Your Questions Needed - Join the Elite Tutorial Livestream - Everything You Need to Know About Exploration

Thought of a couple of questions.

- Will data points ever be more interesting than 4000 credits?
- Will there be POIs which can only be found in a distant system far far away?
- Will there be missions that actually require some serious exploring?
 
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QUESTION: Will you in the future include a few unregistered/unmapped stations/settlements on planets and in space in the game for us to discover.
 
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Will it be possible in the future to have a faction kickstart its own "kingdom" of sorts out in the dark, several LY's away from the current Bubble? In a way, to create a new human bubble.
 
Right now, you can fly two months in a random direction, pick any spot on any airless world... and come across man-made "stuff" over the first hill. Are the planetary surface "points of interest" going to have their generation algorithms beaten into shape?
 
Right now, you can fly two months in a random direction, pick any spot on any airless world... and come across man-made "stuff" over the first hill. Are the planetary surface "points of interest" going to have their generation algorithms beaten into shape?

I don't know - there's a big trade-off between realism and fun here. If they went realistic we'd more than likely NEVER see any man-made POIs. It actually feels about right to me in terms of fun. If I start flying around a planet looking for POIs to appear I can go quite a long time without finding anything. That gives me a nice sense of it being a fairly desolate rock but then, wait, what's that? something on my scanner. I certainly wouldn't increase the concentration but I think any significant decrease and looking for something to find could become seriously tedious. Unless maybe the scanner range was SIGNIFICANTLY increased (i.e. so you start to get indications of "something", a bit like the SRV scanner "fingers" that lead you in the right direction before you start picking up the real POI signal).

Apologies, certainly an interesting discussion but perhaps a bit off-topic for here?
 

Ozric

Volunteer Moderator
Right now, you can fly two months in a random direction, pick any spot on any airless world... and come across man-made "stuff" over the first hill. Are the planetary surface "points of interest" going to have their generation algorithms beaten into shape?

I did say earlier in this thread that Michael has already said that the spawn rate of non natural POIs will be drastically reduced with 2.1

Which is why we need more non-man-made POIs!

Maybe they're already waiting for us and once the spawn rates are adjusted we'll find more of them :D
 
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I don't know - there's a big trade-off between realism and fun here.

If you define fun as driving 5km and find Tea and Bertrandite, then do that in the bubble where there might be a modicum of sense to it.

But personally, if I've made the effort to fly a long way out of the bubble, I'd expect to find next to no POIs at all. And any I did, I'd expect to actually be applicable and hopefully of interest; A crashed Asp with a captains log (their last testiment?) I can scan and return back to the bubble for a CR reward (from his friends/family/faction).

I certainly do not expect to go to the trouble of going to new systems almost certainly never reached by any other CMDRs, and every 5km find piles of rubbish everywhere. As I've said elsewhere, IHMO this is the game giving you a slap in the face! Think you're clever getting here? Well you're not!

I fully expect the POI code is so bizarre at the moment, I could use Jumponium in an Anaconda to make an 80ly jump to an ultra remote system, and find a crashed T9 there, surrounded by a pile of tea!
 
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- Also: any plans to introduce zoom while exploring? Either in space (ability to get a good view of planets without getting stuck in their gravity well), or in the SRV (being able to scan 180 degrees in the turret mode, and zoom in on any specs on the horizon)
I agree, some slight zoom would be really nice and also allow us to enjoy the visuals FD have worked on so hard.

Apparently exploration as a mechanic is solid according to Michael. Don't want to be facetious by asking if there are any planned ideas to improve and deepen the exploration mechanics.

I'll just stick to this one.

400 billion systems? Why??just why???
Is that sarcasm (I hope)? Early on some fools were asking about jumping to other galaxies in a call-back to the original Elite (David Braben was basically speechless... like 400 billion is not enough? LOL)

Exploration feels a bit bare-minimum at the moment. "Honk". Are there plans to jazz it up a bit, even if only visually?
To what extent can you predict what sort of materials you'll find from orbit? This might be an opportunity to jazz it up a bit!
Will the bookmarking system be implemented in a way that might allow commanders to see other player's bookmarks in some way? It might be nice to set "public" bookmarks for particularly interesting discoveries other commanders might like to share, although this could be extended to all sorts of things... This would make already-explored systems more intriguing. Or is this a networking can of worms!?
There have been a huge number of good posts on how to make exploration more fun, immersive and jazzed-up over the way it is.

The question is, when will FD get around to revisiting the mechanics and presentation of each profession.

And the answer is; don't expect Mr. Brookes to drop any major announcement surprises. The focus will be on the systems as they are for this livestream. If these type questions are addressed it will be along the lines of "we read the forums", "there is a lot we would like to do", and if we are really lucky the vague but promising "that's still on the list".

*My QUESTION: If MB is too busy for a Dev Update on 2.1, how can he spare time for a livestream with Ed. Or maybe he is planning on dropping info bombs?
 
