Horizons Tracking the Tick

[Blackcompany]

This thread saddens me.

Has the BGS come to this, then? Changes dont happen in real time; your endeavors are tracked and the progress stored and stacked, and then, at some point in the day, its all compiled and when it "ticks" over, the changes are applied?

I ask because more and more I am convinced there is no background sim. I dont think it exists. I think Frontier want us to believe it exists, when in reality its never worked at all. I think the numeric changes are tracked, and then at a set point in the day, a Frontier employee presses some buttons and they are all applied at once. This would explain the slight inconsistencies in the exact time of the "tick" daily.

Why else would changes not be dynamically applied in real time? I mean, its supposed to be a simulation, right? Based on that fact, when your actions drive numbers to a tipping point that tipping shouldnt have to wait on the 00:00 Universal (or whenever) "tick." They should just happen.

But they dont. I wonder why that is.

 

[DaveC]

Because if it happened in real-time, someone in the UK could cause a war to break out while Australians are sleeping. Those poor Aussies would come back to the game unable to do anything about it. By having a 24 hour period, everyone can contribute during the time that best suits them, and the results are then aggregated to see who wins. It ain't perfect, but there are pros and cons to either method of doing this. FD chose a form of turn-based game play for this aspect (and Powerplay).

The problem of course, is that the tick doesn't happen when it's meant to.

 

[CMDR pollycough]

Yembo 18/02/16 between 11.50 - 12.00. Influence move no state change (not expected)

 

[Rob At Work]

This thread saddens me.

Has the BGS come to this, then? Changes dont happen in real time; your endeavors are tracked and the progress stored and stacked, and then, at some point in the day, its all compiled and when it "ticks" over, the changes are applied?



Or (possibly) the Action you perform (completing a mission, trading, etc...) is applied at that time (Cache permitting) and hidden from view (similar to the way Ranking up used to be). Then at a regular interval(s) the states are updated based on influence % at that moment.

You can check this for yourself, when another Minor Faction expands into a system (state update) the influence in that system is updated, even when there has been no apparent influence update in any other system.

This leads me to believe that the "influence update" is purely cosmetic, is only to communicate changing trends and therefore can be applied at irregular intervals.

 

[Schlack]

Rob,

I'm not sure that theory is correct.

MB has stated that when influence ticks all actions are collated and assessed against a range of factors and then a new influence value created.

Expansion influence changes (where nothing else changes) appear to be related to the different cycles for system states and influence levels. When the system states update the expansion occurs the BGS has to put a new influence value in for the expanded (and displaced?) faction(s). The influence tick then occurs at a later time (usually some hours) where the rest of the galaxy updates. It is not clear if that update also changes the influence in the system that a faction expanded into or was displaced to.

 

[Rob At Work]

Do you have a source of MB quoting that?

Also MB/FDev have a reputation for the completeness and accuracy of their statements, do they not?

 

[Schlack]

"There is a cap on the amount a Faction can change in influence per day, which is determined by: the size of population (the bigger the harder), the faction state, the amount of player activity that day, and any Power influence on that system. Influence is calculated on an approximately daily tick."

https://forums.frontier.co.uk/showthread.php?t=221826

not exactly as I stated but there have been previous statements both from MB and other FDEVs in the past to that effect. They key word above is "calculated". This would tie in with our observations since launch - we have developed a very sophisticated influence tracker to monitor the systems we are active in and the tick is approximately daily.

 

[Rob At Work]

We are going to have to agree to disagree.

I too have been tracking influence & states in a number of systems. My tracker is simple and not very sophisticated at all and it just doesn't make logical sense, unless you apply the things I have referred to before.

Given your explanation/interpretation of how it works and in particular "special case for expansions", would Wars/Civil War/Election (States Update) be a special case as well then? As they require influence % to trigger them into a pending state also?

We are all in limbo land when it comes to the inner workings of the BGS / Influence & States update and our actions and their impact/effect, that is why most of us are in support of this OP.

 

[Schlack]

Given your explanation/interpretation of how it works and in particular special case for expansion, would Wars/Civil War/Election be a special case as well then as they require influence % to trigger them into a pending state also?

As you say, we can only theorize!

I didn't say it was logical or consistent, just reporting what we have observed in relation to expansion and the apparent anomaly. Expansion appears to be an exception. We have regularly seen states change and stations/system change ownership on the system state change, with the influence effect only applied upon influence tick.

From a systems & backend calculation point of view for so many thousands of star systems, it would be easier for FD to run a periodic calculation aggregating all actions within that system and then applying them to the system. We believe that this calculation is run on a rolling basis across the galaxy - this would account for the fact that influence changes at different times in different places (1-2 hours perhaps). If it were merely a display change, this could probably be done almost instantaneously!

If influence was applied at the time of the action (but only displayed at tick time) I think we would not be seeing the apparent missing influence effects of actions when the tick goes missing.

Multiple bugs/bumps/unknown mechanics may also be at work (or not working!)

 

[Zac Antonaci]

Hey guys,

Just a heads up to let you know that everything should now be unstuck and flowing as expected.

The BGS doesn't have a set time that it ticks but anything over 24 hours does mean it needs investigating.

Just to let everyone know, there shouldn't ever be a case that the data is lost. Instead it should be that if a day is missed then the next day will account for both days once the issue is fixed.

Thanks for your patience.

Zac

 

[Szyslak22]

Thank you for your attention to the matter Zac! The worst part about having background sim problems is feeling like player feedback falls on deaf ears, but it has been quite the opposite lately. The responsiveness and sharing of information is very much appreciated.

From Michael's informative post, QA's better responses, the community team's involvement and feedback, it feels like FD are putting in the effort to stabilize the BGS and keep the player groups involved. It's been encouraging, so a genuine thank you sir.

