 In May 2022 Frontier published a top level roadmap for Elite's future development that alongside the narrative updates we've now seen to the game also promised what they called a key feature overhaul in early 2023. In this video I'll go over what I think are likely the key candidate features for that overhaul and why. You know by now how this bit goes. If you enjoy our videos please do hit the thumbs up, subscribe and ding the little bell so you don't miss any of our Elite Dangerous content and to directly support our work here at the pit you can also join our Patreon community. Links to that and everything else are below. When discussing the mysterious key feature that Frontier spoke of there could of course be any number of candidate features within Elite Dangerous being referenced. If you ask any six commanders what features they think Frontier are overhauling you'll likely get six perfectly legitimate but all very different answers. Where possible I've tried to gather some small pieces of evidence or clues that might lead me to think one way or another and I've then filtered them out to see what I think the most three likely candidates are. With that said then and in no particular order. Number 1 CQC If you were a new player coming into the game you could be forgiven for not even knowing that Elite's answer to fast paced enclosed map deathmatch, team deathmatch or capture the flag even existed. If you didn't know it existed and I told you to go digging around in the games front menu looking for it you wouldn't even find a mention of it. Close quarters combat or the CQC championships as it's called on screen if you manage to find it is actually referred to on the menu selection before you enter the main game as Arena. You can since the launch of fleet carriers queue for an arena match from within the cockpit of your ship except here it's called CQC and not Arena. With me so far CQC has had a long and rather tortured history becoming an optional stand alone client on PC and consoles as well as an option from the main menu before that stand alone client was itself pulled due to lack of engagement from the player base with the match centric game mode returning to the main game client option only. Across all of that history however the CQC arena mode has remained largely unchanged. As I've mentioned if you're unfamiliar with the CQC arena it's a fighters and small ships only match based deathmatch team deathmatch and capture the flag option that is brace yourself really really good fun like really good fun but almost no one outside of a hardcore dedicated sub community of Elite Dangerous plays it with any regularity. The reasons no one plays it are both complex and simple being a match based game it requires opponents to queue for the game in a lobby in order for matches to be set up outside of an organized CQC session generally speaking if no one is queuing for a match then no one else queues for it and the vicious self-reinforcing cycle of not queuing because no one else is queuing continues ensuring there are no queues. Away from the queue issue there's no way to guarantee that you'll only end up in a match with for example just friends or just players of a similar level of ability meaning as you'd expect you may struggle to play with your friends or if you're new you'll likely get your pants roundly handed to you over and over again by someone who isn't new to the game thereby ensuring that you never queue again. There have been multiple threads on the official forums pleading with Frontier to revisit the arena idea. Adding it as an option in the main copy is definitely a step in the right direction and with a few other tweaks and improvements like adding bots as an option and closed private group play etc for example it's very easy to see how the mode could be brought more into the mainstream of Elite Dangerous and even become a tidy gateway drug to entice new players into the main game. If Frontier were to revisit the arena idea in modern times it seems unlikely they would do so without also including the on foot portion of the game as well. In fact I've commented on a number of occasions on this very channel that the current on foot conflict zone offering has a very enclosed deathmatch feel to it more than it does an armed struggle to control an asset in a system. I'd love to think Frontier were going to revisit CQC but honestly having taken a lengthy run at it already from the developers and designers perspective it's going to be a significant uphill struggle to convince the executives holding the purse strings that such an underused existing feature is worth spending money on. If that is indeed the case that's a crying shame as I'm not sure those same executives realise quite what an awesome feature they are so very very close to nearly having. Number 2 Power Play Imagine you're a new player to Elite Dangerous you're faced with a gigantic seemingly overwhelming learning cliff to scale and then someone suggests you go and look at Power Play. I guarantee you some folks listening to my voice now who have been playing Elite for multiple years won't know what Power Play is and if they do know what it is they won't know what it's for or even better when asked the question what is it for they'll reply it's what you do to get prismatic shields and packhound missiles. I've been playing Elite Dangerous since its launch as a beta product following the kick starter around 10 years ago and I'm not sure what it's really for or why I would want to participate in it outside of obtaining packhounds and prismatics and every time I do go to participate for the aforementioned kit acquisition purposes I end up shuttling meaningless things from point A to point B after staring at a weird map for a few minutes. For the uninitiated Power Play is an in-game system that allows you to pledge your allegiance to one of the galaxy's super power figureheads like Aisling