BTW, quick question on the new auto launch/formation feature.
Why does it launch 7 and not 8 probes?
Scanning with 8 probes allows you to use some extremely efficient setups and is faster than a 7 probe setup by a good way if you know what youre doing.

Even if its just cos the formations are setup for 7 probes, you CAN still launch 8 probes right?

And now we are back at the start of the thread. New scanning mechanisms are possibly too fast, which shifts the risk-reward of the attacker to his advantage. How much "too fast" should be analysed as soon as this hits SiSi as CCP Greyscale mentioned before. Then CCP has to decide if this change in risk is good or bad.

With decent skills in a good ship 7 probes in the shape of a cross with 1 in the middle, 1 above the middle and 1 below the middle is the only formation you ever need. Most of the time you can roughly pinpoint everything in the system in one scan in that formation, and then focus your scannning down.

In the examples you actually used twice you mentioned a "cross" which is the same shape each time and the only one you mentioned which I haven't seen before is a "sifting" pattern to see what's in system. I'm amazed you've ever managed to gank anyone if you are using your probes to see what is in system before scanning them instead of using your D-scanner. Maybe it's because your experience is only in wormholes where people don't know you're in system and Lowsec where people are used to having neutrals in local and are more likely to have fools who think they are safe in anomalies.

So I'm sorry, I don't buy your premise and I don't believe your examples are concrete at all.

It's not something we can comment on until the changes are in effect and with a change this drastic, it's going to take a while to get it right.

What of the new changes in Oddyseey are increasing the speed of scanning?
a) an additional probe (now 8 probes launchable at the same time)
b) Button to deploy all probes at once
c) Probe-Formation-Presets (optional, you can still position the probes yourself)
d) UI changes in general so you can scan faster
e) new scan-modules which buff your scanspeed and efficiency
f) scanning skills are buffed (Example:
Current: Astrometrics L5 + Astrometric Aquisition L4 = 40% reduction in scan time.
After: Astrometrics L5 + Astrometric Aquisition L4 = 45% reduction in scan time.)

Do you really want me to link your shitfits and comment on them?

Also, your reply tot the tracking thing shows your understanding of it all. Congrats, you're part of the 99%.

Nope, you are incorrect and Garresh is correct.


And I'm telling you and many other scanners will tell you that they are concrete. Yes every scanner has a slightly different method, but the sifting example he gave is very concrete indeed.

This is what I dislike, when people who don't really understand try telling everyone else how simple and easy things are and how everyone is wrong. Just listen to what these people like Jack Milton and Garesh are saying and you will learn something.

Feel free, the last person who thought he'd be the big man and try to comment on my killboard fits went home with his tail between his legs and looking like an idiot, I'm happy to let you do the same.

TL;DR: Scanning ships down might be too quick now.

What do you think

o7

will we be able to save some of our own probe formations?

Kitchner, dont be so aggressive please. And Vilnius, even if you dont like his fittings, everyone can play eve on his own way (pvp in industrials?). Don't judge him if he hasn't asked for help regarding his fittings.



Interesting indeed. Maybe CCP Greyscale can give us an answer?

It's good to see an NPC alt posting about ideas telling me I'm wrong with no evidence to actually back up what they are saying, and even no explanation of why they believe what they are saying is correct.

Either pipe down or start posting with some actual content instead of "nope you're wrong, I'm an NPC alt".

T2 mods but meta 0 guns. truly inspiring

This is fitted to be heavy tackle, not to do any damage. Of course though by looking at my killboard you'd know during that fight I didn't even really do much damage to anyone as I was tackling a carrier right? And you'd also know that I fit that at the last minute using what was available in our market in CR right? Of coruse not.

that co-pro makes no sense, it's not needed at all. Well done

Check EFT again you moron, it's needed.

non plated Retri... amazing. Could it kite without the plate? not really, it's an AF and Amarr so it's too slow

So what I should do is add a plate onto it and make it even slower? That's good thinking, well done you. I'm sure I wont get killed by anything with half decent tracking then.

3 CPR on this one, no words....

The ship needed to keep up with a perma MWD shield fleet and that's what was needed. Of course if you can suggest a better way to stay perma MWD and have a shield tank still without using the lows like that I'm all ears


And the list goes on and on and on. You seem to think that because you're in EXE that it somehow rubbed off on you and you now know wtf you're doing, you obviously don't. And as I, and others, have stated earlier; learn a thing or two about tracking first. You might actually learn something from one of my youtube vids, linked in sig. It's generally aimed at newbies but... yeah.

Either way, you open your mouth a lot but don't necessarily back it with knowledge so stay quiet from now on. Thanks. Lets get back on topic.

ok if you don't like being told by an alt, then go and read Garresh or Jack Milton's posts again. Jack is in AHARM so that should tell you something if you actually have a clue about scanning. So it is not just me saying this to you.

That bomber fit does NOT need a co-pro, without it you have some 60 cpu left.

Maybe he intended to go for an all-T2 fit and just forgon? You'd be about 2% over at that point.

...
Update 30.04.:

Which of the new changes in Oddyssey are increasing the speed of scanning?
a) an additional probe (now 8 probes launchable at the same time)
...

From the OP

Is there a dev quote somewhere about 8 probes launchable at same time? Can't seem to track it down myself, and it's relevant to my interests (I use 8 probes when I scan, and am really hoping it won't require an extra launcher cycle after this change to continue doing so).

OK so firstly, being "good" at scanning doesn't require to have maxxed skills, even if it did I'm not the type of person to call someone out after looking up their skills, your opinion and your content of your post is what counts, not stats or killboards or links to character sheets.

