Colonia People and Ware Connection.

[EWanderer]

So Colonia. Favorite Pet project of some players, since they are not bothered by Super Power Bull, PP and don't have to bother with Space Bugs. I had the pleasure to make 2 stops there during my long distance exploration trips and I always get warm fuzzy feelings once I dock there as I feel the history of the place whispering in the back of my head about what Elite could be with a bit of more community involvement by FDev.

Why am I here for today? Well aside from exploration stops I don't really have a reason to make the trip. I have my faction back in the bubble since we are to young to got the chance of joining the Colonia Initiative and most of my group is still stuck there, since they don't like leaving the bubble that much. Anyway I would love to visit Colonia more often as part of other activities, such as trading, passenger hauling, etc.

And I think there should be a market for such activities. People wanting to Migrate towards Colonia, as well as colonists wanting to get their hands on some rares from the bubble to name a few. If I remember correctly, back in early days of colonia this was actually a bug, that lead to missions in colonia having destinations in the bubble, before it got removed.

I propose to create 2 new Starports one in the Bubble and one in Colonia, that have a special mission board and passenger lounge, which are connected to the other region. So I can pickup people and rares(as part of missions) in the bubble to fly them to Colonia. The starports itself could even have follow up missions to add to the immersion. i.e: The Bubble station has source rare missions, that lead to the move said rares towards colonia harbor, where a follow up would the delivery to the actuall recipient inside colonia region.

I don't know if Colonia has any Rares yet, but this could be a good opportunity to start adding them and then having them be targets of source missions inside the bubble. And I am sure there would be a few colonist in the bubble, who would love to pay a visit to the bubble or scientists, who want to attend conferences there.

Maybe consider doing this for the entire colonia highway, that every station there could be in need of something from either the bubble or Colonia in terms of rares or passenger cabins for missions, so you would be busy making dropoffs along the way.

It could become its own very special niche for traders and people movers to specialize on stacking missions and passenger contracts for Colonia-Bubble Connection(which includes the highway stations themself). I know I would probably do such a loop once or twice in a month given how long those trips would probably take me, just to get to see Colonia every now and then, without having to justify it by making a half roundtrip around the galaxy and stopping by just to repair, refill.

Bonus: If other professions would be able to be represented here, that would be even greater of course. I might need to ponder about this and make a follow up...

 

[Ian Doncaster]

I don't know if Colonia has any Rares yet

There's one - Jaques Quinentian Still - because Jaques Station has always had that, but no new ones. Rares don't work particularly well within Colonia as the furthest pair of systems are under 90LY apart, so the only reason to add them would be for inter-bubble trade (or moving over to Kashyapa), where the distance is a bit too long for anything other than RP purposes.

With missions it could work, though. That or let the price of rares continue to rise with distance without particular limit. Rares are one of the few things it makes much sense to trade between the two bubbles, so it'd be good to see more made of that one way or another.



Rather than establishing separate stations for it, it would probably be easier to add the missions to the existing Tourism economy inter-bubble selection of passenger and data courier missions.

 

[EWanderer]

i mean removing the distance cap on rares would work wonders already, I can understand why fdev doesn't go that route. and my suggestion for the two starports was to bundle this kind of activity so normal missions board wouldn't be cluttered + in my eyes it makes more sense to have a new megacorp establishing this kind of connection and line of service, than having every single colonia group/faction having to manage the logistics of such a huge operation(i mean technically some npcs would also cover those routes in bgs) by themself.

 

[Scubadog]

I live in Colonia (Colonia Dream, to be exact). I love it here. I have visited the core systems a few times last year. I seem to always find missions of various types with destinations at either end of that extreme, at a number of stations, so I'm not sure I see a value of having a single station emphasizing inter-bubble commerce. You could, though, make that a sub-category of missions at a given station. Right now, you have a mission filter for legal, illegal, etc. Just add one more category for something like Long-Distance. You can already find long-distance passenger missions virtually anywhere. I agree, though, with removing distance caps.

But, let's face it, as things stand now, commanders who have migrated to Colonia have come here for the reasons you originally listed. I try to avoid coming back to the core if at all possible, having only done so recently because some ships and modules simply are unavailable in Colonia. I'm giving our new engineers, though, a LOT of work with my fleet, so they are getting better with what modules I DO have. I doubt most who would be trucking cargo (rare or not) are doing it entirely for the cargo---they're working the exploration angle, too.

