Elite Dangerous | System Colonisation Beta Details & Feedback

[Donald Duck]

Seems to be unlimited, or at least the limit is so high it's irrelevant. Canonn have added about a hundred new systems in the last week, for example (some from their own project, some from just being a large edge-of-bubble faction).

Could ofc depend on how many systems they own. If you own one like we do and then all of a sudden the 4th carrier is used by a random Cmdr to colonize a sun-only system close-by (Trianguli Sector FG-Y D87), maybe as well using using some of the system construction points, it gets "a bit annoying".

Even more so as the construction is still at 0 % after some days...

 

[Tifu]

Even more so as the construction is still at 0 % after some days...

Possibly a placeholder. It's possible some people are trying to "reserve" a system without intending to build yet.

 

[Donald Duck]

Players don't own or control factions (whether a pmf or not; there's no difference).... this is a long- held misconception by many... so yes, anyone can expand from any faction they like.

Also, "rewards" aren't given to a faction, only to the system architect.

I get the idea behind that but then use an npc faction to try stuff and not ressources of a pmf who might have a plan and who will have to maintain the unwanted system in case the stranger "was just trying" and has no plan to further work in the system.

 

[[VR] Mad Mike]

sorry may be me being pre coffee but how do you own a system? i dunno about you guys but when i have a carrier full of goods i plan to mosey around looking for a good system i can snag. if/when i find one i absolutely will not look at what faction is in control of the area around that system, i will plant my flag.

IF that annoys anyone that i am invading their region of space then sorry but cest la vie, 1st come 1st served... other than role play there have never really been player owned factions anyway AFAIK.................. or am i missing something and that is a big no no?

 

[Phalanx414CA]

Ok, FDev, I'm not getting a warm and fuzzy with this deploy-a-beacon-and-watch-it-disappear thing. Seriously, it's been deployed TWICE now and still nothing, no mega-ship to start construction, nada, zilch, nothing. Dropped to main menu and logged back in, no beacon, redeployed, logged again, this time all the way to desktop, restarted the game, logged in, no beacon. what, over?!? I want my $25mill back, this is BULLSH*T.

 

[Kzak]

sorry may be me being pre coffee but how do you own a system? i dunno about you guys but when i have a carrier full of goods i plan to mosey around looking for a good system i can snag. if/when i find one i absolutely will not look at what faction is in control of the area around that system, i will plant my flag.

IF that annoys anyone that i am invading their region of space then sorry but cest la vie, 1st come 1st served... other than role play there have never really been player owned factions anyway AFAIK.................. or am i missing something and that is a big no no?

Technically you don't own a system as much as you are the architect for it. Once an installation is completed, it becomes part of the BGS and is operated by the local factions.

But to stake your claim on a system, you need to go to a populated system, dock at a starbase/starport, select Contacts -> Colonization contact. There you get a view of the available systems, if any, with 15 LY that can be colonized. It's generally recommended to scout out the systems that you intend to colonize so you get a better idea about what you can build there.

BGS factions will sort themselves out in time, I wouldn't worry much about factions.

 

[Cosmo]

Can we get an easier shortcut to view the materials left for a system? Right now you can go to the Galaxy Map, click on My Colonies, click on a system you established, click on Select Construction button which loads the system map, click on the outpost in space or click on Points of Interest > Colonization Efforts > Construction Site. That's the quickest way I have found, which is at least 4 clicks and 2 loads. I've devolved into whipping out my phone and taking a picture of my monitor after delivering cargo, hoping that none of my squadron helped me by delivering materials.

Seconded. Add a quick tab with an overview per colony (star system).

Ok, FDev, I'm not getting a warm and fuzzy with this deploy-a-beacon-and-watch-it-disappear thing. Seriously, it's been deployed TWICE now and still nothing, no mega-ship to start construction, nada, zilch, nothing. Dropped to main menu and logged back in, no beacon, redeployed, logged again, this time all the way to desktop, restarted the game, logged in, no beacon. what, over?!? I want my $25mill back, this is BULLSH*T.

This is a beta, things won't work 100%. You can report the bug.

Technically you don't own a system as much as you are the architect for it. Once an installation is completed, it becomes part of the BGS and is operated by the local factions.

Yes, but the architect is the de-facto owner of a system. He or she cannot be removed. For additional influence you can get a chosen BGS faction to dominate it.

 

[Donald Duck]

Possibly a placeholder. It's possible some people are trying to "reserve" a system without intending to build yet.

Use an npc faction for that.

sorry may be me being pre coffee but how do you own a system? i dunno about you guys but when i have a carrier full of goods i plan to mosey around looking for a good system i can snag. if/when i find one i absolutely will not look at what faction is in control of the area around that system, i will plant my flag.

