Expansions: BGS Guide Best Current Thinking
- Thread starter Jane Turner
- Start date
Nope.
Since 3.3 it seems that faction influence is not reduced after expansion. This I have witnessed on many occasions. I have now heard of two other occasions, as well as mine now, where influence dropped alarmingly during the expansion period. Is there a situation where this might happen other than through intervention by griefers or enemies?
Normal BGS activity will still reduce influence, yes. Depending on what else is in the system (and neighbouring systems) it could just be random traffic rather than specific enemies - when you're at 75%+ it's pretty easy for random traffic to help the other factions more than it helps you.
Ironically I'm thinking it may be in my best interest to avoid expansion once I gain control of the little backwater system I recently moved to. I don't want to bite off more than I can chew, or worse, catch the attention of any PMFs in this region of space!
So the trick is to make sure my faction stays below 75% influence, yes?
So the trick is to make sure my faction stays below 75% influence, yes?
This is way more than random traffic. Up until now things have been virtually static. then a 4% drop as soon as we went into pending expansion in one tick and massive effort to bring it back up 2%. Definitely not random. Just wondered if it could be something other than a concerted attack.
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95% chance that is simple paranoia. Happens to all freshmen who tackle the bgs. No criticism or snarke, it really does always happen.
You have to accept that people come from nowhere, and disappear just as quickly. Maybe a day, maybe a week, but they move on sooner or later, and never have any interest in nerfing your faction.
Yes I figured it was Cmdr activity, random or deliberate, but wanted to ask if anyone knew of a game mechanic that would explain the resistance. Wondered about multiple states. We are in Expansion, Boom and Civil Liberty. Could that have an effect. Can't see how but ????? Just trying to eliminate all other possibilities.
btw: Not exactly a noob. Been playing ED for 5 years now and bgs for the last 2. No insult taken.
Your states could be luring in traders from nearby to take advantage of higher profits and they then take outgoing missions for other factions.Yes I figured it was Cmdr activity, random or deliberate, but wanted to ask if anyone knew of a game mechanic that would explain the resistance. Wondered about multiple states. We are in Expansion, Boom and Civil Liberty. Could that have an effect. Can't see how but ????? Just trying to eliminate all other possibilities.
btw: Not exactly a noob. Been playing ED for 5 years now and bgs for the last 2. No insult taken.
Or sometimes a leading faction's beneficial states increase the number of incoming missions from neighbouring systems that, strangely, all target one particular faction that isn't the leading one.
Just did a quick analysis of the influence changes over the last week and concluded that it almost certainly the result of player activity rather than in-game mechanics. Now feel comfortable that "Expansion does not diminish influence" still holds true which is what I wanted confirmation of and that I was right to dismiss in-game mechanic as a possible cause.
Thanks for the input.
All too true.
But itinerants can cause real problems if they have leanings towards a superpower. For example, if you are an Independent in Federation space and your uninvited guests are enthusiastically Fed, they can flatten your faction without thinking about it just by working exclusively for Fed-aligned factions.
Just because they aren't out to get you doesn't mean you should purge your paranoia - mine's still going strong after more than four years (but I don't twitch quite so much).
Strange thing happened.
One of my supported non-PMF losts 2 wars in a row, decreased to 7% (seven!) influence in its only system.
On this Monday its started an expansion state! After 2 days the expanison was a success! Onto a system 40lys(!!) away and totally empty(!!!).
You can check this on Inara, EDSM, EDDB, all says the same (apart from elitebgs, whats not updated since 33 hours).
The new system name is HIP 83701.
Can anybody explain it?
Possible manual control from FDev?
Something will happen there in the new September Update?
One of my supported non-PMF losts 2 wars in a row, decreased to 7% (seven!) influence in its only system.
On this Monday its started an expansion state! After 2 days the expanison was a success! Onto a system 40lys(!!) away and totally empty(!!!).
You can check this on Inara, EDSM, EDDB, all says the same (apart from elitebgs, whats not updated since 33 hours).
The new system name is HIP 83701.
Can anybody explain it?
Possible manual control from FDev?
Something will happen there in the new September Update?
Sounds like a job for a support ticket. There's no assets in HIP 83701 as far as Inara/EDDB are concerned, and the galmap says there's no population or system allegience there.
EDIT: Oh wow. Vektor Zaremov's Legacy is a new Tourist Orbis in that system. Literally no notes of it anywhere. I'm going to assume FD decided to populate a new system... when they do this they tend to grab a random faction from a nearby system. But a single faction... that's odd.
2nd EDIT: It's already expanding again from that system too, obviously coz it's the only faction at 100%... so maybe a bugreport is due coz that faction will just infinitely expand in that case.
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That may be intentional - Frontier have set up single-faction systems before with the intent of getting several expansions out of them before another faction managed to expand there (though as it happened the inbound expansion was very quick)
There's a few other systems in potential expansion range which should slow it down eventually.
We have just triggered an expansion at 74,85%. So it seems the >75% given in the OP is not entirely correct, looks like it might be 75% after rounding. Perhaps you would like to correct.
Is there any control over expansion? I guess not. Triggered an expasion, did a handful of expansion support missions to closest sector with coriolis starport hoping they would expand over there. Instead of setting sail to that sector 6 ly away they expanded 25 ly away to some backwater world with a single distant surface site. Makes no sense at all :/
There's a fixed priority order for expansions, so "control" consists of setting it up so that your preferred target is at the top of the list on expansion day.
Easier in some circumstances than others.
So how do I set it up? By doing expansions mission on the fifth day to change that fixed priority order?
No - it needs setting up over a much longer time period to ensure that expansion targets you don't want are lower priority (e.g. by expanding other factions into them) and the one you want is higher priority. If your faction is present in multiple systems, then balancing influences above or below 75% to ensure that the expansion starts from the most advantageous system is usually necessary. Some player groups are very organised and good about this, but it takes a lot of coordination to really get right, and it helps if other player groups are not trying to do the same thing in the same region...
The priority order is:
First priority: systems which have less than seven factions present, no previous retreats. Closest system within priority is chosen. If none exists, go to second priority.
Second priority: systems which have less than seven factions present, previously retreated. Closest system within priority is chosen. If none exists, go to third priority.
Third priority: systems which have exactly seven factions present, including a non-native target faction not currently in a conflict. System with the lowest influence target faction is chosen (effect of previous retreats is uncertain). If none exists, go to fourth priority.
Fourth priority: no expansion this time, next expansion has extended range. If this expansion already had extended range and still couldn't find a valid target, then this system will not generate any expansions at all for a while.
The priority order is:
First priority: systems which have less than seven factions present, no previous retreats. Closest system within priority is chosen. If none exists, go to second priority.
Second priority: systems which have less than seven factions present, previously retreated. Closest system within priority is chosen. If none exists, go to third priority.
Third priority: systems which have exactly seven factions present, including a non-native target faction not currently in a conflict. System with the lowest influence target faction is chosen (effect of previous retreats is uncertain). If none exists, go to fourth priority.
Fourth priority: no expansion this time, next expansion has extended range. If this expansion already had extended range and still couldn't find a valid target, then this system will not generate any expansions at all for a while.