I don't understand rank progression

[Dirk Braben]

I had to admit to myself that I don't understand how the Fed/Empire rank progression system is supposed to work.

Currently I am:
- Federation: Cordial with 21% reputation
- Empire: Friendly with 73% reputation

My ranks are:
- Federation: Chief Petty Officer with 92% progression to next rank
- Empire: Knight with 55% progression to next rank

Spoiler

And he's just smiling at me, silently...

Following the rank ladder this looks like this:

+----+-----------------------------------------------+---------------------------------------------------------------------+
|    | Empire [73]                                   | Federation [21]                                                     |
|    +----+----------+------------------+------------+----+----------------------+----------------------+------------------+
|    | XX | Rank     | Ship             | System     | XX | Rank                 | Ship                 | System           |
+----+----+----------+------------------+------------+----+----------------------+----------------------+------------------+
|  0 | XX | None     |                  |            | XX | None                 |                      |                  |
|  1 | XX | Outsider |                  |            | XX | Recruit              |                      |                  |
|  2 | XX | Serf     |                  |            | XX | Cadet                |                      |                  |
|  3 | XX | Master   | Imperial Courier |            | XX | Midshipman           | Federal Dropship     |                  |
|  4 | XX | Squire   |                  | Achenar    | XX | Petty Officer        |                      | Sol              |
|  5 | 55 | Knight   |                  |            | 92 | Chief Petty Officer  | Federal Assault Ship | Vega, Beta Hydri |
|  6 |    | Lord     |                  |            |    | Warrant Officer      |                      | PLX 695          |
|  7 |    | Baron    | Imperial Clipper | Summerland |    | Ensign               | Federal Gunship      | Ross 128         |
|  8 |    | Viscount |                  |            |    | Lieutenant           |                      | Exbeur           |
|  9 |    | Count    |                  |            |    | Lieutenant Commander |                      |                  |
| 10 |    | Earl     |                  | Facece     |    | Post Commander       |                      | Hors             |
| 11 |    | Marquis  |                  |            |    | Post Captain         |                      |                  |
| 12 |    | Duke     | Imperial Cutter  |            |    | Rear Admiral         | Federal Corvette     |                  |
| 13 |    | Prince   |                  |            |    | Vice Admiral         |                      |                  |
| 14 |    | King     |                  |            |    | Admiral              |                      |                  |
+----+----+----------+------------------+------------+----+----------------------+----------------------+------------------+

So Knight and Chief Petty Officer are effectively at the same level.
However, I have 73% with Empire but only 21% with Federation.

How does this sum up?

Fulfilling Rep+++ missions and performing trade does raise both reputation and rank, but why this discrepancy between Fed and Empire?

I just don't understand the system.


All "Rank" threads have recently been closed and as far as my forum search foo goes none of the threads was recent enough to be relevant to the current version 2.4 in case something changed.

 

[IndigoWyrd]

I had to admit to myself that I don't understand how the Fed/Empire rank progression system is supposed to work.

Currently I am:
- Federation: Cordial with 21% reputation
- Empire: Friendly with 73% reputation

This is pretty much meaningless when it comes to rank progression. Ignore it.

My ranks are:
- Federation: Chief Petty Officer with 92% progression to next rank
- Empire: Knight with 55% progression to next rank


Following the rank ladder this looks like this:

+----+-----------------------------------------------+---------------------------------------------------------------------+
|    | Empire [73]                                   | Federation [21]                                                      |
|    +----+----------+------------------+------------+----+----------------------+----------------------+------------------+
|    | XX | Rank     | Ship             | System     | XX | Rank                 | Ship                 | System           |
+----+----+----------+------------------+------------+----+----------------------+----------------------+------------------+
|  0 | XX | None     |                  |            | XX | None                 |                      |                  |
|  1 | XX | Outsider |                  |            | XX | Recruit              |                      |                  |
|  2 | XX | Serf     |                  |            | XX | Cadet                |                      |                  |
|  3 | XX | Master   | Imperial Courier |            | XX | Midshipman           | Federal Dropship     |                  |
|  4 | XX | Squire   |                  | Achenar    | XX | Petty Officer        |                      | Sol              |
|  5 | 55 | Knight   |                  |            | 92 | Chief Petty Officer  | Federal Assault Ship | Vega, Beta Hydri |
|  6 |    | Lord     |                  |            |    | Warrant Officer      |                      | PLX 695          |
|  7 |    | Baron    | Imperial Clipper | Summerland |    | Ensign               | Federal Gunship      | Ross 128         |
|  8 |    | Viscount |                  |            |    | Lieutenant           |                      | Exbeur           |
|  9 |    | Count    |                  |            |    | Lieutenant Commander |                      |                  |
| 10 |    | Earl     |                  | Facece     |    | Post Commander       |                      | Hors             |
| 11 |    | Marquis  |                  |            |    | Post Captain         |                      |                  |
| 12 |    | Duke     | Imperial Cutter  |            |    | Rear Admiral         | Federal Corvette     |                  |
| 13 |    | Prince   |                  |            |    | Vice Admiral         |                      |                  |
| 14 |    | King     |                  |            |    | Admiral              |                      |                  |
+----+----+----------+------------------+------------+----+----------------------+----------------------+------------------+

So Knight and Chief Petty Officer are effectively at the same level.
However, I have 73% with Empire but only 21% with Federation.

