BGS changes: Learnings/Issues/comments

[Dommarraa]

Poor olde me is really confused at what I have just read.

Regarding this expansion m'larky,
The FDevs made a big thing about saying how we would expand from the 'Happiest' system that we own.

'Happiest' for me is something I only see in one of our 24 systems. It is an awful system that I would love to disown. W never really work the location and it is certainly not in the best of 'states'

Are we now saying those words spilled out by the developers is a load of tosh and it is once again influence that is the deciding factor?

We should not really say that expansion could not fail prior to this update as for me it did on a few occasions, some of which I manipulated, others purely because they felt like it and after a cooldown period, this failed expansion went exactly to the system I was hoping to get. When this game first started I thought there was a very long pdf file which explained most of the basics and I thought it said in that book 'Expansion might fail'

Going back to my question

Happiest'

Is it only seen in just one of our systems and if so what on earth is its meaning?

Thanks
John

Yes, it appears that everything they said about expansion is so far total tosh:
Happyess is irrelevant.
Happiest tag on Squad page is a lie.
You cannot cut and Expansion short by any known means.
It is still using the 1st system to be processed over 75% just as 3.2 (1st system can be determined over a very long period, now an even longer period)
Expansion will still fail if there is nothing in Range. You will get no message that it has failed, you will just see no new systems.
Investment is no longer anything to do with a Expansion (unless maybe being in Investment still increases your range, not tested)

 

[glojo]

You cannot cut and Expansion short by any known means.
Expansion will still fail if there is nothing in Range. You will get no message that it has failed, you will just see no new systems.

Oops,
My bad I did not waffle enough..

Deliberately failing an Expansion
I should have said..... old way of getting Expansion to fail whilst it is in an active and working state of 'PENDING'

My bad and apologies for the confusion. To me a 'state' or condition was all about a game of 'Trumps' and war tended to be your ace card. If I saw ANY of our systems go into 'Pending Expansion' I would do my very, very best to get a war started or should I say pending war. I am not too sure about this point as it is really encompassed by the statement regarding how we just failed an expansion. I can recall the day a war ended, we had an expansion fail, was this a coincidence but back in those far off days we did get a message saying 'Tough doo doo's, your expansion failed' perhaps not in those exact words though

I wonder if the two differing states going pending would still work but would they have to be in the same system? Not so easy to get a war going in such a very, very short window. Hmmmm... Yes we can have multiple stations in a system but my thoughts that we can only have one state, so would the manipulation to get a war pending simply not work? This is me thinking aloud as I have not tried this.

 

[Ian Doncaster]

Investment is no longer anything to do with a Expansion (unless maybe being in Investment still increases your range, not tested)

Being in Investment when the Expansion completes does not increase your range.

(Other things might - but I haven't had an opportunity to check those yet)

 

[Schlack]

The new expansion mechanics were not included in the beta - and I heard nothing since that suggested a change. Given how the BGS, ahem, currently works I am not surprised that they decided not to introduce a further change.

 

[Dommarraa]

The new expansion mechanics were not included in the beta - and I heard nothing since that suggested a change. Given how the BGS, ahem, currently works I am not surprised that they decided not to introduce a further change.

The change to Expansion was the one thing I was looking forward to, as it would mean less need to play whack-a-mole reducing Inf in higher priority systems. So I am livid. OTOH, the horrid bug that crushes inf for a controlling faction means getting over 75% in a system with any traffic is virtually impossible, so no more whack-a-mole anyway.

 

[Dommarraa]

Smuggling doesnt have an effect on the Election Slider (ignoring bugs). Pity, I dont much like the mission profile.

 

[dAlexis]

Ok,

we lost again Elections.

The BGS acts completely random, one day you do stuff and win, the day after you do the same stuff and lose.

Doing INF+++++ missions in another system in NONE state led to NONE change.

I'm out of this crap for now. Thanx Frontier for crippling the game and for wasting a lot of our time.

Due to this I started a thread in common discussion (please, see https://forums.frontier.co.uk/showthread.php/471066-Something-needed-to-be-done-with-log-file). I strongly suspect, that all these +++++ missions are really NOT present at all. Let it be known not only by BGS players...

 

[Screemonster]

Well... you need to hurt your economy to get it out which is nontrivial (e.g there's no factions in bust or famine because it's not easy)
Why do you want to get rid out the state? It shouldn't be hurting your faction at all

Testing with our PMF suggests that investment is still causing the influence-drain that pre 3.3 investment caused (which made sense as it was tied to expansion) but now it's turning into an uphill fight since everything we can do to keep influence from tanking is also shoring up the investment state.

 

[Ian Doncaster]

Testing with our PMF suggests that investment is still causing the influence-drain that pre 3.3 investment caused (which made sense as it was tied to expansion) but now it's turning into an uphill fight since everything we can do to keep influence from tanking is also shoring up the investment state.

I don't see any direct influence drain from Investment (and I don't recall it ever doing that in 3.2 either) - systems with no transactions and a controller in Investment stay at static influence.

 

[Dommarraa]

I don't see any direct influence drain from Investment (and I don't recall it ever doing that in 3.2 either) - systems with no transactions and a controller in Investment stay at static influence.

Agreed. I like the idea, and it does seem correlate quite well, but No traffic = No drain.
In our sphere of influence, its the systems with most traffic that are tanking the most. Maybe Investment comes with a Transaction Tax of some type. Or maybe its all just borked.

 

[Schlack]

Or maybe its all just borked.

I think this is the only conclusion that can be currently drawn with any certainty. Exactly how it is borked is open to question. The target effects of violence missions are bugged giving positive inf and SECO state effects. Explo is bugged giving wildly inconsistent results. Other actions also give inconsistent and unexpected results. It is impossible to tell in these circumstances the difference between bugs and the effects of the new bgs.

