This video covers the story of the ECS Constant, the unidentified ship floating in orbit above Porrima II in Starfield. The majority of this content comes from the mission “First Contact”. X: / gamingwithmaps Patreon: / icartographer
I love that it felt like a combination of Fallout with the ship functioning as a Vault of sorts to help humanity survive a coming apocalypse and as a Star Trek reference in a way with the crew of the Constant wearing Starfleet-styled uniforms with the departments even lining up nicely to TNG-era Trek: the captain in red, the security team in yellow, the medical team in blue.
Not just that: the Captain reminded me a lot of a younger Captain Janeway. I dropped _Voyager_ early in its run, but I understand Janeway became quite ruthless in later episodes… I also can’t help but see a lot of the _Battlestar Galactica_ in the ship’s design and mission…
Would've been great if they called it the "VT Constant".....like....Vault Tech...and had everyone wearing blue and yellow suits. As a nod to the Fallout team.
I was highly annoyed to find objects inside that ship that belong to the current era, like the little smart egg thing. The devs really should have been more careful
I just wish there was a larger variety in interior designs, this ship is 200 years old but looks basically as advanced as current day ships on the inside. Though, a lot of ships are still using nova galactic parts even though that company no longer exists.
If you do the main quest and visit a nasa space ship construction yard you can find an underground museum showing that on earth tech was already available.
@@thefaceless6406 Nova Galactic Shipyards right? Yeah, I went there and was surprised how modern it felt. I just figured that ships and stations made in the 2300s would be more advanced feeling than those made in the 2100s. But then again it's a piece of fiction so if tech still looks similar that's fine. (I should be used to it since I'm a Halo fan and a lot of UNSC equipment was designed or deployed a century or two before the games happen.)
@@DerCharacter I rationalize the lack of variety in products and ship sets because of how stagnant the starship tech probably is. In our modern sense, every plane we see nowadays, from every company, is basically the same designed plane but with more modern features. Because that design was already the best it could be feasibly achieved. The same goes for spaceship designs or corporate products like chunks lol A dialogue in how technology changes our world. It does so fast and swiftly but periods of stagnation in between as intellect pursues refinement rather than true radical innovation
I like the idea of that quest but I am also annoyed that there are no skill checks to negotiate a better deal for the settlers with the board. Also it is quiet ironic that there is an option to make the ship disappear but not an option to make the resort disappear. Also the members of the board are immortals.
Yeah I thought the quest was real cool at first, but as somebody who was pretty late to the gaming world, this is my first Bethesda game, and I quickly found myself annoyed with the jumping back and forth between the ship and the board room. We don’t have a radio contact to the people on porrima???? But I got slightly annoyed, and ended up blowing up the ship, trying to extort extra money out of the board, which did not work, so I attempted to murder them, only to begin a huge gunfight, that followed me through multiple systems
@@Captain_YogurtA lot of Bethesda writing involves situations solvable through just communication. This typically means you have to be the one communicating as you are the problem solver. Unfortunately this also means people have to bizarrely incapable of just having a radio or a telephone or anything.
Maybe it's discussed during the quest, but it amazes me that the crew of the Constant aren't _absolutely furious_ that this was their first contact with FTL-capable humanity. The Constant had spent the past 190+ years on the voyage - only to find that about 180 of those years of paralyzing boredom and harrowing sacrifice were completely unnecessary. The Constant's mission or flight plan couldn't have been a secret, given how the expedition involved such a huge investment, had such a grand scale for the time, and how the original Brackenridge had made legal headlines by filing to claim the destination planet for the colonists. Presumably, anyone with a gravity drive (and the navigation system needed to make FTL useful) could have set up some sort of interception mission to let the crew of the Constant know they wouldn't need to spend the next ten generations sealed in a relativistic tin can. Again, I haven't played the game yet, so maybe this is addressed. I can think of a few possibilities. Maybe the Constant's boost phase was hard-wired, and overriding it to slow back down that early would have overstressed the ship's design. Maybe the Constant's ten years of acceleration by the time the gravity drive was invented meant the ship was already booking it too fast for an interception mission to match non-FTL speeds with the colony ship. Maybe the colonists the MC meets see the previous generations as a sunk cost and just aren't worried about it. ...Or maybe it's simply that the culture shock hasn't worn off yet, and the Constant's crew have some ticking time-bombs among them as that realization sets in.
