That how I read that as well. I'm just reserving judgment on that part until I see how quickly we can discern that, and whether any artificial timers are added to slow your evaluation down, etc.
Q4 Exploration Reveal
- Thread starter Speccy
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That how I read that as well. I'm just reserving judgment on that part until I see how quickly we can discern that, and whether any artificial timers are added to slow your evaluation down, etc.
That how I read that as well. I'm just reserving judgment on that part until I see how quickly we can discern that, and whether any artificial timers are added to slow your evaluation down, etc.
Adam clarified that:
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Like Un1korn I'm not sure what you mean by this?
It's not beta yet so we have to see where things go.
What I think we will get is from the positive side of things... is to locate volcanism without having to...... you know, search for sites for days without finding any on planet x and then... get a site on planet Y within 10 minutes... lol. I prefer to locate sites within 10 minutes on large planets. That would shift our attention a bit. We will look for geysers on boring icy body's and find plenty of them.
What I am worried about, as mentioned, is that we can't really locate an ELW straight away.
So there we are, we may find volcanism on a lot of planets.. which is currently difficult.. but what is currently easy, like finding elw's by just plotting a route through a bunch of class F stars is likely going to be tougher.
What I think we will get is from the positive side of things... is to locate volcanism without having to...... you know, search for sites for days without finding any on planet x and then... get a site on planet Y within 10 minutes... lol. I prefer to locate sites within 10 minutes on large planets. That would shift our attention a bit. We will look for geysers on boring icy body's and find plenty of them.
What I am worried about, as mentioned, is that we can't really locate an ELW straight away.
So there we are, we may find volcanism on a lot of planets.. which is currently difficult.. but what is currently easy, like finding elw's by just plotting a route through a bunch of class F stars is likely going to be tougher.
Says a lot about you, considering the ridiculous reaction you had on FleetComm a bit earlier.
Try to embrace the idea of opinions, and how people are entitled to one even if it doesn't agree with yours, before going all martyr.
Anyone read that original reveal and think of this:
[video=youtube;VwdzmK35Sk4]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VwdzmK35Sk4[/video]
[video=youtube;VwdzmK35Sk4]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VwdzmK35Sk4[/video]
I too am confused how the ADS has been killed.
My understanding is that all Discovery scanners may be changed to the ADS we have now
That scanner will then be able to detect all bodies in a system
AND be able to give us the DSS information as well now, with the DSS now being a way to launch probes map planets to locate the surface features that the discovery scanner will reveal the presence of but not location of.
I am not see where pew pew has killed it, it seems better?
Say you were looking for Volcanics
Jump into system, "Honk" review energy patterns and hopefully planetary songs, identify the planet types you want to investigate, investigate, for the ones that indicate volcanic present, then use the probes to map the planet to locate.
Is this wrong?
Yup, and I liked it.
To summarize a bit, if I've understood correctly:
It sounds like all three grades of the Discovery scanner might (they're considering this) get consolidated into one version, with monetary compensation to anyone that had the more expensive ones.
And in a nutshell, the new ADS combines all of the old DSS capability, with no range limit, into a new type of wave-scanner-like device. The initial honk detects the arrival star, and preps the scanner for the manual scan phase. While adding bodies to the map is now slower and more manual, this process also tags them while retrieving the old DSS information, without requiring a supercruise over to them.
Since the DSS's old scan capabilities have been rolled into the ADS, the only thing it'll do is the new probe-launch system for gaining additional surface details, tagging with a "mapped by" tag, and finding surface POIs. This part still requires supercruising over to the body in question.
To me it sounds like the ADS is getting a mixed bag. Infinite range DSS capability + the new manual approach to lighting bodies up on the map.
Discarding a system as "boring" will be slower, but scanning/tagging an entire system will be considerably quicker. Surface-mapping an entire system is an entirely different story.
It sounds like all three grades of the Discovery scanner might (they're considering this) get consolidated into one version, with monetary compensation to anyone that had the more expensive ones.
