News Let's talk about Gnosis and the Cone Sector

[rootsrat]

Sure.

I understand why you feel it's disappointing. I can only really echo what's said in the first post. Ultimately the location was locked off, it was never intended or ready to be explored. After the Gnosis set its sights on that location and the beginnings of some emergent community event started there was a decision. The decision was made instead of saying no and close off the loophole, and have this considered "god modding" in some way, to instead weave it into the actual narrative and have the Gnosis involved in the reveal of the newest Thargoid threat. I do appreciate that having the article go live early and people having a few hours without context means that it was less than positive. Add to this some bugs which hampered peoples involvement in it and I can understand the disappointment.

Should we simply have said "no" and closed off the system? That's an interesting debate. Historically we've seen a lot of negative reception to actions like that. It's certainly the easier option rather than trying to react to the event, make new content and so on.

I salute you guys for wanting to engage in the community and the story etc. This is fair play and kudos for trying.

I think the main issue here is that this was hyped and sold mainly as an exploration event with the aim to explore previously unavailable parts of space. A lot out of 11 000 people that were docked on Gnosis were waiting for that, rather than AX combat. Yes, AX battles were expected - it was more than clear from Galnet, but the exploration of previously sealed off areas of space was supposed to be our oyster.

You guys knowing 100% that Gnosis simply is unable to go there and acting like everything was planned towards an exploration oriented event and venturing into the unknown - where the plan from the very beginning was to jump 12 LY and never arrive at the destination... and then playing it like you didn't know: that's what the issue is here Zac.

You made everyone believe they were going on an adventure, then you have spoiled the adventure by prematurely telling us what is going to happen and then finally you have openly admitted that in fact there was never going to be any adventure at all and instead we were always going to get in AX brawl.

So in this particular instance - yes, you should have just said "sorry guys, that's a no go system".

I know it may seem like you can never win. When you say "no" - people rage. When you say "yes" - people rage. But maybe you're saying "yes" and "no" at wrong times? Something to think about. It's not black and white, there is no one single perfect solution. In the context of this event - you should have definitely say "NO" - but that doesn't mean you should always do that. But try thinking about the context of an event and the expectation you are building. Because it's one thing for the community to build expectations on speculation, but it's another to build them based on your actions, words and the hype you yourselves build up.

To be perfectly honest - if I got hyped for this event and spent last 2 weeks getting all the Guardian gear, weapons and SLF's and then got what we got today - I'd probably have uninstalled the game. Luckily I only wasted one evening on building an ordinary AX Conda with no Guardian modules and I docked at Gnosis at last minute. After the way Thargoids were implemented in the game I promised myself never to get hyped for Elite again and instead just adopt "wait and see what happens" attitude. And boy has it paid off today!

So while personally I am not really bothered about what's happened, I am not at all surprised at the community being well cheesed off with you after what you guys have pulled off today.

Combine all that with the last week's announcement about content being cut out of Q4 and somewhat surprising ratio of core game improvements vs new content delivered in Beyond (which was supposed to focus on the former with a pinch of the latter, but seems to be quite the opposite) I'm not really sure how I feel about Frontier and Elite anymore.

This game series is a massive passion for me. And because of that it almost physically hurts to see all that happening

 

[Jenner]

This was a colossal failure on multiple levels. It was bad enough that the galnet article went live before the actual event and ruined the start of the story, but now we find out that there actually *was* no story to begin with.

I'm sorry, but this is inexcusable.

FDev knew beforehand how excited the player base was for this trip. They knew how much buzz was being generated. They also knew how much of a letdown it would be if the Gnosis didn’t do what it was supposed to – that is, jump to an unexplored region and begin a new exploration/xeno story arc. If they didn’t know that’s an indictment in and of itself. It means they are totally dissociated from the community and have no idea what’s going on outside their offices.

Why is the region permit locked anyway? For future content? I’m of the opinion that content *now* is more important. FDev had the opportunity to use this region for a story that they themselves helped shepherd and encourage, and then at the very last minute pulled the rug out from under everyone. If they want to keep the Cone sector walled off then fine – but don’t let a sizeable chunk of the community believe that you’re doing the opposite. That’s poor community management.

