Thanks mate, ive just stumbled across your comment in the thread re Dark wheel missions (again before my time), i am assuming (guessing) that those missions were removed as the player DW faction wasn't the real DW faction?
But then in the Elite world (putting aside real life) all factions are player factions? yes i confuse myself sometimes.

O7
 

Ozric

Volunteer Moderator
But then in the Elite world (putting aside real life) all factions are player factions? yes i confuse myself sometimes.

O7
Really all factions are NPC minor factions. The only "player" related thing is the name that has been given to some. They behave exactly the same way and as Macros said before Player factions, people just supported an NPC minor faction.
 
Thanks mate, ive just stumbled across your comment in the thread re Dark wheel missions (again before my time), i am assuming (guessing) that those missions were removed as the player DW faction wasn't the real DW faction?
But then in the Elite world (putting aside real life) all factions are player factions? yes i confuse myself sometimes.

O7
No one knows for certain the real reason why the original missions were removed and not fixed, but it’s evident they were broken. And no they were not linked to any player faction.

On page one there is a detailed history concerning this.

Irrespective of what they involved, around the time this was all brought to the attention of FD; MB did respond on the forums, that those missions weren’t spawning where they were supposed to, namely close to SD, and FD alluded it was to be looked into.

Ergo, I can only speculate such context confirms they were likely broken from the start, or bugged due to some update but it was never confirmed officially.

Over time the codex was later introduced. Still no official confirmation.

The confirmation identified through this forum was only obtained from cross-examination of the support system, who could not answer complex questions and had to get the DEV team to get involved and provide answers.

Strange how the old support system no longer exists, and we can’t ask such open questions anymore ;).
 
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I wasn't here at the start of Elite Dangerous (i branched into Everquest after 'First Encounters') were Factions introduced from the very start?
Yes, all inhabited systems had at least one faction in them, usually more, with frontier systems generally having fewer. It was player adoption of certain of those factions which led to the original implementation of player-created factions as a way of meeting the unexpected demand for deliberate BGS manipulation.

The original state of Shinrarta Dezhra contained a "Pilots Federation" faction and the "Dark Wheel" faction; due to the slightly odd way that expansions worked in the original BGS, the other factions present there nowadays were "pulled in" by the Pilots Federation expanding into systems they were present in.
In version 2.4 the Pilots Federation was turned into a "virtual" faction which no longer appeared on the influence charts - though it can and does own stations.

For Tau Ceti its original factions are the ones tagged "N" (for native) but not "Player" (best 3rd-party guess at PMFs) on https://inara.cz/elite/starsystem/1441/
There was also a change early on in that in 1.0 faction names didn't have to be unique - so e.g. the Tau Ceti Crimson Boys might just have been called the Crimson Boys back then - and they were made unique for clarity later. (Or they might have been the Tau Ceti CB all along - the only factions I definitely remember this affecting were the various <system> Emperor's Grace factions).

There are around 78,000 factions in the game, almost all of which have been there from the start. Only around 3,000 are player-created PMFs which were added gradually between 2015 and 2023 ... and a few of the other factions were also added later by Frontier as new systems were populated.

as the player DW faction wasn't the real DW faction?
Whether or not the Dark Wheel faction in Shinrarta is "the real Dark Wheel", it's certainly not a player-created faction. It has of course been adopted by various players over the years, with very limited effect until the chaos around the release of the 3.3 BGS rewrite (combined with the earlier 2.4 removal of the Pilots Federation as an influence faction) let it get an Expansion out of Shinrarta, and then a larger group of players adopted it on the (apparently wrong) theory that expanding it to certain locations would do something interesting above and beyond the normal BGS consequences and pushed it into considerably more systems.
 
Yes, all inhabited systems had at least one faction in them, usually more, with frontier systems generally having fewer. It was player adoption of certain of those factions which led to the original implementation of player-created factions as a way of meeting the unexpected demand for deliberate BGS manipulation.

