Elite Dangerous Roadmap Summary

  • We watch a video of four Thargoids chasing a Cobra Mark 3, before one of the Thargoids turns to us and initiates a scan.
  • Enthusiasm of working on the game in its 3rd year reminds high.
  • Behind the scenes video of the ED team hard at work. This team clearly cares about their work and the content they’re delivering, as well as the passion the community has for the game.
  • 2018 updates will be focused on three areas- Core Game Improvements, Narrative Expansion, and new features which build on the first 2.
  • Season 3 of Elite Dangerous is called “Beyond”.
  • 2018 roadmap – Q1, Core improvements, followed by 2 more updates delivering new ships, missions, scenarios. More on Q4 in a bit.
  • Q1 – A bunch of QoL improvements.
  • Engineering improvement – when rolling a blueprint spin, that spin will always be better than the previous spin.
  • Improvements to system authority.
  • Improved Trade Data. Traders rejoice!
  • Wing missions!
  • Asset polish to planets in Q1 2018 (Shaders and Graphs).
  • Wide variety of planetary colour variation. In Q1 2018
  • Narrative improvements.
  • Another video. SRV visiting Guardian base. Intercepted by Thargoid. Oh, it doesn’t like Guardian Tech! Example of narrative thread which Frontier will be expanding on.
  • Q1 will continue the Guardian story. New experiences, CGs, players working together.
  • Personal narrative will be expanded.
  • Ohh, new equipment! A new weapon, a gun of some-kind, and what looks like scientific equipment/sensors are on the way!
  • Frontier not done with Guardians, not by a long shot.
  • Galnet update!!! New feature, Galnet Audio which will read out Galnet articles while you’re in flight in your cockpit.
  • New ships!!!
  • “A lot more ships in incoming updates”
  • New ship shown – the Chieftain– work in progress mesh shown. It’s an answer to a dangerous universe and return of Thargoids. It’s an Allance-Lakon vessel, a more military Lakon vessel.
  • More alliance ships on the way!
  • Another new ship announced - then the 1984 version of the Krait is shown! Cue biggest cheer of the night! Then 2018 re-design shown. Unique cockpit placement among with hardpoint placement.
  • Q4 will be largest update for 2018 – there will be a new organisation structure for player groups called Squadron. Create your own, featuring enhanced communication options regardless of what squadron members are doing in the game.
  • Squadrons can purchase their own fleet carriers! Large, mobile, dockable ships. Squadron members can refuel, rearm etc.
  • Mining improvements! Improvements to detection and extraction of materials. Frontier looking to improve Wild-West feel of prospecting.
  • Concept art of ice planet shown, enhancements coming to planetary surfaces and environments.
  • Improved lighting model, both space and planetary.
  • Improvements to scatter-rock planetary system to improve placements of rocks and other surface objects.
  • Improvements to localised ambient effects including fog.
  • Exploring improvements, to how you find stuff.
  • New feature – the Codex will log your discoveries. It will also serve as an encyclopaedia, and will hint at other potential discoveries for explorers.
  • For explorers, there will be new exploration content and new anomalies to go out and find.
  • There’s a lot more content to be revealed in ED: Beyond. And its all going to be free to Horizons players.
  • But what about 2.4? Sneak peek video!
  • Is that the Type 10? It could be a Type 9 to be honest. Typing and watching so I could be mistaken.
  • SRVs at deserted Inra base.
  • Thargoid ship destroyed in space. One of the human Commanders scoops up something (a Thargoid probe?) at which point 3 Thagroid Interceptors jumps in and unleash swarms of Thargons.
 
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The new Thargoid at the very end look quite different.

Also, was that a new ship near the end? Four large engines. Much larger than a T-9
 
there was a lot there for the multiplayer experience I thought my take away observation is Frontier wants you to play in Open and is making it more attractive and exciting.

The rest was mostly talk, vision and best intentions given as an extension to Horizons so they obviously value the player base.

