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Abandoned POS Tower Reclamation Mechanic & Ship

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Arthur Aihaken
CODE.d
#41 - 2014-04-01 11:45:58 UTC
Am I alone in wanting to simply see all these abandoned POS burn? Twisted

I am currently away, traveling through time and will be returning last week.
Phoenix Jones
Small-Arms Fire
#42 - 2014-04-01 12:11:27 UTC
ChYph3r wrote:
I have agreed with Sugar and Rhavas on this. It seems I maybe the only one that does. On the blog posts it seems everyone is against this. I do not understand why.



I would not put much faith in the random forum troll ChYph3r. People hate any type of change, good or bad.
This is a good one though.

Yaay!!!!
Alxephon
GoonWaffe
Goonswarm Federation
#43 - 2014-04-01 12:11:55 UTC
Quote:
The primary realistic argument to my original premise was that RL sometimes bites and you can’t get to your POS to refuel it, despite your best intentions.

Plain and simple, if you don't pay the bills someone else should be able to take advantage. If the original iteration of your proposal (which to be honest is probably a lot more straightforward and balanced) would ever be implemented, I think it would be great for pretty much everyone except unorganized and lazy POS owners, and I sincerely believe that is a 100% fair trade off.

If you wanted to propose an idea in-line with what's being released extremely recently, perhaps an idea would be an anchorable module that would allow you to unanchor an offline POS after a certain amount of time. Anchorable with no wardec necessary, killable by anyone. No re-fueler would be necessary - your corp mates would be able to do what they should already be able to do if they have assets in space - protect it by forming a fleet and destroying the hostile threat.
Corraidhin Farsaidh
Federal Navy Academy
Gallente Federation
#44 - 2014-04-01 12:42:35 UTC
There was a thread a while back that suggested abandoned POS get taken over and corrupted by rogue drones subsequently showing up as anomalies for cleansing. I thought that was actually a really good approach as it turns them into actual gameplay automagically over time. The owner of course had the option to cleanse the infestation and refuel but this at least meant they had to keep the tower active.
Jinrai Tremaine
Cheese It Inc
#45 - 2014-04-01 12:46:08 UTC
Rhavas wrote:

  1. In most ways, Standby is very much like Reinforced. Like Reinforced, Standby mode is fueled by Strontium Clathrates. The shields will slowly drop to 25% over the course of 48 hours. The major difference is that the stront will be consumed at a far slower rate, leading to Standby lasting 28 days (assuming a full stront bay), and consuming stront at an even rate that entire time. Like Reinforced, Standby is shown with an in-space timer and status. [Side note: To me 28 days is ridiculously long – I think a week is far more reasonable. But I’m trying to be accommodating here.]
  2. If the POS is shot while in Standby, it obeys current rules for going into Reinforced. This means that within the first 48 hours (as the shield winds down to 25%) it must be shot several times, thereafter one shell should do the trick. Obviously this also means that the stront consumption accelerates to rules dictated by Reinforced status.
  3. Once Standby mode ends, the tower goes offline to Anchored status. At this point the tower officially changes status from property to salvage, in game terms. It’s basically a white wreck. Anyone can take a shot at stealing it.
  4. Once in Anchored but unpowered status, the structure may be hacked. Hacking should use the standard hacking modules and skills. Difficulty of hacking rises with size and faction, with a small basic tower being relatively easy, and a large pirate faction tower being very tough.
  5. Once hacked, the tower must be removed by someone with appropriate Anchoring skills (Anchoring 3 (small), 4 (medium) or 5 (large)).


One minor exploit I can see with that is that if a hisec tower has been in standby mode for 48 hours or more, rather than having to wardec the owners to reinforce the POS I could just put an alt in an Arty Thrasher (or even, theoretically, a basic noobship) and fire a single volley at the tower. I'd lose the ship to CONCORD and (I think?) take a minor sec status hit on the alt, but that would kick the tower straight into Reinforced, meaning rather than having another 26 days of slowly draining Stront in Standby mode it'd burn through it in about 1d14h of reinforced, then drop down to anchored (and therefore hackable) at the end of it. The same trick would work outside of hisec without the requirement of sacrificing a ship to CONCORD, though I assume in those areas it's more intentional.
Grayland Aubaris
Aliastra
Gallente Federation
#46 - 2014-04-01 12:49:35 UTC
Regarding the hacking part - I suggested this in a previous thread:

https://forums.eveonline.com/default.aspx?g=posts&m=4419268#post4419268

New deployable structure: 'Mobile Hacking platform'
Cost: circa 25m
Single use, cannot be scooped and used again.
medium amount of shield / armor

How it works:

- Needs to be deployed within 10km of a OFFLINED POS tower.
- Once in place it will spend 24 hours hacking into the mainframe of the tower.
- During this time the corp owning the tower will be notified - you could even broadcast something in local every so often.
- After 24 hours the tower becomes 'Vulnerable' and will RANDOMLY become unanchored at some point in time during the next 4 hours - when it is unanchoured ANYONE can scoop it.
- The mobile hacking platform self destructs.

