Establish your own Minor Faction and FAQ

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Zac Antonaci

Head of Communications
Frontier
Hey all!

As you may know we've been looking at how we can allow player groups the ability to establish their own Minor Faction in game. This is something we're super excited about and we’re now ready to accept applications for your own Minor Faction.

We've updated the main thread, but because it's not as visible I wanted to highlight it in a new stickie. In addition I wanted to invite you to ask questions and we will periodically answer them and update the first post for all to see.

Please note: The first set of questions won't be reviewed until tomorrow. I considered putting this live tomorrow morning but I was just too darn excited! I figured everyone could get their questions in now and we could go through the most common ones in the morning. :)

Here's a copy of how you can establish your own minor faction.

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Establishing a Minor Faction

We’re now accepting submissions for groups to establish their own minor faction in game. In order to apply for one you need to be registered on our groups list. To find out if we have your group registered check this thread.

This process has been deprecated. Please see https://forums.frontier.co.uk/showthread.php?t=241826 - thank you!

Name of group:
Name of minor faction:
Type: See image below.
Description:
Location:
Allegiance:

X2g0TNw.png


For those of you who have already adopted a minor faction we are allowing a month’s grace period from this post to register. After this we would ask that you register a new one.

All minor factions will be checked by the Dev team to make sure they are suitable to be added into the game and existing adopted minor factions will also be checked and a decision will be made over legitimacy of ownership.

Dev team decisions will be final and you will only be able to have 1 official minor faction.

Eventually, this will lead on to the possibility of your faction becoming a power and so it’s really important that you grow and develop your faction ready for when that opportunity becomes available.

Please do remember that frontier retain all copyright for Elite Dangerous.

===

FAQ

Here's a list of questions we've answered previously...

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Is it okay if we use someone from the current lore as our Faction Leader, or does the Leader have to be made up entirely?

Sadly not, it’s best for the leader to be a new character.

=

Where can we setup shop system wise, can we inhabit a system outside of the current Inhabited Human Space and colonize planets and become a power that way? Would there be repercussions for doing so?

It needs to be an inhabited system already. That could be one far out, but that would make it very difficult to expand as expansion requires the system to be populated. We would advise picking a system within the bubble.

=

Would we be able to claim a controlling/major station if we were to house ourselves in an NPC occupied system? If not, would we start at an outpost?

As long as there isn’t a player sponsored group in that system already then you will be the controlling faction for that system.

=

Would we be able to form allegiances with active Major Factions as protection until we grow to a significant point? Likewise, could we resist a Major Faction the same way Lugh was able to fend off the Federation?

They can be part of one of the three superpowers, or independent. This would work in the same way minor factions do now.

=

Will Minor Factions/ Powers have alternate methods of expansion than the current Top 10 Powers? Say, Anarchists spreading through cop-killing, Democrats via elections, etc.

The mechanisms will be the same as the current powers.

=

Will Minor Factions be able to create their own Modules? If so, what can we base our ideas on and what are we limited by?

Ideally yes – we would look for suggestions and then balance them.

=

Will Player Submitted Galnets look Similar or different when compared to the standing Powers and the current lore of the game? If so, can we have something to tell the difference between the current Player-Submitted stuff and the real Lore of this game?

All player submitted stories have the commander name at the bottom.

=

If there are two minor faction applications in the running for the same system, what will determine who gets the system in question? Will it be first-come-first-serve?

It will be first come first served. With exception of groups making a claim on an existing minor faction which will go through a more rigorous check with the developers.

=

Do we need to participate as power in powerplay, or can we just hold the faction aspect?

You do not need to become a power :)


=

There is talk of 'Freedom Fighter' roles. How will this affect a groups ability to 'carve out' a place in the bubble?

It could be used to counter a power’s emergence, but this is not planned in the near future

=

Once a group ascends to Power status...how will the group be treated...as a controlled entity by the founders of that group....or will the group be added to PP and be a PP Power, and basically become a Community 'owned' asset?

It’s added to powerplay and operates in the same fashion as the other powers.
smile.png


=

Can you discuss or lay out how player stories are expected to work? What CG's are available to the groups? What the frequency of CG's insertion would be for groups? Should they be used as modes of moving the story...or as culminating activities to a series of group actions, activities, reports?

