I would like to chip in on this one.
Like many others here I've played a lot of games over the last 35 years. I'm going to say that Elite Dangerous has no more gameplay to it than the first Frontier did. Missions, planet landing, variety of ships, crew. There has been no gameplay advancement on this game, that came on a 720k floppy, even with all the resources. Sure it looks better. Occasionally you can fight other people, but my disappointment with Dangerous is that apparently the BGS is somehow considered "enough" for gameplay.
My view is that it isn't.
I have enjoyed parts of Elite Dangerous, but I'm now hitting the end of my playing cycle without actually doing anything significant. And that's it on the nail. I'm insignificant. I've upgraded several ships, made some virtual money, done a bit of PP, but I have "achieved" nothing. I've spent most of the time performing repetitive tasks to feel competitive, and now I'm either winning easily or losing easily because ship imbalance is just so huge.
In my mind, I need more sense of involvement in the bigger picture. I got that with Warhammer, planet side, etc
I play with 2 other friends. They're in the same position. The game needs more objectives, community goals, and ability to feel as though you can make a difference. In game, not via web blog stories.