Is the lack of raw materials on planet surfaces a feature or bug?

[Evening Sam]

o7 commanders

Occasionally, I like to drive around on planet surfaces and collect raw materials for synthesis and engineering, but I've been having difficulty locating the rocks (Bronzite Chondrite, Mesosiderite, Metallic Meteorite, Outcrop) that spawn these materials in Odyssey.

In Horizons, I can usually park my ship anywhere on a planet and find several of these rocks before my ship auto-departs. In Oddysey, I rarely seem to find any of these rocks (or any other signals) while driving around planets. On the occasions where these rocks appeared, they were often really far away from where my SRV detected them, and after a while, they would just stop appearing. And at that point, these rocks would also frequently "disappear" before I can reach them. I did find a useful guide for finding raw materials on planets with volcanic activity, but I haven't had much luck finding raw materials anywhere else in Odyssey. Now I've started switching to Horizons when I really want to gather raw materials.

Did Frontier change how raw materials are generated on planet surfaces in Odyssey (and I just missed that information), or is there a bug that's preventing these resources from spawning properly on planets?

 

[varonica]

The last time I searched for mats on a planet surface there were plenty there, this was before the last update so it may have changed since. It's very likely with the planetary tech changes mat generation may be different, I will check next time I am on a planet.

 

[Factabulous]

I was wandering around after 7 - seemed fine I don't see any mention of the wave scanner in the OP so I'm assuming it's down to the CMDR for now

 

[Kissamies]

I usually rely on volcanic formations, so I have no baseline for the rocks. Seems fine, though. I have found metallic meteorites while just puttering around. Seems like they finally fixed the volcanics so that they give higher grade materials when they are supposed to. Sometimes they just disappear when shot, though. Crystalline Shards also give G4s again.

 

[Ian Doncaster]

I've found plenty on recent planetary trips [1], including after update 7.

In general in Odyssey:
- there seem to be fewer meteorites generated than in Horizons, and they seem to be persistent over a wider area (so in Horizons you could drive A-B a few kilometres, then drive back to A and get some fresh rocks, and you don't seem to be able to do that in Odyssey)
- those that are generated are much more likely to be high-quality: in Horizons I might drive for several minutes before seeing any metallic meteorites, in Odyssey there seems to be one near the landing site about 50% of the time

Update 7 also fixes the volcanism materials spread, so planets with seismic activity are now much better than before.

[1] Disclaimer: I'm in Colonia, so Pristine reserves. I've often suspected that helps.

 

[ferus]

Not sure if a bug or a feature but I can confirm there are far less of them in Odyssey.
I am pursuing my exobiologist career and I often drive distances on planet surfaces.

And I very rarely find an outcrop or a chondrite or anything similar.
If I didn't have a stockpile of the basic mats from before I suspect I would be stranded in my SRV without fuel quite quickly.

 

[Evening Sam]

I was able to find a decent amount of raw materials from the last volcanic planet I landed on. I was only finding one drop of material at a time, but each rock that spawned them was fairly close to each other. I also noticed higher grade materials dropping from Crystalline Shards, so that's cool.

I was wandering around after 7 - seemed fine I don't see any mention of the wave scanner in the OP so I'm assuming it's down to the CMDR for now

I didn't mention the wave scanner directly, but, when I was searching for Bronzite Chondrites, Mesosiderites, Metallic Meteorites, and Outcrops, my wave scanner seemed to detect them at a farther range than what I'm used to in Horizons. At least, they seem far in terms of how long it took me to reach them from the point I detected them.

Sometimes, as I'm driving towards signals on my wave scanner, they'll just disappear before I can reach them. I stop and point my wave scanner in all directions in case I passed something, but I can never find whatever it was again.

 

[quilvein]

Well, if you are doing it wrong then so am I. Exactly the same for me although I would add that when I do find the rocks it doesn't seem to matter what they are, the materials always seem to be the same. Add to that if I am looking at the contentens on the ground the radar still shows them high in the air. Weird, much better in Horizons if you/we need raws imho.

 

[varonica]

Sometimes, as I'm driving towards signals on my wave scanner, they'll just disappear before I can reach them. I stop and point my wave scanner in all directions in case I passed something, but I can never find whatever it was again.

There's a few times they've vanished for me, only to realise they were in a crater and once you get close the angle between you and the signal becomes to great and they vanish, so stuff being above or below can be an issue.

I've rarely had them vanish altogether, but sometimes that does appear to happen with the very faint lines.

 

[Rob Galaxy]

Use BRAINTREES in future to earn raw materials. I wrote a forum topic about this, just use forum search function