No, the solution is to overlay the FSS view onto the view out of the cockpit and let you use your ship to point at blobs while you fly.
Kill two birds with one feature and add something to SC.
No, the solution is to overlay the FSS view onto the view out of the cockpit and let you use your ship to point at blobs while you fly.
Kill two birds with one feature and add something to SC.
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That's not as reliable as it formerly was. You can engineer your FSD interdictor with Expanded capture arc. I have one of those, which I used when collecting merit for PP. You sacrifice some range, but can interdict at a much wider angle. I never tested this, but I would think that I could interdict a ship trying to avoid this by having its back to a star.
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Uh. Oki, normal space then scan was what I also considered the easy solution, as the old scanners work in normal space. If the new ones require you to be in supercruise, that'll be unfortunate. I would think that allowing their use in normal space should be fine.
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That is another possible solution, but it would have to be optional otherwise it would rule out Multicrew FSS "gunners". I definitely prefer to have all interfaces be in the cockpit when possible, including gunner seats tbh.
The problem here (which I am sure is why we have new window based interface) is that it would be exceedingly challenging to create an interface that would work in every cockpit design. The spectrum display itself takes up almost half the width of the screen. I doubt it would even fit cleanly in an Asp cockpit without shrinking it down. And in shrinking it, it would be harder to read nuances. So you are stuck trying to avoid annoying overlaps, like the kind with the FDL window panel frames, or making it so small that it's unreadable.
They could change the orientation I suppose. If they made it vertical, then it wouldn't fit in an Anaconda cockpit. So the only viable solution then is a circular scale readout. Which would likely obscure a lot of the central view of zoomed in objects.
I am guessing that all of this was hashed out already and test, and the result was another disembodied window.
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Oh, I absolutely agree that this needs to be a multi-crew available feature, but not at the expense of solo-pilot situational awareness and actually being able to walk and chew gum at the same time.
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That would also be welcome. I also dislike the "the princess is on another screen" things. Whenever you get taken out of the cockpit to another screen, the ship is effectively unmanned and unprotected.
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It's kind of like going into sniper mode though. Situational awareness is something that has to happen BEFORE you set up a scoping spot.
It should also be stressed that this is only really an issue when exploring in the bubble or at hotspot tourist destinations. NPCs mostly leave players alone, and most bubble dwelling ships are set up to trounce any NPC that is foolish enough to attempt anything. So the only real security issue are other players in Open. Open players know this full well, and would use something like the "star butt" technique (a name I just made up) in most similar cases (like going afk, or checking the system map etc).
The FSS is the USS identification method as well afaik.
It's fine to talk workarounds, but I'd prefer FD to address the issue at source.
Coming to a virtual standstill, potentially for several minutes, completely blind to what's going on around you is bad design.
People are saying it's zero throttle, but that is 30km/s in SC - you'll be exposing your butt sooner or later.
Are you sure about that?
I'd assume the FSS view is a 'fake' 3D view, it's not going to be your actual viewpoint; for a few reasons - if it's the actual view you'd find lots of bodies to be occluded and wouldn't be able to find them, in particular behind the main star. You'd also have objects behind you (though that's less of an issue, you'd just see the orbital plane all the way around). But it'd also mean that if you engage the FSS you wouldn't always see the orbital plane 'edge on' as they did in the livestream. Now, it's possible it was just a coincidence that they showed the FSS while the ship was right on the plane, but more likely the FSS is a fake 3D view which puts the camera on the orbital plane, and ensures all bodies are visible.
I zero throttle in the bubble all the time, while PP pledged, in hostile territory, and go AFK for 30 minutes at a time. In OPEN no less. It's not really the big concern that some are painting it to be. Occasionally I get interdicted while cooking or watching netflix/youtube, or typing on discord, and then it's just a non-issue because I just beat the interdiction (which is impossible to lose these days), and then I just go on my merry way.
There's no such thing as random danger in Elite, only random mild inconveniences.
I'm pretty sure the FSS view is dependant and built from the ship position, and this is likely why entering FSS mode zeroes the throttle. Not all systems are on a single plane, so the FSS needs to be robust enough to take all stellar forge variations (and ship positions) into account. If the main star occludes anything then you'd likely have to leave the FSS, move the ship, and re-enter the FSS to see anything behind it.
Maybe I'm wrong and you are right, we'll all know for sure next Tuesday.
This is the reason why I've been calling for an optional louder 'new contact' alert than the existing message window output click. I'd have a dropdown on the Functions page with New Contact warning: [None|Click|Bell]. In the bubble, use none or Click. On the fringes or outside the bubble, Bell for maximum stimulation upon new contacts. Hollow or filled.
Yup, gonna add my vote to this - sure does seem like we're a sitting duck to me. Not zeroing the throttle seems like a good idea for the reasons mentioned by Darkfyre99 (and also because FD have a track record of trying to zero our throttle and people REALLY not liking it) although ... I'm not 100% convinced that it completely solves the sitting duck thing 'cos someone could still theoretically get behind and interdict. I also don't buy the idea that FD want the throttle zeroed because the FSS scan interface has somehow taken a snapshot of the system and our position in it. In fact, I'm not sure the view is from the ship's position at all is it? (would love to be corrected on this I guess). It felt more like a generic view of the entire system from some abstract point off to one side, a bit like where you're viewing the system map from. Maybe FSS should engage a cloaking device? Nope, can't actually see an ideal solution, guess I'll be parking with my star at my six.
Nope, can't actually see an ideal solution, guess I'll be parking with my star at my six.
Oh... I thought you were about to tell him to combat log, because in my experience, that is what people do in this game :-D
I like this, but even better would be to integrate the blue smudge & wiggly line mechanism into supercruise itself, as an overlaid part of the HUD. That way instead of needing yet another controller mapping I can just point the ship at the smudge & have the wiggly line indicator act as a marco polo indicator of what I'm pointing the ship at.
I think the problem with that is that they'd be a conflict? ie: When you move around in FSS view, you're in effect sort of moving a turret view around independent of your ship's direction? So you could be pointing your FSS (so you're looking) at objects directly behind your ships direction.
Having a traditional scanner shown in the FSS view would be there simply so show the location known planets, and more importantly, ships that you otherwise would be none-the-wiser to
This could be vastle improved upon by one of the 99 artists working on ED
Wouldn't ship-pointing FSS be punishingly horrible in ships with bad pitch and yaw in supercruise though? I get the annoyance of having another out-of-cockpit view, and I have argued for ship-pointing FSS (when the work-in-progress we saw looked like a 2d schematic minigame), but now we've seen it's looking around the 3D system from the ship's current position, and taking Multicrew FSS into account, I'm happy to have it a separate view.
I'd just like there to be a little pop-out telescope dome appear above and below your ship when it is using FSS, that would be cute.
I think the problem with that is that they'd be a conflict? ie: When you move around in FSS view, you're in effect sort of moving a turret view around independent of your ship's direction? So you could be pointing your FSS (so you're looking) at objects directly behind your ships direction.
Having a traditional scanner shown in the FSS view would be there simply so show the location known planets, and more importantly, ships that you otherwise would be none-the-wiser toThis could be vastle improved upon by one of the 99 artists working on ED
No, in HUD mode the FSS would operate a more like the old DSS. You'd be pointing your ship at the blob instead of the FSS camera.
The difference now is that you can do it from a lot further away (extreme zoom baby), and that an individual FSS body scan is a lot quicker.
Lateral thrusters don't work in SC, so I'd use those controls for the zoom and frequency adjustment.
Still significantly quicker than flying there to use the current DSS.