Alien archaeology and other mysteries: Breaking News, Theories and Tinfoil Hattery

Exactly this. Fdev seem to think that leading us into dead ends are good ways to conclude puzzles. Let's hope this upcoming "paid expansion" does something to alleviate this.

Well, there hasn’t been a noticeable storyline since Salomé died. FD need to get some real storytellers involved. There is lots of gameplay potential already that just needs to be pulled together coherently at a pace that provides some interest.
I don’t mind paying for decent upgrades, but new mechanics and graphics won’t necessarily be an improvement if they are used in the same haphazard way.
 
Well, there hasn’t been a noticeable storyline since Salomé died.

They'll blow up Eagle Eye network you'll see. That's to prevent using Thargoids as a false flag, to take over the Congress. They did it once before. Thargoids are genetic engineers, but they don't believe in killing. Far God is just a name for a technological singularity. Felicia's AI is the false god, slowly crippling her enemies. Black Flight is what you call the smugglers, the cartel, and the nightwatchmen. A nameless dynasty. A New world order of INRA.
*foams*
 
Well, there hasn’t been a noticeable storyline since Salomé died. FD need to get some real storytellers involved.

I'd kinda disagree, though I need to deviate from Thargoids/Aliens specifically to do so.

I won't spend time debating whether the whole Salome thing was "good or not"... think everyone already knows I'm in the "not" camp for multiple reasons. But fundamentally, that was really nothing more than FD-endorsed player-group canon injected into the game with a pretty rubbish supporting activity (Open-roleplay events are absolutely unworkable, period). There's plenty of groups with interesting "fanfiction" type lore which FD could support if they wanted to[1]. Fundamentally though, the Salome event suffered exactly the same thing everything else in the game suffers

IMO There's absolutely no shortage of reasonable plot hooks or story arcs FD have introduced... besides all the stuff about Thargoids. League of Reparation/Nova Imperium/Duradrive/Vitadyne have all been perfectly reasonable "stories". Players haven't cared about them though because there's a big, black hole of nothingness when it comes to in-game mechanics supporting these stories. You've heard me complain about this before... the things I posted above are just the tip of the iceberg compared to the exploded asteroid, HIP 22460, Wreaken Industries, MetaDrive and so on.

Take that celebrity who disappeared (I don't even know her name, the story was so uninspiring). It could've been something as simple as "go to any system within 20LY of the system she was meant to be at, and you'll see salvage missions for Escape Pods worth considerably more credits than your average salvage mission". The mission blurb could be "We've detected an escape pod beacon in system X, go check it out, it could be the missing celeb!". Let that run for a week before she says "Oh, yeah, it was a hoax!" at a very simple implementation. Alternately for a more complex implementation (and taking liberties with the idea of her being another Halsey/Thargoid abduction?) have those same missions, but have a rare chance of some Thargoid wreckage/salvage also spawning in the instance, and when you hand in the mission it adds some context that it appeared to be one of the crew from the ship. That would start the tinfoil... and if she suddenly turns up safe and sound, suddenly things get *really* interesting.

The, take Nova Imperium for example. Yet another rubbish CG which was never going to be won by NI due to the absence of a period where player-support could build for the faction. Have you seen where they are now? They hold two assets in Paresa now for God's sake, that's two key victories in that system, and there's nothing stopping them going to war for control of the Paresa System at this rate. That's because people *do* support them, just not enough to survive a CG against credit-farmers (who side with the winning faction) and a superpower with well-established support, when they're still a fledgling nobody faction. If the goal was to make NI a power or something; how about go out to the player groups and ask "Who want's to put their faction up as supporting NI?". While the mechanics of that get sorted out, FD develops more story around NI, and maybe introduces special missions or other activities in support of them. My faction would've supported NI, and I'm sure others would have, and then instead of a virtual Imperial civil-war playing out in one system, we could've had a *proper* multi-front rebellion across the Empire, with conflicts in 8 or so systems. Don't make a CG of it, but advertise it,, and the venues where they win could become Powerplay[2] control systems for a new NI power.

tl;dr I think there's plenty of absolutely reasonable storylines coming out of FD, just an absolute dearth of related activities. I'm not asking for players to have outright control over all the story outcomes, but at the least have some activities in-game which players can do to at the very least give the feeling of support.