The point being that you don't know exactly when it will become available to steal, and there could be pew pew between people trying to snag it. Sounds fun to me!

And it gives CCP a way to have a new deployable structure, a way for people to steal the structure for profit - (if you want to just make the space available you can war dec them instead), and also gives the defending corp chance to respond. Also it provides the unknown quantity of never knowing WHEN exactly the tower will be steal-able.


This would work in conjunction with your idea - just amend the idea to be effective against towers in standby rather than offline.
Tarsas Phage
Sniggerdly
#47 - 2014-04-01 13:12:23 UTC
Hesod Adee wrote:
Tarsas Phage wrote:
There should always be some shooting involved at some stage. If we can just risk-free scoop a player asset (vs an NPC asset) then that would run counter to the destruction/production theme of Eve. Towers just need a good kick down in HP once they go offline. I think that alone would make shooting them to get the moon a more palatable thing to do.


At the same time, if an offline, highsec tower is operated by someone who hasn't paid his subscription in years, why should other players have to put up the wardec fee to remove it ?


If you (or a client, hint hint) wants the moon for whatever reason, that is incentive enough to pay for a war. If you find an offline tower festooned with external modules, killing the tower in order to unanchor and scoop the modules could also be a profit motive (frankly, batteries, ewar modules are too cheap - something CCP should look at)

Hesod Adee wrote:

Plus I want players to have an incentive to clear up towers even if they don't want the moon. Which means some reward for it.

Would the hacking having a chance of making the tower explode be an acceptable compromise ?


No, because you're trying to avoid even the possibility of PVP with this scheme. You can't make a blanket statement saying that every offline tower there is owned by an inactive corp. There are plenty of quite active corps with plenty of offline towers. If you don't like them having an offline tower in a particular place and really, really want it gone, then you just might have to have deal with them defending it.

Hesod Adee wrote:

In highsec you don't get dreads at all and you have to warn the owner with a wardec. Allowing them time to fuel it up and stick defences on it.

Guess where most of the offline POSs I've seen are.


Yeah yeah, wormholes and lowsec and whatnot. This is why I suggested a precipitous, rather than a token, drop in HP (shield, armor and hull) once a tower goes offline. People don't shoot towers because of the extreme effort and time required, and active corps don't fuel a unused, offline tower they own for a variety of reasons, "no one will bother to take down this large tower" being one of them. . I see no problem in changing things to speed up and entice killing them. But I do see problems with just making it a risk-free hack+scoop.

And, no, suspect flags don't make it risk-free. Sit 5km from tower, hack it in a covops until someone comes on grid, then just cloak up and warp off. If you do manage to hack it, you get an alt in a cloaky hauler to immediately scoop it. If you think suspect flags introduce some sort of risk, you're fooling yourself. Any competent pilot can easily maneuver around this.
Sugar Kyle
Middle Ground
#48 - 2014-04-01 13:36:09 UTC
Plug in Baby wrote:
Don't like this at all.

Offline POS don't have much HP, if the moon is at all worth having you can just 1-cycle it with a few dreads and no one will react in time (unless its somewhere busy).



This is not an option for high sec nor do I believe it is often one for wormholes.

Member of CSM9 and CSM10.
Rhavas
Noble Sentiments
Second Empire.
#49 - 2014-04-01 14:10:12 UTC
Cheradenine Harper wrote:
My main concern is selling any solution to CCP that involves touching the POS code. Any solution that remotely touches an existing mechanic is going to stop the idea dead in the water.

-snip-

Nice thread. Thanks Rhavas.
Thanks for being the initiator of the idea. Big smile

I'm of course very skeptical that CCP will actually do this, but I'd love some of the devs to weigh in, as well as CSM members past and present and future candidates. And as I said in the OP, at worst maybe it provides some thought guidance for future design.

