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Pre-defined Probe Formations
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The Riddik
24th Imperial Crusade
Amarr Empire
#41 - 2012-08-26 15:15:54 UTC
yes, lets make something easy easier.

/sarcasm
Gillia Winddancer
Aliastra
Gallente Federation
#42 - 2012-08-26 15:23:05 UTC
Whilst it is A and O when it comes to reducing the number of actions for any given interface, when it comes to probes I believe that this should take time, considering it is used for actually finding something.

A compromise wouldn't hurt in this regard though. Sure, allow formation malls to be created, which will obviously result in typical 4-5 standard patterns. But to compensate, increase the scan time by x number of seconds as to make up for the time it takes on average to manually position probes.

Yep, fewer clicks = good. But no real advantage gained otherwise compared to how it is now. Everyone is happy.
Selinate
#43 - 2012-08-26 15:32:14 UTC
The Riddik wrote:
yes, lets make something easy easier.

/sarcasm



You're an idiot if you think that pre-making probe configurations is easier than dragging them and dropping them everywhere. Difficulty is not an issue here, it's just getting rid of repetitive and boring/annoying tasks.

/nosarcasm
Kitty Bear
Deep Core Mining Inc.
Caldari State
#44 - 2012-08-26 15:36:25 UTC
Brooks Puuntai wrote:
Haxxi wrote:
Brooks Puuntai wrote:

It really has nothing to do with UI. Having predefined formation mostly removes the challenge of actually finding a site.


Ok you need to explain that. How does it remove the challenge to find a site? It's not like the probe automatically launches at the spot of the site. I think you dont understand what i'm asking for. The probes just launch where your ship is and put themself into formation as you would do it in a manually monotone way too. Then you have to adjust them and move them around to find your sites like you do it anyway


Figuring out a proper formation is part of learning how to probe, not only that people use different methods and formations based off of learning how to probe. Having them just plop out in a single formation would remove that learning curve as well as remove most thought needed in learning how to probe. It's already easy to set it up with being able to shift-click move/resize, I don't see why it would even be needed for those who already know how to probe to need predefined formations, actually I would see it as annoying.



When i read the OP's it quite clearly says

1) Launch Probes
2) Arrange Probes
3) Save Arrangement for later re-use


Was I meant to ignore that part of his post too ?
Saile Litestrider
Deep Core Mining Inc.
Caldari State
#45 - 2012-08-26 17:17:24 UTC
The people arguing against this strike me as having never scanned systems/ships continuously for hours on end, as some professions are wont to do. The tedium of dragging your probes into the exact same formation every time is immense, and this feature could easily remove it without actually giving anyone any advantage (unless you count the lack of carpal tunnel as an advantage). If you do it right, people who are skilled at arranging formations quickly could still scan people down significantly faster.

All the fallacious slippery slopes and asserting that clicking and dragging 10 times constitutes real effort and not simply tedium honestly baffles me. This would be a fantastic addition.
Zagdul
Federal Navy Academy
Gallente Federation
#46 - 2012-08-26 17:21:22 UTC
Un-fun tasks that take time are not necessarily hard tasks. They're tedious tasks.

Removing tedium doesn't dumb things down, it makes things more enjoyable and increases quality of life.

Dual Pane idea: Click!

CCP Please Implement
Zagdul
Federal Navy Academy
Gallente Federation
#47 - 2012-08-26 17:25:17 UTC
Matter of fact, removing tedium makes things smarter as intelligent game and UI design makes mundane and repetitive tasks a non-issue.


Probing and finding results still requires the same amount of skill to achieve if it takes 20 minutes or 5 seconds. Increasing the amount of time to achieve the same result dos not make probing any more challenging.

Dual Pane idea: Click!

CCP Please Implement
Komen
Aliastra
Gallente Federation
#48 - 2012-08-26 17:31:18 UTC
I read a bit and I am wholly in favor of preset formations. The idea is not to remove effort but to eliminate a repetitive, no-choice task. Hell, even give it a delay of 10 seconds or so to get the probes into formation, much like the 'in-warp' delay currently.

In my corp, everyone scans, and we go for hours-long sessions of hunting the chains. It would be nice to have this one dull, tedious, repetitive, no-choice task be automated.

Again, even with a small 10 second delay. Heck, intro a new skill, training it up makes your probes go fasta into formation. Untrained, probes would be a bit slower than they are now. Trained, a bit faster.
Ensign X
#49 - 2012-08-26 17:54:06 UTC
Any idea that reduces tedious, boring tasks and the prevalence of carpal-tunnel syndrome is worthy of a thumbs up, a high five and a pat on the back. EVE Devs could do so much good for their game if they would focus on reducing or removing the silly little click fests that plague this game's terrible UI.
Cheshirepus
Divinity Rising
#50 - 2012-08-26 18:46:20 UTC
I like the idea of being able to save your probe configurations for one button clicks in the future.

But then, I also prefer the (relatively) old way of probing that required the use of multispec and about 1 - 2 hours of your time to locate grav and radar sites. Used to run those in low sec all the time without having to worry too much about getting jumped (even though we still got jumped, but hey, at least we were bringing high sec people to low sec, right?).

Given the probe mechanics we have now compared to the pain in the ass they used to be, what's the issue with saved probe configurations considering probing has been dumbed down to levels where it often takes less time to probe a grav site full of Hulks on your scanner than it does with combat probes? You still have to manually move them around to save them in the first place.

