[INDEPENDENT] How Many PMF's Have Less Than Ten Active Members? Or, Just One?

I have my own squadron of one. In just a few days activity, I pulled ahead from less than the 3500th ranking, to the mid-1500's.

I will never catch up with the big squadrons, but it shows just how few points are required to pick myself off the absolute floor in rankings.

This leads me to believe that there are a number of players/squadrons who have gone dormant. And, quite a few one-player squadrons.

PMF's may have associated squadrons, and PMF's have home factions, but I suspect that many PMF's are dormant as well.

Reason: Burnout. BGS play is hard work. Squadrons may be easier, in that they do not have to go through the submittal process. They can pledge to any faction. Squadron members are free to drop out, and choose another squadron with a different associated faction, form their own squadron, or quit.

How many Zombie PMF's are there? Should PMF's, who can have bases, have an expiration date, or a check to see if they still have ten active members?

If they are indeed zombies, they should be stricken, and forfeit their bases to NPC's. Giving them to other PMF's is pouring gasoline on a fire.

They can always re-form, but somewhere else. PMF's should require a higher level of commitment, if they are to have assets.

This should light a fire under a number of PMF's.
 
How Many PMF's Have Less Than Ten Active Members? Or, Just One?

As Jmais wrote above, Player-named Minor Factions (PMFs) are precisely that: minor factions that players petitioned to Frontier to add to the game, as opposed to the Stellar Forge. Once they've been added to the game, they are like any other minor faction: Players don't have overt control of over them, but can influence them via manipulating influence and faction states. They don't have "members," active or otherwise, and no single player or group of players can bar another player from influencing them. They are run by NPCs, controlled by NPCs, and made up of NPCs.

PMF's may have associated squadrons, and PMF's have home factions, but I suspect that many PMF's are dormant as well.

You've got this backward. Squadrons may associate themselves with PMFs, and squadrons may be dormant, but no PMF will truly be dormant, because they consist solely of NPCs. And PMFs don't have "home factions," they are NPC factions. They've just been named by players, as opposed to having been named by the Stellar Forge.

How many Zombie PMF's are there? Should PMF's, who can have bases, have an expiration date, or a check to see if they still have ten active members?

Until they day that Frontier adds zombies to the game, there can be no "zombie" PMFs. Every single minor faction in the game, PMF or SFMF, consists of NPCs who are very much alive, and not animated corpses.

They also don't have "members," active or otherwise. Keep in mind that many Player-named Factions weren't added to make BGS manipulation easier for player groups or Powerplay. They were added to canonize some players' fanfiction, or as a way of adding their mark to the game, or for a host of other reasons besides BGS play, and there is nothing wrong with this.

Heck, I know of at least five "PMFs" that existed before Frontier decided to insert minor factions that have been named by players into the game, and some of the largest "minor empires" are either Stellar Forge named, or at the very least follow the Stellar Forge's naming convention.

If they are indeed zombies, they should be stricken, and forfeit their bases to NPC's. Giving them to other PMF's is pouring gasoline on a fire.

Those bases are already in the hands of NPCs, because Player-named Minor Factions are NPCs. They've just been named by players, as opposed to the Stellar Forge. Players' don't "own" a PMF, anymore than they "own" a SFMF. Once Frontier has added them to the game, they're fare game for everyone, not whatever player or group petitioned Frontier to add them.
 
I specifically picked a system with an apparently dormant (ie. isn't controlling any assets and doesn't appear to have been making any attempt to claim any) PMF in it as my home base because them being there meant that I wasn't going to get any other upstart player groups wandering in and putting up tents on my front lawn and declaring it to be "their" home.
 
If they get bases for creating them, maybe not.
They don't though? PMFs just appear in the game , no assets get "given" to them[1]. A PMF gets control of assets just like any other NPC faction once they are in the game i.e through conflicts and expansion.

I've still got no idea stay distinction you're trying to make between PMFs and npc factions though... there is zero difference besides whether the name was proc gen, or requested by a player.

[1] there was a time when FD had no idea what they were doing, and a pmf was given the controlling station and a controlling influence amount... but that station could still be flipped like normal rules. My group supported an NPC faction into 7-odd systems before PMFs were a thing... we asked for a pmf because we could; in reality that actually set things back as we pushed the new faction into control. If we stuck with the NPC faction... we'd probably have more assets controlled by that faction than we currently do... and we'd not be relevant to whatever point you're trying to make with this whole "assets going back to NPC factions".

Again... it's a non issue... players do not belong to or have authority over factions... regardless of if they are pmfs or proc gen.
 
Last edited:
They don't though? PMFs just appear in the game , no assets get "given" to them[1]. A PMF gets control of assets just like any other NPC faction once they are in the game i.e through conflicts and expansion.

I've still got no idea stay distinction you're trying to make between PMFs and npc factions though... there is zero difference besides whether the name was proc gen, or requested by a player.

[1] there was a time when FD had no idea what they were doing, and a pmf was given the controlling station and a controlling influence amount... but that station could still be flipped like normal rules. My group supported an NPC faction into 7-odd systems before PMFs were a thing... we asked for a pmf because we could; in reality that actually set things back as we pushed the new faction into control. If we stuck with the NPC faction... we'd probably have more assets controlled by that faction than we currently do... and we'd not be relevant to whatever point you're trying to make with this whole "assets going back to NPC factions".

Again... it's a non issue... players do not belong to or have authority over factions... regardless of if they are pmfs or proc gen.
That's correct, at one time Frontier handed out bases. Nor do they have control over and above what they uses as normal players.

It's just time for some housecleaning (already noted as troublesome).
 
