Great First Explorer mission it crashed

[John Robinson]

Cory Trese , fallen

I'm shooting for the 25 explore missions:

My very first mission;  I got lucky. The Prince says go to Tennath (wild zone) and bring back independents with some kind of box.

How do the cards work: What did I do, what was I thinking.
I didn't see the "Uncover Contact" on the first deal.  Hmm did I land in the right wilderness?  Took off and landed in the other wilderness zone on Tennath.  Hmmm didn't see it there either.  Ok back to orbit land back in the first one.  So it's a like poker?  You will get dealt random cards but the deck will contain the card you need you just have to keep exploring right?  You get dealt a fresh hand every time.  In one hand we got jumped by pirates killed the sobs!  Right on! really enjoyed that.  This exploration deck process is very cool it's random not canned same event every time on same planet.  You feel like you are an explorer wandering in the unknown.  

Combat Screen: When I first saw the mock up at the producers meeting I had my doubts.  Cory you were right!  I love it.  Hovering mouse over any friendly or enemy shows their status sweet feature. Hover on talent descriptions saves allot of time no mouse clicks. Very cool choices.  I hope more combat talents be displayed for these troops when they level up.
 I could have sworn I had one of those baddies down to 12 HP but  on the next round when I hovered it was back up to 100.  I don't want to report this as a bug before I've had allot more practice fighting in the wilderness. Andrew body animations gun fire etc are looking great it's visceral because these are your people/crew, wince when you see them take a big hit.  That's the first impression of my first fight.  Now I want more practice to better see whats going on.

Cards/danger: Does the quadrant danger level and the planet danger level influence the number of nasty encounters are in the deck?
If you have strong explorer numbers does that lessen the number of nasty cards in the deck and make it more likely you will draw the card you need?
+3 Uncover Contact does this card mean I get three strong dice added to getting the card.
-1 Lost Card.  What does that mean to my odds of failing the roll, how do I know what I'm rolling against? 

What happened: Here's how it went down before the crash;

 On the first round the Uncover Contact card didn't get dealt so I thought I might be at the wrong location. But after several rounds including a battle with enemy ground force.  I got dealt this hand and succeeded In getting "uncover contact"  Diggin it baby.  

------------------------	---------------------	------------------	---------------------	---------------------
|       Lost                |	| Uncover Contact |	| Ship Danger  |	|   Crew Damage  |	|  Raw Resource  |
|         -1                 |	|          +3           |	|       -1          |	|       -1               |	|       +1             |
------------------------	---------------------	------------------	---------------------	--------------------

Exploration round  result card displayed;  "Whatever trail we were on turned cold"

 I asked myself did I just blow the mission?  Better hit the status button (upper right screen) and have a look at the mission.

Result: Crash to Desktop, crash report sent 

[Cory Trese]

Click the Status Button in Explorer Causes the game to crash. Unfixable at this time due to problems in the code.

Don't press "Status" button Explorer screen, sorry.

Ticket #3359 ST2 - Crash - ExplorerResults View -> Status -> Crash

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If you are in the right zone, you'll see a bright yellow "Mission Success!" card.

[Cory Trese]

Q: Does the quadrant danger level and the planet danger level influence the number of nasty encounters are in the deck?
A: Yes it has a direct impact on the types of, quantity and quality of the nasty encounters. Like wise, the Richness, Exploration and Harvest values of the planet impact the same for positive results. Conflicts and Rumors (Rumors very important for Exploration) for the Zone, Planet and Quadrant all play a major role.

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Q: If you have strong explorer numbers does that lessen the number of nasty cards in the deck and make it more likely you will draw the card you need?
A: It makes the deck stack more friendly. It does not change the probability of card selection. That selection RNG will remain constant throughout the game. Your goal is to randomly select from smaller set (use talent to eliminate) or better set (use skills to increase good cards.)

Q: What does +3 mean?
A: This is just a score we assign so you, as the player, can know how bad we, the designers, think this card is. -1 is like "meh not so bad" to -5 "will make you have a bad time." -1 Lost is like a few days. -5 Lost is like a time warp that could cost you a year.

[Cory Trese]

Also the Exploration system is also used in Patrol, Blockade and Spy. So if you like Explorer ... there are 3 other decks to try.

[John Robinson]

Cory Trese

Got back from vacation a few days ago. I want to thank you soooo much for these answers

[grävling]

Also, rarely, there is no 'mission success' card dealt when you try to do a mission. This should not happen, and is being looked into. I've done more than 100 of them, and seen it twice, so, ah, maybe you were just unlucky there.

[athios]

Feb 5, 2017 1:59:23 GMT -5 Cory Trese said:

-5 Lost is like a time warp that could cost you a year.

Holy crap, that's scary!
I think I've only seen -1 Lost so far, maybe -2. I will make sure to keep my eyes peeled before clicking on Explore next time.

[Cory Trese]

We're also working on the icons and card backgrounds when we get to the UI phase for those mini-games.