How FD undermined their own creation

[Riverside]

No it only does so for the surveyor. Jump in, FSS everything (instead of honk), move on. Which actually in a way means that the system got bigger. Full FSS scanning a system takes longer than honking. Which is what some of anti-FSS people were and are all about: it takes a little longer to achieve the same thing.

In contrast the system size remained the same for explorers. Instead of "fly there to scan (with or without the old DSS)" you now "fly there to scan (with the new DSS)". But scanning isn't "point your nose at it for a few seconds" but a minigame of sending probes. (The quality of the minigame can again be discussed, but it sure is more than "point nose, wait". )

And even that's still more of surveying than exploration. Nothing of what I wrote involves going down and actually taking a look on what you found. Which still requires as much flight as before, now with a little more gameplay (and thus effort) to locate.

The FSS has turned me into a completion scanner (I probably map less than I scanned before). The net effect on my gameplay has been that there is now busywork to get to a point that was simple before (to complete the system map), and the equivalent of travelling to the body (previously to find out what it was, now to map it) also takes longer & feels convoluted.

To be fair I am getting more info than before, and earning more Credits than I know what to do with.

 

[Stealthie]

Sure!

1) Open galaxy - i like. We can see the stars in the sky and with advances in tech by the 30th century its not unreasonable to think the whole galaxy wouldn't be mapped, especially with FSDs to move around.

See, that's exactly the argument I'd use if I was defending the status quo; we can already map the galaxy in a rudimentary way so it seems likely that the entire galaxy would be mapped in the 34th century.

Thing is, from a gameplay perspective, there should really just be.... more.

It'd be nice if there were, for example, significant solar flares, radiation storms, asteroid belts, comets, micro-meteorite clouds and all sorts of other things which might present a hazard when entering a system - especially for the first time.

When we engage the FSD we currently get a little message telling us the class/state of the destination system.
Imagine if, instead, we got a little pop-up box that could tell us how well-charted a system was, whether it contained any known hazards or whether it was a completely unknown system.
You'd jump in and things might get properly exciting for a while - if the system contained significant hazards.

And then, gradually, as more and more people visit a system, UniCart would "update their records" and the jump-in point would be moved to a safe location, at which point the system would be considered safe for routine travel.

It could, perhaps, be argued that it'd become tedious having to deal with all that stuff continually on a trip to, say, Beagle Point but, then again, if all that stuff did happen all the time then we probably wouldn't be making routine trips to Beagle Point yet and instead there'd be an army of courageous/foolhardy explorers throwing themselves out into the dangerous unknown just to chart a safe course to SagA or attempting to reach the stranded Jaques Station, system by system, instead.

 

[Northpin]

I never tried that either. Can you use the SCA and set the throttle to zero? Also, orbit is not exactly what would interest me too much. My line of thought is more along the line of "fly towards the first interesting object, use the FSS to scan the rest while flying there".

No, SCA will orbit a planet at low speed.
DSS also works at low speed.
What i'm not sure is SCA speed being low enough for FSS to work and also orbit altitude big enough for DSS to be usable

 

[Sylow]

The net effect on my gameplay has been that there is now busywork to get to a point that was simple before (to complete the system map), and the equivalent of travelling to the body (previously to find out what it was, now to map it) also takes longer & feels convoluted.

That's something I agree upon. It now is more effort to get there. That's indeed more gameplay. But I also think that while it is more gameplay, the quality can be discussed. On the feeling convoluted, I personally think that this is to a high degree due to a few small issues:

• You can't use the FSS while moving. Eliminating the "throttle to zero" requirement would go a long way.
• At least for a joystick user like me, targeting an object sometimes is a bit "fiddly". Something like a snap to target function would go a long way. (And would also help a lot when using it while moving would be allowed. )
• The "radio dial" looks more granular that it actually is. I have bound it to a rotary input on my HOTAs. I can move the rotary with high accuracy. When showing the joystick output values on the screen, it also is visible that the rotary delivers data of high accuracy. Still the dial is jumping. Merely upgrading the display part of the dial, to be more granular, would already go a long way.
• And for somebody using the FSS for missions in populated systems, having the ships radar somewhere on the FSS screen would be extremely valuable.

