For assault, yes I should consider...
Perceived unfairness, or how to make people angry.
- Thread starter Martin Schou
- Start date
For assault, yes I should consider...
Hello Commander Cadoc!
Sure, some powers currently have easier ways of progressing and yes, we'll be looking at it over a longer term to see what kind of tweaks might be necessary. And if particular modules become problematic, being too poor, too good, innapropriate etc. then we'll make adjustments if we feel they will improve things.
But to be clear: we're not interested in evenly distributing Commanders amongst the powers or having a completely equitable set of options. It's not up to us to make them choose, or choose their level of involvement.
If the player base runs purely off of mercenary ideals, that's fine, they'll get the kind of galactic geography it leads to. If some powers die and others become enormous, that's fine - it's players affecting the geography of human space for the interest of all.
There are valid points about the ability for supporters to communicate and plan together, this is something I'm interested in exploring, much as I love seeing various threads exhorting various strategies for particular powers (absolute kudos for the folk that do this - I think it's brilliant, and much of the time, their plans are bang on the money).
In short, we're aware of various concerns. Powerplay is an ongoing system we think adds to the completeness of the game, that we'll continue to support.
However, it's certainly not the be all and end all of the game, not a "direction" we are moving in, not something you have to take part in (much like you don't have to play any particular role in the game) even though you may well experience the consequences of it. It's an addition to the background simulation.
And of course, it's not a crime to disagree with us! We can't all like the same things - life would be very boring
I would simply ask that we try to remain civil - there's never any need for poor manners, and no gain, either: we'll simply ignore people who are rude or mean, regardless of what they're saying and who they're saying it to.
Hope this helps!
Sure, some powers currently have easier ways of progressing and yes, we'll be looking at it over a longer term to see what kind of tweaks might be necessary. And if particular modules become problematic, being too poor, too good, innapropriate etc. then we'll make adjustments if we feel they will improve things.
But to be clear: we're not interested in evenly distributing Commanders amongst the powers or having a completely equitable set of options. It's not up to us to make them choose, or choose their level of involvement.
If the player base runs purely off of mercenary ideals, that's fine, they'll get the kind of galactic geography it leads to. If some powers die and others become enormous, that's fine - it's players affecting the geography of human space for the interest of all.
There are valid points about the ability for supporters to communicate and plan together, this is something I'm interested in exploring, much as I love seeing various threads exhorting various strategies for particular powers (absolute kudos for the folk that do this - I think it's brilliant, and much of the time, their plans are bang on the money).
In short, we're aware of various concerns. Powerplay is an ongoing system we think adds to the completeness of the game, that we'll continue to support.
However, it's certainly not the be all and end all of the game, not a "direction" we are moving in, not something you have to take part in (much like you don't have to play any particular role in the game) even though you may well experience the consequences of it. It's an addition to the background simulation.
And of course, it's not a crime to disagree with us! We can't all like the same things - life would be very boring
I would simply ask that we try to remain civil - there's never any need for poor manners, and no gain, either: we'll simply ignore people who are rude or mean, regardless of what they're saying and who they're saying it to.Hope this helps!
I don't understand this sentence. I may be misreading it (more than likely) but it seems to be a contradiction.
Good to see acknowledgement of this; I really feel like the in game communications needs to be completely overhauled tbh. I don't think you will ever see the full potential of something like PP realised if people can't plan without visiting forums and subreddits. As cool as it may be to see such effort going in to planning like that, surely you can understand how frustrating it is to see their effort come to nought because the only people who are going to see it are those frequenting the forums and subreddits?
The ALD status was entirely due to (successful, if misguided) expansion and had nothing to do with conflict. There is no contradiction; powers failing for arbitrarily becoming too large is not a valid reason to fail (instead, it would face contraction as it cannot support its own weight, which happened/is happening).
Hello Commander Cadoc!
