Lave Radio Episode 371 “The Muppet’s Christmas Carrot” – 21/12/2021

Position	Crew Member	CMDR Name
Head of Health and Safety	Ben Moss-Woodward	Eid LeWeise
Staff Liaison Officer	Clare Good	Psykit
Chief Archivist	Colin Ford	Phoenix_Dfire
(in)Human Resources Director	Shan	Shan
Chief Bar Steward	Grant Woolcott	Psykokow
Tech Gibbon	Chris Mk IV	Newell Turner

Download the episode directly from here.

Development News – what have the devs said this week?

1. Elite Dangerous: Horizons & Odyssey Update 16/12/2021 Notes | Frontier Forums
2. Odyssey Know Issues left over the holidays
3. Thursday – Elite Dangerous Christmas Stream 2021
   1. Fleet Carrier Interior interview with Derin Halil – Senior Game Designer
      
      Can buy extra services
      1. Pioneer Supplies – able to change the mark up. Carries all stock
         1. Some pioneer supplies can stock illegal items in some areas and is toggleable
      2. Bar
         1. Works a bit like the commodities market – set up supply and demand
      3. Vista Genomics
         1. Much the same as in the concourse. For the carrier owner it’s similar to Cartography data
      4. Shipyard
         1. Same idea as existing, just on foot
      5. “Jump Room”
         1. We can sit down!!!
         2. People get “moved” to a seat for the jump sequence
      6. Carrier owner and Team can get to the Bridge and a private “ready room”
      7. Can swap out the interior colour palette to personalise it some.
      8. Can swap out NPCs
      9. Coming in Update 11 – Early next year
   2. Update 10 – focussing on optimisations & Bug fixes

In-Game Events – what’s happened this week?

1. 15-Dec-3307 – The Triumph of Salvation
2. 16-Dec-3307 – NMLA Megaship Becomes Marlinist Flagship – Steel Majesty renamed to Fairfax Vision
3. 16-Dec-3307 – A gift from a Thief – 
4. 17-Dec-3307 – Salvation Recruits Naval Crews.
5. 17-Dec-3307 – 5-70
6. 18-Dec-3307 – -9-118
7. 19-Dec-3307 – -76-118
8. 20-Dec-3307 – Theta Seven’s Identity Discovered – John Tyburn
9. 21-Dec-3307 – TBA
10. 10 Operation IDA – Holiday Haul continues. Their present targets are;- 
    1. The Oracle in Delphi
11. 11 AXI – According to Thargoid.Watch, the top three priorities are;-
    1. Pleiades Nebula – Pleiades Sector IH-V c2-7
    2. Coalsack Nebula – Musca Dark Region PJ-P b6-1
    3. Witch Head Nebula – Evangelis

Store Alert (Tis the season for some jumpers tra la la la la)

1. SNOWMAN JUMPER BUNDLE

2. ELF JUMPER BUNDLE

3. FESTIVE JUMPER PACK

Main discussion

1. Christmas Events in Gaming
   1. Elite Dangerous
      1. ‘Free ARX – log on every day earn an increasing amount of ARX’
      2. 3 PACKs of Christmas goodies that costs 6400 ARX
         1. 5000 ARX – £2.99
         2. 8820 ARX – £4.99
         3. 17,700 ARX – £9.59
   2. SC
      1. Advent Calendar idea that gives anything from a Forum Badge or Concept Art, to a ship skin
         
         
      2. Luminalia Event – Pick up presents around stations – hand them in and get credits (these have been reduced from 1000cr / box to 250 cr / box) and essentially delivery missions for a little above average for a similar mission
   3. Psy: Overwatch do a Christmas event each year – But I’m not playing because Activision Blizzard can go fuck itself. Overwatch Winter Wonderland 2021
   4. Psy: I think WoT and WoWS do an advent calendar each year as well. Special missions and discounts on premium vehicles, nothing for free or just logging in to the game as far as I can see
   5. WoW
      1. heavily discount everything except this year’s mount  in store.
   6. Guild Wars 1 and 2
      1. Huge Christmas celebrations . For example, there are whole quest lines where you have to do things like protect wintersday gifts from creatures from the underworld(they look like a cross between the grinch and gremlins, later stages see you trying to drive them back into their box. Two whole new areas where you can choose a side and compete with other players to see who can a, deliver the presents or b smash them to make the kids cry etc) not to mention 4 of the major towns and player hubs are given a Xmas makeover) . You can compete in in town events to support Dwayna (representing spring and light) or Grenth (death and more winter) with different cosmetic rewards for both and all of this is free for players Get To The Point: A Wintersday Guide for Guild Wars 2
   7. SWTOR has Life Day celebration, which lasts from the 14th Dec to 11th Jan. Heck of long day if you ask me. Full details can be found here :- https://swtorista.com/articles/life-day-event-guide-swtor/
   8. Forza is doing a massive xmas thing all for just playing the game

