Why upgrade a scanner?

[onomastikon]

The difference between a level 1 and a level 10 are tiny fractions of decimals in increased distance ... If the level 1 scanner gives me +10 to an attribute and the level 10 doesn't, is there ever a point in upgrading?

[dna]

No. But since you will loot hundreds of scanners during the game, you will get a better one at some point.
(Also note that there are 3 different kind of scanner. Increased ressource, loot or enemy detection range.)

[Johnny Hazard]

I think you will quickly understand why. Stats increase with level. A level 12 firepower bonus is MUCH greater than a lvl4, So keep changing your scanner to one with better stats where you need them.
Firepower for raw damage
Utility for device damage and cooldown
Precision for more criticals (and using perks that take advantage of this)
Expertise for whatever your ship does best.
Resistance and Integrity to make your ship tougher.

Also, some scanners come with extra abilities like tag mines.
My favorite scanner is the observer for extra loot range detection.

[rasabt]

none of this matters during the leveling process
equip what you find (around your level range)
craft for catalysts, aka mining laser + mining catalyst (you will need lots of rare ores to unlock the best ship tier possible) and save your cash
(perhaps buy a normal t3 ship, but save for the 1mil models).

[Pappy]

A couple hundred meters could be the difference between that loot popping up on the hud and not. If you don't mind having to spend more time searching for loot I guess it doesn't matter, but most people would rather see as much on the hud as possible.

[onomastikon]

Originally posted by Pappy:

A couple hundred meters could be the difference between that loot popping up on the hud and not. If you don't mind having to spend more time searching for loot I guess it doesn't matter, but most people would rather see as much on the hud as possible.

Yes certainly, so would I. But the differences I have seen so far are insignificant.
I currently have a level 3 sensor which I only bothered to equip because it offers 8 firepower (which is itself a seemingly insignificant bonus). It offers 5.2km ship, 1.6km loot, and 0.74km resource ranges.
The level 5 ones (plural) in the shop are identical to each other (yey), and offer 5.2km ship, 1.6km loot, and 0.74km resources (with a little tiny +0.01 km on the green mouseover). The differences between the level 3 and 5 are what I would call insignificant.

[Suzaku]

Upgrades are upgrades. I wouldn't spend credits on a .1km increase, but if a scanner drops that's better, no reason not to equip it.

[Pappy]

Originally posted by onomastikon:

Originally posted by Pappy:

A couple hundred meters could be the difference between that loot popping up on the hud and not. If you don't mind having to spend more time searching for loot I guess it doesn't matter, but most people would rather see as much on the hud as possible.

Yes certainly, so would I. But the differences I have seen so far are insignificant.
I currently have a level 3 sensor which I only bothered to equip because it offers 8 firepower (which is itself a seemingly insignificant bonus). It offers 5.2km ship, 1.6km loot, and 0.74km resource ranges.
The level 5 ones (plural) in the shop are identical to each other (yey), and offer 5.2km ship, 1.6km loot, and 0.74km resources (with a little tiny +0.01 km on the green mouseover). The differences between the level 3 and 5 are what I would call insignificant.

I think I have purchased maybe 2 or 3 items from the shop in my current play through (lvl 29 now). The shop is not where you get upgrades.

[Jamma]

Yes, most of the stuff is loot. But there's a gem here and there in a shop though. I remember in my first playthrough I came across a nice nano plating at the scrapyard shop pretty early in the game.

I also tend to not care much about the scanner - it doesn't really matter if it's 5 levels below and I won't exchange it if it has the right stats to it.

[Duneman]

There isn't a reason to upgrade beyond the ones you loot freely. At higher rarities you'll get multiple effects randomly rolled on to the item, as well as specialty scanners. E.g. the Peruser helps you find Resource nodes while the Observer helps you hunt for Loot.

[onomastikon]

Thanks for the replies.
And yes, of course looting, finding -- not buying.
My main question was more along the lines of:
- Most other components seem to have noticible upgrades in power or scale or utility or what have you. The scanners seem to be utterly lacking. It just seems to be some sort of mishap, as if the developers had forgotten a decimal place when creating the algorithm for computing scanner stats.

[Rithrin]

I guess it all depends on point of view. The Sensors are not a combat item, so they don't have ever-increasing enemy armor/shields/damage numbers to consider when scaling. The areas in the game remain the same size and engagement ranges stay the same across the course of play. From level 1 to level 30, a standard Sensor detection range goes from 5km to 7km ship detection range, and slightly less for items and resources. That's several seconds of travel time even in cruise mode, so it's a pretty sizable bonus overall.

The flip side of that is that each level's bonus looks very small because it's measured in km. If they measured in just meters so you saw more zeroes, it might feel better. But also, since each level is only so large, if they did increase the bonus much more (by moving a decimal point, as mentioned above) then you'd quickly have a Sensor at level 30 that essentially scanned the entire map once you spawned in.