How do we find Geological Sites now?
- Thread starter Sepherion
- Start date
The heatmap is not working properly - success varies from scan to scan. That’s why. Check issue tracker.
OK, it took me a bit to sort this one out...
To use the heatmap correctly, make sure you have keybinds assigned to the filters under your DSS keybind menu.
After you send out the probes and have the surface mapped 100%, you can use your keys to swap between the signal types, this switching display appears at the top center of your DSS display.
Here's the frustrating part - I had a mapped planet that showed some absurd amount covered by the heatmap, it must've been 95% covered, with 2 bio signals, and switching filters had zero effect. Was it planet-wide bacterial life types? I dunno, my suit ran out of power so I can't step out and see. So this might be what you're experiencing.
Now, if you do get a couple good signals with defined locations, switch to whichever one you want to try and fly down and get close to the surface... I mean CLOSE to where the color is deepest on your heatmap. I was bumping the nose of my 'Conda on the ground to see some of the life forms, they're small.
That's it.
It might be a bit before we get a good guide to what the life forms are, what they look like, and what sort of coverage we can expect between the types.
To use the heatmap correctly, make sure you have keybinds assigned to the filters under your DSS keybind menu.
After you send out the probes and have the surface mapped 100%, you can use your keys to swap between the signal types, this switching display appears at the top center of your DSS display.
Here's the frustrating part - I had a mapped planet that showed some absurd amount covered by the heatmap, it must've been 95% covered, with 2 bio signals, and switching filters had zero effect. Was it planet-wide bacterial life types? I dunno, my suit ran out of power so I can't step out and see. So this might be what you're experiencing.
Now, if you do get a couple good signals with defined locations, switch to whichever one you want to try and fly down and get close to the surface... I mean CLOSE to where the color is deepest on your heatmap. I was bumping the nose of my 'Conda on the ground to see some of the life forms, they're small.
That's it.
It might be a bit before we get a good guide to what the life forms are, what they look like, and what sort of coverage we can expect between the types.
Your suit recharges as soon as you enter a vehicle.
Here is what I did after getting REALLY frustrated and at the bridge of pressing Alt-F4 : I exited the game, switched to horizon, went to a geological site took note of coordinates, switched back to Odyssey (going to orbit before each switch) and went back to geological site. The DSS showing me crashed sites on left panel felt completely useless to me (I'll try bombing one site from ship later) Here is the result 
(geyser + on foot) (edit green colour alteration is due to my orange desaturating reshade filter)
(geyser + on foot) (edit green colour alteration is due to my orange desaturating reshade filter)
We can start to have visual flying under 100mts
Apparently, they've already abandoned the heat map...
See here:
https://issues.frontierstore.net/issue-detail/32054
See here:
https://issues.frontierstore.net/issue-detail/32054
That's how I was doing it today for the bacteria. I can find the rest easily with the SRV, but I find bacteria easier to see with low-level flying.
That explains why I couldn't see any differences in colour other than terrain. That will save me some flying time looking for darker areas.
Its not a true heat map anymore though. Apparently having a range of colours-from blue to red-was too....confusing....for some folks, so they dumbed it down to this near useless rubbish. I have yet to find a single Geological Site using this new map overlay....and the Filter is now almost useless too.
Low-level flying works, although it does kinda require you to know what you're looking for...
Yeah, I find it useless as well. I already hated the fact that in Horizons, after you mapped a planet, you had to switch to combat mode (even if your ship has no weapons equipped) just to get rid of that stupid blue overlay. I was sad when I found out that they were going to make it a thing you have to use to find stuff now... made me wonder "What's the point of this new planetary tech if I'm going to be hiding it with some ugly overlay?" I'd much rather see the terrain as I descend. I wish they'd just scrap this and go back to the old way.
I'd love to see these complaints they mention. I was closely following all the comments on the various Feedback threads, and the only "confusion" I saw was based on the Planetary Tech not being complete during the Alpha, which made the Heat Maps in Alpha effectively useless. It would have made more sense to release the Heat Map system we had in Alpha, until the end of May, then see how many people were still confused after that.
Low level flying also worked way back in 2016-17. The Heat Map was supposed to do away with the Mk1 Eyeball as a means of finding Geologicals.
They just need to add a color key for their heat map. It'd solve a lot of whatever confusion there was.
It was the lime green ball of confusion that was the problem. When it worked it was brilliant.
These kids today, they're far too reliant on technology! What's wrong with the Mk1 eyeball?
Precisely, even I complained about that. Thing is, they should have waited until after they finalised the Planetary Tech before making a decision on the Heat Map. If people still found it confusing after that. Then either offer us a colour key or a DSS tutorial......better yet, BOTH.