McLave Radio McEpisode 109

Engineers Base

Beta 2.1 updates continue and McColin Ford leads a McScottish episode with McPsykokow and McDave McHughes for chat about beta and the RPG Elite Encounters…

Aired 17th May 2016
Audio versions


Download the episode directly from here.


Crew Members

Chief Archivist : Colin Ford : Cmdr PheonixDFire
Chief Bar Steward : Grant Woolcott : Cmdr Psykokow
Special Guest: Dave Hughes


Show Notes:

  • Development News
    • Beta 2.1.4 Patch Notes
    • Beta 2.1.5 Patch Notes
      • LOTS OF BUG FIXES
        • Grants picks
        • Comms chat history no longer disappears
        • For piracy flag targets, if the target is not a mission target, check if it has a leader and whether that leader is a mission target
        • Add a faction government test so the pesky democracies don’t make my greedy corporation shout “For Democracy!”
        • Fix the method that determines whether we can see planetary missions
        • Added popup explaining where pinned recipes can be found
        • Recipes should now be referred to as blueprints
        • Stop hitmen being sent after the player for no reason
        • Rebalance the tutorials to be reasonable with the new AI
        • Adjusted the shield-down flee behaviour to be less frustrating
        • Everybody docked at Jaques Station has retreated to a safer distance
        • – Fixed issues with recalled ships boosting when trying to land
        • Everybody docked at Jaques Station has retreated to a safer distance
  • – Feedback tweaks to torpedos:
    • – Torpedos now have a 2.5 second arming time rather than their previous 0.5 second. When hitting a target before arming they will deal no damage and self destruct in a small puff
    • – Torpedos now inherit the speed of their launching ship for the first few seconds of flight, before dropping to a 250m/s cruising speed. These two changes give them an effective minimum range of about 700m+ depending on ship speeds, and also means that you won’t be running into the back of your own torpedos!
    • Halve firing heat from missiles
      • Could this mean stealth missile boats?
    • – Added ship voice notification when a mission specific USS has spawned
      • Nice to get an audio cue for it
  • Newsletter 124
    • “From the desk of lead designer Sandro Sammarco”:  is very interesting
  • Main Discussion
    • Rise To Power: Dangerous Games, WILDCARD vote is over
  • URGENT CORRECTION TO SHOW (from the desk of Zac Antonaci)
    • EG pilots aren’t straight through to the final. The top 5 from the votes will have a mini CG tournament and the winner of that will go through to the final.

For the past week player factions have been campaigning for your votes in the first stage of the Dangerous Games to decide which five groups will battle it out in a mini-series of CGs in their bid to become an official Power in the game.

      • The results have been counted and checked and they are as follows:
      • – EG Pilots – 25.5
      • – Wolves of Jonai – 15.5%
      • – Adle’s Armada Coalition – 15.3%
      • – Black Birds Squadron – 10.7%
      • – United German Commanders Coalition – 9%
      • – The Imperial Inquisition – 8.5%
      • – Achenar Immortals Coalition – 7.3%
      • – Planet Express – 3.6%
      • – Black Omega – 2.3%
      • – Pileus Libertas – 1.6%
      • – Battle Vortex – 0.7%

We would like to take this opportunity to thank everyone for voting, and all of the groups for their amazing effort! We will have more news on the next phase of the games shortly where the qualified groups will be looking for your help to complete the Community Goals and help their campaign.

Lave Radio Episode 108

Engineers Base

Beta 2.1 is Live and Cmdr Fozza Bangs his wrench against the new features. Thankfully our Special Guest Obsidian Ant is able to help him hit the appropriate things!

Aired 10th May 2016
Audio versions


Download the episode directly from here.


Crew Members

2nd Technician : Chris Forrester : Cmdr Fozza
Head of Health and safety : Ben Moss Woodwood : Cmdr Eid LeWeise
Chief Archivist : Colin Ford : Cmdr PheonixDFire
Special Guest: Obsidian Ant


Show Notes:

  • Squadron Paint Packs added then pulled and then re-added 🙂

  • 2.1 Patch Notes

    • Loot
    • Engineers
    • Overhaul Feedback Cascade: Now rather than breaking the shields, will inhibit the shield cell to only heal 10% of what it otherwise would do, and will deal direct damage to the shield cell bank equal to half the weapon damage
    • Hyperspace is now much bigger to accommodate large ships —- WTF?!
    • What about moving to an already owned ship in the shipyard?
    • Need to look for this….
    • Makes scooping the stuff that drops ‘interesting’ since of course it’s falling to the ground!
    • New features in 2.1
      • Is loot the ‘materials’ that drop when you kill someone?
      • Data Materials and ‘Physical’ Materials
    • New Mission Board
      • “If there are no missions, give text which tells players what other things they could do to help”
    • New Outfitting Screen
    • Stuff to do in Ice Rings
      • Various Resource Zones
      • Bounty Hunting
    • Updates to the Galaxy Map
      • Bookmarks
      • (Known?) Engineer bases
      • Community Goals
      • Faction States
    • New Weapons
      • Huge Beam Laser
      • Huge Pulse Laser
      • Huge Multi Cannon
      • Large Mult Cannon
      • New art for our guns
    • Improved AI
      • So far Elite ships seem to want to run away when their shields go down, then come back in when they are back up. — Ben
      • Lots of complaints on the Forums that the AI has become too hard. I got a shock when my A rated FDL got owned by a Expert Python. Going to make the grind getting to Combat Elite a lot more difficult because only pilots above your rank and one below count towards your Pilot rating. – C.
    • XBox 1
      • Can now get skins from the store
      • Private Groups
    • Misc
      • “NPC encounters can occur near planet surfaces”
      • “Shipping lanes are created between the primary star, stations, and planets with settlements.”
      • Can scan nav beacons now – (Already done this – Very useful – C)
      • “Allow cargo to be transferred to a newly bought ship, if it has adequate cargo space”
    • Bug Fixes
      • What is “Fix Goliath crime component crash”?
      • “Change the default number of items per page in Exploration selling from 20 to 50 following from server-side optimisations that make this plausible”
      • “Added suspension travel prediction to SRV physics” — No idea what this means but it sounds awesome!
    • New (very valuable) stuff can be mined
  • 2.1.3 Patch Notes

