Where did all the well-paying Passenger Missions go?

[Scoob]

Hey all,

I logged on this evening and, while waiting for a friend to join I thought I'd run a few passenger missions in my Anaconda. When doing this I generally visit a circuit of stations picking up passenger to one of the distant stationing in the area. These missions can pay very well, regularly 10, 20 and even 30 million+ depending on the number of passengers. They're not without danger, and stacking several before heading to the destination station invariably means I get interdicted, but that's part of the fun.

Anyway, after checking the passenger board at one station, then going on to visit other stations, every single passenger mission is between 50 and 100 thousand credits only. These are still missions carrying between 3 and 22 people, yet the payouts have tanked.

I have other means to make money of course - well I assume I still do lol - but I'm quite surprised that the passenger mission offers have utterly crashed.

My friend just came online and I asked him to check where he is, and he cannot even get the Passenger Lounge to load...so perhaps there's more to this than just an epic payout nerf?

Anyone else seeing this?

Scoob.

 

[Siobhan]

FDev swung the nerf-bat yesterday.
The missions are still there... the payout is gone.

 

[MarkAusten]

Hey all,

I logged on this evening and, while waiting for a friend to join I thought I'd run a few passenger missions in my Anaconda. When doing this I generally visit a circuit of stations picking up passenger to one of the distant stationing in the area. These missions can pay very well, regularly 10, 20 and even 30 million+ depending on the number of passengers. They're not without danger, and stacking several before heading to the destination station invariably means I get interdicted, but that's part of the fun.

Anyway, after checking the passenger board at one station, then going on to visit other stations, every single passenger mission is between 50 and 100 thousand credits only. These are still missions carrying between 3 and 22 people, yet the payouts have tanked.

I have other means to make money of course - well I assume I still do lol - but I'm quite surprised that the passenger mission offers have utterly crashed.

My friend just came online and I asked him to check where he is, and he cannot even get the Passenger Lounge to load...so perhaps there's more to this than just an epic payout nerf?

Anyone else seeing this?

Scoob.

Disabled for the moment according to FDev.

 

[Viper2kUK]

Just as Siobhan said, they brought in their overcharged nerf cannon and blew the *rap out of it. There's another forum post about Smeaton Orbital that provides more info on this.

V2k.

 

[Scoob]

FDev swung the nerf-bat yesterday.
The missions are still there... the payout is gone.

Ah, lovely, not been on for a couple of days and missed it.

Interestingly, I've just observed, is that mission to "normal" (i.e. not a long way from the entry point) stations appear to be normal. I jumped out to check missions to Smeaton - that's not where I usually run, but I wanted to check - and Passenger Runs to Smeaton are paying between 50 and 100k or so, whereas missions to other neighbouring systems can be up to 400k or so. Note that VIP missions appear to be fine, as I saw one for 6.9 Million, but they are rare.

To be clear: I'm talking about the bulk passenger missions.

Scoob.

 

[Delilah]

Ah, lovely, not been on for a couple of days and missed it.

Interestingly, I've just observed, is that mission to "normal" (i.e. not a long way from the entry point) stations appear to be normal. I jumped out to check missions to Smeaton - that's not where I usually run, but I wanted to check - and Passenger Runs to Smeaton are paying between 50 and 100k or so, whereas missions to other neighbouring systems can be up to 400k or so. Note that VIP missions appear to be fine, as I saw one for 6.9 Million, but they are rare.

To be clear: I'm talking about the bulk passenger missions.

Scoob.

Yet another nerf and intimations of ending mode switching.

 

[Siobhan]

Ah, lovely, not been on for a couple of days and missed it.

Interestingly, I've just observed, is that mission to "normal" (i.e. not a long way from the entry point) stations appear to be normal. I jumped out to check missions to Smeaton - that's not where I usually run, but I wanted to check - and Passenger Runs to Smeaton are paying between 50 and 100k or so, whereas missions to other neighbouring systems can be up to 400k or so. Note that VIP missions appear to be fine, as I saw one for 6.9 Million, but they are rare.

To be clear: I'm talking about the bulk passenger missions.

Scoob.

Yep... they disabled the distance multiplier... They *say* it'll be reinstated soon at a lower level. Somehow I doubt it'll change much.

 

[GunnerBill]

Hey all,

I logged on this evening and, while waiting for a friend to join I thought I'd run a few passenger missions in my Anaconda. When doing this I generally visit a circuit of stations picking up passenger to one of the distant stationing in the area. These missions can pay very well, regularly 10, 20 and even 30 million+ depending on the number of passengers. They're not without danger, and stacking several before heading to the destination station invariably means I get interdicted, but that's part of the fun.

Anyway, after checking the passenger board at one station, then going on to visit other stations, every single passenger mission is between 50 and 100 thousand credits only. These are still missions carrying between 3 and 22 people, yet the payouts have tanked.

I have other means to make money of course - well I assume I still do lol - but I'm quite surprised that the passenger mission offers have utterly crashed.

My friend just came online and I asked him to check where he is, and he cannot even get the Passenger Lounge to load...so perhaps there's more to this than just an epic payout nerf?

Anyone else seeing this?

Scoob.

