Possible attribution issue.

[Jmanis]

Hey all, just flagging an observation here, mostly to see if anyone else has similar occurrences.

Pre-patch a war was in it's first day in a fairly sleepy system. When I say sleepy, there's been zero opposition to me closing a 10-50% gap over the course of a week or so.

Before the tick last night, I:

• Ran missions for my supported faction only (they were all Salvage/Assassination missions in a neighbouring system)
• Handed in bonds and bounties for my supported faction only
• Cleared one Medium CZ for my supported faction only

Pretty standard fare for when I fight wars these days.

This morning my faction was suprisingly in Close Defeat. On the surface, this seems reasonable as it looks like there was economic and security support for the other faction:

... but checking the traffic report for the last 24 hours, only ships are my own, and a single Type 6. Considering the sleepiness of this system and the low volume of traffic, I find it difficult to imagine there's actual resistance going on... in the context of the bugs from the recent patch I wonder if attribution of activities isn't all messed up again.

Another factoid, I ran two missions in an equally sleepy system, and appeared to lose 0.3%.

 

[cmdr milesred]

I have pointed out several times to fdev how poorly the news system works
To this, currently total failure to report expansions
Incorrect name of Top 5 Local Bounties instead of Top 5 Interstellar Bounties, so we have 2 of Top 5 Local Bounties
Ship count for traffic of past 24 hours has been inaccurate for more than a few years. This one I know all too well as I still test it on a very regular basis, sometimes in an attempt to fool the opposition by flying various ships in and out several times
It also seems to very often report incorrect info for Popular commodities and doesn't differentiate between bought or sold. I know this from testing the buying and the selling of hundreds to thousands of tons of various goods at profit as well as at loss. Sadly you can sell 5,000t of say palladium at a loss and the news reports it as a popular item..clever news.and that's just one example of how bad that part is.Its good that it reports it, but bad info for someone hoping to see what is popular at a station, TBH for most people if its reported as popular but actually loses you money, how is that popular? good as a report but not how it rates trade in any way.
The main thing here though is it very often misses reporting numerous items and if I had to guess it is a limited line FIFO list.

Both commodities and traffic are very important BGS tools as we know and neither work dependably, not now or ever in the past
It seems the only useful indicators are the up and down arrows for security and economy in the status tab or on the mission board and sadly as we know only mean stuff happened or it didn't or it was neutralized by opposing equal force.

 

[teje3]

I don't know if my case is similar.
Faction with 55% influence in small system two days ago

Almost no Traffic in the last two days and no assessinations reported. My faction is in boom state and none else in the system have state.

After these two days, we are down 15%.

I just think that the states are making very strange thing since the update. The bgs is more broken than never.
With the server almost always down, I can't imagine out how a group can do so many missions for that.

 

[cmdr milesred]

The amount of time was not that much, more dependent on what time of day you were able to play.
During that time, I did successful contributions to 1 election, 1 war, 1 civil war and completed an expansion.
In another system pushed a faction up by 6%, another system pushed a faction up by 2%, another system pushed a faction up by 1.7%, another system pushed a faction up by 3%.
Several of my systems did pretty much nothing, a couple lost small amounts.
The only bad thing for this period was that after the update the tick seemed partial, as in inf changed but no states were changed that should have been, then after the Powerplay maintenance it looked as though the tick completed itself and numerous states changes did take place.
As I mentioned in my previous post, the traffic report is seriously broken.
Even if the traffic report is actually not broken, which I know from it not being able to count my own flight activity, an option you and others don't seem to consider sometimes is a player or a group of players not moving but simply taking turns applying accumulated bounty vouchers, or missions previously done(timer stops when done and can be held for a very long time), and depending on station and whether or not their faction owns a station then trade and carto data can also be applied without moving ships in or out of the system.
The point is the traffic counter is very easy to defeat and so is not a good indicator in any way as to what actually takes place.
As this is a valuable tool I am actually surprised that many people have apparently not noticed these things about it.
Myself and I am sure many other players do hold missions for the very reason of faking out the traffic counter as well as to be prepared for large amount of missions being handed in at the right time.
Picture the results of 5 players each taking on 5 sightseeing missions, then parking and doing nothing for 3 days just for the sake of a no traffic, high impact day.
And on that day they each log in and hand in these missions and also each hand in anywhere between 2 and 20mil in bounties , all for their faction.
If they were indeed the only traffic that day, depending on the systems population, but you say its small, these 2 actions could have an impact of near 10% x 2 and you would see no traffic.