 

[Soopyyy]

This is the most disheartening part. Why not let us just go there? The hype around this event wasn't even fully around thargoids. The community was excited in general to GO TO A PERMIT LOCKED SYSTEM, not just to fight and CG. I love fighting and researching them but this is a missed opportunity. Everyone had been excited about the idea of being stuck in the cone sector systems for a month, which would have be fantastic with so many people trapped in a handful of systems. So many exploration and player interaction opportunities gone

I love you Fdev, I still have faith. Get back to work! o7

They wont let you go there, because there is nothing there. They only reason its locked is to create the illusion of mystery.

 

[Azirphaeli]

They have just done what you suggested, as well as the GNOSIS 2 stations are also under attack.

You have what you asked for and then go on to complain about it.

I was unaware that two additional stations are under attack, and when I wrote this I wasn't entire sure there was an active attack no the ship itself.

Don't get me wrong, i am glad that they did this. It's a much much much needed improvement to the Thargoid narrative. I'm just baffled that it took this long into the story to happen, and I am eager to see more improvements. Like I said in the first paragraph I am decked out in anti-xeno and ready to defend the Gnosis. I don't have a problem with that.

My issue was with the perception of the narrative which up until today *was* in the background being an excuse to stop something from happening based on the state of the game at the time the news was released.

 

[Barking_Mad]

You have a point. Enjoy the breadcrumbs FDevs drop.

You have no point. None. Had Cannon asked for this 6 months ago, you might have a point - but they didnt. Still, you can go play all the other games that build in complex player narratives and responses into their game within a few weeks of asking.

Let me know how it goes.

 

[Para Handy]

1..........., along the lines of the B5 Battle of the Line medal - because frankly the only thing running through my mind reading the updates is the Shadow attack on Babylon 5

...... except of course the Battle of the Line was nowt to do with the Shadows but was in the Earth-Minbari war.

 

[Lightspeed]

Too many "you should have seen this coming" comments being written by "white-knighty" (to use a polite term) posters whose comments and advice were patently absent from the leadup to this Event.

Those of us who were following this event as it unfolded through Galnet were aghast that (a) such a blunder could occur, but which gave way to (b) resignation that this is FD true to form with big events, followed by (c) disbelief that the simplest of all story arcs had been followed with very little imagination applied to what happened. It made a short jump.

Later, of course, we had (d) the live attack by Thargoids, which is a great development for future gameplay when FD gets it right, but (e) a classic failure of FD to recognize that a significant proportion of the participants were hoping for at least something with exploration attached to the outcome ........ even if it was only plotting a route to find their way home from somewhere completely different and unexpected.

But please stop with the "wise after the event" .... "told you so" .... posts making excuses for FD on this. They screwed it up big time and you were nowhere in evidence as it unfolded.

 

[Radixbase]

Let's be realistic... Do you honestly think most people would be happy to be confined to just three systems and just one station?

For a whole month?

Remember, a lot of people say there isn't enough to do in the game.

You're twisting my words and you know it, just for the sake of continuing the argument. The Gnosis had planned to jump farther after that towards the rift, so what I was talking about was more of a BSG type thing where the voyage continued but no easy way back to the bubble.

 

[Densho]

Greetings Commanders,

As you and others may have noticed in the early hours of the morning, a GalNet article on our community site revealed the future fate of the Gnosis’ jump toward the Cone Sector . However, the intended jump was to take place at the normal time of the server tick, however this was not the case and has caused a disparity between the news Commanders were able to read and the actions that took place in game.

We are aware that this has caused a number of Commanders to express their discontent that the news that was announced and the fate of the Gnosis’ epic charter.

After seeing this morning’s feedback, we want to take the opportunity to explain a little more about the event as a whole, and how these actions are playing out right now in the game world, the galaxy.

Before the launch…

Canonn high command reached out to us to plan the next jumps for the Gnosis. The destination? The Cone Sector... Cone Sector FN-J B9-0, to be precise.

Without revealing too much about this area of space, the Cone Sector both in content and in game lore was always meant to be locked off; and the fact that certain systems within the sector weren’t permit-locked was an oversight from a time before it was possible for Megaships to make such jumps, like the Gnosis.

