Things that I do not understand about Elite Dangerous

All been playing starting from the Beta....

We have ships that can travel light years, scan cargo bays of other ships etc…. Yet interdicted by NPC’s demanding cargo when there is none.

We have a detailed surface scanner that can tell us the makeup of the planet, but cannot locate those deposits from orbit. (Or anything else from that stand point)

We have advanced refineries that can process the material etc… but cannot filter out what we do and do not want.

1000+ LY’s outside the bubble and find an undiscovered system, yet we have surface mining installations.

Still do not have the ability to store modules for ships.

Is it just me or am I missing something?
 
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There's a lot more to that list. There was a "things that don't make sense" thread around here somewhere, I think it reached a significant number of pages.
 
All been playing starting from the Beta....

We have ships that can travel light years, scan cargo bays of other ships etc…. Yet interdicted by NPC’s demanding cargo when there is none.

We have a detailed surface scanner that can tell us the makeup of the planet, but cannot locate those deposits from orbit. (Or anything else from that stand point)

We have advanced refineries that can process the material etc… but cannot filter out what we do and do not want.

1000+ LY’s outside the bubble and find an undiscovered system, yet we have surface mining installations.

Still do not have the ability to store modules for ships.

Is it just me or am I missing something?

1. If you don't have a cargo scanner do you know what I am carrying?
.
2. Detailed yes not super highly specific
.
3. I can tell my sky box to record frost - it doesn't stop it recording stuff I have already watched or making duplicates - how does it know what you do and don't want?
.
4. This has been acknowledgeed already and will likely go at some point. I don't actually have a great deal of a problem myself undiscovered doesn't mean no one doesn't know its there. Rather like the California gold rush - in the early days the explorers tried to keep their discovery quiet - I could imagine the 34th century explorers not telling of their discovery
.
5. not an issue - stuff is easy to find


What really doesn't make sense is that a docking computer struggles with certain ships to make it to a known fixed slot and takes up a 1T slot and cost 4500Cr, but a planetary landing suite includes a free module as part of the package that can land any ship anywhere on any moon with highly variable gravity constants totally unsupervised
 
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We also have detailed surface scanners, SRV wave scanners than can pinpoint an odd looking rock from 1km away. Many kinds of scanners....
But we have to use a prospector limpet to see what an asteroid is made of.

We also have FTL communication, between players and police, find out if someone is wanted using a KWS. But we can't see the prices or stock for stuff at stations.
 
Some would have you believe that ED is a 'space simulator'. Really, no it isn't. Simulations do their level best, within the contraints of time, effort and resources, to simulate a real world situation and/or process. ED is riddled with 'things that don't make sense' because it's a game, and certain (cf. most) parts of the ED experience could not be further from being anything like a simulation whilst still presenting the appearance of being so.

To be clear: this is not a criticism because ED is, at the end of the day, a space ship computer game cut very much from the same vein as the best traditions of space opera. However, criticism can be levelled against design decisions that are put in place, deliberately, to specifically introduce difficulty without also adding depth.
 
What really doesn't make sense is that a docking computer struggles with certain ships to make it to a known fixed slot and takes up a 1T slot and cost 4500Cr, but a planetary landing suite includes a free module as part of the package that can land any ship anywhere on any moon with highly variable gravity constants totally unsupervised

Production of the docking computer was outsourced to the cheapest available supplier (Nostalgia 84 Incorporated), as support for the module was mandated by an influential lobby group over the protests of designers and engineers.

On the other hand, production of the planetary landing suite was subsidised by a rich megacorporation (Season Pass Limited) in the hopes of attracting new customers to its on-planet trade complexes.
 
Detailed cartographic data isn't shared by everyone, not if they can make money off it. Why would one faction tell another about the amazing system full of pure painite ring systems?
 
I don't understand if they can make an almost seamless transition from SC to a Planet in Orbit Mode and then to Glide (new loading screen instance) then why when dropping out of SC to the Station with it in sight does not zoom in. Plus the same for the Star after Hyperspace. Now the game has developed and been Optimized (ridden of bugs mostly) then why it hasn't got these better smoother graphical transitions that would rid the basic design of Instances? Plus why not bring back all the cool HiRes graphics of mist and amazing asteroids which still BTW POP UP!
Asteroids POP UP
Station Lights POP UP
 
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We can get the route plotter to plot a 1,000Ly route, we can manually plot one jump, but in the year 3302 we have the inability to plot waypoints, or to put it another way manually plot more that one jump.
 