IF that annoys anyone that i am invading their region of space then sorry but cest la vie, 1st come 1st served... other than role play there have never really been player owned factions anyway AFAIK.................. or am i missing something and that is a big no no?

Sure, no-one owns anything. But imagine if - as in Ian's example - someone "waking up early" on tick-day would just block as many of Cannon's carriers...

That can't be the concept, as it opens the door for "pranking". 1st come, 1st serve but not by using ressources dedicated to someone else.

 

[Jmanis]

I get the idea behind that but then use an npc faction to try stuff and not ressources of a pmf who might have a plan and who will have to maintain the unwanted system in case the stranger "was just trying" and has no plan to further work in the system.

That's kinda my point though... there's no distinction between PMF and NPC faction. It's just factions. Nobody really has any need to think about what someone else is doing with that faction, and that's inherent to the design here.

I've already expanded multiple known PMFs without even meaning to; they just lucked out and were one of the injected factions... and in a game where anyone can pledge their squadron to any faction, this makes sense.

Plus, as things grow, a lot of players simply won't have a choice as more active groups carve out large perimeters. They'll have to expand from them.

This is all aligned with what seems to be design by FD that is gradually loosening control of players on the BGS directly.

Edit: fwiw, the original intention of my groups strategy with the faction we got put in was for exactly this sort of thing.... to grow through the action of randoms.

 

[Ian Doncaster]

maybe as well using using some of the system construction points

Construction points are per-system, not per-faction, so they can use up whatever they like in their own system and it won't affect any of your plans.

Could ofc depend on how many systems they own.

Seems unlikely, since you can start colonisations from factions which don't own any systems at all (so long as they own a station with a contact).

I really don't see any evidence - and there's nothing in the documentation - that there is any limit on the number of simultaneous colonisations either a faction or a system can initiate beyond the obvious geographical ones.

then use an npc faction to try stuff

Though, as above, you may not have the option to do that, if some PMF or another has taken over every dockable asset within range of your colonisation target.

And someone who doesn't care about the BGS ... well, they're not going to spend hours trying to find the one NPC-faction station in range of their chosen system hoping that someone else doesn't just take it anyway.

and not ressources of a pmf who might have a plan and who will have to maintain the unwanted system in case the stranger "was just trying"

You don't have to maintain it, though. You can just ignore it.

 

[[VR] Mad Mike]

Technically you don't own a system as much as you are the architect for it. Once an installation is completed, it becomes part of the BGS and is operated by the local factions.

But to stake your claim on a system, you need to go to a populated system, dock at a starbase/starport, select Contacts -> Colonization contact. There you get a view of the available systems, if any, with 15 LY that can be colonized. It's generally recommended to scout out the systems that you intend to colonize so you get a better idea about what you can build there.

BGS factions will sort themselves out in time, I wouldn't worry much about factions.

sure.... but my thinking for now is, right now there is a gold rush everyone and their dog seems to be grabbing systems.... presumably once they come on line the bubble will expand and THOSE new systems will have a colonisation contact and what are currently just out of range systems will be in range.

my hope is a lot of players will be burned out at that point allowing me to come in in a 2nd wave of colonisation and be able to find a decent system.

last night i spent a short while looking (out of curiosity) and any interesting systems i found had already been claimed.

 

[Jmanis]

And someone who doesn't care about the BGS ... well, they're not going to spend hours trying to find the one NPC-faction station in range of their chosen system hoping that someone else doesn't just take it anyway.

Just to expand this a bit further... factions don't care about commanders or squadrons either... they have expansion objectives, and will work with whatever Commander makes an offer.

 

[Ian Doncaster]

sure.... but my thinking for now is, right now there is a gold rush everyone and their dog seems to be grabbing systems.... presumably once they come on line the bubble will expand and THOSE new systems will have a colonisation contact and what are currently just out of range systems will be in range.

That's how I got mine. Looked around on Wednesday night, saw that everyone had already claimed all the interesting systems in the direction I wanted to go. Knew that I wasn't going to be able to do any hauling anyway for a couple of days, so wasn't too bothered. Looked around again on Saturday afternoon, and some of those initial claims had already been completed, making available a nice system with some ringed gas giants, plenty of landable moons, and lots of space to try things out.

 

[dAlexis]

Very simple question - can system architect retrat from the system colonized?

 

[CMDR MAIN SEQUENCE]

My feedback. So far have completed an outpost and have started on a planetary facility.