  • 2.1 ‘Known Issues’

  • Beta Phases

  • Newsletter 123

    • “If you don’t already have beta access, Horizons owners can upgrade by visiting the Frontier store for only $9.99, €9.49, £6.99 or 562 Rubles.”
  • Beta Feedback Livestream

    • Mike Brookes has (MORE) info in newsletter
    • What is mayhem?
      • Unlock ‘all upgrades for modules’
      • All we need is fish to get them
      • Needed because lots of experimental effects that do crazy stuff… FD just can’t test EVERY combination. Need us to game the system and try to break things 🙂
    • Questions
      • How Does this benefit exploration
        • Better armor, hull so less damage etc
      • Can we see the Stats of a crafted upgrade
        • It’s in the list
      • Should Pirates be so interested in Limpets
        • NO
      • Pin > 1 recipe / engineer
        • Not for now
      • Reputer (spelling!) Laser (Heat through shields laser)
        • It should be working now!
        • Seem some ships going to 8000% heat which is a ‘bit op’ 🙂 Adding in Diminishing Returns from heat by multiple weapons but they don’t want to instantly boil you up if you avoid heat / use heat syncs etc.
      • AI Running away
        • Been fixed but not in yet
      • Why no enhanced thrusters in space
        • Engineers for Horizons only – 😛
      • Bookmarks
        • Sorting? Better sorting and filtering in the future…
      • Are all mods 1-5
        • Not ALL modules have ALL grades
        • Will be added to
        • Get off the fence and make a decision to buy or not buy!
      • In general higher ranks better modules
      • What works to improve your rep with engineers?
        • FD are looking into it, maybe using combat / bounty vouchers etc….
      • What does major fac rep have?
        • It acts as a modifier to all associated factions
      • Why no class 4 lasers
        • Coming ‘soon’ – hopefully!!!
      • Can we get large / huge missile racks?
        • Not at the moment – FD don’t want to give missiles LOADS more ammo
        • Please test missiles
      • Point Defence vs ECM
        • Point defence is where they want it
        • ECM needs work but they’re working on it no eta etc…
      • Will we give cannons a look?
        • YES Cannons will be getting a buff
          • Increased speed
          • Increased damage at distance
          • Increase ‘hardness’ i.e better vs large ships
          • Increase penetration – i.e. more dps to modules
      • More info on planet scans and stuff
        • Really cool ideas will be revisited later but Sandy can’t say 🙂
      • Why does the System map take so long to open?
        • Because it’s having to work out all the stars and planets
        • It’s a bug bear of Sandy’s too
      • Increase the speeds of mission boards? (I.E. pre load when you land)
        • Sandy will try to find out
      • Please give Single Skin for all types rather than multiple skins / ship
        • Not Sandy’s remit but valid question
      • Bookmarks infinite plotting bug
        • Sandy isn’t sure but will look into
      • Why can we enter any hanger in our SRV and then teleport to OUR hanger?
        • Because finding the right hanger is hard and NOT fun.
      • Sandy is a cat person 🙂
      • Will materials be added to commodity markets?
        • Some are
        • You can also get them from missions
      • Why is it called Recipes?
        • They will be renamed with something more appropriate!
      • Has the heat gen from firing weapons made it into CQC too?
        • Yes – but FD are watching it
      • Less Heat Sync makes it harder to use SCBs
        • Yes that’s deliberate
      • There is some method as to where you can find materials.
        • FD will add the ability to ‘interrogate’ materials to HELP find out where you can find them.
      • FD will ‘munge’ some of the lower resources to there’s not so many of them makes lower recipes easier
      • SRV Mods?
        • Not at the moment
      • NPCs using SRVs
        • Big work but not at the moment
      • AI Changes
        • Hope ppl think it’s better
        • Lower should be about same as b4
        • Higher should be harder
        • Should stop running away so much
        • FD are adding alternative behaviour to make it more fun
      • Drop out distance is based on how far from a grav well you are
      • Can we get smart collector limpets to discard some stuff
        • NO but it’s a good idea
      • Engineers further out
        • No comment
      • More syntheses recipes
        • Yes – chaff, heat sync etc
      • Collapse Mechanic in PP?
        • Sandy doesn’t know but it’s being looked at.
      • Engineer Qualifications are retroactive so we’ll have a bunch to look at when 2.1 hits. But rem some engineers invite you to others.
      • Engineer mod to increase limpets?
        • Not yet
      • Storage for modules?
        • Hopefully in season 2
      • Plasma Accelerator mods?
        • More coming

Community Corner

Lave Radio Episode 107

Engineers Base

Our Head of Station Entertainment takes us through technical difficulties, trumble attacks and all the recent Elite News as we prepare for Engineers!

Aired 3rd May 2016
Audio versions


Download the episode directly from here.


