Powerplay Powerplay for Pacifists?

[duck0]

I was looking into the new powerplay recently and it seems that even though some of the powers are wielders of influence rather than military force, I apparently must participate in murder to advance past rank 0. Perhaps those in power who prefer to influence rather than bludgeon could instruct their agents to not have bounty requirements?

I don't mind much not participating but I thought I'd put this thought out to the world.

 

[Melanthes]

It's still a conflict simulation where players act against players, including open aquisition wars between the powers. What did you expect?

 

[Ian Doncaster]

Strict pacifism is definitely a "challenge" conduct in a lot of parts of Elite Dangerous - you get locked out of about 2/5ths of the ship engineers, several mission types get tougher, and so on.

In this case, yes, one of the consequences is that you can't gain Powerplay rank. Though you can, using peaceful means, still support your Power in full to expand into new systems or reinforce existing ones - you just won't get paid for it until you unlock your rank.

As far as potential loopholes go, it depends on the specific terms of your challenge:
- If your conduct allows killing in self-defence, then just stick around your Power's territory doing normal stuff until a pirate or mission enemy interdicts you, then retaliate. Job done.
- If your conduct allows property damage but not killing, then you may be able to [1] accumulate the necessary bounties through shooting down wanted Skimmers at certain surface POIs. It'll take a lot of them, but you'll get there in the end.
- If your conduct forbids destruction of anything then you're out of luck.


[1] It very much depends on whether the Powerplay task requires a certain minimum bounty size or not (which merits do, but I'm not sure if it applies to this task). Still, worth a try, especially if you can find a source of Wanted Goliaths.

 

[Rebel Yell]

I was looking into the new powerplay recently and it seems that even though some of the powers are wielders of influence rather than military force, I apparently must participate in murder to advance past rank 0. Perhaps those in power who prefer to influence rather than bludgeon could instruct their agents to not have bounty requirements?

I don't mind much not participating but I thought I'd put this thought out to the world.

Well... murder is good for the cause.

 

[duck0]

Strict pacifism is definitely a "challenge" conduct in a lot of parts of Elite Dangerous - you get locked out of about 2/5ths of the ship engineers, several mission types get tougher, and so on.

In this case, yes, one of the consequences is that you can't gain Powerplay rank. Though you can, using peaceful means, still support your Power in full to expand into new systems or reinforce existing ones - you just won't get paid for it until you unlock your rank.

As far as potential loopholes go, it depends on the specific terms of your challenge:
- If your conduct allows killing in self-defence, then just stick around your Power's territory doing normal stuff until a pirate or mission enemy interdicts you, then retaliate. Job done.
- If your conduct allows property damage but not killing, then you may be able to [1] accumulate the necessary bounties through shooting down wanted Skimmers at certain surface POIs. It'll take a lot of them, but you'll get there in the end.
- If your conduct forbids destruction of anything then you're out of luck.


[1] It very much depends on whether the Powerplay task requires a certain minimum bounty size or not (which merits do, but I'm not sure if it applies to this task). Still, worth a try, especially if you can find a source of Wanted Goliaths.

These are some really good points, thank you for the reply.

My conduct does not allow me to kill in self-defence so the first one is right out, but the second point that skimmers might yield bounty credits something I didn't know about. The rank 0 bounty requirement is just under 500k cr it seems, so it might be possible to go this route. Something definitely worth checking out.

It's been suggested to me by friendly commanders that I could sit in the copilot chair or hang around in the background while they do the murdering but I find that that is me aiding or condoning it being done on my behalf and that doesn't fly.

On the other hand I found that I could justify doing ground CZ:s for unlocking Hero Ferrari by capturing points thereby shortening the conflict and preventing the loss of life. I was of course always unarmed.

It's been an interesting journey since I took up pacifism and finding out where I end up placing the limits. Definitely hard mode in some cases.

 

[duck0]

It's still a conflict simulation where players act against players, including open aquisition wars between the powers. What did you expect?

I dunno, Felcia Winters states this in her powerplay bio:

"Ever since entering politics as a young idealist on Taylor Colony, Felicia Winters has always let her principles guide her decisions. Now serving as President of the Federation, she seeks to maintain this path of morality and compassion - even if the choices required to do so are hard."

It doesn't seem far fetched that she should allow nonviolent means of support.

There's a truth here though that the powers aren't angels and do have massive armies and do fight wars, supporting them as a pacifist could be seen as condoning murder. On the other hand supporting the nonviolent ones and increasing their influence might reduce wars and therefore death and suffering in the bubble as their preference is to not be belligerent.

 

[Ian Doncaster]

Oh, another potential possibility on the "property damage" side.
- find a Pirate Attack Threat 7 signal source in a system belonging to your Power (requires a system in Lockdown or Civil Unrest state, which are somewhat rarer)
- these occasionally have pirate-captured Farragut/Majestic capital ships show up. Might need to be a Federal/Imperial jurisdiction to get this to happen, or it might just be really rare.
- you can't destroy these, but you can repel them by damaging their external heat relay modules (they retreat to hyperspace to repair at this point)
- this gets you a nice bounty credit which (again, I haven't tested this) might count towards Powerplay

They're quite tough modules, but if you're not carrying cargo you should be able to just deal with the capship without anyone else attacking you, and their weapons have a lot of blind spots where you can recharge your shields between relays.