The original state of Shinrarta Dezhra contained a "Pilots Federation" faction and the "Dark Wheel" faction; due to the slightly odd way that expansions worked in the original BGS, the other factions present there nowadays were "pulled in" by the Pilots Federation expanding into systems they were present in.
In version 2.4 the Pilots Federation was turned into a "virtual" faction which no longer appeared on the influence charts - though it can and does own stations.

For Tau Ceti its original factions are the ones tagged "N" (for native) but not "Player" (best 3rd-party guess at PMFs) on https://inara.cz/elite/starsystem/1441/
There was also a change early on in that in 1.0 faction names didn't have to be unique - so e.g. the Tau Ceti Crimson Boys might just have been called the Crimson Boys back then - and they were made unique for clarity later. (Or they might have been the Tau Ceti CB all along - the only factions I definitely remember this affecting were the various <system> Emperor's Grace factions).

There are around 78,000 factions in the game, almost all of which have been there from the start. Only around 3,000 are player-created PMFs which were added gradually between 2015 and 2023 ... and a few of the other factions were also added later by Frontier as new systems were populated.


Whether or not the Dark Wheel faction in Shinrarta is "the real Dark Wheel", it's certainly not a player-created faction. It has of course been adopted by various players over the years, with very limited effect until the chaos around the release of the 3.3 BGS rewrite (combined with the earlier 2.4 removal of the Pilots Federation as an influence faction) let it get an Expansion out of Shinrarta, and then a larger group of players adopted it on the (apparently wrong) theory that expanding it to certain locations would do something interesting above and beyond the normal BGS consequences and pushed it into considerably more systems.
Thanks for this, over the past few months ive gone completely back to the beginning and started again using only information that as a new player with no experience of the ED universe before can obtain.
What i noticed was that in game there is no way of telling that a faction/minor faction is Player driven or Native, so looking at the codex entry for the Dark wheel (last section) i have to assume that the DW faction in SD actually could be the one we are looking for.
Its just scribblings at the moment 😊

O7
 
Interesting point a non-ED-player made to me about the "8th moon" thing: the obvious ED assumption is that it refers to the moon which is 8th nearest to the body it orbits (i.e. designation 'h'). But in astronomical terms, it could equally (possibly even more likely) refer to the 8th biggest by either mass or radius - and of course there are plenty of other orderable properties in-game as well.

(So if you find an interesting candidate, it's probably worth checking all the moons)
 
The original state of Shinrarta Dezhra contained a "Pilots Federation" faction and the "Dark Wheel" faction;

Whether or not the Dark Wheel faction in Shinrarta is "the real Dark Wheel", it's certainly not a player-created faction. It has of course been adopted by various players over the years,
Wait a second , are u guys saying that all of these 'The Dark Wheels' listed here--> https://inara.cz/elite/nearest-stat...&pi7=0&pi23=0&pi6=0&ps3=The+Dark+Wheel&pi24=0 ... are totally fake and possibly just PLAYER made? ( player named , player manipulated, player spread, etc. )

As in, there is absolutely no point nor purpose in wasting time doing missions for those ^ faction in relation to the mysterious Codex entry?

Asking for a friend. ;)
 
Wait a second , are u guys saying that all of these 'The Dark Wheels' listed here--> https://inara.cz/elite/nearest-stat...&pi7=0&pi23=0&pi6=0&ps3=The+Dark+Wheel&pi24=0 ... are totally fake and possibly just PLAYER made? ( player named , player manipulated, player spread, etc. )

As in, there is absolutely no point nor purpose in wasting time doing missions for those ^ faction in relation to the mysterious Codex entry?

Asking for a friend. ;)
My musing was that for a new player and I'm of the Opinion someone that has just joined the game should be able to find Raxxla without any outside research (just my thoughts).
Looking at the system information regarding factions there is no way to tell if its Player made or not, would a new player be expected to know the difference?
Therefore after reading the codex you could assume that the DW faction in SD is possibly the one we are looking for (and yes the codex hints it may not be).
Also from a roleplay perspective as all factions are in effect run by 'people' if you don't break immersion then every faction is technically a player (in game).
To the game world there is no Player and Non player they are all part of the galaxy.