Answer to OP in pictures:

 

[Scoob]

Would have thought a more appropriate response would be to offer people ample missions they can stack without feeling the need to mode switch. I don't expect huge payouts, just for the game to respond to what I'm flying. I.e. I turn up in a luxury passenger barge and get offered suitable missions to fill my cabins. Or I turn up in a Trade Cutter and they offer me some high-volume Cargo Hauling works. I.e. missions revolve, to a degree, what ship I'm flying, it's loadout and my local rep.

Scoob.

 

[Jmanis]

Would have thought a more appropriate response would be to offer people ample missions they can stack without feeling the need to mode switch.

That's at the crux of the issue. There's technical limitations preventing the sending of more missions at the moment. They bumped it up in 2.4 Beta but had to roll it back after it went live and it made the boards time out in a lot of cases, so it's not something a quick hotfix will resolve.

 

[TheUndertaker]

Disabled for the moment according to FDev.

AKA disabled forever. This is FDev after all.

 

[Scoob]

That's at the crux of the issue. There's technical limitations preventing the sending of more missions at the moment. They bumped it up in 2.4 Beta but had to roll it back after it went live and it made the boards time out in a lot of cases, so it's not something a quick hotfix will resolve.

Hmm, I'd have thought not an insurmountable limitation though - but perhaps the underlying code requires a major rework. That said with the addition of Wing Missions as their own entity, perhaps a new and improved mission offer system could be built separately. I mean, players want a decent variety of missions and to be able to fully utilise their loadouts, I've no doubt of that, so it's something that needs to happen.

Scoob.

 

[GunnerBill]

Hmm, I'd have thought not an insurmountable limitation though - but perhaps the underlying code requires a major rework. That said with the addition of Wing Missions as their own entity, perhaps a new and improved mission offer system could be built separately. I mean, players want a decent variety of missions and to be able to fully utilise their loadouts, I've no doubt of that, so it's something that needs to happen.

Scoob.

As far as I could discern from the FDev post on this was that the payout was a simple distance multiplier. So you travel 4,000,000 ls you get 4MM x n = payout.

instead of simply reducing "n" by say 60% they just set it at ZERO.

And yes as per previous flashes of the nerf bat it seem unlikely to change

 

[Lightspeed]

So FD have 'punished' those of us who play the game fairly because of the relatively few who were mission stacking at Smeaton [mad]

See how mission stacking and mode swappers harm the game for others ?

 

[Scoob]

So FD have 'punished' those of us who play the game fairly because of the relatively few who were mission stacking at Smeaton [mad]

See how mission stacking and mode swappers harm the game for others ?

I think a lot of us do the rounds of several systems near a location such as Smeaton, picking up passengers each stop. Only when full - or time gets tight on one of the missions - do we then head for the destination. So, multiple station / system visits to fill up prior to heading to the destination.

Scoob.

 

[Phazon Xenomorph]

They nerfed it hard once it went mega pubic and that someone bought a new account and hit elite trading from these alone while basically having no ranks in combat or exploration. So now we wait until someone reveals the next cash cow and jump on that bandwagon. Wish an easy combat rank trick would appear. Oh well. Soon ill have exploration elite and be double elite

 

[Jmanis]

Hmm, I'd have thought not an insurmountable limitation though - but perhaps the underlying code requires a major rework. That said with the addition of Wing Missions as their own entity, perhaps a new and improved mission offer system could be built separately. I mean, players want a decent variety of missions and to be able to fully utilise their loadouts, I've no doubt of that, so it's something that needs to happen.

Scoob.

It's explained elsewhere, but the skinny is more missions = longer waits and larger data payloads. What this resulted in was mission boards timing out or returning incomplete most of the time.

66-95% of missions generated are wasted effort anyway, so the fix is really to allow players to control the types of missions generated for them.

 

[Scoob]

It's explained elsewhere, but the skinny is more missions = longer waits and larger data payloads. What this resulted in was mission boards timing out or returning incomplete most of the time.

66-95% of missions generated are wasted effort anyway, so the fix is really to allow players to control the types of missions generated for them.

I wonder if handing more control to the Client would be beneficial in these scenarios? Then the server would just verify any relevant point as needed. I'm obviously totally unfamiliar with how things work now behind the scenes, so this may be way off. Basically, though the player would "submit" their ship spec and loadout in effect, and only a subset of relevant missions would be presented, up to a bandwidth-friendly cap.

Edit: just to say I had been experiencing lots of mission board timeouts of late.

Scoob

 

[Trinity Star]

Anyone who discovers then next cash cow would be wise just to keep it to themselves. Always folks on here who start crying.... oooh some random person I've never met or will ever meet is making lots of money doing passenger missions, I best get it nerfed before they come to my house and force me at gunpoint to run these missions....quick nerf nerf it!

 

[Jmanis]

I wonder if handing more control to the Client would be beneficial in these scenarios? Then the server would just verify any relevant point as needed. I'm obviously totally unfamiliar with how things work now behind the scenes, so this may be way off. Basically, though the player would "submit" their ship spec and loadout in effect, and only a subset of relevant missions would be presented, up to a bandwidth-friendly cap.

Edit: just to say I had been experiencing lots of mission board timeouts of late.

Scoob

I've made some detailed suggestions elsewhere that mission agents skills offer categories of missions, not instances. That way there's still a procedural element to it rather than anything jarring like picking exactly what you want, but then you'll at least be offered only missions of the type you want