I think that's the only way to get a bounty claim which doesn't involve actually (contributing to) destroying your target, just damaging it a bit.

 

[Screemonster]

You can always wait until your weekly tasks reroll next week and see if you get a set that doesn't involve doing crimes. However, the entire elite series has always been a combat trading simulator. In '84 combat rank was the only one that was counted.

 

[duck0]

You can always wait until your weekly tasks reroll next week and see if you get a set that doesn't involve doing crimes. However, the entire elite series has always been a combat trading simulator. In '84 combat rank was the only one that was counted.

This I know does not work. The first set of weeklies are always the same.

 

[anShpan]

This I know does not work. The first set of weeklies are always the same.

I believe that really depends on Ethos of Power of your choice. While pledging to Princess from the yearly week(s) of PP I can remember, that first weekly had something like "kill enemy ships..." knowing it was bugged at time, I've simply skipped to next week and those were all about scanning, collecting pods, etc. nothing murderous.

BTW, I'm not pacifist, but for few months already I'm flying ships without weapons. I would say that practically anything other than Combat-related ranks it possible to do without murder-based approach. All required Engineering, Imperial rank, PP, etc. It will just take more effort and Credits.

 

[Sheetrock]

You may want to consider "why PowerPlay?" I got into it solely to get the Pacifier Frag Cannon (yes, because I do bounty hunt on occasion). Two things happened: 1. I found that the Pacifier Frag Cannon is a dude (imo), and 2. having gotten into PowerPlay, I'm finding that the whole concept isn't really for me - I prefer mining, exploration, and exobiology in the black, away from NPC pirates and the like - in essence I sort of regret getting into PowerPlay, especially as I see "Hostile" in the bottom right hand screen as I cruise from system to system - I want to be everyone's friend, and PowerPlay removes that option.

It isn't clear to me whether I can now "opt out"

Just my 2 ¢

 

[Ian Doncaster]

It isn't clear to me whether I can now "opt out"

You can leave your power at any time.

You'll immediately lose all rank, rank benefits and perks.
You won't attract any hostility from your former power (er, don't try doing this while docked at one of their Stronghold Carriers...)
You'll keep any Powerplay modules you've already bought, you just won't be able to buy new ones.
Your status will revert to neutral with all 12 powers.

(You can later pledge to the same power or a different one without further penalty if you change your mind, but the lost rank is gone for good)

 

[duck0]

I believe that really depends on Ethos of Power of your choice. While pledging to Princess from the yearly week(s) of PP I can remember, that first weekly had something like "kill enemy ships..." knowing it was bugged at time, I've simply skipped to next week and those were all about scanning, collecting pods, etc. nothing murderous.

It really doesn't change, every single time I've pledged to someone they've been the same, even if I completed some and left the rest for a few weeks. I just signed up again just now. Exactly the same missions.

 

[duck0]

You may want to consider "why PowerPlay?"

No particular reason other than checking it out and finding that it's not non-shooty friendly despite the icons, power intro text etc. As mentioned in the OP I can just not powerplay.

 

[CMDR Straytaker]

You can participate in powerplay, you just can't rank up until you get a set of weekly missions that don't include combat.

 

[anShpan]

IIRC, the only violent task from my weeklies was to "Collect Bounty in System <whatever>" and I'm pretty sure it is possible to do without murder: strongest shields possible, mining laser (if your principles allows couple of completely harmless but "symbolic" shots as self-defense) and couple units of "juicy cargo" as a bait.
At nav. beacon in specified system:

• one need to wait for pirate's scan
• not receiving cargo/response wanted pirate will attack
• Security Forces with attack pirate
• with harmless mining lasers we "helping" Security deal with pirate
• for some strange reason such "participation" will be rewarded with Bounty Claim for eliminating evil pirate.

Some limitations might occur (like 10(?) seconds from our shot till blast, etc.), but others will advice. In principle, it works - couple of times I've checked that on T-8 with only 4 mining lasers as offensive or rather distractive "weapon".

After first weeklies everything else is optional and plenty of non-violent activities (not to mention mining as PP-king )

Good luck!

 

[Helmut Grokenberger]

IIRC, the only violent task from my weeklies was to "Collect Bounty in System <whatever>" and I'm pretty sure it is possible to do without murder: strongest shields possible, mining laser (if your principles allows couple of completely harmless but "symbolic" shots as self-defense) and couple units of "juicy cargo" as a bait.
At nav. beacon in specified system:

• one need to wait for pirate's scan
• not receiving cargo/response wanted pirate will attack
• Security Forces with attack pirate
• with harmless mining lasers we "helping" Security deal with pirate
• for some strange reason such "participation" will be rewarded with Bounty Claim for eliminating evil pirate.

Some limitations might occur (like 10(?) seconds from our shot till blast, etc.), but others will advice. In principle, it works - couple of times I've checked that on T-8 with only 4 mining lasers as offensive or rather distractive "weapon".

After first weeklies everything else is optional and plenty of non-violent activities (not to mention mining as PP-king )

Good luck!

I've heard it being called "cop surfing", which I find hilarious, and agreed, it works perfectly fine. It's also on the list of recommended techniques for beginners to make some money when starting out. Any Res site other than hazardous works too.

 

[Neilski]

It's also on the list of recommended techniques for beginners to make some money when starting out.

Well, apart from the "harmless lasers" bit, yeah