Compass Markers
Crawmak
USA Join Date: 2016-07-07 Member: 219814Members
USA Join Date: 2016-07-07 Member: 219814Members
A small suggestion that I think would aid greatly in navigation is compass beacon markers.
The compass being at the top of the screen always reminded me of Skyrim, which made me think that it would be nice if there was an option - maybe an upgrade to the normal compass - for beacons, signals, and other markers to appear on the compass.
The main benefits of this would be the option to remove markers from the world view without losing them completely, meaning less screen clutter without loss in navigation. Another thing this would help with is finding your Seamoth or Prawn if you get momentarily lost in the darker parts of the ocean. If you're too close to the Seamoth, the beacon doesn't appear, but if it was on the compass, you'd only have to face that direction and then look up or down to find it.
I realize a problem with this would be that you couldn't display the names of player-placed beacons or signals on the compass. This is where the newer color-coding feature would shine, but additionally I think it'd be great to be able to change the icon style for different markers.
For instance, say you have two signals you've obtained. One leads to the Aurora rendezvous point on Floater island, and the other leads to Lifepod 17. You know Floater Island is where you'll find new blueprints and food sources, so you wanna make it a priority. As such, you make the marker's color red and change the icon to an X. Now you can tell that signal apart from the other very easily on the compass without having to see their names!
Another example of different icons might be changing a beacon's icon to that of a small, cartoony house, or a depiction of a multipurpose room, that you can use to mark your main player base.
Thoughts, guys?
...I said small suggestion. Then I started getting more ideas while I was typing. This started with a compass. How did it end up like this? It was just a compass. It was just a compass...
The compass being at the top of the screen always reminded me of Skyrim, which made me think that it would be nice if there was an option - maybe an upgrade to the normal compass - for beacons, signals, and other markers to appear on the compass.
The main benefits of this would be the option to remove markers from the world view without losing them completely, meaning less screen clutter without loss in navigation. Another thing this would help with is finding your Seamoth or Prawn if you get momentarily lost in the darker parts of the ocean. If you're too close to the Seamoth, the beacon doesn't appear, but if it was on the compass, you'd only have to face that direction and then look up or down to find it.
I realize a problem with this would be that you couldn't display the names of player-placed beacons or signals on the compass. This is where the newer color-coding feature would shine, but additionally I think it'd be great to be able to change the icon style for different markers.
For instance, say you have two signals you've obtained. One leads to the Aurora rendezvous point on Floater island, and the other leads to Lifepod 17. You know Floater Island is where you'll find new blueprints and food sources, so you wanna make it a priority. As such, you make the marker's color red and change the icon to an X. Now you can tell that signal apart from the other very easily on the compass without having to see their names!
Another example of different icons might be changing a beacon's icon to that of a small, cartoony house, or a depiction of a multipurpose room, that you can use to mark your main player base.
Thoughts, guys?
...I said small suggestion. Then I started getting more ideas while I was typing. This started with a compass. How did it end up like this? It was just a compass. It was just a compass...
Comments
In Fallout, which uses compass ticks extensively, it's a good system because you're always limited to the plane of the game world - you're on the ground, so there's effectively no variability in the Z axis. But in Subnautica, where you have three degrees of freedom, being able to pinpoint a place in just the X-Y intersection is of limited use; you need an idea of how far down (or up) you're supposed to go.
I'm not saying it's a bad idea, not at all; I think it definitely has a place. But, on the same token, so do the signals. A compass tick for major landmarks (seabase, Aurora, islands) makes sense because you know where they are on the Z axis...or they're so apparent that you can't really miss them. But for things requiring finer orienteering it could get frustrating. After all, if you follow a compass tick and check the entirety of the Z axis from surface to floor, you might just think "Ah, it's bugged," and not realize that the signal is directing you into the cave below, entered via another point. But with a HUD signal like they are now, which lets you see precisely where the signal location is, it spurs you into finding the way to get to that location.
Just my take on it, though.
Sort of like I said in my main post, my main inspiration for this idea was being unable to locate my Seamoth after an asphyxiating journey through a deep sea Aurora wreck, because even with the lights of the Seamoth on, there are no light beams or anything to guide you toward it, and the beacon marker doesn't show up if you're within roughly 10 meters of the Seamoth, which has caused me to be unable to find where I parked it on several occasions, until I've drowned.
With compass markers, you could get a bearing on the X and Z axes immediately using the compass, then quickly look up or down in that general direction to find your vehicle!
Whenever that happens, I just travel in a straight line for a few seconds, then look around again. Of course, if the world is already fading out, it's usually too late.
If you want to declutter your view, you can hit Tab and go to the Ping Manager (third tab of the PDA), then turn off the visibility of things you don't want to see. When you want access to one of them, go back and turn it back on. Personally I turn off everything that is not a personally placed bouy, expecially Lifepod 5 once I am done with it.
Considering how much crap floats around in the water on this planet, the fact that the Seamoth headlamps don't produce visible light scatter is inexcusable.
What if the markers shrank and shifted toward the top or bottom of the compass to represent depth? It wouldn't be an exact measurement, but you could easily tell when something is above or below you.
Also, as far as the Seamoth headlights, I noticed on the wiki recently that there's something called "Bloom Plankton" in development, that would appear in deeper areas and glow for a few seconds whenever light hits it. That could probably assist in Seamoth location too.
Whoa...I see this being more of a hindrance than a help. If you have your headlights on at bloom depth, you could be driving blind because of all the plankton glow.
Cool.