Someone help me out: What is this about?
So There it is...
- Thread starter Maeyat
- Start date
Currently, subject to changes the BGS has frequent conflicts that are longer and more drawn out than before. For some this makes keeping their in game faction buoyant more tricky.
Game player doesn't understand what is happening and is frustrated.
Game player posts angry and insulting "feedback/advice/demands" expecting FD to kowtow and fix their issues.
FD does not kowtow and Game player posts more frustrated and insulting posts.
Did I miss anything?
You too.
I thought I was stupid or something. Now I'm not so afraid to ask.
What is this about?
*creates toxic and dramatic thread*
*complains about toxic and funny replies*
Maybe there is nothing wrong with the forums. Maybe it's you.
I thought this was part of the design by FDev, we as players should not have much influence on the overall state. After all, we are just "nobodies" that has a one or more ships, going about our business.
Players are not leaders or powers.
When we band together into groups, this changes. but if we are a small group of 5-10 people, we are still a very small number, when we start looking at the billions of people living here...
So we need to form larger groups, and with size, comes greater power, and in most cases, a big group of mediocre players will in the end by just using brute force in numbers, overrun a smaller but much more competent group.
So I do not see this as a problem. We have the same problem with our faction, we are stuck in the middle of several larger players groups factions, so 4 people against player groups of 300+ people. We know that we will never be able to compete with that. So make a decision, what systems that we hold are the MOST important, we focus on these.
And if the other player still decides that it is good to try and take over our home system, then we know that we can make this a very TIME consuming endeavour, but expecting us to keep 10+ systems, with many other much bigger player groups around is just unrealistic fantasy.
You know how the BGS used to work. do you really think that a small group if ~10 could keep up with a player group of 100 players?
Lets say you make 20 transactions/hour, that other group can in the same time do 200 transactions/hour. It does not matter if it never turns into a war or election, they can grind down your influence and push their own up, and eventually, they will be able to push for that war/election, and since they have more active players, they can push more transactions and you will eventually loose. And by their sheer number advantage, they could keep doing this to ALL of your systems... So it does not matter what system you ended up in a war, as they could keep pushing you into wars that you would loose, again and again and again, and you would be in a constant fight for staying in all of your current systems. as they other could keep hammering you down, one system at a time. So they would basically grind you down and there would be nothing you could on your own to stop this.
Hehe, this.
If a small player group is overwhelmed by dozens of conflicts, they have expanded into dozens too many systems.
Indeed. The very idea a dozen people can control multiple, or even dozens, of star systems where hundreds of millions, or even many billions, of people live is absurd. It was only possible because the BGS was so simplistic it could be gamed by small numbers of players. That is now fixed, and small groups of players should accept that and set more attainable goals.
Last edited:
The BGS is still simplistic and a small group of players can still push a faction to control quite a few systems.
What I currently see is the result of a lot of bugs in the BGS and some promising hints at future additions to the BGS (see happiness). It could result in a shift in how the BGS can be played. A shift away from pure expansion and in the direction of sustainability without growth.
The current situation, with it's bugs and some uncertainty how things are supposed to work, makes it complicated and tedious in some cases and easy in others.
I think controlling factions got easier for a player (group) that is not opposed by other players. War got very easy to win and 3.3 reduced the time required to win.
Getting INF looks problematic as some bugs can affect it in rather surprising ways from what I've read (and seen).
Hopefully the next few patches fix those problems and maybe the next major update adds more to the BGS for players to achieve than just growth.
I would say that the aim of the BGS changes was in part to make it very difficult for a faction to control a very large number of systems without also having a very large number of players ... and yes, if that was you, there will be some trouble ahead.
On the other hand, presence in extra systems is now basically "free" - factions wishing not to expand beyond what they can reasonably control no longer have to carefully maintain an influence balance in every system. If they do accidentally expand, the new system can simply be ignored as it won't affect any existing ones. I've certainly noticed a few local factions - which had maintained very careful influence control in 3.2 to prevent unwanted expansion - now happily boosting their influence in the systems they care about to give them more of a cushion, and not worrying about the extra systems this gives them.
Larger factions can also use "locking" with conflicts in some systems to make it nearly impossible for anyone to challenge them, at least most days, because there's not enough "free" influence. The system can be allowed to safely coast 9 days out of 10.
That said, between the implementation bugs and people not being sure how to best optimise their actions any more, I think it'll be six months before we really find out what the consequences were. My guess would be that it'll be:
- easier for small player groups to get started
- easier for groups to consolidate their existing systems
- easier for groups with consolidated control to maintain it
- harder for groups of any size to control very large areas (but especially small groups)
- harder for groups under active attack (or in very high traffic areas) to just "bypass" the challenge rather than face it.
I've seen fewer "important" conflicts (i.e. for control of an asset) in 3.3 than in 3.2 in the region I monitor. (There are quite a few more non-asset conflicts where it makes absolutely no different who wins, of course, but those are easily ignored ... yes, they're unnecessary, but you don't need to win them.)