That's not a complete list of necessary improvements. But I think it would be a good start to make the FSS feel better.

Mind you, I find the DSS gameplay more boring. On the FSS you can learn a few things, work with the arrows, etc. By positioning myself on the zenith or nadir of a systems star, I find it easier to detect strange orbits than in the old ADS. So it's not like everything is worse. On the old ADS->system map routine, you never noticed such a strange orbit, in the FSS I do.

In contrast, I find the DSS "shoot probes in a pattern" to be a tedious minigame. The whole skill is to judge the size of the circles to get a tight patter. If you want the extra payout of sending a minimum of probes, that is. If the payout doesn't matter to you, you just plaster it with probes, no skill needed at all.

I have no idea yet on how to make that more interesting. But I am a bit astonished that everybody rages about the FSS, while nobody says anything against the new DSS. For the FSS I see plenty of room for improvement, for the DSS at least I have more of a problem. It seems tedious to me, but I don't see an easy way to make it more interesting.

No, SCA will orbit a planet at low speed.
DSS also works at low speed.
What i'm not sure is SCA speed being low enough for FSS to work and also orbit altitude big enough for DSS to be usable

Technically the FSS could work at any speed. You can reproduce it in game: accelerate to high speed. Put your throttle to zero. Enter the FSS. If your throttle is at zero, you can enter the FSS mode, while your ship still needs a while to decelerate. Things will move in the FSS, but you can scan them.

The limiting factor is how to enter the FSS: your throttle has to be set to zero. I haven't used supercruise assist for more than one testride, and don't remember any more if you can use it with throttle at zero. If it works with throttle at zero, you should be able to use the FSS while it controls the ship. Else those two things block each other.

 

[CMDR Karrde Sun]

I only have something superficial to add.. when it was a reasonable trip to get from one end of the bubble, it felt much more special, and each area of interest in it had more meaning and value because of it.

Given its a game and we're not commuting to work, it is a bit of a shame that was lost. Even the systems in between held more interest.. because the distance doesnt matter anymore you're not directed to care about the in betweens as in the past out of relief.

While frontier are on one hand frontier are the most ivory tower tunnel vision focused developer, as soon whoever read the steam reviews rocked up to that meeting it was all thrown out the window and carved up, feels that way anyway. It was a point of address at the time though.

 

[Factabulous]

It'd be nice if there were, for example, significant solar flares, radiation storms, asteroid belts, comets, micro-meteorite clouds and all sorts of other things which might present a hazard when entering a system - especially for the first time.

I like the idea, but let's look at one of the few hazards that was present - multiple suns. This had the ability to warm you up (and could cook you if you weren't careful). Something to watch out for.

So what happened? They were nerfed so that we now drop out away from nearly any danger, unless you are seriously unlucky.

Why? Because many people don't want any danger, and complain constantly if there is any. Look at the numbers who get Support to move them 'because they jumped into a system they couldn't jump back out of'.

I like your ideas, because they speak of learning and consequences - sadly the louder voice seems to be 'I want things to be risk free, don't expect to spend effort learning how things work'.

ofc if you add your ideas to the OPs then the game becomes somewhat masochistic - imagine heading out 20 k LY in a ship with nearer the original 40 Ly jump range, only to be holed my micrometeorites on your first jump and resurrect back in the bubble. Ooops, at least next time I fly that 20 k Ly that info will help move my entry point so I miss that happening again

 

[Ian Doncaster]

With hindsight, it might've been better if FDev had, somehow, made it so ships could only travel a limited distance "into the unknown".
Set it up so that, perhaps, you have long-range sensors that can only detect new systems within a limited range - until a system is discovered and entered into the UniCart database.

