A Guide to Minor Factions and the Background Sim

[Axle Reese]

I have a question for the group about using the Black Market to tank the Controlling Factions influence.

We are trying to flip a system and I'd like to get an idea of how many tons of black market sales is required to really do some damage to the Controlling Faction. The main station owned by the Controlling Faction has a black market and the system has a Democratic Government, Medium Security and a population of 5.4 million.

Right now they are at 50% and we are at 30%, so if I can drop them about 15% that should get us close enough to trigger a war. I'm trying to figure out if that is something I can do myself in my Python in a few hours or do I need to get the rest of the crew to help out.

Cheers.

 

[Walter2]

Expansion does not cost % faction wide but only in the Expanding system.

Agreed.

CW/W does not have a % cost against it, as it remains static if no action in the CZ's or BHing.

Agreed.

Famine/Outbreak are not initiated by the factions and the movement of commodities, as there would be a % change driven by the change to the market owning factions %. (Neither of the factions mentioned when they were in Outbreak and Famine owned a market).

Agreed.

 

[goemon]

I have a question for the group about using the Black Market to tank the Controlling Factions influence.

We are trying to flip a system and I'd like to get an idea of how many tons of black market sales is required to really do some damage to the Controlling Faction. The main station owned by the Controlling Faction has a black market and the system has a Democratic Government, Medium Security and a population of 5.4 million.

Right now they are at 50% and we are at 30%, so if I can drop them about 15% that should get us close enough to trigger a war. I'm trying to figure out if that is something I can do myself in my Python in a few hours or do I need to get the rest of the crew to help out.

Cheers.

well, last test i have done (in 2.0.) was around 1% for 50T of illegal goods in a 1500 (!) people system. so - you won't get far with that python alone in a 5,4 mio people system.

 

[Walter2]

I have a question for the group about using the Black Market to tank the Controlling Factions influence.

We are trying to flip a system and I'd like to get an idea of how many tons of black market sales is required to really do some damage to the Controlling Faction. The main station owned by the Controlling Faction has a black market and the system has a Democratic Government, Medium Security and a population of 5.4 million.

Right now they are at 50% and we are at 30%, so if I can drop them about 15% that should get us close enough to trigger a war. I'm trying to figure out if that is something I can do myself in my Python in a few hours or do I need to get the rest of the crew to help out.

Cheers.

Whatever you knock off the leader's score will be distributed among all the other factions as well as your own, so the result is going to depend on how many other factions there are and how much of the 100% they each have. It's obvious that they must be sharing about 20% between them, so you will get the lion's share. There are a number of factors involved; population is one, but also how much other traffic is going through and what activities it is getting up to. There are also subtle influences on the Influence that are hidden from players. All will have nudging effects one way or another.

No-one is going to be able to give you a definitive answer. The advice would be to do a determined amount of sales and see the results, recording everything as you go. Try a different amount on the second day and see if you can spot a pattern. If you can't see a pattern emerging, it may well be down to other commanders buying, selling or taking missions.

You are in the best position to calculate just how cause has an effect in your system - and it's not always easy.

And why can you never buy from a black market?

 

[irongut]

I have a support ticket out regarding this issue and the support and even devs now have confirmed that during War you cannot gain influence in ANY system apart from the one at war and then only through combat related activity (Warzones/bonds)

This is not entirely accurate.

During war you can only gain influence through combat actions. This includes bonds, bounties and combat missions and is the case in any system the faction is in not just the one where the war is present.

On 20th August one of my factions was at war in system A. I cashed some bounties in system B and the next day their influence had increased in system B.

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We had a strange conflict issue last week. One faction with a winning war margin equalized and went war pending with the next highest faction on the day the war ended. Overshoot was expected but didn't happen. No ceasefire day.

Anyone else experienced anything similar?

I had influence equalise and an Election pending on the final day of a War on Thursday last week, I had also expected an overshoot. I still saw 1 day cooldown on the war, on the second day of Election pending.

There is no cooldown for war so yes, you can go pending another war the instant war ends if conditions are satisfied.

War and Civil War have a 1 day cooldown now. This has been shown recently with screenshots by myself and Jmanis.

