so how do you find mat brokers?

I think you have to find them for yourself the first time.

Once you've found them, they can be located on the gal-map by selecting the 4th "tab" (Map View Configuration) and then selecting "services" in the drop-down menu and selecting the thing you're looking for.

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It's rather simple in fact : if you know the systems, they will be displayed in a 40lyr radius with the filter.

Otherwise, to locate them :

  • Data in high pop, high sec, high tech
  • Raw in high pop, high sec, extraction/refinery
  • Manufactured in high pop, high sec, industrial
 

Deleted member 115407

D
It's rather simple in fact : if you know the systems, they will be displayed in a 40lyr radius with the filter.

Otherwise, to locate them :

  • Data in high pop, high sec, high tech
  • Raw in high pop, high sec, extraction/refinery
  • Manufactured in high pop, high sec, industrial



  • I think it's best to look at pop between 1-22M
 
Go to Obsidian Ant's youtube channel, he's just posted a short video on that very subject.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jL9YkvPEFR4

Yeah I've got five minutes in so far and he's finally got as far as telling me that there's a filter on the galmap but it will only show them if you already know where they are. :D It's so FDev.

I am genuinely amazed that with the added stuff in the galmap they STILL haven't made the filters cumulative across multiple search types. I was amazed that they hadn't back on day one when I started playing and with every successive update my incredulity has increased to the point that I almost want to scream every time I have to search for something. I genuinely spent about an hour searching online for how to do cumulative searches when I first started playing because I thought I must just be being incredibly thick and missing an option somewhere; my brain just couldn't comprehend that it hadn't been designed in as core functionality.

For anybody who doesn't get what I mean, say I want to find an Imperial anarchy system. My options are:

1) Filter all Imperial systems and then just mouse over them randomly until I find an anarchy, or

2) Filter by anarchy government type and then mouse over them until I find an Empire controlled one.

Now try finding an Imperial anarchy system that is in a war state:

1) Filter all Imperial systems and then just mouse over them randomly until I find an anarchy that is also in a war state, or

2) Filter by anarchy government type and then mouse over them until I find an Empire controlled one that is in a war state, or

3) Filter by war state and then mouse over them until I stumble upon an Imperial anarchy.


All that despite the fact that ALL of the criteria I want are available as filters.


How it should work in a sane world where people don't think spending five minutes running your mouse over systems on a map is gameplay and recognise that it's just infuriating and utterly nonsensical:

1) Use the allegiance option to filter all Imperial systems.

2) Switch to the government type list and select 'anarchy'. The map, which is already only showing Imperial systems, now also removes everything apart from anarchy government types, so the only systems visible are now Imperial anarchy systems.

3) Switch to the states list and select 'war'. The map is now showing you only the systems you are trying to find.


I mean that is how actual well-designed real world filtering systems work. It's how every decent online shopping site with filters works. I can't actually imagine what informed the decision to do anything other than that to begin with because it is deliberately limiting functionality just to make what should be a simple task into a convoluted failfest. I only use this word very rarely when talking about development and design decisions because it's not usually the right one but in this case it is - it's stupid. Literally, genuinely stupid.

Otherwise, to locate them :

  • Data in high pop, high sec, high tech
  • Raw in high pop, high sec, extraction/refinery
  • Manufactured in high pop, high sec, industrial

There you go, perfect example. I can filter the map by high pop (using the slider) and high sec. Or I can filter the map by high pop and high tech. That should not be a choice between two options, the functionality of map filters should allow us to filter the map by high pop, high tech systems with a high security rating. There is no reason based in logic that explains why you would ever not include that functionality.

The galmap is like a shopping site where I can filter all keyboards, or all items manufactured by Logitech, but which doesn't allow me to filter all Logitech keyboards. So I want a Logitech keyboard but I either have to wade through seven pages of jarg trash keyboards as well as the Logitech ones, or have to wade through eighteen pages of Logitech mice, Logitech joysticks etc instead of just looking at their keyboards. It is absolutely barking mad.
 
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Deleted member 115407

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There you go, perfect example. I can filter the map by high pop (using the slider) and high sec. Or I can filter the map by high pop and high tech. That should not be a choice, the functionality of map filters should allow us to filter the map by high pop, high tech systems with a high security rating. There is no reason based in logic that explains why you would ever not include that functionality.

