Warfare & Tactics

previously there was an idea where you can only cap plexes on a single front to "promote more pvp" but this idea was not supported by anyone.

Silly idea, most will hate, but whatever.

FW is mini sov?

What about incorporating mini-sov at the constellation level?

so each constellation has a "hq" system that cannot be plexed unless the rest of the systems have exchanged control.

this can be at "tier" levels if you will.

so the outer lying systems need to be captured first, and you move in slowly towards the hq constellation.

this is at the constellation level though, mind you.

Examples below are from left to right, you can start on either side, but must cap all outer systems before closing in on the "hq" system.

Outer systems can be dplexed and oplexed but inner systems won't spawn plexes.

Amarr constellation examples
Tandoiras constellation: saidusairos, kurnianian, oyonata (hq), sahtogas, tannakan, haras
Vaarma constellation: saikamon, anka, iesa(hq), uusanen, sosala
Sasen constellation: lamaa, kamela, kourmonen (hq), huola
Semou constellation: ezzara, arzad, sifilar(hq), oyeman, raa, tzvi

Minmatar constellation examples:
Eugidi constellation: floseswin, uisper, turner, aset (hq), isbrabata, vimeini, eytjangard, avenod
Huvilma constellation: olfeim, bosboger (hq), lulm, gulmorogod
Essin constellation: hofjaldgund, eszur, gebuladi, frerstorm (hq), ontorn, sirekur, ebolfer

Working example:
Semou constellation is fully owned by Amarr and the Minmatar want to assault the constellation. ezzara and tzvi are the only systems that can be flipped. once tzvi is flipped, raa and oyeman can be flipped, finally arzad can be flipped and now the HQ (sifilar) is vulnerable to attack. just on the Semou front, you can attack 2 sides until you get to arzad and sifilar.

Huvilma constellation: constellation lost gulmorogod, the only sytem that can be assaulted is olfeim. once olfeim is down lulm can be taken and then bosboger.

There are many constellations so there will always be many fronts, and I think this is an interesting idea.

Alternative addition to this concept would be that you can plex the inner systems but they give 1/10 the rewards (in both contesting the system and LP).

Also no more tiers based on lp donation blah blah blah it's ridiculous.

just make it based on the constellations owned.

some constellations are worth more than others based on the # of systems.

no more 250% lp gains that's just absurd.

As weird as it is, Olfeim is not part of FW, although it is part of Huvilma constellation.

Currently there is a disparity in the number of constellations and systems.

Amarr has 28 systems 5 constellations
Minmatar has 42 systems 7 constellations.

Remove Aldodan and Huvilma from FW and connect Amamake to Egmar directly. Backwater systems are just farmer paradises in minmatar/amarr warzone.

As for the original proposal, I think there may be merit to it, but needs more polish. I think ANY change to FW should begin with ability to run timers to their starting position at a 5x increased timer speed. So that comitting to your timer might have a meaning.

No

That's true. But right now risking your ship is pointless. If anything comes in that has a slight chance of killing you, you are better off warping to another plex.

For home systems this isn't an issue as during the fights for those systems, the plexes will almost always be occupied by dedicated defenders/attackers. But outside of those systems, there is no incentive for this level of dedication or commitment.

As a result, people just do not commit. It is not an issue of warp core stabs or cloaks. It is lack of penalty against non-commitment. Timer rollbacks are just that.

Note that I believe that no timer should ever be counting itself back. You should be spending your time running the timer back to original value, but at a faster rate.

raster rollback does not solve the problem. Problem is that now we have to wait that contested level goos to 75% before defensive farmers are interested to run plexes, so current system leaves 75% of time free for farmers to grind.

Thing is that CCP wants that systems change owner and people farm plexes and thing rolls on, it is working fine now no matter if it makes any sense or not,

right, and currently there are about 70 active pilots at any given time and 70 systems in amarr/minmatar theatre.

would be nicer if there were 10-12 available areas for said 70 pilots.

I like the idea of a 'front'. It makes it a little more 'war' like.

I would also consider a neutral state for systems, ie minnie >> neut >> amarr. I think the current contestation rewards are too high and systems can be flipped too easily with a blitz. I would like to see a more sustained campaign required to take a system than the current 48hrs max. Either this or just drop the % per plex a bit, maybe 0.4% / 0.5%.

I also think more can be done with the ihub upgrades, I would go for +1 rat in each plex for each level for starters. It doesn't sound like much but it would re-address the isk vs reward or farming while benefiting the residents.

Oh, and timer rolebacks. CCP / CSM, this has been widely approved by the community for what, 2 years now? Any danger of you listening to your players? I'll tell you what, I have 10 minutes spare later, send me the snippet of code and I will do it for you.

When I saw this I was hoping it was based on something from CCP, alas changes for FW are unlikely.

Most interesting part I think might be ideas regarding ranks, plexing gives very little standing, if standings were changed to only come from PVP (remove mission standings gain or cap it) then limiting LP reward items by rank may work. Hell standings gains based around the LP formula for PVP for kills and even an amount for losses could be appropriate, and yes reset rank if you leave swap militias.

Any change however small I think would be welcome, CCP’s lack of customer focus for different sections of the playerbase for the expansions always surprises me.

Regarding OP’s suggesting, scaling rewards for border systems maybe but I am unsure of the benefit of an HQ system, when you use the term flipped do you mean no plexes spawn or can the systems still be plexed but not flipped, if the latter very little will change and the former may really impact PVP in the core systems.

I could agree with abolishing LP donations it punishes those committed to the warzone and occupancy a farmer rarely donates.

Linking to constellations owned however would involve an automatic high tier for dominating factions, this would be bad. Perhaps tax defensive plexing adding it to the hub and automatically add/remove equivalent LP to the Hub based on kills. Heavily defended systems would then have a higher tier. Donations could still be left as an option.