Things I found, and things to clarify about exploration

[varonica]

That's a shame... maybe with some external tool/ mod?

Ok, this gets interesting now. As I turn off my shields when I am out exploring anyway, the lower power would not be a problem for me. You still would recommend going armoured? What does the % efficiency value mean actually? Thermal effieciency?

Everyone has armor, the difference is light/medium/heavy, most explorers use light. I don't even carry a shield generator on my exploration ships, sure you can save power by having it turned off, but it still reduces jump range, a big factor out on the edges of the galaxy.

 

[Ander_Wand]

Everyone has armor, the difference is light/medium/heavy, most explorers use light. I don't even carry a shield generator on my exploration ships, sure you can save power by having it turned off, but it still reduces jump range, a big factor out on the edges of the galaxy.

You mean hull armour? Sure, have lightweight heavy duty/ deep plating. still 0 tons. Question is, does armouring the powerplant do anything useful out there?

I though about omitting the shield, but with my build it only adds 0,14 ly range. And I do like to have the extra security for planetary landings. Also, I'm only going out for couple 1000 ly so far, so I'm not too concerned about range atm.

 

[varonica]

You mean hull armour? Sure, have lightweight heavy duty/ deep plating. still 0 tons. Question is, does armouring the powerplant do anything useful out there?

I though about omitting the shield, but with my build it only adds 0,14 ly range. And I do like to have the extra security for planetary landings. Also, I'm only going out for couple 1000 ly so far, so I'm not too concerned about range atm.

Armoring the PP? Couldn't see the point myself, I go for overcharged so I can use a smaller PP on my ship.

 

[Rudi Raumkraut]

That's a shame... maybe with some external tool/ mod?

Ok, this gets interesting now. As I turn off my shields when I am out exploring anyway, the lower power would not be a problem for me. You still would recommend going armoured? What does the % efficiency value mean actually? Thermal effieciency?

If you can enable the shield when you want to, it's fine. But that first build looks like there isn't enough power to activate it at all, for example when landing...
Yes, efficiency is thermal efficiency.
It helps when scooping, and if you want to land on a hot / high gravity planet, as then your thrusters generate lots of heat.

Skardee has a nice landable next to the star, where you can test your ships behavior for such cases.

Engineering your pp with armored isn't for the integrity (as you are aware damage to the pp out in the black is percentage based) but for the increased power output plus a better efficiency.

In most cases a lowEmi isn't necessary, but some ships overheat quite easy, there it comes handy.
On the by default cooler running ships even an overcharged PP is ok, but I wouldn't put one into a Type 7 for example

 

[Ander_Wand]

If you can enable the shield when you want to, it's fine. But that first build looks like there isn't enough power to activate it at all, for example when landing...
Yes, efficiency is thermal efficiency.
It helps when scooping, and if you want to land on a hot / high gravity planet, as then your thrusters generate lots of heat.

It worked fine, could power those shields and everything necessary just barely. Have switched it for the 3A low emission/ stripped down now though. I really want to test how 0,14 efficiency behaves compared to the prior 0,35 while fuel scooping.

This build definitely can't power the shields anymore. But for landing no fuel scoop/ fsd booster are needed anyway. Might even drop them entirely, like varonica suggested if I feel brave enough.

 

[marx]

Have switched it for the 3A low emission/ stripped down now though. I really want to test how 0,14 efficiency behaves compared to the prior 0,35 while fuel scooping.

It really is a good idea to try them out experimentally.
Consider though that power plant efficiency means how much thermal load your power draw produces: your baseline heat, so to speak. (It's power draw * plant efficiency.) The rates at which your ship cools (or heats up) are dependent on the ship itself, and can't be engineered. That said, it's certainly more comfortable to fly around and start scooping at 35% heat than at 60% heat

Armoring the PP? Couldn't see the point myself, I go for overcharged so I can use a smaller PP on my ship.

The Armored blueprint improves efficiency and power output as well, not just integrity. The only downside being a moderate mass increase. At a G3 mod, if you put the Stripped down experimental effect on it, the mass increase is almost entirely negated, and you have a power plant that only has upsides, with no downsides.

 

[varonica]

The Armored blueprint improves efficiency and power output as well, not just integrity. The only downside being a moderate mass increase. At a G3 mod, if you put the Stripped down experimental effect on it, the mass increase is almost entirely negated, and you have a power plant that only has upsides, with no downsides.