That way, the game would have started off with people charting courses, and discovering routes between popular locations, along fairly narrow "pathways" and then it'd be up to the explorers to build their jumpy ships and go out and expand the number of systems in the UniCart database so that everybody else could plot courses to them.

Basically, a kind of galactic "fog of war".

I guess you're not going to get the toothpaste back in the tube, though.

One problem is that it would make long distance exploration really painful. It'd work very well close to the bubble, but further out, it would be:
- fly 5000 LY to edge of catalogued space
- fly 100 LY out discovering more systems near the catalogued system
- fly 5100 LY back to hand in the discoveries
- fly 5100 LY out to get back to where you were
- fly 100 LY out discovering more systems
- fly 5200 LY back to hand those in

The other problem is that the toothpaste would probably be out of the tube by now anyway - we've had almost five years of exploring now, with probably about 250 million systems visited. With 100 LY "fog" range [1], it would only take about 1.5 million visited systems (in specific locations [2]) to completely clear the fog ... and old explorers would be complaining/reminiscing about how there's no real exploration any more now that the fog has been cleared.

It would have been a fun project for the early game, but it would by now mostly be over.

[1] Bearing in mind that you can never jump to a system that is further away from its nearest neighbour than the fog range, it would have to be fairly high to allow the outer arms to be explored at all, and even then 100 LY would mean returning to base every few systems...

[2] Your reference systems would be in something like a hexagonal packing array, and then various optimisations could be made to fill it out quickly by maximising "surface area" at the early stages, which also increases your benefit from explorers who aren't in on the plan.

 

[Riverside]

That's something I agree upon. It now is more effort to get there. That's indeed more gameplay. But I also think that while it is more gameplay, the quality can be discussed. On the feeling convoluted, I personally think that this is to a high degree due to a few small issues:

• You can't use the FSS while moving. Eliminating the "throttle to zero" requirement would go a long way.
• At least for a joystick user like me, targeting an object sometimes is a bit "fiddly". Something like a snap to target function would go a long way. (And would also help a lot when using it while moving would be allowed. )
• The "radio dial" looks more granular that it actually is. I have bound it to a rotary input on my HOTAs. I can move the rotary with high accuracy. When showing the joystick output values on the screen, it also is visible that the rotary delivers data of high accuracy. Still the dial is jumping. Merely upgrading the display part of the dial, to be more granular, would already go a long way.
• And for somebody using the FSS for missions in populated systems, having the ships radar somewhere on the FSS screen would be extremely valuable.

That's not a complete list of necessary improvements. But I think it would be a good start to make the FSS feel better.

Mind you, I find the DSS gameplay more boring. On the FSS you can learn a few things, work with the arrows, etc. By positioning myself on the zenith or nadir of a systems star, I find it easier to detect strange orbits than in the old ADS. So it's not like everything is worse. On the old ADS->system map routine, you never noticed such a strange orbit, in the FSS I do.

In contrast, I find the DSS "shoot probes in a pattern" to be a tedious minigame. The whole skill is to judge the size of the circles to get a tight patter. If you want the extra payout of sending a minimum of probes, that is. If the payout doesn't matter to you, you just plaster it with probes, no skill needed at all.

I have no idea yet on how to make that more interesting. But I am a bit astonished that everybody rages about the FSS, while nobody says anything against the new DSS. For the FSS I see plenty of room for improvement, for the DSS at least I have more of a problem. It seems tedious to me, but I don't see an easy way to make it more interesting.

I don't disagree with any of that, the only places where our views substantially differ are in the 'need' for the old modules to be removed and the (probably related) need for a tool to be itself 'fun' to use.

I want the information. I don't know what I'm looking for specifically, just anything interesting (and that will vary from session to session, and based on what I recently found - eg I don't bother visiting most water worlds or moons any more because I've seen so many).

The FSS & new DSS do a job, and I can make use of those tools. I don't need them to be engaging tools, but I do want the information I gain from them to be, well, informative. So stuff like the delay in getting the geological POI count is a bit annoying, other than that I'm easy.