Crew Members

Station Commander : Chris Jarvis : Cmdr Thane
Head of Health and safety : Ben Moss Woodwood : Cmdr Eid LeWeise
Chief Archivist : Colin Ford : Cmdr PheonixDFire
Chief Barsteward: Grant Woolcott : Cmdr Psykokow


Show Notes:

Development News

  • On the Horizon – Countdown to The Engineers Beta Livestream: Part 3 with Mark Allen (Sr Programmer) and Sandy Samarco

  •  How an Engineer works

    • Gather stuff
    • Resources
      • Salvage
      • Data from scanning  (planets and beacons in space)
      • Mining
      • Materials have ‘context’, which should be obvious. I.E. Scan wakes may give you FSD ‘stuff’
      • Also from missions
      • We can swap commodities or sell them
    • Take it to engineer
    • Get Cool stuff
  • Looking to reduce the effectiveness of silent running

    • Less effective in prolonged combat
    • When you fire a weapon you will build a lot of heat if you are in silent running
    • Something with heat syncs ammo but missed what?!
  • 1 engineer is interested in long range travel. I.E. once you’ve gone a certain distance out they will contact you (or something!)
    • Then we need to ‘prove our worth’
  • Videos

    • Road to Beta – The Dweller Base Approach and WIP Crafting
      • Meeting an engineer
      • New docking voice
      • New docking bay
      • Engineers Workshop
      • Gambling
      • Design Decision – chance isn’t bad so long as it’s controlled. Not as random as ppl may think, quite constrained and still being tweaked.
      • Long Range Damage! (plus beam that helps you regen shields AFTER combat)
    • Road to Beta – Mass Lock Torpedo
      • A Modified Torpedo that stopped the ship from Escaping (Basically mass lock)
      • Currently only on torpedos
      • Torpedos are getting slower BUT much more dangerous
      • So better against bigger ships
    • Road to Beta – Shift Lock Canister
      • Mines
        • Clipper flies over and escaping T9 drops mine and forces the FSD to reboot
        • Kills flight assist so you’re tumbling in space
        • Ed emphasises that EVERYTHING NEEDS BALANCE
    • Road to Beta – Phasing Sequence Beam Laser
      • Phasing Sequence
        • Shoots through shields and causes hull damage!
        • Doesn’t cause module damage
  • Questions

    • Engineers bases are ‘all’ unique
    • Sandy doesn’t see why ‘Theorycrafting’ is dead since random is in ranges
    • Will Engineers Hate Other Engineers? Not Directly
    • Will some engineers be more difficult to rep with – yes. Harder engineers get more exciting ‘stuff’
    • Will we get specially modified shields?
      • Yes upgrade
      • No ‘special’ effects – at the moment being looked at
    • Will we get Ice Resource Extraction Sites?
      • Absolutely – lovely place to BH
    • Will ship manoeuvrability be enhanced?
      • Absolutely
    • Will Engineer Bases have Outfitting?
      • Yes – but limited stock
    • Ram Scans have been fixed by SJA 🙂
    • Explorer Mods
      • Increase Jump Range
      • Reduce Power
      • Loads more spoke too fast!
    • Will they be available to Power Play Modules?
      • Yes lots and lots of heat
    • Mine Love
      • Relatively small but VERY SCARY Special Effects
    • Is Engineered equipment as reliable as normal equipment?
      • They are JUST as reliable as normal stuff
    • Engineers will temporarily deny you if you piss them off
    • The base is a new icon in the galaxy map that we will see once it’s known
    • Upgrading an upgraded module – removes the existing upgrade
    • Will we see modified stuff on target ships?
      • Currently we can see modified but not what it is
    • Insurance replaces the modified component. So buy back gives you YOUR mod back
    • Engineers will use mods
    • High level AI will hurt and Sandy thinks they’ve succeeded….
      • Low level AI are less so kinda
      • Lots of bugs fixed
    • No module storage in 2.1 but something FD want to do and there are ways we can transfer modules between ships
    • Ship Transportation is coming too (with usual caveats)
    • SCB upgrades?
      • Most modules have recipes
      • More material storage
      • FD will see currently 300 stuff 100 data
    • Illegal Mods?
      • Currently no but good idea
    • Colourblind settings
      • Sandy doesn’t know
    • Ship Storage Hard limit > 29 ships in 1 station
      • It’s server side Mark doesn’t know
    • If we just bump into an engineer’s base (without an invite)  will they let us dock?
      • NO THEY WILL SHOOT YOU
    • We can now touch down gracefully without damaging our hull!
    • Can we influence the random chance? – i.e use ‘better than required stuff’
      • Not at the moment but maybe
    • Can we create blue prints
      • No – currently 54 recipes with 5 tiers
    • Changes to missiles
      • Inc damage to shields
      • Inc guidance
      • 95% hit rate against eagle
      • Hits hull deals damage + external module in blast radius
      • Doesn’t ‘hit’ cargo hatches
      • 1 Torp to an anaconda nuked the engines and the point defence
    • How will beta work?
      • Will be in phases
      • Phase 1 – Have access to ‘some things’ Start getting in touch with engineers, collecting resources etc.
      • Phase 2 – called ‘Mayhem’ – Try to make every have access to everything very cheap and GO WILD
        • FD Want us to do insane stuff and ‘break’ stuff 😀
        • Change log is fucking massive
    • Beta will be starting Thursday 5th May
      • MB says please be patient, Ed suggests taking Friday off 😉

 

  • Newsletter 122

  • XB1

    • Elite Dangerous: Horizons for Xbox One will launch in quarter two of 2016, featuring both 2.0: Planetary Landings and the forthcoming 2.1: The Engineers expansions.
  • Engineers

