Opinion: 10 LY range for colonization is ridiculously low.

And do you have an example of a system with factions which is not within 20ly of another system with factions?
Sure - Explorer's Anchorage, almost all of the Colonia Bridge systems, quite a few of the systems on the route out to the Pleiades, all the various isolated nebula stations near-ish the bubble. Robigo is an early (in)famous example nearer to the bubble; New Yembo is another and the very first system to be colonised during the ED game timescale.

There are BGS-related problems with systems that don't have another system in that range - mission selection is poor to non-existent, they'll rapidly ban themselves as expansion sources, as a consequence of those two the controlling faction tends to pin as close to 100% influence as the secondary faction count allows. But they can certainly exist.

How much any of that matters depends on what the purpose of colonisation is.
 
Do NPCs?

I do agree that that 10ly is too low, and I’m sure that will come out in the wash during the Beta, if not before. But I think the distance should be based on an average unengineered ship.
It's interesting you ask what NPCs have. I have a fast, long jump range ship and yet an NPC determined to interdict me to get my valuable cargo is able to out-jump me in a smaller, lower jump range ship, catch up to me in supercruise even though I defeated his previous two attempts AND can get into Shinrarta Dezhra despite not being Elite in something.

It's almost as if the NPC's ......cheat. :unsure:
 
100% this. If FD went over 20LY, my schadenfreude awaits the flurry of "Why does all this stuff not work in my colony!" complaints.

These limits have been in the game since inception... people only notice it when the next update or FOTM thing suffers for it.. but that's what happens when you build on unstable foundations.

What do you think won't work in your colony if its more than 20LY? We have many examples of stations/settlements that work outside this range just fine. The only thing that won't work would be the thing that people wouldn't want working - eg: Powerplay.

And a higher limit means those who want to get away can have it, while those who want to be within range can also have it.
 
On the stream, FDev explicitly said that colonisation is integrated with BGS and PP 2.0. (And do you have an example of a system with factions which is not within 20ly of another system with factions?)

I think that's being misinterpreted. Powers will be able to expand into close enough systems. Colonizing systems might give merits if within a power's territory, but i didn't see anything that would require powerplay.

As for the BGS, its in every system, regardless of distance from other stations, and works just fine, even in systems tens or even hundreds or thousands of LY from other inhabited systems.
 
It's interesting you ask what NPCs have. I have a fast, long jump range ship and yet an NPC determined to interdict me to get my valuable cargo is able to out-jump me in a smaller, lower jump range ship, catch up to me in supercruise even though I defeated his previous two attempts AND can get into Shinrarta Dezhra despite not being Elite in something.

It's almost as if the NPC's ......cheat. :unsure:

Remember the early days when you could be hundreds of LY from the bubble and still have NPCs appear... without a fuel scoop fitted.
 
I think that's being misinterpreted. Powers will be able to expand into close enough systems. Colonizing systems might give merits if within a power's territory, but i didn't see anything that would require powerplay.

As for the BGS, its in every system, regardless of distance from other stations, and works just fine, even in systems tens or even hundreds or thousands of LY from other inhabited systems.
Its more that both synergize each other.
 
Haven't read all the posts so sorry if this has been said.

I did think it was a tad low, maybe 25ly but psykit made a good point on her stream today. If you pick a typical populated system on the edge of the bubble that you might expand out from and do an Inara search for systems within 10ly range you get a small handful (maybe 3 or 4). However, extend that to 15ly and it jumps up a lot (a dozen or so maybe?). So 10-20ly does feel like a kind of sweet spot if you want controlled lines of expansion and not just a scattershot explosion. I think FD want BGS and PowerPlay to be able to move into colonised space so if you make it more than 20ly I think that can put systems out of range? It's clear their thinking is to be able to push out the edges of the bubble but not to be able to span galactic distances. For example, at a range of 15ly and if we said it took 1 week to colonise (probably an underestimate) it would take 32 years to reach Sag A*. That's obviously NOT what they're going for with this.
 
Do NPCs?

I do agree that that 10ly is too low, and I’m sure that will come out in the wash during the Beta, if not before. But I think the distance should be based on an average unengineered ship.
I don't think so but putting it to 230 ly will be a lot less restrictive to finding a desirable system.

Personally, I think this feature shows FDevs traditional myopia and narrow-minded view of what they are creating because they develop everything in secret. They flesh out the idea, have their version of what it will do. Unfortunately, it usually limits player options and emergent gameplay as the player base immediately sees/wants vastly more potential.

As for me, as soon as I saw the word "colonization", I thought about places far away. This is more like expansion. I was initially hopeful about it, but now I'm pessimistic. I don't think for most players it will reach the level of Odessey, some neat gameplay loops that most visit on occasion but most don't use regularly. I think it will go the way of squadrons and player factions; it will be used by a few dedicated player groups but ignored by most.

