Colonisation - new feature, and I love it!

Michael Ryan

Michael Ryan
kofeyh said:
Sure, but I think that choice will boil down to which type of settlement, and some partial control on where and the game will then generate the resulting outpost based on existing assets and procedural generation. Which is good, because that scales and creates predictable building blocks that we can be confident will place down and work as expected. The outposts all then basically 'fit' in the existing world of Elite.

I would think more higher level 'pick type and location' and not 'I can place a picture frame in this precise location, in this bespoke hab type, for the aesthetics'. Anyone expecting complex outpost building beyond maybe being able to plonk pre-set buildings (or large prefabs) down in a given area is likely over-thinking things a bit.
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Of course it will be limited somehow, galaxy is too big to let players do everything they want :D
Just they said about playes choice of what asset/economy they want. Asssets are connected with economy. You have like 5 asstes to every economy of the settlement.
And where - I don't mean exactly, but what planet for an example.

It woulde be nice to have some science abou that like: "ok, this planet has valuable resourecs, I can put there mining base.
 

Urbanski101

Urbanski101
The colonisation feature is quite something...it will change the game & is probably the biggest single feature I think FD have developed for ED. I have loads of questions as I'm sure we all do:

  • Cost - how much for the Colony ship and subsequent stations / settlements?
  • Resources - an indication of the kind of resources needed to build the depot, stations / settlements
  • Time - how long will it typically take for the depot to be built (best case scenario, with all resources / credits available) Same question for stations / settlements
  • Distance - how far from inhabited systems can we colonise?
  • Economy - how will that work, based on the planets / resources in system? Based on the bases and settlements you build? A combination of both factors?
  • Settlements and Orbitals - how much control will we have on what is built and where it's placed?
  • Upkeep and Income - will there be an upkeep cost and will it be possible to earn credits from your colony?
  • BGS - How / when do the NPC minor factions appear in your new colony, is it purely RNG or do architects have any influence here? Is your colony open for manipulation by using the BGS mechanics to promote / expand factions within your colony?

Interested to hear how a typical colony will unfold, the stages of completion for each element. Does the colony ship morph into the depot on arrival (power rangers style...lol). Can we hand place settlements or will that be decided by RNG? Does the colony slowly populate over time, does the economy slowly develop supply and demand in line with population growth or does it all just 'pop' into existence when projects are completed?

Initial thought based on FD design philosophy is that this will be geared towards a group of players and may be a harrowing and unbelievably expensive undertaking for solo player in terms of credits, resources, logistics and time. Though if I know this community at all, that will not deter many solo players from setting up colonies.

My main concern is the last point in my list, the BGS and to some extent Power Play. If a solo player decides to undertake building a colony and becomes an architect, the money sink, time sink, resource gathering etc., what is to stop a PMF moving in and setting up their faction to control the colony they built? Or installing one of the powerplay powers so their chosen power avatar is displayed across every station and settlement?

You may have envisaged a cosy little independent Utopia on the outskirts of human space but some PMF or even NPCMF decides to move in and change the social / political landscape to something very different from your initial vision, as a solo player is there much you can do about it?

I'm guessing that these new colonies will be subject to BGS manipulation like any other system in ED and it's up to the individual 'architect' to protect their colonies or just accept outside influence as part of the deal.

Thoughts?
 

aRJay

aRJay
I am wondering if we will have any role in the colonised system once it is up and running after all the architects of Brasilia didn’t get anything other than fame and their fees out of that job.
 

londonx

L
varonica said:
My personal opinion is, this appears to be a BIG update, I mean allowing players to build their own stations, colonise star systems around the galaxy, extend PP into their own systems? Up to now the only movable and placable objects we had were our fleet carriers and our ships/SRV's, it feels like colonisation should be a major update, even a paid for one, but we are getting it free. What I think has happened is that FDEV have been working on this as part of the Odyssey update since it launched. The new planetary tech, new PP that can expand into player colonised star systems, it is all part of the long plan for Odyssey and will likely be the last Odyssey update before we go into payable DLC territory.