 

[Mangal Oemie]

factions don't retreat if there would be <4 (?) left anymore

That's incorrect. I had a foreign faction retreat out of a 4 faction system, with now only 3 left.

I don't think that there is any qualification on number of factions, just whether they are local or expanded to the system. (Local factions can't retreat, of course)

 

[irongut]

I will go to the CW and fight for some Bonds, and they cash them in at the other system to check the effect.

That is something I've never tried and I would like to know the answer. Based on the way bounties work, I expect you will gain influence in the system where you cash the bonds.

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We did some limited testing. A 1.2m intel pack from a tipoff had zero effect in a low pop, 0 traffic system. Our working assumption is zero effect. In any case the time taken to gather any substantial quantities of packages would make it a very inefficient BGS tool.

Yeah I wasn't thinking it would be particularly effective but if there was some effect I would know to pick where I cash any intel packages carefully, as it is I can just cash them wherever I happen to dock next. Thanks for the confirmation.

 

[jimbeau1571]

That is something I've never tried and I would like to know the answer. Based on the way bounties work, I expect you will gain influence in the system where you cash the bonds.

That is certainly how it did work, some are suggesting that is no longer the case. Myself and my fellow Cmdr believe it is the same, but I'm testing to be certain. Results are in with the tick!

 

[SuBSynk]

This is not entirely accurate.

During war you can only gain influence through combat actions. This includes bonds, bounties and combat missions and is the case in any system the faction is in not just the one where the war is present.

On 20th August one of my factions was at war in system A. I cashed some bounties in system B and the next day their influence had increased in system B.

We are Anarchy so this cannot be tested for our faction.

We have tried handing in combat bonds in a different system to the one at war and still did not gain even 0.1 % influence

I will now ask all members to do another test by dropping combat bonds in another system since war is on for us at the moment.

Combat missions also seem to do nothing in systems when another is at war. (some people think and -have discussed in this thread- combat bonds counting toward influence but say combat missions don't have an affect)

 

[Sentenza]

We are Anarchy so this cannot be tested for our faction.

We have tried handing in combat bonds in a different system to the one at war and still did not gain even 0.1 % influence

I will now ask all members to do another test by dropping combat bonds in another system since war is on for us at the moment.

Combat missions also seem to do nothing in systems when another is at war. (some people think and -have discussed in this thread- combat bonds counting toward influence but say combat missions don't have an affect)

Yes we thought that missions could have an effect based on description, but tests showed that this does not seem to be the case.

 

[goemon]

That's incorrect. I had a foreign faction retreat out of a 4 faction system, with now only 3 left.

I don't think that there is any qualification on number of factions, just whether they are local or expanded to the system. (Local factions can't retreat, of course)

you made me searching the patch notes

- "Factions can no longer retreat if fewer than 3 factions would remain in that star system" https://forums.frontier.co.uk/showthread.php/276723-2-1-05-update-incoming

 

[_trent_]

do a test. go to a no-traffic system (at the edge of the bubble, low population, outpost >10000 ls from entry point), and sell something with a loss, like biowaste. do nothing else in that system, and record the influence changes over some ticks.

Took your advice and found a suitable system, ran a quick experiment to test the theory that selling unwanted goods lowers influence.

System: Col 285 Sector XA-E C12-23
Population: 4619
Station: Bacon Terminal.
Station Owner: Arverni General Holdings
Average number of ships passing through system per 24 hours: 1-3 (including my ananconda)
Starting Influence: 39.3%

Day 1. Influence: 39.3% Delivered 224t Biowaste, 224t Scrap.
Day 2. Influence: 39.3% Delivered 224t Biowaste, 224t Scrap
Day 3. Influence: 39.3% Delivered 224t Biowaste, 224t Scrap
Day 4 Influence: 39.3% Delivered 224t Leather, 224t Natural Fabrics
Day 5 Influence: 40.9% Delivered 224t Leather, 224t Natural Fabrics
Day 6 Influence: 42.6% Delivered 224t Leather, 224t Natural Fabrics
Day 7 Influence: 44.4% Experiment concluded

From the above, it would seem that delivering goods with demand has a positive effect on influence, but delivering goods that are not in demand does not lower influence.

