How do people find all the "cool stuff"

[Arindor]

A lot of this stuff is actually being found by picking apart the game files after each update.

I, too, had the same suspicions that hacking took place, but I now deem it unfair to believe this was the case. However, it was a tad too quick tbh, so quick that it even flummoxed FD, because they hadn't reckoned on it happening yet as they were still working on "content".

 

[Schmack]

Someone will be the first to find something, so hack or not, it's going to be found and the odds are that I won't be the one because I'm not looking for it.

 

[shadow133]

Yeah, I was more wound up by the other guy, sorry you got some flack I guess I prefer it when people just ask how things are found with an open mind, and I see the way the finders are treated by default as if cheats, which ... isn't great
o7

Np, I get your frustrations and it wasnt my intention to suspect cmdr Robbie of any wrongdoing. I know there’s a lot of people that dedicate a lot of time and effort to finding things and solve the puzzles, but this one just seemed like random luck in a way and I did not had the time to browse the entire thread. I am glad to hear Fdev will introduce more content, I am excited already for a future exploration buff. Would love to find more artefacts, generation ships, random npc/thargoids encounters, etc. I wish I had more time to seek those, but unfortunately with my limited play time I would prefer them to come to me in a way lol.

One more thing, when galnet is upgraded, I do hope they enhance the way we can find things in game too, share information in game instead of via forums.

 

[MrFailfactory]

Hi all,

this may have been answered already, but although searching the forums has led me to some great resources like the canonn webpage, I'm still confused as to how a lot of the awesome stuff in the game (generation ships, crashed alien ships, abandoned bases, ghost ships) is initially discovered. I mean I had hoped that by reading GalNet updates I might get some clues as to weird stuff going on, or leads that I can follow to find some of this stuff myself (I know I can follow guides posted by people on the forum, but I was hoping there's be some sort of immersive, in-game method).

I found a crashed nav buoy on a planet, but that was pure luck and apparently that's a randomly generated encounter. How do people search whole planets to find hidden bases? How do people even know which systems to look in? If I wanted to set myself up as an explorer-savant, what tips could you give me?

It's just that as much as I'm loving the game, every time I read an exciting news article on eurogamer about how some CMDR has solved a mystery that's been around for years, I feel a little sad inside, like there's this whole side of the game I'm not participating in.

Any advice?

Honestly, I think the best piece of advice is to join a group that actively searches for things, and join in the discovery that way.

You can learn from them, and perhaps they can learn from you as well, and you will have compatriots to engage with to help pass the time, and share the joy of discovery.

Going it alone, my friend, is the long road.

It might be a very long road, indeed.

Edit to add: It seems to me that a lot of these are purposely designed to be found by community effort, rather than by individual players. I prefer this approach, but not everyone agrees with it. If you want to see the kind of time that might be involved, just take a look here at the dates between INRA base discoveries. The system and planet for bases 2-10 were known from the previous base, yet some still took a fair amount of time to find, likely with several people looking. I point this out so that you can have some reasonable expectations, should you decide to set out on your own, or with a group.

I personally find the Beluga to be an excellent ship for searching - that huge, open canopy is hard to beat, and it can carry fighters. Now that we have the camera suite, that kind of visibility is less of an issue, so you can probably use whatever you want, assuming you are comfortable enough to fly/cruise using the external camera.

Riôt

 

[shadow133]

I think there needs to be a distinction in terms of what “cool stuff” means. I accept that to find the really really cool stuff, the stuff that affects the whole community, there should be effort, time and perhaps a collective effort and research involved. But to find “cool stuff” it should be as common and random as coming across a quarter while walking on the street. These more refular type of stuff I feel could be more prevalent.

 

[Chris Simon]

I think there needs to be a distinction in terms of what “cool stuff” means. I accept that to find the really really cool stuff, the stuff that affects the whole community, there should be effort, time and perhaps a collective effort and research involved. But to find “cool stuff” it should be as common and random as coming across a quarter while walking on the street. These more refular type of stuff I feel could be more prevalent.

Personally I consider "cool stuff" anything that isn't a barren planet.
But if we are to be honest, aside from maybe Guardian ruins and Thargoid base, there isn't anything REALLY cool to find.

 

[2Karl]

I think there needs to be a distinction in terms of what “cool stuff” means.

I think for me it just means finding some stuff which isn't a random generated spawn. Don't get me wrong, the excitement I felt when I found a crashed nav buoy was REAL, and I love finding those things as a solo adventurer. But when I read about things in the lore and I'm told "that's in game too", that's the sort of stuff I want to find.

I totally agree with the group effort mentality - any hints as to how I could find like minded people? I've been flying solo since I started, which has served me well up to this point, but I'd like to feel part of a community seeking the unknown.

 

[Enderby]

Maybe someone within FD secretly leaks locations to their mates?

 

[2Karl]

Maybe someone within FD secretly leaks locations to their mates?

Maybe, I don't mind if they do, as long as there's some clues in the game for me to follow. I love the idea of coded messages giving coordinates to faraway systems where more clues can be found. I feel the game would hugely benefit from more of this.

 

[Badben]

I think the best advice OP is, don't get your hopes up. I don't know how many people play this game on a regular basis, but the number of people who've ever found anything interesting is literally a handful. You're looking at a lottery type situation here, and a lot of the people who've found stuff have either done it by pure dumb luck, they dissected some video off youtube to figure it out, or they have a degree in cryptology and weird audio software to solve a super obscure puzzle. I was excited at first too to find stuff, but realized I was WAY outgunned by other players.

