New Explorer and suddenly...

Valorin

Valorin
Isn't that funny? I wasn't in the cockpit for a rather long time, and while I appreciate all the new stuff they are bringing to the game, all of these things weren't really for me. Combat, more combat (did I mention combat?), Powerplay (yaaawn), an excellent T8 hauler which looks fantastic in my book, and all the other things that are not exploration content. :D

So now they announce a new exploration ship, and by the looks of it it's not even one that I really like concept-wise, but that did it. Partially at least.
(Disclaimer: The Mandalay is basically a jetplane in space, which is not my kind of space ship. I don't like the Normandy either. Yes, really. Design-wise it's marvellous.)

Anyway... That little ship was enough to get me checking my material storage to see if I have enough stuff for the engineering part. Getting the FSD to G5 with Mass Manager, stripping stuff, shields, reinforced armour (yes, I like my explorers robust) and so on... basically everything I did on my Krait Phantom.

And that was one announcement for one ship. Can we have some more exploration stuff next? Pretty please with cherry on top? I'll be back in the cockpit in an eyeblink.

(Damn, I really hope they got the modules right..)
 

Valorin

Valorin
Riverside said:
The Odyssey DLC really added a lot to exploration activities to the game that I like, more would be very welcome.

Personally a big thing I'm looking forward to is landable atmo planets with thicker atmospheres (and wind & clouds & more codex boxes to tick, things to find & so on).
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Yeah. I'm looking for the nerdy stuff though. Using the full potential of the stellar forge and the 1:1 Milky Way we got. I'd love to see acretion discs for black holes, white dwarfs eating their fellow stars, taking ground samples, gas samples, radiation readings and connect these things to new gameplay loops. I'd also love to actually have a mining tool on my SRV. Instead, in a game that is build on astronomy and science in the beginning, I shoot at rocks and collect the bits Super Mario style.
I love space faring and getting out there, and I don't really need too much out there. I'd just really love to see things I would realistically encounter there, instead of having all these civilisation POVs when not anywhere near civilisation. Or strange alien plants and the like. I mean, I take those, but there's a lot you could take inspiration from and add it to the game. Even with a little handwavium I'd really love some more actual astroscience connected to the gameplay.

And well... Amtospheric planets. Why not poke both hornet nests while we're at it and say "Ship interiors". I want atmospheric.
Buuuuut... These are really major things, especially atmospheric planets with vegetation and water and the like. In a game like Elite it's not enough to procedurally craft an interesting colourful alien world. It needs to be realistic enough to fit into the theme of the game. Which not only means original size, but vegetation and potential life has to fit the planet's specs. Gravity, weather, star, astronomical events and everything else. On top of that, they'd all need to be different.
I'd be content with waterworlds, more active volcanic worlds and planets like Mars, with weather for example. Even that is major content, but I'd be more than willing to pay for that.
 
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Oh Seven Commander

Oh Seven Commander
I'm fine if we don't fancier planets, I don't think the engine can handle much more based on the performance it gets now. What I would like is more mechanically interesting things to do while exploring. More stuff to find/do/actual exploration that goes beyond just scanning.

There's no mechanical reason to explore 6,000LY from Sol vs 50,000LY from Sol, it's all just flavor. There's no more risk, rewards, etc out there, either assuming you're in a decently built ship and don't fly recklessly.
 

Michael Ryan

Michael Ryan
Boone Lockley said:
I'm fine if we don't fancier planets, I don't think the engine can handle much more based on the performance it gets now. What I would like is more mechanically interesting things to do while exploring. More stuff to find/do/actual exploration that goes beyond just scanning.

There's no mechanical reason to explore 6,000LY from Sol vs 50,000LY from Sol, it's all just flavor. There's no more risk, rewards, etc out there, either assuming you're in a decently built ship and don't fly recklessly.
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That's why Ryan Family stated to create Explores Bubble in the Trojan Belt, to make one more reason to travel more :)

But, yes, I would to find more plants... and more uniqe for some part/regions.
 

Kira Goto

Kira Goto
Boone Lockley said:
I don't think the engine can handle much more based on the performance it gets now.
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I’d like to think a lot of it is down to optimization more than what the engine can handle… had Odyssey launched in a less atrocious state, perhaps the performance it provides around certain locations would also just be better/have improved even further past what we have now (but given the stories of slideshows even on high end PCs from its launch… well, let’s just say, I won’t complain about the state it is in right now which, largely, is more than playable).
 