Buying and selling 1t biowaste ... isn't a mission, and I'd be surprised if it was any more effective in 3.3 than in 3.2. Do you have good data on how effective it actually is?
Famine is probably impossible because someone - contrary to your point 4 - took out too many of the negative consequences for BGS actions and it's now virtually impossible to decrease the Economy slider. So ... do you want more negative effects to be possible, or fewer?
Expansion doesn't appear to have got more difficult in general - it's the same 75% rule as before, except that now it's not blockable by conflicts on the same faction. While some system setups may be harder to get that 75% in, the average rate of Expansions has increased *significantly* since 3.2 in the region I monitor as a whole, and that's even with the "frozen states" bug which stopped a lot of pending expansions going active in late December.
On the other hand, presence in extra systems is now basically "free" - factions wishing not to expand beyond what they can reasonably control no longer have to carefully maintain an influence balance in every system. If they do accidentally expand, the new system can simply be ignored as it won't affect any existing ones. I've certainly noticed a few local factions - which had maintained very careful influence control in 3.2 to prevent unwanted expansion - now happily boosting their influence in the systems they care about to give them more of a cushion, and not worrying about the extra systems this gives them.
Larger factions can also use "locking" with conflicts in some systems to make it nearly impossible for anyone to challenge them, at least most days, because there's not enough "free" influence. The system can be allowed to safely coast 9 days out of 10.
That said, between the implementation bugs and people not being sure how to best optimise their actions any more, I think it'll be six months before we really find out what the consequences were. My guess would be that it'll be:
- easier for small player groups to get started
- easier for groups to consolidate their existing systems
- easier for groups with consolidated control to maintain it
- harder for groups of any size to control very large areas (but especially small groups)
- harder for groups under active attack (or in very high traffic areas) to just "bypass" the challenge rather than face it.
A counter to this is that you no longer need to care about conflicts in systems you don't control or want to control - you'll no longer get stuck with all your systems bleeding influence just because one minor system is in a war somewhere.
I'm not sure what you mean here.
I've seen fewer "important" conflicts (i.e. for control of an asset) in 3.3 than in 3.2 in the region I monitor. (There are quite a few more non-asset conflicts where it makes absolutely no different who wins, of course, but those are easily ignored ... yes, they're unnecessary, but you don't need to win them.)
Most missions are not giving negative influence at the moment - including plenty which should (and see point 5). If you take an assassination mission, your faction gains influence (as it should) ... but so does the target faction (what?)
Buying and selling 1t biowaste ... isn't a mission, and I'd be surprised if it was any more effective in 3.3 than in 3.2. Do you have good data on how effective it actually is?
Outbreak is around, it's just rarer than before. It took a while to get started after 3.3 - maybe it was turned down slightly too low - but there's a few about now.
Famine is probably impossible because someone - contrary to your point 4 - took out too many of the negative consequences for BGS actions and it's now virtually impossible to decrease the Economy slider. So ... do you want more negative effects to be possible, or fewer?
While I agree with you that Retreat is easier than before, I've seen a lot more BGS players complaining that Retreat is "too difficult" nowadays. It's probably very dependent on the details of the system, passing traffic, etc. as to which you see.
Expansion doesn't appear to have got more difficult in general - it's the same 75% rule as before, except that now it's not blockable by conflicts on the same faction. While some system setups may be harder to get that 75% in, the average rate of Expansions has increased *significantly* since 3.2 in the region I monitor as a whole, and that's even with the "frozen states" bug which stopped a lot of pending expansions going active in late December.
Guest193293
G
As it should be.
Single player groups?
It seems that our poor Faen is a member of CONTRAIL, a Federal-supporting faction based in the Anlave system. They control 9 systems, all of which are in healthy states - looks like they're doing really well!
How lovely for them!
There are probably several organisational groups of single players agreeing on leaving each other alone not expanding into the wrong system - At least that would be my pedantic answer
.
(1) One of the things they wanted to change was to avoid players winning conflicts before they even started through pending periods. Now you actually have to fight wars. That's not so bad. Unless you have opposition or are in high traffic areas, this is not that crazy, but of course, you do have to do something each day. Perhaps longer term FD can think of ending conflicts early when they have already been dominated 4-5 days, rather than make it run the full 7 days. We haven't really got enough experience as our conflicts were stuck for 3 weeks+
(2) I don't think that's the case at all. BGS is very broken, though, so people having put effort into mechanics that don't work? Yes, very frustrating
(3) This happens? Bugs? Other factions rising? This needs detail
(4) So victims of pirate or assassination missions shouldn't drop influence? That seems wrong
(5) new BGS with states reset. Then a 3 week lock on many factions in various systems. Negative influence mechanics broken. Various BGS activities not counting. Bugs, bugs, bugs
(6) Expansion hasn't changed from before. How is it harder?