Powerplay has been in a broken, but still somewhat workable, state for a long time. The events of the last cycle however have really knocked the wheels off the wagon. You now have the leadership of all powers calling out for a pause in powerplay to resolve the bugs and issues.

Honestly, I don’t feel that goes far enough. Powerplay is beyond a simple fix. It needs a full rebuild from the ground up.

Let’s have a very quick recap of

some

of the key issues with the current implementation:

No method of in-game organization or comms on a power-wide scale.

Extremely important information missing or incorrect in the UI

Easy to lose ‘good’ systems and impossible to lose ‘bad’ systems.

Fifth column activity.

Actions that appear positive can be negative.

Actions that appear negative can be positive.

Exploitation of mechanics for personal greed.

Exclusive weapons and equipment.

Utterly bizarre and convoluted mechanics.

Broken rewards and effects.

Inherent and massive intentional unfairness between powers.

No ability to declare other powers enemies or allies.

An extremely complicated command capital economy with no real way to manage it.

A bubble that is slowly (if not already) running out of useful systems to claim, yet still forcing expansion.

And, perhaps the biggest one:



99.9% of players have no clue about how the damn thing actually works.

OK, so the above list is pretty damning. Is there anything actually good about powerplay?

Sure! The list isn’t as long as the one above though…

A community for players to engage with.

Something to spend money and time on in the ‘end game’.

A reason to engage in PVP action with others.

So the basic breakdown is that powerplay is decent at providing a social aspect to the game, especially for players who have been involved for extended periods, but the background mechanics that make it all work are pretty damn terrible.

With the above in mind, I present my proposal:





Fixing Powerplay: Bringing the background simulation to the foreground.

The basis for an amazing solution to powerplay lies in the already existing background simulation.

The idea here is that players build their own factions, fully equipped with group comms in-game. The factions use an upgraded version of the BGS mechanics to wage wars, trade, mine, explore and expand their way through the galaxy.

Controlling stations would allow the controlling group to manage the stations in question. Adjusting prices of commodities, paying ship manufacturers to supply their ports with ships and parts and providing profits to the group leaders and their members.





Factions could ally themselves with other factions, forming their own powers, or wage wars against others.



Let’s examine the concept in more detail:





Forming your minor faction:

In order to form your faction, a player must travel to the system in which they would like to form their faction and dock at a station.

Once docked, a player finds the ‘Faction’ UI in station services and navigates to ‘Create a Faction’.

The player enters the name and back-story of their faction. (Feel free to manually ‘approve’ these if needed.)

The player selects a government type for their faction.

The player selected a super-power allegiance or to be an independent power. The location of the faction matters for this. If the system resides within the current territory of any of the Empires powerplay bubble, they can choose Empire or Independent only. Same for the Federation and the Alliance – If you want a super-power aligned system it has to be in currently held territory by one of the current powers.

The player selects, from a matrix, a number of special effects for their faction. Things like a discount on ships/parts purchased from their space, an increase to mining, trading or exploration profits, an increase or decrease is system security and so on (similar to the current passive effects of powers).

A number of randomly-generated NPC faces are displayed and the player decides which NPCs are present for which influence levels in their faction.



The player forfeits 100,000,000Cr to station services and has their faction created.



The new faction becomes present in the system, but does not have control over any resources.

The maximum number of factions that can be created in one system is tied to the amount of stations present in the system. 1 player made faction can be created for every one station present. Once this number of factions is created, no more can be started in the system.



Players may now join the faction at the invite of the leader. Members can only join via invite – there is no other way to join a faction. Factions are not limited to a specific number of players.



Players in factions have their faction noted in the lower-left corner of the HUD when scanned by other players, where power info is currently shown.

Scanning a player from a faction marked as ‘friendly’ or ‘unfriendly’ shows them as such on the radar and HUD.





Growing your minor faction:

Initially players will run missions for their faction, or complete various other tasks, to raise the influence of their faction.

With enough support, the factions eventually get into a war with other NPC or player factions. Winning the wars moves your influence up and past the losing faction and turning over ownership of any stations owned by that faction to you.

Eventually, after many wars and becoming system controller, you are able to expand.



