Hello once again to the latest in my series of threads compiling some Powerplay activity data and analysing it. Here's the thread links for the previous Cycles:
* Cycle #2
* Cycle #3
* Cycle #4
* Cycle #5
* Cycle #6
* Cycle #7
As always, if you have suggestions (particularly about the formatting or the type of data to be shared in the next post) or corrections to offer, they are very much welcome. My thanks to panterjd42, who helped me format the data for the original post. Special thanks to Zac and Laurence from FD, I am very grateful that they're willing to share with me some of FD's Powerplay data.
I must mention Commander Fergal who last week proposed the table with support-to-opposition ratio, which I think is a very interesting addition to this post. Thanks!
In some ways this Cycle has been fairly quiet, with less hostilities across the board, but there have been some very interesting development in some parts of the galaxy. With the merits per kill increased 10x in Combat and Social expansion zones, next week's analysis might be drastically different. As ever, there's a few things to note before you check this week's data.
* The data comes directly from Frontier, but it was collected at 5 AM, so very late pushes after that time might still have affected the numbers. Additionally, while the numbers are solid, I might have made mistakes collating them. I continously try new methods to make my work a little easier, and as a result some errors might have crept in. Please let me know if you spot any.
* Power Ethos (whether your tasks are Combat, Social, Covert or Finance) largely doesn't matter. No matter what the ethos, you do the same tasks for Fortification and Preparation. However, while Powers with a Finance Expansion ethos (Torval, Mahon, Aisling, Winters, Sirius) also deliver goods to sure their expansions, those with Social or Combat Expansion ethos need to grind Powerplay-specific conflict zones. This is a slower and more difficult way of obtaining merits via Expansion. As a result, the Expansion values for Powers with a Social or Combat ethos are likely relatively lower than they should be. This is relevant when trying to estimate number of pledges per Power.
* There has been a fair deal of chaos this Cycle, with Powers falling in and out of Turmoil. Some swings in numbers might a by-product of this confusion.
* Opposition for each Power refers to the level of opposition *their* Expansions have faced, not what they inflicted upon others. Same with Undermining. In all cases, absolute values are used, not percentages. Since the two terms are sometimes confused - Undermining counters Fortification, Opposition counters Expansion.
POWER RANKING BY ACTIVITY
Power ranking by support
Power ranking by opposition
Support-to-opposition ratio
Major faction ranking by support
Major faction ranking by opposition
ANALYSIS
Aisling Duval
Arissa Lavigny-Duval
Zemina Torval
Denton Patreus
Zachary Hudson
Felicia Winters
Edmund Mahon
Li Yong-Rui
Archon Delaine
Pranav Antal
GUESSES AND ASSUMPTIONS
* Cycle #2
* Cycle #3
* Cycle #4
* Cycle #5
* Cycle #6
* Cycle #7
As always, if you have suggestions (particularly about the formatting or the type of data to be shared in the next post) or corrections to offer, they are very much welcome. My thanks to panterjd42, who helped me format the data for the original post. Special thanks to Zac and Laurence from FD, I am very grateful that they're willing to share with me some of FD's Powerplay data.
I must mention Commander Fergal who last week proposed the table with support-to-opposition ratio, which I think is a very interesting addition to this post. Thanks!
In some ways this Cycle has been fairly quiet, with less hostilities across the board, but there have been some very interesting development in some parts of the galaxy. With the merits per kill increased 10x in Combat and Social expansion zones, next week's analysis might be drastically different. As ever, there's a few things to note before you check this week's data.
* The data comes directly from Frontier, but it was collected at 5 AM, so very late pushes after that time might still have affected the numbers. Additionally, while the numbers are solid, I might have made mistakes collating them. I continously try new methods to make my work a little easier, and as a result some errors might have crept in. Please let me know if you spot any.
* Power Ethos (whether your tasks are Combat, Social, Covert or Finance) largely doesn't matter. No matter what the ethos, you do the same tasks for Fortification and Preparation. However, while Powers with a Finance Expansion ethos (Torval, Mahon, Aisling, Winters, Sirius) also deliver goods to sure their expansions, those with Social or Combat Expansion ethos need to grind Powerplay-specific conflict zones. This is a slower and more difficult way of obtaining merits via Expansion. As a result, the Expansion values for Powers with a Social or Combat ethos are likely relatively lower than they should be. This is relevant when trying to estimate number of pledges per Power.
