Colonisation Answers

[Alec Turner]

So, a test in the live servers, that anyone can take part in, with permanent results.

Doesn't sound like a beta to me. A beta to me is a testing phase on a separate server either with a select group (a closed beta) or anyone who wants to (an open beta). Doing it live (yes, I am referencing the meme), sounds more like a soft rollout.

I guess it's beta in that Frontier are acknowledging it requires large scale testing and that there will likely be some tweaking to numbers, etc during and/or at the end of the "beta" phase.

I think it's absolutely the right thing to make it so that colonisation efforts during the beta phase don't get wiped. I speculated on Lave Radio about how perhaps PowerPlay 2.0 could have perhaps done with a beta test (although in fact I feel like they managed to resolve a lot of the issues there pretty quickly). The problem I saw with it tho' is that, by its very nature, testing of something like PowerPlay (or Colonisation) requires people to properly invest time in doing it and nobody (aside from perhaps a very dedicated few) would do that if they thought their efforts were going to be wiped or lost at the end.

 

[Tifu]

For Powerplay, I'd love to know how many empty places there are in the core compared to the edges of the inhabited bubble, as it might allow fringe powers a way to expand while core powers have to fight.

I regularly bump into these places and these trips are just 65-70ly jumps to and from the neighborhood of Sol. So they do exist and they aren't rare at all. Some are just single or double star systems but there are the occasional 12-20 planet systems that have me scratching my head- as in, why aren't these inhabited?

Depends what you count as "interesting". There'll be a bunch of ELWs and similar, but ultimately a lot of the fringe 10-30 LY on the inside of the bubble's surface is already sufficiently "uninteresting" - no engineers, no major Powerplay fights, poor outfitting, etc - that hardly anyone ever visits those systems. You'd automatically get Pristine reserves so setting up a bunch of refinery/industrial stations in systems with metallic rings is an obvious option but it's not as if there's a shortage of those on the existing fringes either ...

Does making one of these "less interesting" places a stronghold system affect their value or utility aside from the obvious outfitting advantages?

 

[SergMx]

I guess it's beta in that Frontier are acknowledging it requires large scale testing and that there will likely be some tweaking to numbers, etc during and/or at the end of the "beta" phase.

I think it's absolutely the right thing to make it so that colonisation efforts during the beta phase don't get wiped. I speculated on Lave Radio about how perhaps PowerPlay 2.0 could have perhaps done with a beta test (although in fact I feel like they managed to resolve a lot of the issues there pretty quickly). The problem I saw with it tho' is that, by its very nature, testing of something like PowerPlay (or Colonisation) requires people to properly invest time in doing it and nobody (aside from perhaps a very dedicated few) would do that if they thought their efforts were going to be wiped or lost at the end.

You don't have to. They could just get some kind of sticker or ARX for merit for the main game.

 

[Ian Doncaster]

Does making one of these "less interesting" places a stronghold system affect their value or utility aside from the obvious outfitting advantages?

I suppose it might attract more player traffic, which might make the BGS move faster, which might make more interesting BGS states for missions, trade, mining, etc. in the region as a whole. But that would be very indirect at best.

There are the "occupation" benefits - e.g. Aisling Duval banning Imperial Slaves, or Yuri Grom giving everyone +40% bounty payouts - which might matter, but since those are no longer published, were often at best dubiously useful, and so I'm still not sure if Kaine has actually been given any, they probably won't do all that much either.

 

[CMDR Daiyus]

I can certainly see myself doing one system in my Power's space just to push buttons and see what falls out. I always have a home system, typically using one of the large planetary ports (ring-walled) as a home base. Finding a good spot to build one of those cities could be fun, but it'll ultimately be no different to using one of the existing ones.

There really needs to be some passive benefit from being a system architect, either in credits and/or materials, assuming the economy is mature enough to self-sustain and bring in profit.

 

[HRDiagram]

Frontier - There will be a beta period for testing and ironing out any kinks before the feature goes live

Us - So only a select group will be in this beta testing?

Frontier - No, it will be an open beta, anyone can partake in it

Us - So it'll be on a separate server?

Frontier - no, it'll be in the live game

Us - So ... to recap .. it'll be available to everyone and part of the live game?

Frontier - Yep.

It's a beta test of a new concept of beta: a beta beta, or meta beta, if you prefer.

 

[Tifu]

I’m not sure what the big deal about the distance is, other than making a bridge to Colonia and such.

I’ll still be sat at my PC whether I’m building a colony 1ly or 1000ly from the bubble. The gameplay is the same.

I'm thinking it's the romantic idea of "the lone commander at the edge of the galaxy" with his own remote outpost in the middle of nowhere. It's probably why quite a number of players are insisting the colonization can be soloable.

Though why somebody would want to go through all that headache, stress and likely, misteps alone is beyond me.

 

[SergMx]

I'm thinking it's the romantic idea of "the lone commander at the edge of the galaxy" with his own remote outpost in the middle of nowhere. It's probably why quite a number of players are insisting the colonization can be soloable.