    • Descriptions of Engineers
    • Where to find Engineers
    • Engineers each have their own surface bases. These are quite different from surface starports. Many began as secret bases, embedded deep in the rock, but as their bases grew they became bigger and bolder, in some cases smelting their own ore – something very hard to hide from space!
    • How to ‘use’ an engineer
      • Make them like you.
      • The ore the like you the more stuff they offer to make. (Called Blueprints)
      • Get the Reagents
      • Make it – Actual attributes are random within a range.
      • Accept or Reject it and try again (assuming you have the resources)
    • What else?
      • As well as crafting upgrades, some have their own stock of specialist equipment, such as Professor Palin and his recent development of the corrosion resistant cargo racks that can safely carry the elusive alien artefact
  • More Engineer Mods

    • Phasing Sequence
      • Modulating Burst Fire System designed to defeat shielding. A small amount of thermal damage is able to bleed through shields and attack the target’s hull directly.
    • Emissive Munitions
    • Modified Warheads capable of enveloping a target with energetic particles. Successful strikes to shield or hull dramatically increase the target vessels signature.
      Example Video

Lave Radio Episode 104

Starting Line 2

 

Ben takes Grant and Jarvis through the past few weeks for news letters as well as the recent community events

Aired 12th April 2016
Audio versions


Download the episode directly from here.


Crew Members

Head of Health and safety : Ben Moss Woodwood : Cmdr Eid LeWeise
Head of entertainment/strong> : Chris Jarvis : Cmdr Thane
Chief Barsteward : Grant Woolcott : Cmdr Psykokow


Show Notes:

  • Development News
    • Frontier keeping mum’s the word…. Still in their 6 week ‘nothing to see here’ mode… (2.1 ETA ‘May’)
    • Oculus
  • Newsletter 117 + 118 + 119
    • 117
      • Engineers Concept Art – looks like outposts for planets – be nice too see more concrete info though
      • Lost Winds Bobbleheads £5 each, Toku, Deo and Notea
      • Orion HCS voice pack (featuring william shatner)
      • Winners in the Gladiator Challenge
        • The 2 x Premium Elite Dangerous goodie bags, including a cap, a beanie, three faction mugs, and signed artwork went to CMDR Mad Anthony Wayne and Gabriel Case.
        • The 2 x Elite Dangerous: Horizons Season passes were snapped up by Wayne Youngblood and Bozakir
        • And the 1 x Every paint job in the Elite Dangerous store went to the extremely lucky CMDR Nollywood.
    • 118
    • 119
      • Next week, the newsletter will be hosted on the Elite Dangerous Community Site rather than sent directly into your email inboxes
      • Join the Elite on the Background Sim Thursday 14th April 19:00 BST
  • In game news
  • Main Discussion – Elite Meet Discussion ?
  • Community Corner
    • New Streams involving Dave Hughes Elite Encounters RPG, demonstrating the Vehicle Combat System (ie. the ship to ship combat). https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IW8xm-MoEBo
    • The Rock Rats helping CMDR Frawd-Digger getting to Beagle Point in a non shielded Sidewinder!
    • Hutton Orbital Endurance Challenge
      • From Readdy’s Progress to Gooch’s Progress on the planet Cardinal in the Aparctias system a distance of 596km
      • 18 teams some individuals some teams of up to 6
      • ~ 50 ppl (54?)
      • Winner of both the Team and Solo challenges: in 5 hours!
        1 Team name: Team Mummy
        subhouse07 Team member 1: CMDR Brabston, Timmy
      • Amazing video of the “quick way” https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i3yuOkzc3b0
      • 2 Team Name: Redliners
        Player Group: Elite: Racers (ERF)
        Team member 1: [CMDR Deftin]
        Team member 2: [CMDR BlackMaze]
        Team member 3: [CMDR FierceFalcon]
        Team member 4: [CMDR Terrorsidic]
        Team member 5: [CMDR AlexRusich]
        Team member 6: [CMDR Rafi Long]
      • 3 Team Name: Cross Court
        Team member 1: Arsen Cross
        Team member 2: Jay See
      • 4 Team name: The Buckyball Racing Club
        Team member 1: Alec Turner
        Team member 2: Seneh
        Team member 3: Kliggish
        Team member 4: Ozric
        Team member 5: Furrycat
    • LAVECON 2016: please come to it.
    • Paladin Consortium Operation SRV A B C

Lave Radio Episode 103

New LR iTunes Cover

 

Allen Stroud conjures up a Re-animation spell to revive the DDF, but is it too late for this decrepit zombie to be of any use?

Aired 22nd March 2016
Audio versions


Download the episode directly from here.


Crew Members

Station Commander (Presenter): Allen Stroud : Cmdr Helaban Kel
Head of Health and safety : Ben Moss Woodwood : Cmdr EidLeWeiss
Head of station Archives : Colin Ford : Cmdr PhoniexDFire
Chief Barsteward : Grant Woolcott : Cmdr Psykokow


Show Notes:

Development News

  • Planet Coaster Alpha launches today – Released today
    • Advertise Lave Radio special stream for PC? – Alt Lave New Ad Hoc Show from the crew of the Orange Sidewinder that will focus on Movies, Video Games, Tv Shows, and Fiction. Indeed anything really that members of the crew feel is worthy of discussion outside the ED Universe. The first of these shows will focus around Planet Coast from Frontier Developments.