Nice yes, exciting well I think that depends on the delivery... it could be or it could fall flat I can't predict that and Frontier wasn't prepared to go into the detail which is fair enough at this stage.

What I did like the look of though was the Jurassic World game, its clear that has had a lot of attention and yeah would like to know more.
 
I watched it too and I am blown away. I love what they have planned!

Thx for the summary @TheSisko. Great stuff!

Planetary improvements, Wing Missions, Exploration Codex, Mining and Trading improvements, GalNet Audio! I love it! And they mentioned something about a personalized storyline or so? It was a bit vague, but it was about unlocking some new special weapons.

Also there was a very cool cineamatic about a Guardians Artefact thrwon in front of Thargs! Guess that's a broad hint.


And they sayed it will all be for free with Horizons! Expect me to buy a lot more stuff in the store :D
 
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Always better engineer upgrades! Not overly sure that's positive. In F1 not all upgrades end up improving the cars...
Alliance are getting more organised with new military ships. I'm guessing military progression is around the corner.
The Chieftain makes me think the Alliance ships will have Indian names. The Mohawk, the Apache, Cherokee...
 
Will single players be able to own their own carriers? I really don't care if they cost 10billion, I'd just love the notion of having that long term goal to shoot for.
I'm not part of any group so will group play be mandatory for these things?
 
I wasn't impressed with the delivery of the information .. but I've since chalked it up to my own expectations not being met.
Overall, I'm happy and looking forward to 3.0; the PC anniversary update, and JW:E.
 
Thanks for this post. Missed it and so really useful.

As always proof of the pudding etc... but this sounds great.

Aps.
 
Q4 will be largest update for 2018 – there will be a new organisation structure for player groups called Squadron. Create your own, featuring enhanced communication options regardless of what squadron members are doing in the game.
Squadrons can purchase their own fleet carriers! Large, mobile, dockable ships. Squadron members can refuel, rearm etc.

O... M... G...

This is something I suggested back in 2014 and I got a thread full of replies like "Elite is one man against the Universe... go play Eve... blah blah"

Finally Elite is going to become a multi player game with proper multi player structure. This is the best news I've heard in a long long time.
 
A little short on some things I would have liked to hear about (more types of landable planets was notably absent for example) but overall it was a decent stream with a few unexpected reveals that are worth noting. That it's actually going to be free for Horizons owners was a big shocker, but I suppose you could put that down to my own learned cynicism of the game industry, fully expecting them to double or triple-dip on an already full priced game out of sheer habit.

The Krait looks damn cool, I like what they're doing with the underslung cockpit, always wanted a ship with better ventral visibility for planet skimming. The panther clipper Chieftain was nice to see too, wonder if those engines rotate?

And to clear up for anyone who's not sure yet, yes the Type-10 is indeed a militarised Type-9, as indicated by the wording of the game files.

Their explanation as to how they're going to expand the frankly lackluster in-game narrative was light on details and heavy on buzzwords so we'll have to see how that plays out, story integration is their weakest skill so far.

Mining and exploration expansions are good to hear, but again somewhat lacking on details so I'd expect more to come on that as the updates get closer.

The squadron stuff I'm not particularly interested in but if it keeps captain moneybags busy maintaining a capital ship then sure why not.

Overall take from the presentation positive, not bad frontier, not bad. Let's see how it plays out from here.
 
O... M... G...

This is something I suggested back in 2014 and I got a thread full of replies like "Elite is one man against the Universe... go play Eve... blah blah"

Finally Elite is going to become a multi player game with proper multi player structure. This is the best news I've heard in a long long time.


Could be because I don't know Elite IS an MMO and the biggest thing Elite has going against it is that it lacked solid multi player in the multiplayer generation. I also suggested a while back that FD take a hard look at setting Elite apart from NMS and SC by really focusing in on multiplayer tools. Looks like *gasp* FD does listen to their player base. They just want to do it right.
 
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