So, in short, saving patterns would be making something mindless just a little more mindless in my opinion, which still produces a net value of "probing is mindless".

* NOTE: I do understand the necessity for the mechanics as they exist today to make messing about in wormholes realistically possible. I just miss mining Gneiss and Crokite in 0.3... and selling Alpha chips for 14M.
Smohq Anmirorz
State War Academy
Caldari State
#51 - 2012-08-26 18:56:39 UTC
I would suggest to make it so manually arranging them is faster than auto-arrange, so that the person putting in more effort to be fast is actually faster. So if you want it easier, it takes longer.
Omega Sunset
Black.Omega
#52 - 2012-08-26 19:23:00 UTC
Haxxi wrote:
It's just a waste of time to do it each time, especially when you scan systems for explo sites or whatever.
Good. Then I do it fast and you do it slow, I have the advantage. It's not even an issue for me. So no!

—Ω—
Jax Bederen
Dark Horse RM
#53 - 2012-08-26 19:31:08 UTC
I don't get those who enjoy the mundane and think this is some sort of badge of honor. If one knows how to set up probes and has a particular pattern he uses, he should be able to lock that pattern in and have it saved. You are still going to have to adjust your probes to home in after they deploy in your pattern anyway.
Borlag Crendraven
The Scope
Gallente Federation
#54 - 2012-08-27 05:31:51 UTC
Smohq Anmirorz wrote:
I would suggest to make it so manually arranging them is faster than auto-arrange, so that the person putting in more effort to be fast is actually faster. So if you want it easier, it takes longer.


If done like this, I'd be in support of it.
Debora Tsung
Perkone
Caldari State
#55 - 2012-08-27 06:23:05 UTC
Solstice Project wrote:


It's the lack of challenge people get used to ... and suddenly they don't want challenge at all.


Wait, just so I get this right, You don't really believe that putting probes into fromation is a challenge, do you?

Stupidity should be a bannable offense.

Fighting back is more fun than not.

Sticky: AFK Cloaking Thread It's not pretty, but it's there.
Grumpymunky
Monkey Steals The Peach
#56 - 2012-08-27 09:39:08 UTC
When I activate a mining laser, it should instantly fill up my ore-bay. Waiting for miner cycles is a waste of time.
When I accept a mission, I should be able to complete it without undocking. Killing those NPCs is a waste of time.
When I set my autopilot, I should instantly jump to my destination. Traveling is a waste of time.

Post with your monkey.

Thread locked due to lack of pants.
Gillia Winddancer
Aliastra
Gallente Federation
#57 - 2012-08-27 09:44:39 UTC
Grumpymunky wrote:
When I activate a mining laser, it should instantly fill up my ore-bay. Waiting for miner cycles is a waste of time.
When I accept a mission, I should be able to complete it without undocking. Killing those NPCs is a waste of time.
When I set my autopilot, I should instantly jump to my destination. Traveling is a waste of time.


Clearly you don't know what the term "user friendly interface" means.

Then again, that's too much to expect from a chimp.
Sin Pew
Ministry of War
Amarr Empire
#58 - 2012-08-27 10:01:45 UTC
Ensign X wrote:
Any idea that reduces tedious, boring tasks and the prevalence of carpal-tunnel syndrome is worthy of a thumbs up, a high five and a pat on the back. EVE Devs could do so much good for their game if they would focus on reducing or removing the silly little click fests that plague this game's terrible UI.
Don't use a mouse but a trackball... Lol
Removing the multiple clicks to launch X probes would be neat, but no, I will go against the idea. Name another module that can launch more than one "ammo" at once.
Launching probes is a moment of vulnerability, you can move to an area out of dscan to do so, yet you will never be 100% sure there isn't a cloaked ship that still has you in range unless in k-space and there's only you and the target in local, but then again, the target might be really dumb to stay there waiting to be probed down. Sure a good hunter might probe you in one scan, but a probe cycle still takes a few seconds, so that means the target still has a chance of noticing he's being probed. Reduce it even further and it'll become nigh impossible to detect a threat. Everything in EVE is supposed to have a counter, cumulating this multiple probes launch with auto-layout, I'd set a 7 probes layout 50AU below and would be exposed merely 1 second. DScan already has a cycle delay, so what would be the counter then? probing the whole system every second to see if there's a new K162 and have someone on it to see if someone jumps?
Right now, the target still has a chance of noticing, if they don't pay attention then they can only blame themselves.
As for saving layouts, I don't find any valid argument to not have the functionnality, we can already filter the results, ain't different. Make it so probes travel to your saved formation once you hit scan the first time.

[i]"haiku are easy, But sometimes they don't make sense, Refrigerator."[/i]
Riot Girl
You'll Cowards Don't Even Smoke Crack
#59 - 2012-08-27 10:09:27 UTC
Sin Pew wrote:
Name another module that can launch more than one "ammo" at once

I don't think launching all the ammo at once is the issue, but it seems there is a lack of an auto-repeat option so you only have to press the button once.

Oh god.
Sin Pew
Ministry of War
Amarr Empire
#60 - 2012-08-27 10:24:27 UTC
Riot Girl wrote:
I don't think launching all the ammo at once is the issue, but it seems there is a lack of an auto-repeat option so you only have to press the button once.
Yep, auto-repeat would be acceptable.

[i]"haiku are easy, But sometimes they don't make sense, Refrigerator."[/i]