The fact that we can't apply multiple filters to the map astounds and bewilders me. We put a man on the moon for God's sake.

Not to be too mean to FD or anything, but I wonder if it was one of those "We don't want to make it too easy for them" types of decisions. Because filtering and refiltering and clicking on different stars to to find just the right combination of conditions is riveting gameplay. Like blow your hair back, hang on to your shorts kind of gameplay. Like where'd my socks go, cause that was exciting type of gameplay. Like when I have to do it I fling my hands into the air and scream "weeeeeeeee".... because it's so much fun.
 
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The fact that we can't apply multiple filters to the map astounds and bewilders me. We put a man on the moon for God's sake.

It's one of those things that has had me thinking 'seriously, is it just me that thinks this is crazy or what?' so many times. It's such an obvious omission that I'd expect to see a thread on the forum at least once a week about it, I guess after three years people must just be resigned to it now. Sadly I'm not; it still provokes a cold fury in me pretty much every time I want to search for something.

I mean it's a map for frak's sake, the ENTIRE FRAKKING PURPOSE OF ITS EXISTENCE is to enable you to find places. :rolleyes:
 
Yeah I've got five minutes in so far and he's finally got as far as telling me that there's a filter on the galmap but it will only show them if you already know where they are. :D It's so FDev.

I am genuinely amazed that with the added stuff in the galmap they STILL haven't made the filters cumulative across multiple search types. I was amazed that they hadn't back on day one when I started playing and with every successive update my incredulity has increased to the point that I almost want to scream every time I have to search for something. I genuinely spent about an hour searching online for how to do cumulative searches when I first started playing because I thought I must just be being incredibly thick and missing an option somewhere; my brain just couldn't comprehend that it hadn't been designed in as core functionality....

Yep.

I guess it might seem a bit over-zealous to create a proper filter system, like Amazon or eBay might have, for a game but when you've created a game with a heap of different variables and criteria, you need to provide proper tools for accessing that information.

Basically, the entire functionality of the ED gal-map consists of picking a single attribute and then randomly moving around the map until you spot a system that has thae chosen attribute.

It'd be lovely if they could, basically, graft the front-end of EDDB into a side-bar of the gal-map and then you'd just click on one of the results and the gal-map would focus on it.
 

Deleted member 115407

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It's one of those things that has had me thinking 'seriously, is it just me that thinks this is crazy or what?' so many times. It's such an obvious omission that I'd expect to see a thread on the forum at least once a week about it, I guess after three years people must just be resigned to it now. Sadly I'm not; it still provokes a cold fury in me pretty much every time I want to search for something.

I mean it's a map for frak's sake, the ENTIRE FRAKKING PURPOSE OF ITS EXISTENCE is to enable you to find places. :rolleyes:

Yep.

I guess it might seem a bit over-zealous to create a proper filter system, like Amazon or eBay might have, for a game but when you've created a game with a heap of different variables and criteria, you need to provide proper tools for accessing that information.

Basically, the entire functionality of the ED gal-map consists of picking a single attribute and then randomly moving around the map until you spot a system that has thae chosen attribute.

It'd be lovely if they could, basically, graft the front-end of EDDB into a side-bar of the gal-map and then you'd just click on one of the results and the gal-map would focus on it.

I mean... we have the functionality right down below, in the trade data section. There you can use checkboxes to freely refine exactly what you are looking for.

Why this can't be used for the state/government/security/etc. data is beyond me.
 
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The fact that we can't apply multiple filters to the map astounds and bewilders me. We put a man on the moon for God's sake.

Not to be too mean to FD or anything, but I wonder if it was one of those "We don't want to make it too easy for them" types of decisions. Because filtering and refiltering and clicking on different stars to to find just the right combination of conditions is riveting gameplay. Like blow your hair back, hang on to your shorts kind of gameplay. Like where'd my socks go, cause that was exciting type of gameplay. Like when I have to do it I fling my hands into the air and scream "weeeeeeeee".... because it's so much fun.

The tragic thing is I'm almost certain that would be the explanation. I'm entirely sure that a map which doesn't let you easily find things is exactly the kind of inventive gameplay experience that we are supposed to cherish.
 