Just did this quest and found it a little disappointing. They seemed really determined to use this planet and the captain felt a sense of ownership over it, but when I decided they should get a grav drive they didn’t fight it and I didn’t even have to do a persuasion check they like already knew and were chill and excited for some reason which didn’t make sense and I would have atleast liked to have tried convincing them to change the plans they’ve had for 200 years. Felt very strange to not flesh out this very interesting quest idea
It took them 200 years just to reach the system, that's why they're so intent on settling Porrima II, because their ship is so old it'll take another generation to reach anywhere else. Grav Drive? They can be in a system with a habitable planet in ten seconds. I think given that option, it's a fairly easy one for them to accept.
It's because they really didn't have a choice, giving them a grav drive was their best choice and they knew it. Also they really have no claim over the planet in any way. It was honestly sort of funny that they thought they did. Not only were they incredibly late to the whole human space travel, the captain tried to claim they had a deed from back on earth for Paradiso. 😂😂like come on now how are you gonna write a deed for another planet and think someone would honor it if you didn't get there first ,shit was comical
@@hoopla5502 i did half expect a optional mission to go find this deed on earth to force paradisos hand to allow them to settle down on the planet freely, they really avoided the whole subject of earth on this mission and it really got on my nerves....
@Nick871203 I mean even if they did though it would be crazy to expect anyone for actually honor that deed. I mean not only had No one set foot on the planet so there's really no claim , not to mention its a deed following earth's rules, that don't apply on Paradiso. They really have no claim . Would have been an interesting addition to the quest though
You do get to bump into the ship again later, but you don't see them colonize anywhere, at least, not from what I've seen. In my playthrough, I chose the option to outfit their ship with an old Grav Drive, and after I left them, the game updated my quest log to basically tell me I could go and visit them again and showed me whereabouts they had gone. The funny thing is, the system they'd jumped to was a dangerous level 55 system (way above my level) that *I couldn't even jump to myself* because my ship wasn't upgraded enough to make the journey. Like, how have these people, with their old ass ship and rickety old Grav Drive, been able to make it all the way over there when my cutting edge ship can't? I had to go and upgrade my Grav Drive to even make it over to them lol
whats sad was no one even bothered to look for them. We know now, that many people will leave and shortly after we will create a engine good enough to beat their best speed by centuries. Yet no one even bothered to look, sounds like humanity doesn't even have a direction anymore
Mine has to be the one with Juno. As short as it was I really liked the premise… it makes us think on what it means to be human, and if a machine is capable of it.
I seen one guy, 40+ hours into the game play and hes done next to nothing. If my favorite youtuber makes it boring, and it's boring on other lore channels...gonna say this game is boring. My favorite youtuber can make watching paint fun, but if they can't make this fun....
it's kinda boring..I don't get it. Is it the people doing the lore aren't entertaining enough or is it that this game isn't fun to watch? I think I would prefer playing fallout mods that aren't canon than play this game. But someone had to pay $100 for the game and a few 1000 for a computer that can play it. I think I am just gonna go play outside and hopefully I will never come back. The internet is full of the trolls that made us nerds come here in the first place. Now they finally on the band wagon and its no longer cool anymore
A missed opportunity of integrating the settlement building system with the quests. They should have allowed even more ways of solving the problem. Why shouldn't the captain commandeer the Constant and ask, "Why not live in my colony?" Provided you already have a working settlement. Besides, the board may lay claim to a pleasure colony in Porrima, but the fundamentally cannot lay claim to the ENTIRE planet. There is literally nothing stopping them from opening a new colony on the other side of Porrima.
Their excuse for why they didn't just go to the other side of the planet, was that they wanted the WHOLE planet to themselves. They envisioned colonizing the entire planet, and utilizing every bit of space.
This mission shows perfectly the shortcomings of Bethesda RPG elements. There was not a single dialogue option I realistically would have picked. First thing I would have asked them if they are insane. They want to fight a advanced human civilization with their over 200 year old technology. The game doesn't give you a single option for this.
