Reverse heatmap?

[Sashamorning]

I'm looking for a REVERSE heatmap of the galaxy. There are maps of what's been explored, and how complete exploration is in an area, but I can't seem to find a map showing the density of what's NOT been explored. Obviously, this would be pretty useful.

A normal heatmap only helps so much, as places that have not been explored (the centre) look a lot like places with no stars (between arms). Is there one out there that I haven't seen?

 

[Hfarl]

I'm looking for a REVERSE heatmap of the galaxy. There are maps of what's been explored, and how complete exploration is in an area, but I can't seem to find a map showing the density of what's NOT been explored. Obviously, this would be pretty useful.

A normal heatmap only helps so much, as places that have not been explored (the centre) look a lot like places with no stars (between arms). Is there one out there that I haven't seen?

ED Astro has a great map that shows an estimate of the number of explored systems compared to the star density in that pixel, so it gives a good approximation of how thoroughly that part of space has been explored.

You can find it by going here:

Elite:Dangerous Astrometrics Interactive Map

edastro.com

Then click on the layers button in the top right, and select "Saturation".

Super cool map!

 

[Sashamorning]

Thanks for that map. What I'm looking for is the inverse of that. It's different that a simple false color of that image; some of the dark spots on the saturation map would stay dark since there aren't many stars there. What I'm looking for is a simple density map of the galaxy minus the exploration already made.

 

[Jingseng]

Well, approx 0.043% or something has been explored so....

what you are looking for might not exist, but it seems like you could just envision what you want in your minds eye looking at what does exist, couldn’t you?

 

[Danieros]

To have a heatmap of what has not been explored, you'd need to know what hasn't been explored. I think the community databases are fed data of what has been explored from the player journals, so they'd simply not have the data unless some very meticulous data gathering from the galaxy map itself is done to serve this purpose.

 

[Jingseng]

Delteeted

 

[Micha]

To have a heatmap of what has not been explored, you'd need to know what hasn't been explored. I think the community databases are fed data of what has been explored from the player journals, so they'd simply not have the data unless some very meticulous data gathering from the galaxy map itself is done to serve this purpose.

Broadly speaking true, although we do have a reasonable understanding of how the galaxy is generated (thanks to some awesome in-depths presentations by Dr Ross) and could use the sector names as input to estimate star count/density for a given sector. Correlating that with actual star counts from the community databases could then give an estimate of the percentage of systems explored within that sector. Or rather, "visited", since many "explorers" just "jump'n'honk" and some don't even do that and just jump.

 

[Maolagin]

Broadly speaking true, although we do have a reasonable understanding of how the galaxy is generated (thanks to some awesome in-depths presentations by Dr Ross) and could use the sector names as input to estimate star count/density for a given sector. Correlating that with actual star counts from the community databases could then give an estimate of the percentage of systems explored within that sector. Or rather, "visited", since many "explorers" just "jump'n'honk" and some don't even do that and just jump.

That is literally what was done to generate the exploration "saturation" map linked in the second post in this thread.

 

[Micha]

That is literally what was done to generate the exploration "saturation" map linked in the second post in this thread.

That's cool, but why?

You don't need to know how much the total is in order to count how much was counted.. unless I misunderstand that heatmap.

EDIT: ...NVM; didn't realise "Saturation" was a separate layer.

 

[Maolagin]

That's cool, but why?

You don't need to know how much the total is in order to count how much was counted.. unless I misunderstand that heatmap.

There are several map modes available at that link.

The regular heat map mode represents the total number of systems reported in each pixel (I believe the pixels are 10x10 LY). The "saturation" mode estimates how thoroughly a pixel has been explored by looking at the sector names and boxel numbering for the reported stars in that pixel. I.e. if you see that system Foo Blah AB-C d30 has been discovered, you know there are at least 30 other systems (d0 through d29) in that subsector. If you see that only 15 systems with matching names are known, then you can guess that that region of space is about 50% explored.

