Mahon turmoil?

MantisOlthoi · Oct 20, 2021

Rubbernuke said:
I'm fully aware of the differences- however one important job in Powerplay is being vigilant each week and checking all data not just the obvious reports. Ship patterns, bounties, unusual movements, the lot. For core systems this is not easy, but for backwaters you can tell unusual activity.

Of these, the traffic report would probably end up being the only indication, and a single pilot could easily UM a system. Imagine if seeing a single Krait MkII in the traffic report was the only sign that your system was UM'd! Lol. Which honestly, may well have been.

The problem again with the bounty board is that all of this can happen while folks are asleep or at work, and the cleared by the time anyone has a chance to check. Additionally, you can easily hide activity by purposefully having 5 CMDRs rack up 10-20 mill bounties against a power, have them never pay it off, and then do your UM attack months later while clearing your own bounties regularly to stay under the radar.

LDFR_Prozer · Oct 20, 2021

Oraki said:
Why are you still meme-ing about this? You and one of your squadron mates are literally part of FUC (Hudson namely) leadership. You are not independent, you are part of the federal machine.

What we do outside of FUC is our problem, we never warn any of the federal power about what we did. No one in FUC was aware they even screamed at us cause some wanted to take part of it.

So yes, we are part of FUC leadership but no we still do what we want as a indy squad.

LDFR_Prozer · Oct 20, 2021

MantisOlthoi said:
Of these, the traffic report would probably end up being the only indication, and a single pilot could easily UM a system. Imagine if seeing a single Krait MkII in the traffic report was the only sign that your system was UM'd! Lol. Which honestly, may well have been.

The problem again with the bounty board is that all of this can happen while folks are asleep or at work, and the cleared by the time anyone has a chance to check. Additionally, you can easily hide activity by purposefully having 5 CMDRs rack up 10-20 mill bounties against a power, have them never pay it off, and then do your UM attack months later while clearing your own bounties regularly to stay under the radar.

We had to ask favors to some pmf to help us clear the top 5 bounty board. Because every 10 npc kill we were in the top 5. The 3 first days there was my COMPLETE squad in the top 5 PP bounty board ......

Also most of the systems we were in the trafic was literally 1 ship, then suddenly 8 FDL join the trafic ? Sorry but tthey need to look at numbers better next time .....

Also your "instancing" excuse, doesn't work for a system that has litterally 0 trafic for weeks. It happen when it's an HQ, with a lot of rando trafic or a PP expansion system with a lot of activity.
But you instance EVERYONE in open in any random system with just 2 cmdr in it. (except if you block them but well that's another debate)

So yes, take a scout ship jump in any control systems and you see if there is someone uming you or not but for that you need to press open play and have a clean BL.

Rubbernuke · Oct 20, 2021

MantisOlthoi said:
Of these, the traffic report would probably end up being the only indication, and a single pilot could easily UM a system. Imagine if seeing a single Krait MkII in the traffic report was the only sign that your system was UM'd! Lol. Which honestly, may well have been.

The problem again with the bounty board is that all of this can happen while folks are asleep or at work, and the cleared by the time anyone has a chance to check. Additionally, you can easily hide activity by purposefully having 5 CMDRs rack up 10-20 mill bounties against a power, have them never pay it off, and then do your UM attack months later while clearing your own bounties regularly to stay under the radar.

Its why you have to check regularly and see the week to week changes. Its not perfect certainly, but its part of Powerplay and information that could tip you off something is happening.

Banana's_Are_Good_For_You · Oct 20, 2021

Should be interesting for all kinds of reasons.
PP is alive!

Khan Tannhauser · Oct 20, 2021

MantisOlthoi said:
Hauling in open doesn't guarantee you'll see other folks. Just that there will be more of a chance.

This is true sadly, but it's also true that hauling in Solo removes every possibility of instancing and as Quasipoisson said, when it comes to noticing UM activity in your space, doing your usual tasks in Open helps a lot.

MantisOlthoi said:
FLC claims to haul exclusively in open, but many times they're nowhere to be seen. You just watch as merits get turned in in a system where there's no one but your own wing to be seen.

We in FLC don't just claim to do all PP activities in Open, we actually fly exclusively in Open. Next time you try this my recommendation is to ask your wing mates to clear their block lists. One person blocking another might ruin instancing for two full wings trying to instance with each other.

MantisOlthoi said:
Instancing is a very important factor here. If you could always instance with everyone in the same system, this would be a valid argument, but you often won't. Heck, sometimes I can't instance with an Australian in my wing despite our best efforts. We'd like to play together, but we can't.

Not arguing for or against open-only, just that it's currently not the magical solution to this problem. The CMDRs could have easily continued to have gone unseen despite honest intentions while there's already a much better tool specific in the game to show that UM work is happening instead.

This "OOPP won't fix everything" thing is always brought up by the Open Only naysayers in every Powerplay conversation and it's true, it won't fix everything, but no one claimed such a thing.

There's no silver bullet, no single change will magically fix every Powerplay flaw, but the positive impact Open Only would have by itself is undeniable. As a matter of fact the most common points its detractors make are "it won't fix everything" and "they said all modes are equal in the Kickstarter", but you rarely see any valid points against Open Only regarding actual gameplay.

Rebel Yell · Oct 20, 2021

Khan Tannhauser said:
This is true sadly, but it's also true that hauling in Solo removes every possibility of instancing and as Quasipoisson said, when it comes to noticing UM activity in your space, doing your usual tasks in Open helps a lot.

We in FLC don't just claim to do all PP activities in Open, we actually fly exclusively in Open. Next time you try this my recommendation is to ask your wing mates to clear their block lists. One person blocking another might ruin instancing for two full wings trying to instance with each other.

