The Narrative Roundtable stream was actually really good.

[BL1P]

It is definitely an issue with Elite Dangerous in-game storytelling.

Official books which have been approved as canonical say they exist (and the Oresrians too). Nothing in-universe says they exist except in the vaguest terms - you wouldn't necessarily conclude that this article and the beacons in Teorge refer to the same shadowy conspiracy, for example, or that either is the same as the Azimuth/Pharmasapien/Black Flight group being revealed recently [1] - but obviously any shadowy conspiracy worth talking about isn't going to have a public presence.

In more conventional games about conspiracies, well, fine, the purpose of the game story is to uncover the conspiracy so you find out more as you go along, and by the end (after a few days or weeks of play) you hopefully have a satisfying story.

In Elite Dangerous we're still barely out of the prologue as far as that goes, because of the necessarily slow pace of revealing things - and the Club, if they exist, are still so well hidden as to not really be dramatically necessary anyway.

I think this is why stories like Enclave or the NMLA arc - or on the mystery side, UAs or Azimuth - work better: you might not necessarily know all the consequences of your actions in advance, but at least you can make a logical guess at the short- and medium- term ones, and you get to see things change as a result.


[1] I don't think there's any actual reason - speaking solely about lore revealed in-game, not through official fiction - that the Azimuth/Black Flight conspiracy, the Core Dynamics/Vincent/Jupiter one, and the Dynasty/Exodus one couldn't all have been different groups.

I'm not a particular fan of "grand conspiracy" stories and I think they work very badly within ED ("blaze your own trail but they all support the Club in the end") so a broader set of secretive groups each with their own agenda and at best partial knowledge of each other is probably more fun anyway.

All great points as always.
Kinda like "The Company" you see referenced though out all of Elite Dangerous's story's in logs and messages. Though its so vague it could just be the character saying the company or they could be saying "THE COMPANY".
But thats just a theory ! Not lore

 

[Esteban]

I had mixed feelings about the lore stream too. It was fun to anticipate that we'd be talking lore, the views and guests were fun enough to listen to but, in the end, I felt that it was a bit heavy on the powerplay / politics and light on the mysterious lore that I find quite a lot more interesting and compelling to attempt to delve into and learn / discover.

I can say with confidence that this thread has been very interesting to read! Great contributors, obviously!

It is evident to me from reading this thread (and from the cited Galnet article in particular [1] ), how challenging it is to get into the lore of this game if you are a newcomer. The same fine line between digging up mysteries by doing a very large amount of snooping and not enough reward / crumbs to follow that help someone along. That's not necessarily a complaint but, if nothing else, it affirms the breadth of ED's learning-curve being potentially daunting and certainly unrelenting.

1.

The Narrative Roundtable stream was actually really good.

I believe this series of stream (if it has a continuation ofc) can bring much more player attention to Elite's lore, as mentioned above it can be a great way for newer players to just know there is stuff out there to discover and interact with. But i do agree with most of you, there could be a...

forums.frontier.co.uk

 

[Mogen Teras]

While the lore discussion was certainly engaging, I fear it's just going to ultimately be the same spiel; a bunch of cool narrative threads to hear from GalNet or scanned data ports, but has absolutely zero impact on gameplay. It's also annoying that a lot of lore events or threads are usually disseminated through forum posts as opposed to actually being in the game.

I have about 400 hours in Elite and I think I've only encountered ingame lore once. Everything else I only ever knew about via the forum

 

[simulacrae]

Well, the Club could exist and could believe in but be mistaken about the Oresrian/Klaxian distinction without the "hide behind the bubble" theory being true - at least, not in a literal sense ... there are metaphorical ways it could be true, of course.

Here's the article "mentioning" the Club.

Galnet News | Elite Dangerous Community Site

community.elitedangerous.com

(only in a "it's clearly them if you already know they exist" sense, but lore revealed through Galnet must have that limitation for them)

Speaking of deleted story…. Not sure how much it changed things but…Related to the starship1 disappearance and Halseys alibi for the trial there was a deleted galnet post pointing out a meeting with mahon on the day that halsey filed a change of flight plans to azaleach:

Spoiler: Deleted post

President's Visit to 78 Ursae Majoris Disappointing
25th May 3301

After what many residents have called 'years of neglect from Sol', President Halsey made a brief appearance aboard Seddon Gateway yesterday. Thousands gathered to welcome the President as she was ferried over from Spaceflight One. Sadly, upon arrival the President was whisked off to the bridge to meet with local dignitaries, leaving most residents to return home disappointed.