 

[EWanderer]

its not for everyone, especially for those, who left the bubble for good, I know, and yeah some missions already go between both "bubbles", but that is rather rare to find as far as i know from a bubble standpoint. there are so many deep space destinations for tourism, that i feel a simple long distance filter wouldn't help empathize this. The starports could serve as suggested as a focal point, with delivery missions or source missions towards them being chained up to trips towards the other bubble and from there to a final destination. this way all stations could get some free bgs rewards.
I just thought it would be a cool framework, that would get people from the bubble making the trip, bringing a few wares and passengers to colonia and the same on their backtrip, all the while they can stack-up more missions as they visit highway stations to keep them busy. Some might decide to stay after such a trip and stick around to help you guys over there to grow and never make a return trip.

It doesn't even need to be profitable in my eyes, because I enjoy long tracks through the galaxy already, but it would add to the sense of both bubbles still having some connection and put the spotlight on the highway stations a bit. So more a lore/rp-bit, which shouldn't be that hard to implement.

 

[Scubadog]

Okay, so FDev could do better with availability of long-distance cargo, etc., missions from the core side of things. If they improve that, I think it still should be the responsibility of the commander to look at such missions and intentionally plan which missions to take based on creating a "supply route" all the way to Colonia, the upcoming Sag-A base or wherever. They already actively plan for trading routes.

 

[Nadreck]

I was considering taking on a special task in my Cutter: loading up 4 tons of each rare available in the Bubble (I'd have to start with my Python, because some are only available at outposts) and then taking all that lot to Jacques, a stylish way of reaching Elite in Trade (I was just short at the time).

What put me off was the way NPC pirate interdictions work. With such a high-value cargo, I'd have pirates harassing me on every single jump all the way to Colonia.

 

[Ian Doncaster]

What put me off was the way NPC pirate interdictions work. With such a high-value cargo, I'd have pirates harassing me on every single jump all the way to Colonia.

You'd be fine once you got about 500 LY out of Sol until about 500 LY from Colonia.

Going around picking up all the rares would have been irritating, though.

 

[EWanderer]

Okay, so FDev could do better with availability of long-distance cargo, etc., missions from the core side of things. If they improve that, I think it still should be the responsibility of the commander to look at such missions and intentionally plan which missions to take based on creating a "supply route" all the way to Colonia, the upcoming Sag-A base or wherever. They already actively plan for trading routes.

The thing is I don't think there are yet any source missions for Rares and in my eyes it doesn't make sense to bring regular food or consumer wares between the bubbles, so that would be a first one. and at least on the bubble side i've never seen long distance cargo haulage to the Colonia side, might be different the other way around.

right now we don't know what the sag base will be up to after its finished construction, which will be done by mining, so not sure what you are referring there.

also the source of all mission are still some entities and i think running a colonia - bubble connection would be the job of a new enterprising mega cooperation, that would of course have central hubs and not the odd small faction tied up with their own little local businesses. this should even more true for the highway-stations themselves as they would need constant intake of fresh resources.

 

[EWanderer]

I was considering taking on a special task in my Cutter: loading up 4 tons of each rare available in the Bubble (I'd have to start with my Python, because some are only available at outposts) and then taking all that lot to Jacques, a stylish way of reaching Elite in Trade (I was just short at the time).

What put me off was the way NPC pirate interdictions work. With such a high-value cargo, I'd have pirates harassing me on every single jump all the way to Colonia.

i mean as off now there is a cap on the maximum profit for rare distances. you can max out profit on rares just by inner-bubble trade, so a colonia trip is not really necessary.

 

[danteuk]

I brought a new account(my 3rd) on the 2nd of Jan ( in Sale ) and on the 2nd of Feb I docked a Jaques Station in my ASP Ex with A5 FSD (Lv5 engineered) and my Guardian FSD Booster. Now Pioneer rank in Exploration and 100M Cr to spend. ( not bad considering my 2nd Account to doing DW2 !)

Having got to Colonia the plan was to see what can be done gameplay wise, the first thing I see is there engineers out here but you have to have discovered them via engineers in the bubble - so that's not happening - I only used Felicity Farseer - FDev have made engineering out here impossible for most pure explorers that didn't do much engineering in the bubble before they left!