I don't really get why people want the FSS to go away either, but I always smile when RLSG says 'space golf'

 

[Agony_Aunt]

See, that's exactly the argument I'd use if I was defending the status quo; we can already map the galaxy in a rudimentary way so it seems likely that the entire galaxy would be mapped in the 34th century.

Thing is, from a gameplay perspective, there should really just be.... more.

It'd be nice if there were, for example, significant solar flares, radiation storms, asteroid belts, comets, micro-meteorite clouds and all sorts of other things which might present a hazard when entering a system - especially for the first time.

When we engage the FSD we currently get a little message telling us the class/state of the destination system.
Imagine if, instead, we got a little pop-up box that could tell us how well-charted a system was, whether it contained any known hazards or whether it was a completely unknown system.
You'd jump in and things might get properly exciting for a while - if the system contained significant hazards.

And then, gradually, as more and more people visit a system, UniCart would "update their records" and the jump-in point would be moved to a safe location, at which point the system would be considered safe for routine travel.

It could, perhaps, be argued that it'd become tedious having to deal with all that stuff continually on a trip to, say, Beagle Point but, then again, if all that stuff did happen all the time then we probably wouldn't be making routine trips to Beagle Point yet and instead there'd be an army of courageous/foolhardy explorers throwing themselves out into the dangerous unknown just to chart a safe course to SagA or attempting to reach the stranded Jaques Station, system by system, instead.

In system, sure, i would like to see more stuff like you suggest, but i thought the point was about the galaxy level stuff.

 

[[Diplomacy] Carnegie]

But I am a bit astonished that everybody rages about the FSS, while nobody says anything against the new DSS.

The DSS is terrible - throwing rocks at a melon.

 

[Sylow]

The DSS is terrible - throwing rocks at a melon.

Thanks for helping me out here.

 

[MadDogMurdock]

Sure!

1) Open galaxy - i like. We can see the stars in the sky and with advances in tech by the 30th century its not unreasonable to think the whole galaxy wouldn't be mapped, especially with FSDs to move around.

2) In the middle here. I like how big the galaxy is, but after 4 years of play i can't complain if the increased range lets me hop around the bubble a bit quicker. I've been an explorer since before launch, so i'm quite familiar with travel times around the galaxy. Its still a big galaxy, even if we can get around it twice as fast as at launch. I'd rather ranges not get any bigger though.

3) Sorry, got to disagree. I very much like the ability to scan the whole system. People already complain about the new FSS not revealing the whole thing. I understand more hardcore players want realism and some people want to find planets by paralax rather than ping, but for me that would be incredibly tedious.

Thanks - this is more like it.

1) It's one thing to have mapped where all the stars are in space, it's something else knowing how to get there through hyperspace - a different medium with its own set of rules that can be completely arbitrary because its all theory.

2) I did note that one of the drives for increased range was in the bubble and there was an issue there. However, I think the point about the effect on the galactic structure of 50+ly ranges stands.

3) I also very much like scanning the whole system - but as a whole, not on an individual body by body basis. I prefer my system exploration to be based on travelling through the system to targets selected by me on an arbitrary basis as opposed to only having a wavefrom and random panning to use. So, as a bare minimum I need to populate the nav panel in order to be able to select a target, and a system overview to be able to decide which body I want a closer look at. As stated, the FSS is a definite step up as a body scanner.

Realism v gameplay is definitely subject to opinion
It also varies widely depending on the subject.
For example, I've long been advocating instant pilot transfer between ships you already own - haters gonna hate because it's completely unrealistic.
But what it achieves is to remove all that taxi carp of getting between ships before you can actually get to the gameplay you're currently interested in.

 

[Stealthie]

I like the idea, but let's look at one of the few hazards that was present - multiple suns. This had the ability to warm you up (and could cook you if you weren't careful). Something to watch out for.

So what happened? They were nerfed so that we now drop out away from nearly any danger, unless you are seriously unlucky.

