Well I'm almost home from my abortive attempt to traverse around the entire galaxy with my fleet and carrier for a couple of years. I'm about 10,000ly from the bubble and I'll be back in a few days. I've realised though that I just can't even attempt this journey again until Frontier acknowledge there are problems and issues with both Carriers and exploration, and implement some changes and fixes. This post follows on from some others I've written in the last week or so, but I wanted to bring it all together in a single place.
FIRST, THE PROBLEM WITH CARRIERS
There is really only one thing wrong with carriers, and that's refuelling. Opinions in these forums and on Facebook tend to be split between "It's easy and okay to fuel a carrier out in the black" and "It's very difficult to fuel a carrier and changes need to be made". For me I believe it boils down to how much and how often you game, and how comfortable and happy you are with mining. For myself I'm not a natural miner. I find it tedious and monotonous, and also quite difficult when it comes to activities such as sub-surface mining (which of course is where Tritium is to be found).
Carriers need an alternative fuel source. This could be pretty much anything at this point, but just as there are two ways to fuel a ship, there should be two ways to fuel a carrier. How would this be done? There are several ways that have jumped out at players in the Elite Dangerous community...
- The carrier being able to scoop from a star or gas giant
- Crafting from materials gathered on planetary landings in an SRV
- The establishment of bases (NPC and perhaps Player owned) out in the black where Tritium can be purchased
These are just three possible solutions, all of which fit with current game mechanics. Only when it's possible for
every type of player in Elite to easily fuel a carrier will they be suitable for exploration. I know Frontier wanted to make mining more meaningful, but this doesn't mean everybody wants to mine.
I would like to add a note here to the people who have said that "Carriers are not intended for / suitable for exploration". There are two issues here. Firstly when Frontier first advertised carriers they
specifically promoted exploration as being one of the purposes for them. Also during the beta, players who wanted to use a carrier to explore were highly vocal, resulting in Frontier adding universal cartographics as an optional service. Frontier can't then say they didn't know people would want to use carriers for this purpose.
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SECOND, THE PROBLEM WITH EXPLORATION
Exploration is dull, let's face it. With 400 billion stars in the galaxy it's been clear since the early days of Elite Dangerous that the mechanics of stars and systems work very differently inside the bubble to outside it. This will be for reasons of database sizes and manageability, which is fair enough. Slowly we have seen additional areas get more love such as around Sagittarius A*, Beagle Point, and of course Colonia.
For the rest of the galaxy though there's not much to see and do. Some notable stellar phenomena were added, but only inside nebulae. The rest of the galaxy is fairly pedestrian. But one of the downsides with this is that anything we might take for granted as being common inside the bubble, such as double and triple mining hotspots, alien and interesting sites and phenomena are either incredibly rare and difficult to find, or just don't exist at all.
When it comes to features such as double and triple hotspots, the problem is further compounded by the fact that these are all indexed and catalogued inside the bubble by websites such as Inara, EDDB, and EDSM. Outside of the bubble, and outside of the popular areas mentioned already, there's nothing. You're just left to get lucky, and with 400 billion stars the chances are very slim indeed.
So exploration needs improving. We need additional stellar phenomena such as comets and pulsars, and notable stellar phenomena both in space and on planets as can be found in the bubble such as plants and the like. Explorers also need to be able to encounter the occasional other NPC explorer and wrecked and abandoned ships both in space and planetside. These are all things that will exist in "the real world" so they should be in the game.
Some commanders have also suggested missions spawned by scanning data points on wrecked vessels, that can lead to the discovery of notable phenomena, unusual star systems, and perhaps even a long-abandoned Thargoid or Guardian base or ship. Let's face it, these races would want to explore the galaxy as well, and there is already a Guardian ruins site half way to Colonia.
IN SUMMARY
To wrap all this up into a neat package then it's safe to say that as things currently stand, exploration is dull, and exploration in a carrier is extraordinarily difficult for many. I have wanted to take my fleet on a grand tour of the galaxy since I first began playing the game in the initial beta, but as things currently stand I just think it's a wasted opportunity. There are too many barriers to long-range and long-term exploration being enjoyable. So come on Frontier... you know this can be fixed.
