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Dev blog: More Deployables from Super Friends

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Milton Middleson
Rifterlings
#1281 - 2014-01-16 20:15:45 UTC
The ESS needs to have a larger effect relative to baseline income (whether in isk or LP). The basic premise, however, is essentially fine. The real mistake is designing a pillage-and-burn mechanic that the pillagees can (and should) opt out of.

Quote:
Best case scenario after a perfect gate camp you still have 3-8 (or more) interceptors in your region terrorizing ratters

Then perhaps you ought to try a tactic other than gate camping.

Quote:
As a side note, the idea of roaming fleets looking for fights is basically mythological, the ones that are looking for fights sit near a hostile capital and get fights. The ones looking to terrorize ratters are looking for easy kills and will run from anyone trying to give them an actual fight.

This is flagrantly untrue. You probably just don't see them very often because you're deliberately trying to discourage people from looking for fights in your space, so you just get bear hunters instead. (see below)

Quote:
The balance between roaming fleets and defense fleets is currently so far in the favor of the roamers that the best defense is to create circumstances where the roamers don't bother coming to your space.

That seems like a problem with how you handle defense. The defenders will generally get to see what the attackers have brought. Even if they don't completely over do it with their response, they can still very easily pull out a hard counter to whatever the attacker brought. They should also have better intel, a set of bookmarks that allow them to maneuver safely, and a numerical advantage.

The expectation is not that ratters will rally together in their deadspace-fit bearmobiles to drive off the invader for the joy of doing so. Rather, they should be able to respond within a reasonable frame of time to someone trying to disrupt their activities or else suffer some negative consequence beyond the income lost from hiding in station. If they choose to delay so that they can utterly crush the intruders, they should run a serious risk of losing something of authentic value (e.g. a deployable that accounts for a major chunk of their revenue).
Kalenn Istarion
The Scope
Gallente Federation
#1282 - 2014-01-16 20:15:48 UTC
Ratter / PVPer here confirming that the ships I use for ratting are completely useless for PVP (sans re-fit) and vice versa. The assumption that ratters are (generally) going to use their ratting ships to defend space is objectively wrong. You'll get the odd failure doing so because they don't know any better, but otherwise most people will either:

a) dock up and wait
b) dock up and fleet up to stomp the bads into the dirt. Gudfights in your home turf are stupid.
c) dock up and clone-jump / log-in to their PVP alt and go pick fights in someone else's sandcastle.

Those who say they like gudfights live in places where they make sense to get and you're not making a mess of your income source by engaging in the fights. The last thing I want is for small roaming gangs to think they'll have a good time by hanging around my ratting system(s).

Try Harder.
Zerb Arus
WormSpaceWormS
#1283 - 2014-01-16 20:16:54 UTC
Taking the 5% base income nerf into account: (so that 95% is your new 100%)

Carebear point of view:

 ♦ risk:
    ▪ 15.79% less income than without ESS in case of theft.
    ▪ price of the structure
    ▪ travel-time (setup, scoop, cash out)

 ♦ reward:
    ▪ less than 10.5% in the best case
    ▪ 5.26% until the ATM is in bonus-mode

 A sanctum-anomaly has 40 NPCs
 Have a look at NPCs killed per 24h in a sample region.
 ➩ I really can't see why I would use it, except in one hotspot per region maybe.


Roamer point of view:

 ♦ possible rewards:
    ✔ 21-26% of base-income since the last scoop
    ✔ A structure kill-mail
    ✘ A fight with a response-fleet that tries to intercept you and beat the spoils back out of you?
        ➩ have fun catching up with an interceptor-gang (tags would need to be too big for inties to haul)
    ✘ A fight with a response-fleet from Ratters that re-ship to PvP ships?
        ➩ far too less time for that in its current state
        ➩ amount of ratters per system won't do much to a small roaming gang
    ✘ A fight with a roaming defense fleet?
        ➩ The reward is not enough to warrant new defense-fleets

 ♦ risks & downsides:
    ▪ Hauling
      Maybe that's just me, but I frown upon the prospect of having to haul the pillage all the way back to empire.
    ▪ KB stats
      (having to evade a fight because your precious cargo would be bad for KB stats = less PvP instead of more)
    ▪ Structure-shoot
    ▪ Waiting out a timer for the money to come out

  ➩ I have troubles seeing new opportunities for fun here.

