How is it "broken?"
Why FSS Mode Must Go
- Thread starter Commander William Diffin
- Start date
How is it "broken?"
This is what they did to the ADS. Nobody that i am aware of is trying to take the FSS away, its completely the other way around. Somehow a small entitled group has managed to ruin exploration for the people that did it. (but not the almost dozen other types that nobody seems able to name)
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Are we talking about the FSS or date night?
Erm, yes. Even racing games can be looked like that when you break them down to the basic gameplay which is move to another place. And that's it. You use you controller of choice to move a digital blobe that looks like a car to another place.
SHE driving certainly is. You move and hit what you want to hit whether that is scanning something or shooting something. At the end of the day the basic gameplay is not very different, it's just different graphical interpretations of the same thing. Even using the HUD can be called that. You move your mouse or move the cursor to where you want it and wack the what you want to use, again its just another different graphical view of the same type of gameplay.
As I said all gameplay those days are at most are move, point and click.
If I may add an opinion from a non-exploration aligned player:
FD were halfway there. They added some form of dynamic gameplay to exploration - but made it pretty tedious in the process. Instead of taking a few seconds to fully explore a system, it now takes several minutes to timescale much larger - half an hour+, whatever it is to fully discover a system of great complexity.
IMO this draws a couple of matters to hand: one, we finally have SKILL in exploration. The ability to discover a system fully, in good time, is better done by the experienced hand. Congratulations on this FD, this was a true win.
Secondly, it's FAR too delicate, and even worse non-immersive. Exploration via the FSS feels like awkward fumbling until you find a point of interest, and instead of doing this search through the great void around you, you're doing it in some 2D panel.
Why create a beautiful, immersive galaxy if you expect explorers- the ones who want to enjoy that galaxy - to spend most of their time filtering through a 2D page with rocks on?
You know, I said the same thing to myself when I typed "Exploration via the FSS feels like awkward fumbling until you find a point of interest"
FD were halfway there. They added some form of dynamic gameplay to exploration - but made it pretty tedious in the process. Instead of taking a few seconds to fully explore a system, it now takes several minutes to timescale much larger - half an hour+, whatever it is to fully discover a system of great complexity.
IMO this draws a couple of matters to hand: one, we finally have SKILL in exploration. The ability to discover a system fully, in good time, is better done by the experienced hand. Congratulations on this FD, this was a true win.
Secondly, it's FAR too delicate, and even worse non-immersive. Exploration via the FSS feels like awkward fumbling until you find a point of interest, and instead of doing this search through the great void around you, you're doing it in some 2D panel.
Why create a beautiful, immersive galaxy if you expect explorers- the ones who want to enjoy that galaxy - to spend most of their time filtering through a 2D page with rocks on?
You know, I said the same thing to myself when I typed "Exploration via the FSS feels like awkward fumbling until you find a point of interest"
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Quite similar to my take on it. Which is probably why it's so frustrating for me.
As far as I'm concerned, they were that close. For me it all falls apart at the decision: is this a nice place for me to investigate? You have to investigate to know whether it's worth investigating. And since the hit/miss ratio is too low to warrant going through the Mr Blobby game every single system, exploration just became a grind for me. Either I'm forced to play the Blobby game every system and be bored skipless, or I fly around not know what the systems I fly through look like. All that's left is cherry picking the shines, and I'm sorry, but that too just bores the socks of me.
Wow - no I have not come across anything that I couldn't completely resolve in minutes. I think 96 bodies was the largest yesterday for example and it seriously took less than 10 minutes to do them all. Although I do admit to not waiting long for the "Scanning" to resolve on zoom, more than a few seconds and I'm off to the next body.
I think if one gets the controls set up conveniently then it doesn't take much use to become quite fast in resolving a system.
I'd force myself to push on and get there to see it before they build a cafe^h^h^h^h base there and let the riff-raff in.