Sure, some powers currently have easier ways of progressing and yes, we'll be looking at it over a longer term to see what kind of tweaks might be necessary. And if particular modules become problematic, being too poor, too good, innapropriate etc. then we'll make adjustments if we feel they will improve things.
But to be clear: we're not interested in evenly distributing Commanders amongst the powers or having a completely equitable set of options. It's not up to us to make them choose, or choose their level of involvement.
If the player base runs purely off of mercenary ideals, that's fine, they'll get the kind of galactic geography it leads to. If some powers die and others become enormous, that's fine - it's players affecting the geography of human space for the interest of all.
There are valid points about the ability for supporters to communicate and plan together, this is something I'm interested in exploring, much as I love seeing various threads exhorting various strategies for particular powers (absolute kudos for the folk that do this - I think it's brilliant, and much of the time, their plans are bang on the money).
In short, we're aware of various concerns. Powerplay is an ongoing system we think adds to the completeness of the game, that we'll continue to support.
However, it's certainly not the be all and end all of the game, not a "direction" we are moving in, not something you have to take part in (much like you don't have to play any particular role in the game) even though you may well experience the consequences of it. It's an addition to the background simulation.
And of course, it's not a crime to disagree with us! We can't all like the same things - life would be very boring
Hope this helps!
Nice answers, succinct and to the point. You also explain the lack of developers answers to any of my own questions. I up set you guys once, so ignored forever.
So it failed due to inherent problems with the game mechanics and needing external 'fixing'? Or are players not doing properly/ exploiting it?
I'm not trying to be critical or belligerent, I'm genuinely interested in the detail. If intervening makes the game better and make more sense then what would seem to be a valid and useful.
But it does feel a bit like 'The Adjustment Bureau'
So I'll presume now (after the changes) that conflict or a lack of expansion is the only way a power is to lose position or feel pressure, economical control and tactics is no longer a large part of the equation ?
In the design brief, I think that a power failing due to just size increase, rather than opposition* was not an intended outcome. If the mechanics were not fit for purpose, they were to change; no more and no less.
*(I would like a definition or clarity on this, as if ALD had more opposition in her expansions, the power would not have hit the turmoil - in fact the opposition to expansions actually saved other powers from it).
PowerPlay does seem to be pretty much about "winning".
From the PP guide...
------
At its heart, powerplay is a battle for territory.
At the end of each cycle the galactic standing of currently active powers is calculated, allowing the powers to be ranked relative to each other.
As well as provide an easy to understand ranking, galactic standing has two additional functions:
- The top three ranked powers provide an increasing benefit for one of their pledge benefits
- The bottom three ranked powers are in danger of collapse
------
For me, Elite isn't about "winning". Elite is about the journey.
Maybe that explains why PP feels like such a poor "fit". For me.
Well, that and its bizarre "weekly turn-based" approach, the near-total disconnect from Minor Factions (allegiance, governmental type), the invention of "Merits" as currency, and trampling on a well-constructed legal jurisdiction system (Hostile/Enemy).
While FD should indeed develop "the game FD staff want to play", do FD staff really want to play a turn-based game slapped on top of Elite? And do they want it played like this?... Galactic figurehead "Powers" run by vote? Artificially rolling back significant narrative events as if they never happened? Adding mechanics to force headless-chook players into making "sensible" headless-chook selections? Power-specific equipment on offer that is "small enough" for anyone to use, but only available from credit-hungry gameplay pitched at players who have progressed far, far beyond the small-time ships?
What happened to the K.I.S.S. principle of flying a spaceship from the pilot's seat?
Hello Commander Colonel North!
To put it another way: we don't think that brick-walling into insurmountable and extreme system overheads which cause the power to fully collapse is a valid way for powers to fail.
Powers slowly collapsing due to over-expansion is reasonable, and powers collapsing because they are attacked by other powers is fine.
Hope these definitions help a little.
Hello Commander Ixaxaar!
