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Pre-defined Probe Formations
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Brooks Puuntai
Solar Nexus.
#21 - 2012-08-26 11:34:45 UTC
Serena Serene wrote:


I'd instead like to see a way to avoid accidentally clicking on some celestial names instead of the probe when attempting to move it around.. without having to aim for that single right pixel.
(if there is already, please, for the love of god, tell me how!)


If you don't care to know where things are you can hide the icons in the "Solar System Map"

CCP's Motto: If it isn't broken, break it. If it is broken, ignore it. Improving NPE / Dynamic New Eden
Rhea Rankin Nolen
Science and Trade Institute
Caldari State
#22 - 2012-08-26 11:35:45 UTC
Haxxi wrote:
Rhea Rankin Nolen wrote:
GREAT IDEA!!! Even better to just launch probes and just hit 'scan' button to scan down things! I mean, why do we need to pinpoint those pesky sigs manually every single time? It's just a waste of time.. LOL

Also when you scan down pilots, it would give them less time to spot the probes on the d scan, with predefined..so hippy hip hooray for predefined probe formations! Big smile


Why do i get the feeling that really no one here reads what i'm saying -.- You can make it exactly the same time. As i said you can launch the probes and then they move into formation which could take 5 or 10 seconds if you want. They would be on d-scan exactly the same time. And you still need to scan to find the sig, move probes to the sig, adjust range and so on. It's only the step i linked in the picture.

Next time please read the text before answering. But thanks for trying ....


You're welcome. However there is one more thing.

You never place probes in the EXACT same order as before. So it's up to every pilot how he will place probes. Will he be careful and patient every time when positioning probes, or will he just be sloppy about it and get worst results than the careful one?

Predefined probe formations would require effort just that one time, before the save.
Haxxi
Ministry of War
Amarr Empire
#23 - 2012-08-26 11:38:41 UTC  |  Edited by: Haxxi
Serena Serene wrote:

I understood what you meant. But whether you make the formation you saved appear instantly upon clicking "load formation" or selecting it from a dropdown or whatever.. or whether you make it last 5 seconds.. it'll still make the difference between people who can arrange them in to their formation quickly and those who can't go away.


I just think the current probe launching is a pure clickfest that needs no brain. You have to press the probe launcher 7 or 8 times and wait until each cycle is done, then drag*drop all probes where you want them to get the formation, size them and so on. If you check a full constellation for explo sites for example you will hate probes and when you jump into a system you think "oh no not again that clickfest". If you want make the probes take 30 seconds to get into formation vOv in the meanwhile i could have some chat or answer mails or do some other stuff.

And it shouldn't be mandatory, so if someone thinks he's faster manually he still can do it. See it like the autopilot. You can jump the route manually but you also can use the autopilot. It may take a bit more time but you can do other stuff in the meanwhile and you dont have to make the same monotone clicks again and again.


Rhea Rankin Nolen wrote:

You never place probes in the EXACT same order as before. So it's up to every pilot how he will place probes. Will he be careful and patient every time when positioning probes, or will he just be sloppy about it and get worst results than the careful one?
.


Come on .... it's not a complex scientific field where you need a diploma. And yes i always put them in the same way as before. It may differ by a millimeter but that makes no difference for the process of scanning
Serena Serene
Heretic University
#24 - 2012-08-26 11:47:45 UTC
Haxxi wrote:

[...]
I just think the current probe launching is a pure clickfest that needs no brain. You have to press the probe launcher 7 or 8 times and wait until each cycle is done, then drag*drop all probes where you want them to get the formation, size them and so on. If you check a full constellation for explo sites for example you will hate probes and when you jump into a system you think "oh no not again that clickfest". If you want make the probes take 30 seconds to get into formation vOv in the meanwhile i could have some chat or answer mails or do some other stuff.

And it shouldn't be mandatory, so if someone thinks he's faster manually he still can do it. See it like the autopilot. You can jump the route manually but you also can use the autopilot. It may take a bit more time but you can do other stuff in the meanwhile and you dont have to make the same monotone clicks again and again.
[...]