 

[AndyJ]

as long as there's some clues in the game for me to follow. I love the idea of coded messages giving coordinates to faraway systems where more clues can be found. I feel the game would hugely benefit from more of this.

There's one breadcrumb trail that I came across in the summer (of course it had already been solved long before I stumbled over it!) and that was the case of the missing pilot Luca Rekivek, an explorer who's wife reported that he'd found something significant when out exploring.

It was reported in a Herald story in the local news at Obsidian Orbital in Maia. If you go there, you can still find it as a "pinned" story, so you won't have to search through more recent items to locate it.
Near the station is a listening post that appeared around the same time. Heading there and scanning it reveals further information.

I won't say more than that here, but you can follow the clues to try and find Luca and what he may have found.
The cannon site has a write up of it here though for anyone who wants all of the spoilers...

I didn't get too far into it at the time, but depending upon the next CGs I might pick up where I left off and see if I can discover his fate...

 

[2Karl]

or they have a degree in cryptology and weird audio software

Well I have that, so...

 

[2Karl]

There's one breadcrumb trail that I came across in the summer (of course it had already been solved long before I stumbled over it!) and that was the case of the missing pilot Luca Rekivek, an explorer who's wife reported that he'd found something significant when out exploring.

It was reported in a Herald story in the local news at Obsidian Orbital in Maia. If you go there, you can still find it as a "pinned" story, so you won't have to search through more recent items to locate it.
Near the station is a listening post that appeared around the same time. Heading there and scanning it reveals further information.

I won't say more than that here, but you can follow the clues to try and find Luca and what he may have found.
The cannon site has a write up of it here though for anyone who wants all of the spoilers...

I didn't get too far into it at the time, but depending upon the next CGs I might pick up where I left off and see if I can discover his fate...

Excellent! That's exactly what I'm looking for. Rep for you.

 

[SushiCW]

I love codes though. I love piecing together clues and searching, rather than just randomly stumbling across things. These are the sorts of things I'm most interested in and I wish were more frequent in the game - little news reports of strangeness in whatever system, a missing ship in this area, a coded message leading me on a trail to find other clues. That's exactly what I want to be doing, but finding the start of a "rabbithole" or breadcrumb trail eludes me.

I'm right with you. The galaxy is so big (even if you're only considering the bubble), it's very easy to play for a 1000 hours and never stumble across a single trail. I don't understand why Frontier would go through the trouble to create genuinely interesting content and then hide it where practically nobody will ever find it on their own.

In theory there's a "tip off" mechanism but it seems broken. I've never gotten a single one, while people who spam / exploit missions get so many they're a nuisance.

 

[Ian Doncaster]

I'm right with you. The galaxy is so big (even if you're only considering the bubble), it's very easy to play for a 1000 hours and never stumble across a single trail. I don't understand why Frontier would go through the trouble to create genuinely interesting content and then hide it where practically nobody will ever find it on their own.

I guess it's a matter of scale. One person searching the bubble probably never finds anything. Tens of thousands of players travelling around the bubble and anything obvious from supercruise probably gets found pretty quickly just by chance.

The problem is that there's no in-game way to announce these discoveries - it's not done formally through Galnet, and you can't do it informally by leaving a note for people who visit the system after you saying "maybe you should check out that Distress Call near Moore's Charm" either - so the second person has no better chances than anyone else to also find it.

I'm hoping the Codex and Galnet updates next year will go some way towards helping with this.

 

[Moritasgus]

After visiting CMDR Jameson and struggling to find his ship (its was just on the dark side of the planet when i visited) even with the cooridinates i firmly believe that there is noway people are doing this with the MK1 Eyeball.
I do believe some clever people are finding the right system by following the clues from galnet/inra bases etc, but i don't believe a word about people finding these site through searching manually.
FDEV don't seem to care as long as the sites are eventually found once they give us enough of a nudge.

 

[SushiCW]

you can't do it informally by leaving a note for people who visit the system after you saying "maybe you should check out that Distress Call near Moore's Charm" either - so the second person has no better chances than anyone else to also find it.

Imagine if you could leave beacons in a system, sort of like Dark Souls soapstone messages. It'd be a fun combo of genuine useful advice & secret locations, shared wonder, random humor, and trolling.

I'd be 100% behind that sort of thing.

EDIT: Wrote it up into a proper suggestions post.

 

[2Karl]

I found a bunch of escape pods in some wreckage on a planet on the way to Sagittarius A*. Another of the randomly generated temporary finds, but it was still cool. I also fully support the idea of leaving beacons, or at least some sort of limited message in stations (not sure how that would stay managable though). I'm hoping we do get some sort of improved "breadcrumbs" or means of informing us of these sorts of things, it would give me both a sense of purpose in searching and a sense of satisfaction when I discover it. I love treasure hunts with clues to decipher, I set them for my students often. For example http://www.triplesix.co.uk/ultraviolet/mission2.php is one which has been running for 4 years so far, and only three people have come close to solving it all (there's multiple nodes), but many have gotten pretty far. Something like that in game would be easily achievable and would be most wonderous.

 

[shadow133]

I was very underwhelmed after I found a signal coming around the Moon. Dropped, it was a satellite. I scanned hoping it would lead to an adventure. It turned out to be a dud, another waste of time and patience.

 

[Sylveria]

I was very underwhelmed after I found a signal coming around the Moon. Dropped, it was a satellite. I scanned hoping it would lead to an adventure. It turned out to be a dud, another waste of time and patience.

Apollo Moon Landing Hoax confirmed!