Please adjust Undergroud Fauna spawnrates

[Xytan]

Half of my playtime in this game was spent finding the last animal in a planet which is underground. They're the most hardest to find and I've been at cave by cave where they literally do not spawn or they have the spawn chance as small as a grain of salt. This is literally the hardest thing for me to do in the game because all I want is to get a lot of nanites for my gameplay. The hardest animals to find are the ones that are underground and in a planet where much of the landscape are very tall mountains with barely any flat terrain. These types of planets with underground fauna are so hard to find because caves don't spawn around these mountains, and you'd feel lucky you would find one in a place where there is flat terrain only to waste your time finding that last animal underground and it doesn't even spawn at all. Despite being always active, it just doesn't even spawn, even worse if it's a rare one. In my save, I'm in a planet I've described, I found a large cave looking for an underground animal that's COMMON, and the thing does not even spawn, even with natural resources set to abundant. This game would be more fun if the spawn rates of these fauna were increased because it's so time consuming and frustrating.

[笛野めのん]

Indeed. It happens from time to time in the missions presented in the space station.
Asking HG to improve it would be low priority, even if it did come to their attention.
For example, if a "very difficult" Explorer mission is presented to you, like this one, you should abandon it and get another Space Station Explorer.
Not stressing out is one of the proper ways to play the NMS player. (´･∀･`)

[Geldric™]

There are numerous ways to obtain nanites. 100% planetary fauna is but one.

Giving yourself a challenge is great, provided said challenge does not become burdensome. Based on your tone it would seem this has. There are lots of tips and tricks to finding all fauna(1). A quick forum search can yield a ton of advice.

* Exotic planets almost always have just one fauna, easy 250 nanites.
* Corrupted planets (Dissonance detected) "seem" to have a reduced number of underground fauna... in my experience making them easy to 100%
* By selecting the very first mission in the lower section (non story) of your mission log, as soon as you enter the atmosphere of a planet, you can see the total fauna (along with flora and minerals)
* When more than three (3) Underwater fauna, the last one will usually be at a depth of 40u or more
* The planet summary screen shows your position on the planet to help finding those "found in the" north/south fauna


(1) I've yet to find a planet that I cannot 100% yet. Still looking for someone to post one.

Edit: Oh and you're not alone: https://steamcommunity.com/app/275850/discussions/2/3811782656724978573/

[Jaggid Edje]

It is perfectly okay, if you are frustrated, to NOT scan 100% of the fauna on a planet. THere are trillions and trillions and trillions and trillions of planets in NMS, you will not scan all of them to 100%. So don't get hung up on a single one of them if it is frustrating to you.

We see this request a lot, but the actual truth is that 'increasing the spawn rate" won't actually help. There's a lot more to why you are having difficulty finding that last underground creature than just the spawn rate. We know this because there are mods that DO increase the spawn rate, and the rare underground creatures are still elusive.

The solution is more about the specific requirements for them to spawn, than the actual probability of them spawning. i.e. google this problem and actually read, understand, and follow the advice given by other players on how to track those critters down. It does work.

[Xytan]

Originally posted by 笛野めのん:

Indeed. It happens from time to time in the missions presented in the space station.
Asking HG to improve it would be low priority, even if it did come to their attention.
For example, if a "very difficult" Explorer mission is presented to you, like this one, you should abandon it and get another Space Station Explorer.
Not stressing out is one of the proper ways to play the NMS player. (´･∀･`)

I don't touch the explorer missions, since they're definitely going to give me a harder time getting underground fauna. I'm someone who's a completionist in the game and I like all the planets in a system mapped. The only time I would consider a planet perfected is when all fauna are scanned. I don't mind the flora and minerals because I think they're way harder to find than fauna ime. Maybe after that horrific surveying in a mountainous glacial planet, I might fight myself into not being a completionist in this game and just say "it is what it is" because man, I'm stressed out.

[Xytan]

Originally posted by Geldric:

There are numerous ways to obtain nanites. 100% planetary fauna is but one.

Giving yourself a challenge is great, provided said challenge does not become burdensome. Based on your tone it would seem this has. There are lots of tips and tricks to finding all fauna(1). A quick forum search can yield a ton of advice.

* Exotic planets almost always have just one fauna, easy 250 nanites.
* Corrupted planets (Dissonance detected) "seem" to have a reduced number of underground fauna... in my experience making them easy to 100%
* By selecting the very first mission in the lower section (non story) of your mission log, as soon as you enter the atmosphere of a planet, you can see the total fauna (along with flora and minerals)
* When more than three (3) Underwater fauna, the last one will usually be at a depth of 40u or more
* The planet summary screen shows your position on the planet to help finding those "found in the" north/south fauna


(1) I've yet to find a planet that I cannot 100% yet. Still looking for someone to post one.

Edit: Oh and you're not alone: https://steamcommunity.com/app/275850/discussions/2/3811782656724978573/

I've found exotic planets, corrupted planets, and ime they don't really have any fauna or just one although they don't give out the biggest nanite payment to my space wallet. I've already found the last lil fella and it took me so much time walking back and forth in that cave. I'm glad someone is also suggesting this issue because it's problematic for people like me.

