Newcomer / Intro The unbearable grind to engineer modules.

[Dubz]

Ok so first off the game doesn't tell you any of the (preferably all) the material requirements for various module upgrades as well as what's needed in adding experimental effects until you actually travel all the way out to the engineer's remote location and engage the engineer. You travel all the way out there, engage the engineer and only then you find out what you need to upgrade your modules. Then you have to go about the various tasks to obtain such materials, the PITA being finding minerals on landable planets and moons which is about as laborious and time consuming as possible. Endless bad terrain, desperatly trying to keep your SRV from spinnning out or flipping over as you hunt for a signal source, when you do find a mineral rock to blast well chances are not what you needed so off you go again in another direct for god knows how long to find that material. You'd think there would be a way to narrow down your search aside from planet scanning. Like launching a drone from the surface that can find material sources, tag their location, to which you follow in your SRV.

So you obtain all what you believe you need for the engineer, travel back to the engineer and upgrade the module and then you see Experimental Effects and think "Oh I'll try that as well, see what happens." Well now you are presented with yet another list of materials you need. So off you go to find those materials. Materials obtained you get back to the engineer to apply the Experimental (which you have to have the module already engineered to apply, which you did already) only to find out you have to re-engineer the module from scratch to reunlock the Experimental, so now your wasting precious materials doing what you already did. Now your in the Experimental section finally and oh look it seems for the effect you want you forgot one material element. So now you have to go back out into the galaxy, find that material, go back to the engineer, re-engineer the module again, then finally apply the experimental effect you want.

I realize it's not suppose to be easy but it feels like an ongoing practical joke. Now before someone tells me about out of game tools like EDOMH, I finally got it so yes I will at least know ahead of time what I need before making the trip out to the engineer. Thing is more information should be available in game and not only after you've traveled a few hundred ly to an engineer. As well surely something can be done to improve material hunting on planets to make it more bearable. Give me a ballpark idea of where to go so I don't end up endlessly driving around with no signals, drive back to the ship, scoot across the surface to another spot, land, rinse and repeat until finally you get some hits on your SRV scanner. The less time battling the rocky terrain (and I thought driving the Mako in Mass Effect 1 was arduous, ED has it beat) the better. I didn't even want to extensively upgrade all my modules, just a couple level 1 upgrades to make a more viable Vulture build. Now it's hours and hours of grind and I still haven't been able to engineer 1 module fully.

So yeah, this aspect of the game could be improved upon.

 

[thistle]

Have you used Materials Traders, to trade small numbers of the higher grade materials for lots of lower grade materials?

 

[Dubz]

Have you used Materials Traders, to trade small numbers of the higher grade materials for lots of lower grade materials?

Yep, figured that out which saved me some time. It appears though some elements have to be found on planets or moons though.

 

[metatheurgist]

Yes, this is what the Codex should be for in a normal game. But Frontier hasn't played a game with modern conventions for so long they don't know how they work. When they do attempt a modern convention it comes out as a bizarro world, uncanny valley replica that looks like it was made by aliens. It looks like the thing and superficially behaves like the thing but on closer inspection it just ain't right.

 

[Dubz]

Personally I dislike game devs offloading needed game information to player run sites and game tools. It’s fine for secret Easter eggs and the like but not for essential gameplay.

 

[the100thmonkey]

Ok so first off the game doesn't tell you any of the (preferably all) the material requirements for various module upgrades as well as what's needed in adding experimental effects until you actually travel all the way out to the engineer's remote location and engage the engineer. You travel all the way out there, engage the engineer and only then you find out what you need to upgrade your modules. Then you have to go about the various tasks to obtain such materials, the PITA being finding minerals on landable planets and moons which is about as laborious and time consuming as possible. Endless bad terrain, desperatly trying to keep your SRV from spinnning out or flipping over as you hunt for a signal source, when you do find a mineral rock to blast well chances are not what you needed so off you go again in another direct for god knows how long to find that material. You'd think there would be a way to narrow down your search aside from planet scanning. Like launching a drone from the surface that can find material sources, tag their location, to which you follow in your SRV.

So you obtain all what you believe you need for the engineer, travel back to the engineer and upgrade the module and then you see Experimental Effects and think "Oh I'll try that as well, see what happens." Well now you are presented with yet another list of materials you need. So off you go to find those materials. Materials obtained you get back to the engineer to apply the Experimental (which you have to have the module already engineered to apply, which you did already) only to find out you have to re-engineer the module from scratch to reunlock the Experimental, so now your wasting precious materials doing what you already did. Now your in the Experimental section finally and oh look it seems for the effect you want you forgot one material element. So now you have to go back out into the galaxy, find that material, go back to the engineer, re-engineer the module again, then finally apply the experimental effect you want.

