EVE General Discussion

I keep hearing about how this game needs ISK sinks.

Well perhaps it is time for one that would be based in some "reality", if it can be applied to a spaceship pixel game.

In our reality, every man-made structure created out of a metallic material, be it a tricycle right through to an aircraft carrier, need maintenance. Some may not made from materials that don't oxidize, but they still need some TLC, and that TLC costs money.

Typically, the more complicated the structure, the more expensive the TLC.

What would be the impact if Eve introduced some kind of maintenance cost on all hulls of all ships?
I am not talking about damage done in combat, that is already taken care of.

I am talking about costs for general wear and tear.
Imagine if fighter plane, subs, and aircraft carriers were never given overhauls. They would fall apart in no time.
The vast majority never see combat, but huge quantities of time and materials are put into them on a very regular basis to keep them tip top.

And yes, even ships mothballed in dry dock need upkeep, albeit at a dramatically reduced rate.

So why not introduce that into Eve?

I think it would have some interesting effects.

1. The rich in the game, be the individuals with a massive collection of ships, or the mega-corps/alliances could not maintain vast armadas of ships waiting to replace losses, not without some general maintenance fee. That creates another logistical headache for the managers, but this would be one more step closer to emulating managing a real-life fleet.

2. We would be looking at a sink that hits everyone in the game. From the richest alliance to the smallest individual who simply mines in a T1 ship, all would be faced with the equivalent of a general tax. No one could complain that any particular group was targeted.

There are downsides, no doubt. Ship builders would not be thrilled, since there is little doubt this would make people think twice about buying that shiny just to watch it spin in station

What this maintenance costs would be, how it would be applied, I have no idea. That I leave up to CCP.

But I think it is one step closer to the completely immersive experience CCP seems to want for Eve to evolve to.

I think you're thinking too real. Some real life issues just don't need to be covered in a game through risk of making it annoyingly mundane.

For example, pooping in your pod. Yeah sure it's gotta happen but no one wants to deal with it in game.

Sure, why not. Add some depreciation to the game. We can handle some more headaches and extra complexity. That's what separates EvE players from the rest of the MMO riff-raff.

Oh nooooeeess! My hanger queens! Don't make me repackage them!!!

Ok I'll bite; what was the game called?

P.s if you say you can't / won't tell us I'm going to punch my cat in the face out of rage and post the pictures here.

(I will not really do this. I wuv my cat)

When I first started playing this game I was a bit uncertain about the economy with no form of item durability. I thought how can an industrial minded player make an empire if people only have to buy a ship once and then it never goes away. Once I got to playing the game I realized the game did have item durability in the form of blowing stuff up. Which in the end is much more exciting then watching some durability marker go down.

Anyway long story short, I say just make it easier to blow stuff up. That would have the same end result and be much more entertaining.

That said I would be all for some sort of durability system because I'm a selfish merchant and that would be great for business.

A system that just charges ISK to maintaining things? I don't like that idea as much as it is not player driven. I think everything should be player driven. There should be no ISK sinks or ISK faucets. ISK should be created by the players (as in actually manufactured) and given value by the players. But that is a whole other discussion :-)

Just my two cents.

Yes, I can recognize the "dues" part being a pain. I don't know why people would get upset given all the other "pains" we have in the game, but I can see your argument.

How about turning this around then, and make a usage based charge:

For every hour a ship is in space, it experiences some percentage hull damage.
I don't know what would be a decent number, but something quite small, maybe around 0.1%?

You fly a ship, and it slowly gets nicks and scratches from micro-meteors, radiation, frozen space whale dung.
And yes, you can repair a lot of it (but not all) with nanite paste, just to keep the afk cloakies happy.

But ultimately, if you use a ship, it will cost you.
That would keep all the collectors and mega-alliances happy.

Now, how CCP would implement something like that, if it is even feasible, I don't know.

Most of the people that complain about there being too much ingame currency are those that have played for a long time and have far more than they can spend easily. It's the same situation in other MMOs.


For newer characters they don't even need anymore isk sinks because it can be hard enough to scrap a living ingame. I don't think you need anymore isk sinks anyway, because your wallet is an effective isk sink if you just leave it in there.

Having to keep maintaining ships and fleets, do you have any other ideas to add more tedium to the game?

There is already a usage cost for flying a ship. http://eve.battleclinic.com/killboard/combat_record.php?type=player&name=Liang+Nuren#losses

-Liang

Due to insurance, PvP is a faucet. not a sink.