Im just trying now to look at everything from an 'In-game' perspective, not what is outside or 'the real world'

O7
 
My musing was that for a new player and I'm of the Opinion someone that has just joined the game should be able to find Raxxla without any outside research (just my thoughts).
Looking at the system information regarding factions there is no way to tell if its Player made or not, would a new player be expected to know the difference?
Therefore after reading the codex you could assume that the DW faction in SD is possibly the one we are looking for (and yes the codex hints it may not be).
Also from a roleplay perspective as all factions are in effect run by 'people' if you don't break immersion then every faction is technically a player (in game).
To the game world there is no Player and Non player they are all part of the galaxy.

Im just trying now to look at everything from an 'In-game' perspective, not what is outside or 'the real world'

O7
The other option is if they are a fake one then the 'real' one would destroy them.

Conspiracy, we (those in search of) have met more then a few of the "who is the dark wheel" requirements.


What if we are TDW, and we are supposed to destroy SD TDW as fakes. It's something to think about.
 
The last paragraph in the Codex, The Dark Wheel raises doubt about the origins of The Dark Wheel in Shinrarta Dezhra.
As i mentioned in my above post ^ , i'm already well aware of that Codex entry. Probably read/listened to it around 500 times by now since my 5 months of joining EliteD.

The RAXXLA entry i've probably read/listened to around 1000 times. So yeah, congrats FDev you have certainly tricked---err i mean---hooked me in!
That thread is over 160 pages long and i'm sorry but i just can't read all of that right now.

Plus, tbqh , the more forum posts i read the more i'm starting to lose some hope & mystery within this glorious EliteD game.
( Not blaming you btw Marcos , i'm just saying in general it's a very delicate balance between coming to these forums for information & guidance , combined with possibility of ruining/tainting ingame immersion & motivation cuz of spoilers and/or speculations )

I just don't understand why FDev apparently previously allowed players to actually NAME their own personal faction 'The Dark Wheel' ....unless they indeed meant it to become some type of community driven entity.
 
i'm starting to lose some hope & mystery within this glorious EliteD game
Dont! The DW and Raxxla in a game are unique, its addictive, if you would have told me five years ago i would read Paradise Lost having grown up in a mining town i would have asked to see what you were drinking!

O7
 
My musing was that for a new player and I'm of the Opinion someone that has just joined the game should be able to find Raxxla without any outside research (just my thoughts).
...

Im just trying now to look at everything from an 'In-game' perspective, not what is outside or 'the real world'

O7
Yes, this is exactly what I did!

I assume Brookes created the mystery to be resolved mostly in game - like all the other puzzles - no digging into out of game ancient myth or outside sources necessary (but it can add context).

This also keeps it accessible across languages and locations (for example: you don't need to try to find a copy of a medieval english sonnet in your native language, or buy copies of out-of-print books by a semi-obscure british 70s author to try to solve part of an easter egg).
 
Well, i'm not giving up or anything. But...well... i guess i'm just very confused by FDev's decision to supposedly remove prior 'trinkets' and 'Dark Wheel' missions? Like, why? Just don't understand why remove something that's still revered & referred within the Codex? Was it because they had to make space ( pun intended ) for the THARGOIDS ??
The DW and Raxxla in a game are unique, its addictive,
Agreed , however.... For example: Couple days ago , while searching systems, i just happened to have some Tritium in my cargo hold and stumbled upon what i thought was a "secret" system showing The Dark Wheel as the faction ( on lower left corner info screen next to object hologram ) .

I thought: "wow i finally discovered something unique!" -- Then, seconds later, i get interdicted ( cuz of the Tritium ) by a ship that i target and i notice it has red WANTED....and.... The Dark Wheel listed. So i think: "whoa maybe this is what the Codex entry talks about with surviving a suitable test of courage & skill..."