Author of Interstellar Privateer Shattered Planets, Wormholes and Game Commentary
Rhavas
Noble Sentiments
Second Empire.
#50 - 2014-04-01 14:14:47 UTC
Plug in Baby wrote:
Don't like this at all.

Firstly we are in a game that requires more assets destroyed rather than fewer, even if POS are a minor fraction it would still be a step in the wrong direction.

Offline POS don't have much HP, if the moon is at all worth having you can just 1-cycle it with a few dreads and no one will react in time (unless its somewhere busy).

I just really don't see the point, its hardly as if there are no moons around to use.

Edit: Ooops I just noticed the date and that OP may not live in the same timezone as me Oops April Fools!


No April Fool's joke. It was the afternoon of the 31st my time. Smile

I'm betting you live in Sov Null, where there is a sizable navy to hand with dreads whenever something gets in the way and you just pop a casual titan bridge over to pop it.

This just doesn't happen in the places where this is really an issue - namely wormholes (especially Class 1-4 where dreads are effectively nonexistent) and from what I can tell from feedback, high sec (where people tend to hoard moons due to the wardec and standings barriers).

Author of Interstellar Privateer Shattered Planets, Wormholes and Game Commentary
Rhavas
Noble Sentiments
Second Empire.
#51 - 2014-04-01 14:19:48 UTC
Jinrai Tremaine wrote:
One minor exploit I can see with that is that if a hisec tower has been in standby mode for 48 hours or more, rather than having to wardec the owners to reinforce the POS I could just put an alt in an Arty Thrasher (or even, theoretically, a basic noobship) and fire a single volley at the tower. I'd lose the ship to CONCORD and (I think?) take a minor sec status hit on the alt, but that would kick the tower straight into Reinforced, meaning rather than having another 26 days of slowly draining Stront in Standby mode it'd burn through it in about 1d14h of reinforced, then drop down to anchored (and therefore hackable) at the end of it. The same trick would work outside of hisec without the requirement of sacrificing a ship to CONCORD, though I assume in those areas it's more intentional.


Yes, that's exactly how I intended it to work when I wrote it up.

That said, my primary experience with POS has been in wormholes and to a lesser extent lowsec and NPC null. So that's how my brain frames things. There may be an argument for doing it a bit differently in highsec or preventing that specific mechanic from working in highsec.

Everywhere else, as intended. Smile

Author of Interstellar Privateer Shattered Planets, Wormholes and Game Commentary
Rhavas
Noble Sentiments
Second Empire.
#52 - 2014-04-01 14:24:26 UTC
Grayland Aubaris wrote:
Hacking deployable stuff.


Certainly I'm far from the first to suggest the hacking piece (even in the Twitter thread that initiated this!), and I kind of like your mechanic for how you suggested it. If it "auto hacks" and thus comes out at a random time, I can see that as potentially interesting. I actually don't mind that as a deployable in and of itself but I would suggest that they be parallel capabilities (think tractor module vs tractor deployable) rather than either/or.

In this particular case, I see deployables as needless complexity and more stuff to remember/buy/bring when you go out through a wormhole chain or are out on some kind of travel, not necessarily a planned op. I want a way that you can get it, and get it now, with the right skills. For this scenario, I prefer the direct hack like an exploration can.

Author of Interstellar Privateer Shattered Planets, Wormholes and Game Commentary
Rhavas
Noble Sentiments
Second Empire.
#53 - 2014-04-01 14:32:03 UTC
Tarsas Phage wrote:
No, because you're trying to avoid even the possibility of PVP with this scheme.


Actually I'm not (maybe Hesod is, I can't speak for him). In the case of wormholes (where I come from), you can shoot it whenever you like. As you put it "no one will bother with this large tower" is the case in my world.

Tarsas Phage wrote:

Yeah yeah, wormholes and lowsec and whatnot. This is why I suggested a precipitous, rather than a token, drop in HP (shield, armor and hull) once a tower goes offline. People don't shoot towers because of the extreme effort and time required, and active corps don't fuel a unused, offline tower they own for a variety of reasons, "no one will bother to take down this large tower" being one of them. . I see no problem in changing things to speed up and entice killing them. But I do see problems with just making it a risk-free hack+scoop.

And, no, suspect flags don't make it risk-free. Sit 5km from tower, hack it in a covops until someone comes on grid, then just cloak up and warp off. If you do manage to hack it, you get an alt in a cloaky hauler to immediately scoop it. If you think suspect flags introduce some sort of risk, you're fooling yourself. Any competent pilot can easily maneuver around this.