I realize it's not suppose to be easy but it feels like an ongoing practical joke. Now before someone tells me about out of game tools like EDOMH, I finally got it so yes I will at least know ahead of time what I need before making the trip out to the engineer. Thing is more information should be available in game and not only after you've traveled a few hundred ly to an engineer. As well surely something can be done to improve material hunting on planets to make it more bearable. Give me a ballpark idea of where to go so I don't end up endlessly driving around with no signals, drive back to the ship, scoot across the surface to another spot, land, rinse and repeat until finally you get some hits on your SRV scanner. The less time battling the rocky terrain (and I thought driving the Mako in Mass Effect 1 was arduous, ED has it beat) the better. I didn't even want to extensively upgrade all my modules, just a couple level 1 upgrades to make a more viable Vulture build. Now it's hours and hours of grind and I still haven't been able to engineer 1 module fully.

So yeah, this aspect of the game could be improved upon.

Éí 'Aaníígóó 'Áhoot'é

 

[Dubz]

And now I have to find Polymer Capacitors which are rare but needed to to finish a base engineer job on a power supply lvl 1. Doesn’t appear to come up as a mission reward anywhere, unavailable to be traded for, apparently has to be found as salvage under specific conditions…It’s just ridiculous level of grind just for an entry point into engineering.

 

[Ashnak]

So you grab a collector limpet controller (or a collector capable multi limpet controller) and drop into a (any) high grade emissions signal source, grab what's there and then go to the nearest manufactured materials trader to exchange the loot for polymer capacitors.

Manufactured are easy, data has fewer known sources, raw can be an issue as the plentiful sources are a bit out of the way (braintrees or shards, but you can get a lot of them from mining).

 

[Dubz]

Thanks. From my research online it didn’t seem like polymer capacitors were available at a material trader. Good to know that is an option. By way of INARA I discovered that such can be found as wreckage at an Anarchy system during an outbreak. So I made trip about six systems to one and went to as many encoded emissions and combat wreckage sites as I could. Managed to get 6.

 

[Nowski]

the PITA being finding minerals on landable planets and moons which is about as laborious and time consuming as possible

Though many recommend maxing out raw mats via brain trees or shards, I find a trip to the crashed Anaconda sites at either Orrere or Koli Discii to be preferable for a single ship engineering project. These were buffed at the same time as HGE sites last year, with the number of cargo racks rising from four to about 15 or so, giving about 3 (per canister) x 3 (avg canisters per rack) x 15-ish (number of racks) or about 135-ish mats total per visit, usually half or more of which are G4 such as ruthenium, tellurium.

It does need a bit of practice with driving SRV in turret mode and delicate scooping technique to get this done efficiently. One of the annoyances is that the small canisters can go flying off and are easy to lose track of. I find getting close to the container and firing (from turret mode) at an off center part (while still targeting it) can often mitigate this.

 

[Dougie]

And now I have to find Polymer Capacitors which are rare but needed to to finish a base engineer job on a power supply lvl 1. Doesn’t appear to come up as a mission reward anywhere, unavailable to be traded for, apparently has to be found as salvage under specific conditions…It’s just ridiculous level of grind just for an entry point into engineering.

No not hard to find, just do a few runs here:

 

[Factabulous]

Wow - grinders really don't like having fun do they

Collecting mats has been made super easy - just do missions taking the material rewards, rank up with factions somewhere nice, watch out for High Grade Emissions while doing missions and scoop them, and you'll be full of mats like everyone else in no time. And no relogging

 

[aRJay]

Ok so first off the game doesn't tell you any of the (preferably all) the material requirements for various module upgrades as well as what's needed in adding experimental effects until you actually travel all the way out to the engineer's remote location and engage the engineer. You travel all the way out there, engage the engineer and only then you find out what you need to upgrade your modules. Then you have to go about the various tasks to obtain such materials, the PITA being finding minerals on landable planets and moons which is about as laborious and time consuming as possible. Endless bad terrain, desperatly trying to keep your SRV from spinnning out or flipping over as you hunt for a signal source, when you do find a mineral rock to blast well chances are not what you needed so off you go again in another direct for god knows how long to find that material. You'd think there would be a way to narrow down your search aside from planet scanning. Like launching a drone from the surface that can find material sources, tag their location, to which you follow in your SRV.