And in a nutshell, the new ADS combines all of the old DSS capability, with no range limit, into a new type of wave-scanner-like device. The initial honk detects the arrival star, and preps the scanner for the manual scan phase. While adding bodies to the map is now slower and more manual, this process also tags them while retrieving the old DSS information, without requiring a supercruise over to them.
Since the DSS's old scan capabilities have been rolled into the ADS, the only thing it'll do is the new probe-launch system for gaining additional surface details, tagging with a "mapped by" tag, and finding surface POIs. This part still requires supercruising over to the body in question.
To me it sounds like the ADS is getting a mixed bag. Infinite range DSS capability + the new manual approach to lighting bodies up on the map.
Discarding a system as "boring" will be slower, but scanning/tagging an entire system will be considerably quicker. Surface-mapping an entire system is an entirely different story.
That’s how I’ve read it too. As always exactly how it plays out will remain to be seen but I wonder if they’ve been clever enough to allow some kind of quick scan and move on mechanic with the new all-in-one ADS and a far more detailed approach for those that enjoy the discovery more than the tag.
Hopefully it will offer a little more to those that aren’t big explorers and a lot more to those that are. Beta will be very interesting and I’m looking forward to the further updates Will mentioned.
Hopefully it will offer a little more to those that aren’t big explorers and a lot more to those that are. Beta will be very interesting and I’m looking forward to the further updates Will mentioned.
Hmm. Very surprised that you're not on board with the concept of energy spectrum based data. This will give mountains of new data to your mapping project, including the infamously black-box quantity: metallicity of stars. You will be able to get this information about planets as well now. It seems extremely cool and useful for a wide variety of science applications, and will really open up the game in ways that were previously impossible or at best indirect guessing games, especially if they ever extend the concept of energy spectrum to stars on the galmap, or from the background sky in the new DSS cockpit interface. We will be getting a deeper and more complete picture and interaction with every object in the game. Not sure how this could be thought of as a win for pew pew people. Because we'll be shooting probes? Seems harmless enough.
What's hard to believe is how anyone can get any fun whatsoever out of the system as it stands.
No man, I don't think he's being obtuse at all. I'm genuinely curious, too, how you arrive at that conclusion?
Very much so! I can also imagine a huge influx of players going to Sol.... to ... probe one particular planet
I'm glad they are trying to make things better. But I have some concerns. A complete change in the mechanics midstream could be drastic. That said, I will reserve judgement until I see how it plays out. I am however, feeling ambivalent on the whole probe as ammo thing. I hope they don't go the route of manufactured items as that would make this whole change completely silly for long range explorers. I dunno. When one changes the core rules in the middle of the game, lots of things can go wrong. Anyhow, guess we shall see in the beta. I hope they got this play tested by people who actually explore a lot.
My initial reaction is that the mechanics of the changes seem solid to me.
Honestly I've always felt like the honk was too powerful. I know a lot of explorers like how it currently is, but I like how the new mechanics will provide some decisions, actions, and work into exploring a system. I also like how it further separates "traveling" and "exploring", as jonking (jump-honk-jump-honk-etc) won't be nearly as strong a mechanic after 3.3.
I do have a few concerns though:
Overall though I'm feeling positive on this. I hope there are some more things for explorers in addition to these new mechanics, like some new ships or other optional modules to use. Looking forward to the beta to see all of this in action.
Honestly I've always felt like the honk was too powerful. I know a lot of explorers like how it currently is, but I like how the new mechanics will provide some decisions, actions, and work into exploring a system. I also like how it further separates "traveling" and "exploring", as jonking (jump-honk-jump-honk-etc) won't be nearly as strong a mechanic after 3.3.
I do have a few concerns though:
- The ADS honk not revealing the system map worries me, I think it's too much of a step backwards. I'd love to see the honk at least reveal the system structure with black hollow planet markers, meaning no surface data at all, just gravitational data. It would help to quickly identify interesting systems to spend more time in while jonking through space.