* There has been a fair deal of chaos this Cycle, with Powers falling in and out of Turmoil. Some swings in numbers might a by-product of this confusion.
* Opposition for each Power refers to the level of opposition *their* Expansions have faced, not what they inflicted upon others. Same with Undermining. In all cases, absolute values are used, not percentages. Since the two terms are sometimes confused - Undermining counters Fortification, Opposition counters Expansion.
POWER RANKING BY ACTIVITY
Power ranking by support
(Fortification + Expansion + Preparation)
1. Aisling (962,354)
2. Arissa (779,769)
3. Hudson (497,436)
4. Mahon (486,716)
5. Sirius (326,234)
6. Winters (291,169)
7. Torval (183,203)
8. Archon (135,047)
9. Patreus (127,542)
10. Antal (117,786)
1. Aisling (962,354)
2. Arissa (779,769)
3. Hudson (497,436)
4. Mahon (486,716)
5. Sirius (326,234)
6. Winters (291,169)
7. Torval (183,203)
8. Archon (135,047)
9. Patreus (127,542)
10. Antal (117,786)
Power ranking by opposition
(Undermining + Opposition)
1. Winters (407,295)
2. Mahon (326,415)
3. Archon (319,950)
4. Hudson (315,205)
5. Sirius (136,894)
6. Arissa (90,710)
7. Aisling (86,240)
8. Torval (69,464)
9. Patreus (35,546)
10. Antal (32,287)
1. Winters (407,295)
2. Mahon (326,415)
3. Archon (319,950)
4. Hudson (315,205)
5. Sirius (136,894)
6. Arissa (90,710)
7. Aisling (86,240)
8. Torval (69,464)
9. Patreus (35,546)
10. Antal (32,287)
Support-to-opposition ratio
The higher the number, the more support that Power has received relative to the opposition they have experienced.
1. Aisling (1115.9%)
2. Arissa (859.63%)
3. Antal (364.81%)
4. Patreus (358.81%)
5. Torval (263.74%)
6. Sirius (238.31%)
7. Hudson (157.81%)
8. Mahon (149.11%)
9. Winters (71.49%)
10. Archon (42.21%)
1. Aisling (1115.9%)
2. Arissa (859.63%)
3. Antal (364.81%)
4. Patreus (358.81%)
5. Torval (263.74%)
6. Sirius (238.31%)
7. Hudson (157.81%)
8. Mahon (149.11%)
9. Winters (71.49%)
10. Archon (42.21%)
Major faction ranking by support
1. Empire (2,052,868)
2. Federation (788,605)
3. Independents (579,067)
4. Alliance (486,716)
2. Federation (788,605)
3. Independents (579,067)
4. Alliance (486,716)
Major faction ranking by opposition
1. Federation (722,500)
2. Independents (489,131)
3. Alliance (326,415)
4. Empire (281,960)
2. Independents (489,131)
3. Alliance (326,415)
4. Empire (281,960)
ANALYSIS
* After a few weeks of stability, this Cycle we've seen an overall drop in activity, both support and opposition. This is mostly because of some pretty significant drop in Empire and Federation activity. The Alliance has picked up some of the slack, in both respects, but overall the numbers are lower. I don't want to speculate too much about the reasons, but turmoil issues certainly paid a big part - we've never had as many Powers in turmoil as we did this week.
* Opposition activity is in one way more evenly spread out. It used to be that pretty much only the Federation and Archon saw significant hostile activity, with other Powers having a relatively easy time, but now Mahon and Sirius are also starting to feel the hurt. In another way, things turned more uneven - the Imperial Powers, despite seeing significantly more activity than their non-Imperial rivals, saw another drop in opposition. At this point all four Imperials combined see less opposition than Archon or Mahon, or either of the Federation Powers.
* Opposition activity is in one way more evenly spread out. It used to be that pretty much only the Federation and Archon saw significant hostile activity, with other Powers having a relatively easy time, but now Mahon and Sirius are also starting to feel the hurt. In another way, things turned more uneven - the Imperial Powers, despite seeing significantly more activity than their non-Imperial rivals, saw another drop in opposition. At this point all four Imperials combined see less opposition than Archon or Mahon, or either of the Federation Powers.
