Like the title says, I have had odyssey since it came out and when I first started the ground stuff I hated it. I have well over 10k hours in elite and it's safe to say I've tried everything in elite. From bgs to thargoid hunting and everything in-between there really isn't anything left that I have not dabbled in. So when odyssey came out I was excited to try it and bury myself in it.
The problem was, once I saw that huge mountain of engineer grind that lay ahead of me I just noped right the hell out. Why am I going to waste my time doing the same thing I already did for my ships only slower and less refined? The truth was that I wasn't going to. I just didn't play ground missions. I rarely got off my ship or out of my srv. Every now and than I would get out to sit in my carrier as it jumped, or look at something more closely but that was it. I would even advise people against getting odyssey for the ground stuff and just use the interface changes and graphics overhaul on planets as a reason to think about getting it. So what made me try it?
Funny enough it was star citizen that made me want to try it. They had/are having their free week thing and I decided to try it out. To spare you that story let's just sum it up as it looks cool but I spent more time out of my ship than I wanted too and that time I spent out of my ship was just a beautiful way to waste my time. I wanted to fly the ships, I wanted to be off the ground but I just kept finding myself either having to get out of my ship for long periods of time just traveling than actually doing something productive in game or repawning in a hospital because of some weird bug or glitch. Once I got fed up I decided to see how elite ground missions felt. The biggest thing I noticed was that the time I spent off my ship, I was doing a thing. Heading in for a fight, completing a mission, trading, looting ect, ect.
I don't really know what it was but once I understood the basics of how the on foot stuff played I started to want a bit more. I was rocking just random gear I found and just stumbling around with no aim (both figuratively and literally, I have trash aim). I than decided to upgrade my gear and start chipping away at the engi grind. It was rough. I didn't know what to collect, how many to collect, where to collect or what the best method was. I started going at it like my ship mats. Googled up a third party mat tracking tool for odyssey, the Odyssey Material Helper, and it gave me the locations of where to best find all the mats I needed. Luckily enough the majority where at a single location. So I went there, started farming mats…and I hated it. For 3 days I went at it, clearing the settlement out in 15 minutes and resetting it. God was this soul killing. The rng of mat drops is terrible. I made a wishlist of 4 things I wanted to engi/unlock and I hadn't even gotten 40% of the way there. Not to mention I was having issues unlocking Hero Ferrari (yes I know it's low cz's) but after doing more than the required and in different ways I had to contact Fdev (who also confirmed I did more than the required) to unlock them.
I was ready to give up. Literally I was in the station trading what few mats I had and was going to the mission board just to see if there was a settlement raid I could so I could vent frustration out by bombing the hell out of it. The mission I picked had a mat reward. It was 5 of something that I had spent an hour trying to get even 1 of. So I took the mission, vented and when I went through and found more mats I needed things started to fall into place. In 20 minutes I not only gathered a handful of mats I needed, I was being given more as a reward. It was the largest push in the right direction I had and I wasn't just looting the same station I looted 60 times over. It was…fun. I went back looked at the board again. There where loads of the mats I need and coming from all different types of missions.
I felt like I had rounded a corner. To top it off, it gave me a reason to build a silly little planet hopper sidey because I didn't need anything fancy. Slap the advanced thrusters in her, engi it to the nines and I had a hilarious little ship to fly that I named "Hopper". After a couple of nights of just casual mission running, I had my list done up. I went out got my upgrades and now I'm a beast on the ground. But I want more. So now I have a 14 item list made with over 400 mats needed of all different types and I'm itching to go do it. This is where it hits me. I haven't felt like this since I started playing elite and working my way into bigger better ships. It's like I started over without starting over. The best part is, I don't know what I'm going to do next. Couple that with the fact that it's not all easy and I my kit is just a Jack's of all trades type. I still have lots to do. I want to make specialized kits for sneaking, for combat, for raiding, for recovery or restart missions. I'm enjoying it way more than I should and a whole lot more than people expect but I don't care. It's fun and at this point in my life I need that more than anything. Thanks to those who sat and read the ramblings of an old guy who plays games.
TLDR: was super frustrated trying to farm mats only to find out in a fit of rage that I can't play on foot stuff like I do ship stuff and came to love running missions and upgrading my kit.
Source: https://www.reddit.com/r/EliteDangerous/comments/v0hb3j/i_finally_sat_and_decided_to_give_on_foot/
