs will probably set you right.

 

[Scoob]

If you feel like doing some detective work you might find when it happened in your journal files. Then a request to support with the appropriate logs will probably set you right.

It was many many months ago I was last playing regularly, I understand - from reading it in another thread - that logs aren't kept that long? I can have a look though, I think I downloaded a tool for investigating Logs once before, but the logs didn't contain the items I was looking for any more.

 

[GraphiteGB]

It appears if your reporting the numbers correctly that the unlocks have had there values changed any way...
Basic guardian items are unlocked once with mats then pay cash per unit...
so you only need mats if you want to change class sizes or weap0on type... so if you were going to fit 4 class 2 on to a krait of the same type..
Its one large shipment of mats for the class 2 weapon unlock and then 4 cash payment for each one from out fitting...

Now heres the catch pre engineered salavation augmented weapons dont work that way..
You pay lower mats for each one and no cash is required its mats only but the mats are now lower than mats you hand over for the unlocking the default ones...

if your building lots and lots of ships going for the large mats count and then buying many units is better but if your only building a single ship for a single mess about mat only payment can be quicker...
So the pre- engineered weapons are purchased 1 unit at a time with mats...
The plasmas are better than default plasmas
The shot guns are better than the default shot guns...
The repeater rail gun is worse than the default rail gun if you miss a single shot..

All pre-engineered salvation weapons are from the tech broker in Mbooni which is why they ran a CG recently giving away the permit to that system so of course you missed that CG...

To get access to that system requires getting allied with that single faction that controlls mbooni , AB by doing missions in other systems for them and landing on the mega ship they own when allied, getting the permit then jumping to mbooni landing on the planet then using the mats to get the weapons there...

 

[Jack Winter]

It was many many months ago I was last playing regularly, I understand - from reading it in another thread - that logs aren't kept that long? I can have a look though, I think I downloaded a tool for investigating Logs once before, but the logs didn't contain the items I was looking for any more.

AFAIK, the log files stay put until you delete them.

 

[Scoob]

Thanks for the tips @GraphiteGB.

So, is it the Azimuth Biotech faction I need to do missions for in the surrounding systems? They appear to be the controlling faction of MBooni. Using Inara I can see several prospective systems with Azimuth Biotech presence: T Tuari, LHS 1163 and Wandrama. So, I guess fly to one of those and do missions offered by Azimuth.

 

[Scoob]

AFAIK, the log files stay put until you delete them.

Oh, ok. I thought they were purged after a short while. Can't recall when I installed this build, haven't changed the drives in ages but did rebuild Windows, though not data should have been lost during that process.

 

[GraphiteGB]

Thanks for the tips @GraphiteGB.

So, is it the Azimuth Biotech faction I need to do missions for in the surrounding systems? They appear to be the controlling faction of MBooni. Using Inara I can see several prospective systems with Azimuth Biotech presence: T Tuari, LHS 1163 and Wandrama. So, I guess fly to one of those and do missions offered by Azimuth.

Yep...

 

[cmdr milesred]

logs are never removed by the game, only by you or windows crashes.....
your entire guardian history should be intact unless you have been using more than one computer to play.

 

[Stealthie]

After reading the OP, something occurred to me...

I wonder if it'd be a good idea if FDev could, perhaps, find a way to insert some half-decent AX ships into the game pre-built?

After a couple of weeks of Tharginess, they could have a CG where some faction is supporting an AX campaign by supplying ready-to-fly AX ships to willing pilots.
The CG would have, say, 4 tiers providing a range of ships from, say, a Viper4 to a Krait Phantom.
The ships would be pre-configured for AX combat and fitted with AX weapons and be available to participants in the CG at, say, 80% of their true value.
A couple of weeks later they could be made freely available, from a wider variety of places, at full price.

Thing is, U14 is a pretty big update (and the first such update we've had in a couple of years), with plenty to see and do, but the need to unlock AX stuff is probably going to deter some people and that means they'll just ignore the U14 content or, at worst, not bother playing at all.
Also, for people (like me) who haven't really bothered with AX stuff, the ability to buy a pre-configured ship would, at least, give people an idea of what an AX ship needs to be... which, again, would encourage people to get involved in U14.

 

[Scoob]

logs are never removed by the game, only by you or windows crashes.....
your entire guardian history should be intact unless you have been using more than one computer to play.

Thanks for confirming. I read elsewhere that they were purged after a short while. I've played ED on a couple of physical PC's, but they've had software rebuilds at times too. I do generally just copy the entire build then have the Client installer validate it in effect though. If the logs are in the main ED folder, they should be pretty old.

Not a bad idea @Stealthie - it would be nice to have a quicker way to get up and running in light of the increased threat.

I think my next task is to get that permit so I can get access to the salvation weapons.

 

[GraphiteGB]

After reading the OP, something occurred to me...

I wonder if it'd be a good idea if FDev could, perhaps, find a way to insert some half-decent AX ships into the game pre-built?

After a couple of weeks of Tharginess, they could have a CG where some faction is supporting an AX campaign by supplying ready-to-fly AX ships to willing pilots.
The CG would have, say, 4 tiers providing a range of ships from, say, a Viper4 to a Krait Phantom.
The ships would be pre-configured for AX combat and fitted with AX weapons and be available to participants in the CG at, say, 80% of their true value.
A couple of weeks later they could be made freely available, from a wider variety of places, at full price.

Thing is, U14 is a pretty big update (and the first such update we've had in a couple of years), with plenty to see and do, but the need to unlock AX stuff is probably going to deter some people and that means they'll just ignore the U14 content or, at worst, not bother playing at all.
Also, for people (like me) who haven't really bothered with AX stuff, the ability to buy a pre-configured ship would, at least, give people an idea of what an AX ship needs to be... which, again, would encourage people to get involved in U14.

Not the existing versions but new AX versions revision with corrosive resistant augment Hulls boosts that the AI will be flying along side with you into battle...
4 class 2 on the spine hard points rebuilds...
Coming to a community goal for feds and empire some time... they allready given away a smeg ton of class 2 plasmas allready in CGs...

 

[molgrips]

Did you just transfer from console by any chance? Inara is reporting me as having no Guardian mats or blueprints at all, and I'm sure I had some pre-transfer.

 

[cmdr milesred]

not so much in the game folder..

C:\Users\yourpc name here\Saved Games\Frontier Developments\Elite Dangerous

so, if you move to another pc, you pretty much have to know this and make a copy to go to the new pc....

 

[Scoob]

Did you just transfer from console by any chance? Inara is reporting me as having no Guardian mats or blueprints at all, and I'm sure I had some pre-transfer.

No, been PC from the start...though not the same PC.

not so much in the game folder..

C:\Users\yourpc name here\Saved Games\Frontier Developments\Elite Dangerous

so, if you move to another pc, you pretty much have to know this and make a copy to go to the new pc....

I copy that folder plus the game folder, point the Launcher at it as it verified what was there and made it "Live" so to speak. Only when I built a new PC though, not when just reinstalling Windows as the folders remain.