GalNet sources aboard Seddon Gateway report that the President spent much of the day receiving visitors in the Captain's Cabin. Most, but not all, of the President's visitors were members of Federal organisations which still operate in and around 78 Ursae Majoris. Those questioned indicated that during their meeting, the President mostly spoke about ways in which the Federation could help better support small and medium sized business interests in the area.

In the evening, Seddon Gateway played host to a diplomatic dinner between President Halsey and Prime Minister Edmund Mahon. The Prime Minister arrived at Seddon Gateway without fanfare at some point in the early evening. After Mahon's arrival, the two faction leaders are reported to have spent several quiet hours enjoying dinner away from the vast majority of their entourages. What the two leaders discussed during their time together remains a mystery.

Spaceflight One safely departed 78 Ursae Majoris this morning, and will now be travelling to Saga in order to continue the President's tour of Federal frontier systems."

 

[simulacrae]

Oh and this is the other obvious one that disappeared:

Spoiler: Old worlds

17 APR 3301 Weird Science in the Old Worlds (nolonger found on the galnet archives)

Reports coming from GalNet correspondents in the Old Worlds this week have noted a sizable surge in illegal technology being shipped throughout the sector. Details as to the exact nature of the tech are currently sketchy at best. Some witnesses report large shipments of alien weaponry have been passing through the docks in Lave.

Others claim rogue scientists operating in Riedquat have been experimenting with biomechanical enhancements. Still others say that a band of malicious software engineers from Quator have been working on a new type of hostile AI.

Whatever the truth, Commanders traveling to the Old Worlds are advised to be on the lookout for any suspicious activity and to avoid all unknown wings when passing through the area.

also if you notice the “official” galnet website has relatively recently lost all galnet articles prior to june 6 3301 … not sure if this is a curation error or by design…

 

[Ian Doncaster]

https://community.elitedangerous.com/en/galnet still has the older ones - but note the two at the bottom of the list are out of order and the "last" one is June 6 3301. So probably some indexing mistake.

I don't really get why the other two have been removed either... especially not the second one which could refer to literally anything.

 

[Rubbernuke]

https://community.elitedangerous.com/en/galnet still has the older ones - but note the two at the bottom of the list are out of order and the "last" one is June 6 3301. So probably some indexing mistake.

I don't really get why the other two have been removed either... especially not the second one which could refer to literally anything.

There was a lot of background planning to that a lot of people never got to see. I was chatting once to a high rolling KS backer and in the early days FD would canvas opinion on things like the directions of CGs. As time has gone on that initial direction has kind of become muted, and (hopefully going on what CMs have stated) has come back in some way with the ongoing story plot.

 

[Factabulous]

It is evident to me from reading this thread (and from the cited Galnet article in particular [1] ), how challenging it is to get into the lore of this game if you are a newcomer. The same fine line between digging up mysteries by doing a very large amount of snooping and not enough reward / crumbs to follow that help someone along. That's not necessarily a complaint but, if nothing else, it affirms the breadth of ED's learning-curve being potentially daunting and certainly unrelenting.

Finding all the background stuff in-game is indeed daunting, and that's when it's even possible (as some has been altered over time / removed). For instance you can't find all the Thargoid Structures the way we did it originally, as the interlinks between bases were re-used for the subsequent attacks on the bubble. But most stuff is still around.

There is scope for another NPC (or a few) like the engineers, only for Lore. I could see them giving larger/longer missions revisiting strands of the lore - for instance one mission that takes you to the INRA bases, another that visits the Generation Ships. Once you scan the messages for the first target you get a redirect to the second etc. That is a lot of work for missions that most will ignore - the two Ram Tah missions, which are Lore missions (but more complex), don't get done by many.

 

[St0rmFury]

https://community.elitedangerous.com/en/galnet still has the older ones - but note the two at the bottom of the list are out of order and the "last" one is June 6 3301. So probably some indexing mistake.

I don't really get why the other two have been removed either... especially not the second one which could refer to literally anything.

We're playing an alternate version of ED where some stuff never happened. I suspect Thargoid mischief at work here.

 

[zimms]

[...]

It is evident to me from reading this thread (and from the cited Galnet article in particular [1] ), how challenging it is to get into the lore of this game if you are a newcomer. The same fine line between digging up mysteries by doing a very large amount of snooping and not enough reward / crumbs to follow that help someone along. That's not necessarily a complaint but, if nothing else, it affirms the breadth of ED's learning-curve being potentially daunting and certainly unrelenting.

