Newcomer / Intro Wondering about exploration

[Chrras]

I am not an especially new player, I have at least played around 20-25 hours of Elite Dangerous since release in December. I have mostly focused on bounty hunting, and that seems to be pretty profitable (although it seems that there is far between the Anacondas with 100k bounty nowadays). I have mostly been around the Eravate system, so I haven't really been exploring that much (and not messing to much with trade).

I have a Sidewinger which are somewhat upgraded, and a Viper which are upgraded a lot (my rebuy cost is around 36k, rose alot when I bought an expensive Frame Shift Drive). I mostly use my Viper, which has a jump range of around 15ly.

With the new update, and focus to who first explored systems and such, I was wondering about starting to explore. Not just re-explore systems which other people already explored, but explore new systems. According to Frontier, we have a lot of systems left to explore

But I was wondering about how far I need to travel to get to the "new" systems? Is there any way to tell if the system is explored or not, before you go to it, and look at the system map and see the label with the explorer name? I guess I need a fuel scoop if I want to explore, according to what I have read, there are not any stations, or only few? I would really like to help to clarify this - because if I have to spend hours of jumping to get to new systems, I might rethink that. Especially since I have some friends who are mostly around the Eravate system, and I would like to go back there to play with the, without spending hours of jumping

 

[Dommarraa]

Probably not in a couple of hours, no. Especially without a more dedicated scout ship

 

[Chrras]

I just need to be sure. Do you mean that it takes longer than a couple of hours, or shorter? Right now I have traveled for some time, and my current system had a trafic report of only three ships the last 24 hours.

 

[Chrras]

Also, is there any easy way to find out if a system is already explored by another player?

 

[Surly_Badger]

Also, is there any easy way to find out if a system is already explored by another player?

When you arrive in-system pull up the system map, and it'll show what's unknown and what's been scanned by whom.

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I was wondering about how far I need to travel to get to the "new" systems?

Go 750ly in pretty much any direction and you'll start hitting them. If you go to the edge of colonized space and head 500+ly out (which is 50 or 60 jumps) you'll start getting there. To tell where human colonized space ends, you can bring up the nav map and make sure faction alignment is colored (or turn them all off) then plot a course for where it starts turning all white.

 

[Flyto]

There are no stations more than a couple of hundred Ly from Sol.
AFAIK there's no way to tell whether somebody else has scanned a system until you get there (because it's the bodies within the system that get discoverer names associated with them)
Within about 500Ly of Sol, all of the "interesting" looking systems (blue stars and so forth) that I've visited have been scanned, and most of the uninteresting. I don't imaigne you have to go more than perhaps 1kly to find plenty of class Ms and brown dwarfs to claim (that's a pure guess though), but I think you'd have to go MUCH MUCH further to be the first to the less common stars, that stand out on the galaxy map.

 

[DaveC]

I'm currently around 300ly from eravate and have scanned around 30 unclaimed bodies today (some of which were pretty interesting). They are very hard to find so close to populated space though - it has literally taken me all day to find those 30 or so. Further out should be much easier.

Whether they're still unclaimed by the time I get to a station is a different matter of course

 

[Chrras]

Alright, thanks for the advice. How good of a fuel scope would you prefer? There aren't going to be any stations out there, right?

 

[lolanon]

You really need a fuel scoop! I h have one as a trader.

The more expensive they are the faster they scoop.

 

[interfector]

if you are in viper, take a3 fuel scoop. if you can't afford it, take any class 3 scoop.

 

[Chrras]

Okay, thanks for your advice. I have about 500k credits at my disposal, and I was wondering if it was better to get another ship - one that is more fitted for exploration. Any suggestions with that budget or should I wait till I have saved some more up? I would like to get started on the exploration game as soon as possible

 

[Kuroshio]

This morning, I took my Cobra as far straight "upwards" (there has to be a better word for that) as her 20+ Ly jump range allows, to the edge, roughly 900 Ly from my home system of Cuachini. Took me five and a half hour there and back, and while my destination had already been explored, there were plenty of unmapped systems (about 25 or 30, I'd have to check) on the way. Earned about 350k.

It was fun, and the starless view up there was ... kind of scary.

 

[the100thmonkey]

For exploration, you don't really need to worry (too much) about combat. After about 200LY from inhabited space, you stop seeing NPCs. I'd still pack a couple of lasers just in case. You definitely don't want kinetic weapons - there will be nowhere to rearm. Indeed, you might decide to dispense with the weapons entirely. Your call.

The Adder is a great little exploration vessel - it's got a great jump range with a light ship and upgraded FSD, and is very fuel-efficient. The Hauler also makes a surprisingly good low-budget explorer, although the small fuel tank is a concern. If you have the cash, an exploration-spec Cobra will get you about 22LY per jump with 4 lasers, and can fit an A4 fuel scoop, which will pull in fuel at 294KG/s. The Viper is definitely not recommended as an exploration vehicle because of the limitations of the class 2 fuel tank and its FSD limitations - 4t will not see you through more than a couple of stars that you can't scoop from, and you may well end up in a situation where you have to self-destruct, losing all your exploration data.

• Exploration-spec Adder
  
• Exploration-spec Hauler
• Exploration-spec Cobra

Add lasers if you want to the ships - you'll still get over 22LY from the FSD. The Cobra even has room for a field maintenance unit and a shield cell bank, but these get very expensive!

You may question the Advanced Discoverty Scanner and the Detailed Surface scanner, but I've found that they add a great deal of money to the credits you get - they paid for themselves in the long run. Most systems are binary or trinary star systems, with the secondary star often many thousands of light seconds away from where you jump in. The Basic or even Intermediate Discovery Scanner will just not pick them up, and you'll waste loads of time cruising about systems hunting for bodies visually with the parallax effect. If you like doing that, go for it. I hated it, and would rather spend my time travelling to the bodies to inspect them! Detailed surface scans roughly double the value of the data you get for the body.

 

[willowfan]

Just started exploring in an Adder, fitted out exactly as above. No weapons, jump distance is more important than defence - and discovered a new addiction - getting "first discovered by" credits on the system map - If you find any systems discovered by Quick Ben that'll have been me

An Advanced Discovery Scanner and Detailed Surface Scanner are a must for anything other than casual exploration. There is no way you will find everything in a lot of systems with a basic or intermediate scanner without spending a very long time looking.

 

[Chrras]

Sounds great, I think I'll use an Adder instead of my Viper - also great website you are linking to, the100thmonkey

I usually just have problems with being attacked, when I am scooping fuel - so I think I'll need some defences

 

[Agony_Aunt]

Hauler over Adder. Hauler has better jump range and better FOV, and also slightly cheaper.

As for finding virgin systems, depends. I can travel over 500LY/hour as long as I don't take too much time scanning and admiring the sights. Pushing it, i could probably hit 1000LY in my Asp, but that would be straight jump, jump, jump, refuel, jump, jump, jump... etc.

You can start finding virgin systems less than 1000LY from civilized space. Hell, probably a lot less than that. There are lots of explorers and lots of the local areas have been already covered, but there are a hell of a lot of stars and objects as well.