Why are the current CGs so one sided?

[Screemonster]

We had that in places like Di Jian, with expected results.
People supported the NPC faction for the novelty AX missile launcher instead of the player faction.

The worst bit is: I'm involved with the player faction and the CG was just completely dumped on them with no warning, and they had no input in any rewards. We know collectively what reward we'd have asked for but nope, not even a hint from FDev it was coming.

See, this is an example of doing it poorly. That was just "boring alliance politics", not "grand struggle between good and evil, and evil has cookies".
There was no leadup establishing the player faction as goodies and the faction with the novelty AX missile as baddies doing a bribery. Or at least, nothing beyond the baseline "the sirius corporation are as shady as any other corporation in the elite universe".

I'm talking about something like... say...
Darkwater Inc in Summerland. You know, the absolute final baddies of the NMLA storyline and Theta Seven?
The Lords of Restoration, a bunch of corrupt imperial senators literally kidnapping the Emperor? Murdering millions of people and leading the playerbase on a series of incredibly bloody wars?
The final goal to wipe them out was a one-sided curbstomp to wrap up the storyline.
None of the previous goals had particularly offered to side with them, only pick and choose what happened to their scapegoats, like the marlinist refugees and Liz Ryder.
Everything else about the storyline set these guys up to be utter villains, the absolute definition of baddies, even if there had been an option to take their side in the CG it's unlikely the playerbase would have taken it, all else being equal. Because they're absolutely, unambiguously, the bad guys.

... what if there were a bribe on the table?

 

[Jpotter]

Rigged how exactly? There were no rewards offered for that CG.

The only CG that actually offered a choice was these that put Salvation against Aegis
EDIT: updated links
Salvation:

COMPLETED CG - Salvation’s Appeal for Guardian Artefacts

Summary System: PMD2009 48 Station: Glorious Prospect (Megaship, large pads available, 1,629 Ls from main star, 1,299.53 Ly from Sol) Objective: Deliver Guardian caskets, orbs, relics, tablets, totems and urn Time limit: 1st July 3307 @ 06:00 UTC Description Aegis Research and Taurus Mining...

forums.frontier.co.uk

Aegis:

COMPLETED CG - Aegis Appeal for Guardian Artefacts

Summary System: PMD2009 48 Station: Archimedes (Megaship, large pads available, 1,625 Ls from main star, 1,299.53 Ly from Sol) Objective: Deliver Guardian caskets, orbs, relics, tablets, totems and urns Time limit: 1st July 3307 @ 06:00 UTC Description Aegis Research and Taurus Mining Ventures...

forums.frontier.co.uk

I agree it was rigged, in the awards provided where the Aegis campaign's reward of a discount on Guardian modules was nothing compared to unlocking modified Shard Cannons. The AXI group likely could have carried the Salvation CG by themselves given the reward.

A Community Manager at the time mentioned that competing CG would drive the storyline for this entire year..... but we never had a choice given the rewards. CGs that actually drive a storyline shouldn't have special module awards; they should be space bucks only.

 

[Laszlo Plasma]

So the current CG (supporting Azimuth rebuilding) is also very one-sided, once again giving players opposed to Azimuth nothing to do but watch the story unfold.

FD - how hard is it to come up with some sort of opposing CG so more players can be involved? You obviously want more of the community invested in the story, so please provide the means for all sides to participate.

LP

 

[Rochester]

Generally any impact a CG has on the narrative in the present will be marginal, any opportunities that are decisive will have been in the past and around some nexus point, which likely would have been rather dull and poorly rewarded.

Galnet is not an independent news outlet, it is owned by a secretive group of individuals and effectively like with reality peddles a fair amount of propaganda.

Currently FD are in the midst of a conclusion to their big reveal narrative so it’s pretty much set in stone / rails, you can try and delay it, maybe, but FD have chosen for you already, it would need a unanimous landslide to have any true effect and of course FD will always dangle a carrot to tempt us down a certain route.

 

[Mrc_NorthEast]

So the current CG (supporting Azimuth rebuilding) is also very one-sided, once again giving players opposed to Azimuth nothing to do but watch the story unfold.

To me it depends in how you look at it. I am selling tons of gallite that I BOUGHT from a different station. It will not count in the CG, and in theory will not help Azimuth get whatever it is they want.