With the obvious caveat of no guarantee, no ETA, yes, I also believe that communication is key. I love the forum posts though because it reassures me that folk totally get it and make plans. I also think they're really interesting reads.
Hello Commander Arry!
Hey, I'm not ignoring you now!
We take each post on its own merits: when people are reasonable and polite, we listen. Unfortunately, much though I'd love to answer all questions, there simply isn't the time.
Hello Commander Colonel North!
Yes, in the main, this change is because we didn't really like the results of our overhead formulas, which were simply too sharp and potentially catastrophic. This was compounded by the fact that there are no brakes or warnings on expansion when a power is at a critical tipping point: we can't really blame players for doing silly things if we give no warnings.
This second point we hope to address in the near future by adding safety restrictions on expansion (see Zac's PP thread: https://forums.frontier.co.uk/showthread.php?t=163495 ).
Hello Commander CaptainKremmen!
Note that even in that description, the winning is applied to the Power, not Commanders directly. For the powers yes, it absolutely is about winning, and domination, and seeing their enemies driven before them, and hearing the lamenta-- *cough* right, well, yes.
And Commanders can share that glory and get personal rewards from it.
But at the end of the day, the Commander does not "win" when their power is riding high in the galactic standings, nor do they "lose" if their power is vanquished. Life goes on. As I heard in a song once, "the race is long, and, in the end, it's only with yourself" (Goodness, that's showing my age...)
My personal opinion is that there is a very important reason that Powerplay runs in cycles: if it didn't it would be completely unreadable, technically incredibly challenging and in all likelihood impossible to affect in any meaningful manner.
Cycles allow Commanders to read the situation and gives everyone the same amount of time to plan, act and react.
You are, of course, entitled to dislike Powerplay - that's cool, horses for courses and all that, I'm just explaining some of our choices.
Hope this helps.
To put it another way: we don't think that brick-walling into insurmountable and extreme system overheads which cause the power to fully collapse is a valid way for powers to fail.
Powers slowly collapsing due to over-expansion is reasonable, and powers collapsing because they are attacked by other powers is fine.
Hope these definitions help a little.
Hello Commander Ixaxaar!
With the obvious caveat of no guarantee, no ETA, yes, I also believe that communication is key. I love the forum posts though because it reassures me that folk totally get it and make plans. I also think they're really interesting reads.
Hello Commander Arry!
Hey, I'm not ignoring you now!
We take each post on its own merits: when people are reasonable and polite, we listen. Unfortunately, much though I'd love to answer all questions, there simply isn't the time.
Hello Commander Colonel North!
Yes, in the main, this change is because we didn't really like the results of our overhead formulas, which were simply too sharp and potentially catastrophic. This was compounded by the fact that there are no brakes or warnings on expansion when a power is at a critical tipping point: we can't really blame players for doing silly things if we give no warnings.
This second point we hope to address in the near future by adding safety restrictions on expansion (see Zac's PP thread: https://forums.frontier.co.uk/showthread.php?t=163495 ).
Hello Commander CaptainKremmen!
Note that even in that description, the winning is applied to the Power, not Commanders directly. For the powers yes, it absolutely is about winning, and domination, and seeing their enemies driven before them, and hearing the lamenta-- *cough* right, well, yes.
And Commanders can share that glory and get personal rewards from it.
But at the end of the day, the Commander does not "win" when their power is riding high in the galactic standings, nor do they "lose" if their power is vanquished. Life goes on. As I heard in a song once, "the race is long, and, in the end, it's only with yourself" (Goodness, that's showing my age...)
My personal opinion is that there is a very important reason that Powerplay runs in cycles: if it didn't it would be completely unreadable, technically incredibly challenging and in all likelihood impossible to affect in any meaningful manner.
Cycles allow Commanders to read the situation and gives everyone the same amount of time to plan, act and react.
You are, of course, entitled to dislike Powerplay - that's cool, horses for courses and all that, I'm just explaining some of our choices.
