whats a good explorer ship?

[Mr. Pink]

as title says

[Oddball]

Originally posted by Doom:

Originally posted by Oddball:

This reminds me, which I should have mentioned, as I was in deep space for exo...

You know wiki calls deep space anything beyond 150 Ly from the bubble, so I'm going to assume you meant galactic ridges. Yes, there you'd want maximum jump range to reach distant stars. You'll probably want one of those franken condas too, which jump to 84 Ly but in exchange are mostly made out of wet paper.

Originally posted by Oddball:

(I think though you're expressing angst over long distance traveling and refueling, and not refueling while exploring.

No, it really is refueling. In ASP that 7kLy is very tolerable. Because I do not ever need to stop.

The fuel issue only going to matter if you're doing a dash from point A to point B, like reaching from bubble to Sagittarius A* in a single day, Which is possible. In this scenario you do not stop for anything, just honk and immediately jump again. A jump takes 44-60 seconds, so that extra minute on fuel stop is one missed jump, but in the end distance covered is probably the same for ASP and DBX.

If you're exploring and discovering bodies, that fuel scoop issue doesn't matter, because you'll just park in corona and play with FSS while the ship is refueling.

150 LY as "deep space" beyond the bubble is laughable.

I think we're agreeing what you're describing in the other part is long-distance traveling. Not exploring while traveling, which as we both said, means you can refuel while discovering bodies in the system on the FSS post-honk. To me the point was concern over having to excessively pause (refuel) while trying to long distance travel... but that wasn't tied to actually exploring.

[0Samuel]

Originally posted by Oddball:

Thanks for outlining some exploring ship criteria, as the OP glassed over this.

Recongizing this is all just fun personal opinion, and already you pointed this out, I'm keen now on pointing out exploration and long-distance traveling aren't inclusive, but usually single-ship exploration (not using a FC as a mobile station to explore from) does nessiate long jump range to quickly get to locations to start exploration.

However, I don't think heat is a factor for ships, and would never take a dolphin, even as an unorthodox explorer, even for the other trade-offs like handling or whatever. Anyone can manage heat just by moving away from the star while refueling to not burn up. Folks get wrapped around the axle about wanting to maximize their fuel scoop rate and gasing-up time saved, so fret about heat (I can't use 100% of my fuel scooping rate because I will burn up, therefore need a "colder" ship...). Whatever lol. That's a consideration for long distance traveling and wanting to minimize time in getting 1000's of LY away by not sitting for gas. That's not factor for exploration. But in the end, the total distance travel time is huge compared to the extra time needed to gas at a slower scoop rate, so why stress over this "cold/hot" for fuel scooping debate (just my view on it of course) when it's the 200 jumps or whatever that is going to take the majority of the time involved in the end?

I tried using the Phantom (stripped down for exploring and bio w/ SRV) and enjoyed it (had 60+ LY jump range), in my first test bio trip within 1K LY of the bubble. But you're correct that it's landing profile requirements are not great, making landing in roughing/mountainous places very tedious or not permissible. So I moved to the DBX, which I enjoy considerably. I use a sidewinder for closer exploration to my FC when I'm not trying to skip over systems. And use my DBX to mule-lead the carrier to the next jump location (usually after I find a Trit HS to jump to), then explore/exo while I wait for it to jump.

Good write up and explanation though, enjoyed it!

You know, I'm glad one of these write ups was good for someone. Sometimes I wonder..

I wanted to state the criteria explicitly for a couple reasons- for one, while it isn't strictly the question OP asked, answering why a ship would be good for exploration is a much richer explanation than just listing a few. But the other one is what we are seeing here, which is that a ship's performance relative to the criteria is objective but why those criteria are important is a lot less so. "I disagree with you" is a much more constructive stance than "you are wrong," so I like to try and parse the subjective from the objective where I can.

And yeah, if you are exploring from a fleet carrier jump range doesn't mean squat, but if you are exploring from a fleet carrier you may as well use a sidewinder, and I find I must begrudgingly respect the fact that you actually do. To me, 'exploring' with a fleet carrier is like 'camping' with an RV, but that's an opinion and one that I know that many will not share.

