Federal rank orogression bugged?

Kolato · Feb 18, 2015

Federal rank progression bugged?

I currently have the cash for a Federal Dropship however, not the rank for it.
I am currently a Chief Petty Officer which i have been since all the way back to my Cobra days (I am flying an Anaconda now)

I am allied with the federation but still have not seen a single rankup mission since my last rankup to chief petty officer.
I've been traveling to all kinds of federal systems from SOL to frontier worlds but to no hope.

Is this a bug or am i doing something wrong?

Hell Razor5543 · Feb 18, 2015

I am at Post Commander, which is currently the highest rank available. I also have had a Dropship (but I am now back in an Asp).

babelfisch · Feb 18, 2015

Just do missions, improve your reputation with various federal factions and next time use the search function.

Caspar · Feb 18, 2015

I got stuck for ages and seemed to shift rank by running Fed missions at other stations. Suddenly got swamped in them .... although I've yet to make Ensign for the Dropship.

theEmohawk · Feb 18, 2015

I made it to Ensign to days ago. I'd been stuck for ages before getting the latest progression mission.
I got the mission just after my combat rank went to competent. Not sure if there's a link.

Yokai · Feb 18, 2015

Check the Guides forum, you'll find something helpful there. Many of us have been in the same boat, but there's a logical way to make progress towards shore.

Caspar · Feb 18, 2015

Yokai said:
Check the Guides forum, you'll find something helpful there. Many of us have been in the same boat, but there's a logical way to make progress towards shore.

If I could rep you twice today, I would. I read the progression guide and it really helps clear things up.

Clawhammer · Feb 18, 2015

Yokai said:
Check the Guides forum, you'll find something helpful there. Many of us have been in the same boat, but there's a logical way to make progress towards shore.

All i can find there are guides "how people think" this system works. But nothing offical that explain how this "sorcery" really works.

Yokai · Feb 18, 2015

Clawhammer said:
All i can find there are guides "how people think" this system works. But nothing offical that explain how this "sorcery" really works.

Because FD has stated that quite literally they aren't going to explain the background simulation. The term they use is "black box". Therefore, the community has to test and reverse engineer pretty much everything.

Clawhammer · Feb 19, 2015

Yokai said:
Because FD has stated that quite literally they aren't going to explain the background simulation. The term they use is "black box". Therefore, the community has to test and reverse engineer pretty much everything.

I understand this and i have no problem with that, but this only works for game mechanics that are "explorable". And iam not sure if this naval rank system is explorable. If i ask different people they all tell different or opposite stories. And here start the frustration, because the informations you reverse engineer are worthless if they dont have a clear logical result.

So i have to deal with something i dont know if that is right or that or not....i have no idea what to do

And i learned in elite, if you are doing something you dont know, you maybe die fast. So i stop doing this.

Snowstormy · Feb 19, 2015

Kola2 said:
I currently have the cash for a Federal Dropship however, not the rank for it.
I am currently a Chief Petty Officer which i have been since all the way back to my Cobra days (I am flying an Anaconda now)

I am allied with the federation but still have not seen a single rankup mission since my last rankup to chief petty officer.
I've been traveling to all kinds of federal systems from SOL to frontier worlds but to no hope.

Is this a bug or am i doing something wrong?

I was allied with the federation (due to bounty hunting in Ressource Extraction Sites) before i started to rank up with them.
It took me ~ 350 Missions to finally reach the post commander rank.
Its just all about the mission grind i assume. I tried to hand in more combat bonds but these didnt seem to effect the naval progression at all.

Ram Paige · Feb 19, 2015

Everything about rank and reputation is horribly bugged. It has been since launch and even in beta.

Ian Skippy · Feb 19, 2015

I got my reputation to allied by bounty hunting, then just started doing rank missions for the feds. Works as I presumed it would.

Whiterose · Feb 19, 2015

theEmohawk said:
I made it to Ensign to days ago. I'd been stuck for ages before getting the latest progression mission.
I got the mission just after my combat rank went to competent. Not sure if there's a link.

Interesting. I have just got to Baron rank in the Empire, was stuck at Lord for ages, and then got competent rank, and immediately got a ascension mission, could be coicidence. Just keep moving around, once a faction is allied, start on another one.

babelfisch · Feb 19, 2015

Ram Paige said:
Everything about rank and reputation is horribly bugged. It has been since launch and even in beta.