Agreed on the "pressing probe launcher 6, 7, 8 times" .. That's pretty annoying and doesn't do anything for anyone.

And if you have probes on "load formation" need 20-30 seconds to assume the formation centered around your ship, or the first dropped probe or so: That'd be fine with me, too.
Then you'd still do it manually if speed matters, it'd still be an advantage to be good at it, but if speed doesn't matter you avoid the tedium.
Scatim Helicon
State War Academy
Caldari State
#25 - 2012-08-26 11:49:11 UTC
Presumably the people opposing this are also opposed to saved fittings, and think that every time a player undocks they should have to refit their ship from scratch?

Forcing players to participate in a tedious clickfest to replicate the activity they carried out 10 minutes ago doesn't add skill, or depth, or complexity, its just user-unfriendliness for the sake of user-unfriendliness and bad game design.

Every time you post a WiS thread, Hilmar strangles a kitten.
Marcus Harikari
#26 - 2012-08-26 11:55:20 UTC
I've contemplated this idea before. Great idea, probing is annoying as hell, and I use the same probe configuration every freakin time.
Vera Algaert
Republic University
Minmatar Republic
#27 - 2012-08-26 11:55:53 UTC
Haxxi wrote:
Would it be possible to give us pre-defined probe formations?

Like i launch my probes, put them in a formation and then press a save button and the next time i launch probes i can choose the formation without having to move the probes around. It's just a waste of time to do it each time, especially when you scan systems for explo sites or whatever.

I wonder how you got that idea Twisted

.
Borlag Crendraven
The Scope
Gallente Federation
#28 - 2012-08-26 11:57:38 UTC
20-30 seconds until the probes are in formation can easily mean that your target sees your probes way before he's supposed to. Also when thinking about the actual formation, and the possible problems you might get with it such as probes set to be in a specific formation around a gate or wormhole to uncloak boats easier, it could really end up causing more problems than it fixes. Sure the world map doesn't allow such presicion for probe formations, but what's there to stop a player in flying around a gate/hole and dropping probes in convenient locations and then saving that as a formation.

If anything, I'd welcome an option of having the probe launcher launch a set amount of probes on demand rather than having that clickfest. The positioning and formation part of probing is just fine currently.
StudleyManiac
Enigma Expanse
ENIGMA DOMAIN ALLIANCE
#29 - 2012-08-26 12:01:51 UTC
Riot Girl wrote:
I don't think it's a bad idea. He's only asking for a more user friendly feature for the UI, not for the sites to be nerfed. Since when has it been a bad thing to create a more user-friendly interface?


Your asking the developers who in their infinite wisdom decided that the new inventory UI was user-friendly?
Vera Algaert
Republic University
Minmatar Republic
#30 - 2012-08-26 12:17:17 UTC  |  Edited by: Vera Algaert
Borlag Crendraven wrote:
20-30 seconds until the probes are in formation can easily mean that your target sees your probes way before he's supposed to.

A good prober will always launch probes outside dscan range, move them way above/below the solar system plane, assemble his formation, narrow down the location of the target with dscan & F11 map and then drag the probes in for one scan that will get him the 100% hit.

Borlag Crendraven wrote:
Also when thinking about the actual formation, and the possible problems you might get with it such as probes set to be in a specific formation around a gate or wormhole to uncloak boats easier, it could really end up causing more problems than it fixes.

that's a real problem - but not something entirely new.
There is a well-known python injection script that allows for stored probe formations (and also had the alt-drag functionality long before CCP implemented it). One of its uses is to grab the location of an enemy ship as it drops gatecloak and instantly send an array of (deep space) probes to these coordinates to uncloak the ship.

.
Haxxi
Ministry of War
Amarr Empire
#31 - 2012-08-26 12:29:21 UTC
Also i said earlier that it's not mandatory. The old way would work too (launching probes manually). It's like the auto pilot, you can jump gates manually or via autopilot. Same for probe formations.
Lin-Young Borovskova
Doomheim
#32 - 2012-08-26 12:35:02 UTC  |  Edited by: Lin-Young Borovskova
Brooks Puuntai wrote:
The current system is already 100x easier then the old one. Having preformed locations would dumb down a already simple system. Might as well just remove probing and just click scan and get sites..