Based on feedback we've received in the past, and in an aim to involve player agency in Elite Dangerous’ narrative, rather than simply making a universal change, or flicking a switch to ‘permit lock’ the systems in question (known in some corners of the community as “God modding”), we decided to incorporate the actions of a great Elite Dangerous player group, and a huge number of Commanders, into the wider lore of the game. Supporting the event as best we could with our own channels while reacting to an emergent piece of content from the community.

Working with Canonns’ event in mind, we decided to weave the event into the large game narrative, and the arrival of a threatening new Thargoid variant – the terrifying Hydra that some commanders woefully encountered recently.

So, what’s happened so far?

The Canonn called for Commanders to join them on the expedition to the Cone Sector to make history in the name of both exploration and science!

Meanwhile, across other areas of the galaxy, some Commanders reported sightings of what they believed to be a new Thargoid variant, later confirmed and classified by AEGIS and the Pilot’s Federation as the Hydra.

With this growing uncertainty, the Pilots’ Federation reported that the jump to the Cone Sector was not safe, not advised and urged Commanders to steer clear of any journeys there, permit-locking the systems.
Despite these warnings, Canonn would still make the jump into the unknown. And, with them, approximately 11,000 Commanders, from all walks of life, allegiances and states, pledged to this legendary expedition. Whether driven by a pursuit of knowledge, fearlessness or even perhaps… madness, they pledged their ship and soul to the future of the Gnosis.

This morning

As the GalNet article explained, moments into its ground-breaking jump toward the Cone Sector FN-J B9-0 system, the Gnosis has been left stranded following a massive Thargoid attack in the Outotz ST-I d9-6 system.

Now, we are aware that the premature release of the GalNet article (‘Gnosis Stranded’) caused speculation and concern from the community. It spoke of events that had not yet had any consequence or implication in-game, and as this occurred in the early hours of the morning, had no explanation from the team. We have investigated why that article went live at the wrong time and corrected the community site’s GalNet news feed so that it won’t break embargo in the future.

We are also aware that there are a few issues causing problems for Commanders at the current location of the Gnosis. The team are actively investigating and correcting those issues. Some of those issues are already fixed, while others are being addressed and a fix is in progress currently. Please visit the following thread for the current status update on these issues.

We would like to thank all of the Commanders who have provided their feedback – and pledged to aid the Gnosis in its defence against the alien threat and the terrifying new Thargoid variant. We would also like to take this opportunity to apologise for the confusion and bugs within this event but we are hugely grateful to the many thousands of Commanders who came together to make the event possible and become a part of history.

For those Commanders who have found themselves detained further away, please contact our support team who will be happy to move you back to the Gnosis, should you wish to be…

No offense to you will, but whoevers decision it was to decide all this should've just said no to Canonn. Wouldve saved you and us a headache or two and A LOT of salt.

 

[judahnator]

Just so I am on the same page, Frontier LIED?

Not only did they confirm several times that the plan to jump into the Cone sector had not changed, but they even hyped it up and posted it to social media.
You cant even try to pass it off as "this was from before plans changed," this tweet was from September 5th.

Now Frontier is trying to shift blame to the community? Really guys? "We never said you would make it, and we never planned for you to get there." Guys, you said yourself on the official twitter account that we were gearing up to head out yesterday!

 

[Turd Ferguson]

so....

it's over. have some copy-pasta content instead of what you were expecting. Please exit through the gift shop. There's some lovely new ship skins.

 

[rOmiLaYu]

So then to put a point on it the entire exploration part of the "event" was nothing more than a troll? You really let thousands of commanders plan for, work for and believe we were jumping into unknown space with zero intent of allowing that? Please clarify this as MANY of my viewers are extremely upset over this entire debacle.

~Exigeous

This seems to be the most insidious part of it all. I'm well aware that we are well into this thread and most probably won't bother to read this post, but I feel the need to vent, as I am completely and unbelievably devastated by this.