If you want more fights, you have to create situations where fighting a loosing battle is still better than to not fight at all
Manssell
OmiHyperMultiNationalDrunksConglomerate
#1284 - 2014-01-16 20:16:57 UTC
All right, I admit to writing this mostly to get my own thoughts together on this. And I admittedly have not been able to follow the thread too much do to RL work and I while I have seen some good post both ways on this I didn't want to reply to anyone them so not to give off the impression I was milking tears or starting a fight. But now that I have a break for few minutes I wanted to post my thoughts here,

When I first saw this yesterday I was all "Rarrwww the incomes!" "don't nerf the incomes!". "why CCP hate the average 0.0 guy!?" "Rarrrwww CCP is incompetent boobs". But after thinking on it for a day and calming down I think I see what they are trying to do, and I think it should at least be given a chance. This is the "farms and Fields" we've all mostly been screaming for isn't it? I mean you didn't think the farms and fields where going to be farmed by the Serenity server people for us to kill did you? Now yea, I think it needs tweaks. TIme on station for the thief needs to be longer. The payout (and even the nerf) may need to be adjusted either way, but the mechanic I think has merit.

Ceptors are not invincible or uncatchalbe. They just take different tactics to defend against. You just can't rely on a massive 50 bubble camp in one or two systems anymore to protect your space, and I think that's a good thing. I know the idea of a "home defense force" seems absurd to many, but isn't that the point of the whole "live in and defend your own space" problem farms and fields was supposed to fix in the first place? Frankly a home defense force seems like the perfect thing to have an alliance's newbies (or anyone really) do while they learn the game and train for fleet doctrine ships. Now with the extra income the new structure lets you generate, you can now pay those newbies (or anyone who does this) and replace their ships, to actually defend your ratters and space while they learn. This new mod brings that possibility now. I love the idea of seeing a group of ceptors fly by in 0.0 being chased by another gang of people in ceptors yelling in local. I think having a couple of newbies in cruisers hanging out at these structures getting instructions on how to fly would be a great deterrent to the ceptor thieves, and more importantly a great target for them or others.

Now sure that's best case, and no one may end up using this thing at all. But that's where the tweaks can come in. Poop, I have more but boss man is coming gotta go….
Omanth Bathana
Doomheim
#1285 - 2014-01-16 20:17:36 UTC
Gizznitt Malikite wrote:


I won't lie, I find this a very sad state of affairs. The locals should have bookmarks around system, POS & stations presetup with combat ships meeting some quick-response doctrines, with enough inhabitants in system to take on a small gang (5-10 pilots) roaming through. There is something very wrong when this isn't the case during your alliances peak hours.


Many of us "nullbears" have bookmarks, PVP-fit ships, quick-response ships, and so forth ready to go. However, as discussed at great length here a single null-sec system cannot support enough simultaneous ratters to make quickly re-shipping to fight a gang viable. At best, 3-4 pilots can make a reasonable living simultaneously in one system. This means that in the time it takes those people to dock up, pick a set of ships, and go find the gang they will be fighting at a positional disadvantage as well as a numbers disadvantage, which makes the entire idea pointless. Even if this wasn't true, the current Interceptors Online meta means that the roaming gang is likely in uncatchable interceptors and can just disengage and find another system. Thus, there is no point in even trying to fight back.

Gizznitt Malikite wrote:

While I like to come out victorious in the end, my motivation is to get fights, not to engage in easy kills. My favorite activities in EvE are knock-out brutal fights where victory isn't pre-determined and all sides take losses. Even when we held Sov, as soon as an enemy gang is spotted we'd drop all normal PvE to form up and attack, because that's why we play.


Continuing above, this is exactly why we don't form up. If you can't find the fight you want with my ratting alt, you are more likely to go somewhere you'll get that fight. If I dock up and don't fight, you're less likely to interrupt me in the future and the ratting that I need to do to fund the PvP I want to do takes less real-life time.

Gizznitt Malikite wrote:

You have a point here... I play this game for PvP. I carebear some, indy some, but when I log in I do so to pew pew. So when I'm out ratting, I like being interrupted by hostiles. This is a very different mindframe from the nullbear that simply wants to make isk, and loathes the distractions I create. From their perspective, I can see why they would vehemently oppose any game-objective that forces them to fight to keep it.


You're assuming that a nullbear only wants to rat in null-sec and has no other in-game objectives other than making the wallet number go higher. I can't speak for everyone in the GSF, but I can speak for myself when I say that just isn't true. ISK is a means to an end. I don't want to rat any more than I absolutely must to fund the stuff I actually want to do, like participating in fleets, both massive tidi slug-fests and small roaming gangs.
Omanth Bathana
Doomheim
#1286 - 2014-01-16 20:20:53 UTC
Manssell wrote:

Ceptors are not invincible or uncatchalbe. They just take different tactics to defend against.