I quite specifically said "If I may add an opinion from a non-exploration aligned player"...I'm not experienced in new exploration at all: I actually haven't played much since the latest main update, let alone exploration alone. As I said, I'm actually pretty glad exploration now involves some kinda skill. Y'all have the ability to tell combat players to 'git gud' now
In my personal experience from the beta, and from the exploration I have done, the result is that it's kinda dull either way though. I would WANT to develop my exploration skills, if said skills didn't involve staring at a 2D screen with rocks on, and few indicators as to what your time will reward you with.
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See, but ignoring what POIs might be down on planets is exactly what Frontier don't want explorers to do. One of the aims of the new system was that players shouldn't miss the content that the devs put out there.
Of course, the problem is that said content outside the bubble and plot areas is really lacking. So they're already conditioning players to just look for the "shinies" (ELW/WW/AW, and now NSP) and jump out if there aren't any - the hand-crafted planetary content that there is to find is boring. (Except the xeno stuff, but those are confined to the plot areas.)
Honestly, the quality of the FSS and the content makes me feel as if I were playing an Early Access version. Especially with all the bugs.
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With both old & new processes any skill requirement (to spot interesting things & leave boring things untouched) is negated by completion scanning; the new process makes completion scanning much easier so in that respect if the player has the patience/tenacity they will find out what's in the system with the new process without requiring any kind of fore-knowledge beyond getting used to the interface.
I've just cashed in my data from a trip through the Kepler's Crest region (ie polar opposite of Beagle Point) where I completion scanned all but maybe a dozen systems (all near the beginning & end of the journey) and earned just over 750mCr in data (I've visited just over 2,500 systems since 3.3 & earned just over a billion in exploration data alone). I mapped around 800 bodies, an average of less than one per system & those were either cherry picked from the sysmap (terraformables etc) or landable moons to tick my codex discovery boxes. I got my name in the Codex as the first to comp scan some anemones in that region although it only earned me the standard 50,000Cr, no special bonus.
This was an extended test to see whether I could adapt to the new process by playing as I had before - assemble the complete map then cherry pick based on the information available. All challenge & intrigue about whether my experienced guess about the body I was travelling towards was gone, leaving only the detail of exactly what type of geological or biological POI I was going to 'discover'.
For the Codex box-ticking I had quickly ticked the vast majority within a few systems and then found near endless repetition for the rest of the trip. I remember being surprised to see the 'new discovery' box pop up only to realise I'd just moved into the next region.
So completion scanning is an easy if dull & time consuming way to play the game, with no challenge but lots of cash & boxes ticked.
I'm now headed out to the Formidine Rift region, this time just hon/scoop/jumping my way around & randomly scanning the occasional system. I know I don't need the money, I know I don't need to find any special POIs because it'll either happen or it won't. I just want to know if I can find a way to enjoy the new process, to find some way to gain satisfaction from being good at it as I had with the old process.
In the absence of any better challenge raging against the machine will keep me going for a while
I've just cashed in my data from a trip through the Kepler's Crest region (ie polar opposite of Beagle Point) where I completion scanned all but maybe a dozen systems (all near the beginning & end of the journey) and earned just over 750mCr in data (I've visited just over 2,500 systems since 3.3 & earned just over a billion in exploration data alone). I mapped around 800 bodies, an average of less than one per system & those were either cherry picked from the sysmap (terraformables etc) or landable moons to tick my codex discovery boxes. I got my name in the Codex as the first to comp scan some anemones in that region although it only earned me the standard 50,000Cr, no special bonus.
This was an extended test to see whether I could adapt to the new process by playing as I had before - assemble the complete map then cherry pick based on the information available. All challenge & intrigue about whether my experienced guess about the body I was travelling towards was gone, leaving only the detail of exactly what type of geological or biological POI I was going to 'discover'.
For the Codex box-ticking I had quickly ticked the vast majority within a few systems and then found near endless repetition for the rest of the trip. I remember being surprised to see the 'new discovery' box pop up only to realise I'd just moved into the next region.