Hope this helps.
Mate, rep given, you've answered my question. For what its worth your explanation works for me. Common sense and simple language
Hi Sandro,
This statement certainly feels false to those of us who are still staying out of PP and working with the game on what I feel is a 'lower level' of the simulation. Please give the minor faction-based players some love. Things we desperately need:
- More information: The most frustrating thing about playing the game on the BGS level is that we usually have no idea what is really going on. Some of that is by design, I'm sure, but currently this makes the game incredibly frustrating. When you have a negative state that you're trying to get rid of, you can grind for weeks with no sign of progress. Morale and enthusiasm just disappears. All because of a simple lack of information. Also, waiting for the tick update to see changes is a huge problem. Basically everything you do in a 24 hour period just gets lumped into one change, so that you basically have no idea what works and what doesn't unless you empirically study only performing a single action for many days or even weeks. It's unnecessary for this to be so obfuscated.
- Better ways to defend yourself: Currently a small group of players can basically reduce influence from 100 to 0 in a miniscule amount of time compared to how long it takes to build up. Combined with the lack of information listed above, player group conflicts amount to mutually assured destruction. Nobody has any way to defend themselves (or even see how they could defend themselves) so everyone just destroys each other's work.
I apologize for a brief change of topic, but you brought it up; I just wanted to point out that for the BGS-focused community, it 100% feels like PP has overwritten the need and support for the minor-faction-based BGS, and we're all really struggling to see the point in playing the game the way we'd like to.
Hello Commander Colonel North!
To put it another way: we don't think that brick-walling into insurmountable and extreme system overheads which cause the power to fully collapse is a valid way for powers to fail.
Powers slowly collapsing due to over-expansion is reasonable, and powers collapsing because they are attacked by other powers is fine.
Hope these definitions help a little.
Hello Commander Ixaxaar!
With the obvious caveat of no guarantee, no ETA, yes, I also believe that communication is key. I love the forum posts though because it reassures me that folk totally get it and make plans. I also think they're really interesting reads.
Hello Commander Arry!
Hey, I'm not ignoring you now!
We take each post on its own merits: when people are reasonable and polite, we listen. Unfortunately, much though I'd love to answer all questions, there simply isn't the time.
Hello Commander Colonel North!
Yes, in the main, this change is because we didn't really like the results of our overhead formulas, which were simply too sharp and potentially catastrophic. This was compounded by the fact that there are no brakes or warnings on expansion when a power is at a critical tipping point: we can't really blame players for doing silly things if we give no warnings.
This second point we hope to address in the near future by adding safety restrictions on expansion (see Zac's PP thread: https://forums.frontier.co.uk/showthread.php?t=163495 ).
Hello Commander CaptainKremmen!
Note that even in that description, the winning is applied to the Power, not Commanders directly. For the powers yes, it absolutely is about winning, and domination, and seeing their enemies driven before them, and hearing the lamenta-- *cough* right, well, yes.
And Commanders can share that glory and get personal rewards from it.
But at the end of the day, the Commander does not "win" when their power is riding high in the galactic standings, nor do they "lose" if their power is vanquished. Life goes on. As I heard in a song once, "the race is long, and, in the end, it's only with yourself" (Goodness, that's showing my age...)
My personal opinion is that there is a very important reason that Powerplay runs in cycles: if it didn't it would be completely unreadable, technically incredibly challenging and in all likelihood impossible to affect in any meaningful manner.
Cycles allow Commanders to read the situation and gives everyone the same amount of time to plan, act and react.
You are, of course, entitled to dislike Powerplay - that's cool, horses for courses and all that, I'm just explaining some of our choices.
Hope this helps.
Cheers! Thanks for taking the time and effort to explain Sandro
(Colonel North puts toys back in pram)
They just advertise false, they claim you blaze your path and influence the galaxy,but in reality they hand crank everything ingame to their intended original path,I can understand why but people actually fall for it and think they can change stuff,own stations,destroy battleships,stations,etc...
