A Guide to Minor Factions and the Background Sim

[Starwolfe]

Okay, thanks. Then I've been doing OK handing in at the main station, so far, as all the factions involved are independent of the superpowers.

And just to double check that I've got the logic right... Suppose faction "XYZ Purple" has expanded into my home system, won an election, and now controls the main station in-system. Now that I am trying to reduce the influence of the "XYZ Purple" faction, I go out to a RES site and kill Wanted ships ONLY from the "XYZ Purple" faction? Then I hand the bounty claims back in that same system (even if the main station is controlled by "XYZ Purple").'

My hope in gathering bounties against ONLY the "XYZ Purple" faction is to focus any influence decreases on that specific faction. I never collect a bounty on my favorite local factions, nor on any non-favorites I happen to find, either.

Thanks again for the advice and this helpful thread.

The latest on this is that killing wanted ships won't reduce their faction's influence. Just killing the one faction will ensure that you don't damage your reputation with any other faction.

What you need to do is claim bounties from your faction. Either get them from another system that your faction controls, or use a kill warrant scanner. otherwise, any bounties you claim will only help the controlling faction - even if it's their ships you killed.

Right.

To reduce influence directly you need to commit Murder of their Clean NPC ships.

Killing Wanted ships has only resulted in reducing my reputation with a faction, and has had NO impact on their influence.


What you'll want to do is turn in bounties for everyone that is not XYZ, that way everyone else goes up and XYZ only goes down.

 

[Limoncello Lizard]

I need to claim bounties FROM my faction. What does "from" mean?

1. That the Wanted ships BELONG TO my faction? - Easy enough (and I had been doing this backwards by hunting enemy faction ships, if so!)

2. That the bounty was issued BY my faction (supposedly on ships belonging to ANY other faction?)? - How do I determine WHO issued the bounty on a Wanted ship?

When you kill a wanted ship, you will earn a bounty. If you don't have a KWS, you will just get the bounty offered by the faction controlling the system or one of the superpowers (Alliance, Empire, Federation). If you have a KWS, you can also get bounties from other factions.
When selling bounties at a station, the faction that controls the station gains from the superpower bounties and the bounties offered specifically by that faction. But if you claim bounties from another faction, it's this faction that gains the influence.
So if you want to hurt the controlling faction by bountyhunting, and remain clean, you have to only claim bounties from other factions gained from a KWS.

As Starwolfe says, it's far easier to hurt a controlling faction with murder. But you do become wanted and gain a bounty yourself. This bounty makes it easier, as NPC ships start hunting you.

 

[mia389]

Combat Bonds turned in as a by-product of your faction handing out massacre missions is what is doing that.

Because you offer the missions people take them, and then hand in the missions plus bonds, leading you to dominate the war.

My experiences tell me massacre missions contribute to influence. You can think otherwise. I understand MM will draw people which then means CB.

 

[Limoncello Lizard]

My experiences tell me massacre missions contribute to influence. You can think otherwise. I understand MM will draw people which then means CB.

Your "experiences" mentioned so far all involve other players being in the same system. So you have no idea at all what they are doing, except by the results in the next day's tick.

The massacre missions don't have any effect at all. This fact has been proven. You can test this yourself, but it needs to be in an isolated system with no other player activity. Turn in massacre missions without bonds. Compare this the next day with bonds.

 

[goemon]

2.3. BGS related Patchnotes

here we go, extra heads-up for the new superpower-bounties mechanic!

New Content & Features (Horizons)

Multi-Crew
• Crimes system updated to support Multi-Crew

General
• Added asteroid base type station (including air traffic controllers)
• Added 32 asteroid bases in various deep space locations
• Added Megaships
• Added Bucky Ball Beer Mats rare good

General Fixes & Tweaks
• When a bounty voucher or combat bond is awarded, all players in a wing who would previously have gotten a share will now get a copy of the full value
• Fixed issue that was affecting missions at Jaques station

• Mic Turner Base had a population of 0, so added bakeout data for system "California Sector BA-A E6" so that it will pick up the correct details from server

Exploration
• Increased the credit values of exploration data for scans after this release. Unsold data from previous scans is unaffected by this change.

