Elite Dangerous | Colonisation Facilities & Markets

[JR250]

Thank you, Paul. Looking forward to a possible fix.

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People, he just said they're looking into activating markets that are not necessarily on the planet your station orbits. Not sure how else to interpret the message but it seems to say they're looking to fix it.

we will continue to investigate ways to allow all facilities to find a route to market elsewhere within that star system.

Got a station that's orbiting a gas giant or other nonlandable body? The words "allow all facilities to find a route to market elsewhere within the star system" might have a clue for you. We don't know exactly what that means but if they make it happen, it would seemingly solve the issue.

And yes, 1) we didn't know an economy can only run properly if there is a facility on the planet below churning product and 2) we weren't given control of where the first station would go to avoid this issue. We've given that feedback already, I think they got it.

 

[GraphicEqualizer]

I would like to know why after building a bunch of sites in space and on planets that I still don't have a shipyard anywhere and I built my Corialis to completion 3 days after release. Scratch that, I want to know WHY there are no shipyards in the first place AT ALL. This is a head scratcher to me. Some explanation there would be awesome. To me, the only reason to build a system at all is to have a shipyard and a UC there, pointless otherwise.

I believe it needs to be setup to be geared to being a high tech economy

 

[Ian Doncaster]

I would like to know why after building a bunch of sites in space and on planets that I still don't have a shipyard anywhere and I built my Corialis to completion 3 days after release.

Until and unless we get an official answer; how many of the things you built have increased Tech Level? There seems to be some indication that you need about 6 to open a shipyard, and the Coriolis itself only gives 1.

Got a station that's orbiting a gas giant or other nonlandable body? The words "allow all facilities to find a route to market elsewhere within the star system" might have a clue for you. We don't know exactly what that means but if they make it happen, it would seemingly solve the issue.

Yes - although the nature of the fix is important too.

We (rightly, in my view) need to build a mix of settlement types and building types - military ones to increase security, agri/tourist ones for standard of living, etc. rather than just building the same one "optimal" thing over and over until every slot in the system is full.

If all of those end up affecting the same station, you potentially don't get anything much better than the situation when none of them do, because of how hybrid economies work in Elite Dangerous: it still doesn't sell very much, because most of the things the Refinery component produces get consumed internally by the Industrial, High-Tech and Military components.

So there does need to be a way to build facilities so that they don't have widespread effect, too.

(The idea above to allow you to specifically direct economic output from one thing to another would be the most flexible solution, but if Frontier go for something automated then "everything affects everything" is probably worse than what we currently have)

 

[Scarlet Hark]

The current process for growing the market in a Starport is to build up facilities on or around the planetary body that it is orbiting.

This is only occasionally accurate.

Example 1: Still Landing in Arietis Sector ER-V b2-5, is an Orbis orbiting the main star -- not a body. The only other player-built instance in the system is an installation of unknown type occupying the same orbit, and yet this station is producing gobs of commodities.

Still Landing: https://inara.cz/elite/station-market/721758/

Example 2: My starter Coriolis, Gossamer Landing, was completed on day 5 after the feature launch, and is orbiting a moon around a gas giant in HIP 5710. My first settlement was on the moon below the station, a mining settlement (Seidel Drilling Enterprise), in the only slot available (mind you, the placement of the Coriolis was decided for me). This was completed before the weekly tick that first week. The station still only exports biowaste and hydrogen fuel. The settlement at least seems to be making something useful, microbial furnaces.

Gossamer Landing: https://inara.cz/elite/station-market/686127/
Seidel: https://inara.cz/elite/station-market/695078/

So I do not believe that your statement is accurate in practice. Can we acknowledge that there are bugs that need to be addressed here? Either that, or explain how these two cases can exist in the same universe under the rule you stated in the OP.

As a third example, in the "pre-existing" galaxy, Snyder Enterprise is orbiting a gas giant in TZ Arietis. There are no other orbital facilities around that giant, and Snyder is not orbiting a moon or other body. And yet it has a vibrant, booming supply of commodities in its market.

Snyder Enterprise: https://inara.cz/elite/station/1308/

Are the rules different for pre-existing systems/economies/facilities than they are for player-developed ones? And if so, why? And also if so, what are those rules? Can we finally get a list somewhere that describes how a system economy works together, how (if at all) these various metrics such as security, wealth, development, tech level, etc., play into it?

Because flailing around trying to figure it out for ourselves simply isn't working.

 

[Scarlet Hark]

We (rightly, in my view) need to build a mix of settlement types and building types - military ones to increase security, agri/tourist ones for standard of living, etc. rather than just building the same one "optimal" thing over and over until every slot in the system is full.