Community Corner

1. A Message from Cannon… (Ventura has the video)
2. Quick Discussion about the Lack of Console News triggered by :- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_tWLBrRzceQ by Guy Price. – My Response for discussion 
   1. We’ll be featuring this video on Lave Radio this week. Before I say anything else I do want to see a console version. However, as a PC player (with an xbox account) and a dev understanding, there are a few things than need to be taken under consideration. Firstly Communication, People forget that fdev is on the stock market and so any communication they make which could effect the share price is subject to a whole load of rules. The upshot is, you don’t announce anything until you are sure it can happen, otherwise they could be accused of fraud or stock-price manipulation.  That’s why we get this crappy ‘We have nothing to announce at this time.’ line because it’s covers the company’s back and makes sure there are no legal ramifications. BTW, I hate that line, we got nothing but that for six months before fleet carriers were launched. 
   2. Secondly, Performance. Lets be honest, even with update 9, It’s not there yet. Yes there was a new vehicle but most of the performance fixes this time made sure that the frame rates didn’t plummet when you had multiple commanders in the same instance. That was horrible in update 8 and appears fixed in update 9. My point is that they are still working on performance. Try and run Odyssey on a PC equivalent to an Xbox (for example a 3.3 Ghz Processor,  16GB of Ram and a GTX 780), it runs like a dog, you’re lucky to get 20 fps. I know that there are arguments that it should be easier to develop because standard architecture but from what I’ve seen so far, it’s a big ask to get it running optimally on X-box-One and PS4, we might be looking at X-Box-X and PS5 only. There is also the fact that Odyssey will have to pass Microsoft and Sony’s certification. They’re a lot more stringent after cyberpunk 2077, so performance is an issue.
   3. The Elephant in the room (or should that be working from home) is having to develop under covid conditions. People with personal preference might say they’re more productive from home but we’ve seen that this hasn’t been the case with fdev. It’s taking longer to develop and test than they thought which is why we got a horrendous mess in May.
   4. Originally, Plan B was Update 5 and then they’ll work on the console release (aiming for Christmas). However update 5 didn’t fix half of the issues it needed to, so that’s when they made decision to put on hold the console version because to put the fixes on hold for three/four months would have been the death of Elite. The PC players would have given up by then and what would be the point of doing a console port. I suspect (and I don’t have any inside information) that once fleet carrier interiors are done, that’s when they’ll look at consoles again and see what’s possible. If it is possible, then we’ll probably get an announcement around March and then (Assuming the three/ four month conversion from before) we’ll have something in June and then after that we’ll have on foot thargoids attack! (ERK!)
   5. TLDR. For the lack of communication, blame the stockmarket. For the lack of a game, blame covid and please remember I DO want to see a console version (Heck if they could throw in crossplay that would be amazing). I’m just trying to make people understand why they’re acting in the way they are and why it’s taking so long.

Shoutouts

1. Shoutout for Hutton Orbital Live and Aemilia Hawk  for covering my rare good. Shan’s Charis orchid(along with many others). It was very tasteful and well done. Thank you
2. Dockers is doing a Charity Christmas Special
   1. New Video to play
      1. Download link https://drive.google.com/file/d/1qr8cAvQ3YOv3cwGNxhheFoZ_k8AXUEqO/view?usp=sharing
      2. We decided you loved the teaser trailer so much we made another. I mean nobody threw any mugs at us or drowned us in hot chocolate…I think that’s chocolate…
         
         This one is more Christmassy and has much more festivity in it
         
         Still no Wham though. Though if you REALLY don’t trust us turn the sound off and watch the subtitles….
         