Newsletter 116

  • Community Goals will be available on the galaxy map.
  • Tracks on planets – Are they limited to your client, instance or are they permanent (probably not). How long until someone does a big tyre track penis and shares it on facebook? Grant Woolcott I am looking at you after last night!!!
  • New Utility slot type in Peek of the week?!
  • The Join the Elite Stream
    • Where Ed and Michael Brookes took people through how to do exploring, the necessary and helpful equipment required with hints and tips on how to explore showing there is more to exploring than HSJ (Honk, Scoop and Jump).
    • This thursdays’ stream is all about trading tips.
  • In game news
    • Poor  Ishmael Palin (the prominent Barnicle expert) so far has been attacked by pirates, kidnapped and finally rescued. However his bad luck has continued as he’s now contracted the  Cerberus Plague. You’d think someone has it in for him, he’s having so much bad luck. 😉
    • The campaign from the Canonn Interstellar Research Group to establish a new research outpost in the Col 285 Sector IX-T d3-43 system has been successful. A new outpost will be constructed ‘soon’ which will help with more research into the UA.
    • A rogue Farragut Battle Cruiser somewhere? There were reports last week of a Federal Battle Cruiser with Pirate markings in the LHS 3447.
    • Speaking of Farragut Battle Cruisers, the construction of the Latest Cruiser in the Beti Hydri system has the Empire worried. If more cruisers are constructed, sources close to Admiral Denton Patreus say that the empire might have to respond in kind.
    • In response to the New Battle Cruiser and rhetoric coming from the Empire; the Alliance has held a diplomatic summit at the Alliance Capital looking at possible responses.

Main Discussion – DDF Lazerus

  • Default In-game choices to be made by the DDF
  • “It’s been a long time, but we are finally able to move towards some of the things we discussed during the Kickstarter with respect to the DDF and the ability of members to decide together on significant actions within the game. There are some big events coming to the game later this year (in relation to an alien species – trying to minimise spoilers here!), and members will decide where these events first take place, and how the process moves on down the line. This will be by voting on the DDF forum with a choice of possible locations. As the events unfold, there will be further such choices going forwards.”

Community Corner

  • Allen’s Stroud AMA. –  A lot of questions about a possible sequel to Lave Revolution.
  • Mobius AMA – Erm… started off ok but then became a slagging match between people of the opinion that solo or private groups ruin community goals, powerplay etc and those that don’t.
  • Elite Racers who have their subreddit if you want to get along
    • Really impressed with the Imperial couriers’ canyon run. (Beggers Canyon anyone). Someone will have to do on in the fastest ship (Isn’t that a viper?) and see what’s that like.

Lave Radio Episode 102

Lego SRVThe show dives into virtual reality and the health and safety of LOOOOOOOOOONGGGG streams

Aired 15th March 2016
Audio versions


Download the episode directly from here.


Crew Members

Head of Entertainments : Chris Jarvis : Cmdr thane
Head of Health and safety : Ben Moss Woodwood : Cmdr EidLeWeiss
Head of station Archives : Colin Ford : Cmdr PhoniexDFire
VR Expert and all round ‘nice guy’ : Cmdr Snuffler


Show Notes:

  • Development News
    • Join the Elite: Everything You Need to Know About Community Goals with Steve Kirby
    • Zac — Support update – Reiteration of player harassment rules
    • Planet Coaster has a date of Tuesday 22nd March for Alpha backers
    • PowerPlay : Sandro on Collusion Piracy and More
      • Doesn’t Like it BUT Recognises it’s a useful tool
      • Wants to introduce effects to degrade Collusion Piracy (current options)
        • Creating a voting system to allow Commanders, by the act of majority will, to withdraw from poor control systems, ensuring mechanisms are in place to prevent profitable systems from being voted out.
        • Utilising an UP / DOWN vote feature, which would exist primarily to be a channel of communication within the game for pledged Commanders) to also provide veto functionality at the preparation stage, allowing, by the act of majority will, poor control system candidates from being purchased as expansion targets.
        • Introducing a combo mechanism for fortification allotments, limiting the purchase of rushed allotments based on successful deliveries – the more you deliver the more you can pay to rush – whilst adding temporary fortification disbarring for losing fortification commodities.
    • Power Play : Sandro on ‘open bonus’
      • Sandro – “And since I’m in the mood for pulling hand grenades , here’s another thing to chew on: I’m currently rather taken by the concept of a success multiplier for Commanders in Open Play. this modifier would not improve personal gains from power play activities, but it would magnify the effectiveness of a power’s actions (expand, oppose, fortify, undermine). And the effect would probably be significant.
      • Power Play by design encourages player interaction and FD want to encourage that. “Powerplay will always be at its best when opposing Commanders interact directly”
  • Newsletter 115
  • Main Discussion
    • VR News 
    • Ian Honcharenko — “Question for the team: With the rise in popularity of 24hr charity streams and the advertising in the newsletter last week of a race requiring approximately 38 hours commuted flight time in a 2 day period, I put the question to you should frontier be promoting such events despite the inherent health risks and chance of negative press (such as the numerous game addiction articles in both professional medical journals and less professional tabloid newspapers).I’d just add that last year’s Voyager winner did it in 40 hours with a 2 hr nap.”
      • From the newsletter— Probably one of the craziest endurance challenges in the galaxy, the 2nd Annual Voyager Challenge kicks off on March 24, 2016. Head over to the original forum post to find out how you can get involved.

        Can you make 60,000 light years in under 40 hours? According to event organisers, last year’s record was an incredible 38 hours, 44 minutes!

        It’ll take some doing, but we know that there must be some Commanders out there with the tenacity to get this done!