From the day, I found out about the Gnosis jump, I was excited. As an explorer, oh boy! A permit locked area of space? You can't ask for more than that, right? Go where no man has gone before type stuff. But, being an Xbox CMDR without two Live accounts, I didn't have an alt to take and didn't want to leave Colonia. So...I made a plan. I scrimped and saved and bought a laptop capable of running the game...went to the Frontier Store, picked up the CMDR's edition and set about furiously reworking through those early days to get an AspEx up and running with G5 FSD w/ mass manager and G3 clean drag drives. In less than 24 hours in game time, I made it to the Gnosis and was ready to go....and couldn't have been happier. Yes, the narrative turned into a little bit of pew-pew with the annnouncement about the Thargoids in the sector but I thought, eh, they've got to entice the whole community, so, fair play.

But then last night happens. An unbelievably sophomoric spoiler release on Galnet and I find out that we're not making it to the Gnosis. Eh, OK....I mean yeah, I'm upset, but I process it. So it turns into a CG, right? It makes some level of sense. We were warned by the Pilots' Federation that it would be risky...so it didn't work...ok, I'm game, I guess. It sucks that it got spoiled but OK.

BUT THEN....

I get on the forums today and you tell me that this whole thing was simply a way to weave in an "in-game, lore reason" as to why the Cone Sector was permit locked?! And that you never had any plans what so ever to allow us to explore it in the first place?! Furthermore, "it should have been locked from the beginning?"

I am beside myself. You let ELEVEN THOUSAND people get hyped for something that, from day one, you had no intention of allowing them to do....and silly me bought a laptop to do it in. Disgusting...

Troll level: Frontier.

 

[CMDR Salomé]

There are currently 62 users browsing this thread. (24 members and 38 guests)

• Salome, <<<<<<<<<<<
• ​- This day just gets weirder and weirderT

She's an imposter

 

[Archduke]

It's certainly the easier option rather than trying to react to the event, make new content and so on.

Almost like a veiled threat/blöackmail if I were paranoid._I think most reasonable folk appreciate that locked content is locked content, and that the decision wa smade to try toi roll with Cannon's wishes to offer the "illusion of choice" and giving players "agency" in this way is ususally a great way of obfuscating the necessary railroading and therebye keeping people happy and engaged.But in this case it was extremely poorly handle/mismanaged.OIbviously it was apparent there was going to be conflict and likely heavy Thargoid activity - that's fine - voyages of discovery will obviously entail risk, danger and you'd think hugh adventure... but what is rucially irksome, is that the leaked galnet post not only spoiled the "event", but more critically - described the actions of players and resolution too...Leaking the fact the Nosis wasnät going tot he Cone sector - fair enough, permit locked systems we know.Leaking the fact Thargoids would hyperdict and attack - no big suprise, especially given the other recent Galnet articles - in fact taken as warningBut leaking the "end" of the scenario and how "piltos lured Tahrgoids away with MA" - This is just wrong.Sure I tried doing this a little, but mostly it only worked if the Thargoid targetted you, and if I got targetted, I really didn't last loing. Also, the barnacle produciton was insufficien on the moon to support this endeavour.BUT what really lured the Thargoids away turned out to be....GODMODDING by Fdev because some players were reckless with their fire or fighter pilots...

 

[Stonecoldamason]

Gnosis Cone Jump

Hey Rainbro,

Just to clarify from the post above.

The area of space (Cone sector) that the Gnosis was aiming to jump to was never a location that was able to jump to. This is because the location is specifically meant to be used for future narrative. That's the reason why the initiative from the community was weaved into the actual lore of the game.

Thanks,

Zac

Zac, A question, why the need to use permit locks in the first place, surely you have future narrative laid out, you could’ve permit locked specific systems, or even planets to stop landing or make potentially landable bodies unavailable to land on, this would allow the Gnosis and such ships to go wherever they like, and avoid this kind of upset. The explorers and scientists would’ve got their jump, and that would’ve been a better solution than a repeat of the Jacques station storyline, just a suggestion, or is there more to this than we’re being advised.

 

[WizzyThing]

Hey Rainbro,

Just to clarify from the post above.

The area of space (Cone sector) that the Gnosis was aiming to jump to was never a location that was able to jump to. This is because the location is specifically meant to be used for future narrative. That's the reason why the initiative from the community was weaved into the actual lore of the game.

