Quality of Life Improvement: Input LAT/LON Co-ords and have a Surface Waypoint appear, similar to the surface scan mission Waypoint.

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Easy partial fix.... that little 'tail' that extends off the selection circle/highlight? Make that tail static to show the axis of the body. We can discern the equator based on the orbit line. Just let us know which side is "Up".... easy fix and eliminates a lot of b.s.

THEN, let us add surface bookmarks... which you will have obviously also implemented color coding for both galactic and surface colors/interfaces for. :)
 
Agreed, and it has been asked many times.

I want to be able to enter the co-ordinates into my ship's computer, and for it to then guide me there. Finding the co-ordinates manually is both irritating and pointless - it just doesn't make sense. There is no way that navigation computers over a thousand years in the future would be missing such a basic feature...
 
Agreed, and it has been asked many times.

I want to be able to enter the co-ordinates into my ship's computer, and for it to then guide me there. Finding the co-ordinates manually is both irritating and pointless - it just doesn't make sense. There is no way that navigation computers over a thousand years in the future would be missing such a basic feature...

In 2017 we can scan and detect earth-like planets 1402 light years away (Kepler-442b) with an orbital telescope, yet in 3303 we can't even see what's in the system next to us (sometimes less that 4 Ly away) without jumping there and WHOOOOOOOOOOOOOOONK (scanning) it manually.
 
Today's pilots have many tools that help them in navigational matters - but does anyone here think they don't know how to read and use a compass? It's really not that hard IF you are willing to wrap your head around it. While i agree a waypoint system would be helpful - i sincerely hope it's not going to be the same as putting a wp down and thats it. Similar to how much i dislike the current magic markers on top of the ruins or the new sites. Too easy, too gamey. That's not the Elite i personally like playing - ymmw
 
Today's pilots have many tools that help them in navigational matters - but does anyone here think they don't know how to read and use a compass? It's really not that hard IF you are willing to wrap your head around it. While i agree a waypoint system would be helpful - i sincerely hope it's not going to be the same as putting a wp down and thats it. Similar to how much i dislike the current magic markers on top of the ruins or the new sites. Too easy, too gamey. That's not the Elite i personally like playing - ymmw

Like I've mentioned in a few earlier replies in this thread, manual input of a LAT and a LON coordinate would make the feature optional - don't use it if you don't want to sort of thing.

That way folks like your good self who find working out their bearing headings in their heads can still do so, whilst us mere mortals who have trouble finding a light switch at night can plug in a couple of numbers and have the ship navcomp help us find them ;)
 
+1 from me. Hope it's on the QoL list for 3.x. Oh, and on the list for the navigator's panel in improved multicrew. ;)

(Shudders at getting UTM/OSGB Cartesian coords from Lat, Long. Damn you Earth you blasted oblate spheroid! Oooh! Oblate spheroids - some of the asteroids are very 'potato' :D Anyway, if the flat-Earthers were correct, my job would be a bit simpler...)

*Edit* And all that said, I didn't realise that the 'unknown structure scan' effectively bookmarks the current sites of interest.
 
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+1

IMO, a sort of mix 'n' match would be great. The first explorer 'finds' an interesting POI using existing methods (and/or new ones, such as a ship wave scanner), then drops beacons as markers. He/she can then share them (or sell them?) so subsequent visitors can just follow the marker.

It both makes things easier for general players, and adds some value/gameplay for explorer/pathfinders.

I'd go even further, and ask first for a way to sell location bookmarks to Universal Cartographics, and for others to buy them. Value would be set by type of PoI at that location, distance from point of sale, economic value, local factions and dynamically by state and nearby CGs/plot events. Add age, supply, and demand factors too.
Who wouldn't be salivating at the thought of 100MCr for the first find of a new alien ruin, or be prepared to pop 1MCr for the convenient location of a pristine metallic ring near to a mining CG?
 
I would very much welcome this qol addition to the game. It is a pain and needlessly hard to locate a given set of planetary coordinates.

Going on a circumnavigation expedition with many landings, this would be really appreciated.
 
+1.

I learned longitude and latitude in elementary school, learned how to read a compass as a Boy Scout, learned how to shoot an azimuth and compute a back azimuth in basic training, was forced to demonstrate this skill and my general mastery of MGRS map navigation on a PLDC land nav course.

And when I went to war they said, "That's nice. Here's a Blue Force Tracker which shows position, direction, speed, all mission-critical waypoints, any suspected/ known enemy positions, friendly units and general points of strategic and tactical interest within a 200-mile radius."

Of course, I turned that thing off and used a sextant and protractor on a leather-bound reproduction Marco Polo chart of the Babylonian Orient, because "challenge" and "hipster". /s
 
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Waypoints or something like saving of your current location like we can do on our car GPS. An inertial nav system with a pseudo north indicator would be nice too. Something like aircraft since the 1960s.
 
Today's pilots have many tools that help them in navigational matters - but does anyone here think they don't know how to read and use a compass?

What's your point? A pilot is only likely to use this method as a last resort, not the go-to choice for navigating.

I know how to read a road map and have one in the car as back up. Like 99% of other people however I use a satnav because it makes like a hell of a lot easier.

If other players want to be martyrs and make life difficult for themselves then go ahead. I however would prefer to get to the fun stuff somewhat more directly.
 
What's your point? A pilot is only likely to use this method as a last resort, not the go-to choice for navigating.

I know how to read a road map and have one in the car as back up. Like 99% of other people however I use a satnav because it makes like a hell of a lot easier.

If other players want to be martyrs and make life difficult for themselves then go ahead. I however would prefer to get to the fun stuff somewhat more directly.

Let me clarify, i did say that i welcome a waypoint system (by that i mean something like marking/input things yourself, similar to what we have right now in the galmap, but you'd have to find/be made aware of the thing first. Or be able to just put a marker on surface coordinates if you know them, + an option for manual input into the nav panel for a vector). But a thing as easy as dropping into a system and seeing a magic marker is not what i'd prefer. I did not say i want to navigate the hard way, even though being aware of how to do it helps - and that it's not as hard as I felt some posters made it seem/thought it was. I did also say 'your mileage may vary', to how people feel about the whole thing. l'm not sure "my point" can be reduced to just the sentence quoted.
 
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I'll have to agree that this would be a good thing. The compass is helpful, but having a waypoint option would be amazing. It doesn't even hurt people who don't want it. :3
 
Let me clarify, i did say that i welcome a waypoint system (by that i mean something like marking/input things yourself, similar to what we have right now in the galmap, but you'd have to find/be made aware of the thing first. Or be able to just put a marker on surface coordinates if you know them, + an option for manual input into the nav panel for a vector). But a thing as easy as dropping into a system and seeing a magic marker is not what i'd prefer. I did not say i want to navigate the hard way, even though being aware of how to do it helps - and that it's not as hard as I felt some posters made it seem/thought it was. I did also say 'your mileage may vary', to how people feel about the whole thing. l'm not sure "my point" can be reduced to just the sentence quoted.

The kind of thing I'm wanting is this...

You get info about some site of interest on some planet in some system. Maybe it's from the Cannon thread, or somewhere else.

Anyway, system, planet, and a LAT/LON location.

SO you jump to the system, and find the planet.

You perform a DSS - get a 3D surface map.

You enter the LAT/LON coords into the proposed input boxes on the 3D surface map page for that planet

You now have a waypoint for that planet. Now you can fly to that point a lot easier.

That's it, really. I'm not even looking for a bookmark system. Just a couple of text boxes to put a LAT and a LON point in to get a marker on the planet - exactly like you get with a Surface Recovery mission.
 
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