Artisan Archive

Ok I've been /bugging the survey mission problems rabidly since my first day of beta. Let me say when I saw the patch notes I was ready to break out the champagne. The first thing I did in game was check out the "fix".

Great! Actual resources listed more than 10 percent of the time! There is something wonky about it like having to click "yes I'll do it" several times for some of them. (cycling through the ones without resources behind the scenes? No matter, better than having to abort 40 of em to get one)

So I get one for radioactives. There is one kind of radioactive on my planet I survey and see that there is a low concentration at the far reach of my survey tool. I head in that direction, you know the drill. I found the concentration and I got no reward just a "survey too close" message. What? You have got to be kidding me.

Now, I can totally see this for those cheesey times where the resource you need is right outside the guild hall. That was lame and always made me think "How busy is this guy he cannot walk outside the **edit** door?" But this wasn't a case of right outside the door. It wasn't even a case of "inside the same city". Considering the type of resource involved I would have had to take a shuttle (or two or three) to find another concentration somewhere else. WHY?! On what planet would that make sense to ignore the one a short ways past the city I'm IN to go on a wild goose chase for some other farther place the resource can be found (assuming there even is another place on the planet?!?) I can not even role play up that logic!

Good lord. If you don't want people making cheeseball easy money to walk outside the guild hall (aka 1300cr survey missions for a generic resource found right there <boggle> then make the payouts actually relate to the work involved! Right now the payouts all have seemed random 150cr for resource X then later 1300cr for resource X.<boggle> Big money for plentiful resources wimpy money for rare resources <bigoleboggle>. Why not make the missions with resources really close pay a really tiny worthless bit and the ones a bit farther pay more etc etc? Or if that is too complex then make it so you cannot get a survey reward inside the city. But outside the city we players should not have to try and guess if we are "too close" or waste our time surveying up a valid mission objective outside the city only to discover it was for nothing. If you do that then we know when we see "you have left Mos Newbieland" we are no longer wasting our time.

Woops no editing heh. I just wanted to clarify I really do not have a problem with the new system for more generic resources. If it just says gas and I have to find it across the planet thats no big deal for the proper payout. Traveling is not the issue. The issue is some resources can only be found in high concentrations in one or two places. If one of those places just happens to be "too close" and you have no clue where "too close" ends what do you do but waste time.

Under the old system, with the right spot and a helpful NPC outside of town, you could clear 50,000 cr an hour or more even with the bugs. That's a little bit over the target income envisioned by the development team.

I'll reserve judgement on the fix until I've actually tested it myself, but my gut reaction from what you've described is that they may have overcompensated. The system should be as lucrative as destroy or delivery missions, and if it's not then they probably need to tighten that exclusion zone.

i'm in mos eisley.. where can i get survey missions?

Did you actually get the pay off?

For the life of me I dont think ther is any way to get the pay.

Dear God this is annoying.

No I didn't get the payout because I'm not willing to run to the farthest point on the map from every city (through the hellish agro missions spawns) to survey a resource that may or may not be there for half the money I'd get taking a shuttle ride. I did TRY to complete the mission but I couldn't get around the zillion mobs and just gave up.

I just did a little experimenting with the new "system".

First of all let me say I agree there was the potential for some serious cheesiness in the old system. In fact I believe I already DID say that. Secondly let me say I agree that whatever the system ends up being it should be as lucrative as destroy missions. On a destroy mission you get not only good cash but also good exp and occassionally even loot. They also geta hand of god neon sign to their objective. Anyway on to the results of my experiments.

I took a rather generic 300ish cr mission. I happened to look on my planetary map and noticed an inactive grey colored waypoint with name like "mission npc blah blah. For a moment I thought hmm ok if this is giving me an idea of how far I need to be away from the npc then perhaps this will be good. I found it disheartening to have a waypoint on a survey mission as the whole point is playing hide and seek but I headed off. The greypoint was about dead center between Mos entha and Bestine. Not a thrilling hike for 300cr but I figured I'd do it just to see how it all worked. About 1/3 of the way I found myself in an impossible mess of red con agro mission spawns. You know those spawns for those combat missions? I tried for several minutes to navigate my way around this mission spawn alley from hell. I finally decided to scrap the mission and try a new one.

I got a new mission. I checked map and the weird waypoint thing was in the exact same spot. Aborted. Waypoint gone. Get a new one waypoint in same place. Ok. I figure the reason this waypoint is odd must be that its just giving me a sort of distance marker? Fine still better than nothing and made me feel better about having a waypoint at all. I get another mission. (I should mention I was in Entha) I figure ok I'll get a mission then take a shuttle to another city and start my search there. Took the shuttle to Bestine and realized that whoops I got a mission for a resource not on the planet. Silly me.

I had things to do in Bestine area like get chased around and incapped left and right by red con agros spawning on my head while I tried to pay my harvesters up. More combat mission spawns All ofcourse a meer stones throw from town, but I digress. Did all my work in Bestine and decided to pick up a survey mission there. Grabbed one for about 500cr. Was gonna pick up a deliver mission too since its 500cr for a delivery mission to entha but I had to beat the clock on the shuttle.

I land in Entha and survey for the resource. Again I see a small concentration on the outside of my tool. I do the drill and find the right concentration. TOO CLOSE! Apparently Mos Entha is too darned close to Bestine. Had I grabbed a boring point me to my NPC delivery mission back in Bestine I'd have 500cr. Apparently survey missions are only doable if you want to travel to the dead center of the map as far away from any city as possible AND have the combat skills to fight your way through the endless agro mission spawns along the way.

Lower the payouts! Make it so you cannot complete a mission in the city itself. FINE! But why should I have to travel 3 times the distance of a combat mission for less money and no exp. And why WOULD I travel on foot through territory way too dangerous for a non combatant for the same payout I could get hopping a shuttle when on the shuttle hop I can double the payoff by grabbing two missions? Bah.