So why do I do that? $$,$$$,$$$! Money, Money and Mo Money. If you buy any of the commodities it will not count, so the impact to the plot will be zero and you still get the greenbacks.

 

[Ian Doncaster]

So the current CG (supporting Azimuth rebuilding) is also very one-sided, once again giving players opposed to Azimuth nothing to do but watch the story unfold.

FD - how hard is it to come up with some sort of opposing CG so more players can be involved? You obviously want more of the community invested in the story, so please provide the means for all sides to participate.

Sure, but that's probably necessary. The player base, collectively, generally wants to keep the status quo, but maybe with an extra station and some new shinies. Groups offering to seriously shake things up - Jupiter Division, the NMLA, Aden Tanner, Imperator Mordanticus, President Hudson, whoever - tend to lose in a fair fight and often lose even in a fight somewhat leaning in their favour on the quantitative side.

That means that if players get a choice too early in the plot, they'll sensibly - but undramatically - stomp on problems with maximum force before they get anywhere. And then there's no actual plot because all the antagonists and a good chunk of the protagonists got flattened in their first appearance.

So the situation here isn't a choice between "help Azimuth mine" and "stop Azimuth getting mined goods" but between "Azimuth get a Galnet article saying that they're rebuilding infrastructure, no CG this week" and "Azimuth host a filler mining CG so there's something to do while they get the next bit of the plot ready", with a bit of a side note to explain that it's necessary in part because of previous successful opposition. (You got acknowledged! That's big!)



From an in-universe perspective? CGs need sponsors. Azimuth might have a lot of enemies by now but I can't think of any that are particularly in a position to sponsor an aggressive counter CG - and it would have to be aggressive, not just "deliver some mined ores somewhere else instead". Maybe if they let Tanner out of jail he'll launch a raid to try to recapture the Musashi later?

 

[Laszlo Plasma]

Currently FD are in the midst of a conclusion to their big reveal narrative so it’s pretty much set in stone / rails, you can try and delay it, maybe, but FD have chosen for you already, it would need a unanimous landslide to have any true effect and of course FD will always dangle a carrot to tempt us down a certain route.

I understand that the narrative at this point is pretty much set in stone. My comment isn't about a CG trying to derail or alter the narrative, but rather I think FD could be more creative in their CGs to appeal to a wider audience of players within the narrative.

This current one has attracted about 1000 participants, which is smallish compared to many other CGs. If the goal is to involve more of the community and get more players to feel they are part of the narrative, this current CG is not the way to do it.

Perhaps I'm in the minority, but for me the CGs are motivation to play the game and be part of the narrative, rather than just reading Galnet updates to keep up with the story.

LP

 

[Ian Doncaster]

This current one has attracted about 1000 participants, which is smallish compared to many other CGs.

Though not atypical for a mining CG after a couple of days, they're almost always less popular than the trade/combat ones are. It's likely to end early - the quantity delivered will be the largest for any mining CG since Feb 2021 if it does - and will probably get up to around the 2000 participant mark that a popular mining CG gets before then.

 

[Lugh]

Seems to me the only motivation is get get cash and loot.

That's pretty much always been the only motivation. The majority of the player base couldn't care less about the background of the cgs.

The average player asks one or two questions.

What's the reward?

And

What do I need to do?

 

[Factabulous]

Given that the CG is for the people who just riled the Thargoids and brought them down on us, and the only reward is a permit for a system that you could have gotten easily any time in the last year, then I'm surprised it has done as well as it has.

Well, apart from what lugh said ^^^^, which explains it all

 

[Rainbro]

Just gotta organise and prepare for the next possible opposition CG. It'd be great if every CG was actually a meaningful challenge that could be opposed or even just failed, but that could be messy. So we have the ocassional divergence point padded out with these one-way CGs - this particular period inbetween choices just suffers from being quite a bit longer with how Azimuth blockaded the CG schedule for weeks. We're probably due more filler until update 14 at the earliest, Frontier originally stated the Azimuth saga was planned out until sometime in 2022, so I expect by now they're having to ration out what they had planned until the next phase is ready. They probably started early there, hello Colonia Bridge.

But in the meanwhile, you can prepare. Find other likeminded players, make a group, be ready to divebomb an important CG the moment it appears.

 

[Ian Doncaster]

That's pretty much always been the only motivation. The majority of the player base couldn't care less about the background of the cgs.

