Are Terrain and Wreck Spawn Points Random?

[Walrus Beard]

So I had this idea of going into creative mode, building scanner rooms all over the map, increasing their range to max, and telling them to scan for wrecks. I figured I could use markers to mark wrecks, go to the lifepod, and then plot a rough course using the compass in my main save. One problem. I thought it worked for one wreck, but when I tried multiple times to find another wreck in this manner, I failed repeatedly. Do some wrecks spawn in the same places while others are randomized? Also, the terrain features immediately surrounding the life pod seem to vary between saves. Maybe the lifepod spawn point is somewhat random? Thoughts appreciated.

Edit: I used that big coral tube that sticks out of the water a bit as a point of reference. The lifepod spawn points do indeed vary. Using that coral tube, I established a common starting point between the saves and found my second wreck. I'm going to build scanner rooms all over the damn map and mark the explored wrecks with markers so that I don't have to be so random in my exploration anymore. Getting tired of that nonsense.

[DeFragged]

No, Wrecks and lifepods always spawn in the same places. Some of their contents change though. Terrain doesn't seem to change either - most landmarks remain the same for me between games.

Your starting lifepod position varies though.

Do note that wrecks don't show up on your scanner until you've entered their 'cell' and they load up.

Edit: Yes, camera drones count towards loading up a cell.

[Arbadacarba]

Originally posted by DeFragged:

No, Wrecks and lifepods always spawn in the same places. Some of their contents change though. Terrain doesn't seem to change either - most landmarks remain the same for me between games.

Your starting lifepod position varies though.

Do note that wrecks don't show up on your scanner until you've entered their 'cell' and they load up.

If im using the station scanner drones, does that count as entering cell?

[Amanoob105]

Originally posted by SuperNeutral:

Originally posted by DeFragged:

No, Wrecks and lifepods always spawn in the same places. Some of their contents change though. Terrain doesn't seem to change either - most landmarks remain the same for me between games.

Your starting lifepod position varies though.

Do note that wrecks don't show up on your scanner until you've entered their 'cell' and they load up.

If im using the station scanner drones, does that count as entering cell?

Yes. I always keep a drone hidden about a hundred plus meters from my base/scanner room.
Load into the game, activate drone, wait for image to load and when I quit the drone the list should be back to normal as if I'd gone for a swim.

Between games the map itself doesn't change nor does the location of wrecks or destroyed lifepods. The start location of yours will be placed randomly in the safe shallows but will always be in the middle area of the map.

The location of large resource deposits is semi-random. Rresource deposits of a certain type will never be found outside of areas they are known to spawn in, but where in the biome, or if multiple types can spawn, what they will be of is random.

E.g. One game I found a tone of large titanium deposits, next game I found the same deposits but this time they where all nickel.