Science ship won't excavate?

[Ithuriel]

I found an archaeological dig named "Moon Bump" which I can't seem to excavate, and I'm rather confused. I can right click on the planet/system with a science ship selected and pick the "Excavate Site" option. However, when the science ship actually gets there it just goes into idle orbit of the planet, doing nothing. I've tried selecting a scientist to do the excavation from the archaeological dig window itself, but when I do so nothing happens. Any idea what's going on?

[Nightmyre]

Are you sure you have the system occupied? You need to own the system in order to excavate.

It's one of the only complaints I have with this expansion. You often only get to explore 2, maybe 3 relic sites all game, since the rest are just explored by the AI in their controlled systems.

Compared to Distant Stars, which introduced tons of events that you can participate in throughout the game, Ancient Relics seems to be missing just a bit.

They do introduce relic sites as the game progresses; perhaps that should happen more often throughout the game - systems that you own randomly trigger a relic site spawn, perhaps.

[Ithuriel]

If I don't own the system, I couldn't give the excavate order either though, right? I can click the button to order the ship to excavate, it travels to the planet, then nothing happens.

[Meewec]

Originally posted by Ithuriel:

If I don't own the system, I couldn't give the excavate order either though, right? I can click the button to order the ship to excavate, it travels to the planet, then nothing happens.

is nothing happening or is it just taking a long time? there should be rolls happening every 90 days or so to determine the outcome and you might just be getting unlucky

[Wealthy Aardvark]

Are you on 2.3.1 or the 2.3.2 beta?

Oh Meewec's right, is this your first excavation? Every 90 days the game rolls a d10 and if you get a 6-10 you gain a +1 bonus to rolls on that stage, 11-13 a +2 bonus, and on 14+ you complete this stage and move onto the next one. If your scientist is of the same level as the difficulty of the stage they're working on, it'll probably take two years to clear a stage.

On rolls of five or below you might get an event to happen on this dig site. This can be good (extra clues) or bad (a bunch of resources, but also your scientist gains the Maimed trait and has -40 year life expectancy). You want a skilled scientist to do the digging, but don't send anyone you absolutely cannot afford to lose.

[Tanathar]

I'm having a similar issue. The problem I have is sometimes, when the next part of the site is ready, I need to click on the excavation site to proceed.
So my science ship will start working on it, but when the next chapter is ready, I need to manually click the site to proceed.

So try clicking the site when the science ship is in orbit and see if you have an option there

[Elementus]

you need to click on the dig site and assign a scientist to it, just telling a science ship to go to it won't work

[Meewec]

Originally posted by Elementus:

you need to click on the dig site and assign a scientist to it, just telling a science ship to go to it won't work

you can right click the planet with the site and tell it to do the dig

[Ithuriel]

Update: it apparently had something odd to do with the sync between my local client and my friend, who was hosting the game. We saved to pause for dinner, and when we later came back and loaded the save that planet no longer showed an archaeological dig at all for me. The info about it in the situation log had also vanished o.0