1.

The Narrative Roundtable stream was actually really good.

I believe this series of stream (if it has a continuation ofc) can bring much more player attention to Elite's lore, as mentioned above it can be a great way for newer players to just know there is stuff out there to discover and interact with. But i do agree with most of you, there could be a...

forums.frontier.co.uk

I once assumed the Codex would keep track of lore and new stories and maybe point players in the right direction or show a summary if they don't care about spoilers.

Unfortunately, whatever the idea behind the Codex was, it has not been made reality.

 

[Ian Doncaster]

There was a lot of background planning to that a lot of people never got to see. I was chatting once to a high rolling KS backer and in the early days FD would canvas opinion on things like the directions of CGs. As time has gone on that initial direction has kind of become muted, and (hopefully going on what CMs have stated) has come back in some way with the ongoing story plot.

Yes - there does seem to be more significance to CG outcomes in future plot direction nowadays.

They just need to figure out a way to encourage players to take the more interesting directions sometimes.

There is scope for another NPC (or a few) like the engineers, only for Lore. I could see them giving larger/longer missions revisiting strands of the lore - for instance one mission that takes you to the INRA bases, another that visits the Generation Ships.

Why not use the engineers for it? It'd be more interesting than "haul 50 rares" or "find 20 opinion polls", not any more time-consuming, and could also be extended to make the engineering process itself more interesting than just "get these materials".

Selene Jean <unlock>: for my armour research I need to know more about the long-term properties of metal degeneration in space. Generation Ships provide an ideal way to assess this - scan A, B and C and I'll do some work on your armour in return.

Selene Jean <monthly mission, so existing players don't miss out and later content can be included>: my data on Generation Ship [D/E/F/etc] hasn't been updated for a few weeks. If you go out there and bring me the scans your next experimental effect will be free.

 

[Rubbernuke]

They just need to figure out a way to encourage players to take the more interesting directions sometimes.

Which they will never do. I mean, on the lore stream check out how little regard superpowers, powers or anything non-indy is regarded. To me that signals the CGs and the lore are not communicating or selling that POV as being valid. It also suggests players are not as sophisticated as they think they are.

 

[Ian Doncaster]

I once assumed the Codex would keep track of lore and new stories and maybe point players in the right direction or show a summary if they don't care about spoilers.

And it sort-of does, but only at the broadest possible level. You get very brief summaries of the major powers and individuals ... but they aren't kept up-to-date either with new events or the rise and fall of particular individuals. It records the contents of beacons you scan ... but doesn't provide hints as to where others might be. Galnet mentions various systems from time-to-time, but that doesn't go into the Codex, and older Galnet articles disappear from the in-game feed entirely very quickly.

They're going to need to re-do Tourist beacons at some point when Odyssey is stabilised - a lot of the surface ones are just completely invalid now - so that would be a good time to re-do the Codex to cover this a bit better. It doesn't need very much more, just a "leads" section which populates if you scan an appropriate beacon and clears when you scan the "next" step ... but can also be populated by mission rewards, tip-off data points, reading Galnet articles, tourist beacons, etc. so it fills up with various starting points on its own.

 

[zimms]

[...] It records the contents of beacons you scan [...]

Sometimes...

But yeah, I agree with everything you've said.

 

[Ian Doncaster]

Which they will never do. I mean, on the lore stream check out how little regard superpowers, powers or anything non-indy is regarded. To me that signals the CGs and the lore are not communicating or selling that POV as being valid. It also suggests players are not as sophisticated as they think they are.

It's not as simple as "support independents, oppose the superpowers", though. If it was, the NMLA - destroy the superpowers, kill their corrupt leadership, rise up for independence - would have been really popular.

I think the problem is that people are mostly looking for the "good" side. And as Frontier have set up a dystopia where there really isn't one, intentionally or not [1], there's just evil and evil-with-PR, which is all managed by an even more evil conspiracy anyway.

In terms of sides people pick, the overall pattern seems to be "oppose the perceived aggressor" (in, as you say, a fairly unsophisticated way). So:
- NMLA bomb stations, they were the first to resort to Galnet-reported violence, oppose them
- Federal faction secedes, Hudson sends in a Carrier, oppose Hudson
- Empire attacks Federal system to investigate NMLA, Empire started the shooting today, oppose them.
- Federation attacks Empire system to capture Hadrian, Federation started the shooting today, oppose them.

