Player Features and Ideas Discussion

With the upcoming changes to exploration I remembered an old thread of mine about a mix between PI and exploration and decided to revive the idea, with some slight modifications.

Basically, it would be a new type of exploration based around finding stuff on the surface of planets using a new type of probe. It would be a type of exploration for those with a lot of patience as it could take hours or days before you get your reward, but wouldn't require much work other than

Also, low-sec would be the best place to explore. 0.0 would simply not contain as many sites as it hasn't really been colonized by the empires nor have the pirate factions lost many bases there. And while there are a lot of people in high sec, most things worth finding would already have been found by the empires or would simply never have been lost at all.

Low-sec on the other hand is where the faction navies and pirate factions fight each other, resulting in a lot more loot to be found as the frontlines changes and things get left behind.



The idea how this would work is that you get close to a planet, open up the PI interface (or something very similar) and choose a location to send down a probe.

If the probe then finds something in its search radius, it will point in the general direction towards the signature, with something like this. Higher skills will result in a more exact pointer. After sending down a few probes you should be able to triangulate an approximate position of the signature. Unless it is on the surface, finding the exact location with just probes should be impossible but it would be possible to get so close that it wouldn't matter.

The next step would be to send down a team of archeologists (or whatever they would be called) to actually find and excavate whatever it is you probed down. Once again you use the PI interface to chose a location to send your team to. Once they have landed, the team will set up a small base and begin searching for your signature. The time it takes to find the site will depend on how close you dropped the team. They will start by exploring around their base and then work outwards, pretty much just a circle slowly expanding from the base camp until it hits the site. There could also be several sizes of archeology teams, the bigger ones being both faster at searching the area and excavating the site once it's found but would require somethig bigger than a cov ops frigate to carry.

Eventually you will hopefully get a message that your team has found what they were looking for and that they have begun excavating. With a few exceptions, it should not be until then that you will know what type of site you have actually found. You will also get an estimate on how long it takes to excavate the whole thing.

During the excavation phase, anything of value that your team finds will be sent to the base camp, where it will be stored until you are ready to pick it up. Eventually you will get a message that they have finished searching, this means that the site is empty and that everything valuable is now in the base camp.


The type of loot you find will depend on the type of site you found and the NPC factions that operate in the area.

The types of sites would be something like these.


Civilian colony. Crappiest of all sites but easy to find and quick to "excavate". Would give you random civilian commodities. Pretty much just 0.0-lowsec colonies where the inhabitants have left, either by themselves or because the bloodraiders or sansha found them.

PI facility. Simply an abadnoned PI facility, containing PI stuff from the planet. Also farily easy to find.

Abandoned outpost. Fairly common site. Will usually contain faction ammo, DUST 514 stuff and will have a small chance of containing a faction frigate BPC.

Crashed ship. Simply a ship that has crashed on the surface. The loot would be something like salvage, normal modules, ammo but also a small chance of containing faction modules.

Underground laboratory. An abandoned lab containing R&D stuff and BPCs. Can contain BPCs for faction items.


There would also be a special "map" item that can be found in almost any site. Finding it will give you the location of another site, either on a planet or in space, that could contain even better loot.

I like it.