[Jaggid Edje]

FOr my own sanity, I follow a general rule. If I have spent more than 30 minutes to an hour on a planet and STILL haven't found all of the fauna, I move on.

I do agree with @geldric that there is no planet where you cannot get 100% scanned. But I also value my own happiness. To me it is NOT worth the frustration of hunting down that one underground creature that is playing hide-and-seek if it takes more time than I have allotted.

[Xytan]

Originally posted by Jaggid Edje:

It is perfectly okay, if you are frustrated, to NOT scan 100% of the fauna on a planet. THere are trillions and trillions and trillions and trillions of planets in NMS, you will not scan all of them to 100%. So don't get hung up on a single one of them if it is frustrating to you.

We see this request a lot, but the actual truth is that 'increasing the spawn rate" won't actually help. There's a lot more to why you are having difficulty finding that last underground creature than just the spawn rate. We know this because there are mods that DO increase the spawn rate, and the rare underground creatures are still elusive.

The solution is more about the specific requirements for them to spawn, than the actual probability of them spawning. i.e. google this problem and actually read, understand, and follow the advice given by other players on how to track those critters down. It does work.

Yeah I just did this a while ago, it's not guaranteed, a bit tedious although it does kinda help. Thank god I've found the last one, now I can just leave the system and use the space station to find cool ships to buy and S-tier upgrades to get. I might have to take a break from all the exploring, this was so rough

[Xytan]

Originally posted by Jaggid Edje:

FOr my own sanity, I follow a general rule. If I have spent more than 30 minutes to an hour on a planet and STILL haven't found all of the fauna, I move on.

I do agree with @geldric that there is no planet where you cannot get 100% scanned. But I also value my own happiness. To me it is NOT worth the frustration of hunting down that one underground creature that is playing hide-and-seek if it takes more time than I have allotted.

I'm gonna have to adjust my playstyle in this game, since I don't got much time these days, so I gotta struggle not to 100% a planet, but the nanite reward is just too good to be left ignored. Still, I just hope they consider making the spawnrates a bit more higher for people who want to explore a lot.

[Bored Peon]

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2843478049

[momopovich]

Originally posted by Xyt:

the nanite reward is just too good to be left ignored.

This is possibly one of the worst ways to get nanites in nms.

Ship scrapping, sentinel farming or (fastest but mega boring) curious deposit farming are what you are looking for

[Guyver8]

if you're not averse to using mods, on the page linked below you will find 5 versions of the mod 'MoreCaveCreatures' these set the spawn rate for underground creature to 3%, 5%, 10%, 20% or 50%.
https://github.com/MetaIdea/nms-amumss-lua-mod-script-collection/tree/main/Babscoole/courtycat%20MODs
select the one you want (i found the 5% one to be sporting), click the 'Raw' button to view the lua without html formating, save the page as a .Lua file.
you'll need to 'compile' the .lua file using the AMUMMS tool to create the mod .pak file to add to your PCBANKS\MODS folder (and remove/rename the disablemods.txt file in the PCBANKS folder)

[UncreativelyNamed]

I guess I'm more of a "completionist" than OP because I must find not only the fauna but also the plants and minerals. That's hard, with the minerals being the hardest, IMO. The animals are extremely easy, by comparison, especially since the game tells you where they are. I don't do it for the nanites because there are much easier ways to get those if you want them, but just because I want to find them all. This is part of the reason why I will spend tens of hours exploring a single planet. Which I'm sure most would find boring, but to me, it's fun.

Anyway, I get the frustration, OP. I can tell you that the most consistent way I've found of finding underground creatures, rare or otherwise, is to seek out points of interest. Any points of interest. They generate in a grid so once you find one, if you follow any of the cardinal directions from it (North and south are easiest since they're marked on your compass), you will consistently find them a few thousand units apart (Less if you're on a moon, since moons are smaller). They usually have caves near them because their generation flattens the terrain around them, but the important thing is that, because of the flattening, some parts of the terrain that the game "sees" as underground are actually above ground, and you'll have a much easier time finding that elusive last critter at POIs than you will tromping around in the depths of caves.

[Grimmslayer73]

I used to think the underground tag was BS but recently I realized that they sometimes warp to the surface. So when you're deep inside a cave looking for the underground fauna, be sure and look up for the red dots. You can also find them on the surface having been no where near a cave because there is probably a cave under your position.

[Jaggid Edje]

Originally posted by Grimmslayer73:

I used to think the underground tag was BS but recently I realized that they sometimes warp to the surface. So when you're deep inside a cave looking for the underground fauna, be sure and look up for the red dots. You can also find them on the surface having been no where near a cave because there is probably a cave under your position.

Yep, I feel like that happens at least 1/3 of the time when I'm in a cave looking for that last underground critter that I need. Since I realized that, I have a LOT less issue finding them, probably because I didn't used to look up. LOL

[Xytan]

Originally posted by Bored Peon:

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2843478049

This guide is really helpful, thank you. I didn't know the type of multi-tool affects the scan values, so those underground fauna was way more harder to find because I'm using a rifle that has low scan stats, but I thought it just looks cool. Hopefully it makes my scanning easier using a pistol with 3 s-class upgrades, since I haven't found this type of multi-tool yet. Thanks all for the helpful tips. Still hoping HG would do something about the spawnrates in the future.