It has been shown multiple times in this thread that properly fit interceptors are literally uncatchable due to the way server ticks work.
Innominate
KarmaFleet
Goonswarm Federation
#1287 - 2014-01-16 20:22:51 UTC
Omanth Bathana wrote:
Manssell wrote:

Ceptors are not invincible or uncatchalbe. They just take different tactics to defend against.


It has been shown multiple times in this thread that properly fit interceptors are literally uncatchable due to the way server ticks work.


What he means is that an interceptor that chooses to engage can be killed, which is true but irrelevant to the discussion.
IrJosy
Club 1621
#1288 - 2014-01-16 20:26:53 UTC  |  Edited by: IrJosy
Omanth Bathana wrote:
Manssell wrote:

Ceptors are not invincible or uncatchalbe. They just take different tactics to defend against.


It has been shown multiple times in this thread that properly fit interceptors are literally uncatchable due to the way server ticks work.


No no no!

If you have a HIC, two remote sensor boosting ships(because inty's are hard to lock fast), a 90% web ship (this is incase the inty crashes the gate), a keres (hi scan res/long scram range), eos boosts for locktime and scram range, a dps ship (perferably with another remote sebo ship supporting), and a bumping/decloak ship. (You end up with a 6k scan res keres)

You can in fact catch one or two ceptors on a gate if the server ticks align perfectly.

It ONLY takes 8-9 ships, great coordination, and a bit of luck!
Omanth Bathana
Doomheim
#1289 - 2014-01-16 20:30:28 UTC  |  Edited by: Omanth Bathana
Innominate wrote:
Omanth Bathana wrote:
Manssell wrote:

Ceptors are not invincible or uncatchalbe. They just take different tactics to defend against.


It has been shown multiple times in this thread that properly fit interceptors are literally uncatchable due to the way server ticks work.


What he means is that an interceptor that chooses to engage can be killed, which is true but irrelevant to the discussion.


My bad. From my reading of his post, he seems to be encouraging "home defense forces" as a "perfect thing to have an alliance's newbies do while they learn the game." All this would teach GSF newbies is that there's no point in try to defend, as any fight the newbie could win a (rational) interceptor pilot would choose not to have and any fight the interceptor would win would result in the death of the newbie.

Edit:

IrJosy wrote:


No no no!

If you have a HIC, two remote sensor boosting ships(because inty's are hard to lock fast), a 90% web ship (this is incase the inty crashes the gate), a keres (hi scan res/long scram range), eos boosts for locktime and scram range, a dps ship (perferably with another remote sebo ship supporting), and a bumping/decloak ship. (You end up with a 6k scan res keres)

You can in fact catch one or two ceptors on a gate if the server ticks align perfectly.

It ONLY takes 8-9 ships, great coordination, and a bit of luck!


Sorry about that! I completely forgot about us dirty goonie blobbers and our totally practical 8v1, luck-based interceptor catching gatecamps at every gate in our territory. Oops! Roll
Manssell
OmiHyperMultiNationalDrunksConglomerate
#1290 - 2014-01-16 20:31:33 UTC
IrJosy wrote:
Omanth Bathana wrote:
Manssell wrote:

Ceptors are not invincible or uncatchalbe. They just take different tactics to defend against.


It has been shown multiple times in this thread that properly fit interceptors are literally uncatchable due to the way server ticks work.


No no no!

If you have a HIC, two remote sensor boosting ships(because inty's are hard to lock fast), a 90% web ship (this is incase the inty crashes the gate), a keres, eos boosts for locktime and scram range, a dps ship (perferably with another remote sebo ship supporting), and a bumping/decloak ship. You can in fact catch one or two ceptors on a gate if the server ticks align perfectly. (With a 6k scan res keres)

It only takes 8-9 ships and a bit of luck!


Sorry if I gotta bolt after this for a while, but I was trying to has out the idea that if the time on station is made much longer (and no warp off and come back junk) to steal from the structure, then the ceptors end up not being a threat (to income) as long as you have some kind of fleet in the area to chase them off. That's where the newbie training fleets idea comes in.
Muffet McStrudel
Aliastra
Gallente Federation
#1291 - 2014-01-16 20:32:46 UTC
All one really has to do is check the killboards to see someone's motivation on the ESS topic.

http://www.agony-unleashed.com/killboard/index.php/pilot_detail/294286434/kills/

Surprise, surprise you like to cloak gank at very favorable odds or engage relatively helpless ratters or mission runners.