EDIT: Take this recent article for example: https://community.elitedangerous.com/galnet/uid/5c5b04c165f38b692e2ea038
Who's Ambrose Foundation? Never heard of them til today. Where are they? Nowhere, according to EDDB. OK, so we can't do anything.

How about we get given a system, where Ambrose Foundation is a faction, and they're offering missions to donate money (Or heck, let's make a CG where pilots can donate arbitrary volumes of credits; this is kinda how donations should work anyway)
Local security services are investigating a possible data hack
Offering some freelance work to interested commanders would definitely be an idea right now! We could go scan installations, salvage data banks, transport investigators. But nope. Nothing.

[1] Notwithstanding numerous issues which would arise, which I won't bother going into here.
[2] Notwithstanding the forum rage that might cause because powerpants is a failed implementation, IMO.
 
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I'd kinda disagree, though I need to deviate from Thargoids/Aliens specifically to do so.

I won't spend time debating whether the whole Salome thing was "good or not"... think everyone already knows I'm in the "not" camp for multiple reasons. But fundamentally, that was really nothing more than FD-endorsed player-group canon injected into the game with a pretty rubbish supporting activity (Open-roleplay events are absolutely unworkable, period). There's plenty of groups with interesting "fanfiction" type lore which FD could support if they wanted to[1]. Fundamentally though, the Salome event suffered exactly the same thing everything else in the game suffers

IMO There's absolutely no shortage of reasonable plot hooks or story arcs FD have introduced... besides all the stuff about Thargoids. League of Reparation/Nova Imperium/Duradrive/Vitadyne have all been perfectly reasonable "stories". Players haven't cared about them though because there's a big, black hole of nothingness when it comes to in-game mechanics supporting these stories. You've heard me complain about this before... the things I posted above are just the tip of the iceberg compared to the exploded asteroid, HIP 22460, Wreaken Industries, MetaDrive and so on.

Take that celebrity who disappeared (I don't even know her name, the story was so uninspiring). It could've been something as simple as "go to any system within 20LY of the system she was meant to be at, and you'll see salvage missions for Escape Pods worth considerably more credits than your average salvage mission". The mission blurb could be "We've detected an escape pod beacon in system X, go check it out, it could be the missing celeb!". Let that run for a week before she says "Oh, yeah, it was a hoax!" at a very simple implementation. Alternately for a more complex implementation (and taking liberties with the idea of her being another Halsey/Thargoid abduction?) have those same missions, but have a rare chance of some Thargoid wreckage/salvage also spawning in the instance, and when you hand in the mission it adds some context that it appeared to be one of the crew from the ship. That would start the tinfoil... and if she suddenly turns up safe and sound, suddenly things get *really* interesting.

The, take Nova Imperium for example. Yet another rubbish CG which was never going to be won by NI due to the absence of a period where player-support could build for the faction. Have you seen where they are now? They hold two assets in Paresa now for God's sake, that's two key victories in that system, and there's nothing stopping them going to war for control of the Paresa System at this rate. That's because people *do* support them, just not enough to survive a CG against credit-farmers (who side with the winning faction) and a superpower with well-established support, when they're still a fledgling nobody faction. If the goal was to make NI a power or something; how about go out to the player groups and ask "Who want's to put their faction up as supporting NI?". While the mechanics of that get sorted out, FD develops more story around NI, and maybe introduces special missions or other activities in support of them. My faction would've supported NI, and I'm sure others would have, and then instead of a virtual Imperial civil-war playing out in one system, we could've had a *proper* multi-front rebellion across the Empire, with conflicts in 8 or so systems. Don't make a CG of it, but advertise it,, and the venues where they win could become Powerplay[2] control systems for a new NI power.

tl;dr I think there's plenty of absolutely reasonable storylines coming out of FD, just an absolute dearth of related activities. I'm not asking for players to have outright control over all the story outcomes, but at the least have some activities in-game which players can do to at the very least give the feeling of support.