This "OOPP won't fix everything" thing is always brought up by the Open Only naysayers in every Powerplay conversation and it's true, it won't fix everything, but no one claimed such a thing.

There's no silver bullet, no single change will magically fix every Powerplay flaw, but the positive impact Open Only would have by itself is undeniable. As a matter of fact the most common points its detractors make are "it won't fix everything" and "they said all modes are equal in the Kickstarter", but you rarely see any valid points against Open Only regarding actual gameplay.

L-O-V-E-L-Y

100% agreed.

There are not valid points agaist open only... just EXCUSES.

cmdr Ramius007 · Oct 20, 2021

Every pp relatd thread lead to this, but open only pp would be really helpfull, PP is already game in the game, with everything being optional, and not particiapting in pp not close any doors in game, it's just primary reason why it should be open only, besides being more fun this way obviously

DNA-Decay · Oct 21, 2021

Hotel California? Sure, why not!
My personal take: The game would be improved by the removal of the modes. Open Only Everything. I'm in.

But.
Realistically - Frontier will never do it, the modes are here to stay.

SO - Living with the modes:
I've said this before with regards to BGS and PvP.
PvP is great fun. My greatest weekend in any game ever was fighting PvP in Helios. AEDC and Alliance buddies vs SPEAR or whatever that Fed group was called. (and their mates)
FUN FUN FUN. Pew Pew Pew.
But - While me and a bunch of Alliance CMDRs were having fun PvP taking opposing sides in CZs, other crew had to do the actual WORK of winning the war for the system. Kill Kill Kill, CZ, CZ, CZ, grind grind grind.

PvP is Great, but it is a DISTRACTION. If you want to win at BGS or PP you have to just GRIND it out. Getting involved in PvP is a waste of time. There are no rewards for it. It is not efficient. Why bother?

While the modes exist, the players that really care about wining the big game will not be working in Open.

Misaniovent · Oct 21, 2021

LDFR_Prozer said:
What we do outside of FUC is our problem, we never warn any of the federal power about what we did. No one in FUC was aware they even screamed at us cause some wanted to take part of it.

So yes, we are part of FUC leadership but no we still do what we want as a indy squad.

This is all very familiar. There are two possibilities here: first, FUC leadership knew, in which case independent powers should assume they are targets of opportunity. Second, FUC leadership didn't know, despite your leadership position in the FRC, which means that FUC leadership can't be seen as capable of upholding any kind of diplomatic agreement with any independent power. In either case, I'm glad I'm not a diplomat for the Feds...but that's nothing new.

Still, good on you for shaking things up. If I had any faith that Frontier had any ability to substantively improve powerplay, I'd consider coming back for this. As it is, I'll just have to hope history repeats itself and this episode will end in a massive Federation defeat. Just, you know...without BID rising from the ashes.

LDFR_Prozer · Oct 21, 2021

Misaniovent said:
This is all very familiar. There are two possibilities here: first, FUC leadership knew, in which case independent powers should assume they are targets of opportunity. Second, FUC leadership didn't know, despite your leadership position in the FRC, which means that FUC leadership can't be seen as capable of upholding any kind of diplomatic agreement with any independent power. In either case, I'm glad I'm not a diplomat for the Feds...but that's nothing new.

Still, good on you for shaking things up. If I had any faith that Frontier had any ability to substantively improve powerplay, I'd consider coming back for this. As it is, I'll just have to hope history repeats itself and this episode will end in a massive Federation defeat. Just, you know...without BID rising from the ashes.

Shot first whine later. Our moto, and honestly better like this.

I don't want to lose time doing diplomacy, it could be spent in uming

breach_candy · Oct 21, 2021

Tons of fun. Thanks to all the kind people who dropped 1.5 million merits this cycle to kick the crap out of Mahon.

Tarkus Venius · Oct 21, 2021

DNA-Decay said:
Hotel California? Sure, why not!
My personal take: The game would be improved by the removal of the modes. Open Only Everything. I'm in.

But.
Realistically - Frontier will never do it, the modes are here to stay.

SO - Living with the modes:
I've said this before with regards to BGS and PvP.
PvP is great fun. My greatest weekend in any game ever was fighting PvP in Helios. AEDC and Alliance buddies vs SPEAR or whatever that Fed group was called. (and their mates)
FUN FUN FUN. Pew Pew Pew.
But - While me and a bunch of Alliance CMDRs were having fun PvP taking opposing sides in CZs, other crew had to do the actual WORK of winning the war for the system. Kill Kill Kill, CZ, CZ, CZ, grind grind grind.

PvP is Great, but it is a DISTRACTION. If you want to win at BGS or PP you have to just GRIND it out. Getting involved in PvP is a waste of time. There are no rewards for it. It is not efficient. Why bother?

While the modes exist, the players that really care about wining the big game will not be working in Open.

Open play is a play style some of us choose, it is not a distraction. It's more challenging to eliminate the enemy, keep a combat space patrol of capable PVPers on-hand, and let wings of your BGS combat pilots do as many CZ's as you want.

IMO if you aren't capable of beating the enemy or keeping them at bay while you fight, maybe you should lose. But I agree that's definitely not the way things are designed.

LDFR_Prozer said:
What we do outside of FUC is our problem, we never warn any of the federal power about what we did. No one in FUC was aware they even screamed at us cause some wanted to take part of it.

So yes, we are part of FUC leadership but no we still do what we want as a indy squad.

I suppose the FLC PVPers killing Alliance haulers in Gateway were all working on their own or something.

DNA-Decay · Oct 21, 2021

breach_candy said:
Tons of fun. Thanks to all the kind people who dropped 1.5 million merits this cycle to kick the crap out of Mahon.

Noted

FUC