This is my intention -- I would like to build a balanced system, but it's incredibly hard to know "where to stop" with various metrics because we have no idea what their effects are. "There seems to be some indication" is a terrible player experience -- especially when it would be a simple matter of ten minutes to publish a web page that explains it authoritatively. I cannot understand why this is all such a trade secret.

 

[Tomsgalaxy]

Yes - although the nature of the fix is important too.

We (rightly, in my view) need to build a mix of settlement types and building types - military ones to increase security, agri/tourist ones for standard of living, etc. rather than just building the same one "optimal" thing over and over until every slot in the system is full.

If all of those end up affecting the same station, you potentially don't get anything much better than the situation when none of them do, because of how hybrid economies work in Elite Dangerous: it still doesn't sell very much, because most of the things the Refinery component produces get consumed internally by the Industrial, High-Tech and Military components.

So there does need to be a way to build facilities so that they don't have widespread effect, too.

(The idea above to allow you to specifically direct economic output from one thing to another would be the most flexible solution, but if Frontier go for something automated then "everything affects everything" is probably worse than what we currently have)

If we could chose which Starport our economic outputs go, we can direct the unwanted outputs to a outpost somewhere, problem sloved. You will have a weird rainbow economy outpost at the back of your system but that's fine.

 

[Ian Doncaster]

Are the rules different for pre-existing systems/economies/facilities than they are for player-developed ones? And if so, why?

Yes, they are.

The previous systems were built up bit by bit as the various station types were added to the game over multiple years - to start with there were only orbital outposts and the big orbital stations. So the current colonisation rules could never have applied to them, and making them work retrospectively would break almost every existing system.

especially when it would be a simple matter of ten minutes to publish a web page that explains it authoritatively

True - though writing the content to go on that web page would take them a lot longer. The details of what exactly wealth, tech level, etc. do aren't at all clear but don't appear to be particularly simple in terms of consequences even if they are simple in terms of inputs.

Still, even some broad and maybe not entirely accurate hints would help us figure out the rest quicker.

 

[Florenus]

The current process for growing the market in a Starport is to build up facilities on or around the planetary body that it is orbiting.

I wonder how that works in case of gas giants with lots of moons. Does installation placed in slot closest to the Gas giant influence market on a station orbiting one of the moons?

I've built mining installation in only free slot directly around the gas giant (being close to icy rings seemed like good place for such installation), noticed it does absolutely nothing for my main station which is orbiting completely different planet in the system and I really don't want to commit to building new station orbiting a moon around that gas giant only to find it not benefiting from that installation either.

 

[NeoHazuki]

The system follows the old structures (structures that old players know by heart), but new players need a manual with everything instead of experimenting and having the pleasure of learning.
I just believe that the connections between the planets should follow the line of the star not the line of the planet, respecting the primary economy and the factory economy.

 

[HCR Motorhead]

I think we should be able to manually link starports to other constructs to better dictate supply routes and what comes to market which gives us more control over what everyone was hoping to be the case anyway. Or we select the economy type of a larger station and it draws from all relevant supply sources in a given system.

 

[Zimous]

Greetings Commanders,

The current process for growing the market in a Starport is to build up facilities on or around the planetary body that it is orbiting.

We are continuously iterating on the design implemented, and we will continue to investigate ways to allow all facilities to find a route to market elsewhere within that star system. We have read your feedback and we are taking it into account in our investigation.

Thank you for continuing to share your thoughts during this Beta process and helping us to improve Trailblazers.

When will we get a complete documentation on how colonization works? It kinda sucks having to guess and be forced to waste our time experimenting.

 

[Freyar]

The system follows the old structures (structures that old players know by heart), but new players need a manual with everything instead of experimenting and having the pleasure of learning.
I just believe that the connections between the planets should follow the line of the star not the line of the planet, respecting the primary economy and the factory economy.

I'd be up for experimenting like the old days with the run-up to the Thargoids. That's fine, as a mistake doesn't leave a permanent mark on the galaxy and doesn't cost a full week's worth of time.

The problem here is that bad decisions are permanent, and the time investment is too high to experiment like back in the old days.

 

[Weiner Warlock]

Greetings Commanders,

The current process for growing the market in a Starport is to build up facilities on or around the planetary body that it is orbiting.

We are continuously iterating on the design implemented, and we will continue to investigate ways to allow all facilities to find a route to market elsewhere within that star system. We have read your feedback and we are taking it into account in our investigation.

Thank you for continuing to share your thoughts during this Beta process and helping us to improve Trailblazers.

I want to add my voice to those calling for documentation to be shared. Not giving the community any information to work with makes it all the more frustrating for us.