EDIT: Take this recent article for example: https://community.elitedangerous.com/galnet/uid/5c5b04c165f38b692e2ea038
Who's Ambrose Foundation? Never heard of them til today. Where are they? Nowhere, according to EDDB. OK, so we can't do anything.

How about we get given a system, where Ambrose Foundation is a faction, and they're offering missions to donate money (Or heck, let's make a CG where pilots can donate arbitrary volumes of credits; this is kinda how donations should work anyway)

Offering some freelance work to interested commanders would definitely be an idea right now! We could go scan installations, salvage data banks, transport investigators. But nope. Nothing.

[1] Notwithstanding numerous issues which would arise, which I won't bother going into here.
[2] Notwithstanding the forum rage that might cause because powerpants is a failed implementation, IMO.

Basically, you can't interact with most of the storylines in any way, shape or form, apart from the odd godawful community goal. And I just don't understand why. It's like painting the Mona Lisa and forgetting the head.
 
Basically, you can't interact with most of the storylines in any way, shape or form, apart from the odd godawful community goal. And I just don't understand why. It's like painting the Mona Lisa and forgetting the head.

Definitely. And that's all it needs to be... doesn't need to be any player agency or influence, if FD have a plot they want to see play out no questions asked, just have some activities that actually relate to the story event.
 
I'd kinda disagree, though I need to deviate from Thargoids/Aliens specifically to do so.

I won't spend time debating whether the whole Salome thing was "good or not"... think everyone already knows I'm in the "not" camp for multiple reasons. But fundamentally, that was really nothing more than FD-endorsed player-group canon injected into the game with a pretty rubbish supporting activity (Open-roleplay events are absolutely unworkable, period). There's plenty of groups with interesting "fanfiction" type lore which FD could support if they wanted to[1]. Fundamentally though, the Salome event suffered exactly the same thing everything else in the game suffers

IMO There's absolutely no shortage of reasonable plot hooks or story arcs FD have introduced... besides all the stuff about Thargoids. League of Reparation/Nova Imperium/Duradrive/Vitadyne have all been perfectly reasonable "stories". Players haven't cared about them though because there's a big, black hole of nothingness when it comes to in-game mechanics supporting these stories. You've heard me complain about this before... the things I posted above are just the tip of the iceberg compared to the exploded asteroid, HIP 22460, Wreaken Industries, MetaDrive and so on.

...
<snipped>
...

IMO.

We are in total agreement. The Salomé “event” itself was not good, it was a poor end to an interesting character although I give credit to DW and FD for an interesting experiment and it got a lot of people involved. My point was that the FRift mystery and the Salomé storyline leading up to that event was brilliant, starting in a novel to give the characters some flesh, then being implemented in-game was a really interesting bit of storytelling and I loved the hours I spent out in the black exploring and looking for “something”. Though a few more clues would have been welcome, and a breadcrumb trail (where are the deployed “beacons”?) to follow/find leading to Zurara essential rather than just dropping her in a single system in amongst a billion others which made finding her almost impossible. The end of that story seemed totally forced (the poem which solved the clue to Zurara) and rushed through for some strange FD reasons; apparently because it was holding up the Thargoid “storyline”, which has since seemed to be non-existent; the UA/UP strange pointing behaviour is typical of this apparent lack of storyline, and what has happened with “the Club” since the”event”? Apparently nothing, other than maybe a CG to support a big party with no more information available.

My point was exactly this, there are loads of plot hooks given out on galnet, and some in-game, but these just don’t seem to be connected to anything else and galnet just doesn’t appear to be followed through in-game to nay depth. So why bother with Galnet articles & the weekly news? While the Salomé story was running Galnet was interesting and seemed to have lots of story-related stuff; since then it has been totally haphazard. Why did this change?

FD seem to concentrate effort on developing new game mechanics rather than using what they already have in a coherent story. I’m not against new mechanics per se, but often wonder why I continue to play after three years. FD continually confuse grind with entertaining storyline.
 