Why? Because many people don't want any danger, and complain constantly if there is any. Look at the numbers who get Support to move them 'because they jumped into a system they couldn't jump back out of'.

I like your ideas, because they speak of learning and consequences - sadly the louder voice seems to be 'I want things to be risk free, don't expect to spend effort learning how things work'.

I think the difference is that there was no way to avoid/mitigate getting cooked when jumping into a system.
Jump into the same system a thousand times and you're going to get cooked a thousand times.

The main thing that would elevate navigation/exploration beyond what we currently have would be adaptive tools related to UniCart.

Our FSDs allegedly work by targetting the largest mass in a system.
Fair enough.
So, you jump into an unexplored system and arrive at the primary star.
Maybe you get cooked between binaries, maybe you get cooked by a solar flare, maybe your ship hits an asteroid belt, maybe you get shotblasted by micro-meteorites or maybe your engines get damaged by clouds of space-gunk.
If you make it back to civilisation, and hand in your data, UniCart should be capable of recognising all these things, adding them to the Codex (which would be the source for the little pop-up warning message you get before jumping), and eventually adjusting the jump-in coordinates to avoid hazards.

There might only need to be, say, Green, Amber and Red states for a system - Green for a definitely safe jump-in, Amber for one that's "under review" pending further data-gathering and Red for unexplored systems.

Honestly, I wouldn't mind if FDev retconned something like this into the game now, given that we only recently got the Codex.
Leave all the discoveries as they are but move all the jump-in points back to an initial location near the Primary and reset every system to "Red" status so that the Codex and UniCart can start recording hazards and then move the jump-in points as required.

It wouldn't be long before the bubble was all "Green" and players could go about their usual business but it'd give explorers a lot more to think about and a good reason to build a variety of different types of exploration ship for different purposes.
Build a tinfoil ship for getting far away but you might, instead, want to build a super-tanky exploration ship for surveying hazardous systems.


Oh, I'd also like to see the Codex retain information about ships lost (excluding those lost in combat) in each system.
That way, even if there was no data about the hazards in a system, part of the pop-up warning would tell you that a given number of ships had been lost in that system so you'd know there was something dangerous in there.

 

[MadDogMurdock]

Thanks for helping me out here.

Plus the DSS was essentially new - the only thing it replaced as a surface discovery mechanism was the MkI Eyeball.

 

[[Diplomacy] Carnegie]

I think the difference is that there was no way to avoid/mitigate getting cooked when jumping into a system.
Jump into the same system a thousand times and you're going to get cooked a thousand times.

The main thing that would elevate navigation/exploration beyond what we currently have would be adaptive tools related to UniCart.

Our FSDs allegedly work by targetting the largest mass in a system.
Fair enough.
So, you jump into an unexplored system and arrive at the primary star.
Maybe you get cooked between binaries, maybe you get cooked by a solar flare, maybe your ship hits an asteroid belt, maybe you get shotblasted by micro-meteorites or maybe your engines get damaged by clouds of space-gunk.
If you make it back to civilisation, and hand in your data, UniCart should be capable of recognising all these things, adding them to the Codex (which would be the source for the little pop-up warning message you get before jumping), and eventually adjusting the jump-in coordinates to avoid hazards.

There might only need to be, say, Green, Amber and Red states for a system - Green for a definitely safe jump-in, Amber for one that's "under review" pending further data-gathering and Red for unexplored systems.

Honestly, I wouldn't mind if FDev retconned something like this into the game now, given that we only recently got the Codex.
Leave all the discoveries as they are but move all the jump-in points back to an initial location near the Primary and reset every system to "Red" status so that the Codex and UniCart can start recording hazards and then move the jump-in points as required.

It wouldn't be long before the bubble was all "Green" and players could go about their usual business but it'd give explorers a lot more to think about and a good reason to build a variety of different types of exploration ship for different purposes.
Build a tinfoil ship for getting far away but you might, instead, want to build a super-tanky exploration ship for surveying hazardous systems.