Though why somebody would want to go through all that headache, stress and likely, misteps alone is beyond me.

But flying in another part of the Galaxy in research YOU will be 100 percent sure that you will not stumble upon someone's Colony, even if abandoned.

I wonder why the existing Colony was built so far away from the Bubble and not in the 50's on the side?

 

[Knuttin Atoll]

Frontier - There will be a beta period for testing and ironing out any kinks before the feature goes live

Us - So only a select group will be in this beta testing?

Frontier - No, it will be an open beta, anyone can partake in it

Us - So it'll be on a separate server?

Frontier - no, it'll be in the live game

Us - So ... to recap .. it'll be available to everyone and part of the live game?

Frontier - Yep.

Performing testing of new features on live/production servers seems like such a great idea, and there's nothing that could wrong either, I'm sure. I'm curious why this isn't more widespread in the software business!




Edit... To switch from sarcasm to cynicism for a minute - I wonder if they're going down this route because running a proper beta takes more effort, and we'll likely end up with plenty of issues in the live game anyways, plus calling it a 'beta' gives them the excuse of an unfinished product, at least for as long as the beta is considered active. Not a completely unheard principle in the space game genre

 

[Kira Goto]

I wonder why the existing Colony was built so far away from the Bubble and not in the 50's on the side?

Because a station became stranded there by accident and kind of ended up serving as a point of development for a local mini-Bubble.

 

[SergMx]

The lone CMDR with half a billion colonists…

I get the lone CMDR thing, it’s why I flew a DBX into the black - the Anaconda felt too big, I was either rattling around a giant ship like Dave Lister, or had a whole crew of 50 below me while I was locked in the bridge.

But colonisation is almost by definition a group activity.*

*Although it should still be available in all game modes.

Yes I agree that colonization is a group and very expensive activity, so the location for a new Colony should be chosen very carefully and thoughtfully. Not any system within 10 years.

 

[Knuttin Atoll]

I'm thinking it's the romantic idea of "the lone commander at the edge of the galaxy" with his own remote outpost in the middle of nowhere. It's probably why quite a number of players are insisting the colonization can be soloable.

Though why somebody would want to go through all that headache, stress and likely, misteps alone is beyond me.

Same reason why some people feel the need to reach Beagle Point (I'm not one of them but can understand it at least).

 

[SergMx]

10ly is a long way! If there wasn’t other superpowers, of the time, in Europe we wouldn’t have be looking towards the Americas.

And 10ly is a safe distance to see how the mechanics work in the hands of the community without risking them messing things up.

I probably wrote it wrong, 10 years and the distance itself can not play any role especially with our mechanics of jumping between systems.
The most important thing is the end goal - whether that system is suitable for colonization or it is not worth the effort spent on it and it is better to move on to the next one.

 

[SergMx]

I imagine, in week one people are going to run out and colonise everything. I would imagine that certain systems would be better sites, but we won’t really discover that until a few months down the line.

Restricting to low key bubble expansion stops the galaxy filling up with abandoned colonies. FDev has explicitly said that the 10ly will be under review so I would find it surprising for it to be the final distance. And by the time we’ve been let off the leach most CMDR will be more discerning about their colonisation choices.

To be more precise, colonization is building colonies somewhere far away, not taking over nearby territories as an expansion in the Bubble. This action isn't quite the same as Colonization.

Can we just see, after Colonization, what should happen? That's right, a Colony. I don't think the layer around the bubble will be named Colony.

 

[Alec Turner]

I'm curious, what do the folks who are so sure 10ly is not enough actually want to do?

Is it a desire to explicitly be disconnected from the bubble in terms of trade/BGS/Powerplay etc (in which case yeah, I guess that's not what Frontier are doing with this) or is it mostly because you have a specific, very scenic system/planet in mind that you wanted to be the first to colonise?

If the latter, then I do wonder how sure we are that there aren't plenty of nice places within a few multiples of 10ly around the edges of the existing bubble.

I've tried to do some maths.
The radius of the bubble is approx. 150ly.
That means the surface area of the bubble (4πr²) is about 282600ly².
If we divide that by the 10ly range then I think we have around 28260 systems that could be current starting points from which we could begin our colonisation efforts.
This is a complete guesstimate but let's say each one of those has 2 or 3 systems within 10ly that only it could colonise.
That means there's something like 70,000 systems up for grabs on day 1.
Someone PLEASE check my maths but that sounds like a lot of systems to dismiss as "uninteresting".

 

[SergMx]

I'm curious, what do the folks who are so sure 10ly is not enough actually want to do?

Is it a desire to explicitly be disconnected from the bubble in terms of trade/BGS/Powerplay etc (in which case yeah, I guess that's not what Frontier are doing with this) or is it mostly because you have a specific, very scenic system/planet in mind that you wanted to be the first to colonise?