Maybe you are doing something wrong because except from minor bugs, reputation and missions just work like I would expect. I never lost reputation after completing a mission.

Sure, missions need a massive overhaul, but they are not "horribly bugged".

Whiterose · Feb 19, 2015

babelfisch said:
Maybe you are doing something wrong because except from minor bugs, reputation and missions just work like I would expect. I never lost reputation after completing a mission.

Sure, missions need a massive overhaul, but they are not "horribly bugged".

I agree. They are not bugged, just severely misunderstood. The combat missions especially, just ignore the alternative path and do what you had set out to do. If attacking pirates always carry cargo so when scanned they turn hostile. Try Nav points and RES sites first to see if you get a Kill granted, if not then it has to be USS's.

BoingZebadee · Feb 19, 2015

Posted in Yokai's thread about my lack of progression in federal missions. Since I posted that I have done another 200 missions for Brani, Cupis, Freng, Ho hsien and Negidals, three of these systems I am new to and out of 400 missions in the last 8 days I have risen less than 5% with just one of the major factions, in Brani, and absolutely no progression in any of the systems 15 minor factions.

The Federation is totally allied and every major controlling faction also allied but the smaller ones are all either friendly or neutral. I actually made one of the Independent factions loose rep in Cupis due to warzone missions but I was expecting that anyway!

So basically the system rep isn't working for me at all and my federal rank hasn't risen since chief petty officer. Oh and in the other thread I thought it might be because I was only competent so I did the warzone missions to get my kills to 500 and I rose in combat rank to expert almost 3 days ago, but nothing has happened with naval progression missions.

Going to fly out 100ly and pick a new set of systems to see if that helps. But as I said Freng and cupis where the new systems but they where close to Brani so maybe the extra distance will help.

BishopC · Feb 19, 2015

Ranked out in both. It's just mission grinding. Choose your missions wisely if you are rank grinding, priority on time efficency, not money, and you can rank out one faction within 3 days (meaning: carry around non-lethal weapons for those beg missions that are pretty common, haul, have an eye out for "bring us" missions that can be completed with the commodities within the station). I think I did (almost) no fighting except the progression missions themselves. Pretty sure reputation is not that important.

Arithon · Feb 19, 2015

From my experience (I'm Baron in the Empire and Ensign in the Federation) that while reputation missions help, you must take a mixture of courier, cargo, data and combat missions to gain rank.

Work for one faction for faster progress - working for a rival faction can lower your reputation and be counter productive.

Avoid doing anything illegal for missions (murder, smuggling, piracy) as they will gain you local reputation, but damage your Federation or Empire reputation.

Stick at it. If you go off and do other stuff the faction you've been working for seems to "cool off" and lose interest in you. I got to Baron in four days. Ensign took ages because I did other stuff.

If you have a large or expensive ship (Type 7, Clipper, Python, etc.) buy a Cobra and use it for the missions. It's cheaper to equip and maintain and can visit outposts, which a large ship cannot. Plus if you go up against an Elite Anaconda, you'll likely lose the first time and replacing the ship with insurance will cost 200K CR as opposed to 3M CR for something like a Clipper or Python.

Good luck!

Ram Paige · Feb 19, 2015

babelfisch said:
Maybe you are doing something wrong because except from minor bugs, reputation and missions just work like I would expect. I never lost reputation after completing a mission.

Sure, missions need a massive overhaul, but they are not "horribly bugged".

Maybe you missed the part in the other thread where everyone else experiences the same 'horribly bugged' issues. Also, even the graphical glitches suggest something is clearly wrong.

Whiterose said:
I agree. They are not bugged, just severely misunderstood. The combat missions especially, just ignore the alternative path and do what you had set out to do. If attacking pirates always carry cargo so when scanned they turn hostile. Try Nav points and RES sites first to see if you get a Kill granted, if not then it has to be USS's.

I've read Yokai's Guide, I've read all of FD's comments, I've actually read everything I can on the topic. I've been experiencing these reputation bugs since launch, many of them still affect my current game. In ALL cases I've detailed, you CANNOT ignore the alternate path and in many cases you can't abandon them, delete them or turn them in - which is why a half dozen of them are sitting in my trans tab even after being there for a month.

Your suggestions are good ones, they're sensible, but they don't circumvent the problems I've encountered.