 

[varonica]

Nearly everywhere I go is unexplored. I just avoid populated areas and nebula.

 

[Florenus]

It's kind of funny, because exploration is an act of exploring unknown area. Meanwhile OP wants a map of that area first.

 

[goemon]

ED Astro has a great map that shows an estimate of the number of explored systems compared to the star density in that pixel, so it gives a good approximation of how thoroughly that part of space has been explored.

You can find it by going here:

Elite:Dangerous Astrometrics Interactive Map

edastro.com

Then click on the layers button in the top right, and select "Saturation".

Super cool map!

it's an amazing map!

i just wouldn't overestimate what means "mostly explored". I'm nominally in such an area, and even on my last 1500 leg to a DSSA carrier, around two thirds of all systems i visited were previously fully undiscovered.
it might have to do something with my routeplotting (i'm was not using spansh neutron plotter, so i'm automatically a bit off the trodden paths - and for the fuelscooping speed of the DBE i'm filtering out non scoopables, while using supercharging provided ingame), my shiptype (DBE - a bit different to krait/aspe/conda), or generally the route i'm flying (between DSSA Carrier and galactic POIs; DSSA are quite new, so routes changes a bit to people visiting the POIs before me). just wanted to put it here -"mostly explored" will most likely mean you won't first discover rare types of stars, but it does not mean all system there have been visited at all.

 

[Vandaahl]

it's an amazing map!

Can't argue with that...

 

[Sashamorning]

It's kind of funny, because exploration is an act of exploring unknown area. Meanwhile OP wants a map of that area first.

Exactly. We can see the stars, we know what's been explored. [known] - [explored] = [unexplored]. This would seem to be possible.

That is literally what was done to generate the exploration "saturation" map linked in the second post in this thread.

First, that site is f***ing awesome. I'm not saying it's not.

However, I think my intent is being completely misinterpreted.

The sat map appears to show % explored/density. That means that there is a reasonable expectation that the number of stars in that region is (roughly) known.

[# explored/total # stars] / [total # stars/size of region] = [# explored * size of region] / [total # stars]^2. The units would be volume / # of stars, so m^3 / # stars. This uses the actual number of stars.

In order to determine the total # of stars, as the sat map does, the database has to know the # of explored stars and the total # of stars. Therefore, it should be possible to show [total - explored] to get # of unexplored stars.

What I'm looking for is {[total # stars] - [# explored]} / size of region. The units would be # stars / volume. The units are inverted, so the sat map is clearly not the map I am looking for.

I'm not looking for a % saturation. I'm looking for actual unexplored star density. The purpose is obvious. What areas have the highest density of unexplored stars, so that we can focus there for exploration?

I just want a reverse map so that we can look at the bright areas and target those. Aiming for dark areas is counterintuitive and inaccurate on a black site background.

I'm not sure what the disconnect is. I kinda feel like this would be broadly beneficial.

 

[goemon]

What areas have the highest density of unexplored stars, so that we can focus there for exploration?

at least i can answer that easily. the core region, bulge of the milkyway
highest density of unexplored stars.

 

[Maolagin]

I'm not looking for a % saturation. I'm looking for actual unexplored star density. The purpose is obvious. What areas have the highest density of unexplored stars, so that we can focus there for exploration?

I just want a reverse map so that we can look at the bright areas and target those. Aiming for dark areas is counterintuitive and inaccurate on a black site background.

I'm not sure what the disconnect is. I kinda feel like this would be broadly beneficial.

No, I get what you're saying. It has frustrated me too (for different reasons, I'm interested in knowing more about the structure of the simulated galaxy out of astronomical curiosity) that we don't have a galaxy-wide density map. Which is ultimately what you're asking for here. The trouble is, that the maps we have are those that can be made (with some effort) from the databases of explored systems and what we know about the procedural generation. The density map we're missing, unfortunately, is just very hard to create with any accuracy.