Everything is instanced and hand cranked,I still enjoy the game but lets not lie to eachother that its a living galaxy.
Everything is instanced and hand cranked,I still enjoy the game but lets not lie to eachother that its a living galaxy.
Hello Commander Colonel North!
To put it another way: we don't think that brick-walling into insurmountable and extreme system overheads which cause the power to fully collapse is a valid way for powers to fail.
Powers slowly collapsing due to over-expansion is reasonable, and powers collapsing because they are attacked by other powers is fine.
Hope these definitions help a little.
Hello Commander Ixaxaar!
With the obvious caveat of no guarantee, no ETA, yes, I also believe that communication is key. I love the forum posts though because it reassures me that folk totally get it and make plans. I also think they're really interesting reads.
Hello Commander Arry!
Hey, I'm not ignoring you now!
We take each post on its own merits: when people are reasonable and polite, we listen. Unfortunately, much though I'd love to answer all questions, there simply isn't the time.
Hello Commander Colonel North!
Yes, in the main, this change is because we didn't really like the results of our overhead formulas, which were simply too sharp and potentially catastrophic. This was compounded by the fact that there are no brakes or warnings on expansion when a power is at a critical tipping point: we can't really blame players for doing silly things if we give no warnings.
This second point we hope to address in the near future by adding safety restrictions on expansion (see Zac's PP thread: https://forums.frontier.co.uk/showthread.php?t=163495 ).
Hello Commander CaptainKremmen!
Note that even in that description, the winning is applied to the Power, not Commanders directly. For the powers yes, it absolutely is about winning, and domination, and seeing their enemies driven before them, and hearing the lamenta-- *cough* right, well, yes.
And Commanders can share that glory and get personal rewards from it.
But at the end of the day, the Commander does not "win" when their power is riding high in the galactic standings, nor do they "lose" if their power is vanquished. Life goes on. As I heard in a song once, "the race is long, and, in the end, it's only with yourself" (Goodness, that's showing my age...)
My personal opinion is that there is a very important reason that Powerplay runs in cycles: if it didn't it would be completely unreadable, technically incredibly challenging and in all likelihood impossible to affect in any meaningful manner.
Cycles allow Commanders to read the situation and gives everyone the same amount of time to plan, act and react.
You are, of course, entitled to dislike Powerplay - that's cool, horses for courses and all that, I'm just explaining some of our choices.
Hope this helps.
Thank you Sandro for your acknowledgement
Hello Commander drhay53!
Hey, I hear you! We haven't given up on minor faction background simulation interaction. I know it can feel like ages past before we react (and sometimes, thanks to priorities, it *can* be quite a while), but I can assure you, we are/will looking at the issues cropping up in this area. With Elite: Dangerous development we're in this for the long haul!
Your points are valid (in fact, one of the reasons Powerplay shows more clearly what's going on is because we accept that the opaqueness of minor faction interaction has caused us problems).
So, as usual, here comes Mr. Caveat. Hello, Mr. Caveat! What's that, no guarantees, no ETA? OK!
We are looking to make improvements here.
Hope this info helps a little.
Hey, I hear you!
We haven't given up on minor faction background simulation interaction. I know it can feel like ages past before we react (and sometimes, thanks to priorities, it *can* be quite a while), but I can assure you, we are/will looking at the issues cropping up in this area. With Elite: Dangerous development we're in this for the long haul!Your points are valid (in fact, one of the reasons Powerplay shows more clearly what's going on is because we accept that the opaqueness of minor faction interaction has caused us problems).
So, as usual, here comes Mr. Caveat. Hello, Mr. Caveat! What's that, no guarantees, no ETA? OK!
We are looking to make improvements here.
Hope this info helps a little.
But surely you see that the people who take the time to analyze, debate, and suggest these strategies don't want to broadcast them to the entire community on the forum?