Faction leaders may trigger expansion at any time when they are system controller. Triggering an expansion requires they select the system they wish to expand from and which they wish to expand into. The faction is required to fork over 10,000,000Cr for every 1LY the new system is from their chosen expansion system. They also take an influence hit in the system they are expanding from.

After expansion they enter the new system with a small amount of influence and may begin growing their support in the new system.

Expansions that do not receive enough support, or are successfully opposed are fully subject to ‘retreat’ mechanics.



Expansion can occur into a system that is otherwise ‘full’ and unable to support newly created factions.





Managing your Faction:

As ‘powers’ are no more, replace the corresponding menu with a ‘Factions’ menu.

The Faction menu displays an overall view of your faction and its status. How many players have visited your stations, values of trade profits through your ports, number of successful missions run, pending state changes with detailed info on what each state means for your power, group roster, influence levels of your faction in various systems. Etc.

Make all the hidden and unknown BGS values front and centre and show what is happening.

Further, using galmap, implement views that show the status of your faction. Which systems they are present in, which they have control of, which they are in war with, etc. A new marker can be added to show where in the galaxy members of your faction are present (with the appropriate toggle to add and remove from galmap as needed)





Managing your Members:

Through simple use of permissions, faction leaders may grant abilities to their members to control various aspects of the faction.

Examples of permissions would include:



Join or Leave a Power.

Declare another faction as friendly.

Declare another faction as unfriendly.

Trigger the ‘Expansion’ state.

Changing the values in the commodities market.

Invite players to the faction.



Forming a power:

Naturally, as conflicts rise and alliances are formed, different factions may find themselves working together.

Faction leaders may agree to form a ‘power’ – a formal alliance between multiple factions.

In order to join or create a power, A faction must have control of at least one system.

Factions many only join a power if they are aligned with the same super-power.



The faction leader creating the power is required to pay a fee of 1,000,000,000Cr to create their power.

Factions may only join a power via direct invite from the power leader (or appropriately permissions sub-faction leader) sent directly to the faction leader (or appropriately permissioned member)

The power leader names their new power as they see fit to call themselves (feel free to have player submitted stuff moderated)

The power leader who created the power may pick a portrait for their ‘leader’ or submit one directly (once again, feel free to have player submitted stuff moderated)

The power leader may choose additional passive benefits

Power leaders may choose to set themselves as Hostile, Allied or Neutral with other powers. This setting applies to all the groups in the other power, overriding any faction-specific settings if applicable.

Power leaders can choose to ‘kick’ factions out of powers, or faction leaders can choose to leave should they wish.

Powers are shown supplementary to the player’s minor faction in the lower-left corner of the HUD when scanned.

Players from differing factions in the same power automatically appear as if they were on your friends list should you be in the same system as them – As in you can see their name and details without having to scan them.

Scanning a player from a faction marked as ‘Enemy’ shows them as such on the radar and HUD.





Communications:

In-game comms are now available to each ‘group’. Each group has its own group channel shown in a separate tab in the Comms menu. An ‘all’ tab, a ‘local/direct’ tab and a ‘faction’ tab. This allows players to communicate with their fellow player’s in-game. If a player is a part of a power, they also have an extra ‘power’ comms channel.

Summary:

Players can form factions at will.

Players can form powers.

Players can formally mark other groups as allies or foes.

Players get to control stations / systems.

Players can communicate within their faction/power easily.

Group members are controlled, limiting 5 th column / spy activity.

For the most part, mostly existing gameplay mechanics are used.

Clearly positive actions are positive.

Clearly negative actions are negative.

The playing field is fair and level.

Complex economics are no longer a massive factor.

No arbitrary limits on size of factions or powers.

The ability to contribute regardless of playstyle.

The current powerplay territory is transition into the placement of new factions.

​



Wrapping it all up:

I believe I have provided a decent outline for providing a replacement for powerplay which address most if not all of the shortfalls within the current system. It is not something which will happen overnight. It is not something that will be easy. It is something that would alter the game for the better.

Give us the tools to create our own story, instead of trying to write it for us. Give us the ability to try and conquer the galaxy or die trying. Give us the the ability to work together properly in-game. Give us the ability to build and control our own little corner of galaxy.

Realize the dream that is Elite: Dangerous