EVE New Citizens Q&A

Your filters are screwed up and you haven't learned the quick keys yet. I refuse to post instructions here because they are all over the internet already. Don't whine, learn.


...and yes it should only take minutes to mark out a system.

I highly recommend using 7 probes.

Use 5 probes in a plus (+) sign, with 1 probe in the center. Then launch 1 probe to go up (z-axis) and 1 probe to go down. This means you're covering the plus sign, as well as the 3D areas.

Remember to use alt and shift key. I find these 2 buttons make life SIMPLE.

Mate, you do something to fix it. Thousands of people use it fine, you just aren't very good at it yet. Get back on your bike and learn to ride, then you can discuss the mechanics of bicycle design.

EDIT : I have basic scan skills and use 6 probes. I have never been unable to scan down a sig since learning how so i know its not so skill intensive as some make out.

Ask anyone that's lived in a wormhole, it's entirely possible to scan an entire solar system in a matter of minutes. You'll find that scanning takes a combination of both real world and virtual skills, and practice is an important part of gaining the real world skills.

Knowledge and research are your friends, there's multiple websites out there that provide information on the shortcuts to determining the signature type via their initial strength. http://wiki.eveonline.com/en/wiki/Base_Signature_Strength is a good place to start.

Normally I would lock this for ranting, but you're getting some good help and responses despite that, so I'll leave it open as long as it stays that way, and only do some light editing of OP.

Some extra tips to make the UI work for you:

• Hold Shift and drag one probe to move all probes at once, keeping their "formation" intact.
• Hold Shift and drag the scan radius of one probe to scale the scan radii of all probes at once.
• Hold Alt and drag one probe to scale the position of all probes around their central point.

Using these three shortcuts, you can easily progressively narrow down single signatures.

Ed: Make sure your scan filters are also set up correctly. By default, everything is shown while it is an "unknown" signature. The filters only get applied when you narrow it down enough to put a type to it. If that type is not within your filters, the signature will just "disappear" when you narrow it down.

Check my exploration tutorial, click the link in my sig.



p.s. stop acting like a clown.

Even if he start to use 10 probes it will not change to much.Most of my isk making if not all is over probing ,and up to this day I didnt find one reason why you should use more then five probes.You dont even need five ,four is enough to scan strong signals with decent skills.Point is he have problem understanding how things works,so with more probes he will not solve any if he dont understands basic concept about probing.




It worked fine for big majority of players in EVE so problems is in you.Maybe now CCP need to change this mechanic so you can use zero effort and earn tons of isk and say how you are space rich.

Scanning is fine it is just asking for bit of reading and that is all.Few days ago I was talking with one week new pilot,and he/she used tutorial that one of posters said above (Vilnius Zar ),and he/she didnt had any problems.

Raging on forums cause you are lazy will not help,and scanning is that way cause it is really strong tool,you dont use probes only in pve ,so making it trivial will just be wrong.

Also one thing more ,regarding skills.You dont need all skills maxed or to be freaking great,what you need is just to have five probes and that is about it.For start that is more than enough cause you will use ships with scan bonus (Heron,Imicus etc).

Just read and ask players in help chat they will help you ,dont come to forum asking for something to be fixed what works just fine.No one likes drama queens.Also some players learn something faster and some slower.that is why we have so many things in EVE,so if you find something annoying for you dont do it.

After reading your post it seems its this problem, if u filter out any of the spesific Sites in the scanning option, it will vanish when the site is recognised. I did exactly that myself when i started my very first exploration trips, thinking i could filter out everything but the radar sites and i couldnt understand why 99% of the scans vanished lol.

And as for the skills, you dont need a gazillion probes or 4-5 in astrometrics to scan down almost any site(it will be easier however), at least not in hi and low sec, except maybe the 5 and 6/10 sites. Once i figured out the filter issue i scanned with lvl 3 skills and 5 probes for a long time with no problems whatsoever, if ur not using a scanning frig, i used a rupture with only 1 scan rig and skills at lvl 3. When you get better at scanning and you cannot scan down a site its most likely too hard for you to do anyway.

Just saying because some advices here may seem like you "cant" do exploration unless u have astrometrics and the other scanning skills at 4+


Personally i prioritized getting a T2 cloak on my rupture for low sec, because i got fed up by the T3 cruisers nabbing everything in hi sec :P

I suspect the issue is you are only thinking about it in 2 dimensions. This was my issue when I first started scanning.

Be sure to flip the solar system so you are looking at the plain, then adjust the height of the drones above and below the plain.



So.. to scan effectively.

Have skills to use at least 5 probes, and have the other skills that increase probe signal strength trained.

Open the map, select solar system map, use left click to ensure you are looking at it from directly above/below.

Launch 5 probes. Open scanner window. Select all probes in the scanning window. Adjust the scan range to like 32au.

One by one, drag the probes out from the stack, one in each direction, about 2/3rds of the center probe's range to get a good overlap. Then hold shift while moving all 5 probes to cover most, all of the solar system's planets.

Drag the map so that you are looking at it on edge. Hold shift and drag the probes up/down to be on the plain. Drag the map back so you are looking from above again.

Scan. Pick one of the sigs to try to narrow down. Drop the scan range to like 8au. hold ALT while dragging one of the probes into about 2/3rds of the center probe's range. All 4 of the outer probes will move in at one time. Remember that you can zoom in/out, and right-click-drag recenters on all 3 plains.

Hold Shift while moving one of the probes. All 5 will move at once. Drag them directly over the sig. Drag the map vew so you are again looking at it from the edge. Drag the probes up/down to be over the sig. Scan again.

If you have a ring, adjust the location of all 5 using shift/drag to cover the ring. if you get 2 dots again, adjust the location of the probes... on the plane or above/below.

Once you get it back to a single dot, shrink the scan range again, alt-drag the probes in toward the center with a good overlap. shift drag on the plane and above/below the place as needed to have the dot be in the center of the probes.


Repeat shrinking the range, alt drage the probes in, shift-drage to move the probes in all 3 dimensions.

If you can't get it to 100%, better skills and better launcher/probes/ship with bonuses.


I can now scan down very hard locations within a couple minutes.

Hint: Use alt and shift.