I decide to get a Cobra and do a simple combat build - but
90 Stations with outfitting (source: eddb.io ) and no A rated modules! Seriously! Why are FDev punishing the poor folk in Colonia!!!

So my Cobra has power issues because I can't A rate the power plant and the shields aren't great because I can't A rate them either and I can't engineer anything. I wonder if the NPC's out here also lack A-rated ships?

It's not looking to great out here ( apart from the views ).

 

[Ian Doncaster]

and at least on the bubble side i've never seen long distance cargo haulage to the Colonia side

The problem here is that to stop Colonia missions being generated in massive numbers everywhere, they restricted them to Tourism systems. And they don't produce any commodities (apart from Biowaste) so no haulage missions. There used to be some before they put that restriction in, and they were pretty lucrative.

So my Cobra has power issues because I can't A rate the power plant and the shields aren't great because I can't A rate them either and I can't engineer anything.

You can get almost all modules in at least B-rated, so you could do something like this
https://s.orbis.zone/222h
which has sufficient power with a bit of prioritisation (and I picked some fairly power-hungry modules, though you can't do an all-rails build without sacrifices elsewhere)

EDDB isn't a great tool for searching Colonia outfitting because it makes it difficult to find alternatives when A-rated isn't available - it's designed for the Sol bubble where the question is "where is the A-rated?" not "what is the best available?". https://cdb.sotl.org.uk/outfitting summarises what you can actually get. (There's plenty of A-rated, too, just not in the medium and large core modules)

Or if you do unlock the engineers - which, yes, is a bit awkward if you don't do the prerequisites in the bubble first - you can get some pretty good stuff from that. This is my current ship: https://s.orbis.zone/222l using only modules and engineering available locally. It's bad luck you went Farseer rather than Martuuk for your FSD engineering, or you could at least have unlocked Mel Brandon who is probably the best engineer in the game.

 

[danteuk]

Very nice phantom build.
Does having 5 level of power management actually do anything ?
I know modules with a setting of >1 get disabled when you deploy if you don't have enough power, but what do the other levels actually do ?

 

[EWanderer]

The problem here is that to stop Colonia missions being generated in massive numbers everywhere, they restricted them to Tourism systems. And they don't produce any commodities (apart from Biowaste) so no haulage missions. There used to be some before they put that restriction in, and they were pretty lucrative.

And this is my main reason why I would construct 2 special Stations, that are the focal point for the Highway Missions. For the Stations between the Bubble and Colonia, I would Introduce a new Faction(the same, that runs the corner stations), which only offers the long haulage/passenger missions for the Highway as Described in my original Post.

 

[Ian Doncaster]

Very nice phantom build.
Does having 5 level of power management actually do anything ?
I know modules with a setting of >1 get disabled when you deploy if you don't have enough power, but what do the other levels actually do ?

It's probably overdone a bit: I learnt power management from PvPers so I tend to power spec all my ships that way just in case even if the PvP tactic for them is "immediately flee"

5 is for things that can't be used simultaneously with deployed hardpoints anyway
4 is for things I've temporarily de-prioritised because Etienne Dorn isn't researching power plants fast enough so if I need them I'll turn a weapon or two off manually. Once Dorn gets G2 I'll probably be able to drop this level out entirely.
3 is general stuff for normal operations
2 - if the game didn't keep resettting it... - would be thrusters, to keep 1 and 2 combined below 50% for emergency escapes if my power plant gets taken out
1 is then the essentials (and the collector which I must have engineered recently) below 20% so I can keep charging the FSD even in an emergency malfunction situation

 

[Scubadog]

I'm still shocked when people who have been playing awhile aren't using inara.cz for their research, including for the Colonia area. You can search for nearest <insert what you're looking for here> to a particular system. And, if you have and plug-in loaded, the site keeps track of where you are so that your searches are dynamic (if you choose not to enter a system to search near). So, yes, you can get up to B-rated in most modules. Lower class modules are available in A-rating, but the bottom line is that this is the wild west. I'm not sure why more A-rated aren't available by now, but I think part of the philosophy is that players start in the core systems anyway, so you would logically start your upgrade and engineering experience there.

