PMFs: data, charts, and the coming galactic player wars...

Yeah... no.

I think some people have invented some "legitimacy" rules after a number of years in the game that are not coming from FDev, and are not coming from those who played the BGS from Day One. I think this starts with a fundamental misunderstanding of what PMFs are.

PMFs didn't exist at launch. They are a later invention at the request of the community (which, personally, I wish they never had accommodated) and in its initial implementation was deeply flawed (initially they literally gifted the system to the PMF). While the reaction of the community was clear: PMFs should work for their home system, I think it did create a perception that PMFs were somehow special.

They're not. They are minor factions like any other. They behave exactly the same like any other minor faction in the BGS. Getting your PMF doesn't confer ownership or executive control. There is nothing that stops anyone in the game to start to work for or against your faction.

That also means that there is no legitimate and illegitimate BGS play. All of it is still just pushing minor factions. I don't care for PP BGS, but it is just as legitimate (I just don't like it, because it is for entirely different purposes).

We are all disadvantaging new groups by playing, by establishing our various territories. A recognized PMF closes space off more completely for new PMFs than un-recognized factions pushed by players. No new PMF can be inserted into your systems, but we got four(!) inserted into our 2nd faction last round. We don't mind, but obviously, not as nice for those who got their new faction.

Related to this is the idea that somehow FD endorses PMFs to take their home system. Not quite. FD just adds them into the game with a home system. That's as far as the endorsement goes. No PMF deserves their home system like no minor faction deserves their home system. There are typically at least 5-6 home factions in the system, each have as much right to rule as the next. It all just depends on player actions.

Player groups put all kinds of self-imposed rules on themselves, and people should play how they want. Splitting BGS play in legitimate and illegitimate is a fool's errand, and while I can understand it may get you some sympathy with a section of the community, it doesn't mean anything beyond you telling other players they're not playing the game right.

Finally, the typical PMF owns no systems and no assets. Large factions like yours and ours are exceedingly exceptional in the galaxy (whether official PMFs or not). Maybe we should talk of PSFs (Player Supported Factions) rather than PMFs, as some of the biggest factions in the game aren't PMFs, but definitely Player Supported, whereas the majority of PMFs is not player supported at all.
This is the best summary of the state of faction/player relationships I've seen. Could it be reworked slightly as general guidance and stickied?
 
We all BGS in our own way but I wont deny that we had more BGS interest by our members once we had Delta Squadron inserted on the 1.4 update.

Before 1.4 we pushed Jet United and took over 12 systems I think it was. We then had to take over the same systems all over again but with the Delta Squadron faction.

The charts are lovely and I have nothing against player adopted factions however I'd love to see just a player created faction chart... so just the player factions that have been manually inserted since the 1.4 update.
 

Jane Turner

Volunteer Moderator
Low tech solution

Top mfs only
7EHmXp6.png
 
That just gives me a reason to re-run them! Although if that happened on today's tick, it's unlikely to be in today's data dump yet...
 
Since I was already messing with maps that processed over all factions, rather than only those marked as PMF in eddb.io, I thought to return to this chart as well. Three systems controlled or more, or the earlier bars squish everything else down to nothing.

Y3recow.png


https://i.imgur.com/Y3recow.png
 
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Since I was already messing with maps that processed over all factions, rather than only those marked as PMF in eddb.io, I thought to return to this chart as well. Three systems controlled or more, or the earlier bars squish everything else down to nothing.



https://i.imgur.com/Y3recow.png

Great work as always, question about the color coding. What do the different colors stand for here unless thats already there and I just can’t see it on my phone.
 
Great work as always, question about the color coding. What do the different colors stand for here unless thats already there and I just can’t see it on my phone.

Allegiance, - indi is yellow, imp is blue , fed is red and alliance is green
 
More chart :D

h8yoKRd.png


There are four separate metrics on this chart, contrasted between PMFs on the right and non-PMFs on the left, to see if there is any significant difference: 1. The total population controlled by super power aligned or independent controlled systems divided by the number of systems controlled; 2. Total population controlled divided by the number of super power aligned or independent factions; 3. The average number of systems controlled per aligned faction, and finally 4. the average number of factions present in a system controlled by a particular aligned faction.


Looking at non-PMFs first, the Alliance shows an interesting contrast. It's ahead on average population per system, but the contrast is even greater when it comes to population controlled per faction. This shows that the Alliance has a somewhat higher population density per system, but that larger multi-system factions lead to a real contrast with the rest of the galaxy. It also suggests that Alliance factions dis-proportionally control the systems they are in. Independents, due to their high concentration of anarchy factions that don't rule (see below), have a very low population per faction.


With PMFs, the Federation population per controlled systems is interesting. This suggests that ruling Federation PFMs are concentrated in high population systems, as it is not reflected in the population by faction, where the Alliance is even more dominant than among non-PMFs. The population controlled per faction is more than 2.5 times the average population size of other aligned factions.


Systems controlled per faction between NPC and PMF factions is interesting, too. Both show a similar picture at the top end, with the Alliance factions well ahead. Among PMFs, though, the independents are way up (as many successful PMFs are independent), whereas the Federation's number of systems controlled is only a quarter of Alliance factions.

Finally, when we look at assets, the super powers are ahead, with the Alliance again in front. But among PMFs, the Alliance factions have just under double the assets as Independent factions, and four times as much as the Federation. Independents among non-PMFs are squeezed again by the large number of non-asset owning anarchy factions.

The state of the human populated galaxy
 
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Big PMF insert today. Seems to me, from the records I keep we had 1,371 PMFs on eddb.io yesterday. That is 1,532 today - an increase of 161. This doesn't seem a case of someone flipping NPC factions to PMF, from the spot checks I did.
 
Big PMF insert today. Seems to me, from the records I keep we had 1,371 PMFs on eddb.io yesterday. That is 1,532 today - an increase of 161. This doesn't seem a case of someone flipping NPC factions to PMF, from the spot checks I did.

FD have been busy adding a lot of new PMFs over the last few weeks, since the new application system came online. And I suspect there are still more PMFs that are not yet marked as 'Player Faction' in EDDB.
 
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