What was being ingested when the rank system was designed?

[Winterwalker]

Should the assumption really should be bounty hunting would always be the most valuable service?
What if you need a plumber? A gun's no good to you then ..?

If you take kill missions during civil war you can get mission rep + controlling station faction rep, with vouchers you hand in like cartographics? Probably getting at least near par with hauling then but would weapons' support really be more valuable to a faction's wealth, than trade in fruit, veg and metals? I'm not convinced it would be .. haul tons of low temp diamonds, supermodels will want to visit and the fat noney follows them (rep for doing that) and meanwhile hauling fish in the thirty third (at any time) is a stinky job so .. kudos, here's to the revolution Cmdr + rep.

 

[metatheurgist]

and wait a minute, isn't this supposed to be military rank?

No, it's naval auxiliary rank. It's honorary. Like how the Queen makes you a knight for doing deeds for the commonwealth and not for being born noble, training as a squire and beating people up in metal suits.

 

[[Diplomacy] Carnegie]

No, it's naval auxiliary rank. It's honorary. Like how the Queen makes you a knight for doing deeds for the commonwealth and not for being born noble, training as a squire and beating people up in metal suits.

And the last tiny shred of respect I held for Sir Alan Sugar shrivels and dies...

 

[BostromNZ]

It's weird that as a Duke in the Imperial Navy that in order to become a Prince, I must deliver 4t of biowaste to the neighbouring system. Ummmmm ooookay. Of course by that stage you are completely over the whole process and gave up on it making sense hundreds of hours ago.

The military ranks are one of the best examples of the kind of stuff FDev should put time into post 2.4.

 

[Schmack]

Other than the mission/passenger boards you really do jack squat for any other entity besides yourself (in Solo). You never interface with any part of either faction, their ships never even pretend to know you except the scripted trade offers and green dots on your screen. Even as an admiral you never get called admiral, but commander. You're called commander from the moment you launch a sidey to the time you get admiral, never anything else, not even in the mission boards where the factions are supposed to know you. The ironic thing about that is you are actually going through Lt commander and commander ranks as you progress.

It's a video game. Check out the aesthetics and gameplay. Don't get caught up in the triviality of the side games like ranking and engineering and such, they are just doors you open to unlock game goodies. But yeah, I went a long time seeing naval missions and ignoring them, didn't even know I held a rank. I didn't recall joining the navy. Odd that it's the navy, nary a drop of H2O up here.

 

[Schmack]

It's weird that as a Duke in the Imperial Navy that in order to become a Prince, I must deliver 4t of biowaste to the neighbouring system. Ummmmm ooookay. Of course by that stage you are completely over the whole process and gave up on it making sense hundreds of hours ago.

The military ranks are one of the best examples of the kind of stuff FDev should put time into post 2.4.

I relish those missions. I will bypass the 48 pirate slaughters to deliver some cargo any day. In fact, you can move around a bit and get the type of mission you want, never needing to actually do those you detest (like finding 48 pirates that have "mission target" on them and pulling them out of SC)

 

[crushdepth]

The rank system is just bizzarre. I got a rank mission to "steal clothing" from the Feds (which I did not do). As far as I'm concerned the rank missions were better in 1984.

I would like to see it scrapped and re-thought. It's just awful.

 

[BostromNZ]

I relish those missions. I will bypass the 48 pirate slaughters to deliver some cargo any day. In fact, you can move around a bit and get the type of mission you want, never needing to actually do those you detest (like finding 48 pirates that have "mission target" on them and pulling them out of SC)

They're great because they're easy. Doesn't mean it's good.

 

[Droid8Apple]

been playing for years (since 1.1, which doesn't sound long because we're only at 2.3, but it was a long time ago)... i have about 3,000 hours in... I still can't get a Cutter/Corvette. That "3-4% BAM" you're getting will quickly turn into 'Donate for the cause 1,000,000' = .00000485754893% BAM!

Had I done what intelligent people did before 1.3 or whenever the ranks thing changed (at that point nobody knew we'd need it for top tier ships, only that it was cool to max everything out and there wasn't anything else to do) it used to be literally 1/8th the time and 1/20th the effort to rank. But with all the other changes they've made for the grind, this is still the one that's untouched. I would rather pay real life money to unlock the ships (not the rank itself, not give me the ships for money, just unlock so I can buy them) which would actually give me more play time opposed to looking at my right screen and seeing LT.Commander by my federal rank and thinking I'd rather die than increase it.

 

[FoxTwo]

As I've stated in the past, I don't "grind" ranks. I just do whatever the heck I want and if the rank % goes up, great. I only take a look at the rank when it's over 95%, then maybe I'll run some REP+++ missions to kick it over.

