[Lore] How does the (solar) system lock actually work?

[Y'Berion]

Pardon my ignorance, I am just a noob in ED - especially when it comes to lore, so I do apologize if this question has been already answered.

Is there any explanation how do "they" (whoever "they" might be - local system authorities, pilots federation, factions...) prevents us to jump into certain systems? I mean, our nav computers are supposed to lock onto the strongest gravitational well in adjacent system (the most massive stellar object), at which point FSD is activated and ship performs the jump. Apparently, this is completely autonomous process - our ships do not need any sort of assistance from the outside. So, how the heck someone can stop us from jumping into permission-required systems? Is there some sort of magic device floating in those systems which messes up with nav computers and/or FSD?

Also... them nav beacons. Why do they even exist (apart from the gamey reasons)? As being said above, ships in Elite do not need that to pinpoint solar system and to jump into it.

See, I am coming from EVE, game with incredibly rich and well crafted lore. There were some details which used to bother me there too, but in general, almost everything is pretty solidly covered and it's easy to get immersed into it because things make sense. ED on the other hand...

 

[Bruce Warren]

The real reason has to be gameplay. If you could bypass the permit requirement permits would have no purpose. Since some of the locked off systems are likely related to the Thargoids, I wouldn't want the permits so easily worked around.

I like to think of it as something that's built into the Galactic Map. If you try to enter a system that's locked down you need to enter a security code. No code and the navigation computer will simply refuse to go to that star.

Why are your ships built with such a restriction? Wouldn't it be cheaper for Falcon Delacy et all to leave it off when building ships? Possibly.

Thing is there are only a small number of manufacturers and all of them have to abide by Galactic Law. If they built a ship without this lock mechanism the Feds or the Imperials would remove their license to make and sell ships. They'd go out of business.

Off course that opens up the idea of pirates hacking the nav maps to deactivate it, but so far there's no suggestion of that being in game. Presumably the ships would have some sort of advanced anti hack mechanism to prevent that sort of thing.

 

[Vasious]

Navigation Beacons provide the navigation data needed to locate the stations and outposts within a system.

As you will note that if you jump into settled system without the map data the Stations and outposts will appear on the system map, shown in orbit of planets you don't know about

So they are for intra system navigation rather than to jump to, and they are placed by the entry star for ease of communication, like a information Kiosk on the outskirts of town, on the motorway as you arrive.

 

[Schmack]

Because you're coming from War and Peace and playing Animal Farm. A game that can be played on the Xbox isn't that complex to begin with.

 

[Sapyx]

In older Elite games (FE2/FFE), you were physically capable of entering a "Permit required" system. But when you arrived, you received a warning that the system required a permit which you didn't have and to please leave immediately. If you didn't leave within like 5 seconds, a "god gun" blew your ship up. The present system is better than an invisible, unbeatable, infinite-range, instantaneous god-gun, in my opinion.

As for how in-lore it is implemented: the permits seem to be inextricably linked to the Starmap, which is maintained and updated by Universal Cartographics. Presumably, UC is a non-political body, unaffiliated with any major or minor faction (similar to the Pilots Federation; I think they even have a HQ planet out there somewhere) so any government that wishes to register a star as being permit-locked has to apply to them. Pay the right fee, or some such. Acquiring a permit sends a code that then removes the lock on that system on the starmap.

Logically, if it really is just a "software lockout", then a criminally-inclined 33rd century hacker shouldn't have too much trouble hacking the map on their ship and giving themselves access to permit-locked systems.

 

[Zenith]

I like to think of it as a feature of Universal Cartographics and the manufacturer of your FSD.

When you have your new FSD installed, it gets calibrated with your nav computer. UniCart have a monopoly on navcomps. If you want to fly a ship, you will have a navcomp running the system UniCart provide you.
UniCart insert a number of permit systems into their navcomp specifically locking them out. Any attempt to jump into those systems will result in the FSD not engaging. Think of Polaris, Regor Sector, Peregrina, Jotun etc.
When you've gained a permit by whatever means, you get given an encrypted key. You enter the key into your navcomp and it unlocks that specific system. It's how UniCart maintain the integrity of the permit system, while allowing specific individuals to access systems once they've gained a permit.

That's my take on it anyway.

 

[Vasious]

Because you're coming from War and Peace and playing Animal Farm. A game that can be played on the Xbox isn't that complex to begin with.

Ah yes, lets attack a Console, does that make you feel big, superior, better than other people?
What if I said "You use a PC so they cannot be very complex things to use either."

 

[Y'Berion]

Regarding the locked systems: that explanation could work I suppose - that our nav computers come with some sort of absolutely unhackable list of no-go systems, which gets updated by someone as we earn permits. "Unhackable" part looks a little bit stretched, though, but it's better than no (official) explanation at all which seems to be case at the moment. Same goes with nav beacons and many more things (e.g how come that we never die when we eject from our exploding ships? how the heck are we being transported back into the last visited station even when our ship gets destroyed on the other side of the galaxy? Etc...)

