Leigong down - time for retaliation?

[Ian Doncaster]

And if it rolls past the end of the year, so be it. The next big update doesn't come out until near the end of the year. Plenty of time for us to win.

It does very much depend on if they've got a specific date in mind and if so, what it's tied to
1) Tied to the Powerplay rewrite, currently scheduled for whenever Winters gets out of that stuck lift summer. In that case they're going to need to make Control clearance much easier (ideally by making combat much more relatively effective, rather than by just reducing all the difficulty numbers by 90%) fairly soon.
2) Tied to the mystery feature, currently scheduled for hopefully the end of the year but possible that it will slip. They might need to give players some extra tools for the last couple but can certainly wait until they've seen how much post-release adjustment Powerplay needs (it will be a lot!) and how much that delays the mystery feature; in the meantime having a couple of Titans that would otherwise last well into 2025 is a good thing.
3) No specific schedule, it can just be an ongoing feature and anyway the next thing after these Titans are defeated is going to be "the Thargoids send some more". If it takes until 2026 to clear the current ones out on a "1% a day adds up eventually" basis, no worries.

that fun FDs perspective, "some mysteries aren't meant to have a conclusion".

Yes - though also, of course, leaving some things open-ended so that in three years time they have some plot hooks makes sense. Minor loose ends like Salvation (or what the Dredger clans are up to, or who the First Apostle really is) can be left to cool down for a while before being brought back to set off the next storyline.
(It's the major loose ends like "it's still not at all clear why the Thargoids sent eight Titans to the bubble" beyond the obvious and unhelpful "as a response to the Proteus Wave" that I'm less sure about)

 

[Factabulous]

And if it rolls past the end of the year, so be it. The next big update doesn't come out until near the end of the year. Plenty of time for us to win.

Uh huh. Oya currently estimated to be 3-4 years away at the current rate of progress. Though at least one group is working on Hadad with its much more manageable 176 year completion estimate.

You guys are sure patient waiting for those sweeet decals and ship kits

Kinda interesting:

• AX groups don't have any real interest in ending things as they like the pew pew, so mashing away at an improbably target is fine for them
• Some 'science' groups still have lots to study, so aren't interested in making progress other than being able to estimate even more accurately how long it would take - if they were trying.
• The metagamers will continue just watching and doing nothing because they know fdev will change things

The only ppl who are willing to do stuff to make this war end are fdev

 

[Jmanis]

(It's the major loose ends like "it's still not at all clear why the Thargoids sent eight Titans to the bubble" beyond the obvious and unhelpful "as a response to the Proteus Wave" that I'm less sure about)

Because meddling with Guardian Tech is the true enemy

 

[Jmanis]

Uh huh. Oya currently estimated to be 3-4 years away at the current rate of progress. Though at least one group is working on Hadad with its much more manageable 176 year completion estimate.

And then the Thargoids become a supportable faction in PP2.0 under Seo (and Guardians under Salvation), and we all go

... and have instant regret from torching those Titans.

 

[Factabulous]

And then the Thargoids become a supportable faction in PP2.0 under Seo (and Guardians under Salvation), and we all go
View attachment 387246

... and have instant regret from torching those Titans.

Don't worry - it'll be much like being an Admiral and a King at the same time - being a pro-goid Titan killer will be the norm

 

[zimms]

"Unfortunately, I'm the Admiral King of the Bubble."

 

[Navigare Necesse Est]

I’ve seen one person in a discord server I frequent mention they’re hoping for a queen to be found (alive) in one of the Titan wrecks by Aegis to have Seo… well, I guess, at least try to communicate in a rudimentary way. Assuming that is at all possible with her not actually knowing their language.

Not that I’m convinced they would be on a Titan, but who knows. I sure as hell don’t.

(There was that odd focus on the Thargoids around that Guardian-Thargoid battleground where they were totally fine with us being there for a few days and then vanished - so maybe something could come from that but I’m not sure if I expect it.)