How does this sum up?

Fulfilling Rep+++ missions and performing trade does raise both reputation and rank, but why this discrepancy between Fed and Empire?

I just don't understand the system.

All "Rank" threads have recently been closed and as far as my forum search foo goes none of the threads was recent enough to be relevant to the current version 2.4.

Long and short of it:

You've run more successful missions for the Federation than the Empire.

Pay attention to the Factions giving you missions.

Those with the Federation logo will award % to your Federation Rank.
Those with the Imperial logo will award % to your Imperial Rank.
Those with the Alliance logo will award you credits, materials and/or commodities, as there is no Alliance Rank.
Those with no logo are a waste of time.

 

[Dirk Braben]

This is pretty much meaningless when it comes to rank progression. Ignore it.



Long and short of it:

You've run more successful missions for the Federation than the Empire.

Pay attention to the Factions giving you missions.

Those with the Federation logo will award % to your Federation Rank.
Those with the Imperial logo will award % to your Imperial Rank.
Those with the Alliance logo will award you credits, materials and/or commodities, as there is no Alliance Rank.
Those with no logo are a waste of time.

Well, that's what I knew and did.
However it seems to me I have done more than 5x the number of missions for the Empire (fetch commodity missions, donate money, donate commodities) than for the Fed (those are mostly back from old 1.x days).

For the Empire I have several small factions at Ally, for the Fed none even at Cordial (AFAICR). which would line up with the reputation values (that's where I see the connection between reputation and rank you said to ignore).

 

[EUS]

I think his point is, he's basically at the same level of rank between the two superpowers, yet far below in Fed superpower reputation.
It's a good question.
But answerable.
Probably a spat of missions that went against the Fed brought down his overall rep?

 

[Dirk Braben]

I think his point is, he's basically at the same level of rank between the two superpowers, yet far below in Fed superpower reputation.
It's a good question.
But answerable.
Probably a spat of missions that went against the Fed brought down his overall rep?

I never did any assault or other harmful missions (gotta grind those creditsss before raising the Combat rating).
I only ever did "positive" missions, many more for the Empire than for the Federation (that's where the reputation difference stems from I assume)
Then again I would have expected the ranks would equally be at different stages.
So I ask why it's not the case and what is wrong with my mental model of the ranking and reputation system the game has implemented.

 

[Ben Sevil]

Pure trade and selling data, etc, will raise your reputation but not affect your rank.

 

[ROSS-128]

Major power rep also decays over time, so while he was off running empire missions, his Fed rep will have been decaying back to neutral.

 

[Dirk Braben]

Major power rep also decays over time, so while he was off running empire missions, his Fed rep will have been decaying back to neutral.

AFAIK super power rep decays down to 75% and then stays there.

The mayority of the recent Empire missions are fetch/donate commodity at a station with several Empire minor factions requesting minerals and I had a corresponding station in my ABBA trip, netting me 20+ fulfilled missions up to Elite rank every round.

 

[EUS]

ninjas, ninjas everywhere.

 

[Dirk Braben]

ninjas, ninjas everywhere.

And I pick up every response to add more information for the proposed idea.

(BTW thanks to everybody)

 

[EUS]

Pure trade and selling data, etc, will raise your reputation but not affect your rank.

I didn't know this.

 

[Gun Star]

I didn't know this.

Yeah unless you are directly doing missions with the Superpower Affiliated Factions turning in BH/Combat vouchers or trading only affects rep with those factions. That is a good thing though. The higher the rep with factions the better the payout on missions and more missions with ++ +++ inf attached to them.

Find Systems that the controlling faction is directly affiliated to the Superpower. Become allied, get paid well and rank faster. I work out of Barnard's Star which has 4 Fed factions that I'm allied with and since it is the heart of Fed space all the surrounding systems are Fed. I'm allied with most for running missions. In the past month I've made 3 ranks in Fed only playing a couple hours a day and taking breaks doing CG's

 

[Alderius]

I've kinda given up on trying to understand or grind for rank. I'm currently Duke and Rear Admiral, and it seemed that up until around 2.1, you did a handful of missions and you could see some progress. Now I do missions for each and see no movement at all, even though I'm allied with all of the minor factions at my station. Just seem to have hit the wall on progression, so I've been doing CG's and not worrying about rank at all....

