The Powerplay discussion thread.

cwstad · Jun 17, 2015

New to powerplay whats the best way to progress

Hi all, i've just pledgeged with one of the factions but im wondering what the best way to get started? Been away for a few weeks and it all looks very different

thanks

Malfahri · Jun 17, 2015

Probably the easiest way would be to check out the sub-reddit for your faction.

zaikoji · Jun 17, 2015

amen

random_tangent said:
I had a similar experience with Eve back in the day. One day I just asked myself: why? Why am I spending all day every day mining to get a battleship? What am I going to do with it when I get it?

I agree on all points really. I've just narrowed my objectives down to "gear up" before I move on for a bit. I suppose I've reached the point where I hope ED grows into the great game it could be, but I've accepted that there are no guarantees.

I know we've chatted at length about exploration elsewhere, but it really is the best exemplar of what's wrong for me. The greatest irony is that in the profession of exploration, there is almost NOTHING to discover. There is nothing unusual or unpredictable out there, unless your concept of discovery encompasses "planets with slightly out of the ordinary properties" - i.e. a larger-than-average water world. There is nothing dynamic or eventful, nothing mysterious or inexplicable. And on top of that, there is no game-play. Just point my ship at something, get close enough and wait.

There is an overwhelming lack of content in ED. There are a series of self-contained, simplistic game-play choices at the moment, which feel like place-holders. In my humble opinion, interesting content is long long overdue. That FD are investing development resource on things like PP when the core game has so little meat on the bones is very troubling. The simplest explanation is usually the most likely: they don't plan to flesh out the core game significantly. If they did, how could they prioritise content like PP over it? It's like buying a football before you've planted the grass for the pitch. Sure, we can play headers and vollies against that brick wall over there, but we can't play a real game until the pitch is laid. We can't get the most out of the ball til then. We'd rather you have spent the last 3 months sorting out the turf, then whilst we're running around on it, getting used to it and making up our own games like tig, spend the next 3 months finely crafting the perfect ball for our first game.

I liked your footy simile, and I have to agree that there isn't much to see here. Some different-sized suns, a few planets of varying hues and lots of pretty rings.. What's there is nice, really nice. But where are the frightening anomalies, the inexplicable phenomena, the drifting hulks and enigmatic objects? In-game events that make you hit the brakes. Such things could provide the starting point for missions, or be ends in themselves.
And how about some rare modules, exotic weapons or simple upgrades to existing tech? These could be picked up as random "loot" by defeating roaming NPCs (which could in themselves be new, interesting and challenging). Alternately they could be given as rewards for mission completion.
Some missions, "raids" or whatever you want to call them could be available as random encounters, and some situated at set points. They could vary in difficulty, with some requiring more work than others. Some could only be possible in a wing.
I could envisage a crafting system requiring a range of materials and tech. Obtain items A, B and C to fashion an amplification device for your lasers; collect 3 Ds and 2 Es to construct a scanner-baffle. Said items can only be created by the master technicians at Station X. It can be as hard or as easy as you want, with reward scaling with difficulty.
None of these ideas are original. They're merely popular elements of the modern RPG. Whilst ED is a wonderful game, with immense possibilities, we have to wonder what most players want from the game.
A virtual monetary reward is one thing. It's satisfying, and we need cash to buy our gear. But there's no variation. We fly the same ships in a galaxy devoid of mystery. The better (and richer) we get, the more homogenous our loadouts become.
Now we have to cope with Powerplay. I must be pretty dumb, because I'm having trouble understanding how to play it, let alone its purpose. Must I really turn my Vulture into a delivery van to shuttle documents and expand a theoretical area? Do I have to risk my modest but beloved Asp to earn three or four credits in a never-ending battle zone, before slogging back to a controlled system? Credits which I may or may not keep depending on how much free time I have that particular week? Credits which may, if I'm lucky, eventually enable me to obtain one new item?
I'd really like to enjoy Powerplay, and I apologize if my generic RPG vision for ED is way off the mark. I don't want to grumble, but judging by the tone of the forums recently, I feel that quite a few of the players may be feeling the same. But hey, lots of time for tweaks, patches, and direction changes, right? Keep buying those skins! Don't want Frontier to go bankrupt just yet. Whatever we might think about Powerplay, let's keep it respectful and optimistic. Thank you Frontier for your hard work so far.

cwstad · Jun 17, 2015

Thanks for the tip

UltimateTK · Jun 17, 2015

Another curious that do I have to keep rating 3 4 weeks ?

jgm · Jun 17, 2015

It's very frustrating that this stuff matters and yet FD haven't been bothered to write down the rules of the game. All of the major powers could be affected by overheads but because they haven't been explained it's impossible to know if, or how. This could in turn have a knock-on effect on preparation for the next cycle.

