would like to see some confirmation that federal rank progression is at least possible.

[SoulTechnology]

i hear many different 'stories' about different bugs in rank progression, and more 'stories' in patch notes that its fixed... i say the patch notes are just stories cuz i can soundly say i bet i've done enough missions for federal sub factions (many, many different sub factions) to singly handedly turn them into a war machine that could defeat them empire or build their own dam deathstar.

what my problem is, after doing these 20+ missions i have not seen a SINGLE federal rank progression opportunity (and i've checked everywhere, every stop). id atleast like to see it in the 'available but unobtainable' section of the bulletin board so i know the systems working but i haven't.

pre 1.3 it was taking 3-4 missions between me receiving rank progression opportunities, i got to the 5th rank, then 1.3 dropped and i haven't seen a single one. sucks cuz all i want is the cruddy dropship for the reason of it being cruddy and ill be one of the few flying (and apparently you cant obtain the rank anymore) maybe get a rank head start on the fed corvette and hopefully obtained enough for the condor when its flyable (or whatever they call it these days). wanna just be greedy and ask to at least be promoted to the 7th rank for my efforts but i know it wont happen. but id be nice if it could atleast get fixed, heck, i wouldn't mind if it was made so the ONLY missions i got at a station were rank progressions for a week, even if most of them were unobtainable i could atleast see they still exist.

to be clear... i was doing 3-4 missions between ranks until rank 5, then 1.3 dropped and THEN ive done 20+ missions and haven't seen a single one. yes there all for federal sub factions and they were for various sub factions. some i got allied with (allied wiht them individually, not applied through the feds... although i am allied with the feds anyway). i would submit a ticket but i know ill just get told the usual when it comes to this particular type of issue so the best i can do it on the forums and wait patiently for an update that actually FIXES it as opposed to just says it does... or hope i just get 2 ranks handed to me on a silver platter but like that will ever happen.

want my damn coffee makers.

please refresh the page / read the comments befor posting

 

[Rick Venus]

To get from chief to ensign, I had to work on rep with a bunch of minor factions and it appeared to require some trader to get some of the hauling missions for the minor factions.
I saw the same thing pre-1.3 in terms of knocking out the lower ranks.
Seems to be a logarithmic increase in required minor faction rep instead of linear.
It definitely works in 1.3.x.

 

[SoulTechnology]

i figured id be logarithmic, it was taking more and more to rank up befor (by about 2 big missions each rank) but that's a steep slope to go from maybe 6 missions to 20 (and i still haven't seen a rank mission). i am aware you need pilots fed rank for some missions but i have a pretty broad selection, im dangerous or equivalent (rank 7) in all 3 fields. so i strongly believe that isn't the issue (or atleast it it shouldn't be, and even if it is the progression missions would appear in available but unobtainable). like i said, i'm not in the early ranks, i'm trying to get to federal rank 7 and i'm currently at 5, think frontier knows how a get when i have my coffee and doesn't want me flying a ship with built in coffee makers.

 

[Rick Venus]

Weirdly, I had a 2-station trade run between 2 different minor factions and did zero missions for them but gained rep as i bounced endlessly back and forth in the T-6.

 

[SoulTechnology]

its supposedly just earning reputation with different factions makes progress on an invisible 'xp' system or something rather (separate from hostile/allied rep you can view in your ship) but earning rep in any way with any minor faction helps... missions are just the quickest but mine is apparently broken.

 

[nicomak]

Doing missions is not the only way to gain rep, selling exploration data, trading, claiming bounties, combat bounds ...

Later ranks take more time to achieve(to get the actual rank mission) than the first ones.

 

[SoulTechnology]

Doing missions is not the only way to gain rep, selling exploration data, trading, claiming bounties, combat bounds ...

