Just found life on a planet, need help
- Thread starter Montpup
- Start date
Hi, and congrats! It sounds like you either found an Earth-like World or a Water World; either way it's a nifty find.
As for what to do next... well, that depends on you. Myself, once I get the detailed scan, I might approach the planet, slow to a safe speed and drop out of supercruise so I can take some pictures of the planet in question. Then I move on, the planet's scan safe in my ship, waiting to be sold once I return to civilization. If you're really eager to get your name on that planet, then you might want to book it back to the nearest station and sell the system data, but if you're far away (2,000 light years or more from the nearest station), then chances are you can wait; the odds of another pilot chancing on your discovery after you and then selling the data before you are pretty small.
Sadly, we can't land on Earth-like planets, nor can we check to see if those planets have a native civilization to contact (given the current story line with the Thargoids, perhaps that's just as well), so there's not much more to be done at the planet itself.
I hope this helps.
As for what to do next... well, that depends on you. Myself, once I get the detailed scan, I might approach the planet, slow to a safe speed and drop out of supercruise so I can take some pictures of the planet in question. Then I move on, the planet's scan safe in my ship, waiting to be sold once I return to civilization. If you're really eager to get your name on that planet, then you might want to book it back to the nearest station and sell the system data, but if you're far away (2,000 light years or more from the nearest station), then chances are you can wait; the odds of another pilot chancing on your discovery after you and then selling the data before you are pretty small.
Sadly, we can't land on Earth-like planets, nor can we check to see if those planets have a native civilization to contact (given the current story line with the Thargoids, perhaps that's just as well), so there's not much more to be done at the planet itself.
I hope this helps.
Don't forget Ammonia based life either, plenty of those around the galaxy as well as water and terrestrial...
Life is surprisingly common in the ED universe: about one star system in five has a life-bearing planet of some kind in it:
- Earth-like worlds
- Water worlds
- Ammonia Worlds
- Gas Giants with water-based life
- Gas Giants with ammonia-based life
Those last two are disappointingly non-valuable: you'll only get a few thousand credits for those. Ammonia worlds are worth about 400,000 apiece. Earth-likes are worth about 600,000. Water worlds, the price varies depending on whether the planet is terraformable or not: 50,000 if they're not, up to 700,000 if they are.
As for whether to rush home and claim them: well, it depends how long that'll take you, and how long you plan to be out exploring for. It's really, really rare for an Unexplored planet to be "claim-jumped", unless the first discoverer does something silly like tell the whole galaxy exactly where their valuable Untagged find is. I've first-discovered eighty ELWs and hundreds of waterworlds and ammonia worlds, and not once have I ever noticed that some darned claim-jumper has stolen a Tag from me. But then, I rarely spend more than a month away from a spacedock, so I don't usually give them much of a chance. If you plan on staying out there for a year or more, and if you're close to inhabited space, then yes, it is likely someone else will claim your world before you get back.
- Earth-like worlds
- Water worlds
- Ammonia Worlds
- Gas Giants with water-based life
- Gas Giants with ammonia-based life
Those last two are disappointingly non-valuable: you'll only get a few thousand credits for those. Ammonia worlds are worth about 400,000 apiece. Earth-likes are worth about 600,000. Water worlds, the price varies depending on whether the planet is terraformable or not: 50,000 if they're not, up to 700,000 if they are.
As for whether to rush home and claim them: well, it depends how long that'll take you, and how long you plan to be out exploring for. It's really, really rare for an Unexplored planet to be "claim-jumped", unless the first discoverer does something silly like tell the whole galaxy exactly where their valuable Untagged find is. I've first-discovered eighty ELWs and hundreds of waterworlds and ammonia worlds, and not once have I ever noticed that some darned claim-jumper has stolen a Tag from me. But then, I rarely spend more than a month away from a spacedock, so I don't usually give them much of a chance. If you plan on staying out there for a year or more, and if you're close to inhabited space, then yes, it is likely someone else will claim your world before you get back.
That's the best advice.
I always check the dark side for artificial light 
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Congratulations Cmdr. As others have said, various non-landable's have life on them, but still it's a good feeling to find something for yourself.
Your quest now, should you choose to accept it, is to find life on a landable. If you find an undiscovered type then you will always be the cmdr who found it. It will not be easy.
Be very careful exploring can become very addictive and like all addictions it has some serious side effects. I did most of my exploring to the west of the bubble out toward the rim then I decided to head to colonia from a more obtuse angle hoping to dodge the ‘highway’ and find more virgin areas. Even if you just ‘honk’ and scoot it’s a long way and a lot of systems, then you check the systems your in while you scoop and before you know it your scanning everything in the system and it’s suddenly a REALLY LONG WAY and a major time commitment.
but that’s not the biggest side effect for me. That’s come from getting closer to the core and I’ve called it ‘star blindness’ there’s literally SO many stars it sends you mad. Just picking out the next destination on your jump becomes hard, then you start twitching about the stars your NOT scanning and wondering if you missing the one with multiple ELWs in it or a black hole or even ALIEN LIFE FORMS. Suddenly you realise there’s no chance you can scan a fraction of these stars, even though you want to your body demands silly stuff like food and sleeep, then the world starts demanding you spend time at work, with family and friends, all time you could be looking for new planets instead.
It has its upsides though, especially the closer I get to the core, the sky has become more and more beautiful. Filled with nebula and thousands upon thousands of pin pricks of light and I keep exploring, despite life’s demands, now knowing I can never visit them all but im]n my madness I will visit as many as I can.
but that’s not the biggest side effect for me. That’s come from getting closer to the core and I’ve called it ‘star blindness’ there’s literally SO many stars it sends you mad. Just picking out the next destination on your jump becomes hard, then you start twitching about the stars your NOT scanning and wondering if you missing the one with multiple ELWs in it or a black hole or even ALIEN LIFE FORMS. Suddenly you realise there’s no chance you can scan a fraction of these stars, even though you want to your body demands silly stuff like food and sleeep, then the world starts demanding you spend time at work, with family and friends, all time you could be looking for new planets instead.
It has its upsides though, especially the closer I get to the core, the sky has become more and more beautiful. Filled with nebula and thousands upon thousands of pin pricks of light and I keep exploring, despite life’s demands, now knowing I can never visit them all but im]n my madness I will visit as many as I can.
Actually there are those brain trees that exist on laudable planets as well. Those are some sort of life that people have been finding on landable planets:
http://elite-dangerous.wikia.com/wiki/Brain_Trees
Yep, I'm one of those people for braintrees.
Just giving the OP a hint that there's stuff to find. 
Beautifully written, CMDR! I find my own thoughts tend to sound better when anyone else can put them into real words. In my case I had the same kind of epiphany, but in reverse. My first exploration trip was out to the California nebula. I found the void seemed to call me forward more and more the fewer stars were in the sky.
Trying to decide between the Rift, and Sag*A for my next trip out into the black.
Oh, and OP! Congrats on your achievement! Returning home with that first big load of shiny data is totally a great feeling!
I have still failed to find one on my own yet. It's my exploration quest to do still...Yep, I'm one of those people for braintrees.
don't forget to check the list of weird rares..
http://www.elitedangeroustrading.com/list-of-rare-goods.aspx
including giant snails, sea worms and a long etc of alien based stuff..
http://www.elitedangeroustrading.com/list-of-rare-goods.aspx
including giant snails, sea worms and a long etc of alien based stuff..
I'd be more than happy to give some help/advice if you want any, but it's obviously dependent on to what extent you want to do it yourself.