Is it so hard to tell us how our CC is calculated at the end of the cycle, using an example to remove confusion? I understand that upkeep CC can change depending on fortification status but for the sake of an example pick a number, and show us.

Ian Doncaster · Jun 17, 2015

Good work on collecting the data.

So, that's about 5 million powerplay "actions" across all powers in most of a week. Any ideas on how that translates into absolute rather than relative numbers of supporters per power? It looks quite a bit more popular than the community goals have been - more convenient, better advertised, potentially better rewards so that's not a surprise.

Ben Ryder · Jun 17, 2015

This is great stuff. Just started in to power play and its a bit crazy

Cmdr NXS Tripp · Jun 17, 2015

I meant is that figured into the CC cost, my mistake, but apparently it's not but I have to wonder why not.
Why have a rogue cost floating around?

Mohrgan · Jun 17, 2015

FD posted a PP guide. It is sticked at the top of this forum. Have a look. It does a decent job of explaining things.

RingoD123 · Jun 17, 2015

It has already been confirmed that this was originally a hidden value. We have not been given any info on how this number is generated, and we have no way of alleviating it or even understanding how expanding into any given system will affect it. It is there to stop any single power taking too much control over occupied space, and personally, I think they are just arbitrary numbers that FD will change at will to manipulate the galaxy how they see fit. It will allow them to throw any power into as much turmoil as they want by just changing a single value (and if this is the case then its just another big pointer to the fact that there is no real background simulation, just by-hand manipulation during server downtimes).

jgm · Jun 17, 2015

Mohrgan said:
FD posted a PP guide. It is sticked at the top of this forum. Have a look. It does a decent job of explaining things.

Thanks, but it doesn't explain what overheads are though, and how they tie in to the final CC available calculation.

Rauminen · Jun 17, 2015

Overhead is something that they've added in (well, subtracted) silently before, now they made it so it's displayed.

But since it is not subtracted from the total, it would seem that it is already calculated into the upkeep value. So the upkeep you see there is overhead + (upkeep1 +...+ upkeepN)

Or not.

Mohrgan · Jun 17, 2015

This how I understand it from my reading and observations. Take it as you will. CC's are the determining factor in a Powers ability to Control/Exploit any given syste. Each system has a CC value it is assigned. That values stems from the systems intrinsic worth to a Power. A Power both Spends and Earns CC from each system. If a system costs more to maintain than you earn from it, it is a unprofitable system. Each Power gains and spends CC each cycle. If a Power's CC costs outpace their earning, that Power is sent into turmoil. A uncontested system costs/pays it's standard value. If a system in undermined it doubles the cost, if a system is fortified it costs zero CC's to maintain.

Your example shows that Power has a surplus of CC as it stands. Each value listed in Red is a cost. Each value listed in Blue is an income. In order for a power to maintain it's holdings it must be able to pay for them. Undermining makes it harder for a Power to pay, that is how you can use CC to push control between Powers.

jgm · Jun 17, 2015

Mohrgan said:
This how I understand it from my reading and observations. Take it as you will. CC's are the determining factor in a Powers ability to Control/Exploit any given syste. Each system has a CC value it is assigned. That values stems from the systems intrinsic worth to a Power. A Power both Spends and Earns CC from each system. If a system costs more to maintain than you earn from it, it is a unprofitable system. Each Power gains and spends CC each cycle. If a Power's CC costs outpace their earning, that Power is sent into turmoil. A uncontested system costs/pays it's standard value. If a system in undermined it doubles the cost, if a system is fortified it costs zero CC's to maintain.

Your example shows that Power has a surplus of CC as it stands. Each value listed in Red is a cost. Each value listed in Blue is an income. In order for a power to maintain it's holdings it must be able to pay for them. Undermining makes it harder for a Power to pay, that is how you can use CC to push control between Powers.