(Given that, it should be fairly easy for Frontier to manipulate players towards the more interesting outcomes rather than away from them, but so far they mostly haven't)


[1] I'm still trying to decide if Frontline Solutions is deliberately intended as an extremely sharp critique of military recruiters, or if it was just a horrific accident because the design work on it didn't actually think through the lore implications of what they'd created for a second.

 

[Rubbernuke]

It's not as simple as "support independents, oppose the superpowers", though. If it was, the NMLA - destroy the superpowers, kill their corrupt leadership, rise up for independence - would have been really popular.

I think the problem is that people are mostly looking for the "good" side. And as Frontier have set up a dystopia where there really isn't one, intentionally or not [1], there's just evil and evil-with-PR, which is all managed by an even more evil conspiracy anyway.

In terms of sides people pick, the overall pattern seems to be "oppose the perceived aggressor" (in, as you say, a fairly unsophisticated way). So:
- NMLA bomb stations, they were the first to resort to Galnet-reported violence, oppose them
- Federal faction secedes, Hudson sends in a Carrier, oppose Hudson
- Empire attacks Federal system to investigate NMLA, Empire started the shooting today, oppose them.
- Federation attacks Empire system to capture Hadrian, Federation started the shooting today, oppose them.

(Given that, it should be fairly easy for Frontier to manipulate players towards the more interesting outcomes rather than away from them, but so far they mostly haven't)


[1] I'm still trying to decide if Frontline Solutions is deliberately intended as an extremely sharp critique of military recruiters, or if it was just a horrific accident because the design work on it didn't actually think through the lore implications of what they'd created for a second.

In short people lack imagination or a willingness to really think about consequences- even neutral stances broken down are grave robbing, drug dealing or feeding the machine.

 

[simulacrae]

https://community.elitedangerous.com/en/galnet still has the older ones - but note the two at the bottom of the list are out of order and the "last" one is June 6 3301. So probably some indexing mistake.

I don't really get why the other two have been removed either... especially not the second one which could refer to literally anything.

Ya the june 6 got me.. its actually everything before Jan 6th 3301… it should go back to sept 3300 - so missing about 50 articles there.

 

[Esteban]

Which they will never do. I mean, on the lore stream check out how little regard superpowers, powers or anything non-indy is regarded. To me that signals the CGs and the lore are not communicating or selling that POV as being valid. It also suggests players are not as sophisticated as they think they are.

There is also another argument to be made here beyond that a player base isn't real sophisticated or doesn't give much thought to consequences. That is that this is an escape for many, many players. Having to do that kind of thought or being that focused is not how players escape what is asked of them day-in and day-out.

There are plenty of times when I'm focused on supporting a faction, a role, or a cause during a CG but just as many when I'd like to just wander, be aimless, live in the moment and enjoy the view.

That said, I'd also like to see some of the foundations rocked, establishments shaken, and status quo pushed around and strained (at least)

 

[Esteban]

There is scope for another NPC (or a few) like the engineers, only for Lore. I could see them giving larger/longer missions revisiting strands of the lore - for instance one mission that takes you to the INRA bases, another that visits the Generation Ships. Once you scan the messages for the first target you get a redirect to the second etc. That is a lot of work for missions that most will ignore - the two Ram Tah missions, which are Lore missions (but more complex), don't get done by many.

Why not use the engineers for it? It'd be more interesting than "haul 50 rares" or "find 20 opinion polls", not any more time-consuming, and could also be extended to make the engineering process itself more interesting than just "get these materials".

Selene Jean <unlock>: for my armour research I need to know more about the long-term properties of metal degeneration in space. Generation Ships provide an ideal way to assess this - scan A, B and C and I'll do some work on your armour in return.

This would be brilliant. So simple and perhaps obvious. I would find that more engaging and enjoyable than, for example, being required to make 6 trips to get a commodity for an engineer - not because my ship doesn't have the space - but because the station only spawns 1/6 of the required number. That's far less satisfying an "accomplishment" (if it can be called that).

I always intended to do the Ram Tah missions, but got engaged in other things and haven't yet done them. I'm almost embarrassed to admit that because I'm a fan of the mysterious, alien lore parts of Elite and Elite Dangerous.

Here I come, Ram. Really...

 

[Factabulous]

Here I come, Ram. Really...

Probably not the best time - I hear all the obelisks were broken by Odyssey