        Remember, fly safe Commanders! Make sure you take regular breaks, look after yourselves and be sensible with any long play sessions.
      • Also worth working in the Hutton Orbital Gimp run with the race to Sag A
      • Also arguably FD’s original race to Elite and what the guy to get the Triple did to win that
      • 24 hour streams – a good/bad thing to encourage?
  • Community Corner
  • Questions
    • MonkeyBones asks – Which is a more valuable asset, an A5+ fuel scoop or a REALLY BIG GAS TANK? (For the record, after a year or so with a RBGT I have finally switched to a B6 Fuel Scoop. It is SO fast, but it still makes me nervous that I will get stuck out of fuel in a brown dwarf desert.) Shameless Plug for the REALLY BIG GAS TANK Methinks
    • CMDR Smugallo – Id love to hear the cast each try an impression of someone not a discussion i know hahaj.
      • Ben failed and everyone else wimped out. 🙂

Lave Radio Episode 101

New LR iTunes Cover

We’re on a mission from Chalker Landing to Lave to deliver blood crystals and help Lave Radio Network complete their Community goal… fancy coming along?

A Special Convoy episode to tickle your fancy with sprinklings of Dev News, newsletters and discussion on the announced Delay to Horizons 2.1

Aired 8th March 2016
Audio versions


Download the episode directly from here.


Crew Members

Host & 2nd Technician : Chris Forrester : Cmdr Fozza
Head of Entertainments : Chris Jarvis : Cmdr thane
Head of Health and safety : Ben Moss Woodwood : Cmdr EidLeWeiss
Head of station Archives : Colin Ford : Cmdr PhoniexDFire
Chief Bar steward : Grant Woolcott : Cmdr Psykokow


Show Notes:

  • Development News
    • Newsletter 114
      • Galaxy Map Bookmarks
        We can rename them, plot routes to them
      • ED 2.1 Delayed (see main topic)
      • Elite Dangerous 3D Printed Models
        • Eucl3D have created full-colour, 3D-printed sandstone models of some of your favourite Elite Dangerous ships. Prices for the models start at $29.99 – head over to Eucl3D’s website to get a glimpse of the Viper, the Anaconda and the Cobra.

          Eucl3D are going to be taking part in an AMA on the Elite Dangerous subreddit on Friday 11 March at 7PM GMT. So get your 3D printing-related questions ready!
      • Join the Elite
    • Dev Update
      • Consequences and Rewards
        • Improve BGS Communication
          • “With minor faction states we’re intending making their effects more noticeable on available missions, ship traffic and composition, and markets. At the moment these can be quite subtle, so beefing them up with add more drama to a star system.”
          • “authority response if they are attacked will be sharper.”
        • Wider range of rewards than just credits
          • Treasure Locations
          • Materials
          • Hard to find commodities / salvage items
            • Some may be mission rewards only and could tie into story events
        • Rewards will be more appropriate to the risk.
        • Rewards will also increase the more a faction likes you.
      • Cockpit gets a clock!
    • New paint job packs for the Imperial Courier and the Type 6
    • Naming ‘things’ in game being added to the Store
      • This week we want to share with you something we’ve been thinking about for some time, in response to the many requests we’ve had since the Kickstarter.

        Naming NPCs, renaming planets and even having a named surface marker to commemorate a special person, thing or event, are all things you’ve been asking for. We are considering adding these items and more to the Frontier Store, including star system naming and creation and naming of new surface starports. We would love to know your opinion on this, and gauge interest.

        In order to keep these items special we would limit the availability of each, and if it works well, we would have a batch in each future expansion too.
      • Arubeto – “Really? This is open to discussion? Guess we won’t be visiting “Sagittarius A*” anymore…”
      • Zac“Allow me to clarify. Everyone is very conscious about making sure that the naming of things are done in a way that does not ruin existing names. What I mean to say is that we want your feedback here to make sure that we consider everything, so even if things seem obvious, let us know your thoughts on what you would like or wouldn’t like as part of this process. We’ve seen some really great feedback already”
    • Trailer Competition – The winner has been announced for the trailer competition. Commander NOTONLYHERE came up with a blinder including timed delay shots of cities, coordinated ship launches, SRV races etc. The trailer can be found at :- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cF4qln6-qUw
    • Main story “The furor surrounding FD’s delay of 2.1 and recent stock exchange news”
      • 2nd March Press Release http://www.londonstockexchange.com/exchange/news/market-news/market-news-detail/FDEV/12719733.html
      • Translation from Finance Speak to Real Speak from Cmdr GTuk
        • 2.1 Engineers is was scheduled for release in April. “Release date?” “Not that we’re talking about just yet.”
        • Accounting-wise, Horizons will now “leave early access” and be considered “released” after 31st May.
        • Accounting-wise, revenue from the sales of Horizons will be deferred to FY2016-2017’s financials (starting June 1st), instead of being included in FY2015-2016’s financials (which ends May 31st).
        • FDev will pay less tax in FY2015-2016, choosing instead to pay more the following year.
      • Comment from DB
        “What it means is that 2.1 is pushed out by around 6 weeks. This is to push the quality up, which is a good thing for the game. It’s ready when it’s ready. It does mean you’ll have to wait a bit longer, but it will be worth the wait.”
      • Post by Zac
        Hey guys,
        This morning we released a trading update that we wanted to share with you.
        The update explains that our next instalment of the Horizons season of expansions (2.1 – The Engineers) which was previously planned for April will now move into the beginning of our next financial year. We’re aiming for to release the beta in May.
        We’re sorry to keep you waiting, but the Engineers is a truly colossal update and this additional time is being used to ensure that the new content is of the highest quality possible. We take great pride in all of the content we produce and we firmly believe that giving this additional development time is the right thing to do for the game, the studio and the fantastic community of players.
        You can read the update here: http://www.frontier.co.uk/investor_r…l=edit&blk=275
        Thanks,
        Zac

Lave Radio Episode 100

laveradio-cover

Join us on an amazing celebration of 100 episodes of the Lave Radio podcast, tonight we are going to recall our favourite moments from the last 3 years, take a look at all the things that have happened and also recall some of the features that have yet to make it to the game.  Then we turn our gaze forward to bring you the very best in speculation on what the future holds.