"hey, that power is trying to expand into a system that will contest systems we want. It would really benefit our power if we prevent that expansion. If we can do enough undermining with a last minute push, perhaps we can catch them unaware. The undermine trigger is in our favor here, so we need approximately this number of merits... If the other power sees this, they will overwhelm the expansion, just because of sheer numbers"
Do you really think a post on the forum is the best way to communicate strategy to other members of your power? Wouldn't it be better if we had a way to make those suggestions to pledged commanders in game?
Let me tell you about one of the worst gaming experiences in my life; not because it was offensive or threatening (although there have been some of them) but because it summed up everything wrong with listening to gamers who are trying to create virtual and alternative identities compared to their real life lack of Power Play.
EvE Online. I'd tried 3 times with 14 day free trials to get into it. And I'd decided to do one month of paid time and really make one last effort. "Get into a corp!" I kept hearing again and again. "The game is so much better as part of a corp!". So I joined EvE University, got fitted out with a tackler thingy set up. Joined a team speak type of server. And then spent 6 agonizing hours on one mission sitting outside a space station waiting for a single player to come out, or log out, who didn't move at all and just wasted everyone's time. And it wasn't that this is what passed for gameplay that made it so bad ("We locked him down!" was the claim for how well we'd done); no it was the 6 hours of attempted preening and trying to be a comedian and endless "I'm so baked right now" dribble poured into my ear. It was the fact that the kind of person who spends hours min-maxing to move figures on a spreadsheet just that little bit higher are usually the absolute last people you want on a stage trying to be entertaining.
So let's bring this to Power Play; I don't want to get in the way of the people who feel influential by coming up with strategies to push their little Power Numbers that bit more efficiently. I, like the MMO market in general, just want to have fun ourselves and leave them to theirs in peace. Powerplay doesn't do that though. What you seem to think "emergent narrative" is, is providing the bare bones numbers, some forums for min-maxers to push those numbers around, and everyone else to somehow support that. But it doesn't work. I've no intention of listening to self appointed community "leaders", even if in game you made their wishes somehow clearer to all of us like they want; and the moment they start being able to dictate where and how I can play, I'd abandon both Powerplay and the game itself.
Likewise I don't really want how I play to remove their progress to their goals; I'm with ALD simply for mercenary reasons; I want to raise my Empire rank and make more money bounty hunting which is my preferred method of income generating. And then, if I managed to stay with the game that long (which is highly unlikely as you keep extending the grind which just shortens my desire to beat it) raise my Federation rank and stay with them. But that means I have to keep myself above 100 merits or so now, which means I have to influence the wider politics by that small amount; And the game shouldn't be set up that if I have a small amount of success I'm going to risk the progress of the wider Power. We're really not playing the same game, and I shouldn't be able to reduce the effectiveness of their game by my actions.
Why not just have space expanded into beyond a certain point not have any positive or negative influence on a Power? Put a maximum cap on productive size. So space can be technically owned by that Power and might lead to narrative conflict later because someone tries to take it (Power Players will almost certainly see it as an attack on them) but all it does for those who want to gain from the mechanics and aren't interested in the Internet Spaceship Drama is give a way to "blaze their own trail" again? And where people want to directly complete against other Powers, their Power isn't directly punished if they're successful.
But I'm not and never will listen to internet experts on how to do this. Frankly the kind of community mindset that gameplay style encourages is horrible to socialise with. The kind of almost cult like intolerance to criticism on these forums too has already told me I just want to keep E : D a game I dip into occasionally for space ship fun, but I don't care about the wider community in the slightest. Power Play however tries to jam us both together, and that's not going to work out for anyone. So why keep trying?