Oh, I'd also like to see the Codex retain information about ships lost (excluding those lost in combat) in each system.
That way, even if there was no data about the hazards in a system, part of the pop-up warning would tell you that a given number of ships had been lost in that system so you'd know there was something dangerous in there.

There currently isn't a single jump-in 'point' for a system. You arrive on the side of a star facing where you jumped from. This is why when you have a plotted route your next system is always on the far side of the star.

 

[cheesenbiscuits]

Engineering extreme range fsd’s are completely optional.

 

[Codger]

Interesting. I don't agree with any of it, lol.

 

[Riverside]

Plus the DSS was essentially new - the only thing it replaced as a surface discovery mechanism was the MkI Eyeball.

It is also optional because it comes at the end of the discovery process.

 

[VR jefranklin18]

The greatest single aspect of ED is without doubt Stellar Forge and the recreation of a 1-1 galaxy with all the variety that RNG can muster with 400 billion potentially unique outcomes.

Unfortunately, almost every single decision made about exploring it has been wrong and has undermined the glorious scale and variety of our home, the Milky Way.

Blunder 1. The Open Galaxy
By making travel unrestricted, FD immediately and irrevocably removed the wide possibilities of path-finding as an exploration mechanism.
A huge amount of gameplay could have been built around the idea that hyperspace routes between systems need to be established before they can be used.
Imagine a hard frontier around the bubble of explored space, as there was on a smaller scale during Beta. A key gameplay mechanism could have involved some form of route discovery to both push the frontier outwards, and improve transport links inside the bubble.
Instead, the #1 attraction in the entire galaxy, the centre of it, was reached becore the game even officially launched.
Rather than an exercise in path-finding led expansion, travelling our galaxy became an exercise in endurance.

Don't necessarily agree with this - I understand the "fog of war" argument about not being able to see everything but this is the 3300s and therefore it is reasonable expect that the known galaxy had been mapped albeit it not fully explored.

Blunder 2. Ever-Increasing Jump Ranges
Space is big, really big, you wouldn't believe... you get the idea. Prior to Engineers, jump ranges maxxed out at about 40ly. The top range from 30-40ly was in a sweet spot that gave the galaxy a structure - the difference between the core, the spiral arms, and the gaps between them was clearly noticable and represented a genuine navigation challenge.
Possibly due to pressure from this community, instead of addressing the very poor jump ranges of certain ships, engineering grossly exagerrated the jump ranges of ships that were already the best at it.
Sure, getting around the bubble is now a lot more convenient, but the cost was the removal of any texture in the galaxy.
Prior to this change, a trip to the next spiral arm posed minor route finding problems, and the further out you went, the more tricky it got. This is arguably, the only navigation problem the game has ever contained. Removing it trivialized the scale of the galaxy, and made it a generic unstructured clump of stars instead of an interesting stuctured spiral requiring route planning.
That route finding gameplay does still exist, but now it is very much a fringe activity out on the extreme edges of the galaxy, with a rapidly diminishing set of unreachable locations.

I sort of agree with this. I have no issues with the increasing jump ranges to some extent (technological progress or whatever) but there is really little point in a player who is wanting to get to Beagle Point in going for an AspX or a DBX when the Anaconda out-jumps them. There is a small set of ships are completely overpowered in all areas and have become the end-game ship for many. Either the big ships should have a minimum crewing requirement (as per FE2 and FFE) or they need to have their jump range drastically reduced - the salt it would generate though....