Thanks,

Zac

You know, this is not how you build community trust.

 

[The Lawful]

I must say I'm sad I'm not there atm, for my 1.5k EUR Samsung laptop that I had brought here to my holiday resort in DK to play Elite had a GPU meltdown after 4 days, so I'm stranded at some Guardian ruin and who knows what else may have happened. Will be back on Saturday at last. All I can say is I need another laptop and am glad to have my VR rig back then. I'm really feeling offline, typing everything into a 7" Nexus tablet tablet or worse and...well. That's what Elite means in my life

On the other hand, I had plenty of time reading the forums. FD gets a real lot of bashing lately. Some of it is even justified, but most is not IMHO. In any case, not being able to play at all showed me again how much I miss this unique game and what a great work the FD team did to implement this experience. Working in the IT industry myself for 20+ years now, I kind of know what doing complex projects means. I'm glad that even our worst & most toxic customers are just diluted versions of a gaming community. So all I can say: it's easy to criticize, but have mercy with the dudes on the receiving end. You wouldn't want to do their job, believe me. I think FD have a very high standard throughout and 99.9% of their team members are triple A. It's easy to point fingers and complain, and there's enough things that go wrong and much room for improvement, but imagine a world without ED instead. Would you really want that? I don't.

Ah, and the Gnosis thing is epic. Wish I could be there again. FD tried not to plainly say no, but to wrap this up in a lore event after Canonn insisted on on their plan. It's a pity the Cone sector is still locked, and many things didn't go optimal, but for me, these 'fails' are what makes ED special and even lovable after all. Perfection is desirable, but boring. YMMV.

Thanks, ED team, and you know I'm no Fanboi, but you can quote me on that.

O7,
[noob]

NB. I have a detailed plan here for my AX Cutter, Ender's Game, to jump 67 hops in support of the Gnosis and beyond. Typing a wall of text into the Nexus is much worse. Should get me a new tablet, too.

 

[Wobblin-Gobblin]

Likewise, for those commanders who joined this voyage for what it was originally billed as...an exploration venture into the unknown, and were equipped for such a voyage...will support move those commanders AWAY from the Gnosis?

I'm in an explorer-aspx without weapons. It's no problem to leave. I've managed it without a scratch o7

 

[Deleted member 110222]

Too many "you should have seen this coming" comments being written by "white-knighty" (to use a polite term) posters whose comments and advice were patently absent from the leadup to this Event.

Those of us who were following this event as it unfolded through Galnet were aghast that (a) such a blunder could occur, but which gave way to (b) resignation that this is FD true to form with big events, followed by (c) disbelief that the simplest of all story arcs had been followed with very little imagination applied to what happened. It made a short jump.

Later, of course, we had (d) the live attack by Thargoids, which is a great development for future gameplay when FD gets it right, but (e) a classic failure of FD to recognize that a significant proportion of the participants were hoping for at least something with exploration attached to the outcome ........ even if it was only plotting a route to find their way home from somewhere completely different and unexpected.

But please stop with the "wise after the event" .... "told you so" .... posts making excuses for FD on this. They screwed it up big time and you were nowhere in evidence as it unfolded.

I'll have you know I was vocal in my disagreement with Canonn.

 

[Stealthie]

Should we simply have said "no" and closed off the system? That's an interesting debate. Historically we've seen a lot of negative reception to actions like that. It's certainly the easier option rather than trying to react to the event, make new content and so on.

Quite simply, yes. You should have.

What you did, here, was deliberately mislead people and cause them to waste their time.

You should have resolved it privately, between yourselves and Canonn, long before there was any hint of an "event" made public.
You should have told Canonn that it would be impossible to reach the intended system and then you should have proposed that if they wanted to continue to travel in that area then it "might become hazardous", Canonn could have publicised that information and asked for players to assist by providing an armed escort in a hazardous area and you could have implemented this scenario for the benefit of players who might have appreciated it more.

I'm surprised that any of that needs explaining, TBH.

It's genuinely worrying that nobody at FDev seems to have considered that turning what was intended to be an "exploration event" into a "combat event" might not be a good idea.