I don't know. For a 30y old franchise, Elite's lore feels pretty bland: there's just too much empty space in it.

Navigation Beacons provide the navigation data needed to locate the stations and outposts within a system.

I thought that the stations and outposts are coming with their own beacons and that's the reason why we can see them in system map before planets. I admit that what you said makes some sense too (is that an official lore, btw?), but then again... why them NPCs are hanging there? What's there to see? I mean, we don't need to come anywhere near nav beacon to pickup the data about local stations and outposts, so why do they stop there? Except to be shot at?

In older Elite games (FE2/FFE), you were physically capable of entering a "Permit required" system. But when you arrived, you received a warning that the system required a permit which you didn't have and to please leave immediately. If you didn't leave within like 5 seconds, a "god gun" blew your ship up. The present system is better than an invisible, unbeatable, infinite-range, instantaneous god-gun, in my opinion.

I agree, that sounds a lot worse.

 

[Vasious]

I thought that the stations and outposts are coming with their own beacons and that's the reason why we can see them in system map before planets. I admit that what you said makes some sense too (is that an official lore, btw?), but then again... why do them NPCs are hanging there? What's there to see? I mean, we don't need to come anywhere near nav beacon to pickup the data about local stations and outposts, so why do they stop there? Except to be shot at?

Why the steady stream of NPC traffic at them I don't know
At a guess
Since it is patrolled maybe it is a place to stop, eat etc before you plan the next leg of your journey
But I don't know the official reason

 

[zxaber]

Why the steady stream of NPC traffic at them I don't know
At a guess
Since it is patrolled maybe it is a place to stop, eat etc before you plan the next leg of your journey
But I don't know the official reason

Nav beacons as rest stops? Yeah, that could make sense. Especially since they're generally close to stars and would be easily accessible after a jump.

--

I dislike the idea of permits being a software lock, because I cannot see any computer system built by humans being uncrackable. Whether it requires packet injection, or a button combination to enter dev mode, or even soldering over a chip, someone will figure out how to root a sidewinder. I'd jump on the idea that the nav beacons are required as a warp destination and permit ones simply don't give coordinates to unprivileged ships, but then if I recall correctly some of the distant systems don't even have nav beacons so how would you jump to these?

Perhaps you could go the other direction with it, and say that the system is able to 'cloak' itself from detection by ships in witchspace, while allowing permitted ships a destination to calculate to. The idea here would be any ship that forcibly tries to jump will be blind once in hyperspace and would end up so far off course that there'd be no point to even try the jump. Thus, the mystery is solved and the 'permit required' block in the ship navigation is actually a safety device, not an inhibitor.

I have no idea what kind of power one would require to cloak a system from hyperspace detection, though.

 

[Zenith]

I don't know if you've read "The Dark Wheel" that came with the original Elite (link in my sig), but they describe the horrible effects of witchspace if you don't follow the rules precisely.
FSDs these days are a lot better, more efficient and have longer range than in the original Elite. Those improvements also come with additional safety, and the navcomp will trip and cancel an FSD jump at the slightest problem.

Thinking on it, it would make more sense for actual FSD jump coordinates for permit systems to be OMITTED from the navcomp. preventing the jump before it starts. When you key in the permit, you're programming in a new destination and that gets secured into your own ship's navcomp. From then on, your navcomp has coordinates to calculate against for the permit system.

Again, this is all speculation. I've given some thought to the "how" FSDs and navcomps work in the past, but until someone comes up with canon or "official lore" then we're just guessing.

 

[Y'Berion]

I'd jump on the idea that the nav beacons are required as a warp destination and permit ones simply don't give coordinates to unprivileged ships, but then if I recall correctly some of the distant systems don't even have nav beacons so how would you jump to these?

As the matter of fact, 99.999% systems do not have nav beacons but this doesn't stop explorers to travel all over the galaxy. So, these are definitely not needed for hyperspace jumps. Which leaves us with Vasious' suggestion that nav beacons are providing location and other data for stations within one system. Although I'd assume that it would make more sense to put a beacon on each station to transmit its position. At least this way it wouldn't be possible to throw whole system and all different stations into the darkness after destroying one single nav beacon (ok I know it can't be destroyed, which is also strange, but let's leave it at that). Anyway. This brings me to another dilemma - unless I am mistaken, there are nav beacons in systems with no stations (or anything else for that matter). Now, why is that?

I have no idea what kind of power one would require to cloak a system from hyperspace detection, though.

As our ships are locking onto the stellar-mass objects in order to perform jump, I too find it hard to belive that the humanity in the Elite's universe has means to "override" such epical massive objects like stars and black holes. If it does, though, well... it wouldn't hurt if someone comes up with few words about it. Is there anyone who's actually hired to work on the lore, by the way?

I don't know if you've read "The Dark Wheel" that came with the original Elite.