So you obtain all what you believe you need for the engineer, travel back to the engineer and upgrade the module and then you see Experimental Effects and think "Oh I'll try that as well, see what happens." Well now you are presented with yet another list of materials you need. So off you go to find those materials. Materials obtained you get back to the engineer to apply the Experimental (which you have to have the module already engineered to apply, which you did already) only to find out you have to re-engineer the module from scratch to reunlock the Experimental,

All I do to add an experimental is select the module then select the blueprint I used by clicking on the level 1 grade usually as it is at the top of the list then click on the experimental button followed by clicking on the experimental I want to apply.

No redoing of what was done required.

so now your wasting precious materials doing what you already did. Now your in the Experimental section finally and oh look it seems for the effect you want you forgot one material element. So now you have to go back out into the galaxy, find that material, go back to the engineer, re-engineer the module again, then finally apply the experimental effect you want.

See previous comment.

I realize it's not suppose to be easy but it feels like an ongoing practical joke. Now before someone tells me about out of game tools like EDOMH, I finally got it so yes I will at least know ahead of time what I need before making the trip out to the engineer. Thing is more information should be available in game and not only after you've traveled a few hundred ly to an engineer. As well surely something can be done to improve material hunting on planets to make it more bearable. Give me a ballpark idea of where to go so I don't end up endlessly driving around with no signals, drive back to the ship, scoot across the surface to another spot, land, rinse and repeat until finally you get some hits on your SRV scanner. The less time battling the rocky terrain (and I thought driving the Mako in Mass Effect 1 was arduous, ED has it beat) the better. I didn't even want to extensively upgrade all my modules, just a couple level 1 upgrades to make a more viable Vulture build. Now it's hours and hours of grind and I still haven't been able to engineer 1 module fully.

So yeah, this aspect of the game could be improved upon.

The thing is it has been reworked twice. But the game is still pretty opaque.

There is a lot to be said for picking up anything that is a material whenever you encounter them, and if hunting for specific ones getting more than you need.

Personally I dislike game devs offloading needed game information to player run sites and game tools. It’s fine for secret Easter eggs and the like but not for essential gameplay.

The devs aren’t offloading information to the player run sites that information is all provided by the players. Which is why there are times showing how long ago that information was provided by a player.

 

[rootsrat]

Ok so first off the game doesn't tell you any of the (preferably all) the material requirements for various module upgrades as well as what's needed in adding experimental effects until you actually travel all the way out to the engineer's remote location and engage the engineer. You travel all the way out there, engage the engineer and only then you find out what you need to upgrade your modules. Then you have to go about the various tasks to obtain such materials, the PITA being finding minerals on landable planets and moons which is about as laborious and time consuming as possible. Endless bad terrain, desperatly trying to keep your SRV from spinnning out or flipping over as you hunt for a signal source, when you do find a mineral rock to blast well chances are not what you needed so off you go again in another direct for god knows how long to find that material. You'd think there would be a way to narrow down your search aside from planet scanning. Like launching a drone from the surface that can find material sources, tag their location, to which you follow in your SRV.

So you obtain all what you believe you need for the engineer, travel back to the engineer and upgrade the module and then you see Experimental Effects and think "Oh I'll try that as well, see what happens." Well now you are presented with yet another list of materials you need. So off you go to find those materials. Materials obtained you get back to the engineer to apply the Experimental (which you have to have the module already engineered to apply, which you did already) only to find out you have to re-engineer the module from scratch to reunlock the Experimental, so now your wasting precious materials doing what you already did. Now your in the Experimental section finally and oh look it seems for the effect you want you forgot one material element. So now you have to go back out into the galaxy, find that material, go back to the engineer, re-engineer the module again, then finally apply the experimental effect you want.

I realize it's not suppose to be easy but it feels like an ongoing practical joke. Now before someone tells me about out of game tools like EDOMH, I finally got it so yes I will at least know ahead of time what I need before making the trip out to the engineer. Thing is more information should be available in game and not only after you've traveled a few hundred ly to an engineer. As well surely something can be done to improve material hunting on planets to make it more bearable. Give me a ballpark idea of where to go so I don't end up endlessly driving around with no signals, drive back to the ship, scoot across the surface to another spot, land, rinse and repeat until finally you get some hits on your SRV scanner. The less time battling the rocky terrain (and I thought driving the Mako in Mass Effect 1 was arduous, ED has it beat) the better. I didn't even want to extensively upgrade all my modules, just a couple level 1 upgrades to make a more viable Vulture build. Now it's hours and hours of grind and I still haven't been able to engineer 1 module fully.

