Powerplay Faction: Yuri Grom Cycle 309 objectives - Return of the 5c

[Aleksander K]

C308 became a very interesting week. Our 5c returned once more to try and disrupt Yuris progress.
They started by preparing a terrible loss making system, also is a weapon against the Feds - Nuakea (You're welcome by the way for us stopping yet another weapon aimed at you), simultaneously they started to drop the vote, the free epic accounts come to the fore.
We prepared a good system for expansion in response - Umaitis, forcing them to show their hand further and drop the vote down below 50% which would have allowed various bad systems through to expansion.
Yuri's loyal forces rallied and quickly prepared 4 systems to force Nuakea out of reach, 3 of which are now in expansion.

This cycle please:

1. Vote Consolidation

2. Fortify all systems above 100CC base income:

In particular:
Wulwula
San Guan
Katurru
Frey
LFT 78
Chireni
Huilliche
Hip 99642
Hip 88178
Medzistha
Garm

3. Do not prepare any system - especially Nuakea - you are actively harming Yuri by doing this.

4. Fight for Yuri in Armed Revolts in his expansion system:

Umaitis

If you just want merits to maintain your rank or gain the module please fortify by delivering Grom Counter Intelligence materials to LTT 7548 or Alino (Closest systems that dont hurt Yuri).

Yuri thanks you for your amazing work this cycle Comrades.

 

[Bard Voronwe]

The day that FDev will make us vote accordingly to our ranks (and not the weeks of pledge) and vote for evey system separately will be too late anyway. -.-

 

[Justinian Octavius]

The day that FDev will make us vote accordingly to our ranks (and not the weeks of pledge) and vote for evey system separately will be too late anyway. -.-

Or they could add:-
If Sphere Income < 0 then Sphere Income = 0 and rebalance undermining to make it have a greater effect.

The problem with voting based on rank is that it removes the large number of part timers from Powers who can vote leaving just the committed commanders which will also include the 5C. Thus, for smaller Powers, changing the voting weights could actually make 5C even more powerful.

CMDR Justinian Octavius

 

[Bard Voronwe]

Or they could add:-
If Sphere Income < 0 then Sphere Income = 0 and rebalance undermining to make it have a greater effect.

The problem with voting based on rank is that it removes the large number of part timers from Powers who can vote leaving just the committed commanders which will also include the 5C. Thus, for smaller Powers, changing the voting weights could actually make 5C even more powerful.

CMDR Justinian Octavius

It's an idea, it shouldn't affect weaponised too.

 

[Bashy81]

Or they could add:-
If Sphere Income < 0 then Sphere Income = 0 and rebalance undermining to make it have a greater effect.

The problem with voting based on rank is that it removes the large number of part timers from Powers who can vote leaving just the committed commanders which will also include the 5C. Thus, for smaller Powers, changing the voting weights could actually make 5C even more powerful.

CMDR Justinian Octavius

It would make weaponised expansions a nightmare. But thats not a problem if combined with a number of other beneficial changes.

Regards votes I dont see a simple switch making things better. Pros & cons either way. If fdev keep a record of total merits earned during current pledge, the square-root of that could be multiplied by weeks pledged & divided by say 10'000.

It would need tweaking especially at lower values to differentiate between 5C & normal dedicated players. But even with that crude formula I gave, the results would be better than with either the status quo, or 'current rank' determining votes.

You dont want Powers to be hijacked by new arrivals (such as 5C) but you dont want them held to ransom by the Old Guard either.

 

[Bard Voronwe]

It would make weaponised expansions a nightmare. But thats not a problem if combined with a number of other beneficial changes.

I think that @Justinian Octavius means the income as you see it in the GalMap during preparations: in case of weaponised expansions the income is calculated considering the contested systems too, the same doesn't happen when the systems are overlapping.

Still this kind of solution would be almost irrelevant if you think about it: it's rare that a 5C expansion income is lower than the upkeep, and even an income of 30-35 can be catastrophic. It wuld be much more easier to stop preparations 24 hours before the week leaving the last 24 hours to vote the top 10 preparation systems, with a aye/nay mechanism, weighting the votes accordingly to ratings (rating 3 = 1 vote strenght, rating 4 = 2 votes strenght, rating 5 = 5 votes strenght).