It's going to be all right. Jorki, come, play CQC with me. We need to become quadruple Elite before the war begins. The League of Reparation was only a prelude for what's to come. Only then will we truly understand what being an Elite means, not only a combateer in spirit.
 
It's going to be all right. Jorki, come, play CQC with me. We need to become quadruple Elite before the war begins. The League of Reparation was only a prelude for what's to come. Only then will we truly understand what being an Elite means, not only a combateer in spirit.

Afraid at my age Elite combateer is a distant dream, and I get nauseous in an SRV never mind CQC. I did get Elite Combateer back in ‘85, does that count? :)

As for spirit, I prefer lavian brandy!
 
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Tangentially, I can't believe I missed this one: https://community.elitedangerous.com/en/galnet/uid/5c5d9d27c9fc306cf10a1310

It's basically just a fluff article. Unspecified outpost with unspecified occupants being murdered by unspecified people, for a list of relatively nonspecific reasons.

This has generated a bit of discussion on the Quest for Raxxla thread, as it might be an FD hint about the stealth technology used to hide the Dark Wheel station, and perhaps also Raxxla. The station should be detectable since it’s emitting a Distress Signal, and could then give us some information on this stealth technology, but nobody has reported back on it yet; perhaps it’s another bit of galnet false news. Can’t check it myself as I’m on expedition with DW2, and my young clone Tyko is still trying to get friendly with engineers & hasn’t got any permits yet.
 
We are in total agreement. The Salomé “event” itself was not good, it was a poor end to an interesting character although I give credit to DW and FD for an interesting experiment and it got a lot of people involved. My point was that the FRift mystery and the Salomé storyline leading up to that event was brilliant, starting in a novel to give the characters some flesh, then being implemented in-game was a really interesting bit of storytelling and I loved the hours I spent out in the black exploring and looking for “something”.
...
My point was exactly this, there are loads of plot hooks given out on galnet, and some in-game, but these just don’t seem to be connected to anything else and galnet just doesn’t appear to be followed through in-game to nay depth. So why bother with Galnet articles & the weekly news? While the Salomé story was running Galnet was interesting and seemed to have lots of story-related stuff; since then it has been totally haphazard. Why did this change?

FD seem to concentrate effort on developing new game mechanics rather than using what they already have in a coherent story. I’m not against new mechanics per se, but often wonder why I continue to play after three years. FD continually confuse grind with entertaining storyline.

A major event like Salome should not have been the first event to test the idea. I may have been better to have a trial run with say ambassadors from the fed, imps, and Alliance travelling in human controlled ships in either open or a PG to some neutral site for major talks. If the ambassadors get killed then it affects the relations between the powers in some way. This may have highlighted any issued before the one off high stakes run. The potential issues like the G5 rolls for G1 mats may have become obvious earlier(due to players using them, and Fdev analysis the results), and been dealt with before the Salome event.

It would definitely be nice to have more story/story event in game besides the constant CGs (that do not seem to matter very often). Things like the Tionisla graveyard, the Pirate asteroid base from 'AHTW', or the Ceeper base (that likely is not in the game despite the locations being vaguely hinted at.) It is frustrating to think that these cool thread are there, but looking in to them is likely pointless.

Maybe if we start a thread to collate info from the book (with a minimum of spoilers) we might convince Fdev it is worth adding this sort of stuff related to the books. (it is also possible it is already there, and no one as been able to find it for some reason.) Sorry if this is too off topic.)
 
A major event like Salome should not have been the first event to test the idea. I may have been better to have a trial run with say ambassadors from the fed, imps, and Alliance travelling in human controlled ships in either open or a PG to some neutral site for major talks. If the ambassadors get killed then it affects the relations between the powers in some way. This may have highlighted any issued before the one off high stakes run. The potential issues like the G5 rolls for G1 mats may have become obvious earlier(due to players using them, and Fdev analysis the results), and been dealt with before the Salome event.

It would definitely be nice to have more story/story event in game besides the constant CGs (that do not seem to matter very often). Things like the Tionisla graveyard, the Pirate asteroid base from 'AHTW', or the Ceeper base (that likely is not in the game despite the locations being vaguely hinted at.) It is frustrating to think that these cool thread are there, but looking in to them is likely pointless.