Factions
• Fix a rare opportunity for a conflict to start immediately after ending early
• Fixed faction influence change from smuggling weapons
• Faction influence change reduced from murder, interdiction and assault crimes
• Faction influence change increased from redeeming bounty vouchers
• Balanced faction effects from selling commodities with a zero purchase price
• Removed faction reputation gains from smuggling cargo at a black market
• Improved local news articles when faction conflicts end
• Distributed effects from redeeming vouchers from super powers amongst all minor factions in that system aligned to that super power

Installations/POIs/USSs
• Added additional installation scenarios
• Medical installation added
• Added Space Bar installation
• Added Space Farm installation
• Added Government installation
• Added new Security Station installation

Missions
• Made supply to demand overrides take max distance into account (Makes Colonia missions more likely to spawn destinations within the Colonia Bubble)
• Smuggle missions maximum range has been reduced to 100ly away
• Smuggle long minimum range has been increased to 100ly away
• Updated the influence/reputation shown on the mission board for missions so that it matches the amount it actually changes on completion
• Added factions involved in the mission on space missions inbox messages so that you know who you are working for, and who you are working against
• Mission specific cargo can no longer be sold on the commodity market, although can still be sold as stolen items through the black market
• Welcome missions should not longer contribute towards influence or ranks
• Fix to prevent exploit when selling abandoned mission cargo
• Massacre conflict and massacre skimmer missions limited to 3 per player at a time. Rewards increased slightly to compensate
• Planetary scan missions now limited to 3 per player at a time. Rewards increased slightly to compensate
• Decoupled normal missions and passenger missions selection, so a full allocation is available to each type

NPCs
• Added in the Vulture & Python to the police archetype, these ships should now respond to crime and have the correct skins

Passengers
• Added prisoner cells as alternatives to passenger cabins

Player Journal
• Fix for getting the correct faction when docking at a station (to write into the journal)
• When accepting a new mission, include some info in the Player Journal entry about the effect on Influence and Reputation
• Include Faction info in RedeemVoucher event in Player Journal
• Include target faction and count in Player Journal when accepting a mission
• Include local minor faction information in the player journal when arriving in a system
• Player Journal now shows faction data for redeemed voucher events

Powerplay

Station Services

StellarForge
• Added a dockable megaship called 'Fisher's Rest' to the Aldebaran system
• Hyades Sector Zu-Y D117 renamed to Fullerene C60
• Added starport "Rebuy Prospect" to Fullerene C60
• Added starport 'McArthur's Reach' to LHS 5287
• Added starport 'Bob Paffett' to Runo
• Added starport 'Jaitinder Singh' to Namba
• Added starport 'Mike Tapa Astronautics Ltd' to Sigma Hydri
• Added starport 'Contestabile' to Baltah'Sine
• Eol Prou IW-W e1-2400 renamed to Meretrida
• Eol Prou YI-W b17-19 renamed to Kopernik
• Eol Prou PX-T d3-347 renamed to Pergamon
• Eol Prou IW-W e1-3246 renamed to Magellan
• Eol Prou NH-K c9-40 renamed to Pyrrha
• Eol Prou LW-L c8-227 renamed to Signalis
• Eol Prou KW-L c8-164 renamed to Garuda
• Eol Prou IW-W e1-3167 renamed to Canonnia
• Eol Prou PX-T d3-336 renamed to Union
• Eol Prou IW-W e1-1601 renamed to Phoenix
• Eol Prou LW-L C8-10 renamed to Dubbuennel
• Eol Prou LW-L C8-6 renamed to Kioti 368
• Eol Prou LW-L C8-54 renamed to Mobia
• Eol Prou IW-W E1-3231 renamed to Edge Fraternity Landing
• Eol Prou SS-T D3-241 renamed to Tas
• Added a dockable megaship called 'The Harmony' to Yum Kamcabi system

 

[Jane Turner]

We have noticed an interesting effect which suggests that there may be slightly different values for the +ve and negative caps... we have a system that we've had the last useful expansion out of. Its a target for a player group that goes on regular murder sprees which we track carefully. Its very small population and so prone to huge influence swings. Our modus operandi is to let them have their way for a day, then ensure we get a positive swing the following tick .... we don't want to risk pushing over 75, so we rest again.... anyway - as the graph shows - the up and down bounce seem to be different.

 

[_trent_]

here we go, extra heads-up for the new superpower-bounties mechanic!

Thanks for posting this (saves me looking for it [big grin])

I'll be interested to see how the buff to BH and nerf to murder-related activities will work too.

 

[Mysteron]

Thanks for posting this (saves me looking for it [big grin])

I'll be interested to see how the buff to BH and nerf to murder-related activities will work too.

I will be testing it on a daily basis...

 

[Schlack]

Distributed effects from redeeming vouchers from super powers amongst all minor factions in that system aligned to that super power


Indy factions getting the shaft from this.

 

[Perseus]

Distributed effects from redeeming vouchers from super powers amongst all minor factions in that system aligned to that super power


Indy factions getting the shaft from this.

It can be seen as a dilution too. Sometimes, I need to install a certain government type over another despite them both belonging to the same superpower.