 

[Tetra Trash]

I think all of us players and FDev want colonization to be a success, so I also would like to echo others’ requests for documentation on how processes are supposed to work. Not only would it prevent us players from potentially wasting large amounts of time on things that can’t be undone, it would help us focus our activities and feedback and likely help the dev team produce a better project in less time since 1) we would know what to look at/for and 2) you probably cut way down on “is bug or feature?” Issue tracker issues. It doesn’t have to be every last detail, just big picture. Think recent legend of Zelda type games that lead you through the basic mechanics while still leaving details to be discovered.

 

[MDHansen]

The current process for growing the market in a Starport is to build up facilities on or around the planetary body that it is orbiting.

-If a star has 3 slots, would the other 2 slots influence the Orbis in the 3rd slot?
-If a planet has X orbiting slots and 2 moons with each X orbiting slots and 0 planetary slots, will all those influence a station in orbit around the planet?

-It would be prudent that an unnafected port/station adopts the system main economy if no influencing ports/installations is within given parameters

 

[Brian of Earth]

I believe it needs to be setup to be geared to being a high tech economy

Nope, this is my whole point. Does this mean if you have a mining system you will have no shipyard? You build your dream mining system but you can't park any ships there, you have to go next system over (maybe) and park your ships in someone else's starport? Is that ok? Legacy systems don't seem to have this restriction. Plus, I've hauled my 455 off trying to get my shipyards unlocked, this is just frustrating.

 

[Ian Doncaster]

Nope, this is my whole point. Does this mean if you have a mining system you will have no shipyard?

You don't need an entire high-tech economy on the system level, but you do need to get a few points of tech level from somewhere (and high-tech constructions are the most efficient way to get it, though not the only one)

- if you have rings/belts then Asteroid bases fit the theme and give +3 each
- large Extraction settlements do give a point each, though that's going to be a slow way to get them
- Comms Installations are also +3
- an Industrial Outpost on the side somewhere is +3
- a single medium High-tech Odyssey settlement is +6 (which reports suggest is enough) and can be put somewhere out of the way without moving away from a general 'extraction' theme.

It's hard to tell exactly, but it seems like having an entire system which is only a single type of asset is discouraged - a few Odyssey settlements or installations to boost security, tech level, etc. while still allowing the system to have an overall extraction theme seems to be the way to go. But if you purely build extraction things there's going to be a downside to that.

 

[Brian of Earth]

You don't need an entire high-tech economy on the system level, but you do need to get a few points of tech level from somewhere (and high-tech constructions are the most efficient way to get it, though not the only one)

- if you have rings/belts then Asteroid bases fit the theme and give +3 each
- large Extraction settlements do give a point each, though that's going to be a slow way to get them
- Comms Installations are also +3
- an Industrial Outpost on the side somewhere is +3
- a single medium High-tech Odyssey settlement is +6 (which reports suggest is enough) and can be put somewhere out of the way without moving away from a general 'extraction' theme.

It's hard to tell exactly, but it seems like having an entire system which is only a single type of asset is discouraged - a few Odyssey settlements or installations to boost security, tech level, etc. while still allowing the system to have an overall extraction theme seems to be the way to go. But if you purely build extraction things there's going to be a downside to that.

Still, I'm dying on this hill: Makes no logical sense to not offer a shipyard OR UC on any starport, otherwise no point in having them. But, I seem to be the only one that feels this way so I'll settle down lol

 

[Syrelai]

Still, I'm dying on this hill: Makes no logical sense to not offer a shipyard OR UC on any starport, otherwise no point in having them. But, I seem to be the only one that feels this way so I'll settle down lol

No, you're not the only one who feels this way.

Me and my squadron made our first steps into colonizing a nearby system by building a coriolis starport together. It went live after maintenance as it should have, but still has no shipyard, livery, or outfitting.
My buddy made a coriolis starport somewhere else, and has a shipyard out of the gate, no other structures built.

So far I've read "raise your tech level" or "raise your development level and it'll show up".

I spent 4 hours solo building a comms installation which supposedly raises my tech level by 3 points to test this, and it completed Tuesday. After thursday's recent tick over, still no shipyard, livery, or services. Meanwhile, buddy's coriolis? Still chuggin' with everything except UC, out of the gate.

My system is Ross 303, an 8 body system with a pop of 13,900, with a system score that increased from 8 to 11.
My buddies system is Piscium Sector UK-N A7-1 with a body count of 6, and has a population of 14,000.

The ONLY detectible difference is that he chose to build a coriolis with the 4 poles sticking out, and I chose the base one without any.

It's incredibly deflating to have 0 real answers to this.

 

[Alice of Altair]

Could make it so that facilities like satellite, Comms, relay stations and maybe certain surface facilities like the io hub extend the influence of the other facilities on and around the same body so that they can affect the markets on stations further within the same system.