It works for EvE because their entire ethos is "Make A Game For Online Sociopaths To Be Too Serious About". Where as Elite's entire history is based upon the "Lone Wolf Doing Their Own Thing"; although it also has the "I'm SO GLAD This Isn't EvE" crowd and the "Star Citizen Isn't Out Yet" market share too. So even if you can get the faction mechanics balanced, Power Play is going to continue to be a widely disliked system as a whole because it's trying to design an entirely unworkable game considering the consumers it actually has. You don't have to agree with my personal assumptions, or indeed even those who Power Play. But it's insane that Frontier don't realise that this is the kind of customers they have...
EvE Online. I'd tried 3 times with 14 day free trials to get into it. And I'd decided to do one month of paid time and really make one last effort. "Get into a corp!" I kept hearing again and again. "The game is so much better as part of a corp!". So I joined EvE University, got fitted out with a tackler thingy set up. Joined a team speak type of server. And then spent 6 agonizing hours on one mission sitting outside a space station waiting for a single player to come out, or log out, who didn't move at all and just wasted everyone's time. And it wasn't that this is what passed for gameplay that made it so bad ("We locked him down!" was the claim for how well we'd done); no it was the 6 hours of attempted preening and trying to be a comedian and endless "I'm so baked right now" dribble poured into my ear. It was the fact that the kind of person who spends hours min-maxing to move figures on a spreadsheet just that little bit higher are usually the absolute last people you want on a stage trying to be entertaining.
So let's bring this to Power Play; I don't want to get in the way of the people who feel influential by coming up with strategies to push their little Power Numbers that bit more efficiently. I, like the MMO market in general, just want to have fun ourselves and leave them to theirs in peace. Powerplay doesn't do that though. What you seem to think "emergent narrative" is, is providing the bare bones numbers, some forums for min-maxers to push those numbers around, and everyone else to somehow support that. But it doesn't work. I've no intention of listening to self appointed community "leaders", even if in game you made their wishes somehow clearer to all of us like they want; and the moment they start being able to dictate where and how I can play, I'd abandon both Powerplay and the game itself.
Likewise I don't really want how I play to remove their progress to their goals; I'm with ALD simply for mercenary reasons; I want to raise my Empire rank and make more money bounty hunting which is my preferred method of income generating. And then, if I managed to stay with the game that long (which is highly unlikely as you keep extending the grind which just shortens my desire to beat it) raise my Federation rank and stay with them. But that means I have to keep myself above 100 merits or so now, which means I have to influence the wider politics by that small amount; And the game shouldn't be set up that if I have a small amount of success I'm going to risk the progress of the wider Power. We're really not playing the same game, and I shouldn't be able to reduce the effectiveness of their game by my actions.
Why not just have space expanded into beyond a certain point not have any positive or negative influence on a Power? Put a maximum cap on productive size. So space can be technically owned by that Power and might lead to narrative conflict later because someone tries to take it (Power Players will almost certainly see it as an attack on them) but all it does for those who want to gain from the mechanics and aren't interested in the Internet Spaceship Drama is give a way to "blaze their own trail" again? And where people want to directly complete against other Powers, their Power isn't directly punished if they're successful.
But I'm not and never will listen to internet experts on how to do this. Frankly the kind of community mindset that gameplay style encourages is horrible to socialise with. The kind of almost cult like intolerance to criticism on these forums too has already told me I just want to keep E : D a game I dip into occasionally for space ship fun, but I don't care about the wider community in the slightest. Power Play however tries to jam us both together, and that's not going to work out for anyone. So why keep trying?
It works for EvE because their entire ethos is "Make A Game For Online Sociopaths To Be Too Serious About". Where as Elite's entire history is based upon the "Lone Wolf Doing Their Own Thing"; although it also has the "I'm SO GLAD This Isn't EvE" crowd and the "Star Citizen Isn't Out Yet" market share too. So even if you can get the faction mechanics balanced, Power Play is going to continue to be a widely disliked system as a whole because it's trying to design an entirely unworkable game considering the consumers it actually has. You don't have to agree with my personal assumptions, or indeed even those who Power Play. But it's insane that Frontier don't realise that this is the kind of customers they have...
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