 

[Jmanis]

I don't see any direct influence drain from Investment (and I don't recall it ever doing that in 3.2 either) - systems with no transactions and a controller in Investment stay at static influence.

Agreed. I like the idea, and it does seem correlate quite well, but No traffic = No drain.
In our sphere of influence, its the systems with most traffic that are tanking the most. Maybe Investment comes with a Transaction Tax of some type. Or maybe its all just borked.

Yeah +1

Any observed influence drain I'd put down to the BGS still being bugged out. My group's faction hasn't seen any influence loss due to Investment.

 

[Schlack]

Are the devs thinking it's working as intended?

apparently they are working on squishing the bugs. fingers crossed for a patch soon

 

[Witcher 7]

Alright, my system stuck in Investment has finally triggered Expansion in 3 other systems. So can each of 3 system expand into 3 other systems or just one?

One of the Expanding system is also pending War, hence does this mean it will neither gain nor lose any influence during these 2 states?

 

[Dommarraa]

Alright, my system stuck in Investment has finally triggered Expansion in 3 other systems. So can each of 3 system expand into 3 other systems or just one?

One of the Expanding system is also pending War, hence does this mean it will neither gain nor lose any influence during these 2 states?

The investment is irrelevant. The war is irrelevant.
One of your systems over 75% will be the one actually expanding. Look at station news to find out.
Expansion is listed as system wide because you can only have 1 at a time, and has no readily observable effect on anything.

 

[Witcher 7]

The investment is irrelevant. The war is irrelevant.
One of your systems over 75% will be the one actually expanding. Look at station news to find out.
Expansion is listed as system wide because you can only have 1 at a time, and has no readily observable effect on anything.

Thing is none of my 3 systems in Expansion has >75% influence except the one which is stuck in Investment state. Moreover, 2 other systems have None state.

Please explain these.

Edit: So, will I expand from Investment state system?

 

[Jmanis]

Thing is none of my 3 systems in Expansion has >75% influence except the one which is stuck in Investment state. Moreover, 2 other systems have None state.

Please explain these.

Edit: So, will I expand from Investment state system?

Forget Investment[1] entirely. It has absolutely nothing to do with Expansion.

Expansion is a faction-wide state, so that's why all three systems are now in the Expansion state. Your system is not "stuck" in Investment either. It will stay there for as long as the economy stays strong.

What's happened is *entirely* dependent on whether or not FD have followed through on what they said on the livestream or not.

Pre-3.3 expansion: Get a system over 75%, and then you'll trigger expansion.

3.3 expansion according to FD: Get "high" influence and happiness across all your systems. When the expansion finishes, you'll expand from the "happiest". Caveat: Nobody knows what "high" refers to, i.e it might not be >75%


What you're observing fits with FD's explanation. If you've got good influence and happiness across all your systems, Expansion should trigger for that faction (thus, it's a faction-wide effect). If this logic is following, you'll expand from the Happiest system. This may not be the one you're in investment.

*HOWEVER* most observations to-date have seen expansion follow pre-3.3 logic. Yours is the first expansion I've observed/heard about since the recent bugfix by FD, so maybe it's following the rules FD mentioned in the livestream now, rather than the old rules.

[1] Your system isn't stuck in Investment. It'll stay there as long as the economy is good.

 

[CMDR Zadian Lichtfrost]

Thing is none of my 3 systems in Expansion has >75% influence except the one which is stuck in Investment state. Moreover, 2 other systems have None state.

Please explain these.

Edit: So, will I expand from Investment state system?

The expansion should happen from the first system where your faction had over 75%.

Were did you get the information that 3 systems are in expansion state from? If it's from the station menu or the station local GalNet, then it is very unreliable.
From my observations since 3.3 only the system map and the right hand panel status tab are (more or less) reliable.

 

[Witcher 7]

Expansion is a faction-wide state, so that's why all three systems are now in the Expansion state. Your system is not "stuck" in Investment either. It will stay there for as long as the economy stays strong.

3.3 expansion according to FD: Get "high" influence and happiness across all your systems. When the expansion finishes, you'll expand from the "happiest". Caveat: Nobody knows what "high" refers to, i.e it might not be >75%

What you're observing fits with FD's explanation. If you've got good influence and happiness across all your systems, Expansion should trigger for that faction (thus, it's a faction-wide effect). If this logic is following, you'll expand from the Happiest system. This may not be the one you're in investment.

*HOWEVER* most observations to-date have seen expansion follow pre-3.3 logic. Yours is the first expansion I've observed/heard about since the recent bugfix by FD, so maybe it's following the rules FD mentioned in the livestream now, rather than the old rules.

How do you know which system is the happiest - influence? Fact that none of my systems except the one in Investment has > 75% Influence confuses me how 3 others (but not 2) is in Expansion.

The expansion should happen from the first system where your faction had over 75%.

Were did you get the information that 3 systems are in expansion state from? If it's from the station menu or the station local GalNet, then it is very unreliable.

I get the info from SQ Allegiance or Management and Inara gets updated by EDMC.

 

[Jmanis]

How do you know which system is the happiest - influence? Fact that none of my systems except the one in Investment has > 75% Influence confuses me how 3 others (but not 2) is in Expansion.

Expansion is a faction-wide state. That is, unlike all the other states which are per faction, per system, Expansion applies across your entire faction.

Happiness is on the system status panel, or in the squadron allegience page:

If it's the happiest, it says so (i.e Happy [Happiest])... but like all good things at the moment, it's thought that measure might be broken at the moment.