 

[Kalisti]

Hey guys,

Just a heads up to let you know that everything should now be unstuck and flowing as expected.

The BGS doesn't have a set time that it ticks but anything over 24 hours does mean it needs investigating.

Just to let everyone know, there shouldn't ever be a case that the data is lost. Instead it should be that if a day is missed then the next day will account for both days once the issue is fixed.

Thanks for your patience.

Zac

Please see our bug report comments. A there does seem to be something wrong with the data over this latest tick, even consider what you say about it being delayed.

 

[Jmanis]

Hey guys,

Just a heads up to let you know that everything should now be unstuck and flowing as expected.

The BGS doesn't have a set time that it ticks but anything over 24 hours does mean it needs investigating.

Just to let everyone know, there shouldn't ever be a case that the data is lost. Instead it should be that if a day is missed then the next day will account for both days once the issue is fixed.

Thanks for your patience.

Zac

Hi Zac,

Understand there shouldn't be a case where data is lost, however posts here and this thread from last week and this one indicate from multiple commanders that it is happening. These bugs seemed to get acknowledged, but not dealt with (or at least, not visibly, or in a way that could be observed by players through the BGS). In every case, the tick was well and truly over 24 hours late (almost 48 generally) and didn't reflect the expected changes of multiple commanders across multiple systems. Although a remote possibility, I find it very hard to believe that all these commanders had their actions negated by the actions of other players, across multiple systems, in a way that would seemingly negate the "missing" tick's effect.

I think there really is something going wrong here.

 

[lefty1117]

Can you elaborate on why it doesn't have a set time that it ticks? What would instigate the tick, then?

 

[jimbeau1571]

Hey guys,

Just a heads up to let you know that everything should now be unstuck and flowing as expected.

The BGS doesn't have a set time that it ticks but anything over 24 hours does mean it needs investigating.

Just to let everyone know, there shouldn't ever be a case that the data is lost. Instead it should be that if a day is missed then the next day will account for both days once the issue is fixed.

Thanks for your patience.

Zac

You might want to check the Ewenet system then. Stuck in Pending Expansion despite the Boom period now being in recovery and no other state being applicable. Please.

 

[Kiera'Swan]

I somehow have the impression that some CMDRs expect the BGS to be predictable. That some action will always have the same outcome.

On a "small" world like "Earth" a single combatant, bataillon or even commander in chief has not the power to determine the results of a battle, trade war or covert action.

So why would anybody expect predictability on a galaxy wide scale? I really hope that this will never happen.

I'm even amazed how predictable the BGS reacts on my actions at the moment. I am located on a system at the edge of the "bubble". Traffic news seldom show any ships other as my own ones.

During the last 21 days I went through several trade busts, fought 3 civil wars in 2 systems, my adopted faction became leading power in both, has nearly all stations/settlements under control, and is currently in a expansion state towards a third system.

Every day I'm astonished when the new state / influence data come in. Who am I to cause such changes? All my ratings are low to medium. My ships only use small pads. I don't make millions in credits on trade runs or combat.

If i had such predictability in my stock investments, I would have plenty more time to play games like ED:Horizons

That said, I ask for some more waywardness, the unexpected, life like suprises.

 

[CaptainKirby]

Just a heads up to let you know that everything should now be unstuck and flowing as expected.

Thanks a lot for your statement to the latest issues we had to experience, Zac. The quote above indicates that there actually has been some bugs or problems which has been fixed and solved now. I think it'd help us and eventually your support team if we knew some details about what went wrong. We would at least know if our recently reported bugs were actually bugs and wether they've been fixed.


I think communication is most important to "make the BGS great again".


Cheers!

 

[irongut]

Hey guys,

Just a heads up to let you know that everything should now be unstuck and flowing as expected.

The BGS doesn't have a set time that it ticks but anything over 24 hours does mean it needs investigating.

Just to let everyone know, there shouldn't ever be a case that the data is lost. Instead it should be that if a day is missed then the next day will account for both days once the issue is fixed.

Thanks for your patience.

Zac

Thanks Zac. I feel much better about the situation knowing there was a problem and that you're working on it. The fact that the war I've been provoking for the last week is now pending helps too.

 

[Kalisti]

I somehow have the impression that some CMDRs expect the BGS to be predictable. That some action will always have the same outcome.

This is a disguised argument for realism vs good gameplay. An argument that I am somewhat halfway between one side and the other.

I think it's really all about expectations, if we know that random things are meant to happen in the game then it would be less frustration. When odd things happen some in game explanation would help. E.g accident at factions processing plant causes major production disruption and loss of influence blar blar blar.

Part of the issue is the number of bugs with missions and the bgs. So you never know the real state of the game. At the moment I believe I should never do hostage missions cos they don't work, that if I get a pilot rescue mission I probably only have 1/3 of the time it actually tells me I have. And if I deliver goods to a black market it will either increase and decrease a factions influence but no-one really knows. But in would need to spend more hours on this forum a day to find out if and when any of that is fixed.

As one of our minor faction commanders put it recently, "it simply isn't fun"

Being from and IT background, I want to express it as a user requirement...
A Team of commands working together in a minor faction, should be able to work together to effect influence in any system in a manner that is predictable to a reasonable level, if and when unexpected influence or state changes occur then an in game reason is communicated within the system.

I hope that this is similar to what frontier are working towards; because when we players see the rules of the universe suddenly change it does ruin the immersion and the fun, which is why we are here ....

 

[DaveC]

This project continues by the way, even after Zac's post above.
Having an indication of when the tick is next expected is important, and keeping a record of it for future bug reports is also useful. So keep on reporting when you see it happen and I'll keep the OP updated.

Thanks for your help so far.