The could definitely have added more options, but to be fair, Captain Brackenridge never wanted to fight the people of Paradiso, she wanted them to leave on their own. It's of course a ridiculous thing to ask of them, but I don't think it's terribly unrealistic for someone as young and naïve as Captain Brackenridge to request it.
@@IrresoluteCartographer I asked her what if they don't want to leave and she quite literally said to me "I am willing to fight them if it's necessary". That's right at your first meeting on the bridge. Absolutely insane and you cannot give a single reasonable response to that.
I went back over the conversations again. She talks about want the people of Paradiso to leave, understands that compromise may be necessary, but wants to start negotiations from a point of strength. When you say: "Are you out of your mind? There's no way they'll go for that!" She responds with: "I'm serious. We have a rightful claim to this land, and I intend to fight for it. But... as you're currently our only hope, perhaps you'll honor my request and give it your all, for the sake of some very weary travelers who have come a very long way to be here. Thank you." It seems to me that she's saying she'll fight for Porrima II through diplomatic negotiation, not through combat, as that would indeed be ridiculous.
@@IrresoluteCartographer But what does this even mean "negotiation from a position of power". What power does those people have? None. They rock up in a ship that belongs in a museum and make demands. That is what drives me crazy. You as the player cannot point this out. For me it sounds she would resort to violence if the people of Paradiso just told them of. What are they going to do if they just said no. It had to resort to violence at the end.
I think Captain Brackenridge is a young and naïve leader trying to use a questionably legal, but undoubtedly older, claim to the system to negotiate from a position of strength; strength that you rightly point out, she doesn't have, as no court would be likely to recognize that claim. I don't believe that her statement that she would fight for this legal claim, is a statement that means she intends to do so violently. She recognizes that her ship is antiquated, as she talks about it becoming a museum ship. Her crew recognize that the ship you arrived in, and the weapons you carry, are significantly more advanced than anything they have. I think they were simply in a tough position, and she was hoping to negotiate her way out of it. At the end of the day I suppose it comes down to what you believe she meant. I believe she was speaking figuratively.
Fun fact: The original plan were what the Enclave in fallout were trying to do was to build a generation ship. The vaults were meant to gather test data to help them design said generation ship by testing the effects of various scenarios. This was reconnected at some point iirc but it was what the original creator intended for the enclave to be. Although perhaps with Vault Tecs own post nuclear bunker getting a direct hit & not surviving it was only ditched due to them not being able to control & collect data from the vaults post war.
Definitely blowing them up in my next playthrough. Why did I get stuck running chores/footing the bill in order to meditate this situation between two groups whose business is with each other? 😂
I was so disappointed to hear that she captain was openly willing to “take” the planet by force if she had to, and yet there was no way to have them launch some kind of invasion. The whole system is neutral too right so you wouldn’t have to worry about the factions. That was a wasted opportunity
all it would take is a single armed ship to wipe them all out, they had no defences not to mention its all antiquated, so any thoughts of an invasion is kinda ludicrous
@@Nick871203 You’re right but there could have been a plot setup where you help them upgrade their ship or something. There’s no large scale battles (based on what I’ve experienced) in Starfield so it would’ve been nice to see one
@@ericbooth3393 wouldent have made sense for them to do this. they were colonists, not soldiers, they would be killed easily regardless especially being being stuck on a spaceship their entire lives lol
That's probably my only issue with Starfield... It hits a little too PG at times... I wanted to take the planet by force, I even went on a killing spree to see if it would give some different dialog but of course the main people can't be killed.
I Can see fanfiction of the media already there being very much celebrated among the crew as it provides new media for them to consume, even if it’s just written content
i would love a variation of this quests where they use the new gravity engine to settle on a planet using the ship hull as a first structure, i would love to see them as settlers and having happy ending.
Can we talk about the reality of putting a GRAV engine on a ship that was 200 years old and not built with such an engine in mind. Another story plot hole there. There is no way its space frame would be compatible with a drive that did not exist when it was made.