• construction points are too complicated. Why are they even necessary? It’s a barrier to enjoying the feature. The “costs” for the higher tier facilities are already high (commodities, player time). Same for the need for certain installations to be constructed before building another facility. What's the incentive to build these space-based installations? They look pretty but don't add much other than a place for PvE combat.
• requirements for initial outpost OK for solo player (without FC) given 4 weeks. I doubt if I’ll ever commit to a Starport because of the CMM requirement - not just the number but also planetary landings take much longer and can get tedious. Which is a shame as the Ice Asteroid bases look fantastic. But it’s good that building a huge starport requires either a very significant commitment from a solo player or players working together
• there needs to be more varied activities not just hauling/mining. Perhaps increase the spawn rate of legal commodities (salvage) in signal sources? Same for missions. The great thing about PP2 is the different activities. I would do more mining but the process is slow
• would be nice if the requirements were a mix of materials and data (i.e. blueprints, schematics etc.) as well as commodities
• why can’t we choose which services are and are not available as with a Fleet Carrier?
• I would have liked to have seen some modularity to the outposts, planetary settlements and space installations i.e. player gets a certain number of “building blocks” and can place them in certain configurations. Without wishing to turn the game into Planet Coaster of course
• would have been good to have split construction of larger facilities into 2 or 3 stages i.e. 1st stage is building 50% complete (with visuals of partial construction - giving the player a sense of progress), 2nd stage is 100% complete and 3rd stage is delivering supplies such as medical equipment, food etc. Perhaps even a 4th stage where people and their cats are transported to their new home
• further to the above, I was hoping that the mission system would be updated to generate passenger missions to deliver population to the new systems
• the transactions panel needs to have a new section ‘construction efforts’ shown in left panel and each construction effort lists the commodities remaining. And also perhaps add an icon in the commodities market (i.e. similar to ‘required by mission’)
• using the in-game tools to find commodities is futile - we should be able to buy trade data for any system within 50-60LY even if we have not visited
• researching the location of your new colony is not easy – the galaxy map should allow us to use other filters alongside the system colonisation ones - and not just one at a time as now – allow us to use 3 or 4 filters at once
• it's a shame that the ships with the most capacity (T9/Cutter) are the worst to fly (especially in supercruise), making the hauling process more tedious than it needs to be (and I like hauling)
• claiming a system costs 25mil – what’s the point of this? Either make it very small 100CR or make it a more meaningful amount
• discount on ships/outfitting when have 10 or more facilities – this is mean, should be lower (maybe 3) and should be weighted based on the tiers not just the number
• need to be able to cancel a construction at any stage - will we end up with lots of unfinished construction sites all over the galaxy?
• tech level, wealth, standard of living, development level - where to see these in-game?
• why do the colonisation ships jump to an inhabited system when finished? Makes no sense, should just de-spawn
• when you release the customization options I hope it’s more than just skins for the starports (I hope you include outposts and planetary bases) e.g. holographic adverts, landing pad holo-marker colours, name plates, signage around the letterbox, customisable hangers, concourse, ATC
• there needs to be FAQ. It’s obvious from the forum and social media that there are a lot of unanswered questions that are not covered by the info on the website, the players handbook or that YT Q&A video from a while back

 

[Kzak]

A screen or panel summarizing the effects of the constructed buildings/orbitals' effect on the solar system would also be good. Some numbers are useful when trying to work out which direction to develop the solar system.

 

[Disemboweled Ego]

Pivoting off this... this is kinda why i wish they left CMMs as they were.

I agree with this on principle, the previous state it (where you could do 1-2 big ship runs from a port before having to go elsewhere while it restocks) was fine.

But considering the time losses from long carrier jumps and downtime and how a less active player might just get unlucky and hit a drained port severl times in a row and being unable to make the extra trips needed to actually find the CMM composites it's more reasonable to err on the side of it being too easy.

The end result is kinda similar to engineering where it undercuts the deeper systems to reduce the grind. Which results in a better experience overall but does it in a away that cheapens a design that would've otherwise been good and makes the traps players can fall into comparatively worse.

 

[ChickChop]

There's been a lot of talk about naming systems. Although it would be nice, it is obviously open to "funny" names.
Maybe have that as an approved option but only when the system is fully completed?
For me that's 31 installations. As I fully intend to "complete" the system, as I'm sure others are, that seems like a reasonable barrier.
For clarity I'm happy to keep the Sector name and just change the coded section.

 

[Jmanis]

Very simple question - can system architect retrat from the system colonized?

No. System architect is a commander, not a faction.

 

[Ian Doncaster]

Very simple question - can system architect retrat from the system colonized?

The architect can't give up their architect role, but all of the factions involved are non-native, so can certainly retreat in the normal way.