Later ranks take more time to achieve(to get the actual rank mission) than the first ones.

i am aware as discussed... its just the fact that exponential growth from 1-3 to 4-6 'high' rep missions is understandable... but going from 6 to 20 (and still counting) is a bit bugged. ive been working on this on and off for weeks and i am annoyed by stories of epople who went form 0-9 in a day because they got 'lucky' with the ranks.

its not that there are other ways then missions to gain rep, its the fact that ive earned SO MUCH REP (not only have i been doing missions since you mention it, i have been handing in bounties which i'm aware count for allot, and other minor things)... the BUG here is im not receiving any federal progression missions in the bulletin board generator.

 

[nicomak]

Well it does take some efforts. I hardly doubt people simply got lucky, i think they probably just did more rep building, purposedly or not, before even starting to get ranks. I had the first 5 almost in a row iirc, i did not do them right from the start. Then each of the next 3 ones took me a while. I did a lot of many things before even one mission showed up. Though i'm not really rushing them at all, some day i'll see the next mission and i'll do it then.
It could be that there is a bug, but it could also be that it's just the way it works.

 

[Vladimar Rubicon]

I found it pretty simple to progress. I'm rank of Post Commander right now, and it was just a matter of killing a few (or "retiring" as they put it) Anacondas and Pythons. One mission to gain a rank up was just to deliver a message to another system one jump away. It's fairly easy.

 

[Cobblars]

Well it does take some efforts. I hardly doubt people simply got lucky, i think they probably just did more rep building, purposedly or not, before even starting to get ranks. I had the first 5 almost in a row iirc, i did not do them right from the start. Then each of the next 3 ones took me a while. I did a lot of many things before even one mission showed up. Though i'm not really rushing them at all, some day i'll see the next mission and i'll do it then.
It could be that there is a bug, but it could also be that it's just the way it works.

You could be correct. However, in game there is no indication if you are even on the right track.

i also agree that as you progress through the missions esch one will progressively take more effort. However having been on Marquis for the past week or so now, providing trades, exploration data, missions and combat hand ins, I would have thought i was somewhere near to getting to the next level.

But many people are complaining of the same thing and follow this by silence from the dev team and people start to get a little annoyed that what they are working on could all be for nothing. I will be very dissapointed if the past week or so's work has merely been a waste of time bar the credits earned.

 

[GJ51]

You could be correct. However, in game there is no indication if you are even on the right track.

i also agree that as you progress through the missions esch one will progressively take more effort. However having been on Marquis for the past week or so now, providing trades, exploration data, missions and combat hand ins, I would have thought i was somewhere near to getting to the next level.

But many people are complaining of the same thing and follow this by silence from the dev team and people start to get a little annoyed that what they are working on could all be for nothing. I will be very dissapointed if the past week or so's work has merely been a waste of time bar the credits earned.

It has pretty much always been this way. Once you get to the higher ranks progression takes exponentially longer to achieve the next rank up. FD will not comment on any of this, which is their normal policy indicating that they feel things are working as intended.

You can almost count on it that you won't be offered the higher rank missions until you're convinced that the whole process is borked and it will never happen and you give up and move on to something else. Once you've reached that conclusion, when you least expect it, an ascension mission pops up.

 

[Samosa]

Forget all the theories. Forget up arrows, down arrows, and going to lots of different systems. Minor factions don't matter, other than that you're doing missions for factions allied to the major faction you're interested in ranking with.

It has nothing to do with reputation. It's all about successfully completed mission count, nothing more, nothing less.

20 missions per (higher) rank isn't going to cut it.

At least, this was true until last weekend - I don't have information about this week's patches.

 

[Thoris]

^This. I've been Lieutenant for a good while. Then got the mission for Lt. Commander just two days ago when I really didn't expect it. Was funny actually ("We want you to get something illegal...16 tons of Cobalt please"

Keep working on those missions. It's the only way to advance eventually.

 

[Cobblars]

Already at the point that the whole process is borked and will never happen.

Strange that I can see rep progression with factions.... lot's and lot's of factions. Yet I am unable to see any form of a progression tables for ascension missions?!

Well back to doing things without having any real indication of whether there is any point to it I guess.