I could get behind an HP drop as a mechanic as well, but ironically I think other folks in the "don't take my POS" camp outside of highsec would have the opposite reaction to you.

I also agree that a suspect flag would not be a deterrent - fights where that would matter happen on gates and stations, not POS.

But the bottom line IMO: If you want your POS, keep it fueled. If you didn't bother to fuel it for an entire month (again, I'd prefer a week!), I should be able to steal it.

Author of Interstellar Privateer Shattered Planets, Wormholes and Game Commentary
KiithSoban
Mackies Raiders
Wild Geese.
#54 - 2014-04-01 14:34:35 UTC  |  Edited by: KiithSoban
In general, +1 .

However I too believe that ~a month is way too long for this pos to sit in "standby". Also, I do not like the idea that a POS lacking fuel would display a timer to the whole system. That would not only be annoying for those of us that do not care, but would make finding a shut down POS too easy.

I want to see logi appear on killmails! (by just repping)  See CSM "reasonable things"
Rhavas
Noble Sentiments
Second Empire.
#55 - 2014-04-01 16:23:51 UTC
KiithSoban wrote:
In general, +1 .

However I too believe that ~a month is way too long for this pos to sit in "standby". Also, I do not like the idea that a POS lacking fuel would display a timer to the whole system. That would not only be annoying for those of us that do not care, but would make finding a shut down POS too easy.


A month honestly seems too long to me too but I can live with it so long as it inexorably starts when fuel runs out and not when I as the salvager first interact with it.

I actually probably need to clarify the "visible" thing - my intent was not system-wide, but on-grid. I will update the OP.

Author of Interstellar Privateer Shattered Planets, Wormholes and Game Commentary
Cheradenine Harper
The Grey Area
#56 - 2014-04-01 17:50:36 UTC
Two last thoughts.

1. OMG. Rhavas spelt my name wrong in the original post. As befits a egotistical, avaricious vagabond I have now dedicated my life to trawling wormholes looking for the blighter in order to send him on his merry way to Bob. Actually I will be doing this after I stop being scared of wormholes.

2. If you really want to understand how I felt when I found all those dead sticks then watch the scene at the end of The Good The Bad and The Ugly where Eli Wallach runs around the graveyard to the tune of Ennio Morricones "The Ecstasy of Gold". The dead sticks are the graves. If someone had named their stick "Arch Stanton" I'd of been CONCORDed just after flying to the next moon. Yes I am ugly and yes, I lust for ISK.

Now go and read my blog or play some EVE.

;)

http://diaries-of-a-space-noob.blogspot.co.uk
Marsan
#57 - 2014-04-01 18:55:03 UTC
As much as I like the thought of being able to hack all those abandoned POSes. It would cause POS prices to take a huge dive for sometime. With most things I claim this is a good thing as it would allow a lot more players to play with POSes, but think of all those poor players who will finally decide they can afford a POS, and their suffering with the POS interface;-)

Seriously there should be some way to get rid of a POS that has been hanging around for months without fuel. Nothing sucks more about moving into a new hole or area and having to spend hours bashing a POS owned by a defunct corp. Worse yet having to war dec a you are only 95% is defunct and impact the entire alliance with unneeded paranoia. Maybe this should happen in several passes. The 1st pass being POSes belonging to defunct corps, then POSes belonging to inactive corps, and then any offline POS.

Former forum cheerleader CCP, now just a grumpy small portion of the community.
Hesod Adee
Perkone
Caldari State
#58 - 2014-04-01 20:10:23 UTC
Tarsas Phage wrote:
No, because you're trying to avoid even the possibility of PVP with this scheme. You can't make a blanket statement saying that every offline tower there is owned by an inactive corp. There are plenty of quite active corps with plenty of offline towers. If you don't like them having an offline tower in a particular place and really, really want it gone, then you just might have to have deal with them defending it.


If they want to keep a moon to themselves, they should put in the effort. Either keep it fuelled, or find some other way to drive off anyone who tries hacking it.

Quote:
Hesod Adee wrote:

In highsec you don't get dreads at all and you have to warn the owner with a wardec. Allowing them time to fuel it up and stick defences on it.

Guess where most of the offline POSs I've seen are.