Will it be possible to have more detailed logs so that things like EDSM and such can more accurately map the galaxy? Currently, triangulating systems is a painful process depending on where you are. Sometimes it works after adding 6 systems and sometimes after noting down 25.
 
.... 3. There are quite a few 3rd Party tools like EDDB and Captains Log that are a real godsend for career explorers. Is there any chance that Frontier might add more detailed information to the netlogs that would help automate some of the tasks we have to perform manually in these tools like including system X,Y,Z coordinates....

That's a good idea, but what about systems you did not visit yet?

So, additionally: Would it be possible to add the coordinates of a system to the INFO-Tab in the Galaxy-Map?
 
I'm out in the black myself right now heading for Sag A* for the first time (maybe I'll try to catch up to the Distant Worlds expedition) about a good 13k LYs from Sol atm.


1. Any plans to make the planetary maps gain more detail? (Right now its kinda useless, being able to see where craters, plains, mountains, etc. would make it more useful aside from just a utilitarian tool of here i settlement X or Y)
2. Any plans to allow us to scan a planet and be able to determine materials we might be able to gather prior to landing (perhaps as an added featured to the detailed surface scanner module)?
3. As someone mentioned earlier, Any plans to make traveling easier with for example letting explorers put down nav beacons for faster travel (or new starting points)?

4. A tutorial helping explain the wave scanner would be nice. --- I'm still struggling with it, mostly finding only outcrops, wrecks and the occasional bronzite. Not having much luck finding meteorites and being able to tell some signals aparts. 3rd party websites and some guides have helped me but still a bit lost overall.

5. Any plans for long distance colonies (either preppared by the community or by individual players carrying supplies)? I would love to setup a few colonies in the rims of the galaxy if possible in the near future.

6. Any plans to aid stargazing?
What I mean by that is much like how we can point the camera to a nearby point of interest and find out that is a "Distress Call" or a "Strong Signal Source", etc. Perhaps have a viewing mode where we can see a star in our canopy and be able to find out what star we're looking at (which then we can pull up the Galaxy map and look it up).
At the moment to try any sort of stargazing its mostly trial and error having to "plot" a course to the star you are trying to view but that star could easily be thousands of light years away and hundreds of jumps away. It would add a nice bit of flavor to exploration.


7. Again and someone else mentioned, does ED keep track of what stars players have visited and thus if there are any heat maps of the galaxy?
 
Hi Apologies if this has already been asked but why are systems that have been discovered by someone else and their data sold still shown as unexplored?
 
Hi Apologies if this has already been asked but why are systems that have been discovered by someone else and their data sold still shown as unexplored?

Unexplored by you or exploration data otherwsie not yet available to you (e.g. you can sometimes purchase exploration data for a system, where available, by clicking the appropriate icon in the galaxy map).

Think of it like a satnav. It comes pre-loaded with some data and you can add additional data by purchasing it or by exploring the system yourself.
 
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Are there any plans to make systems/planets a little bit more dynamic?

Comets? Meteors/Meteorites? (We see many craters, but never any impacts or atmospheric entries. Obviously those craters happen over a very long timeline...) We see huge amounts of wreckage, but never the actual crash or even a recent crash which is still smoking etc.
 
Why does the Wave Scanner audio sweep from right to left when the visual sweep is left to right?

I have checked my headset commander and yes, the speakers are on the right ears. Same when on loudspeakers.

I posted a bug report about this in Beta, but it persists, although it does seem less dramatic than I recall in Beta. Most noticeably with Mesosiderite and metallic meteorite. A few of the sounds don't exhibit this odd behavior but most seem to peak on the left at the end of the sweep.

I would like the sound to give directional left/right approximate information towards the material.

***Audio alone is a clunky UI for this function, who thought this was brilliant? In 3300 a "Wave Scanner", whatevs that is, would interpret the signal and list likely materials. Instead we get, "snap, crackle, pop, make a guess what I am commander!". At least make the visual clues easier to understand.

I would really prefer some instruments more analogous to real world ones today, like spectrometers. Even if the idea is some dumb take on fantasy Quantum Mechanics like entangled particles shooting out through the hills and sending back signals based on what they hit. (I dread to think that might be the lore because that is magic not science but I digress). So whatever the Lore behind the scanner, it should present data in a comprehensible way.

Once a nugget is found and blasted, the scanner immediately detects and displays what it is with exact precision, "Phosphorus", "Carbon". So why is the initial scanner so obtuse?

By the way, would be great to integrate the Periodic Table of the Elements data in those displays
. Carbon
. 6
. blah, blah
 
I'm well aware of it but I still can't make sense out of it half the time.

The basics are relatively simple:

If you're looking for materials, then look for 'lines' (arcs) in the lower part of the Wave Scanner. Wide means they're far off, but they get narrower as you get closer. You need to get within 50m for them to appear on your scanner/HUD.

If you're looking for wreckage/cargo/nav beacons/barnacles, look for lines in the mid-to-top of the Wave Scanner. Again, the width will tell you how near you are to the contact.
 
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