Consider: the information in the heat map, star type maps, etc, is the result of straightforwardly adding up the systems that have been reported (to EDSM, in this case). The saturation map uses a little more information (knowledge of how procgen systems are named) to estimate how many stars remain unexplored in sectors where some exploration has been done. But the vast majority of the galaxy is black on that map, because most sectors are still almost entirely unexplored. Which means you would have huge uncertainties if you tried to estimate total density in those areas. It would probably look mainly like random noise.

That said, I can reasonably assure you that, if you go to any of the dark areas on the saturation map that you can actually reach, you will not run out of undiscovered systems. The dark areas beyond the bright red, well explored galactic rim, are dark because nobody can get out there, and there's almost nothing out there anyway.

 

[Danieros]

Exactly. We can see the stars, we know what's been explored. [known] - [explored] = [unexplored]. This would seem to be possible.


First, that site is f***ing awesome. I'm not saying it's not.

However, I think my intent is being completely misinterpreted.

The sat map appears to show % explored/density. That means that there is a reasonable expectation that the number of stars in that region is (roughly) known.

[# explored/total # stars] / [total # stars/size of region] = [# explored * size of region] / [total # stars]^2. The units would be volume / # of stars, so m^3 / # stars. This uses the actual number of stars.

In order to determine the total # of stars, as the sat map does, the database has to know the # of explored stars and the total # of stars. Therefore, it should be possible to show [total - explored] to get # of unexplored stars.

What I'm looking for is {[total # stars] - [# explored]} / size of region. The units would be # stars / volume. The units are inverted, so the sat map is clearly not the map I am looking for.

I'm not looking for a % saturation. I'm looking for actual unexplored star density. The purpose is obvious. What areas have the highest density of unexplored stars, so that we can focus there for exploration?

I just want a reverse map so that we can look at the bright areas and target those. Aiming for dark areas is counterintuitive and inaccurate on a black site background.

I'm not sure what the disconnect is. I kinda feel like this would be broadly beneficial.

If I understood correctly, there is no database of unexplored systems. Only an extrapolation based on name patterns for regions, allowing to assume that there are X other systems there, based on explored systems.

Like you said, the information is all there in the galaxy map but I don't think there has been an attempt to extract that information to create the total galaxy map for you to subtract the explored ones from the player-made databases.

A "perfect exploration" highly demanding method could be devised to manually look at the galaxy map and write down system names and coordinates, with some standard methods for doing it so there can be a coordinated effort. For example, one "up/down" press on the map will change the Y axis by exactly one, however for the X/Z axis the input is different but you can use the grid itself. I assume it can be improved by having screenshots taken and then OCR software decode it, but I'm not savvy enough for it, neither I'm sure about ToS implications.

The benefits are very clear though, if such a work is done at least for a region/sector, you'd be able to much more efficiently explore it in-game, especially if you'd empower an existing website like EDSM to feed interested explorers with different systems so it could be done very efficiently (little wasted effort as they wouldn't be going blindly on already explored systems or overlapping same work with other explorers)

 

[Sashamorning]

Fair enough.

 

[Micha]

In either case the density of unexplored stars in a sector is roughly equal to the density of the total number of stars in that sector. We've apparently visited something like 0.042% of all available stars as of Dec 2019 according to FDev itself. According to EDSM it's 0.0142%.

There's a handful of small regions (not even sectors) where that is not the case - in the Bubble, Colonia, SagA*, most nebulae, the Rim, and some very linear routes between some of these areas. Almost everywhere else you go the number of unexplored systems VASTLY outnumbers the number of visited systems.

The only reason the heatmaps look so impressive is that even that tiny percentage is a LOT of systems. We're talking about 168 million visited systems if we take Frontier's percentage, and ~56 million using EDSM. Since we only have EDSM's data, not Frontiers', any heat maps produced will be off by a factor of 3 or so anyway.