I have very low power draw, so by overcharging I can fit a PP one module size smaller than normal, decreasing mass and increasing jump range, and there are no issues with heat.

 

[Ander_Wand]

It really is a good idea to try them out experimentally.
Consider though that power plant efficiency means how much thermal load your power draw produces: your baseline heat, so to speak. (It's power draw * plant efficiency.) The rates at which your ship cools (or heats up) are dependent on the ship itself, and can't be engineered. That said, it's certainly more comfortable to fly around and start scooping at 35% heat than at 60% heat

Definitely! Swapping the 6B to a 6A fuelscoop after my first trip was already much of an improvement. While jumping at max range I can now fill my tank in just one pass at full speed most of the time. VERY comfortable. But still, I get to the 70% heat range quite regularly in the process. Hence trying this now.

 

[varonica]

Definitely! Swapping the 6B to a 6A fuelscoop after my first trip was already much of an improvement. While jumping at max range I can now fill my tank in just one pass at full speed most of the time. VERY comfortable. But still, I get to the 70% heat range quite regularly in the process. Hence trying this now.

70% isn't hot although many players think it is these days, I remember jumping into close binary systems through the secondary star and you would come out of hyperspace at 85%-90%+, 70% is just when the smoke starts!

 

[Ander_Wand]

70% isn't hot although many players think it is these days, I remember jumping into close binary systems through the secondary star and you would come out of hyperspace at 85%-90%+, 70% is just when the smoke starts!

Yeah I realise that. Still, there seem to be star types that heat you up REAL fast, had it a few times that when reaching 70% heat it instantly dropped me out of supercruise. But that might probably just be due to hitting the exclusion zone. (Had the orbital lines turned off that first trip)

 

[varonica]

Yeah I realise that. Still, there seem to be star types that heat you up REAL fast, had it a few times that when reaching 70% heat it instantly dropped me out of supercruise. But that might probably just be due to hitting the exclusion zone. (Had the orbital lines turned off that first trip)

I have had temps well over 120%, you don't drop out of SC because of temp but you do start to take damage and that will eventually drop you out, you are almost certainly hitting the exclusion zone and that's also why you are heating up so fast, you don't need to get anywhere near the exclusion zone to be fuel scooping at max rate.

 

[Orvidius]

Heh, overcharged is the one PP mod I try to steer people away from. But to each their own. There's no wrong answer here, just personal preference.

Overcharged of course increases the heat output, but if you turn most systems off, or don't install them in the first place, then the heat won't be as big of an issue. And heat really only just determines how long you can spend scooping comfortably.

Personally I prefer low emissions so that I can park in the deeper parts of the scooping zone, for as long as I want. It means that I'm unlikely to overheat, even if I walk away from the computer during a hyperjump and automatically hit the exclusion zone,. Plus, I can use the FSS while scooping without any concerns. But not everyone cares to do things that way.

And of course Armoured is great since it boosts power and efficiency simultaneously, just neither is as large of a boost as either the low emissions or overcharged would do. But since it improves both, you can still sometimes get away with a smaller PP (especially combined with the monstered effect), and still scoop longer and deeper than overcharging might permit.

But the best way to know which is best for you is to... unfortunately... try them all.

 

[Ander_Wand]

It worked fine, could power those shields and everything necessary just barely. Have switched it for the 3A low emission/ stripped down now though. I really want to test how 0,14 efficiency behaves compared to the prior 0,35 while fuel scooping.
This build definitely can't power the shields anymore. But for landing no fuel scoop/ fsd booster are needed anyway. Might even drop them entirely, like varonica suggested if I feel brave enough.

I have tested this now and am pretty pleased with the results. She supercruises at 14% heat and barely reaches 60% while scooping. All while not even being G5 low emissions, only got to G4 at Qwent.
To my utter surprise I can still power the shields, although coriolis says nay.... Might be the G4 instead of G5, will have to keep an eye on that.

Edit: I took another look at my coriolis build and in theory it should be absolutely impossible to run the shields on this build, its like 3,8% short on power. Need to inspect my IG build tomorrow how this even works.

 

[iain666]

Plus, I can use the FSS while scooping without any concerns. But not everyone cares to do things that way.

