Whats going on with BGS (Complete Lack of Famine State Systems)

[Wildcard]

I have been looking into the states around the bubble and have found that there are No Systems in Famine at all. For that matter most of the systems are either in Boom or have No State at all.

Atleast for the majority of the other States any given system can be in there are atleast some systems even if it is a small hand full to choose from, But when it comes to Famine there isn't a Single Solitary System.

This leads me to believe that something is going on with the BGS as it should be impossible for the Entire Bubble with literally thousands of systems not to have so much as one.

Without being able to find a Famine System and spending hours in just any system constantly waiting for ships to jump out to scan wakes. I was able to get One DMW in a hour. Is this a Bug? Is this Intentional? How can out all the systems in the bubble can there not be a single system in Famine?

Source: https://youtu.be/bEYToy4-5zc

 

[Ian Doncaster]

Is this a Bug? Is this Intentional? How can out all the systems in the bubble can there not be a single system in Famine?

It's both a bug and intentional, depending on which bit of the cause you're talking about.

Intentional: BGS states are modified through player activity, and the vast majority of players don't do activities which lead to Famine. Controlling factions of systems - the ones which show up on the galaxy map for a state - are particularly likely to have players doing anti-Famine activities for them. So in that respect the lack of Famine is because players are good at keeping systems well fed.
(There might be - though probably aren't - some non-controlling factions in Famine which you can't see through the galaxy map. But for the specific reason you want famines I'm not sure that would be useful)

Balancing Bug: there are so few pro-Famine activities that even if players wanted to do them it's a huge amount of effort. A similar problem affects the Bust, Lockdown, and to a slightly smaller extent Civil Unrest states. A few Famines have been intentionally caused by BGS researchers, but it required carefully finding an appropriate system in a quiet region of space where passing players wouldn't accidentally undo their work, then working on it for several days. Frontier are aware of this, but BGS changes are high-risk and will get a lot of complaints if they go wrong, so are being fairly cautious at trying to fix it without breaking other stuff.

Workaround: there are a few other locations where large numbers of ships consistently high-wake from regardless of the state - the one I know of may not be much use to you (Jaques Station - busy station plus three nearby tourist beacons) but there are presumably some others in the bubble

 

[Factabulous]

Guides out of date - other locations are fine as Ian said - people seem to have no issues finding DWE once they stop looking for famines.

Funny how badly the internet seems to serve games like ED that evolve/change (or break, depending on your viewpoint ) over time.

 

[Vardaugas]

I think more people need to support anarchy factions. That should damage economy enough to cause some famines.

Maybe they should add an economy (and maybe security) simulation on top of player influence. Every system has a certain effect on near by systems (diminishing by distance) which leads to economically strong and weak areas, leaving some more prone to famines than others. Ideally the system economy, the population, faction types in the system and available bodies in the systems influence the strength or weakness of the system. Could also influence what commodities are produced/consumed and the amount of them in demand/stock.

But, of course, such a complex system is prone to "oddities" appearing.

 

[Ian Doncaster]

I think more people need to support anarchy factions. That should damage economy enough to cause some famines.

Maybe they should add an economy (and maybe security) simulation on top of player influence. Every system has a certain effect on near by systems (diminishing by distance) which leads to economically strong and weak areas, leaving some more prone to famines than others.

There is some of this already.

A player-backed Anarchy faction can tend to cause negative security states in nearby systems, due to the types of missions generated by Anarchy factions.

The effects are fairly subtle, but definitely there.

 

[Midian Cabal]

There is some of this already.

A player-backed Anarchy faction can tend to cause negative security states in nearby systems, due to the types of missions generated by Anarchy factions.

The effects are fairly subtle, but definitely there.

How does selling on the black market influence economy of the controlling faction? Can I use it to drive its economy towards famine (in a non-anarchy system)?

 

[thebattlepope]

Interesting. To be honest, I've been looking for famine systems too, for the same reason as op.

I've got a squadron that could use a break from engineering their ships. Playing the BGS could be a welcome change. So, here's the question:

What kind of actions should we take to influence the BGS to trigger a famine in a particular system?

 

[Ian Doncaster]

Interesting. To be honest, I've been looking for famine systems too, for the same reason as op.

I've got a squadron that could use a break from engineering their ships. Playing the BGS could be a welcome change. So, here's the question:

What kind of actions should we take to influence the BGS to trigger a famine in a particular system?

Good luck - this won't be easy.

Black market trading should help versus non-Anarchy factions.

Versus Anarchy factions, the "assassinate pirate leader" mission type harms their economy, if you can find some nearby systems that semi-reliably generate them.

Both of these actions will also harm influence, so you may need to look for actions which improve influence but not economy, to stop the controlling faction getting into a conflict and losing control of the system to an economically-healthier faction.

In either case, pick a system with ideally no passing traffic (no-one on the traffic reports in local news you can't personally account for) or you'll have serious trouble as pretty much every casual action helps the faction - make sure you don't give them any legal trades, exploration data, mission successes, etc. either.

Factabulous may be able to give more detailed or accurate advice, from having actually succeeded in generating a Famine.