Now, when I migrated to Colonia I had only been playing for a couple of months. I hadn't built up very much in the way of credits, so I had a DBX with mostly D-rated modules, an AFMS and an SRV. I didn't know about Inara yet and hadn't really dug into EDDB. Also, engineering seemed like far too much of a pain and too random (this was before the big change). When I arrived in the Colonia region I was as surprised as Danteuk to find the lack of top-rated modules---particularly since the cartographic data I sold seriously buffed my bank account.

Fast forward two years and I've since taken a couple of trips back to the core systems specifically to purchase and engineer A-rated modules as well as unlock and purchase the Corvette, guardian tech and a Mamba. I stockpiled modules of different sizes and then transferred them to Colonia Dream (my home station) as soon as I got back. NOTE: It sure would be nice if we could initiate a transfer TO a station from where we are at right then instead of having to wait until we are at the destination to initiate it.

So, the Inara.cz site lists all the engineers, what they can do and how you find out about them, get invited and unlock them. This makes it really easy to come up with a "pathway to engineering". Right now the engineers in Colonia are still building their skills up to be able to get modules to 5-level. The more people engineer with them, the faster they improve. There are some things now that you can get to level 5 on. BUT, the nice thing is if you pinned key blueprints back in the core systems you remote engineer them in Colonia (to the full level you pinned) and then go to the appropriate Colonia engineer to get the experimentals added on. I've engineered my entire Colonia fleet this way.

 

[danteuk]

I'm still shocked when people who have been playing awhile aren't using inara.cz for their research, including for the Colonia area. You can search for nearest <insert what you're looking for here> to a particular system. And, if you have and plug-in loaded, the site keeps track of where you are so that your searches are dynamic (if you choose not to enter a system to search near). So, yes, you can get up to B-rated in most modules. Lower class modules are available in A-rating, but the bottom line is that this is the wild west. I'm not sure why more A-rated aren't available by now, but I think part of the philosophy is that players start in the core systems anyway, so you would logically start your upgrade and engineering experience there.

Now, when I migrated to Colonia I had only been playing for a couple of months. I hadn't built up very much in the way of credits, so I had a DBX with mostly D-rated modules, an AFMS and an SRV. I didn't know about Inara yet and hadn't really dug into EDDB. Also, engineering seemed like far too much of a pain and too random (this was before the big change). When I arrived in the Colonia region I was as surprised as Danteuk to find the lack of top-rated modules---particularly since the cartographic data I sold seriously buffed my bank account.

Fast forward two years and I've since taken a couple of trips back to the core systems specifically to purchase and engineer A-rated modules as well as unlock and purchase the Corvette, guardian tech and a Mamba. I stockpiled modules of different sizes and then transferred them to Colonia Dream (my home station) as soon as I got back. NOTE: It sure would be nice if we could initiate a transfer TO a station from where we are at right then instead of having to wait until we are at the destination to initiate it.

So, the Inara.cz site lists all the engineers, what they can do and how you find out about them, get invited and unlock them. This makes it really easy to come up with a "pathway to engineering". Right now the engineers in Colonia are still building their skills up to be able to get modules to 5-level. The more people engineer with them, the faster they improve. There are some things now that you can get to level 5 on. BUT, the nice thing is if you pinned key blueprints back in the core systems you remote engineer them in Colonia (to the full level you pinned) and then go to the appropriate Colonia engineer to get the experimentals added on. I've engineered my entire Colonia fleet this way.

I do use inara.cz, have all 3 accounts created in it and use it for the few times I do engineering, the annoying thing is I forgot to check out the Colonia engineers before I left! - I probably would have at least tried to get one of them discovered, oh well
I checked inara first for A rated modules and when it said none with 50ly I went to eddb.io because that doesn't have the range limit.

 

[Scubadog]

So, here's how I did a shortcut when the Mamba came out. I bought a cheap Sidewinder and sold off everything I didn't absolutely need, then I went into a Haz Rez, angered a wanted commander and somewhat promptly got killed. I respawned back in the Core Systems instead of chose the rebuy. Then I was able to buy the Mamba, upgrade it, engineer it AND buy other modules, upgrade and engineer those for shipment later. In your case, you could use that opportunity to do some engineer unlocking and then make your way back to Colonia. This at least saves you half the trip.

 

[EWanderer]

I love how this suggestion thread became so derailed and even after dying in obscurity.

 

[Scubadog]

I love how this suggestion thread became so derailed and even after dying in obscurity.

Gee, that's helpful.