So yeah, this aspect of the game could be improved upon.

Engineering was already dumbed down painfully. I agree that it lacks in terms of providing solid info to the player.

Currently the easiest way to get the mats is:

Raws - Go to Orrere 2B, land at Crashed Ship POI, shoot the containers - they will all drop G4 raws. Exchange them at mat trader as required.
Data - Go to Jameson's Crash Site, scan the hell outta the - now magically multiplied - data points. Exchange at mat trader as required.
Manufactured - go to High Grade Emissions, grab the G5's, exchange at mat trader as required.

I think I am one of the few people that absolutely hates that change. Material gathering - when it was balanced - allowed for a varied gameplay, as there were many different ways to get the mats. Now the above methods yield so many top level mats, that pretty much any other way is moot and not worth doing at all. Just pointless. This is extremely path-of-least-resistance and - dare I say lazy? - design which I personally hate. It makes for shallow and boring gameplay, and to me this change to engineering was a massive downgrade.

And I personally think while lack of info is also an issue, what I described above is the worse one to tackle. Material gather didn't need dumbing down. It was quite well balanced cross-methods. Just all of the methods needed slight boost, some materials added to other POI's and we'd be golden.

Now we have no info in game, but it really isn't needed as all you need to know for each type of material I posted above.

 

[Dillon Fallon]

Join a powerplay faction, rank up and start crying as mats keep raining down on you with no way to make it stop.

 

[Dubz]

All I do to add an experimental is select the module then select the blueprint I used by clicking on the level 1 grade usually as it is at the top of the list then click on the experimental button followed by clicking on the experimental I want to apply.

No redoing of what was done required.


See previous comment.

The thing is it has been reworked twice. But the game is still pretty opaque.

There is a lot to be said for picking up anything that is a material whenever you encounter them, and if hunting for specific ones getting more than you need.

The devs aren’t offloading information to the player run sites that information is all provided by the players. Which is why there are times showing how long ago that information was provided by a player.

I think I might have missed something when I went back to do the experimental. Was defaulted to something other than the mod I did previously. I did manage to finish the mod though. I also grab materials whenver I can as well I have Inara and EDOMH. Still not looking forward to finding minerals on planets and moons but overall I seemed to have figured out a pathway. Thanks.

 

[Dubz]

No not hard to find, just do a few runs here:

View attachment 426200

So you can find materials outside of bases then? Good to know, that might m,ake things easier.

 

[Dubz]

Engineering was already dumbed down painfully. I agree that it lacks in terms of providing solid info to the player.

Currently the easiest way to get the mats is:

Raws - Go to Orrere 2B, land at Crashed Ship POI, shoot the containers - they will all drop G4 raws. Exchange them at mat trader as required.
Data - Go to Jameson's Crash Site, scan the hell outta the - now magically multiplied - data points. Exchange at mat trader as required.
Manufactured - go to High Grade Emissions, grab the G5's, exchange at mat trader as required.

I think I am one of the few people that absolutely hates that change. Material gathering - when it was balanced - allowed for a varied gameplay, as there were many different ways to get the mats. Now the above methods yield so many top level mats, that pretty much any other way is moot and not worth doing at all. Just pointless. This is extremely path-of-least-resistance and - dare I say lazy? - design which I personally hate. It makes for shallow and boring gameplay, and to me this change to engineering was a massive downgrade.

And I personally think while lack of info is also an issue, what I described above is the worse one to tackle. Material gather didn't need dumbing down. It was quite well balanced cross-methods. Just all of the methods needed slight boost, some materials added to other POI's and we'd be golden.

Now we have no info in game, but it really isn't needed as all you need to know for each type of material I posted above.

I think I came across a crashed ship once, there were sentries though and when I got close I was warned of tresspassing.

 

[Dubz]

Join a powerplay faction, rank up and start crying as mats keep raining down on you with no way to make it stop.

Thanks, didn't know that.

 

[aRJay]

I think I might have missed something when I went back to do the experimental. Was defaulted to something other than the mod I did previously. I did manage to finish the mod though. I also grab materials whenver I can as well I have Inara and EDOMH. Still not looking forward to finding minerals on planets and moons but overall I seemed to have figured out a pathway. Thanks.

Yes the engineering screen defaults to the first level of the first blueprint on that engineers list.
If lots of red writing appears on the screen in engineering you should stop as it is possible you are about to remove/replace something you already did to that module.