Regarding the first point from Heater I find it amusing that the Galaxy seems to be empty with no NPC ships having interest in the player.
As long as you're not hauling anything illegal/ are wanted by a third faction.
Constant Interdiction anyone?

It's just putting me off that these "AI" mechanics are blatantly obvious.
I'd be happy if the AI would actually follow some kind of rational choices which ship to scan.
Scanning a ship that's in mint condition running straight to the heavily frequented trading outpost? Or a beat up cobra with a pirate livery that's constantly scanning cargo holds near the nav beacon?

Now it's just obvious that you're being scanned because you took mission xyz or got slav.. erm tourists in your cargo hold.
 
I don't understand if they can make an almost seamless transition from SC to a Planet in Orbit Mode and then to Glide (new loading screen instance) then why when dropping out of SC to the Station with it in sight does not zoom in. Plus the same for the Star after Hyperspace. Now the game has developed and been Optimized (ridden of bugs mostly) then why it hasn't got these better smoother graphical transitions that would rid the basic design of Instances? Plus why not bring back all the cool HiRes graphics of mist and amazing asteroids which still BTW POP UP!
Asteroids POP UP
Station Lights POP UP

My guess on this one is just how the managed to get it working for release with the stations, and it was in a "good enough for now" state. Planets, we still have transitions, they are just smoother. Now they have done it for planets, at some point in the future, when they have the time, they can look at making transitions to stations smoother. Its probably just not high enough on the priority list at this time.
 
I'd be happy if the AI would actually follow some kind of rational choices which ship to scan.
Scanning a ship that's in mint condition running straight to the heavily frequented trading outpost? Or a beat up cobra with a pirate livery that's constantly scanning cargo holds near the nav beacon?
In all fairness by the time they can criticise your paintwork they've probably scanned you a dozen times.
 
My ship can hammer out the twisted metalwork of my SRV, reattach the turret, put out the engine fire, move said engine out of my chair and back to its proper compartment (don't ask), replace any missing pieces and a smashed canopy. Instantly.

But it can't refill the fuel tank.
 
Some would have you believe that ED is a 'space simulator'. Really, no it isn't. Simulations do their level best, within the contraints of time, effort and resources, to simulate a real world situation and/or process. ED is riddled with 'things that don't make sense' because it's a game, and certain (cf. most) parts of the ED experience could not be further from being anything like a simulation whilst still presenting the appearance of being so.

To be clear: this is not a criticism because ED is, at the end of the day, a space ship computer game cut very much from the same vein as the best traditions of space opera. However, criticism can be levelled against design decisions that are put in place, deliberately, to specifically introduce difficulty without also adding depth.

THIS.

This is what FD have done from the get-go. that's why I stopped playing.
 
1. If you don't have a cargo scanner do you know what I am carrying?
.
2. Detailed yes not super highly specific
.
3. I can tell my sky box to record frost - it doesn't stop it recording stuff I have already watched or making duplicates - how does it know what you do and don't want?
.
4. This has been acknowledgeed already and will likely go at some point. I don't actually have a great deal of a problem myself undiscovered doesn't mean no one doesn't know its there. Rather like the California gold rush - in the early days the explorers tried to keep their discovery quiet - I could imagine the 34th century explorers not telling of their discovery
.
5. not an issue - stuff is easy to find


What really doesn't make sense is that a docking computer struggles with certain ships to make it to a known fixed slot and takes up a 1T slot and cost 4500Cr, but a planetary landing suite includes a free module as part of the package that can land any ship anywhere on any moon with highly variable gravity constants totally unsupervised

On the one hand, you try to explain away that guy's rather valid points, yet on the other, you yourself list a ridiculous problem which with a bit of consideration could be thought through. Hint: Navigating around moving obstacles with 6 degrees of freedom is hard, and the game needs a way to determine if a ship is "allowed" to land on a planet.
 
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