As for Thargoids, gone but not forgotten I expect, Thargoids are the enemy in the Elite Dangerous universe, it would be like Dr Who with no Daleks, the are always Daleks, just when you least expect it, there they are, Daleks again, I feel the same goes for Thargoids. It will quieten down for a while after the last Titan is gone and they will pop up when we least expect it.
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I agree this is definitely Codebase 4.0 functionality at play (the "New Era") not a post-financial crisis change in direction, we saw glimpses and hints when the Thargoid War Narrative first started and saw the stargoid moving through the galaxy in realtime visible to everyone. I wonder if we will see Odyssey Merged into the base game after this.
 
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Cosmo

Cosmo
zimms said:
we'll have to wait for the next FU episodes to learn more.
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Arthur said the new feature would be released this year. So they got FU #11 to explain most stuff, because December will be launch month unless it got delayed.

aRJay said:
I am wondering if we will have any role in the colonised system once it is up and running after all the architects of Brasilia didn’t get anything other than fame and their fees out of that job.
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The creator of a system colony is the owner. It would be awful if we were forced to give up a colony after pouring months, years of effort into it. Maybe there is an option to abandon a colony after which it's managed by NPC factions. Maybe a player group can conquer a colony.

Urbanski101 said:
Interested to hear how a typical colony will unfold, the stages of completion for each element. Does the colony ship morph into the depot on arrival (power rangers style...lol). Can we hand place settlements or will that be decided by RNG? Does the colony slowly populate over time, does the economy slowly develop supply and demand in line with population growth or does it all just 'pop' into existence when projects are completed?
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How much control do we have to place and design the settlements? If we have 0 influence in the design and layout of the buildings then it would look bad and boring if most look the same as pre-made assets. Manual building customization is essential for sufficient diversity between stations / settlements and colonies.

Can settlements expand to become big metropolises?
 
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Alaska Sædelære

Alaska Sædelære
Much of this is speculation since the announcement did not contain a lot of detail. But what I read a good deal of commenters obviously wishing for makes my toenails curl. I hope that whatever Frontier comes up with here does NOT enable this cancer to spread anywhere it wants in deep space. This includes places like Beagle Point or Explorer's Anchorage where an exception was made for a very popular destination. That's cool but leave it alone now, please.
 
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angusmadmac1

angusmadmac1
DoG Duggy said:
i hope we can set out to colonise from any current settled systems rather than just the bubble.. we could end up with a nice colonia sized bubble near sag A for instance!
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Have a look at the Azura Initiative?? It was thought up and put into motion about 2-3 years ago ...
 

Ian Doncaster

Ian Doncaster
Cosmo said:
He said "it's coming this year" (4:42).
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Specifically, he said that in February when Powerplay was scheduled for release in "the summer", rather than September October the last day of October.

It's not impossible that it's mostly separate teams working on the two and the colonisation side of things is keeping to schedule ... but it wouldn't be unusual at this stage for it to slip into next year.
 

Alec Turner

Alec Turner
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Frankymole

Frankymole
Ian Doncaster said:
Specifically, he said that in February when Powerplay was scheduled for release in "the summer", rather than September October the last day of October.

It's not impossible that it's mostly separate teams working on the two and the colonisation side of things is keeping to schedule ... but it wouldn't be unusual at this stage for it to slip into next year.
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Yes, and maybe he meant "tax year" anyway :D

TBH, I have got more than enough to keep me busy in game at present.
 

IstvaanDCIV

IstvaanDCIV
Given how PP2.0 turned out to have some rough edges in spite of being delayed for a week, I'd be happy to wait until next year for colonisation to happen if it would mean a reduction in jank levels upon release.
 

zimms

zimms
IstvaanDCIV said:
Given how PP2.0 turned out to have some rough edges in spite of being delayed for a week, I'd be happy to wait until next year for colonisation to happen if it would mean a reduction in jank levels upon release.
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I can't speak for the press preview with the rumored crashes and overeager NPCs, but the release didn't look very rough around the edges. Sure, there's a lot of balancing to be done now, but I think that's an issue no amount of inhouse testing would have solved. Frontier needs the player feedback to fine tune that.

The bugs seem to be not directly related to PP (missing settlement loot, Engineering crashes, etc).

But of course it's better to push the colonization update to 2025, instead of releasing it in a broken state.
 
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