New Regions – Why not use the ones already established by the exploration community?

Strangepork

Strangepork
Corbin Moran said:
On the recent livestream FD showcased the changes for exploration mechanics that will be coming with update 3.3. Among these changes was the introduction of 42 numbered regions that will allow FD to spread rumors about possible places to discover within that region, as well as allowing player discoveries to propagate to other players.


(The new regions)​


We think this is an amazing idea! However…

The Galactic Mapping Project is one of the oldest community projects in Elite Dangerous, and although we've always understood that the project is not an official 'naming' project that FD has adopted, we hope that the rich history that has been built up around it over the past few years would be taken into consideration when Frontier Developments implement their regional overlay for 3.3.

The GMP, EDDiscovery and EDSM are projects that are widely used within the community, and the regional names have become part of the everyday lexicon for hundreds, if not thousands of players. The regional names are part of the community created lore, as well as the official lore (Colonia, Hawkin's Gap and the Conflux for example are mentioned in Drew Wagar's book, Premonition - an official Elite novel.) The regional names add flavour to the galaxy that Frontiers numbers will not. The regional names are woven into the tapestry of many historic expeditions, exploration journals, blogs, and hundreds of YouTube videos created off the back of the journeys players have taken out into the black.

We feel that the numbered regions introduced by FD will over time usurp the place of the regions named by the community - because the numbered region will have a game mechanic effect and thus it will be natural for people to refer to them. This would be a sad loss of the 'character' and that human touch that the community names have added to the wider gameworld for the past 4 years.


Proposal 1: Implement (some of) the community named regions instead of the numbered regions
There are currently 60 community named regions, and as they vary a lot in size, we understand that it is probably not feasible to ask Frontier to adobt them as they are. However, we have tried to merge and remodel the existing community regions into a map that should be more suitable for the mechanics presented by Frontier on the stream.


(The currently established community named regions)


(Proposed approximate in-game region layout and names)​

Even if the new mechanics of Elite 3.3 only allow Frontier to roughly approximate the borders shown in this proposal, we would still count it as a huge improvement if they implement those regions using the community names.

This will bring continuity to the established community lore and narrative.


Proposal 2: Don´t call them regions…
If proposal 1 is not possible we would hope that FD will at least consider the following suggestion;
What we are asking is for FD to consider dropping the name "Region" from their in-game UI and instead replace it with the word "Grid" or "Galactic Sector" - as this will at least prevent confusion of having two sets of 'regions' to refer to. For example, the everyday lexicon when players describe a trip, or expeditionary waypoint, would be presented along the lines of.. "Sol, Grid 01, The Orion Spur Region.
We feel that this UI change would help prevent the community submitted regional names from being undermined, and eventually consigned to history.


Sincerely
The Galactic Mapping Team


__________________

EDIT: Im adding a third proposal - based on a suggestion made in this thread by Ozzric (source):

"My proposal would be to implement the GMPs map as a view that can be toggled on and off. That way FD don't need to change anything with the work they have already done, and we can still use the names we made and refer to them as such (if wanted) when creating expeditions."
Click to expand...


FD have been quite clear, they want to make the game their own way.
 

Eisen

Eisen
Baroness Galaxy said:
To be fair, if you guys manage involving the GMP regions I'm going to personally fly to London and drop a box of Belgian chocolates and Belgian Trappist beers. And those who know me well know I'm not joking :D
Click to expand...

Can‘t rep you again. You are right, great move Will!
 

Mengy

Mengy
Will Flanagan said:
Hey there, this is a really awesome suggestion!

I know that we won't be able to move the regions. However, the team are aware of the request and will take it into consideration, for sure.

We will let you know when we have more news.

Many thanks!
Click to expand...

Very nice! Even just using some of the established names for regions would add a lot of personality to the new galactic map.
 

Rollo

R
CDR Michael Darkmoor said:
Names.... so much more "human" than numbers... I like it!
/signed
Click to expand...
What? Numbers are human! I won't have no filthy aliens taking credits for them anyway!

There's a lot of love and energy to the GMP initiative. Energy and love...and ruthless efficiency. There's...ahem...a lot of love, energy and ruthless efficiency...and an almost fanatical devotion to the Milky Way amongst these fine people. FD should of course add the regional names in some capacity. Cheers! [up]
 

Olivia Vespera

Olivia Vespera
Corbin Moran said:
Please share your suggestions :)
Click to expand...

zjK3S37.png

as best as i can massage it. I think gmp and others who know the regions better can either fill in the blanks or create new names from the old ones.
 

TheOverWolf

T
I think that this would be a great way of saying thanks for all the hard work that's been done by the Galactic Mapping Project and it would tie into much of the existing game lore as well. If it can be done, it should.
 

Mengy

Mengy
Olivia Vespera said:
as best as i can massage it. I think gmp and others who know the regions better can either fill in the blanks or create new names from the old ones.
Click to expand...

Yeah, that's much more interesting. It's more fun to say " I'm going to explore the Abyssal Plains" than " I'm going to explore Region 22". I love it.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top Bottom