The ESS doesn't give someone in null sec something to defend, it simply gives you (at least you are hopeful) a way to make some passive isk income while pvping. Hoping that it goes unnoticed perhaps?

May I suggest using empire alts like 90% of the rest of EVE has to do?
Milton Middleson
Rifterlings
#1292 - 2014-01-16 20:32:57 UTC
Jesus. Trying using something other than gate camps to deal with interceptors. "Can't be caught by gatecamps" is not equivalent to "can't be caught".
IrJosy
Club 1621
#1293 - 2014-01-16 20:33:49 UTC
Manssell wrote:
IrJosy wrote:
Omanth Bathana wrote:
Manssell wrote:

Ceptors are not invincible or uncatchalbe. They just take different tactics to defend against.


It has been shown multiple times in this thread that properly fit interceptors are literally uncatchable due to the way server ticks work.


No no no!

If you have a HIC, two remote sensor boosting ships(because inty's are hard to lock fast), a 90% web ship (this is incase the inty crashes the gate), a keres, eos boosts for locktime and scram range, a dps ship (perferably with another remote sebo ship supporting), and a bumping/decloak ship. You can in fact catch one or two ceptors on a gate if the server ticks align perfectly. (With a 6k scan res keres)

It only takes 8-9 ships and a bit of luck!


Sorry if I gotta bolt after this for a while, but I was trying to has out the idea that if the time on station is made much longer (and no warp off and come back junk) to steal from the structure, then the ceptors end up not being a threat (to income) as long as you have some kind of fleet in the area to chase them off. That's where the newbie training fleets idea comes in.



The newbie defense fleet can defend one structure.

The inties can enter a region split up hitting multiple ess "take all" buttons.
Manssell
OmiHyperMultiNationalDrunksConglomerate
#1294 - 2014-01-16 20:34:11 UTC
Omanth Bathana wrote:
Innominate wrote:
Omanth Bathana wrote:
Manssell wrote:

Ceptors are not invincible or uncatchalbe. They just take different tactics to defend against.


It has been shown multiple times in this thread that properly fit interceptors are literally uncatchable due to the way server ticks work.


What he means is that an interceptor that chooses to engage can be killed, which is true but irrelevant to the discussion.


My bad. From my reading of his post, he seems to be encouraging "home defense forces" as a "perfect thing to have an alliance's newbies do while they learn the game." All this would teach GSF newbies is that there's no point in try to defend, as any fight the newbie could win a (rational) interceptor pilot would choose not to have and any fight the interceptor would win would result in the death of the newbie.


I was thinking more of it being a roaming gang type learning experience with a few newbs, especially when people are first learning who to work in small fleets. But I should have read this first, because yes, I can see your point.
IrJosy
Club 1621
#1295 - 2014-01-16 20:35:35 UTC  |  Edited by: IrJosy
Milton Middleson wrote:
Jesus. Trying using something other than gate camps to deal with interceptors. "Can't be caught by gatecamps" is not equivalent to "can't be caught".


If you can't catch them on a gate with plenty of time to prepare and 8-9 ships hand picked for the task worth billions of isk, where and how exactly are you going to catch them?
Keeper of TheLost
Empty Skulls
#1296 - 2014-01-16 20:41:05 UTC
Ok so your going to nerf the null sec bounties. Are you going to nerf the Drone regions too because you already nerfed them into the ground. Just sayin
Gizznitt Malikite
Agony Unleashed
Agony Empire
#1297 - 2014-01-16 20:46:18 UTC
Innominate wrote:
Gizznitt Malikite wrote:

You have a point here... I play this game for PvP. I carebear some, indy some, but when I log in I do so to pew pew. So when I'm out ratting, I like being interrupted by hostiles. This is a very different mindframe from the nullbear that simply wants to make isk, and loathes the distractions I create. From their perspective, I can see why they would vehemently oppose any game-objective that forces them to fight to keep it.


You keep using this word "nullbear" I am curious if you would be willing to define it?

Ratting ships are very specialized PvE ships not cut out for PvP, expecting a ratter to openly engage in PvP means they are either stupid, suicidal, bait fit, or earning terrible isk. Non-bait ratters are ALWAYS going to run from PvP ships as both parties know who is going to win the encounter, while the people looking to kill the ratters rarely hang around for the ratters to switch into PvP setups anyways.