If the latter, then I do wonder how sure we are that there aren't plenty of nice places within a few multiples of 10ly around the edges of the existing bubble.

I've tried to do some maths.
The radius of the bubble is approx. 150ly.
That means the surface area of the bubble (4πr²) is about 282600ly².
If we divide that by the 10ly range then I think we have around 28260 systems that could be current starting points from which we could begin our colonisation efforts.
This is a complete guesstimate but let's say each one of those has 2 or 3 systems within 10ly that only it could colonise.
That means there's something like 70,000 systems up for grabs on day 1.
Someone PLEASE check my maths but that sounds like a lot of systems to dismiss as "uninteresting".

When you arrive in the Colony, you feel it and realize it, in the Colony. Will YOU have that feeling when you fly on the edge of the bubble?

 

[Rubbernuke]

I'm curious, what do the folks who are so sure 10ly is not enough actually want to do?

Is it a desire to explicitly be disconnected from the bubble in terms of trade/BGS/Powerplay etc (in which case yeah, I guess that's not what Frontier are doing with this) or is it mostly because you have a specific, very scenic system/planet in mind that you wanted to be the first to colonise?

If the latter, then I do wonder how sure we are that there aren't plenty of nice places within a few multiples of 10ly around the edges of the existing bubble.

I've tried to do some maths.
The radius of the bubble is approx. 150ly.
That means the surface area of the bubble (4πr²) is about 282600ly².
If we divide that by the 10ly range then I think we have around 28260 systems that could be current starting points from which we could begin our colonisation efforts.
This is a complete guesstimate but let's say each one of those has 2 or 3 systems within 10ly that only it could colonise.
That means there's something like 70,000 systems up for grabs on day 1.
Someone PLEASE check my maths but that sounds like a lot of systems to dismiss as "uninteresting".

But those systems are not somewhere notable, though. Places may be pretty but one of the draws for the explorists is building a station somewhere far, far away in mini Colonia.

The hidden issue for me is that colonisation is not going to be very creative- the only time people will be happy at 10Ly is if the base building / placing is fun and allows a lot of creativity. If it does not, then the draw will be the scenery and where the base is.

 

[varonica]

I'm curious, what do the folks who are so sure 10ly is not enough actually want to do?

Yeah this seems specifically designed by FDEV as "expanding the bubble" and not, put a remote system so far away no-one will ever find it. I mean, we have Fleet Carriers for that right?

 

[vanFace]

I'm curious, what do the folks who are so sure 10ly is not enough actually want to do?

I don't know all the reasons, but "claiming Beagle Point on day 1" is certainly one of them.

 

[CMDR Daiyus]

I'm curious, what do the folks who are so sure 10ly is not enough actually want to do?

Is it a desire to explicitly be disconnected from the bubble in terms of trade/BGS/Powerplay etc (in which case yeah, I guess that's not what Frontier are doing with this) or is it mostly because you have a specific, very scenic system/planet in mind that you wanted to be the first to colonise?

If the latter, then I do wonder how sure we are that there aren't plenty of nice places within a few multiples of 10ly around the edges of the existing bubble.

I've tried to do some maths.
The radius of the bubble is approx. 150ly.
That means the surface area of the bubble (4πr²) is about 282600ly².
If we divide that by the 10ly range then I think we have around 28260 systems that could be current starting points from which we could begin our colonisation efforts.
This is a complete guesstimate but let's say each one of those has 2 or 3 systems within 10ly that only it could colonise.
That means there's something like 70,000 systems up for grabs on day 1.
Someone PLEASE check my maths but that sounds like a lot of systems to dismiss as "uninteresting".

There's definitely two camps here. One wants to simply engage in the mechanics and put their stamp on the galaxy, and will enjoy that process no matter where it is. These tend to be the players that enjoy engaging in things like the BGS and PowerPlay, so the 10 Ly limit, while still short, doesn't massively impact them as they want to be connected to everything anyway.

The other camp are the explorers, who take pride in being as far away from all of the Bubble antics as possible. These players want to break away from the BGS and PowerPlay and set up shop pretty much anywhere, typically somewhere pretty they've found, and create a subset of a few systems as an outpost Bubble in the black where they can live in peace.

Both are pretty reasonable approaches to me, but the current rules definitely caters to one and excludes the other. How much that will change during "beta" is yet to be seen.

Personally, I've got my eye on a system that's fairly close to home. There's a really pretty spot that I want to place my planetary home base at, but it's within spitting distance of being involved in all the BGS and PowerPlay shenanigans that I personally like to have around. Based on the current rules that we know of, it'll take three hops to get there. As nice as it'd be to do it in one, I've got no issue putting the work into getting there and then expanding my Power in that direction. What I am worried about is working hard to do the first two hops, then someone swooping in and taking the system I'm aiming for if life gets in the way. If I could hop a little further each time, or even do it in one hop, then I'd be less worried if someone took it as I'd have not put any work into getting there.