Nah, the Queen is the second step.
First is cracking the code / lingo. That requires cipher to be found. A bit of treasure hunt.
Second: The Queen. Humanity finds a suitable champion who will sacrifice themselves in epic romance with the Queen. Only if the Queen is pleased the champion will be inseminated with bug pheromone organisms (kinda like symbiont) that allow for rudimentary communication.
Third: Study and make more love to Thargoid Queens.

 

[Fizzatron]

Now that two Titans are down, do you think there's something else in store that we haven't seen yet?

I imagine that the Thargoids will not just be sitting ducks, passively accepting the destruction of the Titans one after the other*, and not doing anything about it.

Even the latest Galnet article ends with a similar (obvious, dare I say) thought:
"Can these victories be repeated a further six times?”

I hope we're going to see some form of twist, hopefully not just limited to higher damage resistance (aka spongier bullet sponges) or increased number of vessels defending the Titan.

Thoughts?

*Unless the Titans are in fact just an experiment to observe us, and they were sent specifically to be destroyed, to fathom our ingenuity and offensive capacity.
Or just to have a laugh.

Thargoids recalled all the glaives so they could use them to create dyson sphere of glaives around the remaining titans. Humanity gives up.

 

[Aris Tarkus]

I keep seeing references to the locked systems, but I am still skeptical about those all being related to Thargoids.

With my spoeculation hat running, I can see a couple of the closer locked regions being Thargoid related, and that we need to come up with something made out of the Titan remnants that will actually let us get in there and explore.

I can also see a couple of them being Guardian related, with the method of access still to be discovered.

The more distant ones (out near Beagle Point) I would like to imagine are something completely differrent. Some new anomalous lifeform that has been sitting around watching and judging us...

 

[Jmanis]

I keep seeing references to the locked systems, but I am still skeptical about those all being related to Thargoids.

With my spoeculation hat running, I can see a couple of the closer locked regions being Thargoid related, and that we need to come up with something made out of the Titan remnants that will actually let us get in there and explore.

I can also see a couple of them being Guardian related, with the method of access still to be discovered.

The more distant ones (out near Beagle Point) I would like to imagine are something completely differrent. Some new anomalous lifeform that has been sitting around watching and judging us...

I think implicitly when people talk locked sectors, they're referring to the close by ones.

The only challenge is, if further out ones are "something completely new"... well... it's been a long time coming now... the fact these were reserved for future content and it's been 10 years... it's getting a bit beyond the point now.

 

[Ian Doncaster]

The further out ones I expect are "reserved for future content" only in the "if the game's a massive success and still running in 30 years we'll regret not having anywhere new" sense - it's quite possible that Frontier has no current idea what future content they're reserved for, just that without the ability to add entirely new systems to the map later it has to be done this way.

 

[Factabulous]

I think they were initial locked because "we need somewhere to put new things"*, because adding stuff where people have been would break immersion. Then they found it didn't break immersion, and they can just add stuff where they want it - without it being signalled via a 'oh that permit dropped' hint. Now the permit locks are just there because people would complain if they were removed and there was nothing present - and there is no cost to fdev of leaving them locked.

It's like the way they added Rumours in the Codex - they though it would be a good idea, but never used them, but don't have a good reason to remove them. I'm sure there are other examples.

* unlocking areas to discover new things sounds like it would make sense beforehand, but if they had gone with that we would now have several remote areas full of Guardians and Thargoids etc, and nothing close to the bubble. They made the correct choice to not use the locked areas.

 

[Firehawk894]

As a counterpoint, does anyone else kinda hope there isn't yet another element/twist/hurdle/module to the Thargoid war content?

Looking back the Thargoid war has been excellent but it's not content that has been to everyone's liking. And it's not like it's hasn't been a loooong, hard (and don't get me wrong, enjoyable) slog to get where we are now, finally capable of getting to the Thargoid motherships and taking them down and I almost kinda hope this is it.

a) I'm so sooo bored of the villain getting back up again at the end of a film and much prefer it when the hero finally wins ... and the villain doesn't have yet another move up their sleeve and STAYS DEAD.
b) I just want Frontier to do something else now. It HAS been great ... but jeez, enough already! (maybe?)

Point A is a very ironic statement considering that we're the villain that just keeps getting back up