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Ok: I'm glad that for each planet FDev have provided a "minimum probes par" challenge that I can aim to achieve, thereby giving me an incentive to use skill in probing instead of carpet bombing
It stops it getting too boring too quick, without making it a chore. I reckon they are on to something, hey. Looking forward to beta.
I hate module creep, if it were me I'd just remove all discovery scanners and leave a single one for the new mechanics of update 4.
We should have half the modules we currently have but make them very different from each other in terms of functionality. I don't like having 3 discovery scanners AND an advanced surface scanner on top of those. I don't like having several type of scanners to detect different things. And most of all I don't like having FOURTEEN limpet controllers.
1 module, unlimited probes.
Yay gameplay.
Would you like some coffee with your cookie? It'll wake you up
Funny.
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Ok: I'm glad that for each planet FDev have provided a "minimum probes par" challenge that I can aim to achieve, thereby giving me an incentive to use skill in probing instead of carpet bombing
Fair enough.
I would like limited ones instead to be able to make decisions (few probes remain... should I map this or that? If I'm good enough I will do both) and to interrupt the exploration routine having the concrete need to land on a planet and do something different for about 15 minutes.
I believe a good compromise could have been found.
Still happy with the new contents. As I said in one of my previous posts that's the small imperfection in a big and wider good job.
No need for the strawman.
When ammo was limited, using less was clearly its own reward.
Now, there's no logical benefit to using less if ammo is infinite? Who cares and what does it matter if you use 6 or 7 probes?
But, if the result it "fun" fair enough...
You must hate pulse lasers too? Frontier have added a little challenge to keep it from being stale. And without making it a ceaseless grind. That's a good sign. There is so much more to this update. Baby steps. Chin up.
The challenge levels themselves irk because they are now retrofitted to justify shooting more than one probe. You could make it so the stock replenishes slowly on its own, so that if you are careful you never run out, but still have a 'fail' state if you are ham-fisted.
Or. if you had one probe that scanned everything based on its context (so shot into a planet you scan surfaces, shot past asteroids you get minerals, shot into space you reveal POIs) it would make more sense. Forget this 'I'll name that tune in three, Lionel' probe challenge, remove the infinity symbol and just give the game a tool that is multifunctional and invisible. One probe launch for one job. Engineering could then be used to increase the probes range, scan radius etc and then you have no grind of having to fire multiple probes.
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Either my memory is failing me (very possible) or that is not the same ford probe we got in the uk
Are you encouraging exploration and using the mechanic, or are you trying to limit it out of the belief that of all the things the game could possibly focus on - its probes? I mean I get it. But really if we take that to its logical conclusion then we have to approach pulse lasers and a bunch of other stuff and I reckon theres better use of Frontiers time.
People are going to do this hundreds of times. I will be doing this, potentially, hundreds of times, not once or twice; so no, it stops being a challenge and ends up a chore, if i am having to stop everything, repeatedly to sort out the probe situation.
Theres still value in learning the trick. It may save time, and has value in doing so, versus spamming. Dont underestimate the value of that.
Because we, the community at large, will be doing this a lot. Not just once or twice, on Sundays.
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I want something that challenges me over the long term, not simply become a scratch card bonus game. If it can't be that, I'd prefer the latter where its slimmed down to its bare essentials.
Then do it just once. 1 probe for 1 moon.
If you are doing this all the time, then do it just once. 1 probe 1 moon. Don't tack on superfluous legacy cruft, slim it down and remove stuff that has no place. This is like nominations in Powerplay- why are they still in when they are redundant? The same can be said for moon probes- since the practical reward for conserving ammo is now very tenuous why not simply ditch it? Firing more than one is now redundant unless the bonus reward is amazingly high.
Just pretend that somehow Ram Tah extracted some sensor / probe knowledge from the Guardians technology and made it free for everybody, for the sake of humanity.
My GUESS, is that it applies to how many you fire in one sensor 'session'. If you leave the session, everything is reset, and the planet goes back to 0% explored.
(The only reason I'm assuming this, is because this would be the easiest way to do it, by far. Plus, it explains why - by the sounds of it - surface sites are only revealed when you have mapped the planet. i.e. 100%).
And you don't get any geological/planet side locations/features until you hit that 100%?
ie: Even though you've scanned 89% of the planet, you're not found a single thing, until you get that 1+% more?
11% and yes, I think this is kinda dumb - you'd think the things in the "lit up" regions would be found when said regions, you know, light up.
I'd envisaged the surface of a planet being broken down (by lines of longitute and latitude) into say 30-50 sectors, each which you could scan and even "discover". When you used a probe, obviously numerous of these would be scanned at a time. Anything in a sector would then appear to you. This would be stateful, so once you've scanned a sector its contents would appear to you forever...
So if you only probed half the sectors on a planet you've only be able to see the features in those specific sectors.
ie: Something more dynamic and stateful...
That would be my guess. IIRC, from watching the demo, no surface locations were revealed until the planet was "100%" (well, 90+%) mapped.
I think it's not ideal. If you scan 10%, and that happens to include the site you're looking for, it should show that site. It's a bit silly having to scan another 80+% just to reveal something in an area you've already mapped, surely?
It does look that way. I’m ok with it though. Think of it this way:
You fire off a probe, it says: I am cover this much territory. It doesn’t do anything else yet though, as it’s waiting for the next probe in the network. You fire off the next probe, same thing, until you have full coverage. Then they all send their results together, showing you the neat things to be found.
Sort of like buying at Atlas of England, without any maps of London... it’s not quite useful until you have all the parts.
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