So I'm new to the game (Mostly), I took a mission to rescue / find an escape pod on the surface of a planet and can't figure out how to properly look for the damn thing. I fly around in orbit or low to the surface but nothing ever shows up.
Horizons How do I search planets properly?
- Thread starter Southpaw Gamer
- Start date
You have to fly around above the planet surface, above 1.5km. That way the blue rings indicating POI points show up on your ships scanner. When you see one (a blue circle) on the scanner, turn and point your ship towards it. I then increase the range of my ships scanner by using the page up/page down keys (by default). That way as you get closer you can decrease your scanner range to keep the POI in the centre of your scanner. I usually fly slowly, a little into the blue POI area then land. You then enter the SRV and commence the land search. In the BETA the POI points were in the middle of the blue circle and too predictable, so FD changed it and now the POI can be anywhere inside the blue circle, which can be huge.
Using the SRV to search for your POI can be at times a challenge. You need to keep on a heading of your choice and learn to use the wave scanner. A tip is when the wave scanner shows a broken 'sweep' towards the top its a man made object which is far away. As you get closer that broken sweep pattern will turn into a solid yellow/gold sweep. You may see the sweep pattern move slightly right or left. As you are moving, the POI is not. You need to change the SRV course to keep the 'sweep' centered in your wave scanner. There is a difference in the sound between metallic man made objects and naturally occurring rocks. On this point there is a difference between the sound made by rocks that contain metallic material and rocks that don't. You will learn the difference. All rock targets also appear towards the bottom of the wave scanner no matter if they contain metal or not. Another tip when trying to locate POI points is to zoom out the SRV's scanner (page up/page down) and usually you will see the red exclusion zone square long before you visually find the POI, or with the wave scanner for that matter. Hope this short guide helps.
Another awesome tip I read on here was use a game pad joystick for your SRV. I set mine up and I love it. I use a normal throttle/joystick setup for flight and a gamepad for the SRV. Works for me.
Using the SRV to search for your POI can be at times a challenge. You need to keep on a heading of your choice and learn to use the wave scanner. A tip is when the wave scanner shows a broken 'sweep' towards the top its a man made object which is far away. As you get closer that broken sweep pattern will turn into a solid yellow/gold sweep. You may see the sweep pattern move slightly right or left. As you are moving, the POI is not. You need to change the SRV course to keep the 'sweep' centered in your wave scanner. There is a difference in the sound between metallic man made objects and naturally occurring rocks. On this point there is a difference between the sound made by rocks that contain metallic material and rocks that don't. You will learn the difference. All rock targets also appear towards the bottom of the wave scanner no matter if they contain metal or not. Another tip when trying to locate POI points is to zoom out the SRV's scanner (page up/page down) and usually you will see the red exclusion zone square long before you visually find the POI, or with the wave scanner for that matter. Hope this short guide helps.
Another awesome tip I read on here was use a game pad joystick for your SRV. I set mine up and I love it. I use a normal throttle/joystick setup for flight and a gamepad for the SRV. Works for me.
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The method described does not work for me either.
POI blue shading either seems to take up none of my scanner, or all of it, and no amount of scale adjustment changes that. It's literally impossible to find the center, because the blue shading doesn't have a shape from my 'vantage'. It's just the entire scope of the scanner.
POI blue shading either seems to take up none of my scanner, or all of it, and no amount of scale adjustment changes that. It's literally impossible to find the center, because the blue shading doesn't have a shape from my 'vantage'. It's just the entire scope of the scanner.
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You just need to land somewhere inside the blue shaded area. The POI point will be somewhere inside this shaded area. You have to find it with the SRV. Apparently you can spot big POI's with your naked eye, but I have never tried this. I have found POI's easily using the above method. It just takes some patience and time. There is no point in finding the exact centre of the blue circle because the POI can be anywhere within it.
Center isn't very important as the POI likely isn't going to be there.
I could almost argue it's almost better to land at the edge and make a zig zag sweep forward (Remember you seem to always exit your ship with the SRV facing backwards, so remember to turn around as you exit, if you landed with the nose pointing towards the center).
I also usually climb to above 1.5km and keep the scanner at maximum range (zoomed out) so I don't miss any blue circle appearing. As you approach it, it seems to deform into some elliptical blob, probably due to the scanner logarithmic scaling I have, but it doesn't matter that much.
Also, when you drop below 1.5km, the circle vanishes anyway so make sure you make a slow but vertical descent.
I'm used to smaller moons with 0.05G and such and I just "landed" on a 1.5G planet. Quite a difference!!! Good thing I got shields...