The average player asks one or two questions.

...and then goes and does something entirely unrelated to whatever the week's CG is, unlike the few thousands who actually show up some of the time.

(But the impact of doing plot events goes way beyond just the participants, so it's fortunately still worth Frontier's time to do them!)

I'm surprised it has done as well as it has

With hindsight, it's asking for three materials which can all be bulk-mined in the same non-icy ring, which probably speeds up collection considerably compared with the "two icy and a metal-rich" that mining CGs often have. Participant numbers aren't much different to the usual, but delivery rates are much higher than normal.

 

[Jack Winter]

I wonder if this CG wasn't a bit of trolling.. Like you all saw what Azimuth has done and what kind of morals they have. Are you really going to help them just to get a Mbooni permit, so that you can get more Salvation modded weapons...

 

[Factabulous]

Are you really going to help them just to get a Mbooni permit, so that you can get more Salvation modded weapons...

Apparently the answer was - yes, verymuchso

 

[MacHurto]

I wonder if this CG wasn't a bit of trolling.. Like you all saw what Azimuth has done and what kind of morals they have. Are you really going to help them just to get a Mbooni permit, so that you can get more Salvation modded weapons...

It was also set extremely low. Wasn't T1 reached already Thursday?

 

[Ian Doncaster]

It was also set extremely low. Wasn't T1 reached already Thursday?

It was not set extremely low - the T4 target of 850kT has only been exceeded three times by mining CGs - the two Distant Worlds ones which are rather special cases, and the one Liz Ryder ran pre-Odyssey to make her improved missile launchers available through Tech Brokers. At typical mining CG rates it would have cleared T3 but been well short of T4 by the end of the week. Similarly, participation numbers exceeded all but those three mining CGs.

They didn't make it easy, but perhaps they were expecting the talk of opposing Azimuth/Salvation to translate a little more into not showing up for them that they also didn't feel the need to make it unusually difficult?

 

[MacHurto]

It was not set extremely low - the T4 target of 850kT has only been exceeded three times by mining CGs - the two Distant Worlds ones which are rather special cases, and the one Liz Ryder ran pre-Odyssey to make her improved missile launchers available through Tech Brokers. At typical mining CG rates it would have cleared T3 but been well short of T4 by the end of the week. Similarly, participation numbers exceeded all but those three mining CGs.

They didn't make it easy, but perhaps they were expecting the talk of opposing Azimuth/Salvation to translate a little more into not showing up for them that they also didn't feel the need to make it unusually difficult?

Ok, thanks for the comparison with other CGs. I guess that proves that people really wanted the permit, like Azimuth or, maybe, that CMDRs are moved by good credit opportunities, regardless of how many billions they already have.

Was T1 also set at a similar level of other mining CGs? At the end of the day success is measured on T1, not completing all Tiers.

 

[Ian Doncaster]

Was T1 also set at a similar level of other mining CGs?

Hard to say, since the other mining CGs - and there really haven't been many in the last two years - also had more than four tiers to start with and were either competitive or had specific per-tier effects.

The usual tier curves for ones which don't have published per-tier effects tend to be somewhat accelerating, so I didn't think T1 was positioned unusually on that basis (T3 was perhaps a little lower than normal, maybe?)

At the end of the day success is measured on T1, not completing all Tiers.

In the context of an individual CG, certainly - but we have also seen Frontier give extra screen time to more popular groups, so if Azimuth consistently get strong CG performances it might still affect things a bit.

 

[Jack Winter]

Ok, thanks for the comparison with other CGs. I guess that proves that people really wanted the permit, like Azimuth or, maybe, that CMDRs are moved by good credit opportunities, regardless of how many billions they already have.

There was the opportunity to earn a lot of credits by either mining (or buying) and delivering the goods without participating in the CG, in fact if commanders would have taken that course of action the CG would still be open.

 

[MacHurto]

There was the opportunity to earn a lot of credits by either mining (or buying) and delivering the goods without participating in the CG, in fact if commanders would have taken that course of action the CG would still be open.

But delivering without signing in would be asking for hundreds of casual players to work together in that direction, extending the CG duration. It was the same for the Tritium CG and it also didn't happen there where the money rewards were much higher.

My comment about CMDRs moving for profits was more a comparison to the Alliance AX CG before this one, that barely reached T2.