News Implementation of a dedicated mission server

There are 2 things wrong with what you say:

1. You never proved mission board flipping was used by a small percentage of players, because you never said what percentage of players used the mission boards.

2. Your data-driven approach is flawed, because it cannot measure the players who stopped playing Elite Dangerous (partly) because the mission generation sucked (and they either didn't know about board flipping or didn't like doing it).

While those who only play ED rarely, or avoid the missions, due to the poor mission generation, will also be greatly undervalued by your data-driven approach.

It's a bit like a bad restaurant asking their clients to rate their food - only those who like the bad food will keep coming, and so the food rating won't reflect reality very well.

Excellent post. Repped.

It is the Tomato Metaphor made real.
 
Here is a thought.

Why even have a server for missions? Why not just let the client generate missions when it knows the systems’ state and so on and it would generate missions accordingly. This way you could just add a REFRESH button for when the mission board sucks and I wouldn’t be breaking someone else’s “immurshen” while doing it. Doesn’t it break your “immurshen” when a faction with a population in the billions has only like 10 missions for you?

Wing missions could just be synced between clients in a wing too.

Would it make it easier to get rich? Yes, but it will also make the game a lot less frustrating. Because at the moment it goes like this: Log on; check mission board; everything sucks… Fly to a different system? Nah… probably the same there too…; log off.

Yes, the client would have to store data on all populated systems with all the starports, POIs and so on. But that’s like what? 100 Mb at most?

That server should rather be dedicated to something more important like matchmaking. Less of this P2P bullfeces! No combat logging! You get where I’m going with this.
 
Either you don't understand the board refresh or I don't (I could certainly be wrong ;) ). As I understand missions are not removed from the boards when one person takes them, it's just that we can all choose from the same set of missions* every refresh.

* well, there is client filtering, but that just confuses the issue.

I believe you are correct here. I watched the Mission Q & A livestream yesterday when I was home sick, the way it was described by Dom matches what you have described. Missions don't disappear from the board for other CMDRs when another CMDR takes the same mission. Although the specific details of a mission will vary and they won't look exactly the same, they are the same mission template.
 
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Honestly curious. Do you have any data or analytics that shows FDEV´s are incorrect? Or just your personal and anecdotal bias?


The latter, which I wholesale believe are more likely, until and if ever, FD show their workings.

Step outside this forum, aside from the same people posting on FB and Reddit, and it's kinda obvious.
 
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What these numbers also don't show (and I would understand why FD isn't keen to tell us more details about it) how the board flippers all together hurt system performance and stability - and thus everyone playing the game, even those who cause it.

This is very speculative of course but when I read here that taking missions even in Solo can take certain missions away from you suggests that board flipping has a similar effect, to all currently docked at the same station no matter what mode they are in. Shortening the cycles will even sharpen that issue, though a dedicated server could easier deal with that sort of stress.

But fixing the cause of board flipping it is not - for now at least. Which boils down to adjusting mission payouts. Personally I couldn't care less (I don't support a general buff of mission payouts) but would highly appreciate a general balance pass of missions towards risk, difficulty and general effort.

I really doubt about this, cause every "GOLD RUSH" alot of people come to the same system and i barelly have some trouble with disconnection or any another server issue.
I have much more adjucation server problems on Combat zones than problems in the station, and my connection really sucks - so imagine if i have a better one,
 

Arguendo

Volunteer Moderator
Mission pool is shared between commanders. If you see mission, and it is gone after several minutes, it is most likely not because new set of missions have appeared, but someone took it.

For now it was separate pool for solo/private group, and another one for Open. Now there will be single one for both.
I actually don't think that's it. I think it means that everyone logging into the mission server at approximately the same time sees the same missions on their end.
I've been working together with a wing doing missions and I would be staring at a mission and another guy would say; "Yeah, I just took that mission as well."
So, it wouldn't be that people would "steal" missions from each other, just that they would all see the same mission pool, in the same mission interval.

Again, I think that's how it is. I don't know for sure.
 
If you mean will it be possible to have a mission board spawn a specific type of mission based on player input (for example, choosing to spawn only cargo delivery missions), this is not currently planned.
Again, good decision IMHO. Good for immersion and I value that :)
Facepalm :(

"We will continue to waste player's free time & patience, by keeping it difficult for them to find missions they would enjoy doing."

Good decision & great for immersion... Not :(
 
The only reason they are doin this is cause its the most hands off lazy way to try and curb the next gold rush. And everybody knows, they are going to be as hands off and lazy as humanly possible with the future of this game.

Also, I'm expecting them to start selling credits or selling a easy way to grind a bunch of credits in the future.
 
I actually don't think that's it. I think it means that everyone logging into the mission server at approximately the same time sees the same missions on their end.
I've been working together with a wing doing missions and I would be staring at a mission and another guy would say; "Yeah, I just took that mission as well."
So, it wouldn't be that people would "steal" missions from each other, just that they would all see the same mission pool, in the same mission interval.

Again, I think that's how it is. I don't know for sure.

Yep its like this. Im just wondering how influence is going to work.

With one mission board you can economically starve out another player faction. We wont be able to generate missions as quickly. Time will expand a bit during some phases.

So, my question is. If the board populates 4 missions for group A, but group B gets 11 missions 3 times in a row because of RNG.

Then people are losing to RNG and not a controlled environment for running missions to defend(or boost your side of the BGS % Back)?

Im stoked for everything the server has to give us.

Maybe its a good thing, It should be snowballing people into wins. I just dont think the Economic snowball of +++++ missions should be RNG based. Gotta give some counterplay and a chance to bounce back before a certain point.
 