That being said, we have too little information, but it will need several engaging game loops to be used by most. It just seems to be too narrowly focused, like fighter combat thing that has all but died... I can't even remember the name!
 
Haven't read all the posts so sorry if this has been said.

I did think it was a tad low, maybe 25ly but psykit made a good point on her stream today. If you pick a typical populated system on the edge of the bubble that you might expand out from and do an Inara search for systems within 10ly range you get a small handful (maybe 3 or 4). However, extend that to 15ly and it jumps up a lot (a dozen or so maybe?). So 10-20ly does feel like a kind of sweet spot if you want controlled lines of expansion and not just a scattershot explosion. I think FD want BGS and PowerPlay to be able to move into colonised space so if you make it more than 20ly I think that can put systems out of range? It's clear their thinking is to be able to push out the edges of the bubble but not to be able to span galactic distances. For example, at a range of 15ly and if we said it took 1 week to colonise (probably an underestimate) it would take 32 years to reach Sag A*. That's obviously NOT what they're going for with this.
Best explanation for the feature... Like I said, as soon as FDev comes up with something, the play base immediately thinks way larger. For the purpose you stated, 25ly would be great. A lot of explorers will be disappointed though. I still say there needs to be a second type of colonization, one that caters to explorers.
 
Haven't read all the posts so sorry if this has been said.

I did think it was a tad low, maybe 25ly but psykit made a good point on her stream today. If you pick a typical populated system on the edge of the bubble that you might expand out from and do an Inara search for systems within 10ly range you get a small handful (maybe 3 or 4). However, extend that to 15ly and it jumps up a lot (a dozen or so maybe?). So 10-20ly does feel like a kind of sweet spot if you want controlled lines of expansion and not just a scattershot explosion. I think FD want BGS and PowerPlay to be able to move into colonised space so if you make it more than 20ly I think that can put systems out of range? It's clear their thinking is to be able to push out the edges of the bubble but not to be able to span galactic distances. For example, at a range of 15ly and if we said it took 1 week to colonise (probably an underestimate) it would take 32 years to reach Sag A*. That's obviously NOT what they're going for with this.
Giving the keys to the galaxy sounds a little bit more ambitious than just being able to push out the edges of the bubble.

 
"Giving the keys to the galaxy" is (for me) in the same area as "an Armstrong moment", and we all know how that went.
Marketing hype... 🙄

I did some tests this morning from a couple of systems, 10ly is too low.. Both systems had only a couple of systems that were suitable around them... The majority were empty or had a single gas giant in it.

20 ly would be better.
 
I don't understand. What exactly is going to break if the range for system colonisation goes over 20ly at a time? From what I see there are plenty of isolated pockets of civilisation already that seems to be doing just fine. What's the difference?
Player expectations, pure and simple.

Yes, isolated systems exist, and they're entirely uninteresting. No missions to speak of except a board full of donation or mining (one or the other, not both... that's just how they work). The markets are bland and uninteresting because there's nothing around to interact with. It functions because there's no detriment to the shortfalls because players can choose to go elsewhere.

Colonisation is different. When players drop a system, even though it's a player interject, by all accounts they behave just like normal populated systems, just a player is allowed to develop them further.

My question is: Do you really think players want to make colonies which, ultimately are just glorified cosmetics for unpopulated systems, because there's nothing they can interact with in range at a bgs level?

If so.. great, do nothing. I look forward to the complaints though, as i suspect people are going to want the colonies they drop to be more lively than that.

You don't need to look further than Odyssey, PP2 and the various other updates to see when people being unhappy with the updates despite then being entirely inline with the game's limitations.

So then FD scrambles to make changes that are merely kludges without addressing the core issues, and so things continue to get exacerbated... PP2 balancing being the most recent example because we're well overdue an economic rebalance.

But every time people like myself highlight those issues or limitations and the need to address them... heads go in the sand.

So by all means, people can advocate for bigger range all they want. The end result will either be:
  • bland, uninteresting colonies due to the current limitations... or;
  • major optimisations and overhauls to mission generation, market mechanics and the entire BGS, which will result in a very different lived experience and break many FOTM activities which rely entirely on those limitations.
Edit: as an example... general missions are limited to 20Ly for optimisation; is an O^3 increasing problem (that is, double the radius, it's 8 times slower) which will ultimately cause mission board timeouts/ failure to generate as evidenced in the past. Now extend that consideration to everything relevant in the BGS. That's a major optimisation needed right there.
 
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My question is: Do you really think players want to make colonies which, ultimately are just glorified cosmetics for unpopulated systems, because there's nothing they can interact with in range at a bgs level?

If so.. great, do nothing. I look forward to the complaints though, as i suspect people are going to want the colonies they drop to be more lively than that.
If you build it, they will come...
 
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