But I do think I want to push back on the separation of exploration from long distance travel. At a minimum, you need to run the gauntlet of the first few thousand light years of explored space around the Bubble, without any neutron stars to help you. How much fun you might have exploring once you get wherever it is you are going is no good if you burn yourself out trying to get there. Moreover, while I know some don't, having a goal is very important for having fun with this game, and exploration is great for setting yourself goals- maybe it's "fill out the codex for this region," maybe it's "reach Beagle Point," could be any number of things, but most of the time exploration goals involve seeing something somewhere, and you can't really separate that from getting to that place.

That means you might have fun exploring a system, but you compare how much fun you'll have finding each and every bacteria compared to how much it will slow you down. The question of how quickly you will get where you are going is how you decide whether or not scanning that last rocky body is worth it, the metric against which you compare the nigh-infinite expanse of the Milky Way to decide what is worth stopping for. And in the end, most of us get space madness sooner or later and just start jumping, because we'll get burned out if we don't. At that point, having a ship that can handle the long distance travel well is critical.

Yeah, strictly speaking they aren't the same thing. But everything you want to do and see with exploration is somewhere far away, and how you get there is a critical element of that part of the game.

[jimbalayajones]

I run the Krait Phantom for exploration...Plenty of options and wonderful jump range...

[loandreu]

Not sure this has been said, but here it goes: get any ship you want, have it be heat-efficient, and with at least 40LY jump range. More importantly—get the right equipment. IMHO, you will need: a maxed-out friendship drive, an SRV, an Auto Field Maintenance Unit, a repair limpet controller, a cargo rack, a fuel scoop, a Detailed Surface Scanner, and a heat sink just in case. Think self-sufficient. Some basic weaponry might be ok, but mostly will not be needed. Good shields are more important here. Oh, an Artemis suit is also a must, for exobiology work. Not sure I am forgetting anything. Maybe do a 150 LY test run first and adjust your loadout?

[Cablefast]

Don't think I've seen it suggested yet, so I'll recommend the Viper MK IV.

It's got decent internal space.
It has decent jump range when fully kitted out and engineered (around 50ly).
It's decently fun to fly as a fighter / combat ship.
But where this ship really shines is it's tiny landing footprint. Only the Sidewinder and Eagles are smaller. The small footprint makes the Viper a great exobiology ship. It can easily land in mountains and rough terrain, near whatever plant you're trying to scan.

[Oddball]

Originally posted by Holeypaladin:

Originally posted by Sighman:

2 ground conflict zones (high) should earn you about 10-20 million, even if you keep getting killed.

That's enough to outfit a DBX.

This.

DBX is not only one of the cheapest exploration ships, it's also the best.... provided you actually explore the planets themselves and conduct Exobiology.

It has one of the longest jump ranges, and it can land basically anywhere on a planet. Asp has a harder time finding a landing area, and you can basically forget about ever landing near your objective in an Anaconda.

One of the absolutely "free" ways to make money for a new player is just to hit the Bio planets in the bubble and cash in. yes you won't get a discovery bonus, but you'll still make on average 1-10M on each set of bios collected. You don't even need to travel outside to find the no-"First Footfall" planets (meaning nobody's discovered those Bios yet either).

(I used to use my jump-Anaconda to transfer LTD or plat to to jump to the best markets to sell. Now it's a garage piece lol).

[Oddball]

Originally posted by Cablefast:

Don't think I've seen it suggested yet, so I'll recommend the Viper MK IV.

It's got decent internal space.
It has decent jump range when fully kitted out and engineered (around 50ly).
It's decently fun to fly as a fighter / combat ship.
But where this ship really shines is it's tiny landing footprint. Only the Sidewinder and Eagles are smaller. The small footprint makes the Viper a great exobiology ship. It can easily land in mountains and rough terrain, near whatever plant you're trying to scan.

Small landing footprints in rugged terrain is the best feeling. I've still been able to land the DBX anywhere needed (in rough terrain), but it takes a bit longer to encourage the auto-landing to settle down, or land a bit off and hike over. So not as easy as the smaller ships, but still doable.

A bit of a downside with the DBX is if you're using a SRV (which you don't need for Exo-bio, but sometimes useful in open plan situations where there's many bios scattered out in clusters), is that the ship's rear end sits woefully low into the ground, often making getting the SRV in/out a chore if there's rocks under it. I think this also messes with it's landing footprint as it has no ground clearance in the back end. I don't get why the devs thought it'd be cool to make the DBX look like it was taking a crap everytime it landed...