Yeah yeah, wormholes and lowsec and whatnot. This is why I suggested a precipitous, rather than a token, drop in HP (shield, armor and hull) once a tower goes offline. People don't shoot towers because of the extreme effort and time required, and active corps don't fuel a unused, offline tower they own for a variety of reasons, "no one will bother to take down this large tower" being one of them. . I see no problem in changing things to speed up and entice killing them. But I do see problems with just making it a risk-free hack+scoop.


Lets take the example of a 1 man corp who wants a high-sec POS to do blueprint stuff. He has, maybe, a single battleship. How long do you think he should spend shooting at the tower after the HP reduction ?


As for risk free, what do you think of the high sec slumlords and their risk-free placeholder towers ?
They see unoccupied moons and stick a towers on all of them. Then ask for ISK to remove it.
This is risk free because, if they do get wardecced they can unanchor the tower and get the ISK back from selling it. Or they could stick so much EWAR on it that you'll need a fleet of maraduers with their EWAR immunity to even shoot it.

Quote:
And, no, suspect flags don't make it risk-free.

This I agree with.

Prince Kobol wrote:
I would love to see something as simple as once a pos goes offline you do not need a war dec to shoot, you will simply get GC


So players should sit around in high sec for hours while being able to be shot by everyone ?

That's not going to solve anything.
Bane Nucleus
Dark Venture Corporation
Kitchen Sinkhole
#59 - 2014-04-01 21:32:08 UTC
Rhavas wrote:


Hi Bane - SSC, you will be unsurprised to learn, has full moon coverage in our home system. That means a bunch of placeholder POS. I do not speak for SSC management when I say this, but IMO, we should have to fuel those things at least once a month. and keep them stronted. I think most WH alliances can afford it if they can afford to POS every moon.

But in return for that concession to cost, I want us to be able to steal every POS that's not nailed down in the chain every night.

I think it's a fair trade.


I am SHOCKED that you have full moon coverage P

Thank you for answering my question. The only concern I have is that massive timer. I think for an offline tower it should be at the most 12 hours. At no point should an offline tower's timer be longer than a reinforce timer. If we want the change, lets make it interesting Lol

No trolling please
Grand Formage
The Planetary Baron Society
#60 - 2014-04-01 23:54:15 UTC
Re: High Sec space
It seems to me that people just want to find a "work around" that will allow them the ability to bypass the established system. In high sec, if corp abc123 drops a tower and corp/alliance xyz789 wants it removed, they must wardec the owners to prevent the involvement of concord and the adjustment of security standings. To do this, three things must happen, 1) a wardec is declared and a fee is paid, 2) a timer begins, 3) timer expires and the aggression against the towers begins with or without defenders. A non-shielded large or small tower will fall in a relatively short time.

Now, just because the tower has not been online for X amount of time, does not necessarily mean that it belongs to no one currently active and that it is not of interest to anyone. to disallow steps 1 and 2 does nothing for anyone except for the aggressor by allowing them to avoid a rather small amount of isk and eliminate a minimal amount of time for the owners to make ready a defence. In the larger scheme of the eternal life of a pod pilot, making them wait for a measly 24 hours for the wardec is nothing more than a big boohoo, and for the pilot or pilots bold enough for such an endeavor, the fee for the wardec is most likely of no consequence.

Re: Low Sec Space
I cannot speak to lowsec as i have spent almost no time in it to know the mechanics.

Null and W-spaces are dangerous places. To kill a dead stick in these areas is like swimming in the ocean...you do it at your own risk as there are no lifeguards other than those you bring. if you can kill it fast enough and get away, you score.

However...

Re: Null Space
I do not feel those of null space need changed as the powers that control those areas have most likely done what they needed to remove unwanted structures. If an aggressor takes a shot at a placeholder stick, notices are delivered, forces are rallied, conflict (most likely) ensues. what needs changed. There are almost always sharks in the waters looking for foolish swimmers.

Re: W-Space
Like null, if there are dead sticks along with active towers present, they are not dead, they are strategically placed or allowed to remain. for an aggressor, the only reason they would want to get rid of a dead stick is to take over a wh that has no active towers. while there is no mechanic to punish the aggression other than a system owner or stray griefer, what would be the benefit of modifying the system other than to give the aggressor an easy button. NO. All gains should have cost. An objective must be worked for. even if it means taking down a presumably unattended control tower.

TL;DR

Aggressors just want an easy button. Screw you. if you want what is not yours, to take or to kill, you should have to work for it.