I rarely hear the sound of the POI when I start with my SRV. I have to find those scanner blips that are more towards the upper part of the scanner. Also, when I do start to hear it, it sounds like when you're looking at your own ship.
If you leave your ship on the ground, drive a bit away from it and turn towards it and listen to the sound. That's usually what artificial scanner blips sound like, in my experience.
There's a post containing some scanner echoes and sounds somewhere in this forum...
I could almost argue it's almost better to land at the edge and make a zig zag sweep forward (Remember you seem to always exit your ship with the SRV facing backwards, so remember to turn around as you exit, if you landed with the nose pointing towards the center).
I also usually climb to above 1.5km and keep the scanner at maximum range (zoomed out) so I don't miss any blue circle appearing. As you approach it, it seems to deform into some elliptical blob, probably due to the scanner logarithmic scaling I have, but it doesn't matter that much.
Also, when you drop below 1.5km, the circle vanishes anyway so make sure you make a slow but vertical descent.
I'm used to smaller moons with 0.05G and such and I just "landed" on a 1.5G planet. Quite a difference!!! Good thing I got shields...
I rarely hear the sound of the POI when I start with my SRV. I have to find those scanner blips that are more towards the upper part of the scanner. Also, when I do start to hear it, it sounds like when you're looking at your own ship.
If you leave your ship on the ground, drive a bit away from it and turn towards it and listen to the sound. That's usually what artificial scanner blips sound like, in my experience.
There's a post containing some scanner echoes and sounds somewhere in this forum...
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Thanks for this... I tried to do two of these missions yesterday and no farking clue whether I had to drive around with the SRV or the starship. The mission in game tells you NOTHING about how the system works (e.g. with the blue circles being a possible area where you might find it).
Frontier needs to start understanding that while THEY, inside the studio, know how the mechanics of these things work, doesn't mean every player who try it out for the first time knows how the mechanics work.
They are adding new missions and new ways to do those missions, but please, there has to be some explanation as to HOW the mechanics work. I fully agree with what Don_Von_Hulio said in another thread... it's so convoluted that it gets extremely frustrating.
Frontier could at least make some brief youtube snippets where they explain new mechanics they are introducing. For instance, a 5 minute segment where they show how to do the escape pod mission would go a long way. Just add it as a link in the patch notes or the newsletters.
"NEW mission mechanic - How to search planet surface for mission objectives!" --- <insert video link> ... thats how easy it is. 5 frakking minutes is all it would take.
Anyways... just venting some frustration here.
Many, many thanks to you guys in the thread here for explaining how it works; thus succeeding (without getting paid) in doing something Frontier (who do get paid) should have been able to do in the first place.
Hats off to you all.
Frontier needs to start understanding that while THEY, inside the studio, know how the mechanics of these things work, doesn't mean every player who try it out for the first time knows how the mechanics work.
They are adding new missions and new ways to do those missions, but please, there has to be some explanation as to HOW the mechanics work. I fully agree with what Don_Von_Hulio said in another thread... it's so convoluted that it gets extremely frustrating.
Frontier could at least make some brief youtube snippets where they explain new mechanics they are introducing. For instance, a 5 minute segment where they show how to do the escape pod mission would go a long way. Just add it as a link in the patch notes or the newsletters.
"NEW mission mechanic - How to search planet surface for mission objectives!" --- <insert video link> ... thats how easy it is. 5 frakking minutes is all it would take.
Anyways... just venting some frustration here.
Many, many thanks to you guys in the thread here for explaining how it works; thus succeeding (without getting paid) in doing something Frontier (who do get paid) should have been able to do in the first place.
Hats off to you all.
They have added some YouTube videos for various aspects of horizons. Go to training menu and then training videos in the game. Might not show everything but gives the general idea about how the scanners should work. Hope it helps
Finding anything in ed ages yesterday to find something for 60k creditsd ages yesterday to find something for 60k credits. i like the idea of not making it to easy but the payout is a joke again.
Its a pity that its not possible to make money while doing missions that arent boring. I dont know why they try to force us to do boring trading or merits farming as the only meaningful posibility of income.
The cooldown for high profit missions could be very high to not overpay with that no problem. But the scaling with ranking is not really well designed in my opionion
Its a pity that its not possible to make money while doing missions that arent boring. I dont know why they try to force us to do boring trading or merits farming as the only meaningful posibility of income.
The cooldown for high profit missions could be very high to not overpay with that no problem. But the scaling with ranking is not really well designed in my opionion