It’s a bumper episode so make sure you have your kettle handy, or that you have indeed been to the loo before hand.

Did I mention the interview with David Braben?

Aired 1st March 2016
Audio versions


Download the episode directly from here.


Crew Members

Host & 2nd Technician : Chris Forrester : Cmdr Fozza
Station Commander : Allen Stroud : Cmdr Heldaban Kel
Head of Security : Lisa Trott : Cmdr Voo
Head of Entertainments : Chris Jarvis : Cmdr thane
Head of Health and safety : Ben Moss Woodwood : Cmdr EidLeWeiss
Head of station Archives : Colin Ford : Cmdr PhoniexDFire
Chief Bar steward : Grant Woolcott : Cmdr Psykokow
Head of operations Lave Station : John Stabler : Cmd Glyndwrr)
Head of Station Security : Lisa Voo : Cmdr Voo


Show Notes:

Announce Minor Faction, big thank you to Frontier
Lave Radio Network is now an in game faction in the Lave System
lave minor factions

Quick Natter

  • Each crew member’s stand out moment from the history of Lave Radio
  • First David Braben Interview segment (15 mins)

Discussion 1 – The Present Horizons so far and current community Buzz

  • Current state of ED/LR.
  • Minor Faction
  • CG (starts Thursday!)
  • Favourite stuff to do in-game
  • Community events
  • Elitemeet 2016
  • LaveCon 2016
  • Play Runes of Anarchy in the LAN competition
  • All attendees get a link to John’s latest game to play. Help stress test it over the weekend.
  • Second David Braben Interview segment (18 mins)

 

Discussion 2 – The Past Kickstarter, Alpha, Beta, Launch Party, Season 1

  • What did ED get right, straight off the bat?
  • What is still a Work in progress?
  • Ideas we had that didn’t work for us?
  • Favourite memories from LaveCon?
  • Elitemeet 2016
  • Past of ED/LR? Some nostalgia and looking back
  • LaveCon 2016
  • Play Runes of Anarchy in the LAN competition at Lavecon 2016
  • Final David Braben Interview segment (10 mins)

 

Discussion 3 – The Future – Wild Speculation and wrap up

  • The future of ED/Lave Radio/Lavecon?
  • The Real Orange Sidewinder! – An in game asset that spams local chat with quotes from the podcast.
  • Major shoutouts for those who have helped us:
  • Thank all those that took the time to record and send in a message
  • Thank everybody that has supported the show from behind the scenes Karen for all the extra work she does with Lavecon but also all our better halfs, Hannah, Suzi , Mel, Amy, Claire  and Alison and James !
  • Community Shoutouts

 

Lave Radio Episode 99

SDCvsMobius

The Blood is in the air tonight as we play host to both the Mobius Group and The Smiling Dog Crew. We try to get the facts about the recent storm in a teacup between the two groups and hear about if you’re going to be the bad guy, then BE the bad guy.

Aired 23rd February 2016
Audio versions


Download the episode directly from here.

Show Notes:

  • Dev Update 18th February
    • More Missions at neutral rep
    • Higher rep means more missions and better money
    • Remove the rank requirement, Rank now implies the difficulty of the mission
    • State of the minor faction
    • Type(s) of market for that port
    • Government
  • Better feedback for what that mission will do to the BGS
  • Galactic Academy
    “It’s a frontier thing, but not possible without the incredible community. We have a group of mentors that have signed up (volunteers) and they are on Teamspeak and Discord and we will be emailing all our players with low play time and then all new players every week with details about the academy. It’s a landing page with user guides, videos and most importantly ways to connect straight up with our volunteer mentors. They consist of ambassadors, mods, group representatives and other specialists. It’s about teaching players and hand holding them where needs into basic things like the galaxy map, making a credit or two, etc”
  • Reduce the barrier for entry for ‘alternative mission flows’ I.E. you won’t have to drop out of supercruise to get an alternative.
  • USS for missions will generally be at a specific body in a system rather than random
  • Nav Beacons can be scanned to give system information!
  • Systems will now have traffic lanes and hubs and these affect the creation of USS. Also USS are created spatially not temporally, so you can’t just sit there and wait for them,
  • USS can be scanned to reveal information about them.
    • “This week’s dev update is the penultimate update “ Hmmm so 25/2 for last 2.1 update. Can we speculate Alpha early March?
    • Improving Variety
    • 3 stage hierarchy for generating missions
  • Capitol in Achenar to get some actual Land!
  • New Sets of Anaconda skins. The empire people are very happy with the white one. 😉
  • Announcement via Zac:
    • Galactic Academy
      “It’s a frontier thing, but not possible without the incredible community. We have a group of mentors that have signed up (volunteers) and they are on Teamspeak and Discord and we will be emailing all our players with low play time and then all new players every week with details about the academy. It’s a landing page with user guides, videos and most importantly ways to connect straight up with our volunteer mentors. They consist of ambassadors, mods, group representatives and other specialists. It’s about teaching players and hand holding them where needs into basic things like the galaxy map, making a credit or two, etc”
  • Newsletter 112
  • Not Only Here wins FD’s Horizons Video competition
  • Distant Worlds Set some records at Sag A
  • CQC Mayhem – LOADS of streaming
    • If you see FDEV Rhino, FDEV Jet or FDEV Wolf in CQC, then take a screenshot of you playing against them and email it to community@frontier.co.uk with the subject line ‘CQC Gladiators’
  • Educating Ed Episode 13 – UGC Thursday 25th 19:00 (GMT)
  • Community Corner
  • Questions
    • We are a small player faction, known as NULL,  here to help others with donations for lost ships due to lack of insurance as well as new players getting their footing, and an escort service for traders and returning explorers.  And we are now under threat of being steam rollered by Winters PP faction.  We need help, as our currently limited resources are running low.
      Any Alliance commanders listening in please ship prep agreements to DR Crucis.
      Any NON-Winters aligned players, please undermine them to assist us staying independent, and here to help others.
      NULL needs your help, to ensure our BANK deposits here for others remains available and open for business.
      Thank you CMDR NULL
  • Shoutouts
    • Massive thank you to those people that have already sent us message of congratulations to play out on next week’s 100th episode. If you would like to send us a message to play out on the show please record a short mp3 and send it to info@laveradio.com with the subject 100th.
      Everybody that does gets a little thank you in the post from the crew.Hi guys, any chance of a shoutout on tomorrow nights show for the Wasat Cup, a
      50km, point-to-point SRV race from Elwood Camp to Ferguson Prospect on Wasat A2
      E organised by the Buckyball Racing Club. You can run it any time you like (and
      as many times as you like) from 23rd-25th February using screenshots to capture
      your start and end times.Takes around 30mins … if you’re fast. Well? Are you fast?? Come along and
      prove it then!