Very fun. Very mysterious. Very cool. Right?

Well, then as i'm about to post the screenshots ( all excited lol ) i find that earlier post from @Ian Doncaster ...and my bubble ( another pun sorry lol ) bursts , since his post i quoted leads me to check the 'Inara' site and i see there's actually a bunch of 'Dark Wheel' faction systems already. ( which means i didn't discover anything unique after all )

So i dunno.... i'm just confused really. But maybe that's what FDev wants? And maybe, as the saying goes, ignorance truly is bliss? ;)
 
Wait a second , are u guys saying that all of these 'The Dark Wheels' listed here--> https://inara.cz/elite/nearest-stat...&pi7=0&pi23=0&pi6=0&ps3=The+Dark+Wheel&pi24=0 ... are totally fake and possibly just PLAYER made? ( player named , player manipulated, player spread, etc. )
So:
- the faction "The Dark Wheel" was placed in the game by Frontier, in the Shinrarta Dezhra system, as one of the 70,000ish factions they added at the start of the game. It's reasonable to think that they exercised slightly more care over its naming and placement than they did over the Tau Ceti Crimson Boys
- any station that faction owns in Shinrarta Dezhra itself was also given to it by Frontier
- there are limitations above and beyond the normal ones on what BGS activity can take place in Shinrarta, but these don't preclude factions within that system expanding; all the instances of "The Dark Wheel" are the same faction originally placed by Frontier so are all either "fake" or "real"
- there is so far no evidence that "The Dark Wheel" faction behaves any differently to any other faction in how it responds to player activity within the systems it's present in; this was always intended to have the galaxy change over time, it's just the level of opinionatedness that players have over which factions should be present in which systems that Frontier didn't anticipate originally.
- the vast majority of "The Dark Wheel" faction presence and station ownership outside Shinrarta has indeed been deliberately done by players in the hope that this would unlock something. (it hasn't)

It's not possible to tell the difference at the moment between the following scenarios:
- the Dark Wheel faction is entirely a red herring when it comes to the mysteries, or at least it serves no more purpose than a bit of background flavour for the Shinrarta system
- the Dark Wheel faction has some significance, but as it was never intended to be present outside Shinrarta, its presence elsewhere is irrelevant to the mysteries
- the "Turning the Wheel" player project was right that something interesting would happen if the faction was present in a particular system outside Shinrarta, but has so far been wrong about which system. (Still, as with everything else, ruling out lines of enquiry is also valuable!)
 
@Neestar - Please do read the first page, there are areas which describe specifically how the ‘old missions’ were originally found to be have been removed.

You post a good question, the answer is an unknown unfortunately, we can only hazard a guess as to why.

We know not from the game but through support and devs: that at one point these missions were ultimately removed. But other elements linked to ‘that story’ left in game!

We know from statements made by MB: that there was a known bug.

We know from released patch notes: a series of new unrelated mission updates were also released around that time.

We know due to all of the above: there was some confusion around mission triggers for elites and founders and backers etc and activation levels were edited to accommodate.

We know from leaks made public by code readers and posted, that various historical game aspects - not necessarily linked to Raxxla etc, but which do now exist in game as active game elements, had existed in ‘name’ and code prior to an earlier point. Additionally never released content, models, video and audio has been found in the code, and since removed.

In conclusion: the game existed in a prior state of development than it does now. But something changed and FD decided - as they used the words themselves in the Dev support tickets, to remove that story.

This happens in game development. Good point of example is Deus Ex: Human Revolution. When that game was in pre-launch development the Devs showed plans for large levels of various content which was later cut from the game. Later a whole story arc was released ’the missing link’ which was evidently cut content … my point is in development story arcs are cut all the time for various practical or commercial business reasons.

Personally I suspect FD have done this with the expectation that the player base would not have noticed. The majority of new players or PVP players probably view Raxxla with derision.

