Decision Paper on Background Simulator in Elite Dangerous
- Thread starter Jane Turner
- Start date
Jane Turner
Volunteer Moderator
Problem is combat transactions are balanced against missions and exploration.
On the contrary, it seems to me that the changes introduced in the 3.3 go exactly in the direction I had hoped for.
More monitoring tools. More management parameters. The effects of player actions affect the BGS more transparently.
WorldsGreatestForumDad
Banned
Its a great step in the right direction.
This will be another temporary hotspot out of control from the players supporting a faction without information on its outcome to the BGS. I thought it would add to the whole lot to your own post here:
https://forums.frontier.co.uk/showt...te-Dangerous?p=6663557&viewfull=1#post6663557
Not what I said... and agree with everything you have written.
Poster I was responding to was talking about the changes turning BGS activities from indirect activities into direct activities, not to do with transparency.
It's awesome that the changes *are* making the outcomes of our actions more visible. But in my opinion, they don't change anything with regards to how directly we affect the BGS compared to what we currently have. I will still drop into a Distress Call, and it could be a combat scenario, or someone asking for food, or someone who needs fuel.
Sorry, but I can not follow you. If the BGS becomes more transparent, you can influence it more directly.
Now that it is opaque, my player group can condition it, including predicting future expansions. Tomorrow will be even simpler. I do not say easy, because there will be more parameters to check. However, parameters such as influence, security or happiness can not be influenced only by mission drops in the distress call. Players' actions will also have a bearing on the variation of states. Actions means trading, delivery of exploratory data and bounty collection. The black box will be less magical.
Help me understand your objection.
I disagree entirely with that first assertion. All the does make things more transparent... which is great. It's not introducing any *more* direct control than we already currently have available to us, as far as I can see from the streams so far. Though, to someone who doesn't understand the current BGS, the new transparency may offer the illusion that there is more direct control being introduced.
It just makes those changes more obvious. And my objection to the previous post which I linked the older livestream to is that the BGS *isn't meant* to be directly controlled by players, rather it's *meant* to be indirect. I even think Adam at one point says "..If it is at the forefront of players minds when they're playing the game, then they (FD) have done it wrong."
The previous poster suggested it looked like this update provides more direct control over the BGS; it doesn't in my opinion, it only increases transparency and gives players better understanding of how it works, which in no way provides any more control than we already have.
If I gave you a die, and you rolled it a bunch of times, and noticed "6" rolled up more often than other numbers, you may suspect the die is loaded, or you're just unlucky. If I told you the die was loaded to roll up 6 more often, you'd have increased transparency and can expect 6 to come up more often with confidence, but it doesn't give you any more or less direct control over rolling a 6. That's how I see this update (so far, based only on the videos and descriptions)
I kind of understand where Frigna comes from. Let me use your dice analogy.
What we in fact have now is this: you throw the dice x-times and at the end you are told: your total result is more/less than y.
While with the new system you will be told the aproximate result after every throw.
That means you can asses much more accurately how many throws you need to reach y. This gives you more control over reaching the desired effect than the first system.
What we in fact have now is this: you throw the dice x-times and at the end you are told: your total result is more/less than y.
While with the new system you will be told the aproximate result after every throw.
That means you can asses much more accurately how many throws you need to reach y. This gives you more control over reaching the desired effect than the first system.
Jane Turner
Volunteer Moderator
You will still have to wait till the next tick to see what the effect is
But this doesn't change anything.
Someone who knows a lot about the BGS already knew the die was loaded. Someone who doesn't know, didn't.
Increased transparency just means we all know the die is loaded now. Just some people were already using that knowledge to form an assessment.
"More direct control" would be something like going to the mission board and actively requesting, say, a mission that targets a faction to cause famine and loss of influence. Or alternately, in discussions with other players talking about "direct control", they want to be able to set the relation of "Their" faction to make players not part of their squadron hostile, or the canonical example, force all BGS activities to open so they can *directly* control activity of other players in the system. And as far as activities I'd call "Direct control" go, I don't see anything new in the livestreams in that regard.
These are all examples of "more direct control" which is not what the BGS is about. "Increased transparency" is the difference between statements like "Economic Boom makes trading more beneficial to a system" and "Economic Boom doubles all influence effects from trading.". If you didn't realise that, then that might feel like you've been given "more control" over boom. But if you did know or assumed that already then it's status quo.