Disincentivizing the 5th Column in PP
https://www.reddit.com/r/EliteDange...nstorm_disincentivizing_the_5th_column_in_pp/
INTRO
If you enjoy Powerplay and have an archaic sense of fair play, this thread is for you. Please provide any input you have, positive, negative, or neutral, in regards to the topic to be discussed here: Disincentivizing the 5th Column in Powerplay.
BACKGROUND
To provide context to this discussion, let's clarify what is meant by "5th Column" activity.
Wikipedia definition of "5th Column"
A fifth column is any group of people who undermine a larger group—such as a nation or a besieged city—from within, usually in favor of an enemy group or nation. The activities of a fifth column can be overt or clandestine. Forces gathered in secret can mobilize openly to assist an external attack. This term is also extended to organized actions by military personnel. Clandestine fifth column activities can involve acts of sabotage, disinformation, or espionage executed within defense lines by secret sympathizers with an external force.
In Elite: Dangerous, the "5th Column" ranges from benign to self-interest to malicious.
Definition:
- Benign: AKA "Merit Grinders" - people who don't understand what they are doing is detrimental to their power
- Self-Interest: AKA "Merit Grinders MK II" - people who don't care what they are doing is detrimental to their power
- Malicious: AKA "@#!$!%@#%" - people who are fully aware of the damage they are causing, and do it purposefully
Motivation:
- Benign: simple ignorance about how Powerplay works, and no knowledge of communication channels like Reddit and the FD Forums lead to foolish preparation, expansion, and fortification wastage
- Self-Interest: people in this category may know what they are doing is detrimental, but want a system for personal reasons, or just want to generate merits expeditiously so they can collect their salary and move on to other things
- Malicious: deliberately push bad preparation and expansion targets in order to hurt the power to which they are pledged
I personally believe that the vast majority of "5th Column" activity can be categorized as benign or self-interest. For examples of this, look no further than Arissa Lavigny-Duval. The organized player base is hard pressed to prepare favorable systems that surpass the Her combat expansions now regularly generate more merits than nearly all other Powerplay activity combined. Fortification of systems near her capital system, particularly Guathiti, receive merits counts orders of magnitude beyond the triggers. Other powers are in similar situations in various ways.
NOW WHAT?
This is the reason this thread has been opened. I'd like to ask the community if they have any solutions in mind that be proposed to Frontier that will help curb "5th Column" tendencies, regardless of motivation? These solutions need to encourage meaningful allocation of Powerplay efforts while removing the incentives (disincentivizing) activities that bring harm to a power. It only makes sense that the leaders of the powers would not want to throw away millions of credits to minions who do them more harm than good.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS:
If FD considers "5th Column" tactics to be "fair game," I would strongly encourage them to still raise the bar on the difficulty. Hopefully some of the solutions the community proposes will fit their vision of allowing this misbehavior while making it unappealing for the masses.
PROPOSED SOLUTIONS:
In this section I'd like to highlight the best ideas contributed in the comments. The sky is the limit. Use your imagination. The more useful the ideas, the better the chance the community will get some attention on this issue.
I'd personally like to offer the following potential solutions:
- Reduce base salaries and institute a bonus to the base salary that scales based on the effectiveness of merits contributed. If a system being prepared or expanded provides negative CC to the power (before overheads), deduct credits from the base salary, and make it known. If a system is being fortified by commanders who submit merits after the trigger is reached, prompt them that their efforts are wasted and that they should choose another system. Do not add over-fortification merits to the weekly totals contributed by said commanders. I'm sure power leaders are not happy that their resources are being wasted. Let the mechanics reflect that
Só tem gravação de npc sofrendo isso, eles sempre param mesmo, mas já disseram no fórum que você tem que fazer o gerenciamento da nave todo antes e quaqleur coisa já pra se preparar para essa mudança do pp
Essa semana agora abrirão o beta para todos, podemos nos aqui mesmo fazer uns testes do que precisar
de recompensa ai da pra ir direto pra cobra.