Secondly I think you need to have a long ahrd think about the phrase "in depth art".

ART is an indepth art. I can teach you to draw, in fact I could teach you to draw almost perfectly, but that doesn't necessarily make you a world class artist, it makes you a good at drawing.

The techniques you've described are, by and large, redundant too. The probing system isn't an art, it's maths pure and simple and if you assert otherwise I'm sorry to say but you're plain wrong, and if you haven't noticed, maths isn't an artform, it's maths and it's factual.

With decent skills in a good ship 7 probes in the shape of a cross with 1 in the middle, 1 above the middle and 1 below the middle is the only formation you ever need. Most of the time you can roughly pinpoint everything in the system in one scan in that formation, and then focus your scannning down.

The only bit that requires intuition is figuring out which of the things you have located is the one you want to go to. For PvE purposes this is easy as pie as it tells you. For PvP you need to be making sure you are warping to the right ship, which isn't easy and requires a balance of good probing skills to find the ship quickly, but also good guesswork to figure out what the target is likely to be based on information available to you.

In the examples you actually used twice you mentioned a "cross" which is the same shape each time and the only one you mentioned which I haven't seen before is a "sifting" pattern to see what's in system. I'm amazed you've ever managed to gank anyone if you are using your probes to see what is in system before scanning them instead of using your D-scanner. Maybe it's because your experience is only in wormholes where people don't know you're in system and Lowsec where people are used to having neutrals in local and are more likely to have fools who think they are safe in anomalies.

So I'm sorry, I don't buy your premise and I don't believe your examples are concrete at all.

Yes, same here. I don't think that feature list was what the devs intended though, it is just what me and a few others on here have been asking for though. And then Saheed compliled everything in the thread for easy reading.

So they stopped what they were doing and took your pro advice to design the new stuff? It couldn't be that no blog or detailed official information has come out so all of us are working off of speculation? And Saheed just compiled all the great peals of wisdom you morons have spewed out in 600,000 words or less?

Seek help for delusions of grandeur.

Lol wow, you didn't even read did you? The cross shape is the core of any good scan pattern. That uses 4 probes...which leaves 3-4 other probes for modified cross patterns, including the nested cross, a layered central focus, and a lotus pattern. ALSO, you're completely minsunderstanding which pattern is used for which scenario. Sifting patterns aren't used for ganking, they're used for ninjaing and scanning systems with a large number of sites. If you're ganking, you're either going to d-scan and quickly scan in, or use a long range 32 AU scan and collapse it at the last second, to give the target no warning that you're coming. Seriously, they're all crosses? Wtf are you going to do, arrange your probes in a line? Are you ******* ********?

And I SAID you use d-scan first if you're planning a gank and the enemy isn't aware of you. Maybe you need to level up your reading comprehension.

Edit: And for the record I'm not an NPC alt, I'm between corporations atm cause an old friend and the CEO of my new corporation went on vacation right after I submitted my app. Check my corp history.

Hello folks,

so the new scan mechanisms coming with odyssey will give us

a) new scanning mechanisms like presets of probe-positions
b) new modules for your ship to increase the scan-range, scan-time etc. (adding to the old scanskills)

What are the consequences of this changes?
1.) easier access for casual scanning pilots
2.) a big decrease of the time you need to scan something (or someone) for experienced pilots

So, 1.) is a good thing. Especially for not so experienced pilots the old scanning was horrible. Easier access is good, especially if you want new pilots to expierence the new exploration sites easily.

But 2.) gives me and my corpmates some headaches. We live in a wormhole, and scanning down enemy pilots is an important part in our daily life. Also our enemies are scanning us down often, at least they try.
I dont now what the timeframe for scanning someone down with combat probes is, but i think it will be a lot quicker with the changes. Maybe too quick. Maybe you guys can give me some numbers on that.

Update 30.04.:

Which of the new changes in Oddyssey are increasing the speed of scanning?
a) an additional probe (now 8 probes launchable at the same time)
b) Button to deploy all probes at once
c) Probe-Formation-Presets (optional, you can still position the probes yourself)
d) UI changes in general so you can scan faster
e) new scan-modules which buff your scanspeed and efficiency
f) scanning skills are buffed (Example:
Current: Astrometrics L5 + Astrometric Aquisition L4 = 40% reduction in scan time.
After: Astrometrics L5 + Astrometric Aquisition L4 = 45% reduction in scan time.)

Additional Informations:
- No more deep space probes (CCP Greyscale: "The functionality of the deep space probe should largely be replaced by the new scanner overlay doohickey, which gives you a nice visual overview of what signatures are present in system, and their *approximate* location (give or take a reasonable number of AU)."
- Probe-Formation-Presets: CCP Greyscale: "There's two presets in Odyssey currently: one is seven arranged in a plane, for doing an initial sweep over as much of the system as possible, while the other is a gunstar for pinpointing individual signatures."

Also within the first 10 pages of this thread: Huge load of ideas how to change scanning completly, also solutions how to fix the problems with the big increase in scanning time.

TL;DR: Scanning ships down might be too quick now.

What do you think

o7

From the OP

Is there a dev quote somewhere about 8 probes launchable at same time? Can't seem to track it down myself, and it's relevant to my interests (I use 8 probes when I scan, and am really hoping it won't require an extra launcher cycle after this change to continue doing so).

CCP Soundwave showed in the demo that it will deploy 7 probes at once since that is the optimal number, no more and no less. If you want to use 8 you will need to use the formation deployment and then hit F1 once to get your 8th.