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The only reason they are doin this is cause its the most hands off lazy way to try and curb the next gold rush. And everybody knows, they are going to be as hands off and lazy as humanly possible with the future of this game.

Also, I'm expecting them to start selling credits or selling a easy way to grind a bunch of credits in the future.

This is a great reply, to be fair. You've managed to get everything wrong in it.
 
It appears people don't see as looking for good deals and missions as part of gameplay, because it is 'busywork', and everything will be crowdsourced anyway. I personally do find it very engaging part of gameplay
The problem is that there is often little rhyme or reason for the missions (that you want) being generated - come back to the same system an hour or a day later & the chances are it won't offer anything like the same mission again. I know in theory stuff like the economy type & system state should determine this, but in practice the RNG tends to overpower this. (This might not be the case for all types of missions, but it is for the planetary/surface missions I enjoy.)

You have to spend a long time searching for a system (and even a station) that happens to consistently generate the type of mission you are after (*), and even then you are at the mercy of the RNG whether they are actually generated or not. (* Probably something to do with the nearby systems only allowing the RNG to generate a limited number of mission types, so RNG isn't such a factor.)

The mission generation system might be 'realistic' (in some sense) but realism is often a poor guide to making something fun.
 
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First of all i will personally state i have never ever board flipped with the intention of trying to manipulate available missions to max revenue or max influence etc.

I have never engaged in any of the gold rushes eg Robigo, skimmer missions etc.

i have 4.3 billion credits in cash not tied to any ships.

i play the BGS and have worked a minor faction to be one of the most powerful in its sector. I have done this by playing by the games rules. I also have an ethical commander who doesnt engage in criminal activity to undermine a faction. So no Security ship massacres or smuggling to enforce lockdowns etc.

I have made this money by playing the game. It is believe it or not possible to make good money without recourse to dubious methods.

How then do i run missions. Well i check the board and fill up whats available for a faction or two i may want to support. If i cant fill my cargo hold with missions i will fill the remainder with cargo, i will use my in built knowledge of local systems to know what they buy from the system im at. I also use the galaxy map to obtain such data. This means my ship is always making money. Perhaps not 100 million an hour but when i play the counter keeps ticking.
I have learned the value of making allies in many surrounding systems to build those trade routes and increase the value and quantity of available missions. As a result i have zones in the Empire, Federation and Alliance where i am allied with numerous systems. I am pretty much allied or friendly with every faction in the Pleiades. This allows me to make lots of money where i please. It also reduces interdictions and shortens the time it takes for security vessels to respond to attacks on my trade ships.

When running my Conda or Python in passenger mode i often carry a cargo hold to allow me to carry out the odd cargo mission if there isnt much on offer at a station passenger wise. I also fill my hold with passengers going to many different destinations, rather than just try to manipulate the passenger board to deliver to a single station. When i drop one set of passengers off. I pick another set up at the destination station. This keeps the money flowing and builds my rep up in the region.

I appreciate this represents a gameplay paradigm shift for some, however i hope you can adapt. Elite is after all a continually evolving game, and from time to time something changes that affects us individually, takes us out of our comfort zones and forces us to re evaluate our current playstyles.
 
Mission pool is shared between commanders. If you see mission, and it is gone after several minutes, it is most likely not because new set of missions have appeared, but someone took it.

For now it was separate pool for solo/private group, and another one for Open. Now there will be single one for both.

That's not in the slightest bit true.

Multiple CMDRs have been able to collect the same mission from the mission board at the same time.
 
Don't forget, this ship is in the top 2.8% of liners out there :D

beluga.jpg
 
This is incredibly frustrating. When in a wing, I am actively seeking wing missions. When I am not in a wing, I am not. Separate boards would facilitate gameplay instead of frustrating it further by reducing the rate they appear, yet still have them take away from the available non-wing missions.
I agree with you, but that's also a symptom of the mission board's broken design - it can only hold a limited number of missions, so with every new type of mission (and Wings missions basically doubled the number of mission types) the less of each type of mission we get. So it comes down to RNG whether the kind of mission you want ever appears, even if it should do according to the economy, system state, etc.
 
I just want to voice I'm HIGHLY skeptic of the figure "only 2.8% of commanders board-flip".

When it's something that is so widely mentioned and more than that, *recommended* whilst playing the game - that is not just a "2.8%" issue to push aside.

I'm not certain of the solutions to it, not without fundamentally changing what the mission system is, at least.

That being said, I don't see too many issues with a dedicated mission server...but I think this is setting yourselves up for doing a lot of later back-and-forth changes to remedy mission count/availability/type, and I wonder whether that could be preempted somehow - perhaps, say, with an open beta? It would likely bring light to issues that are not readily apparent right now and give a chance to address them without 'going live' with something that is knowingly flawed.

Perhaps also take a hard look at Empire/Federation ranking and question whether it really ought to involve such mass quantity of missions in order to progress?

That's my 2 cents done.
 
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When running my Conda or Python in passenger mode i often carry a cargo hold to allow me to carry out the odd cargo mission if there isnt much on offer at a station passenger wise. I also fill my hold with passengers going to many different destinations, rather than just try to manipulate the passenger board to deliver to a single station. When i drop one set of passengers off. I pick another set up at the destination station. This keeps the money flowing and builds my rep up in the region.

I appreciate this represents a gameplay paradigm shift for some, however i hope you can adapt. Elite is after all a continually evolving game, and from time to time something changes that affects us individually, takes us out of our comfort zones and forces us to re evaluate our current playstyles.

YES YES YES
 
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