Not that any of that is particularly important because when these ratters are looking for fights, they go and do it away from their money making systems. The phrase "Don't **** where you eat." comes to mind. You speak of "nullbears" as people who will do nothing to defend their space, when in reality denying kills and fights to hostiles is exactly what is best for defending their space. If you get fights, you come back. If you face nothing but boredom and ratting ships watching you from the safety of a pos shield, you go somewhere else.


Nullbear == a person carebearing in nullsec. This is not meant to be a pejorative. Merely a statement of activity (in which I regularly partake in).

I don't insist a person PvE'ing attempt to engage us in PvE fit ships either. What I want to see is raid-able farms and fields where you get benefits for harvesting but only if you defend it from others harvesting it first.

This idea has some major design aspects are are fairly brilliant:
1.) The amount in the ESS is proportional to the number of ratters in system. So the rewards for raiders will be most in systems filled with enough players to properly defend it. Spending 10 minutes in a system with a local population of 1, just to recover 20m isk in loot is not worth your time, unless you are only 1 or 2 players, because the local will not bother to defend it otherwise.

2.) Scorched earth policy is completely unnecessary. I'm ok with these things have POCO level EHP and even an RF timer. So long as they can be accessed & stolen from within 10ish minutes. Destroying them doesn't give value, only harvesting them does.

3.) It has an access time & notification system that could be tweaked to allow the locals to swap ships from PvE to PvP fits. This is important, as defenders wont be setup ahead of time ready to fight, and need time to scout, organize, and deploy.

4.) It is time zone independent: The bounties are collected and typically will be dispersed at the end of a PvE session. A gang roaming through 5 hours later when nobody is on gains nothing by attacking it.
IrJosy
Club 1621
#1298 - 2014-01-16 20:48:30 UTC  |  Edited by: IrJosy
Gizznitt Malikite wrote:

I don't insist a person PvE'ing attempt to engage us in PvE fit ships either. What I want to see is raid-able farms and fields where you get benefits for harvesting but only if you defend it from others harvesting it first.

Let's take that stuff here:

https://forums.eveonline.com/default.aspx?g=posts&m=4118365#post4118365
L'ouris
Have Naught Subsidiaries
#1299 - 2014-01-16 20:56:18 UTC
spitballing here:

goal: small gang offensive target ( farm )
enable group PVE rewards
Separate from SOV so alliance and whole CORP mobilization is de-incentivized
Put more PVP fit ships active in space
minimize raw-isk faucet of benefits

suggestion:
deployable for fleet
tracks all bounties shared by fleet
provides LP or some other non-isk compensation to fleet to promote multiplayer PVE in belts and anomolies
maybe tracks up to one squad per unit?
can't be scooped after deployed
fleet Payout at timed intervals ( 1 hr? 2? )
if destroyed prior to payout, payout lost
bubble, overview notification all that jazz of proposed ESS
fleet payout can be taken with hacking mini-game
successful hacker id'd in fleet broadcast
give it few hit-points, but a reinforcement timer of only about 20 min or so to permit defense form-up

theory gameplay:
small easily interdicted deployable that can be deployed by a group of ratters who can see non-isk faucet profit by actually working together in PVE in Null Sec. Actual profit from ratting is placed directly at risk, but the bonuses of the structure actually allow PVP fit ships to make money as a group for quick interdiction. If a group too big comes in a blows up the structure, 20 min gives time for an actual defense fleet to be formed and get a fight if desired. if not, tough luck, stuff happens. smaller groups coming to interdict rat income can be met directly by a pre-formed fleet of PVP fit ships.

I would throw something like that up if it didn't cost me too much to deploy and run around with my buddies to make money. Real target, real motivation to defend, realistic timelines for response, real opportunities to be burned by friendlies without it being a 5 second inty driveby by a neutral alt.
Innominate
KarmaFleet
Goonswarm Federation
#1300 - 2014-01-16 20:57:20 UTC
Gizznitt Malikite wrote:

1.) The amount in the ESS is proportional to the number of ratters in system. So the rewards for raiders will be most in systems filled with enough players to properly defend it. Spending 10 minutes in a system with a local population of 1, just to recover 20m isk in loot is not worth your time, unless you are only 1 or 2 players, because the local will not bother to defend it otherwise.


Most nullsec systems can't support more than 2-3 ratters at once, the very best can pack in five or so(but who will feel very crowded there).