Deleted member 115407

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The tragic thing is I'm almost certain that would be the explanation. I'm entirely sure that a map which doesn't let you easily find things is exactly the kind of inventive gameplay experience that we are supposed to cherish.

I highly suspect that that is the case. Yes.

Unfortunately for the players, it's the gameplay experience that FD want, rather than the one that we want.

And the fact is that it doesn't prevent us from finding what we need. We're a bunch of smart people who will and do figure it out. It just makes it a hell of a lot more tedious for us to get to the end result. And tedious is bad game design.

I suspect that it is designed around the experience of the noob in the sidewinder, stumbling and bumbling his way through the early game. That's real great and all, but truthfully the noob in the sidewinder isn't going to realize the full potential of these tools anyways, and is still going to meander about, exploring and discovering the game. By the time you get out of that phase and start getting real comfortable with the game features, deficiencies like these map features start to really stand out.
 
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useful responses, and I got a good chuckle... glad to know it's not just me, the struggle is very real lol

shortly after I posted this question, I found the filter in my map options... lo and behold... it showed me nothing.

I was starting to think maybe I was missing something really obvious and might even be border line :p

thanks guys [up]
 
Where did this 40ly radius come from? If you filter for them, you will see all the ones you've discovered anywhere in the galaxy, wherever you are. There is no range limit on the filter.
 
the engaging gameplay design very complex that FD came up to find material traders is checking forums.
 
useful responses, and I got a good chuckle... glad to know it's not just me, the struggle is very real lol

shortly after I posted this question, I found the filter in my map options... lo and behold... it showed me nothing.

I was starting to think maybe I was missing something really obvious and might even be border line :p

thanks guys [up]

I feel your pain, I have extensively explored the bubble and when I filter, I only get about 4 of each type. FWIW, they are pretty hard to see, you need to zoom out and swing the map around a bit to see the moving colours of them.
 
useful responses, and I got a good chuckle... glad to know it's not just me, the struggle is very real lol

shortly after I posted this question, I found the filter in my map options... lo and behold... it showed me nothing.

I was starting to think maybe I was missing something really obvious and might even be border line :p

thanks guys [up]

It's working correctly then as the map only shows you what you already know with regards to these traders. As far as finding them is concerned, here is the relevant part from the Beyond Notes:

Each trader type only trades in their type of materials and can be found in different economy types. Locations material traders can be found are:
- Raw Materials Trader: found at extraction and refinery economies, only trades in raw material found on planet surfaces and planetary rings.
- Manufactured Materials Trader: Found at industrial economies, only trades in manufactured materials.
- Encoded Materials Trader: Found at High Tech and Military economies, only trades in encoded materials.
- Systems also need to be mid to high security systems and have populations between 1,000,000 and 22,000,000.
• Materials Traders will not show up in anarchy systems.
• Materials Traders will not show up at stations that are currently controlled by a criminal faction.
• Materials Traders will be unavailable when a station is damaged, under repair or put on lockdown.

I found it best to clear all filters first, then find a system that had 1million population using EDDB and locate it on the map. I used the min slider on the population filter to locate where that system was no longer shown and then moved the slider down one notch. Likewise the max slider for 22 million. Having set those two I would then use the economy filters to locate system that might have the traders that I needed to find. Selecting the system map for a likely candidate I could then select a station and see in the detail details if it had a trader or not. Once I'd done that I could go to the station and see if it was what I needed.

Once you've done it once or twice it's easy. The fiddly bit is getting the population sliders correctly set. I counted the notches for the max and main sliders and wrote it down so I could easily set it next time.

Hope this helps.
 
shortly after I posted this question, I found the filter in my map options... lo and behold... it showed me nothing.

I was starting to think maybe I was missing something really obvious and might even be border line :p

thanks guys [up]

I'm a bit surprised that there isn't already a definitive thread listing all the mat' traders people have found, TBH.

On the bright side, I see EDDB already has an option to locate mat traders in it's "Stations" page, under the "Has Facilities" drop-down menu. \o/

Alas, it doesn't seem to differentiate between the different types of mat' trader.
It'd be better if they had 3 different options for manufactured, data and element traders.
 
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