Aisling Duval
is always a bit of a difficult Power for me to talk about, in part because not a whole lot happens to her. She has lots of support, almost zero opposition, and a fairly safe strategic position. This Cycle not a single one of her systems was Undermined, none of her Fortifications were cancelled, none of her Expansions failed, and in fact she received a grand total of zero Opposition. The Peoples' Princess is at the top and unless this week's mechanics changes stir things up significantly, she'll be staying at the top for the foreseeable future. Certainly I don't see any scenario other than some carastrophic Overhead failure that pushes her out of the top 2.
Arissa Lavigny-Duval
enjoyed Turmoil again, and as before, her supporters compensated by doing Fortification like crazy - the smart thing to do for a Power in their situation. Despite suffering a grand total of 45 Opposition she somehow managed to secure her one expansion. Despite the Undermining she sees being very modest, it seems better spread out than that against Aisling, leading to 6 of her Fortifications being cancelled. The active support behind this Power continues to support, as they're able to continue to field the core of the offensive against Archon and heavily oppose the Federation, while easily securing their own space.
Zemina Torval
has had her overall activity drop for the third week in a row. On one hand, that further confirms that Torval is extremely unlikely to again rise to the heights she once reached, and top 3 is pretty much unattainable for her. Her supporters do a fine job with limited resources, and she's in no danger of a further drop in the rankings right now, but the Senator continues to be the target of some rather focused Undermining. Even though the amount of Undermining in her space is hardly huge, her enemies once again succeeded in Undermining one of her systems, Tanghpon.
Denton Patreus
too has seen a drop in activity, but smart efforts on the part of his pledged pilots and lack of hostile activity mean that he's in a secure position for now - or at least as secure as a Power in the bottom 3 can ever be. Patreus won a major Preparation race against Archon in Cuchua, and although that race distracted a lot of his pilots' attention that would have been better spent elsewhere, nobody took advantage of this Power's rather weak Fortification and Expansion. With two expansions secured and just one fortification negated, Patreus continues to run a great CC surplus, giving him a useful buffer against Undermining.
Zachary Hudson
was in Turmoil as well, and saw a drop in activity likely at least partly connected to that. Although Hudson's supporters do a lot of Fortification - 3rd most in the game - this Power sees worryingly little Expansion. This is a problem common to all Powers with the Combat or Social expansion ethos, but it hurts Hudson the most, as he sees significant Opposition since launch of Powerplay. This will likely be the main beneficiary of this week's buff to combat expansion. On the plus side, the massive Undermining of Hudson's systems failed to succeed anywhere - partly due to being too focused on a few systems, partly because of more spread out Fortification on part of the President's supporters.
Felicia Winters
has long been the Power in perhaps the most difficult position in the game - a title stolen from her by Archon in recent weeks. With absolutely massive amounts of Undermining compared to her own activity, she has nevertheless secured 3 out of her four expansions and fortified against all undermining attempts. Winters' supporters continue to impress, but she might be one of the big losers of the recent mechanics changes. Simply put, it seems her fairly small support base is already very stretched, and might not be able to cope with the added strain of the more effective Undermining, to say nothing of the proposed increase to Fortification triggers.
Edmund Mahon
keeps his #3 spot despite a pretty massive surge in enemy activity against him. With his only expansion, in Lugh, succeeding in face of some pretty stiff Opposition, and all Undermining attempts stopped by Fortification (with 9 Fortifications cancelled), his supporters have done well to guard their top 3 slot. Mahon is now firmly one of the biggest, most important Powers in PP, and will remain in top 5 without a doubt. Whether he can keep his #3 slot depends in large part on the impact of the Undermining changes, and his pilots' ability to deal with increasingly spread-out territory.
Li Yong-Rui
grabbed 5 more systems this week, had no systems successfully Undermined, and had only 3 Fortifications cancelled. All in all, Sirius Gov continues to have a pretty easy ride in Powerplay. With very good territory, good expansion choices and a secure flank with Antal, this probably won't change for now. What will be interesting to see is how running out of space will affect this Power - with their borders continuously pushing closer to the Alliance, Federation and the Empire, they might yet be in for some serious fights. I can't see Sirius climbing more ranks at this point, and I wouldn't be surprised to see them drop a place next week, as Hudson climbs back up.