 

[EUS]

I've kinda given up on trying to understand or grind for rank. I'm currently Duke and Rear Admiral, and it seemed that up until around 2.1, you did a handful of missions and you could see some progress. Now I do missions for each and see no movement at all, even though I'm allied with all of the minor factions at my station. Just seem to have hit the wall on progression, so I've been doing CG's and not worrying about rank at all....

I spent the weekend trying to progress my empire rank, in a little bubble of friendly empire space.
3 sessions = 5hrs of running rep++ (or +++ donate) missions has taken me from 37% to 60% Count.
To add insult to injury, I'm not even making money, as the highrep missions are always low paying.
I did the Fed ranking before the introduction of minor factions, it was much better.

 

[IndigoWyrd]

I spent the weekend trying to progress my empire rank, in a little bubble of friendly empire space.
3 sessions = 5hrs of running rep++ (or +++ donate) missions has taken me from 37% to 60% Count.
To add insult to injury, I'm not even making money, as the highrep missions are always low paying.
I did the Fed ranking before the introduction of minor factions, it was much better.

I made my Imperial Rank running trade-type missions. Took me 4 days to go from Baron to Duke.
I made my Federal Rank running general-purpose missions. Took me 5 days to go from Ensign to Rear Admiral, because I had 3 systems to run back and forth between instead of 2.

I averaged around 5 hours a day for the first three days, and probably close to 8 on the 4th and 5th.

No planetary scans, no massacres. Lots of data runs, Industry Needs, Donate (Cr/Commodities), and a bunch of dead pirate lords. I sometimes think there are more pirate lords than pirates.

Usually took 2 or 3 trips back and forth between places to fill my mission list, but after that it stayed full until I was done - and I don't see much point in making any effort to raise either rank after unlocking the Cutter or Corvette at this point, so I'm back to pretty much how I was when I first started - taking whatever mission for whatever faction, aligned to whatever power, as long as the pay is good.

 

[Misty_Dark]

I had to admit to myself that I don't understand how the Fed/Empire rank progression system is supposed to work.

Currently I am:
- Federation: Cordial with 21% reputation
- Empire: Friendly with 73% reputation

My ranks are:
- Federation: Chief Petty Officer with 92% progression to next rank
- Empire: Knight with 55% progression to next rank

Reputation is earned by doing stuff that helps a faction, doing mission, but if the controlling faction is federation or empire, turning in bounties, war bonds, selling goods/exploration data also improves your reputation with empire/federation
Repudation decay over time if you are not doing things to keep or increase the reputation.


Rank, is only earned by doing mission
* All factions that gives missions can belong to empire, federation, alliance or be independent, this can be seen when taking mission, if they have a logo next to them. So if federation rank is your current focus, do mission for factions that are federation.
* The number of missions you need to complete for the next rank increases for every rank you have gained.
* Once you reach 100% you get a special "naval" mission that upon completion also awards you your next rank. These do not always spawn so it can take a while to get one.
* At 100% your progress do not stop, so you will still earn rank progress by doing missions, although you cannot see the progress, until you complete a rank up mission.
* Best missions for ranking up appears to be donate missions, as they appears to give you the biggest increase to your rank. Doing lots of these can be really expensive!!! I spent well over 100 million when I found a system with several Empire factions that just went crazy with donate missions. Why this appears to happen is a mystery to me, but I have seen this in so many systems and also that it has happened several times in my home system.


I have not seen that pure trading (ie it is not a mission giving you the goods to deliver, but you buy goods) increases your rank, but it will have an effect on your reputation if the controlling faction is connected to any of empire or federation (and also empire).


on a sidenote, I think the entire ranking process could be done ALOT better, this pure do missions for the right factions is booring.. this is why all fast tracks for money that involves doing alot of missions also tends to be a good source of actually ranking up faster too, as ranking up is only tied to the number of mission done and to some extent what kind of missions.

 

[Gamatech]

All these complicated explanations just seem confusing to me, no offence intended to any one of you of course!!

To put it simply, there is a difference between your reputation and your rank. The percentages on the left of the screen showing major powers is your reputation, which affects available missions and rewards.

The percentage on the right hand bar is your RANK progression. You earn points towards your next rank by completing missions for factions associated with the corresponding major powers. When the bar is full, stations have a chance of offering you a naval contract. Once completed you rank up a level. Some levels give you access to exclusive star systems or allow you to purchase exclusive ships.