 

[GJ51]

Forget all the theories. Forget up arrows, down arrows, and going to lots of different systems. Minor factions don't matter, other than that you're doing missions for factions allied to the major faction you're interested in ranking with.

It has nothing to do with reputation. It's all about successfully completed mission count, nothing more, nothing less.

20 missions per (higher) rank isn't going to cut it.

At least, this was true until last weekend - I don't have information about this week's patches.

I wouldn't disagree with that. It felt like nothing but a weekend of mission grind worked when I finally made Earl. I was offered and made Post Captain shortly after 1.3 was released and did a bit of mission grind in Fed space after that but haven't been offered another ascension mission yet.

 

[MADmanOne]

20 missions per (higher) rank isn't going to cut it.

Do you remember how may missions you have done in the higher ranks ? I try for over a week now to climb from Rear Admiral the last two ranks to Admiral, but even after doing more than 40 missions, I still got no rank progression mission.

 

[Samosa]

I wasn't keeping track. PM incoming...

 

[Karakhian]

I wasn't keeping track. PM incoming...

My understanding of the way you unlock the next Navy rank mission is as follows - you cannot simply work your reputation up with one minor faction belonging to the major faction in question.

To be offered the next rank mission, there are a minimum number of minor factions belonging to the navy's major faction that you must gain a good reputation with. It is useless just to work on your reputation with a single minor faction to try to increase your major faction reputation. There must be several different minor factions, all belonging to the major faction, and eventually, when you have raised enough of them to the required reputation (i.e. the major faction is receiving good reports about you from many different jurisdictions under their control), they will offer you the next rank mission up (you have to be at a station with a minor faction of that major faction).

This is how it's worked for me so far - I'm at Lieutenant with the Federal Navy, one above Ensign. I wasn't really trying to do this - I'm more of an independent pilot. But in the course of jumping around and doing missions in some areas and for Federal minor factions, I eventually became Allied to a large number of Federation minor factions. The threshold for the next rank seems to get higher and higher, with more different minor factions with good rep needed, and the rep needing to be Allied rather than just Friendly.

Remember, I did this without even meaning to - the rank missions turned up, and when they did, they kept coming. Eventually an easy one would pop up, and I'd do it just because it was on my way.

 

[Samosa]

My understanding of the way you unlock the next Navy rank mission is as follows - you cannot simply work your reputation up with one minor faction belonging to the major faction in question.

I believe, despite popular opinion, that this is not the case. I worked my way up from Midshipman to Admiral pretty much at one station, whether or not my reputation was on the rise or fall. I maintain that it's nothing more than the number of missions completed.

Same with getting to King in the Empire, but more of that was pre-1.3.

 

[Karakhian]

I believe, despite popular opinion, that this is not the case. I worked my way up from Midshipman to Admiral pretty much at one station, whether or not my reputation was on the rise or fall. I maintain that it's nothing more than the number of missions completed.

Same with getting to King in the Empire, but more of that was pre-1.3.

Yes, something similar happened to me, though of course my ranks are much lower than yours - but it depends whether before you started ranking up, you'd been flying around and becoming allied with many different Federation minor factions. This is especially true of traders or bounty hunters doing a lot of work on Community Goals. If so, you'd be becoming allied in many different places. So afterwards, if you'd become allied in say 100 Federation systems, you may instantly hit the threshold for a lot of the ranks one after the other. My last three ranks were all at the same station - but I hadn't bothered doing much ranking up for a long time before that (I saw missions, but I didn't want to do them because there was that issue with them not working at all). I was offered the rank mission, did it, then the next got offered, then the next. In all cases up to Lieutenant, doing one mission was enough to gain the next rank - I obviously have no idea if you have to do multiple missions for any ranks after that.

I've also noticed that you often get offered a mission for the same rank in multiple places - indeed many different missions for the same rank in the same station sometimes (e.g. do this delivery/assassinate this target/smuggle in these goods, all at the same time). If you do one, doing others for the same rank at the same time does nothing. I always waited a bit and then took the rank mission that got offered after I'd completed the previous one.