@@braddl9442they do talk about how the ship was built with theoretical grav drive travel in mind. He even brings it up in the beginning of the video. Not saying it closes the hole completely but it is addressed
So happy lore vids are being uploaded already. Not gonna watch this yet bc I dont wanna run into spoilers accidentally, but still super happy people are on top of it already Saving this for later :)
Great video! This is also your most viewed video it seems, so congrats for that. I hope they add more side quests like these or an extension to them which include more skill dialogue options.
This is such a Bethesda showing us their corporate leanings quest. The ONLY options for finishing the quest are the options out forth by the Corporate heads of Paradiso. No option from the ECS are even available. Despite them having claim to the planet.
just wondering if there are any good lore videos or if good now is just the least bad one? This guy is making me fall asleep. I ended up skipping a lot. This seems so disjointed and slow. Maybe I should be watching this incredibly drunk so I don't have higher function thinking that tries to figure out the story, and then just do be disappointment by a lesser story. It had so many possibilities but then it seems like they cut a lot of content or just skipped things to reach the ending.... this is definitely a -5/10 game so far imo
The old Macintosh style computers could be there for 2 reasons; 1 being "museum pieces" much like the media stores they had on board but the other could be because older technology or rather, simpler technology is comparably easier to repair and maintain, especially if you have limited resources. Many sci-fi shows, books etc shows outdated tech being used for that reason
One of the biggest things to their mental fortitude is imagine being on a generational ship that can't support generation growth for some reason your ancestors the builders were unable to calculate a population growth of let's say three children per couple that would take some incredible mental fortitude to know that. To think somehow they didn't have the technology or the ability to compress every movie and book, movies alone mounting in total probably around 40,000 years worth of entertainment without any stopping for food, bathroom, work.
the captains tone and demands to take over the planet really made a lot of quicksaves. ended up helping them though, wish there were more dialogue options from an outsiders perspective, like in fo4 with vault 81.
Great video! I like to see documentaries made out the game. This shows you that this game is amazing. I’m currently looking into what I believe was a massacre. Great video 🦾❤️
I ended up doing the evil route here... not because I wanted to, but I was like level 6 when I ran across this. I didn't have the money or the resources to spend on any of the good options. I found it pretty cruddy that this quest required you to either go full evil, or broke in order to help these people. Aren't quests supposed to pay YOU, not the other way around? I ended up asking if they had resources to use, but it was only half of what I'd need to get, so ended up blowing up their ship, and used the resources I got as 'payment'.
I believe there's a funny thing called Escape key on a keyboard (or whatever button it is) you press to leave a quest if you don't have enough resources or whatever- instead of, you know committing a massacre?
This mission feels like rushed or cut content, I was surprised with how quickly it was resolved and also how the colonists had no say leaving only one moral option.
seems like that way with everything I seen in the game so far....10 alternate realities? Wait, you can only see the constellation building you can't actually explore 10 different universes. Seems like this whole game was just half arsed.
Realistically, I don’t think the Generation Ship scenario would really work. Even if the entire population of the generation ship managed to survive up to the final year of the journey, they would struggle to adapt to the environment of the planet they were travelling to, since they have spent their entire life cooped up in a ship.
I hope that we get follow up content at some point. If nothing else, disease would likely be a factor for a population that survived nearly 2 centuries in an isolated environment
The red/orange/yellow bar on the bottom of your thumbnail looks like the red bar you get after watching a video, I skipped watching this a few times I saw it assuming I already watched it! haha Could you put that bar on the top in future SF content? Weird request, I know, but I enjoy this channel and would hate anyone to miss your content! Great video as always, thoroughly enjoyed, especially your thoughts at the end.
According to google you could hold multiple hundreds of thousands of books on just a 1tb drive I dont think running out of media to consume was their top concern. Unless they were into some weird niche thing. And the loss of the landing craft is just typical bad writing they came up with the ship story first then needed a reason to explain why they were just sitting there waiting.
