BUG: Nebula Plow

Brainiac4 · #1 December 13th, 2005, 12:51 AM

I don't think it's a bug as such. The behavior of the plow depends on the angle you are plowing at and the amount of nebula. If the nebula is really dense, it takes time to get out of the way.

Tanelorn · #2 December 15th, 2005, 12:22 AM

well, that's all nice and all, but it is a bug. It's a bug because the plowing action acts quickly when your ship is moving quickly, and acts slowly when you're bogged down by nebula. So, when you're moving more slowly, which should be giving the plow plenty of time to divide the nebula, it instead works the worst.

The coorelation between slow move speed and slow plow action tells me that it's a bug, and the priorities of ship nebula speed and plowing calculations are the cause.

When you are crossing a nebula, and a 200 day journey becomes 2000, it makes you want to never use or depend on the plow again. So, of course, including an item that claims to do something, that is worth 5 coins, and doesn't work, is a problem.

I don't remember the plow ever having problems in the demo. Could there be a difference between the demo code and the full version?

Phoenix-D · #3 December 15th, 2005, 03:43 AM

Oh, the plow definitely has the same issue in the demo..

rocky8311 · #4 December 15th, 2005, 07:35 AM

I've only ever encountered a problem with the nebular plow if I folded to a system in the middle of a nebula and then tried to go to another system by the use of a normal stardrive.

What level do you set your nebulas at when you're starting your game? I don't care for nebulas so I keep mine set at the lowest coverage and I've never had this problem. If it's occurring at highest levels of nebula coverage, it would seem to me to be a function of the difficulty level.

Also: does anybody know if use of the nebula plow loses you points? Something about environmental destruction? If this is so, do you lose points even if you're not on a scientific mission?

Shadowcat · #5 December 15th, 2005, 09:42 AM

Yep, check out that negative value in the "bonus" section of your mission score-card. I don't know whether if there is any multiplier attached to this depending on the mission type.

Fingers · #6 December 15th, 2005, 03:44 PM

The travel time estimate never underestimates the time, and it takes the nebula into account. So you'll never see an ETA of 200 days and have it actually take 2000.

You need a nebular star drive to move fast in the nebula. The plow creates a path through the nebula so that you can cross it faster with a normal drive afterwards; it's not intended to be a replacement for nebular drives.

Tanelorn · #7 December 15th, 2005, 04:22 PM

Quote:

Fingers said:
You need a nebular star drive to move fast in the nebula. The plow creates a path through the nebula so that you can cross it faster with a normal drive afterwards; it's not intended to be a replacement for nebular drives.

Ok, there's an issue with that.

1. There's only one nebular drive that is worse than a standard drive, the hydrogen nebula drve. All others have a nebula speed of 12 or higher. Therefore the nebula plow doesn't help you if, by your statement, you are supposed to have nebula drives in addition to the plow.

2. Since when do we backtrack using the exact same path as before anyway? The nebula plow isn't very useful if we can only move faster after we've plowed our way through and are taking the same path again.

3. We see the plow working well and efficiently about 50-75% of the time. So obviously it is capable of working well. When it only works well some of the time, that tells me there's a bug.