Northpin

Northpin
Valorin said:
And that was one announcement for one ship. Can we have some more exploration stuff next? Pretty please with cherry on top? I'll be back in the cockpit in an eyeblink.
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Sorry, next one will be the Panther Clipper 😁

... although i would not say no to a small dedicated explorer, one with an especially good down/side view (way better than dolphin's or icourier's) and a decent sized fuel scoop, unlike the DBX.
 

Oh Seven Commander

Oh Seven Commander
Michael Ryan said:
Have you seen any other Frontier games??? Read about their graphic engines :)
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Those games aren't Elite, though, and none of their other games have whole explorable planets with weather, flora, fauna, etc. Elite doesn't even have caves - engine limitation - and on foot CZs still have notable drops in performance with only a few dozens combatants, and no weather at all.
 

marx

marx
Riverside said:
Personally a big thing I'm looking forward to is landable atmo planets with thicker atmospheres (and wind & clouds & more codex boxes to tick, things to find & so on).
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There is wind on the current landable planets already (well, not on the ones without atmospheres of course!), with varying strengths and all - it's just barely noticeable. Personally, I only noticed this when one of the patch notes mentioned it. Try looking at the small plants that can sway in the wind, and in the extreme cases, you can even hear the wind.

Boone Lockley said:
There's no mechanical reason to explore 6,000LY from Sol vs 50,000LY from Sol, it's all just flavor. There's no more risk, rewards, etc out there, either assuming you're in a decently built ship and don't fly recklessly.
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If you wish to see every Odyssey flora out there, you do need to fly to at least three locations outside of the bubble. Out of the 90 species, 76 can be found around the bubble, 11 can be found around Sagittarius A*, 2 around Colonia and just one (Tussock Divisa) elsewhere. (This is just a route optimising regions, by the way.)

There are also the various Notable Stellar Phenomena, for which you have to go much farther for a completionist run, although the mechanical rewards of NSPs in general are tiny.
 
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Oh Seven Commander

Oh Seven Commander
marx said:
If you wish to see every Odyssey flora out there, you do need to fly to at least three locations outside of the bubble. Out of the 90 species, 76 can be found around the bubble, 11 can be found around Sagittarius A*, 2 around Colonia and just one (Tussock Divisa) elsewhere. (This is just a route optimising regions, by the way.)

There are also the various Notable Stellar Phenomena, for which you have to go much farther for a completionist run, although the mechanical rewards of NSPs in general are tiny.
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The differences between all of these plants and NSPs however is just flavor. That's the point I'm bringing up, there's really just 90 different colors of plant.
 

Rat Catcher

Rat Catcher
Koma Pahu said:
When you set the frame rate to 30 for SCO heat management, there’s no difference between space and on foot even on my old rig 😉
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One of these days I'll have to ditch my 286-20 and maybe get a 486-50...

I guess I'm fortunate in having a very recent PC setup built primarily to play games - which has the benefit of being pretty reasonable for doing photo / video editing too.
It may even get upgraded again soon, particularly if AMD release the 9950X3D as the rumour mill is hinting at!
 

Kira Goto

Kira Goto
Koma Pahu said:
When you set the frame rate to 30 for SCO heat management, there’s no difference between space and on foot even on my old rig 😉
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I'm pretty sure they fixed the SCO heat generation being tied to FPS.

Or so I remember patch notes claiming, this isn't exactly something I've personally looked to verify. At best I might notice it if/when I plug the PC out of the big TV and back into the smaller monitor which runs at 1440p and so I go with a higher framerate for it (also pointless to go higher on the big screen when it runs 60 at most... but 4K).
 

IstvaanDCIV

IstvaanDCIV
Valorin said:
I don't like the Normandy either.
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Indoctrinated presence detected

FDev said the Mandalay will have a jump range range to give the Anaconda a run for its money (or something to that effect), so my main hope is that the internals are decent enough for it to be outfitted for neutron running plus an SRV hangar. If they get it right then it could usurp my Krait Phantom as my deep-range exploration vessel of choice.

Funnily enough, I wasn't too enamoured with the aesthetics of the Krait to begin with, but its utility did win me over.
 
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