         We will be broadcasting on 26th December 2021 at 9pm GMT on Twitch at Twich.tv/psyskokow
         
         Donate to Special Effect through our Just Giving page @ https://www.justgiving.com/fundraising/beyond-dockers
   2. I know it’s only September and good taste dictates that Christmas should never be mentioned until long after Halloween, but in the world of entertainment Christmas has to be prepared well in advance. When you think about preparing for Christmas, you’re probably thinking about the dinner. Will it be turkey? Beef? How about an enormous cock?
      
      Yes, the Dockers are coming back this year with a Christmas special and they have set up a kickstarter on justgiving. Yes that’s right, a kickstarter on Just Giving. I don’t think they quite understand that all the money will be going to charity.
      
      If you haven’t heard of it before Dockers is a mockumentary podcast about the ordinary folk of the Galaxy from the lowly toilet attendants to famous wildlife documentary makers. It’s been going for a few years and usually does a live show at Lavecon, late at night, well after the watershed because it’s very, very naughty
      
      If they meet their target they will put on the Christmas show, (though to be honest they will put it on regardless.) They have some rewards in their charity kickstarter. If you ever fancied being the subject of a documentary  there are a few options to get your name in the show. Some of them are pretty unsavory.

Tier	Amount	Reward
1	£5.00	Listen to the Christmas special in the comfort of your own home for no additional cost!
2	£10.00	Listen to the Christmas special in the comfort of your own home for a small additional cost!
3	£20.00	Have your name read out by the Narrator at the end of the show with the credits.
4	£30.00	Listen to the Christmas special in the comfort of your own home for a substantial additional cost!
5	£40.00	A lifetime supply of Gnosis Avian Cheese**While stocks last (10 available). Only one block per lifetime, believe me that is enough. No refunds. First come first serve. After ten blocks are allocated reward will be downgraded to tier 3
6	£50.00	A sketch featuring you written and performed by members of the cast of dockers.* To be clear when we say members we don’t mean penises. The segment will be up to 5 minutes long.
7	£200.00	A character of our choice will perform a sex act on you during the show**This will be a dramatisation not an actual act you sicko
8	£500.00	A character of our choice will perform an enjoyable sex act on you during the show**This will be a dramatisation not an actual act you sicko. Enjoyment is not guaranteed.
9	£1000.00	We will have your ears surgically removed so that you never have to listen to the show again.*Need I tell you that this is satire and not a cure for body dysmorphia?
10	£10,000.00	The episode will be set in the Star Citizen Universe
11	£11,000,000	Are you a pharma-bro? We will record a 40 minute episode exclusively for you. Nobody else will be able to listen to it unless you let them.

https://www.justgiving.com/team/BeyondDockers

3. Our sister station, Hutton Orbital Radio, Broadcasts on Thursdays from 20:30. You can tune in at twitch.tv/huttonorbitaltruckers  or, for just the audio, at radio.forthemug.com/.
4. For the discerning Commander who likes a bit of CQC action, check out the CQC Discord at “discord.me/elitedangerouscqc”.
5. We’re also giving a shout outs to the following Elite Dangerous podcasts which have appeared over the last year or are standard regular contributors;-
   1. Algorab AM: An Elite Dangerous Podcast
   2. Black Sky Legion (who also do other space sims as well as ‘RL’ science and tech bits)
   3. Cannon Podcast
   4. For Spanish Speakers there is the Elite Cast 
   5. Fatherhood Podcast
   6. Flight Assist
   7. The Guard Frequency (who do other space sims)
   8. Loose Screws
   9. Squeaking Fuel
   10. System Chat
6. For those who want a literary discussion about Sci-fi and fantasy books. Please subscribe to the Dataslate podcast created by station commander Allen Stroud. 
7. Following this we have the latest Galnet News Digest as provided by Cmdr Wotherspoon and Cmdr BeatleJude.
8. Thanks to those who have chipped in on Twitch chat and in-game commanders.
9. Special Thanks to Cmdr ToCoSo, Jn Tracks and Allen Stroud who created the music used on the Show.