      Search the forums for “The Wasat Cup – Buggyball”

      https://forums.frontier.co.uk/showthread.php?t=234304

      There’s a free pint in it for you at Lavecon 2016 🙂

Lave Radio Episode 98

elite arena

 

The Speculation Engine is in full gear, what do we think we will see in 2.4?

Aired 16th February 2016
Audio versions


Download the episode directly from here.

Show Notes:

    • Introductions Fozza / Jarvis hit Frontier Towers
    • Development News
      • Newsletter #111
      • Elite Horizons 2.0.0.6 released today – Lot of CQC fixes, a couple of smaller fixes to the main game – https://forums.frontier.co.uk/showthread.php?t=232819
        • Although this item does stand out –  i Sola Prospect in the Brestla star system now always stocks all ships and modules
        • Sadly does not fix forming Squads for CQC – it’s still a large unsorted list!

 

  • CQC Mayhem will run for four weeks, beginning on Tuesday February 16 and ending on Tuesday March 15 . Take part in intense PVP action in custom-built arenas set within the Elite Dangerous galaxy. Equip a unique loadout on your craft and earn XP to unlock new weapons, modules and abilities. Simply select Start and then CQC from the main menu in Elite Dangerous or Elite Dangerous: Horizons to get started.

 

Quick Overview

Fly agile fighters and go head-to-head against the galaxy’s greatest pilots in PVP dogfights – easy to pick up controls reward your skills with more to master for the ultimate combat edge. Choose your ship, customise your loadout and prepare for instant Arena-based action to earn the right to be called Elite.

 

Please note: All customers who buy Elite Dangerous: Arena from the Frontier Store will receive a discount equal to their original purchase price, when upgrading to either Elite Dangerous or the Elite Dangerous: Deluxe Edition.

 

    • David Braben talks to PC Gamer about Elite : Arena
      • http://www.pcgamer.com/david-braben-on-arena-and-the-future-of-elite-dangerous/
  • Dev Update Michael Brookes – Leading on from last week’s “Personalisation” with this week’s “Progression” –
    • 5 Levels of rep with minor faction Hated, Disliked, Neutral, Liked, Allied with a new one being added between Neutral and Liked
    • Rewarded with in game rewards but also within the narrative, Maybe your contact saying well done your rep has increased with us.
    • Mission givers change as you progress up or down the ranks.
    • Mission givers express what affects the success or failure of that mission has on their minor faction.
    • Last week I mentioned that we had some more huge weapons coming, but without providing any details, so we have huge beam and pulse laser and multi-cannons being added. There will also be a new large multi-cannon.
    • Topic of the week – Wild Speculation – What is 2.4 Update ?
      • Jason Carthes (facebook) this is what 2.4 gonna be about (walking fpv)  but just in our ships as a teaser for the new season 3.0. My guess
      • Invasion?

 

  • Community Corner
    • OOgie Boogie PvP League Advert – In Episode 98 Folder
    • Emperors Disgrace? Chased out of home system, challenged with 1 month to regain control.
      • https://www.reddit.com/r/EliteDangerous/comments/45x2nt/triple_elite_group_emperors_grace_no_longer/
        • Have contact EG for a reaction.
        • EG – Triple Elite Status Player Group (means they have the ear of the devs)
        • Home system Novas flipped by Diamond Frogs
        • Large population therefore took a month to flip
        • one or two wings of three doing activity daily for a month to flip, no response at any point from EG
        • Kermit “Big Frog” Laphroaig reporting on Reddit gives EG a month unhindered access to reset the system because EG and the Frogs go way back.
    • https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XE7WPstMzsM – Proper gravity exists. An orbit of Enceladus with engines off. (Thanks for Kerash for that one)
    • Latest Update on the RPG and the Tabletop game – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=On_wmRhGCR0