Sigh. I understand.
I don't mean to be bitter or tough on Sandro; It's just I'm an original 84' Elite player and have seen other space games build upon its greatness.
I hoped that, if the eventual reboot could incorporate even some of today's space/sci fi concepts for story/missions etc
then my dreams would be realised. (you must admit engaging missions/content and story are not too hard to come up with with everything that's out there)
The resources required for powerplay and the time to required properly fix/restructure and balance it, makes me wince.
The possibilities for missions/content/story could have been limitless; but instead of Elite, first becoming the best is could be in this area, valuable personnel and
time and resources are being expended on a concept, (whilst epic in scale),after launching into the live environment; is barely functional.
The worst part is that the previously thriving, united and growing, community goal CMDR's; that were really communicating and working together to hit targets etc has been destroyed. When thousands used to gather in a shared goal and follow story, we are now fractured and few due to powerplay being attempted and disliked causing CMDRS to quit completely.
I hope one day we can return to those pre 1.3 levels of group participation and camaraderie.
PS
If the current community goal is really part of the long term story (plague and possibly Thargoid involvement)
then it is being missed by distracted CMDRS that are concentrating on grinding merits and ferrying paperwork in order to get a supposedly better weapon; that can actually turn out to be worse and not worth the effort.
I understand what you mean. PP has had an equally chilling effect on CMDR to CMDR chat. Before PP I regularly had chats with other CMDRs I met when roaming around. Since PP was released most CMDRs immediately hyperspace away when they see other CMDRs for fear of being attacked. I blame the unrealistically high level of aggression of Powers towards each other throughout the whole inhabited bubble.