Personally I believe FD wrote the codex as a way to explain away this blip, albeit vaguely. It’s not perfect and personally I would have preferred FD making a statement. But still this could allow for audience derision. Better in the long run to apply a level of deniability.

@Neestar - Your question is valid. And that is the primary reason we asked that question to FD because to any new player who does not understand the lore (which itself is malleable) one interpretation advocates a certain path is true, over the other and is instructing players perform redundant tasks.

I think the codex text is written intelligently because FD know their player base is rather informed, and it covers a lot of bases and is cleverly referencing historical architecture and has repurposed it as a spacial map to better orientate us.

But yes it’s not perfect. But remember that game development is actually more akin to the ship of Theseus it is under constant revision.

However accepting this removal provides us context. And allows us to view it abstractly; in doing so the metaphorical nature of the codex becomes far easier to read because we have removed a significant obstacle in our environment, which shifts the physical puzzle into an orientational map; they have given us the directions, we simply need to learn how to read it.

Personally I believe we are 3/4 the way there. We are missing a couple of locational identifiers, once those are better understood the whole thing will slot into place.
 
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In the 'Quest for Raxxla' one of the thing I found really useful was to try to imagine what was in Brookes and Braben's head when they were discussing/implementing Raxxla before/during the creation of Elite Dangerous.

Try to remember that a lot that we take for granted now either wasn't in anyone's mind (EDSM, INARA, EDMC, Wiki, Reddit, etc.etc.) or was a totally unknown quantity (how the players would respond to/shape the game itself as time goes on, what kinds of communities would form, what things the playerbase would get hooked into, etc.).

These are things that I found helpful to keep in mind (remember, this is back in 2013-15 time period):

1) They were making an entire massive game!
1a) We know for a fact a lot was cut back or removed/revised as development continued, indicating a lot of time crunch pressures.
2) Raxxla is a very small easter egg for the really nerdy Elite fans.
2a) Raxxla was most likely implemented by a very small team or (most likely) Brookes himself with minimal help (to keep it secret).
3) Travel was much harder (no long-range route planning, shorter ranges, harder to make money to get better ships/modules, no neutron boosts, etc.)
4) Many unknowns out there (only the bubble was explored at all, anything could be anywhere).
5) There was a lot of mysteries in game around launch (and even commonly known features now were mysterious then, like Tip Off missions, etc.), not just Raxxla.
6) Tie in novels fleshed out a lot of lore, specifically on topics like general politics, Thargoids, etc. Introduced other mysteries like Soontil and Formidine Rift.
7) Tourist Beacons were a major Lore Delivery system in-game (available to people who could find them (some are in permit locked systems)).
8) Galnet was a major Lore Delivery system in-game (available to all)
9) Thargoids were the "big mystery reveal" of the first part of the game, with lots of mystery/treasure hunt mechanics built into the early game, including lore discoveries and physical discoveries.

Obviously we don't know if Fdev spent any dev time on Raxxla after Brookes initially developed/implemented it. Personally I strongly doubt it given the realities of game development. Therefore, whatever was implemented originally is what's there to find.

As I've said before I really, really doubt Brookes spent major time creating a hugely complex set of mysteries delving into esoteric puzzles and ancient history. The mystery is based on in-game lore and mythology, and solved mostly in-game via lore and in-game mechanics (mostly) that have also been used in other parts of the game.
 
In the 'Quest for Raxxla' one of the thing I found really useful was to try to imagine what was in Brookes and Braben's head when they were discussing/implementing Raxxla before/during the creation of Elite Dangerous.
This is definitely the logic that has me looking around NGC 7822 right now with a bunch of unanswered questions:
- why is there a giant (if non-obvious) arrow pointing right at it?
- why does it need a giant arrow pointing right at it when it's NGC 7822 and the arrow is considerably less obvious than the object itself?
- how could anything be hidden here that wouldn't have been discovered accidentally by now anyway?
 

