Wormholes

You need to stop posting this crap.

I've been fighting making this post, but I just can't take it anymore. I really really want probing to go back to the original system. The one were you had to carry all the different types of probes for different outcomes. The system where probes were consumable and once launched were never to return. That glorious system that only a few folks could wrap their brains around. The one where most of you nit wits would be totally lost.

I really miss those days. A good prober was way more valuable than a good scout.

I did an experiment the other day, and my dog (golden retriever, so I'll give you she has above average intelligence for a dog) was able to scan down a HS static. I would ask her questions like 'up or down' and 'bigger or smaller' for probe movements. If she wagged her tail I did the former and if she put a paw up I did the latter. She got the hs. I gave her some kibbles and thanked her for the help. Not sure she understood, but it seemed to make us both happy. She accomplished this miraculous feat between putting a pizza in the oven and taking it out.

This whole 'problem' boils down to splitting hairs between one easy mode and another easy mode. Fozzie, put scanning back to the original way for a month. Then put it back to how it is now. I assure you, the nit wit masses will no longer see any issues with scanning.

Double Dog Dare Fozzie.... Double Dog Dare.

You had to use d-scan (both range and directional) to get a rough guess where stuff was. You launched a probe of the appropriate range (you had 3 choices - longer range had less strength and shorter range had more strength) in your best guess direction. Probe range was kind of like flight time and how far the probe could see in all directions if I recall correctly.

You got some 'fuzzy' hits from the probe that you could warp to. You warped to the hit (which was not the actual thing you were after, but it was closer to it) and did the d-scan range and direction all over again. This time you were closer and could use a shorter range/larger strength probe. Shoot another probe and get a more clear response.

If you were not good at d-scan you were no good at probing.

There were other tricks to use. If a guy was using hammerheads in a site you could swap to garvimentric probes and get a much clearer picture (warp in) very quickly. Deployed drone race corresponed to probe type (racial - just like the ECM skittles) for this shortcut/trick. You probed a guys drones, not his ship.

Mostly it took d-scan skill and some 'spatial instinct' (my made up term) to be efficient at it.

You know the guys that can pick a tengu running an anom out of a gaggle of 20 anoms without probes in 30 seconds? He's the guy that could probe like a boss back in the day.

You know all the guys that take 30 min to find that tengu using d-scan? They were the guys that let other guys probe stuff out for them back in the day.

Does that mean what we call signatures today were previously visible on dscan? Or did you have to launch a long-range probe to see what was in system to begin your guessing?

The triangulation method that we have now does seem more intuitive since we have the easy real-world examples of cell phone tracking and GPS. But then, I've never liked the mechanic of chasing the rabbit which is the only thing other games seem to know how to use.

The scanner changes in Odyssey were definitely going way too far, though. I can put up with an eventual, non-instantaneous listing of signatures in the scanner window, but the more I really stop and think about it, the less I like that it shows you the approximate position in space before you even scan. It does make it easier and faster to scan, but it also takes away a little bit of the feeling of accomplishment as you improve your scanning times.

But the flip side of that is, after thousands or tens of thousands of signatures scanned, are you still being rewarded with that feeling of accomplishment, or do you want to get the scanning done so you can get to your target or continue the hunt?


What other methods could be used to introduce, or re-introduce, more player skill in the scanning process without simply adding tedium?

Combat scanning is still wonderful, but CCP seems to be doing their best to kill reasons to even visit cosmic signatures in W-space.

You keep coming up with all this moronic ideas. What bugs me is that I can't figure out if you are trolling or if you just are a little bit r3tarded.

I'll gladly give you a Fido (Slaver) for a Fedo.

Also OP no. Just....no.

Signatures have changed a lot over time also. Exploration wasn't a 'profession'. Folks used to make a safespot in a large system off of d'scan and were able to just leave ships floating at the safe until they needed them. Deep safes (over 200au from any celestial) used to be common hangouts for pirates. No d-scan triangulation to get an aiming point for your probes.

Grav/ladar/mag/radar sites didn't exist in the forms they are today - though knowing a bit of probing history reveals why they were called ladar/grav and so on. of course now I think they are dumbed down to gas/relic/data/ore since there are no racial probe types anymore and no need to connect a given site with a given racial sensor type.

There is no going back. I guess I would just like to stop the 'dumbing down' of the game. I get the need for subscriptions, but I don't get the pandering (yeah that's kind of funny) to all of the whining about eve being 'too hard' and this or that 'needs fixed'.

One of the reasons I liked eve in the past is that it was a difficult game to play and not everyone could. It kept out the 'come at me bro' types and all the easy mode folks.

There is also the stubborness of CCP. They make a lot of changes to the game. Guess what (apply sunglasses - blinding flash of the obvious incoming) not all of them are good. When CCP puts NOT GOOD changes in the game it would be nice to see them be a bit more grown up and just pull them back out.

My example (even though it has zero effect on my play style) is drone assist. A great concept. Emergent game play made it a bad mechanic for both game play and server hardware. CCP is too stubborn to just get rid of it. The current 'fix' is to limit the number of assigned drones. Man up, admit it didn't work out and pull it. It's not that difficult. The game was playable before drone assist and it would be playable again without it.

My point with that rant is: they will tweek the overlay piece of crap for a decade to improve it (think a big shiny poop), but they will not pull it. They will pander to the pandas if they think it will improve the bottom line. If that means dumbing something down, then they will. We just have to adapt.

Watch what you whine about you may get what you ask for.

Exit from Wormspace is that way -> Please use it

+1


I'm also starting to lean towards the idea of making wormhole signatures scannable from boths sides immediately after they spawn, not just one side, and be done with it.

Cant you just refer to him as "that old bastard" like the rest of us?