Largely correct (if a system is undermined you lose the entire CC income for a system and have to pay its upkeep from CC earned elsewhere; also, uncontested/contested isn't directly relevant to this conversation but doesn't do what you say it does). Also, undermining falls in to upkeep rather than overheads.

But unfortunately there's still no real idea of which part of the information shown in the OP is incorrect.

RingoD123 · Jun 17, 2015

Mohrgan said:
This how I understand it from my reading and observations. Take it as you will. CC's are the determining factor in a Powers ability to Control/Exploit any given syste. Each system has a CC value it is assigned. That values stems from the systems intrinsic worth to a Power. A Power both Spends and Earns CC from each system. If a system costs more to maintain than you earn from it, it is a unprofitable system. Each Power gains and spends CC each cycle. If a Power's CC costs outpace their earning, that Power is sent into turmoil. A uncontested system costs/pays it's standard value. If a system in undermined it doubles the cost, if a system is fortified it costs zero CC's to maintain.

Your example shows that Power has a surplus of CC as it stands. Each value listed in Red is a cost. Each value listed in Blue is an income. In order for a power to maintain it's holdings it must be able to pay for them. Undermining makes it harder for a Power to pay, that is how you can use CC to push control between Powers.

Actually, if a control system is undermined without being fortified then its upkeep is its regular upkeep cost + all income normally brought in from exploited systems in its control. I also think you missed the Op's point, it was all about the Overheads cost which is completely separate to upkeep, and not explained anywhere.

Klab · Jun 17, 2015

If it isn't subtracted from the CC total, then it's not worth worrying about. If your blue CC figures are correct & your red CC figures are also correct (you can check these system by system), then that 'overhead' figure must be meaningless. Just a figure to illustrate that your empire is getting very big & costly.

RingoD123 · Jun 17, 2015

Klab said:
If it isn't subtracted from the CC total, then it's not worth worrying about. If your blue CC figures are correct & your red CC figures are also correct (you can check these system by system), then that 'overhead' figure must be meaningless. Just a figure to illustrate that your empire is getting very big & costly.

unfortunatey I do believe you are wrong, quote from Michael last week:

Quote Originally Posted by Michael Brookes

"The CC values shown should now be correct. However it doesn't show the value for the overheads so if you take income and deduct upkeep it is a higher value than the balance because the overhead isn't shown.

Michael"

jgm · Jun 17, 2015

Klab said:
If it isn't subtracted from the CC total, then it's not worth worrying about. If your blue CC figures are correct & your red CC figures are also correct (you can check these system by system), then that 'overhead' figure must be meaningless. Just a figure to illustrate that your empire is getting very big & costly.

So you're saying that FD went to the effort to add a number which doesn't do anything (overhead showed up in the last patch). I'm afraid that doesn't seem very likely, although perhaps I'm using the wrong yardstick when it comes to rationality of changes.

Rauminen · Jun 17, 2015

Mohrgan said:
This how I understand it from my reading and observations. Take it as you will. CC's are the determining factor in a Powers ability to Control/Exploit any given syste. Each system has a CC value it is assigned. That values stems from the systems intrinsic worth to a Power. A Power both Spends and Earns CC from each system. If a system costs more to maintain than you earn from it, it is a unprofitable system. Each Power gains and spends CC each cycle. If a Power's CC costs outpace their earning, that Power is sent into turmoil. A uncontested system costs/pays it's standard value. If a system in undermined it doubles the cost, if a system is fortified it costs zero CC's to maintain.

Your example shows that Power has a surplus of CC as it stands. Each value listed in Red is a cost. Each value listed in Blue is an income. In order for a power to maintain it's holdings it must be able to pay for them. Undermining makes it harder for a Power to pay, that is how you can use CC to push control between Powers.

Yes, yes, all fine. We know all that.... BUT WHAT.... IS IT, DOCTOR?

(not shouting, XCom reference) So what is the overhead? that's the question.

On the image, [CC Income] - [Upkeep] = [CC Available]
Yet there is a CC Overhead value, that doesn't seem to fit into this. The only place where it could possibly fit would be: [CC Income] - ([Real upkeep???] + [CC Overhead]) = [CC Available]
Where "real upkeep" is not displayed, only the sum of "real upkeep" and Overhead, and it's named "upkeep"....