- The probe mechanics sound good but I don't like how they reveal the exact locations of POI's on the surface. It's too easy in my opinion, there's not much searching required. I'd rather the probes reveal a small manageable search zone which we then have to fly down and investigate further in order to find the POI. Just one more level of player decisions and activity would be good IMHO.
- I can only hope that Q4 comes complete with a LOT of new types of surface POI's for deep space explorers to find and scan, plus I hope it makes the current geysers and fumeroles scannable for data. If not then these mechanics won't add much actual gameplay for explorers in Q4.
- I'm worried that they might be turning exploring into more of a time sink than it currently is. The beta will be important for balancing the times for each of the actions.
Overall though I'm feeling positive on this. I hope there are some more things for explorers in addition to these new mechanics, like some new ships or other optional modules to use. Looking forward to the beta to see all of this in action.
So how is jumping in with the new scanner, popping up the scan screen and seeing whatever the new "standard system" wave pattern looks like, and moving on, any different from the current method of....jumping into the system, hitting the scanner, and opening the system map to see a bunch of worthless ice planets?
I mean, some of the arguments coming out of against this are utterly ridiculous as usual.
"We want new exploration mechanics and things to discover!"
FDev: Here you go.
"No! Not like that!"
[haha][uhh]
The new system will take more time to accomplish the same task as we can do now with a single honk. At least that is how it seems to me.
I like the new proposed mechanics, but I can see the validity in the complaints about 3.3 turning exploration into a super time sink. It has the potential to, from the sound of it.
From the sound of it, it seems like it will only become an additional time sink for certain kinds of exploration. It may or may not be slower for the "at a glance" decision to skip a system. But it sounds like the "scan all the things" approach will benefit greatly, since the ADS won't require you to supercruise out to each body. And the surface mapping with probes doesn't come into play unless you specifically decide to do so, since the ADS will indicate whether any given body has something to search for. If you're not interested in the surface POIs, and just want to scan/tag as we do now, you can do that all with the ADS from the entry point.
Unfortunately we won't really know until the beta, as to how quick or slow each piece of this will be though.
Unfortunately we won't really know until the beta, as to how quick or slow each piece of this will be though.
I think it's far more likely that the new mechanic will save time for a lot of players. Having watched Obsidiant Ants video on it, he made some interesting points I didn't catch from Frontier's post namely that we'll have a range discriminator, and that signals at that range will be stronger this means that finding terrraformables will be potentially MUCH faster than it currently is as long as you are familiar with the habitable zone ranges for specific types of stars.
example:
1) pop into a G star system
2) set the scanner range to discrimnate for 400-600 Ls
3) look for a telltale ELW/WW/Terraformable energy signal
That could take less than 10 seconds + actual scan time (which is apparently skill dependent)
Compare that to the current system:
1) honk ADS
2) check system map
3) fly over to scan
4) check system map again to verify that it's terraformable
this whole process usually takes 1-2 minutes at least
Likewise with completionists, it's entirely possible that as people gain experience, scanning an entire system might be something that you can do much quicker than you can currently. The flightime + scan time of the current "mechanic" isn't exactly a short process, and it's likely given Frontier's track record, that the skill based aspect of the mechanic (ie being familiar with the energy distribution/signal of the object you're looking for) will significantly decrease the time it takes to scan a whole system.
It's possible that some exploration playstyles might go away at least partially, like jonking while giving a cursory glance to the system map. That was always more of a lame way to kill time while buckyballing to an actual exploration destination.
As for the people who think they will be losing some key information that they can grab quickly at a glance right now, if they are experienced explorers, they will likely be able to get a similar quick glance by learning to quickly ID the energy distribution patterns of common system types.
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Sometimes a system filled with "boring" planets can have some interesting and rare arrangements. This information is available at a glance by just "Honking"...for example you can see that a planet could have a fairly high-G by looking at it's radius and how many earth masses it is, or you could see that a binary set of moons only takes an hour or so to orbit each other, so might be worth a look at.
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