GalNet stories are submitted in the usual fashion. CGs have to be approved, we’ll look at providing more detailed guidelines in the future, but the main issue would be using CGs to directly boost a minor faction’s influence or for doing things that could otherwise be done through the background sim. They can be used for story purposes, or as a call to arms or to develop a system.

The details on submitting a CG are on the main thread, linked to from the first post

As an example...a BGS Civil War breaks out. The group thinks a refugee exodus should occur based on the outcome of the war. They fight the war, get their outcome, the exodus occurs. Do we expect the exodus to be a quick report in Galnet (maybe with some RP by the group to move consumer items to a different system) or would this warrant a Trade CG within the new system to exemplify the movement of people and goods to that system (and could a CG be injected quickly enough to retain it's relevance to the story)?

It could work either way. How quickly a CG can be added depends on a number of factors and would be dealt with on a case by case basis.

=

If a group is already backing a minor faction, will it be possible to have that factions name changed to what the group chooses, or will every group get a fresh minor faction to build up?

If it’s already backing a minor faction then the minor faction remains as is, if they want a new name then they need a new minor faction.

=

If we choose a minor faction, would we be able to say who they where hostile / friendly / neutral / have a non aggregation pact ect.. with them?

Not specifically except by agreement with other player groups.

=

Can our faction be apolitical where we are friendly with all main powers, as a apolitical / non-political groups like the FGE and the Fuel rats or do we have to be hostile to one or more of the main powers?

That’s up to player group and any arrangements they make with other groups. The superpower alignment defines how they will be treated by the superpowers, minor factions can be independent, but that does not guarantee safety from the superpowers or powers.

I imagine there will be really interesting player led political affiliations and develpoments


=

How does adopting an existing minor faction work. Will you fill out the same details but the whole minor faction will change into your groups minor faction name and details? Or will it just show as you’re supporting them?

The minor faction details would not change, it would just be recorded that they have been adopted by a player group.

=

How is that going to happen? One day you release a server update and *poof* two dozen systems suddenly have a different owner that popped out of nowhere?

The minor factions would be added in batches through a server update as they are processed.

=

Due to the nature of the galaxy will the new minor factions be seen on both Xbox and PC/mac. The EDC has a very diverse group of members on different platforms who want to work together.

The minor factions are the same for all platforms.

=

Is there a limit to the name in terms of size and words. I take it calling the faction Elite Dangerous is a bit silly as would be Facebook group. Is EDC or FBEDC allowed?

The abbreviations shown in the examples would be fine, using Elite Dangerous wouldn’t.

=

Can we declare our minor faction as independent and neutral to all of the PP factions? We want to be the Switzerland of Elite and let everyone be apart of our minor faction and not keep getting enemy status on every passing ship.

You can declare it, but you would need to enforce it.

=

Is it okay if we don't have a faction leader at all? Would be important to communist factions.

Having no leader at all is perfectly fine.
smile.png


=

If our request are refused by developers, will we be warned and will we be able to adjust our proposal to be compliant ?

Within reason yes, but it isn’t a debate and our decision will be final.
 
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Hey all!

As you may know we've been looking at how we can allow player groups the ability to establish their own Minor Faction in game. This is something we're super excited about and we’re now ready to accept applications for your own Minor Faction.

We've updated the main thread, but because it's not as visible I wanted to highlight it in a new stickie. In addition I wanted to invite you to ask questions and we will periodically answer them and update the first post for all to see.

Please note: The first set of questions won't be reviewed until tomorrow. I considered putting this live tomorrow morning but I was just too darn excited! I figured everyone could get their questions in now and we could go through the most common ones in the morning. :)

Here's a copy of how you can establish your own minor faction.

===

Establishing a Minor Faction

We’re now accepting submissions for groups to establish their own minor faction in game.

In order to apply for one you need to be registered on our groups list. To find out if we have your group registered check this thread.

If you have registered your group simply email groups@elitedangerous.com with the following information.