 

[Ben Ryder]

I've pulled together what I could find in 2.3 notes regarding bounty hunting etc, added some comments and tired to keep it neat and in relation to the BGS. The notes were put together for a layer group butt you should be able to get all the info you need from skim reading them and applying it to your own faction BGS activity.

https://www.reddit.com/r/EliteAntal/comments/64q434/23_direct_effects_on_antal_pledges_and_utopia/

 

[Starwolfe]

here we go, extra heads-up for the new superpower-bounties mechanic!

Good catch! I was expecting most of this, except the Superpower change.

That effect will have some interesting implications in the future.

Moreso than the change to affect independants, it affects everyone as it prevents a Federation Power in charge from benefiting from Empire bounties and the like. Its going to need to be something to remind players of in the future.

 

[CMDR-AD]

When you kill a wanted ship, you will earn a bounty. If you don't have a KWS, you will just get the bounty offered by the faction controlling the system or one of the superpowers (Alliance, Empire, Federation). If you have a KWS, you can also get bounties from other factions.
When selling bounties at a station, the faction that controls the station gains from the superpower bounties and the bounties offered specifically by that faction. But if you claim bounties from another faction, it's this faction that gains the influence.
So if you want to hurt the controlling faction by bountyhunting, and remain clean, you have to only claim bounties from other factions gained from a KWS.

As Starwolfe says, it's far easier to hurt a controlling faction with murder. But you do become wanted and gain a bounty yourself. This bounty makes it easier, as NPC ships start hunting you.

Thanks to both you and Starwolfe for the advice. I'll be putting this to practice soon.

This would also seem to make the cashing in of bounties make more sense. Looking at the UI elements on the Contacts screen, where I see the buttons with a faction name and bounty awards to claim... The faction name shown on the button is the faction that benefits when I cash those specific bounties?

 

[Sentenza]

Good catch! I was expecting most of this, except the Superpower change.

That effect will have some interesting implications in the future.

Moreso than the change to affect independants, it affects everyone as it prevents a Federation Power in charge from benefiting from Empire bounties and the like. Its going to need to be something to remind players of in the future.

The text is not clear on this - it can either mean "effect will be distributed only to all aligned minor factions" or "effect will be distributed to controlling factions and all aligned minor factions".

The latter would make more sense because systems can and do have no aligned factions for a specific power at all.

 

[Starwolfe]

I expect the former actually.

Federation bounties to benefit Fed-Aligned minor factions in the system, but not help the Independent-Controlled station for example.

This will warrant some testing needing to be done. Glad I know a couple spots for variables.

 

[Schlack]

My experiences tell me massacre missions contribute to influence. You can think otherwise. I understand MM will draw people which then means CB.

It may appear to be so, but what is likely happening is that the availability of combat missions attracts nomad massacre mission grinders. Each of those grinders would cash in bonds regularly boosting one side over the other reflecting the imbalance of mission availability. The missions don't have direct effect but additional bond cashing as a side effect of mission grinding does.

 

[Sentenza]

It may appear to be so, but what is likely happening is that the availability of combat missions attracts nomad massacre mission grinders. Each of those grinders would cash in bonds regularly boosting one side over the other reflecting the imbalance of mission availability. The missions don't have direct effect but additional bond cashing as a side effect of mission grinding does.

I disagree. Abundant use of massacre missions plunge the unlucky target faction to 1%. Try that with bonds only.

 

[fergal]

We have noticed an interesting effect which suggests that there may be slightly different values for the +ve and negative caps... we have a system that we've had the last useful expansion out of. Its a target for a player group that goes on regular murder sprees which we track carefully. Its very small population and so prone to huge influence swings. Our modus operandi is to let them have their way for a day, then ensure we get a positive swing the following tick .... we don't want to risk pushing over 75, so we rest again.... anyway - as the graph shows - the up and down bounce seem to be different.

Are the caps based on the system, or on each player contributing?

 

[Starwolfe]

I disagree. Abundant use of massacre missions plunge the unlucky target faction to 1%. Try that with bonds only.

I've nearly done that.

It is only Bonds that generate the influence swings, the missions are the magnets.

Most players that grind the MMs tend to go out repeatedly, generating multiple combat bond transactions as they return to rearm and restock on missions.

I have duplicated the effect just by repeatedly handing in combat Bonds in lower-population systems to the effect of max-influence swings during conflicts.

With help, I have gotten pushes hard enough to give the possibility of driving a faction to 1% - so the same result can occur regardless, it just needs the manpower.

 

[Schlack]

I disagree. Abundant use of massacre missions plunge the unlucky target faction to 1%. Try that with bonds only.

I have been largely going on what was said here based on testing. Haven't tested this mechanic myself recently and was always unsure - too busy with operations! Kind of a moot point with 2.3 as massacre missions will be limited to 3 at a time, reducing the level of mindless grinding - or at least stretching it out.