The landing craft problem is not THAT outlandish. Any real (as in real life, not a game) interstellar craft is likely to be EXTREMELY limited on available mass, making our today's aircraft and spacecraft look "spacious" and "sturdily built". Every gram will count. The use of steel and even titanium will be limited to parts which absolutely can not be made from carbon fiber composite or aluminum-lithium alloys. Thus, carrying with the interstellar ship the entire complete landing craft, which is useless for all those years of travel, may be deemed too much for the mass budget. I think it's more likely that a colony ship would plan on using local asteroids as resources to start up their in-space manufacturing (which would be presumably a well-developed technology by then), before embarking on landing on large terrestrial worlds. (The landing is actually relatively easy, but launching back from the planet to orbit would require a rocket at least the size of Rocket Lab's Electron - 18m long, 1.2m wide, 12ton launch mass, probably can launch one human in a bare-bones capsule to LEO).
@@denysvlasenko1865 counterpoint- it makes no sense why all the ships would just casually leave this big weird outdated looking ship just hover above the planet without investigation or anything for literally so many years. They'd have been intercepted far before at some point by a UC or Freestar ship
I've always wondered about how colony ships would handle FTL tech being developed back on Earth during their voyage. Well, Bethesda seemingly had the same idea.
this idea has been around for decades........so its lame no one even looked for them. Just seems like Bethesda copying and pasting again from other peoples stories so they don't have to create anything original themselves...except this boring game that reuses almost everything from the past games
Aye! That was Oumuahmuah. Imagine if that was a generation ship now piloted by AI that decided not to alert the crew about Earth as it decided this planet was already over populated?
I guess i will check this quest out later today. The management of a generationship must be really crazy! This game really makes me wonder whether or not humanity will ever get that far to leave earth behind.
I went with attaching the Grav drive and sent them on their way. Spoiler ahead; I ended up coming across the Constant in another star system almost half the game later!
That’s neat, I had assumed that because they didn’t leave after getting the drive that they would stay put. I’ll have to create an addendum for this video if they so ever actually settle somewhere
@@IrresoluteCartographer It took me half the game to come across the ship again. - I think it's s bugged, I could do was hail them, but there was silence at the other end. Gamerant suggests following the 22lighyears of the Constants grav drive - but I came across the ship in a lvl 50 system, far from where they were originally.
seems like this is a bugged quest...there is supposed to be something next but most people marker keep sending them back to the first place you met them..bugged quests oh bethesda, how I loathe you
This sounds interesting, I’ll have to check this out when I get that that planet. I wish there was a payoff to then getting a grav drive. Like that you are informed later on where they settle.
From what other commenters have said, they do move systems at times, so you’ll likely come across them again. Along with that, if you pickup the repeatable quest with Abe Levitz, you’ll be able to find them whenever you want, through the quest marker
Not sure if anyone noticed but the color coding of their uniforms is a reference to Star Trek. Captain (Command) is wearing red (I guess it's more of a wine color but whatever), Security is in gold, and the medical officers are in blue, just like in Star Trek (not the original series color coding but next gen and beyond) The only thing that was out of place was the engineers, they're wearing blue instead of gold- my guess is to either avoid copyright or because the engineers were lumped in with the science officers
Is it deliberate that the Constant's profile looks like Oumuamua? It's fitting in a roundabout way considering the Constant is kind of like an outsider into the Settled Systems just as Oumuamua is an outsider into our solar system.
Unfortunately I had to stop the video because I don't want the entire story spoiled. I haven't been to Paradiso yet but I'm heading there next game session now. How interesting!
I can't complete Abe's or Janet's quests. After Getting the Constant its GravDrive, it disappeared on me. When active, both quests as well as the 'Location of the ECS Constant' activity just point to Porrima II but the ship is not there.
There is another bug that if you choose to retro fit the ship your supposed to get cordinates to where they go but the quest never updates it keeps sending you back to where you first found the ship without the ship being there
I liked this quest because it is so scientifically accurate as something that could totally happen. The quest itself was really short and there was no real extra lore to be had in the ship from what I could find.
shame of the people of settled system. after 200 year of advancement, they still using the same docking ring, same locker, same control console etc. joke aside I think this side quest is so cool, wish it has more story to it.
ah yes, ECS Constant...yeah i was definitely not gonna be looking for those supplies they needed so the people from Paradiso let them live on the planet so i said fuck it and blew them all up
This needs to be a dlc I'm only 30 hours in and have done nothing of the main quest line but seeing earthing survive in space for 200 years and all you do is give them a jump drive and send them on there way we need updates because now I'm invested 😂😂😂
If you're on pc you actually can build colony ships, freighters and large battleships. It's just a matter of unlocking the Class M habs, hull pieces, engines and whatnot with a console command. I have a colony ship that acts as a freighter and build a warship twice the size of the Vigilance. I believe dlc for larger ships is on the way, everything is there, just need content to make them useful.
