Limpets recycling and repair!

[Troopi]

Hello mates.
This new suggestion is about... limpets!
Yes, those tiny things that die at the slightest bump into an asteroid! Those tiny things that, like condoms, are one timed and tossed away!
FDevs, are you aware of how much debris your game design is creating around the bubble? I'm pretty sure that those resource extraction rings are by now more filled with dead limpets than rocks.
Limpets, as highly advanced robots that fill so many purposes, are simply laughable in their reuse and restore capability.
So please, let us collect those dead limpets and refuel/repair them:
1- make limpets more resistant to impact. If they hit something, make them return to ship for repairs.
2- after their life time expires, and they float around, let players scoop them and refuel/repair them to be used again.
- or, after their lifetime expires, let them have enough energy to return to ship for refuel/repair.

These changes will drastically reduce the amount of wasted limpets (immersion wise), and allow players to better manage and reuse their limpets.
Of course, the need to carry 40 tons of limpets would disappear, and this could change a core game-play style that the game was designed on, but Sci-fi-wise, I think it's completely unacceptable the current system and the way limpets are trashed after each job assigned.

What do you say, boys? Aye or naye? XD

Cheers

 

[Blasphemous One]

by design limpets are cheap and expendable, instead i would prefer them not taking up cargo space, could be a special slot that comes inbuilt with Universal Limpet controller, and the limpet limit is capped by class and / or size of slot, we no longer need to carry around 100's tons more weight and frees up cargo space for other things.

 

[Lestat]

If you are skilled you don't lose that many Limpets. I tend to discard Limpets when mining.

 

[CMDR X]

and a limpet collector limpet controller to make it all work.

Sounds great!

 

[nanite2000]

I don't have a problem with being able to scoop up and repair limpets, since I do see the benefit for pilots with smaller cargo holds who want to maximize their available cargo space.

Another good suggestion that was made recently was to change limpet behaviour so that they don't expire at all: https://forums.frontier.co.uk/threads/improved-collector-limpets.514492

 

[Troopi]

Thank you for the replies. I would like to add one specific note; at the beginning, limpets were thought of as cargo collectors, but quickly changed into more specialized roles. If this system is implemented, collecting limpets could quickly be substituted by tractor beams, and remain the main item for all other specialized activities (mining survey, fuel and repair, hatch breakers, etc...)

 

[Troopi]

by design limpets are cheap and expendable, instead i would prefer them not taking up cargo space, could be a special slot that comes inbuilt with Universal Limpet controller, and the limpet limit is capped by class and / or size of slot, we no longer need to carry around 100's tons more weight and frees up cargo space for other things.

The problem is exactly that "cheap" and "expendable". We human beings waste away too much, and it's a bad example to carry that into a futuristic game. As I say in the first post, by this time, resource extraction sites would be filled with so much junk that no ship could fly there without serious accidents.

 

[Riverside]

If a limpet is still alive after I've done with it I would like to be able to get them back onboard. Always seems a bit cruel to just jump away and leave them when they are loyally hovering by my cargo hatch

 

[space voyager]

I like the ecological twist on the suggestion. Eco is a thing nowadays and for a good reason. For educational purposes I support the suggestion.