Name of group:
Name of minor faction:
Type: (e.g Democracy, Criminal etc)
Description:
Location:
Allegiance:

For those of you who have already adopted a minor faction we are allowing a month’s grace period from this post to register. After this we would ask that you register a new one.

All minor factions will be checked by the Dev team to make sure they are suitable to be added into the game and existing adopted minor factions will also be checked and a decision will be made over legitimacy of ownership.

Dev team decisions will be final and you will only be able to have 1 official minor faction.

Eventually, this will lead on to the possibility of your faction becoming a power and so it’s really important that you grow and develop your faction ready for when that opportunity becomes available.

Please do remember that frontier retain all copyright for Elite Dangerous.

===

FAQ

Here's a list of questions we've answered previously...

=

Is it okay if we use someone from the current lore as our Faction Leader, or does the Leader have to be made up entirely?

Sadly not, it’s best for the leader to be a new character.

=

Where can we setup shop system wise, can we inhabit a system outside of the current Inhabited Human Space and colonize planets and become a power that way? Would there be repercussions for doing so?

It needs to be an inhabited system already. That could be one far out, but that would make it very difficult to expand as expansion requires the system to be populated. We would advise picking a system within the bubble.

=

Would we be able to claim a controlling/major station if we were to house ourselves in an NPC occupied system? If not, would we start at an outpost?

As long as there isn’t a player sponsored group in that system already then you will be the controlling faction for that system.

=

Would we be able to form allegiances with active Major Factions as protection until we grow to a significant point? Likewise, could we resist a Major Faction the same way Lugh was able to fend off the Federation?

They can be part of one of the three superpowers, or independent. This would work in the same way minor factions do now.

=

Will Minor Factions/ Powers have alternate methods of expansion than the current Top 10 Powers? Say, Anarchists spreading through cop-killing, Democrats via elections, etc.

The mechanisms will be the same as the current powers.

=

Will a power be able to create their own Modules? If so, what can we base our ideas on and what are we limited by?

Ideally yes – we would look for suggestions and then balance them.

=

Will Player Submitted Galnets look Similar or different when compared to the standing Powers and the current lore of the game? If so, can we have something to tell the difference between the current Player-Submitted stuff and the real Lore of this game?

All player submitted stories have the commander name at the bottom.

=

If there are two minor faction applications in the running for the same system, what will determine who gets the system in question? Will it be first-come-first-serve? Thanks and I hope this is the q&a thread.
 
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free-MrBurnsExcellent.gif

Glad to see this is moving along! Thanks guys and to the rest of the community.....let's everyone get behind this! The more we 'do' the more enjoyable the game will get!

For something related to the OP
1. There is talk of 'Freedom Fighter' roles. How will this affect a groups ability to 'carve out' a place in the bubble?


2. Once a group ascends to Power status...how will the group be treated...as a controlled entity by the founders of that group....or will the group be added to PP and be a PP Power, and basically become a Community 'owned' asset?


3. Can you discuss or lay out how player stories are expected to work? What CG's are available to the groups? What the frequency of CG's insertion would be for groups? Should they be used as modes of moving the story...or as culminating activities to a series of group actions, activities, reports?

As an example...a BGS Civil War breaks out. The group thinks a refugee exodus should occur based on the outcome of the war. They fight the war, get their outcome, the exodus occurs. Do we expect the exodus to be a quick report in Galnet (maybe with some RP by the group to move consumer items to a different system) or would this warrant a Trade CG within the new system to exemplify the movement of people and goods to that system (and could a CG be injected quickly enough to retain it's relevance to the story)?
 
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I am CMDR Elenar, leader of the Achenar Immortals - an Imperial faction. I'll be the figurehead for our group. This excites me greatly. Thank you Frontier!

As an Imperial Democracy, I am currently gathering members' input and will update this post shortly with all our information
 
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If a group is already backing a minor faction, will it be possible to have that factions name changed to what the group chooses, or will every group get a fresh minor faction to build up?
 
Thanks for your work on this Zac, everyone that I've been mentioning this to is very excited. Quick question, now that we're registered is there anything else we need to accomplish before the faction is made and placed in the game? I was a bit unclear on this.
 
apolitical / non-political groups

The members of The First Great Expedition have a question about the minor factions.