 

[dynamicbob]

Took your advice and found a suitable system, ran a quick experiment to test the theory that selling unwanted goods lowers influence.

System: Col 285 Sector XA-E C12-23
Population: 4619
Station: Bacon Terminal.
Station Owner: Arverni General Holdings
Average number of ships passing through system per 24 hours: 1-3 (including my ananconda)
Starting Influence: 39.3%

Day 1. Influence: 39.3% Delivered 224t Biowaste, 224t Scrap.
Day 2. Influence: 39.3% Delivered 224t Biowaste, 224t Scrap
Day 3. Influence: 39.3% Delivered 224t Biowaste, 224t Scrap
Day 4 Influence: 39.3% Delivered 224t Leather, 224t Natural Fabrics
Day 5 Influence: 40.9% Delivered 224t Leather, 224t Natural Fabrics
Day 6 Influence: 42.6% Delivered 224t Leather, 224t Natural Fabrics
Day 7 Influence: 44.4% Experiment concluded

From the above, it would seem that delivering goods with demand has a positive effect on influence, but delivering goods that are not in demand does not lower influence.

has anyone tested with in demand and not in demand black market illegal goods ?

 

[Sentenza]

I would also add:

- repeat the test with multiple smaller batches, to check if no-demand has actually zero value or if it just has less value, so that more transactions are needed
- repeat the test with goods that are not in the market, not just in no demand

 

[jimbeau1571]

I would also add:

- repeat the test with multiple smaller batches, to check if no-demand has actually zero value or if it just has less value, so that more transactions are needed
- repeat the test with goods that are not in the market, not just in no demand

Pre Engineers , not in the market dropped the influence, I tested this myself.

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has anyone tested with in demand and not in demand black market illegal goods ?

Is there such a thing as not in/in demand on the Black Market?

There is no commodity page for the BM, you just get offered a price for the illegal goods. I don't recall any demand figures on that page.

 

[irongut]

Yes we thought that missions could have an effect based on description, but tests showed that this does not seem to be the case.

Missions with names like "Salvage for the War Effort" definitely won't increase influence during a war but assassination, kill x ships and destroy skimmers missions did in 2.0. Unfortunately I can't remember if I've checked them in 2.1.

 

[Walter2]

Took your advice and found a suitable system, ran a quick experiment to test the theory that selling unwanted goods lowers influence.

System: Col 285 Sector XA-E C12-23
Population: 4619
Station: Bacon Terminal.
Station Owner: Arverni General Holdings
Average number of ships passing through system per 24 hours: 1-3 (including my ananconda)
Starting Influence: 39.3%

Day 1. Influence: 39.3% Delivered 224t Biowaste, 224t Scrap.
Day 2. Influence: 39.3% Delivered 224t Biowaste, 224t Scrap
Day 3. Influence: 39.3% Delivered 224t Biowaste, 224t Scrap
Day 4 Influence: 39.3% Delivered 224t Leather, 224t Natural Fabrics
Day 5 Influence: 40.9% Delivered 224t Leather, 224t Natural Fabrics
Day 6 Influence: 42.6% Delivered 224t Leather, 224t Natural Fabrics
Day 7 Influence: 44.4% Experiment concluded

From the above, it would seem that delivering goods with demand has a positive effect on influence, but delivering goods that are not in demand does not lower influence.

What is the station's economy? It probably isn't essential to know, given the products involved, but each piece of data adds to the overall picture.

 

[_trent_]

What is the station's economy? It probably isn't essential to know, given the products involved, but each piece of data adds to the overall picture.

It's an industrial planetary base on a tiny snowball of a moon. It's the only station in the system, there are no other settlements, orbitals or bases. The system is listed a Terraforming economy. If you want to know anything else about it, just ask.

 

[goemon]

It's an industrial planetary base on a tiny snowball of a moon. It's the only station in the system, there are no other settlements, orbitals or bases. The system is listed a Terraforming economy. If you want to know anything else about it, just ask.

did you sell the no-demand-goods for a loss?

 

[dynamicbob]

did you sell the no-demand-goods for a loss?

WOULD BE nice to provide all the terraforming requirements for a terraforming colony and at some point see it progress along the development pathway