I did that for a bit, but the star fills up such a huge wodge of the sky that it seemed like there was almost always something behind it and I needed to fly away a bit and try again anyway. Now I start heading in the direction of my next jump and fire up the FSS as my speed hits 1c.

 

[ChipStar65]

Now I start heading in the direction of my next jump and fire up the FSS as my speed hits 1c.

I usually put the system primary in my rear view and travel until the "stellar rumble" audio FX fades to naught. At this point I'm far enough from most any star to not have it occlude planets, though now and then a relocation is needed.

So many ways to approach the same situation -- is good!

 

[varonica]

I usually put the system primary in my rear view and travel until the "stellar rumble" audio FX fades to naught. At this point I'm far enough from most any star to not have it occlude planets, though now and then a relocation is needed.

So many ways to approach the same situation -- is good!

I fly out until the fuel scoop animation vanishes, 90% of the time this does the job, sometimes it doesn't but all I have to do is exit and since I am already traveling quite fast it isn't an issue.

 

[BradHann]

I usually put the system primary in my rear view and travel until the "stellar rumble" audio FX fades to naught. At this point I'm far enough from most any star to not have it occlude planets, though now and then a relocation is needed.

I combine this with the colour saturation from the star fading out of the background (and ship's console, as often as not).

 

[Ander_Wand]

It really is a good idea to try them out experimentally.
Consider though that power plant efficiency means how much thermal load your power draw produces: your baseline heat, so to speak. (It's power draw * plant efficiency.) The rates at which your ship cools (or heats up) are dependent on the ship itself, and can't be engineered. That said, it's certainly more comfortable to fly around and start scooping at 35% heat than at 60% heat
The Armored blueprint improves efficiency and power output as well, not just integrity. The only downside being a moderate mass increase. At a G3 mod, if you put the Stripped down experimental effect on it, the mass increase is almost entirely negated, and you have a power plant that only has upsides, with no downsides.

I have tested this now and am pretty pleased with the results. She supercruises at 14% heat and barely reaches 60% while scooping. All while not even being G5 low emissions, only got to G4 at Qwent.
To my utter surprise I can still power the shields, although coriolis says nay.... Might be the G4 instead of G5, will have to keep an eye on that.
Edit: I took another look at my coriolis build and in theory it should be absolutely impossible to run the shields on this build, its like 3,8% short on power. Need to inspect my IG build tomorrow how this even works.

Found the reason at last... turns out armoring the fuel scoop adds a lot extra power draw, that's why the coriolis build would not work, but the real one did. Also cant go G5 low emissions, which also raises power consumption. looks like I reached optimum at G4 already.

On another note, after reading your guide on NSP's I went out and revisited one of my own discoveries, which had 3 NSP in the rings of a GG with water based life. After quite a while of searching I finally found one of those elusive little mollusc things.... WOW they are hard to spot, neigh impossible if you don't know they must be there. Thanks a lot for this info, makes the NSP all the more interesting!
I also went to the other ones, and all had the same type of mollusc: Albulum Gourd Mollusc. (not 100 % sure if they are called like that in english) So this means all the NSP in one system will have the same life form in it?
The crystalls are of different types though, and one (the one in the rocky ring) has some spheres in it, with the others being in the icy ring. Is there a connection as well?

 

[varonica]

I also went to the other ones, and all had the same type of mollusc: Albulum Gourd Mollusc. (not 100 % sure if they are called like that in english) So this means all the NSP in one system will have the same life form in it?

The crystalls are of different types though, and one (the one in the rocky ring) has some spheres in it, with the others being in the icy ring. Is there a connection as well?

First no, but the Albulum Gourd Mollusc seem to be the most prolific of that life form, I find them everywhere in the area they are in and very few of the other variants. I have also found the molluscs just by themselves in a ring, small groups of around seven or eight.

I don't think there's a connection, it's rather if the system meets the specification they will have life forms, and then it's a percentage chance what sort they will have based on factors know only to FDEV.

 

[Ander_Wand]

First no, but the Albulum Gourd Mollusc seem to be the most prolific of that life form, I find them everywhere in the area they are in and very few of the other variants. I have also found the molluscs just by themselves in a ring, small groups of around seven or eight.

Speaking of finding things.... just found your name on some planets. Funny coincidence. Too bad it wasn't your Neutron Star though.