Pranav Antal's Expansion ethos is "Social" - but his expansions require combat. Is this as intended?

Pranav Antal's Expansion ethos is "Social" - but his expansions require combat. Is this as intended?

As in the thread title. Pranav Antal is the only with neither Combat nor Finance expansion, but rather "Social". Was Social expansion intended to be somehow different from the others but that wasn't intended, or is that just another way of saying the Power has a combat expansion ethos?
 
https://forums.frontier.co.uk/showthread.php?t=150431

The answer:
https://forums.frontier.co.uk/showthread.php?t=150431&p=2312984&viewfull=1#post2312984

Nearly all of the Powers have this problem.

Look at Hudsons, his screen says combat for preparation, expansion and fortification.
That would make a player who likes combat join him.

His preparation and fortification is exactly the same as everyone, take cargo to some place. I'd call that trading, not combat.
Its the same for the smuggling skull, its used for a few powers, but its just trading non illegal goods.
 
As in the thread title. Pranav Antal is the only with neither Combat nor Finance expansion, but rather "Social". Was Social expansion intended to be somehow different from the others but that wasn't intended, or is that just another way of saying the Power has a combat expansion ethos?

https://forums.frontier.co.uk/showthread.php?t=150431

The answer:
https://forums.frontier.co.uk/showthread.php?t=150431&p=2312984&viewfull=1#post2312984

Nearly all of the Powers have this problem.

Look at Hudsons, his screen says combat for preparation, expansion and fortification.
That would make a player who likes combat join him.

His preparation and fortification is exactly the same as everyone, take cargo to some place. I'd call that trading, not combat.
Its the same for the smuggling skull, its used for a few powers, but its just trading non illegal goods.


I joined because it said social expansion
 
Well, that's the dirty little secret / issue of PowerPlay.

Ever since it went live - if you judge them by what they do insted of what they claim they do - you'll find that all so-called Powers are exactly the same, doing the exact same things and use the exact same methods & tools to achieve their goals.
This goes hand in hand with all Faction types having become the exact same, so are the Empire and Federation Military.

It boggles my mind that Frontier would intentionally make all Factions and all Governments and all Powers throughout civilization the exact same, leaving only rather cosmetic differences.

PS.
This is btw. why I stopped supporting the Alliance.

Seeing their Factions issue Terrorist Missions just like any Unfettered Pirate Faction - and seeing the exact same happening both in Federation and Empire space...
It just made no sense anymore.

There's absolutely nothing left I could even remotely identify with or team up to support. All the same.
Bizarre... Absolutely bizarre...

All above is the reason I (and others) complain that V1.3 essentially destroyed every single Government/Faction-type of immersion or attachment that existed - literally overnight.
All for no reasonable or plausible cause, other than to push a 100% artificial and nonsensical PowerPlay onwards that ironically suffers the very same fundamental issue....

Even as a long-standing Supporter, Backer, Tester, Bug-Reporter and Advisor... when I see it I can just stand by in awe and shake my head in disbelief.
Nothing I could do from that point on, as it has reached a level of irrational and illogical breaks to an extent that just boggles my mind.

There is a very slight variety between the powers. Thats the expansion missions. Delaine, ALD, Petreus, Hudson, and it seems Antal from the OP, go to renamed combat zones. The other 5 powers deliver stuff.

I really thought after 5 weeks more would have been added, it seemed like a bare bones system to start with.
 
Frankly, I would be happy if Antal's "Social" expansion was the same as "Finance" expansion for some other Powers. Powerplay conflict zones are anti-fun in their current form.
 
Space is ugly, the future is ugly, people are ugly and I'm ugly. Now go and stare at a rebuy screen and ponder the limits of your virtual mortality because you spent too much time contemplating on virtual morality or did you think those two words were only one letter apart for no reason?
 
the answer provided doesn't make much sense.
the image represents the ethos being militaristic not the players actions
Really? How is a image of a handshake representing them as being "militaristic" there? Are they going by what it states? well, I can interpret that "Saving systems from misguided bureaucrats, who resist the truth of utopia" part as "having the people protest against their current government and demand the current power to step down" which players can aid in both non-aggressive and aggressive methods. It feels as though they didn't really think this out at all. Putting a combat requirement there makes no sense at all, from a lore and game mechanic stand point. Everything in that "expansion" area for Antal scream "you are not the focus, the citizens living their are the focus, you are only to help aid them" not "ok, kill everyone"
 
Well, that's the dirty little secret / issue of PowerPlay.

many words.

Hit the nail on the head, pretty much, right down the line. There was a golden opportunity to add tons of flavor to the universe, to make the different regions of space feel different (flying through cutthroat pirate space where pilots are all gunning to take your cargo, flying through a stretch of space where the slightest infraction of the law would draw fire, entering a region where the credit was served above all, etc.)... but there's nothing. Going from system to system between factions there's no difference between the jobs offered or the goals of the factions. At least with the main factions (Alliance/Fed/Imperial) the colors and logos change.

And now, I can be a Post Commander in the Federation or a Baron in the Empire, and sign up for any faction I want and destroy whichever ships are marked "enemy" without repercussion? Really? Worse, I can work to completely overthrow a system belonging to the major faction and still remain allied with them. Was I the only one looking forward to actually having to choose a side in the coming conflict before PP came out?

I see people throw around the phrase "breaking immersion" a lot, but this is a case of where it really happened for me - and it's not because the factions they created for PP aren't interesting or diverse in concept. The problem is that in execution they are no different and take away what little true political structure the game had to begin with.
 
Last edited:
As another note, Antal's Preparation is also "Social", and that does require you to simply deliver goods. It's strange that a Social ethos means different things in a different context.
 
As another note, Antal's Preparation is also "Social", and that does require you to simply deliver goods. It's strange that a Social ethos means different things in a different context.

3 of the pictures mean the same thing, the handshake, money and skull.
They are all delivering tons of goods from one place to another.

The crosshair sometimes means the same thing as the above 3, but if its in the expansion part it means combat at a renamed combat zone. ALDs is called a crime sweep for example. Some of these still don't spawn so they can't be completed.

Its terribly misleading, since the ethos part is the only real flavor for each power.
 
And what? I find that the "Enforcer" Cannon sounds like very social ;)

START BEING SOCIAL TO PEOPLE CITIZEN - OR I WILL SHOOT YOU IN THE FACE WITH THIS SOCIAL ENFORCER CANNON!

Are you antisocial citizen? Antisocialism is COMMUNISM citizen and a hotbed for mutant recruitment...are you an antisocial mutant communist citizen?
 
Back
Top Bottom