But the OP's original point was that the risk/rewards for gaining ranks is not logical. Some are practically risk-free and they gain the same amount of awe and respect as something else that's dangerous and difficult.

I view these differences simply as jobs given by different departments. Some corrupt officials may have started a "charity ball" to get donations, and if you donated an amount which some of it goes into their pockets, they'll remember you more easily Kinda like in real life. Buying your way into their good graces works IRL too. This is one of those risk-free kinds of missions.

Then maybe the combat bonds part is given by another dept, where if you handed in more and more vouchers they'll start to remember your name, and whenever they see you coming they'll now you've done a good job. That gains favour with them if they needed someone for more... special... kinds of missions (like assassination ones).

Just my way of looking at things.

 

[Aesthetech]

I made a big post and the forum ate it. Ah well.

I'm mostly in the same boat as the people who think it needs more polish. I'm looking forward to what the patches hold.

The risk:time:reward balance is all thrown out of whack right now. Or rather, it simply doesn't exist. 5 minute "jump 8 ly and land on a station" missions reward exactly the same as "kill 30 dudes in a violent combat zone." Donating 25k spacebucks yields the same as delivering or donating several hundred thousands of bills worth of product (or bills). And so on.

A nitpick in the grand scheme of things, but still something to sort out. I don't mind a masochistic grind and complexity; among other things, I play hardcore PoE and heavily modded X3. But I do prefer a well designed and fun one. I get that a lot of the features of the game right now are in the "we needed to get this into the game in some way and we will come back and polish it later" state. That's fine, as a newer player I'm just throwing in my 2 cents of the biggest problem I've seen so far, even though I jumped straight into the game with new tutorial and extremely little prior knowledge of the game or its mechanics. It's kinda sad to see some neat ship designs locked behind an overly tedious system.

It's weird that as a Duke in the Imperial Navy that in order to become a Prince, I must deliver 4t of biowaste to the neighbouring system.

 

[Aesthetech]

As I've stated in the past, I don't "grind" ranks. I just do whatever the heck I want and if the rank % goes up, great. I only take a look at the rank when it's over 95%, then maybe I'll run some REP+++ missions to kick it over.

But the OP's original point was that the risk/rewards for gaining ranks is not logical. Some are practically risk-free and they gain the same amount of awe and respect as something else that's dangerous and difficult.

I view these differences simply as jobs given by different departments. Some corrupt officials may have started a "charity ball" to get donations, and if you donated an amount which some of it goes into their pockets, they'll remember you more easily Kinda like in real life. Buying your way into their good graces works IRL too. This is one of those risk-free kinds of missions.

Then maybe the combat bonds part is given by another dept, where if you handed in more and more vouchers they'll start to remember your name, and whenever they see you coming they'll now you've done a good job. That gains favour with them if they needed someone for more... special... kinds of missions (like assassination ones).

Just my way of looking at things.

I view it as "they made some new shinies, but didn't want end game players with wads of cash instantly buying them and wanted something to incentivize bored vets to stay in the game, so instead they quickly turned into an end game grind by quickly slapping a non-linear rank progression on the existing mission system without regards to the type of mission so they could make a release date."

But ooh, now I'm letting my cynical edge show. Back to the game!

 

[CMDR Ellegon]

Back in the day, gaining military rank was a lot easier. Especially the Sothis/Ceos smuggling missions added substantially to your rank.

If you go back even further, ranking missions were specific to the new rank. So if an assassination was required to gain rank X (after reaching 100% on that rank) that was the only option available to you. I remember I had to go after an Anaconda, when I was still flying a Cobra MK III. While the Conda was not high ranking, it cost me three rebuys to finally manage that mission and limb back into the station with only a few percent of hull left (and a big grin on my face). Since people on the forum found that system to tough, it was changed to "whatever mission". So if you don't want the assassination job, just wait for the next "Haul 10 tons of poo to wherever" mission instead.

For post-2.4, I would also hope for a revision of the ranking system. Wouldn't it be fun to see the forums, if they decided to reset military ranks as part of the deal?

 

[Susanna]

And where do I get some?

I've been playing Elite for a couple weeks now, and on the whole I really love it. My life has needed a game like this for a long time. I've been trying to play and piece things together as much as possible on my own (no tutorial for me, throw me out into the wild black yonder!). However, the rank system has been my biggest hiccup and my motivation for joining the forum.

First, after seeing my rank for Federation was at 100% and not going anywhere, I had to Google for that. Okay, I have to find a Federal Navy mission. Straightforward. I'd actually passed up a couple--it'd have been nice in the mission description if it said completing the mission would result in a rank up, but ok, whatever.

So then comes the problem of actually gaining rank % again. This is probably one of the most counter-intuitive things I've ever encountered.