Archon Delaine
has 5 out of the 6 successfully Undermined systems from this Cycle, a further blow to his CC that spells serious trouble in light of the recent changes to Undermine, and the planned increase to Fortification triggers. The Kumo Crew has now resisted some pretty overwhelming odds (just look at that support-to-opposition ratio!) for around 5 weeks, and they have a fine job defending their space, but it feels like any further changes to mechanics that will make it more difficult to defend against Undermining will break this Power. Due to a mix of Opposition, bugs and poorly chosen Expansion targets, Archon secured no Expansions this Cycle. It's not all doom and gloom, though. Archon's failure to secure an Expansion wasn't particularly penalised, even though he he's in the bottom 3, likely because their prime Expansion target was bugged (again). While Archon's people only Prepared two systems, one of those two has very good expansion triggers, making them fairly secure on the opposition front this week, especially in the wake of the much-welcome buff to combat expansion.
Pranav Antal
actually had an eventful week! This excited me, because while I am a supporter of Utopia myself, I was rarely able to write much of interest about my Power. After weeks of only getting 1 or 2 expansions a Cycle and low activity overall, Pranav Antal suddenly grabbed a grand total of *four* Expansions. In fact, the Expansion value for this Power is higher than for Hudson - and if you recall a recent dev post, Antal is the Power with fewest supporters in the game, while Hudson has the most. This is attributed to some unknown player group (which some of came to call The Many) that suddenly threw their weight behind the Simguru. Their identity is unknown, and it's not at all clear if we'll see the same thing this week - it's entirely possible this week was a one-off fluke. On another mildly interesting note - this Cycle Pranav Antal saw a remarkable balance in activity between Preparation, Expansion and Fortification. I thought that was kinda cool.
GUESSES AND ASSUMPTIONS
This is the section for random, half-coherent thoughts that popped into my head while I was writing up the rest of the post. Probably a waste of your time, tbh.
* Faction imbalance, blah blah, Empire sees no Opposition or Undermine, whine whine. You know my old spiel by now, and it seems uncharitable towards FD to repeat it on the wake of a much-welcome change to PP piracy that may yet see some conflict between Imperial Powers. That being said, I did have a good, hearty chuckle when I saw that The Alliance, consisting of JUST MAHON, sees more opposition than The Empire. I laughed a bit harder when I saw that Arissa had 45 Opposition and Aisling had ZERO. You can't make this stuff up.
* I remain unconvinced that the buff to Undermining and the proposed, second increase to Fortification triggers are good ideas. They will inevitably not bother Aisling and Arissa (between them responsible for most Powerplay activity), but it will be a catastrophe for some smaller Powers. IMO those are good changes, but rebalancing of perks and rewards should come first, to spread out the acitivty a bit. That being said, I can see the reasoning behind those changes. A grand total of 6 systems were successfully Undermined this cycle, and there's relatively little Opposition to Expansions. That's clearly not ideal, it doesn't make for an interesting, dynamic Powerplay landscape.
* It was fun to see that several Powers delivered a few thousand Preparation even though they were in Turmoil. As amusing as that is, perhaps some sort of warning for players would be useful.
* I've been really short on sleep this week and felt myself dozing off in the middle of this post, so there's a higher than normal likelihood of mistakes. I'm going to take a nap now.
* Faction imbalance, blah blah, Empire sees no Opposition or Undermine, whine whine. You know my old spiel by now, and it seems uncharitable towards FD to repeat it on the wake of a much-welcome change to PP piracy that may yet see some conflict between Imperial Powers. That being said, I did have a good, hearty chuckle when I saw that The Alliance, consisting of JUST MAHON, sees more opposition than The Empire. I laughed a bit harder when I saw that Arissa had 45 Opposition and Aisling had ZERO. You can't make this stuff up.
* I remain unconvinced that the buff to Undermining and the proposed, second increase to Fortification triggers are good ideas. They will inevitably not bother Aisling and Arissa (between them responsible for most Powerplay activity), but it will be a catastrophe for some smaller Powers. IMO those are good changes, but rebalancing of perks and rewards should come first, to spread out the acitivty a bit. That being said, I can see the reasoning behind those changes. A grand total of 6 systems were successfully Undermined this cycle, and there's relatively little Opposition to Expansions. That's clearly not ideal, it doesn't make for an interesting, dynamic Powerplay landscape.
* It was fun to see that several Powers delivered a few thousand Preparation even though they were in Turmoil. As amusing as that is, perhaps some sort of warning for players would be useful.
* I've been really short on sleep this week and felt myself dozing off in the middle of this post, so there's a higher than normal likelihood of mistakes. I'm going to take a nap now.
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