I missed that, unfortunately, I was mostly picking up bits and pieces about Elite's lore everywhere around teh interwebs. "Dark wheel" has just been promoted onto the top of my "to-do" list, thanks mate

 

[h347h]

No real point in trying to rationalize gamist elements. You can enjoy the game and still be immersed in it with out having to have the answers to all the tiny things. You are playing a game where when you die you just respawn.

 

[[HJ]-RedRaven]

I think the Nav beacons are specific to each star, its simple for the Navcomp to act as the gate-keeper. Gaining a permit to a system, or sector simply allows the NavComp to plot a witch-space jump to that permitted system's nav beacon. Each nav beacon's code simply forms part of the jump solution; without a permit, no code = no jump.

Any tampering with the NavComp would render it useless.

I'm sure 'hacked' NavComps exist in the ED universe etc, for a price, but its outside the scope of the game at the moment.

 

[nexxo]

I don't know. For a 30y old franchise, Elite's lore feels pretty bland: there's just too much empty space in it.

Elite doesn't have much lore, except for novels recently written by third parties. It's not like Eve Online which has a team of dedicated writers supplying a background to its universe for the last 12 years or so. A lot still has to be worked out.

 

[Vasious]

Out of Curiosity I just flew to Van Maanens Star in Frontier Elite 2, without the permit
The result
a 4000 Cr fine which I needed to pay before I was allow to dock


No Insta Kill, just the fine, and once paid I could dock, got the fine each time I jumping into the System

 

[Commander Debic]

No real point in trying to rationalize gamist elements. You can enjoy the game and still be immersed in it with out having to have the answers to all the tiny things. You are playing a game where when you die you just respawn.

Actually the OP seems to find it strange that you can magically transverse space and be reborn in the last station.

But in the game he comes from, EVE, you don't just transverse back to the last system you were at you can transverse the whole of space there to the other side, if your clone sits there.

Even use the death process by committing suicide to magically travel every few hours to your clone for a form of quick safe travel.
Like Eve OP, its just a game way of allowing you to continue your play/progress time within the game environment.

Non true Newtonian physics is another game way of making a game that allows people to enjoy their game better in the Devs minds, not sure I agree with them but its the games physical rules so I play as I did with EVE.

 

[Falcon_D]

Elite doesn't have much lore, except for novels recently written by third parties. It's not like Eve Online which has a team of dedicated writers supplying a background to its universe for the last 12 years or so. A lot still has to be worked out.

Hello,

There's the thing. I've played EvE, didn't pay much attention to the lore in-game, it was just background noise while the main action was the fighting among the Corporations. But even then, it did still have some lore. The different societies, the different ships, what happened if you blew up, some story behind the jump gates. And as you mentioned, Eve has been around for 12 years, it's pretty much considered the definitive space based sand-box MMOG (IMHO). It seems that everytime CCP wants to expand the game or add to the lore they go through the player base first.

Elite, until Elite Dangerous was pretty much a single player sandbox which Frontier could have done anything with. And the Elite franchise has been around for the last 30years. So, I'm just wondering, why they haven't done much with the lore. This Power play stuff was supposed to add to the lore of Elite but to me it seems like a lot of fluff.

Don't get me wrong, I really like Elite Dangerous the way it is atm (I think, I'm actually kind of addicted to it.) If FD adds more lore to it, it would like it even more. But I really disliked the Elite games before Dangerous and I would not play those games now, pretty much for the reason that there is not much story behind them. The pretty pictures, cool sounds and interesting community in Elite Dangerous is what makes the difference for me.

Sorry, forgot to address the initial question.
I personally would like to think of system permits as what other posters have mentioned. It's a code that unlocks part of the nav comp that allows travel to these systems. The manufacturers of the nav comp and UniCat together implement system locks. Some hacker could possibly hack but that kind of work requires a large lab setup that we have no access to.

Regards.
Have fun, fly safe.

 

[Firestarter]

In my mind the permit is just a software key that unlocks that system in your nav computer.

It might be fun if you could buy illegal keys from pirates, maybe one day...

ED is very young as an mmo and is still finding its feet. It's been going since 1984 but the lore is mostly in our heads or in novels but there is no general agreement. When the game was single player there didn't need to be agreement.

 

[Fishy]

Is there any explanation how do "they" (whoever "they" might be - local system authorities, pilots federation, factions...) prevents us to jump into certain systems?

The FSD is powered by Handwavium crystals. Same energy that causes food shortages on stations when it takes all of 5 minutes to CMDR RandomJoe to deliver hundreds of tons from light-years away, prevents trade data from traveling through space, and allows criminal status and bounty information to travel instantly to your computer no matter where you are. Thinking about it, ED scientists should work on a Criminal Status Drive, allowing one to travel on the bounty update waves for instant travel across space...

(on a side note, in FE2/FFE, nothing prevented you from jumping to restricted systems, however you got fined for it and no station would give you landing clearance)