If we choose a minor faction, would we be able to say who they where hostile / friendly / neutral / have a non aggregation pact ect.. with them?

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Can our faction be apolitical where we are friendly with all main powers, as a apolitical / non-political groups like the FGE and the Fuel rats or do we have to be hostile to one or more of the main powers?
 
Q: Will Minor Factions be able to create their own Modules? If so, what can we base our ideas on and what are we limited by?
A: Ideally yes – we would look for suggestions and then balance them.

Do you mean POWER and not minor faction? That would be awesome to have player backed factions with special weapons.

I would be completely up for that as I have had an idea for a weapon for a long time that would be fair and actually useful.

If FD were to open up special weapons for player driven factions, the game would be a hell of a lot more interesting, because you would have previously uninitiated CMDRs supporting SYSTEM factions, I would be completely on-board with this.




Also, thank you for this opportunity!
 
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I think I may be confused about how this all works. If your group has already decided to adopt a minor faction, will there be anything in game to denote that faction as being adopted by a player group? I think I may have been under the impression we could register a group in game, then claim an existing minor faction we were supporting. I am now getting the impression that the intent was for a group that has supported a minor faction, to register that faction as their group name? Otherwise, how would you tell if a minor faction was being support by a player group?
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SO
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Is it possible for groups who have already adopted a faction and begun working with it, instead of registering a new one, to just have the name of the existing in-game faction changed to something that suitably represents thier group name? Seems like that would be easier on your end anyhow then creating new factions from scratch. I mean, so long as someone doesn't expect to claim and rename the Federal Congress... Subject to approval I guess?
 
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Would we be able to claim a controlling/major station if we were to house ourselves in an NPC occupied system? If not, would we start at an outpost?

As long as there isn’t a player sponsored group in that system already then you will be the controlling faction for that system.

How is that going to happen? One day you release a server update and *poof* two dozen systems suddenly have a different owner that popped out of nowhere? I would have imagined these player-sponsored factions would begin as minor factions without any outpost or starport at all, and would have to work up "from rags to riches", not start with their own starport and system immediately.
 
How is that going to happen? One day you release a server update and *poof* two dozen systems suddenly have a different owner that popped out of nowhere? I would have imagined these player-sponsored factions would begin as minor factions without any outpost or starport at all, and would have to work up "from rags to riches", not start with their own starport and system immediately.

Aye, I imagined that would have been the enjoyable part of doing this. But I guess FDev doesn't want to run the risk of a player group sponsored minor faction being stuck in the rags part of the story for too long. Also, say, if Emperor's Grace gets a system where the faction is already in control, people would cry 'Imperial bias' a lot. Though, to be fair, EG has been working those minor factions for a year now.
 
Three questions so far.

1. Due to the nature of the galaxy will the new minor factions be seen on both Xbox and PC/mac. The EDC has a very diverse group of members on different platforms who want to work together.

2. Is there a limit to the name in terms of size and words. I take it calling the faction Elite Dangerous is a bit silly as would be Facebook group. Is EDC or FBEDC allowed?

3. Can we declare our minor faction as independent and neutral to all of the PP factions? We want to be the Switzerland of Elite and let everyone be apart of our minor faction and not keep getting enemy status on every passing ship.
 
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This is not really something I'm interested in doing but I know others will and that's great for them.

I have but one plea for FD. Please vet any faction names, I'd not really like to be doing my own thing and suddenly head into XxherpderplolxX territory. ;)

Thank you
 
This is not really something I'm interested in doing but I know others will and that's great for them.

I have but one plea for FD. Please vet any faction names, I'd not really like to be doing my own thing and suddenly head into XxherpderplolxX territory. ;)

Thank you

This. And I am concerned that it seems to have real, lasting influence on the game, you need strength in numbers. Not really in keeping with the spirit of Elite -- "Blaze your *own* trail"?
 
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This. And I am concerned that it seems to have real, lasting influence on the game, you need strength in numbers. Not really in keeping with the spirit of Elite -- "Blaze your *own* trail"?

Don't like a faction fight against them! Blaze your own trail!
 
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