First thought: Hey, I'm gaining military ranks in a Navy. So I should probably go park in a CZ, right? Popped a few things, no rank increase. Turn in bonds? No rank increase. Okay... maybe I need one of the massacre missions for these to count. Grab massacre mission, still no rank up from kills or bonds. Turn in the mission... 3%. Well, that's a little disappointing for 10 kills in CZ when my rank is "Recruit."

Okay, let's try an assassination. Run through the usual hoops, blow up a deserter, turn it in... another whopping 3%. Yikes, this is gonna take a while.

At this point I'm feeling experimental, so I grab a handful of different missions just to see what happens. Donate 25k credits to the cause... okay, peanuts. 3% rank. Wait, what? 10 CZ kills = 25k spacebucks? Holy cow, here's a donate for 125k, let's try that....and 4%. So much for scaling.

So then I grab a bunch of the crappy little 'deliver 4 cargo this' and super low tier 'deliver data' rewards -- lo and behold, 3-4% each. Except my ship isn't at risk, it's a hell of a lot faster, I can do a ridiculous amount at one time--and wait a minute, isn't this supposed to be military rank?


TL;DR edition:

Killing things in a combat zone for a faction does not increase military rank with that faction.
Turning in combat bonds for a faction does not increase military rank with that faction.
Performing combat missions results in a minimal rank increase with that faction.
Playing space UPS/mailman increases military rank the same per mission as combat missions (and yet is both far more time efficient and safer).
Alternatively, I can just buy/bribe my ways up the ranks and focus on more money/time efficient missions to easily offset the costs. (When did I join the Lyran Alliance?)

http://s2.quickmeme.com/img/dd/ddeeeaf8cdf5cd837bf014bcf5d23a675ce7a7690a20c1dda57b6d5f8ec870ae.jpg

Yeap. None of it makes a whole load of sense at the moment. You summed it up nicely. Repped.

 

[silvrav]

Hmmm - the missions actually do state that they give rank progression, and what that rank is, and they have navy in the title. Sounds like you need to read things in the game a little closer. If you think that's obscure... your going to LOVE the rest of the game

This...ED you spend about 30% of your time adminning (ie reading, doing research, plotting routes etc.) its not just all about flying and shooting

 

[DukeIronHand]

My main gripe with it, is that by the time you get the ranks required for certain ships, you're already at the point where you no longer need them. It doesn't really make a whole lot of sense, and combined with the utter uselessness of the non ship bearing ranks, makes me wonder if it was a last minute addition just for the sake of it.

Spot on. And the permits. Is there anything special in these permit systems? Doesn't seem to be.

But back to the ships.
For my current playstyle the Fed ships are worthless - have yet to try the Corvette but don't see it as a improvement over my A-rated Anaconda. Tried grinding Fed rank once and stopped. Got a bit just through gameplay (BGS missions).
Imperial ships: Grinded intentionally for rank here too...a lot. Bought a Clipper - after years of wanting one - but (again with my playstyle) besides "go fast" there is nothing it is good at compared to the non-rank locked ships. The Cutter maybe cool but I have a long way to go. Let you know latter in the year if I decide to get back to grinding.

Bottom line: After years of playing this game playing it for, or to get, superpower rank really does me little good - almost worthless in fact. Am currently at a famous rank grinding spot with my 2nd Cmdr save. For the rank? Nope, don't care. Doing it the money.

EDIT: To be clear, especially if some Dev drops in and gets an idea in his head, I am very thankful that the almost impossible (for the casual player) top rank-locked ships are quite optional in the game and while nice to have (maybe) I really don't feel "put out" by not having them. The non-rank ships do me just fine thank you very much.

 

[Iain M Norman]

"What was being ingested when the rank system was designed?"

Pizza most likely

 

[Rørik Þrumsålr]

its the federated commonwealth actually.

Regardless, we can all agree that ED could use some Lyran scout lances.

 

[KING5TON]

HAHA! OP wait till you get to the higher tiers.
0.5% for a completed mission.
You need to complete 200 missions just to go up one rank!
It's flipping ridiculous. Just don't do it.

Tell FD to stick their rank grind up their jumpers till they can develop something worthwhile.

 

[Demascus]

Mind you, you are not actually part of the military. You are a member of the military's auxiliary, a fancy word for a military contractor/deputy. This why you have no military issued ship, equipment, no influence and your own military will blow you out of the sky for a parking violation.

It allows FD give the illusion that your important and progressing without actually having to commit to designing that. Your doing the exact same missions as you would be doing before but now with a progress bar! Staple on a sloooow progression system. Spinkle in a little RNG chaos and you have yourself a time sink for players while you slowly churn out buggy half baked content.