Just because this became easier doesn't mean it can't get better.

brb
Borlag Crendraven
The Scope
Gallente Federation
#33 - 2012-08-26 12:35:14 UTC
Vera Algaert wrote:
Borlag Crendraven wrote:
20-30 seconds until the probes are in formation can easily mean that your target sees your probes way before he's supposed to.

A good prober will always launch drones outside dscan range, move them way above/below the solar system plane, assemble his formation, narrow down the location of the target with dscan & F11 map and then drag the probes in for one scan that will get him the 100% hit.


You can't always launch them outside range, mainly in systems that aren't big enough to do so. Sure you can move them out of range as soon as they're launched, which should be what every sensible pilot does anyway.
Disdaine
#34 - 2012-08-26 12:37:29 UTC
INB4 people using ProbeHelper injection with predefined probe layouts defending their advantage.

Oops.
Selinate
#35 - 2012-08-26 12:44:51 UTC
You mean to suggest removing a key feature of the game that serves no other purpose except to annoy us with a click fest and waste our time manually moving probes??? That would be removing a key time-wasting, annoyance-inducing feature. I mean, think if they bothered to remove something like... oh say... learning skills.

EE GAD. The horror.

Oh wait...
Anubis Star
Federal Navy Academy
Gallente Federation
#36 - 2012-08-26 12:51:39 UTC
Great Idea, If it's a save your own formations and nothing pre-definded by default
Serena Serene
Heretic University
#37 - 2012-08-26 13:49:14 UTC
Borlag Crendraven wrote:
20-30 seconds until the probes are in formation can easily mean that your target sees your probes way before he's supposed to. Also when thinking about the actual formation, and the possible problems you might get with it such as probes set to be in a specific formation around a gate or wormhole to uncloak boats easier, it could really end up causing more problems than it fixes. Sure the world map doesn't allow such presicion for probe formations, but what's there to stop a player in flying around a gate/hole and dropping probes in convenient locations and then saving that as a formation.

If anything, I'd welcome an option of having the probe launcher launch a set amount of probes on demand rather than having that clickfest. The positioning and formation part of probing is just fine currently.


As was said before, you'd still be able to do it manually, too, which would be advisable if the goal is to be quick. The saved formations would then mainly be used by people scanning for cosmic signature stuff, as convenience feature.

About the formation .. I imagined the formation being saved relative to your ship, not in absolute positions in a system.
You couldn't save a formation "probe 1 at this point in system x, probe 2 at that point" and so on, but only how the probes are positioned relative to each other. When loading a formation, the probes would, for example, arrange themselves with your ship at the center of the formation, before you then had to move the probe-cluster to wherever you want it to be.
YuuKnow
The Scope
#38 - 2012-08-26 14:10:15 UTC
Except that it makes it too easy for amateurs. Perhaps if the formation was saved by the user on an individual basis.

yk
Serena Serene
Heretic University
#39 - 2012-08-26 14:24:58 UTC
YuuKnow wrote:
Except that it makes it too easy for amateurs. Perhaps if the formation was saved by the user on an individual basis.

yk


That's exactly how I understood the idea: you can, for yourself, save a formation of probes you yourself set up before.
Selinate
#40 - 2012-08-26 14:39:54 UTC
Serena Serene wrote:


That's exactly how I understood the idea: you can, for yourself, save a formation of probes you yourself set up before.


I wouldn't be opposed to this, but there has to be some way to position probes without clicking and dragging. Something to allow us to easily experiment with other geometries would be nice. I still wouldn't mind a coordinate system where I could type in coordinates relative to some origin and have it retain that shape.

Also, some way to move a probe to a cluster of other probes is needed BADLY. I hate trying to scan down a site and realize that the signal is too weak and that I need another probe, but moving it with clicking and dragging is terrible for this.