 

[FrogsFriend]

It also seems to very often report incorrect info for Popular commodities and doesn't differentiate between bought or sold

I'd always assumed that report was just based on the value of goods bought or sold i.e. largest transaction value regardless of whether you made a profit or a loss on the deal. At one point there were two separate reports for buying and selling but they were merged.

 

[Jmanis]

OK, so something odd is going on... just handed in 700k in combat bonds to my faction (with which I have slightly less than full rep with), and no change to the rep level.

Normally handing in bonds increases rep with the issuing faction... so something's not quite right. Will have to see what happens after the tick I guess though.

 

[DNA-Decay]

If there’s an active CZ then surely you are in a war, so BH and battles only.

Missions don’t count in a war.

 

[Rubbernuke]

If there’s an active CZ then surely you are in a war, so BH and battles only.

Missions don’t count in a war.

OT but your...face. Its changed.

 

[Jmanis]

If there’s an active CZ then surely you are in a war, so BH and battles only.

Missions don’t count in a war.

Nope. Missions count, as far as I'm concerned at the moment. I've had numerous successes based on just doing missions and no CZ's/bonds.

Have done way more testing pre-patch since I made this post and was pretty satisfied it worked: https://forums.frontier.co.uk/threads/missions-might-affect-war-outcome-now.513743/

Also recall, reshaping the simulation featured this snippet:

I know it doesn't tell us much, but there's at least acknowledgement certain missions are meant to have effect for both wars & elections.

But again, no rep gain when handing in my bonds tonight suggests something's not counting like it's meant to.

 

[Jmanis]

OK, it's bugreport time.

After clearing 4 Medium CZs and handing in =~ 2m in bonds across 4 transactions, no change to the war status today, but not only that, no change in security status for my faction. Handing in bonds increases security rating, so clearing CZs and handing in bonds appears to be having no effect.

 

[teje3]

Have FDev ever reacted to this kind of bug reports?

 

[cmdr milesred]

not really
Not to mention, no proof here providing info on whether or not there is possibly any equal counter - measures happening in said system.
And there is more than one type of counter measure that can prevent security indicator from changing.
I currently am taking part in a couple civil wars, a war and a couple elections and seeing no issues, this doesn't mean there are no issues either though.

 

[Jmanis]

Have FDev ever reacted to this kind of bug reports?

not really
Not to mention, no proof here providing info on whether or not there is possibly any equal counter - measures happening in said system.

Actually, FD have acted on this sort of thing in the past. They generally inspect the transactions and report back something like "Actually, there's more opposition than you realise"... and on the occasions when there has been an issue, it's been quickly identified and acknowledged.

And on the contrary, there's plenty of proof... the security slider says it all tbh.

Even if the war was opposed, both sides would increase security state... it would not balance out naturally, and especially not in this war. Mutually opposed efforts resulting in zero change to all of the war state, economy and security statuses are nigh-on impossible. The game simply doesn't work that way.

That is.... If I hand in 500k bonds for one side, that doesn't create a counter-security effect for the opposing side. It just creates a positive effect for the faction who received the bonds. And the -ve effect of running massacre missions to eliminate enemy ships is never enough to outweigh the raw volume of bonds earned when completing those missions.

I've been involved in enough wars as the winner and the loser to be certain that that even when there's opposition, the tendency is for both sides to experience positive security effects, regardless of who is winning. The fact that neither side experienced any change to their states on a is a huge red flag; I've had draw-days before where we've "just been that lucky"... but both sides have changed their security and economic status, or even both, in those situations.

 

[brap_man]

... but checking the traffic report for the last 24 hours, only ships are my own, and a single Type 6. Considering the sleepiness of this system and the low volume of traffic, I find it difficult to imagine there's actual resistance going on

How do you know people didn't arrive 25 hours prior to you checking the traffic report, or even if people just live there perhaps. I wouldn't call this a bug as I have witness many people assume they are nopt getting countered only to discover that they indeed are

 

[brap_man]

But you don't have to take my opinion on it alone, I suggest you join the BGS discord and voice your concerns there, as the folks there will have experience enough to guide you
https://discord.gg/PZwERyb

 

[Jmanis]

How do you know people didn't arrive 25 hours prior to you checking the traffic report, or even if people just live there perhaps. I wouldn't call this a bug as I have witness many people assume they are nopt getting countered only to discover that they indeed are

But you don't have to take my opinion on it alone, I suggest you join the BGS discord and voice your concerns there, as the folks there will have experience enough to guide you
https://discord.gg/PZwERyb

I check the traffic report every 6-8 hours, and frankly I've been doing this since before lugh... good chance I know of everything that gets talked about on discord already

I think there's gross underestimation of the effort needed to achieve resistance in a way which causes:

• No change in war progress
• No change in economy status
• No change in security status

... for either of the factions involved. You don't just casually run some missions or CZ's and hand in bonds to cause that kind of effect. There's always impact to the economy/security sliders in any situation of resistance.