 

[thebattlepope]

Good luck - this won't be easy.

Black market trading should help versus non-Anarchy factions.

Versus Anarchy factions, the "assassinate pirate leader" mission type harms their economy, if you can find some nearby systems that semi-reliably generate them.

Both of these actions will also harm influence, so you may need to look for actions which improve influence but not economy, to stop the controlling faction getting into a conflict and losing control of the system to an economically-healthier faction.

In either case, pick a system with ideally no passing traffic (no-one on the traffic reports in local news you can't personally account for) or you'll have serious trouble as pretty much every casual action helps the faction - make sure you don't give them any legal trades, exploration data, mission successes, etc. either.

Factabulous may be able to give more detailed or accurate advice, from having actually succeeded in generating a Famine.

Thanks for the info. I've just PM'd Factabulous for some aid, with a little bit of luck I'll be making a thread about all this later today/tomorrow.

 

[Factabulous]

I'll post the response here, so Ian can correct me (I'm no BGS expert), but here's what I did

I did it using assassination missions - if you want to target an anarchy then trying to find a location without many anarchies around works (as more law abiding factions will give you missions for the same faction). I got allied with the factions in Karabal and targeted the anarchy in LP 708-253. Jumping around the stations in Karabal allowed stacking of 20 assassinations. Take Pirate Lord assassinations, massacres and also other assassinations that give -Eco effect (some give -Sec, skip them). You also want lots of factions to give you the missions as the effect of the missions you do will cause constant conflicts, which tend to block the factions from attacking the anarchy as they start fighting each other. I had 6 factions and 4 always seemed to be fighting.

As Ian said, you will tank the INF of the faction - I used a faction with 1% INF so they didn't get into any wars. If you want to put a controlling faction into famine - not sure how you would do that - I guess win all their wars on the way down?

Main thing is to be consistent - if you stop then the faction seems to recover back towards normal. The states you should see are like on this thread https://forums.frontier.co.uk/threads/facts-new-theory-of-hatching.477450/ . I reckon 3 weeks should do it, but depends on if anyone else interferes, and I was only working a small system.

HTH

 

[rootsrat]

Intentional: BGS states are modified through player activity, and the vast majority of players don't do activities which lead to Famine.

As far as I remember from FDEV stream, initiating both Famine and Outbreak ais no longer connected to player actions. They are states that occur randomly now. Player actions can reverse them, but not initiate.

 

[Factabulous]

As far as I remember from FDEV stream, initiating both Famine and Outbreak ais no longer connected to player actions. They are states that occur randomly now. Player actions can reverse them, but not initiate.

 

[Midian Cabal]

As far as I remember from FDEV stream, initiating both Famine and Outbreak ais no longer connected to player actions. They are states that occur randomly now. Player actions can reverse them, but not initiate.

Looks like their random function is not random at all, as there are no systems in famine...

 

[thebattlepope]

Oh. OK.

In other words, there isn't even anything we can do to trigger a famine.

Well, nevermind, then. Either way - a big thank you to Factabulous for the swift reply!

 

[Midian Cabal]

Surely no famine is a good thing?

Not for us. We're ruthless and heartless scumbags that will drive whole systems into famine just to get a few Datamined Wake Exceptions. Gankers additionaly drown kittens from what I've heard.

 

[zimms]

Surely no famine is a good thing?

Would be, if you could just buy materials in this galaxy.

 

[rootsrat]

Looks like their random function is not random at all, as there are no systems in famine...

System states filter on the map only shows one state. Since systems can be in multiple states now it's entirely possible there are famine states somewhere, but it's not showing on the map.

 

[Retropolitan]

System states filter on the map only shows one state. Since systems can be in multiple states now it's entirely possible there are famine states somewhere, but it's not showing on the map.

Yes, I've recently seen a non-controlling faction in famine. But those factions' states don't count as "system" states even though they may spawn USS's.

 

[Jmanis]

Yet another "Lack of Famine" threads.

Obligatory link to "Buff antagonistic PvE" thread.

https://forums.frontier.co.uk/threads/time-to-buff-antagonistic-pve.472325/

On an aside, I went cruising around for Civil Unrest/Bust systems today, and noticed something not entirely unsurprising.

Almost every faction in Civil Unrest/Bust is an Anarchy faction? Why? Because Anarchies suck. Because there's 16,000 Anarchy factions, and 50,000 Lawful factions, and with the exception of when those lawful factions go to war, the vast majority of their missions specifically target Anarchies only, or benefit themselves.

FD simply must either incentivise activities which target lawful factions with negative effects, or better yet, actually build a Naval Career path into the game, where you undertake missions for the navies of the respective superpowers, targeting factions belonging to the other superpowers.

 

[Midian Cabal]

System states filter on the map only shows one state. Since systems can be in multiple states now it's entirely possible there are famine states somewhere, but it's not showing on the map.

EDSM can find systems in all states except bust, lockdown and famine in a 65,000 ly radius around Sol. 139 systems in outbreak are found. Could it be that there are really no systems in famine?