Another thing we need ASAP is for Powerplay modules to be available from tech brokers too, using materials if you want to give an advantage to pledged CMDRs.

I know this way 5C could do what they want anyway, but it's better than the current situation if you think about it, you know that I have a totally different idea about what Powerplay should be, but considering the current mechanics I don't see any other way better to stop the phenomenon.

 

[Bashy81]

I think that @Justinian Octavius means the income as you see it in the GalMap during preparations: in case of weaponised expansions the income is calculated considering the contested systems too, the same doesn't happen when the systems are overlapping.

ah ok I jumped the gun, I thought he was going more bluesky than that. & im not entirely sure ^ is what he meant either was it really?

eg. It would limit Utopia's usual random '5C' prep to maximum damage of about 160CC (off top of my head) so, while the simpler the suggestion the more chance of implementation, are there any examples where it would make a significant difference?
er nvm. yeh it would make a sizeable difference to the end CC result. its a band-aid tho, wouldnt make any difference to what we face trying to oppose it

 

[Bard Voronwe]

ah ok I jumped the gun, I thought he was going more bluesky than that. & im not entirely sure ^ is what he meant either was it really?

eg. It would limit Utopia's usual random '5C' prep to maximum damage of about 160CC (off top of my head) so, while the simpler the suggestion the more chance of implementation, are there any examples where it would make a significant difference?

With current design there's just that much we can do. I think that some little things (change how vote strenght works, 6 days preparation then the last day to vote aye/nay for every preparation, modules available to brokers too) could be done in a very little time, and it would make our life really easier.

 

[Bashy81]

I totally agree about the brokers. Being bribed with trinkets isnt how you get people playing obtuse chess with spaceships.

Regards the vote suggestion, wouldnt you at least accept that some kind of pledge-duration modifier apply, so that a possie of miscreants cant ride into town & grind-out a takeover with effort they could never sustain? I dont think assuming a playerbase should just grind harder is fair, theyd have to do that every cycle just to cover a late putsch.
It incentivises 5C otherwise. One good thing about Sandro's Flash Topic was it didnt try one single hard counter to 5C, it was a collection of disincentives that all worked together to kill it. One rule change is always exploitable ; a bunch of harmonious ones achieve the desired result.

 

[Rubbernuke]

There is a paradoxical problem with Powerplay 5C, any remedy to doing it v weighting will always make weaponsied expansions impossible or very hard to pull off.

This is a paradox as currently weaponised expansions are the only real weapon powers have to lower other powers CC enough to make them vulnerable.

If weighting ever comes in, FD will have to also bring in uncapped UM to replace weaponised expansions, otherwise if not you'll have no 5C but also no way to attack powers.

My advice would (like all of here I think) ask FD do the changes all at once and not in (even) smaller chunks.

 

[Tarkus Venius]

The best idea I’ve heard is to have pilots lose merits to prep a loss-maker. That way an entire power can still fort and then weaponize, but a small group of (let’s be honest, they’re botters and many here know who’s doing it) has a lot more trouble pushing their garbage on another power.

I believe that idea came from the Feds.

 

[Rubbernuke]

The best idea I’ve heard is to have pilots lose merits to prep a loss-maker. That way an entire power can still fort and then weaponize, but a small group of (let’s be honest, they’re botters and many here know who’s doing it) has a lot more trouble pushing their garbage on another power.

I believe that idea came from the Feds.

What I dislike about that though is its you being punished for trying to be tactical, which is folly in a game about strategy. Powerplay should be about attacking weak spots and being able to batter a power into a bloody twitching pulp- uncapped UM allows you to go straight for the jugular and attack profitables and create choke points. For Powers like The King and Quiche Warrior its great because CC is spread across uniformly mediocre CC systems, while powers in the core have rich high CC worlds to guard.

 

[Bard Voronwe]

I totally agree about the brokers. Being bribed with trinkets isnt how you get people playing obtuse chess with spaceships.

Regards the vote suggestion, wouldnt you at least accept that some kind of pledge-duration modifier apply, so that a possie of miscreants cant ride into town & grind-out a takeover with effort they could never sustain? I dont think assuming a playerbase should just grind harder is fair, theyd have to do that every cycle just to cover a late putsch.
It incentivises 5C otherwise. One good thing about Sandro's Flash Topic was it didnt try one single hard counter to 5C, it was a collection of disincentives that all worked together to kill it. One rule change is always exploitable ; a bunch of harmonious ones achieve the desired result.