Well, 4 Cassiopiae was nearby, so I gave it a go - I think this is a pretty good match for the Codex picture in terms of relative scales (I left my Orbis at home so had to substitute a Krait). You can see the gas giant whose 8th moon I'm orbiting would be a bit out of shot on the Codex crop. Playing with colour balances and brightness curves can match the actual picture even more closely.

This is at about 1500Ls from the red giant, and I think it would be possible to get away with being further out - maybe out to 4000Ls or so depending on the exact size of the giant star.
So I've been playing around with the DW codex image and have stumbled on a potential way to narrow the candidate stars (ever so slightly!), perhaps even rule out the 8th 'h' moon search entirely. The trick might be in the 'bokkeh effect' lens artefact texture present in the game's camera.
This effect only seems to appear within a certain close distance from a star depending on its size, magnitude etc. Notice in your sample screenshot above the effect is not visible. An extreme example here is at Epilon Circini - a K type Orange Giant. The drop distance is around 111Ls from the star and it was impossible to get the bokkeh effect to show. Notice also the fine-grain texture of the star's surface which reinforces that the DW image star is small.

20240915225650_1.jpg


These dots are where I started from.
TDW post1.png

Those fuzzy blobs are potentially part of the lens artefact texture, which gives us a frame of reference for how the image was captured.
Here is a sharpened adjusted image for clarity.
TDW post Colour Shift.png


The other aspect to the lens effect is that it can be more or less intense depending on your zoom level.
As an example below, I am at SWOILZ JM-G B3-11 B - an M class Red Dwarf. The camera exposure dips in the 3.0x range as I get to 3.9x zoom, making the lens effect weaker. This could indicate whether the codex image was taken at a high zoom, or at a lower zoom to maintain the 'brighter' silhouette effect.

20240915224403_1.jpg
20240915224417_1.jpg


It took me a while to find the artefact, but I eventually found it and realised the DW codex image doesn't have to be a 1:1 original screenshot.
The codex image is possibly rotated and cropped - likely to help disguise any stars that a Mensa-level genius can triangulate from. As you can see below, background stars are clearly visible through the glare of the star.

Star Alignment_Example.png


Now that I have the anchor point I can easily align the DW image and determine what the original screenshot image may have looked like.
Circle = approx DW star diameter.

TDW Alignment Test.png

With the original red image overlaid.
TDW Alignment_OriginalRed.png

There are 1 or 2 other lens artefacts that come close to this pair of dots, but this pair seemed to fit the closest. Others are more to the side of the screen which can lead to warping of the star's shape - and as the star in the codex image appears fairly circular, it would have to be near the centre of the screen to match correctly.
I attempted to check if blurred background stars could be another option, but it would mean finding the perfect pair of red-shifted stars.

The fact that the lens artefacts are a fixed static texture on our screens means that with some careful data gathering you could possibly narrow down the star size and what systems have moons at such a close orbit. In this case small red dwarfs or young T Tauri stars where the lens effect appears at a distance that allows for a moon to fit somewhere in orbit. If that's even possible.

From a lore perspective, it would make sense that this dark station is jammed up against a star to provide maximum concealment. This would therefore mean the star it is orbiting cannot be the primary navigation star.
 
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Right here's another head scratcher then whilst we are on the Station.
Again just following in game stuff we learn that the Brewer Corporation have been making Coriolis stations since 2752.
It says the second design was the Orbis (possible toroid).
BUT Cora talks about Raxxla in 2296, is this before the DW existed as the codex also talks about the DW faction in SD forming in 3300.

Its the station thing that's killing me because way back in the first game it said that the first ever station (built by Galactic Astronautic and Space Exploration Centre) was around Lave also in 2752.
Were there no space stations before that then? where and when did the DW set up?

What i am trying to establish is the extent that humanity had travelled (and set up a station) when Cora said those infamous words.
This will narrow my new search.

O7
 
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