That's correct, at one time Frontier handed out bases. Nor do they have control over and above what they uses as normal players.

It's just time for some housecleaning (already noted as troublesome).

Why?

Not all Player-named Minor Factions were created to make BGS manipulation easier for a particular player group, Squadron, or Power. Why should a PMF be “cleaned up” just because they don’t match your particular criteria for “being active?”
 
And conversely, anyone can just show up and support a PMF. You couldn't tell automatically whether they were "supported" or not, not reliably. And you really don't want the situation where "Got a PMF? You can't go on DW3 or it'll have disappeared by the time you get back."

If you want to talk about Squadrons instead - the data is a few months old, but I had a look at https://forums.frontier.co.uk/threads/how-big-are-squadrons-a-statistical-survey.511022/
On PC, around 8% of Squadrons have at least 10 players and around 70% of the players in squadrons are in squadrons with at least 10 members. That would be about 600 squadrons of 10+ players at the time, probably slightly more now.
 
Why?

Not all Player-named Minor Factions were created to make BGS manipulation easier for a particular player group, Squadron, or Power. Why should a PMF be “cleaned up” just because they don’t match your particular criteria for “being active?”
Exactly this.

Notwithstanding the fact "faction members" makes no sense since no factions any members, pmf or no, there's many other problems. Let's just call this fictional membership "supporters".. some crazy measure which makes no sense.

  • why kick a faction out with less than 10 supporters, if its more effectively developed than most factions with more than 10 supporters?
  • one group of < 10 supporters helps a pmf... another group of < 10 supporters helps some rando npc faction. You'd remove the first, but not the second. Why? That's pretty illogical.
  • what if a faction gets massive passive support from local traffic (all not defined as actual "supporters", think like sothis or ceos)... but shas no defined supporters. Do you just rip that out? Seems tot totally illogical to me

But again... this is all moot because players are not part of nor do they control factions. You could make an argument to remove squadrons below x members.. not that i think that's a great thing either... but the argument would carry some logic at least.

If your concern is an abandoned/unsupported faction sitting on an asset, go take it. That's how the bgs works.
 
Exactly this.

Notwithstanding the fact "faction members" makes no sense since no factions any members, pmf or no, there's many other problems. Let's just call this fictional membership "supporters".. some crazy measure which makes no sense.

  • why kick a faction out with less than 10 supporters, if its more effectively developed than most factions with more than 10 supporters?
  • one group of < 10 supporters helps a pmf... another group of < 10 supporters helps some rando npc faction. You'd remove the first, but not the second. Why? That's pretty illogical.
  • what if a faction gets massive passive support from local traffic (all not defined as actual "supporters", think like sothis or ceos)... but shas no defined supporters. Do you just rip that out? Seems tot totally illogical to me
But again... this is all moot because players are not part of nor do they control factions. You could make an argument to remove squadrons below x members.. not that i think that's a great thing either... but the argument would carry some logic at least.

If your concern is an abandoned/unsupported faction sitting on an asset, go take it. That's how the bgs works.
My concern is that I have no sense of "ownership", or "player agency" with the way assets are implemented currently. It's just another shell Corp.

You might say that being able to own/build something of your own beside your ship is not what Elite is about. Fair enough. But, the current investment in time in PMF's should give you something more than a brass plate on the front door.

I just want to own my own convenience store, out in the black. I don't want to build an empire. I don't think that I am alone. Just like an engineer base, with no BGS influence. I just want a corner gas station.
 
My concern is that I have no sense of "ownership", or "player agency" with the way assets are implemented currently. It's just another shell Corp.

You might say that being able to own/build something of your own beside your ship is not what Elite is about. Fair enough. But, the current investment in time in PMF's should give you something more than a brass plate on the front door.

I just want to own my own convenience store, out in the black. I don't want to build an empire. I don't think that I am alone. Just like an engineer base, with no BGS influence. I just want a corner gas station.
So, you acknowledge that players don't have ownership over assets, and feel the "results" of BGS actions are somewhat meaningless, yet feel like "unsupported" factions should have any assets revoked?

That's some major cognitive dissonance going on there... and makes even less sense than your original post.
 
I think part of the problem stems from the creation and use of "PMF" or "player minor faction" since these don't really exist. It would be more accurate to describe them as player-introduced minor faction. The term was coined simply because for much of the time up to the present, we didn't have squadrons and so the "PMF" term was used to express some kind of "ownership". With squadrons, the situation is now clarified but we still have factions that just happen to have the same or similar name to squadrons that support them.
It might be better to do away with "player minor faction" and simply refer to factions as either active or inactive minor factions (AMF/IMF) since faction influence only changes as a result of players supporting or undermining them.

I would think things like base building would be a squadron thing rather than something related to a minor faction you are supporting. It would be nice for perhaps the squadron to have the ability to introduce its own emblem into the game which could then be used to deck station interiors if the squadron is pledged to a minor faction. Speaking of which, why squadrons do not have the ability to change their faction allegiance in-game from time to time is beyond comprehension.

Now what we could really do with is a ship paint design package so squadrons can design their ships according to a defined squadron colour scheme.

Who knows, perhaps some of these things are coming in the major update next year, particularly base building...
 
Last edited:
So, you acknowledge that players don't have ownership over assets, and feel the "results" of BGS actions are somewhat meaningless, yet feel like "unsupported" factions should have any assets revoked?

That's some major cognitive dissonance going on there... and makes even less sense than your original post.
Blame it on my blood pressure meds. :)
 
AEDC's preferred terminology is "player-supported faction", which could be player-named ("PMF") or NPC faction (procedurally named).

After all, what's important is whether the faction has player support or not
 
Top Bottom