Duval, Edmund Mahon or the T-1000 from Terminator 2. Once pledged you can perform actions on behalf of those powers that will affect the ebb and flow of influence they have enabling the acquisition of star systems to their respective banners. In return through a somewhat strangulated process you can earn the right to buy kit for your ships that can't be obtained from anywhere else. The kit is only available from specific power players meaning if you want it all you need to pick up and drop allegiances left and right making said allegiances largely meaningless. Think of it as background simulation turf wars on super power scales with prizes. There are folks whose entire game is Power Play outside of the kit acquisition mechanic but I think it's fair to say that they're probably in the minority. Power Play has fantastic storytelling potential it's almost completely player driven and as such is something hugely unique to Elite Dangerous and it should be a massive draw to the game but in its current incarnation its very presence is obfuscated, its inner workings a mystery without some lengthy forum reading and its longer term benefits to the more casual player difficult to decipher. There are some movements story-wise from the power players themselves currently that has me wondering if changes to Power Play are on the cards. The T-1000's position at the top of the Federation for example is about to be challenged by space Rockefeller in an election in June this year. Also as I've mentioned before on this channel the artist formerly known as D2 so Jin A surgically altered by salvation and his goons now has the ability to commune with the Thargoids on some level. She is now off on her own doing who knows what and I'm still not yet convinced she isn't going to return with a legion of Thargoid drones in tow to establish herself as a power in the bubble for the Thargod cultists to flock to. Likewise giving those players that want some sort of non-killy option for Thargoid engagement a banner to fly under. Frontier have presumably got a long-term reason for a character in their lore to be Dr. Dolittle but for Thargoids and a solid argument can be made looking at the war map currently that the Thargoids are indeed already a power just without a figurehead that also speaks a galactic standard language and doesn't spew caustic goop. If Evdev has other plans for her which is of course totally a possibility then they are currently obscured. Number three then in November of 2021 Frontier put out a focused feedback request with regard to all things tied to ship engineering. The feedback was duly offered and gathered and indeed acknowledged by Frontier but the last time a review of all things engineering was meaningfully mentioned by Frontier was December of 2021. Ship engineering and specifically the gathering of the materials needed to facilitate that engineering is one of the biggest bugbears that is continually raised by the community with the word grind being thrown around quite liberally. Ship engineering is also of the three things I've mentioned the one thing that probably touches the most players. If the decision at Frontier on what to overhaul was based solely on bang for your buck I'd imagine ship engineering issues would have to be right up there near the top of the list. If I was forced to pick a personal favorite of the three things I've listed here and a thing of the three that I thought it most likely to be the subject of a revamp it would be ship engineering. Just to be clear however and it's important to note that this in particular is a very personal perspective it's not so much a case that ship engineering itself needs a revamp. Personally I quite like the way it works for me however the sticking point and the single reason I don't engage with it more is the acquisition of materials and if Frontier were to take a run at overhauling engineering it's this area that I think they may be able to affect large changes quite easily and see large changes as a result. It's already possible to acquire fairly large swathes of certain materials as part of running missions in the Thargoid war and with judicious use of the material trader network I can see how it would be possible to add a few more materials as mission rewards overall and then encourage players to use the mat traders to get what they need. Ultimately rather ironically my personal leaning toward engineering as a candidate feature is due to my relative level of engagement with that feature when compared with CQC or Powerplay and the reason I don't engage more with CQC or Powerplay is likely because they would in fact benefit most from an overhaul that would encourage increased engagement. I do just want to give an honorable mention to exobiology as well in the days of the Odyssey Alpha test exo bio had a mini game associated with the plant scanner that it was widely felt had no place being in Elite Dangerous so loudly and enthusiastically was the feeling expressed that F Dev stripped out the whole thing before Odyssey launched but they did at the time promise to return to the game loop. When Odyssey launched quite a lot of dust needed to settle from Odyssey itself before dev efforts could be justified returning to the plant scanning gameplay. I'm not convinced that the plant scanning mechanic as is really needs further development efforts but it would be nice to see exo bio fleshed out a bit more in some fashion to add more depth and options to it. I really don't think that is on F Dev's radar right now however. What key feature do you think Frontier are planning on overhauling? What key feature would you like them to overhaul and just when do you think that overhaul will arrive? Let us know in the comments below. That's it for now. Thanks very much for watching. If you enjoyed this video consider subscribing to the channel and maybe take a look at one of our other videos linked on screen right now.