It is plausible, but would require unorthodox gameplay (undertaking activities which for any standard player are counter-intuitive and inefficient methods), and perfect intelligence on my activities that day. That last part in particular is impossible since I don't even tell my own group what I've done until after it's effect has occurred, and I don't use any 3rd party tools which report to sites like inara. I also verify activity with quite a few other intelligence methods which I won't bore you with, and, well, opsec to boot.

Again, it's plausible, but the only realistic way to achieve it would be to have had someone literally looking over my shoulder at four random times during the day and to carefully craft a perfectly balanced response that didn't benefit the opposing side at all.

There is one other possibility; that I just botched the tick times and attributed my CZs to the wrong tick cycle.... possible, but given my last tick time was accurate, unlikely.

On an aside.

If there’s an active CZ then surely you are in a war, so BH and battles only.

Missions don’t count in a war.

@DNA-Decay , for the last tick, I ran nothing but missions. Post-tick, my faction won the day, and economy/security sliders changed 100% as expected, so missions definitely count.

This tick I'm going to validate just CZs and Bonds again... given the outcome on the first day in the op it is likely there was some counter-activity (as economic/security sliders all went up for both sides), but it's plausible that if bonds/cz's aren't counting, it would've contributed to the loss.

 

[brap_man]

I check the traffic report every 6-8 hours, and frankly I've been doing this since before lugh... good chance I know of everything that gets talked about on discord already

I think there's gross underestimation of the effort needed to achieve resistance in a way which causes:

• No change in war progress
• No change in economy status
• No change in security status

... for either of the factions involved. You don't just casually run some missions or CZ's and hand in bonds to cause that kind of effect. There's always impact to the economy/security sliders in any situation of resistance.

It is plausible, but would require unorthodox gameplay (undertaking activities which for any standard player are counter-intuitive and inefficient methods), and perfect intelligence on my activities that day. That last part in particular is impossible since I don't even tell my own group what I've done until after it's effect has occurred, and I don't use any 3rd party tools which report to sites like inara. I also verify activity with quite a few other intelligence methods which I won't bore you with, and, well, opsec to boot.

Again, it's plausible, but the only realistic way to achieve it would be to have had someone literally looking over my shoulder at four random times during the day and to carefully craft a perfectly balanced response that didn't benefit the opposing side at all.

There is one other possibility; that I just botched the tick times and attributed my CZs to the wrong tick cycle.... possible, but given my last tick time was accurate, unlikely.

On an aside.

@DNA-Decay , for the last tick, I ran nothing but missions. Post-tick, my faction won the day, and economy/security sliders changed 100% as expected, so missions definitely count.

This tick I'm going to validate just CZs and Bonds again... given the outcome on the first day in the op it is likely there was some counter-activity (as economic/security sliders all went up for both sides), but it's plausible that if bonds/cz's aren't counting, it would've contributed to the loss.

Even if you check the traffic reports it wouldn't show you if someone lived in the system and bounty hunted there.
The fact is it is entirely possible that there is a rational reason for you losing the war, rather than it being a bug.
As I say, I advise you to join the BGS discord which I gave you the link for.

 

[cmdr milesred]

as I mentioned and as brap_man mentioned, me in more detail though, the traffic indicator is often wrong and is very easy to fool.
If I hade 5 friends each with 3-4 ships parked in your or any other system and worked parts of the bgs every day, you would have no idea we were even there.
Easy to do, we each happen to have several hundred mil in carto data and can easily collect bonds and/or bounties with no indication given. and doing mission invisibly as well. Even trade.
There would only be one indicator for you to try to figure that something is happening. if we play our cards right.
If you are a lone bgs player, it might be slightly more difficult, but not entirely.
like a good game of chess or cards, 2 equal players easily counter each other without much thought as they are both likely to make similar moves and counter moves.
To assume otherwise, makes you an easy target.

 

[brap_man]

Also it is very easy to win a war via winning CZ instances and not handing in bonds, which would cause very little movement to the security or economy sliders.

 

[brap_man]

Before the tick last night, I:

• Ran missions for my supported faction only (they were all Salvage/Assassination missions in a neighbouring system)
• Handed in bonds and bounties for my supported faction only
• Cleared one Medium CZ for my faction only

This amount of work for example, would probably lose to two high CZs, or maybe three medium CZs
That would not make a noticeable movement on economic or security slider.
Trust me, you do have things to learm from the people and conversations in BGS discord