There’s a game called Ixion on Steam that looks like it might be what you’re looking for. I’ve not played it, so I can’t say whether it’s good or bad, but it looks interesting.
@@IrresoluteCartographer a similar game I found is called stardeus. Both games that I have watched and looked at scratch that itch and now I shall buy both games
I think the old Apple computers are probably just an in joke from the developers. In game though it might be that this is not “our” universe anymore than Fallout is. So the Apple computers might have been high tech at the time. Although, internally they might be more advanced than our similar looking devices.
because they literally copy and paste someone elses work? Reuse stories and assets? Create a mission where most the people who do it, think it ends in the middle? Where the markers to continue don't work? Because it makes you think? Create bugged games where the person thinks its actually over and aren't even half way......because they make the fans fix their games while they get paid big dollars? theres a reason this is their lowest rated game
They could have built that option in. I said this already in another discussion here, but shortly: they had a claim, a board member of Paradiso who wanted control could guide you to a corrupt judge that would go along with it, in turn New Jamestown grants Paradiso semi-independence, and the board member takes control. Just one option, I’m sure there are better options to that.
I got them the new drive. But they still don't leave. Quests like delivering letters can't be triggered then. Don't know if it's a glitch or something.
They’re still hanging around Porrima in my game as well, but it didn’t stop me from delivering letters for them, it must be a glitch, or the quest hasn’t triggered or something
There’s so many missing opportunities in this quest. Why can’t you destroy the resort? Why can’t the Constant’s people pay for the drive themselves with their antiques? And, most striking for me, why was there no discontent on the Constant when they found out their 200 year history of strict utilitarian social controls was for nothing? This one gets into Bethesda’s lack of any bottom-up movements in Starfield. There’s no real material opposition to the ruling class by the lower class anywhere - some discontent in places, sure, but no missions or factions. I want to see a large group of Constant residents enraged at the leadership by the fact that humanity survived without them, and maybe it could be this group that refuses to go along with the grav drive idea and (rather than the Constant captain) *they’re* the ones who ask you to help them take over the planet. This way the player would have to deal with negotiating not only with the Constant and the Resort, but the dissenting colonists as well. You could do a difficult dialogue challenge with the colonists / force them using the security guards in order to to convince them to go with the drive, or convince the Constant leadership to step down / kill them and allow the popular movement to lead an attack on the Resort, *or* do a dialogue challenge / use the ship guards to enforce control to convince the colonists to agree to the servitude contract. There’s just so many more opportunities but Bethesda are very stupid people and are very bad at writing.
Best quest, just finished it yesterday. Just wish the developer would have fleshed it out as well and they could have. It’s half baked and needs work. Devs please please please fix.
It’s not terribly unlikely. We’ve standardized docking systems in our time, I don’t think it’s too crazy to think that at the very least the dimensions would be the same, even if the equipment wasn’t identical after 190 years.
I don’t even have starfield and I feel like this quest is kinda lacking. I feel like there should’ve been options to help the colony ship usurp the current colony or settle somewhere else on the planet and become their own opposing colony. Both could provide ongoing chain quests with the establishment of an opposing colony requiring more negotiating and resource supply while the usurp provides on going combat quests. It feels like lost potential in its current state.
You do need to understand that the grav drive option isn't a great idea, mainly because Spacers, Pirates, and Ecliptics exist, and with the constant not having weapons on the ship they are sitting ducks. Also with the constant not having any form of landing craft, or having no knowledge of the alien species in this games world like the Terrormorphs, interlopers, and swarmers, the option for them to "pay off their debts" would be the safer option.