So completion scanning is an easy if dull & time consuming way to play the game, with no challenge but lots of cash & boxes ticked.
I'm now headed out to the Formidine Rift region, this time just hon/scoop/jumping my way around & randomly scanning the occasional system. I know I don't need the money, I know I don't need to find any special POIs because it'll either happen or it won't. I just want to know if I can find a way to enjoy the new process, to find some way to gain satisfaction from being good at it as I had with the old process.
In the absence of any better challenge raging against the machine will keep me going for a while
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As a VR player, I must admit that the fact that it takes you out of the cockpit is less than ideal. I'd have preferred a truly 2D popup, like the Codex (curved) or Commodities trading in a station (flat), which fills your forward view, but you can still see the cockpit around you.
I know the feeling. It's Friday afternoon and I'm raging against the coffeemachine because it decided it didn't want to be a coffee machine anymore, but rather a hot water dispenser.In the absence of any better challenge raging against the machine will keep me going for a while
I don't know if it has been mentioned elsewhere but you don't have to loiter on that for it to resolve. It is odd, some bodies with POIs resolve immediate, others get the "spinny" effect for a few seconds before resolving. If I get a "spinny" I back out and scan a couple more bodies. When I come back to it the scan has finished and resolved.
With the old system, even though I had spent months in the black and took a bunch of pretty screenshots, I never thought the gameplay itself was very good at all. The experience is what sent people in the black, but the gameplay was completely mediocre. After spending 9 months in the black, I never had the desire to make a major exploration trip again. With the new gameplay, it’s much more efficient and I can spend an hour playing and actually accomplish something, which gives me time to do other stuff, so returning to the black is much more inviting.
I wonder if FD could somehow create an in-game poll... Before you can start playing you MUST participate with clicking on the three options; like it more, like it less, don't give a damn.
This forum simply can not be a representative of the whole Elite bunch.
OTOH, the number of people gone into the (DW2) black is telling. Exploration now can't be too bad. And for some (like me) it is good.
This forum simply can not be a representative of the whole Elite bunch.
OTOH, the number of people gone into the (DW2) black is telling. Exploration now can't be too bad. And for some (like me) it is good.
Yeah the new process has opened up exploration to a lot of players that didn't like the old process. Seems to me it didn't have to be at the expense of the old tools though. I've waited a long time for new stuff to be added to the game & needlessly removing stuff doesn't sit well with me. The general design goals of scanning from a distance and making it easier to find the stuff that is there are good though.
Same thing here. Not playing that stupid and pathetic FSS arcade minigame anymore.
Explorers asked for C O N T E N T, and FD came with this crap.
This.
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I love the new system. The only thing I would like to see changed is for Terraforming Candidates to be shown with the body type in the FSS zoom.
I've played since beta and never could get up the drive to go into the deep black. 5001 LY was the furthest I ever traveled--for Palin. After they added the FSS scanner I finished engineering a couple ships and set out towards the core. The last 86 jumps I made have been unexplored systems, and I'm loving it. I scan every body in every system too--even when I can clearly see it's just 23 icy bodies.
And also, you can honk and FSS and see right away and see MRW, ELW, WW, and AW just by the position of the signal sources. So unless you're hunting HMC-TCs or RB-TCs all you have to do is honk, look at the FSS, and move on to the next system. If you can't remember the position of the various bodies, rub some peanut butter on those spots or something.
I've played since beta and never could get up the drive to go into the deep black. 5001 LY was the furthest I ever traveled--for Palin. After they added the FSS scanner I finished engineering a couple ships and set out towards the core. The last 86 jumps I made have been unexplored systems, and I'm loving it. I scan every body in every system too--even when I can clearly see it's just 23 icy bodies.
And also, you can honk and FSS and see right away and see MRW, ELW, WW, and AW just by the position of the signal sources. So unless you're hunting HMC-TCs or RB-TCs all you have to do is honk, look at the FSS, and move on to the next system. If you can't remember the position of the various bodies, rub some peanut butter on those spots or something.