On the other hand, considering how easy it is to have multiple accounts, we should consider that right now it's far too easy to maintain 16 weeks old accounts (rating 2 can be kept easily). Maybe something like that:
After 4 weeks: +1 strenght modifier
After 8 weeks: +2 strenght modifier
After 16 weeks: +3 strenght modifier
After 32 weeks: +4 strenght modifier
After 64 weeks: +5 strenght modifier
With at least a minimum of rating 3 to be elegible to vote. (It's just an example).

EDIT

This way a rating 5 64 weeks old player would have a 10 votes strenght, of course the only thing you can't do is make rules to avoid completely any unfavourable expansion. That's mostly the reason why I came to the conclusion that current Powerplay can't be fixed intrinsically, for that we'd need something different "by design", similar on the surface but completely different, with no overheads, higher upkeeps, competitive triggers and systems going turmoil singularly, with canceled systems (eventually) going turmoil anyway if their upkeep is higher than their income. But that's far more complicated to have.

And: I suspect FDev is secretly working on Powerplay, but considering how few they understand of this very old and bad designed feature, I am truly afraid that whatever they will give us it will be even worse.

 

[Justinian Octavius]

I did mean CC Income of the Sphere; as I have said elsewhere numerous times Weaponised Expansions don't need to do just CC damage and you cannot keep economic turmoil and solve 5C without losing loss making Spheres.

Just get rid of economic turmoil & move over to per system turmoil. You can have Weaponised Expansions still; under such a system the Undermining Trigger could be reduced by the number of non-allied Superpower Spheres overlapping; so if Kumo wants to kick Antal out of HIP 85129 you'd run overlapping Weaponised Expansions until the trigger was low enough for you to easily Undermine the system and forcefully eject it from the Power.

Frankly Weaponised Expansions are already a nightmare. Some Powers have been trying to push through the same Weaponised Expansion for about a year.

CMDR Justinian Octavius

 

[Tarkus Venius]

On the other hand, considering how easy it is to have multiple accounts, we should consider that right now it's far too easy to maintain 16 weeks old accounts (rating 2 can be kept easily). Maybe something like that:
After 4 weeks: +1 strenght modifier
After 8 weeks: +2 strenght modifier
After 16 weeks: +3 strenght modifier
After 32 weeks: +4 strenght modifier
After 64 weeks: +5 strenght modifier
With at least a minimum of rating 3 to be elegible to vote. (It's just an example).

EDIT

This way a rating 5 64 weeks old player would have a 10 votes strenght, of course the only thing you can't do is make rules to avoid completely any unfavourable expansion. That's mostly the reason why I came to the conclusion that current Powerplay can't be fixed intrinsically, for that we'd need something different "by design", similar on the surface but completely different, with no overheads, higher upkeeps, competitive triggers and systems going turmoil singularly, with canceled systems (eventually) going turmoil anyway if their upkeep is higher than their income. But that's far more complicated to have.

And: I suspect FDev is secretly working on Powerplay, but considering how few they understand of this very old and bad designed feature, I am truly afraid that whatever they will give us it will be even worse.

Time pledged is irrelevant since the “free” accounts will eventually get there.

Another Fed suggested that we tie powerplay rank to the vote strength so that saboteurs that want 5 votes per Alt account at least need to fortify 10K to get it.

 

[Bashy81]

Time pledged is irrelevant since the “free” accounts will eventually get there.

Another Fed suggested that we tie powerplay rank to the vote strength so that saboteurs that want 5 votes per Alt account at least need to fortify 10K to get it.

Time pledged does matter. 'eventually' is less of a 5C incentive than 'any time they want'. And time pledged is more relevant if its not a barrier, but a multiplier in a calculation including other measures of contribution.
If you use a 10k fort barrier only, one player could rank-up the equivalent of many veteran accounts in a single cycle, using one-hop overfortification. If it was a grinder hit-squad doing it, reaching a 25% vote share could be a single week's work.
That's not much better than the simple wait-time system we have now. Imo it needs to be more robust than that to warrant a dev change, for the forseeable future.

Any vote system will be more vulnerable to 5C exploitation if you use just one requirement to attain increased votes.