Maybe if we start a thread to collate info from the book (with a minimum of spoilers) we might convince Fdev it is worth adding this sort of stuff related to the books. (it is also possible it is already there, and no one as been able to find it for some reason.) Sorry if this is too off topic.)
Salome wasn't the first event to test the idea.

"The Hunt" was the first "Open RP event" and it, frankly, didn't work either. The multiplayer technology choices made by FD mean that that style of event simply does not work, period. I totally get that "not everyone can be the center of the universe"... but to be:
- online at around 2am my local time
- in the right system
- at the right time
- in full awareness of *dozens* of players in-system interacting together

... but in my game experience to literally see just *one* other player in-system and nothing related to the event at-all was utterly soul-crushing as an experience. If I'd got there late, or incorrectly interpreted a clue, or had a run-in with another player that destroyed me and my chances of participating, fine. But to have literally zero interaction because that's the way the networking algorithm decided I'd connect to other players is a failure of implementation, and one that cannot be resolved due to the underlying game implementation.

Any future "events" need to be done in ways that rely on player interaction with NPCs/The PVE environment while still reflecting those player interactions in the game. CG's are one, poor way of doing this. There's plenty of other mechanics (Engineers aka 2nd Tier NPCs, missions, beacons, puzzles, items etc. etc. etc.) which FD could use to create great experiences. Player-RP events are simply unfeasible.

On an unrelated note, I'm also not a fan of adding external-lore sources as things in the game... but that's a whole other debate wihich is entirely unrelated.
 
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IMHO the Hunt or the Salomé events were, even though not without issues, better than anything we get todays, background-wise. Finally, there was something happening, even though one was not necessarily in the middle of it (was shut down in Maia by gankers in my Cobra III, and that was it for me). Not to speak of highlights like the breakthrough in UA decoding or the Merope/Col 70 maps from the Unknown/Thargoid structures and such things. When Drew was around, GalNet actually meant something. Nowadays, it's just filled with placeholder articles which sometimes are nice to read, but completely meaningless otherwise. I stopped reading them a long time ago.

O7,
[noob]
 
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My point was exactly this, there are loads of plot hooks given out on galnet, and some in-game, but these just don’t seem to be connected to anything else and galnet just doesn’t appear to be followed through in-game to nay depth. So why bother with Galnet articles & the weekly news? While the Salomé story was running Galnet was interesting and seemed to have lots of story-related stuff; since then it has been totally haphazard. Why did this change?

FD seem to concentrate effort on developing new game mechanics rather than using what they already have in a coherent story. I’m not against new mechanics per se, but often wonder why I continue to play after three years. FD continually confuse grind with entertaining storyline.

^ this. If they just used the existing mechanics to have a few storylines that you could actually interact with / participate in (and ***NOT*** statistically driven community grindgoals), the game would be about a million times more interesting. Why it hasn't happened, I cannot understand.
 
Hey, has anyone logged the Listening post in LP 855-10? I've searched eddb, edsm, and the Cononn website and can't find it anywhere, and I have no clue what it leads to.
a421990f-b6d2-4cab-978b-4668dd27d008.PNG

Any info would be appreciated.
 
Hey, has anyone logged the Listening post in LP 855-10? I've searched eddb, edsm, and the Cononn website and can't find it anywhere, and I have no clue what it leads to.

Any info would be appreciated.

Generation ship Venusian.
https://canonn.science/codex/generation-ship-venusian/
For future reference try searching for the 3 lettter 3 number combo in the listening post signal to find what it goes to. In this case what to search for is 'VEN-393'.
 
Hey, has anyone logged the Listening post in LP 855-10? I've searched eddb, edsm, and the Cononn website and can't find it anywhere, and I have no clue what it leads to.

Any info would be appreciated.

I compiled the Canonn LP & UCB data into a spreadsheet (see my signature) in an attempt to analyse where such things as Sarasvati units or other LPs might be found. Didn’t help at the time but is useful as a quick check (see Summary tab) and may help in future analysis attempts.

PM me with details if any more are found.
 
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