Blunder 3. The Full System Scanner
Space is big, really big, you wouldn't believe... oh, I already said that. Yup, even individual systems are big. Supercruise was a late change to the original design but it is absolutely essential to getting even the slightest sense of the vast distances even within a system.
Yup, it is not fully fleshed out, it seems like a timesink in very large systems, and there isn't enough to do on one of those trips to Hutton Orbital. But just think about Hutton Orbital - the most iconic outpost in the game - only because it is so far away.
The glory of Stellar Forge is the variety it creates, some systems are big, some systems are tiny, and everything in between. There is no lack of choice available, and the truth is that if you don't like long SC trips, you can easily avoid them.
What's that got to do with the FSS - it's the wrong solution to something that isn't actually a problem.
The problem with SC isn't so much the time it takes to get to secondary stars, it's the lack of things to do on the way there.
Instead of making an in-flight scanner, the FSS brings us to a standstill, removes us from the cockpit, and then commits the worst offence of all - it flattens out every system into the same generic sized strobing blue sphere containing the same generic blue blobs.
System discovery becomes an exercise in camera panning where distance is irrelevant - somehow the developers surrendered to the idea that SC is a problem and created a mechanism to avoid it instead of adding it as something to do while you travel.

I am in partial agreement here. The FSS is fine (and a vast improvement on the honk mechanism) but it lacks "something" - when I drop into a system with a lot of bodies in it, I am now at the point where I don't bother scanning the gas giants, icy and rocky worlds and focus on the money spinners (and I consider exploration my preferred role). There is just nothing to see. I am on the return from the DW2 expedition, I cannot remember the last time I saw a USS to go have a look at or something on a planetary body worth looking at. How the FSS is implemented can be discussed until the cows come home because people will never agree.

I would lose the ability to plot long-distance routes though; I much preferred the 1000ly maximum.

 

[Lightspeed]

The greatest single aspect of ED is without doubt Stellar Forge and the recreation of a 1-1 galaxy with all the variety that RNG can muster with 400 billion potentially unique outcomes.

Unfortunately, almost every single decision made about exploring it has been wrong and has undermined the glorious scale and variety of our home, the Milky Way.

Blunder 1. The Open Galaxy

A very good post, although I don't agree with this point. Routes would have been established very quickly 'by others' limiting the sense of freedom later .... you know, the ones that like to go out and discover everything, solve all the puzzles, ahead of everyone else. (Maybe I have misunderstood you here, if so apologies.)

Blunder 2. Ever-Increasing Jump Ranges

Possibly due to pressure from this community, instead of addressing the very poor jump ranges of certain ships, engineering grossly exagerrated the jump ranges of ships that were already the best at it.

It was Michael Brookes who decided 'we need to bring distances closer' (my loose quote because I can't find the original. Soon after saying that, neutron stars were introduced, then we had crafted jump boosts, then engineering, then Guardian boosters .....

Sure, getting around the bubble is now a lot more convenient, but the cost was the removal of any texture in the galaxy.
Prior to this change, a trip to the next spiral arm posed minor route finding problems, and the further out you went, the more tricky it got. This is arguably, the only navigation problem the game has ever contained. Removing it trivialized the scale of the galaxy, and made it a generic unstructured clump of stars instead of an interesting stuctured spiral requiring route planning.
That route finding gameplay does still exist, but now it is very much a fringe activity out on the extreme edges of the galaxy, with a rapidly diminishing set of unreachable locations.

I know what you mean. I'm flying a Clipper Explorer with around 45 ly jump range. Even with this range, it's challenging to explore in a sector between two spiral arms where stars are teasingly remote at times. With a larger jump range, I would be skipping over the challenges.

Blunder 3. The Full System Scanner
Space is big, really big, you wouldn't believe...

What's that got to do with the FSS - it's the wrong solution to something that isn't actually a problem.

.... the FSS brings us to a standstill, removes us from the cockpit, and then commits the worst offence of all - it flattens out every system into the same generic sized strobing blue sphere containing the same generic blue blobs.
System discovery becomes an exercise in camera panning where distance is irrelevant - somehow the developers surrendered to the idea that SC is a problem and created a mechanism to avoid it instead of adding it as something to do while you travel.

This is what I felt, very early on, even in beta. But I couldn't lay my finger on what was wrong at the time. It's the bland flatness of the task we are given.

The FSS can be improved by merging it with an orrery presentation. That way, you have a sense of the shape and size of the system you are in.