Player Features and Ideas Discussion

The main problem at the moment with nullsec is that in order to "win" you need to be able to field more capitals than your opponent, and the way to counter these blobs is to bring more capitals and the only way to counter that is with yet more capitals and so on and so forth until you get to a point where TiDi kicks in and a fight that should only last an hour ends up taking almost an entire day assuming the node doesn't die. The sheer size of these cap fleets makes it very hard for new and smaller entities from getting a foothold in nullsec because for the most part Eve is a numbers game; people like to win and winning is more assured with greater numbers. It is very difficult to prevent people from teaming up, we are a social species and we have that "safety" in numbers mentality. So how do you incentivise people into not creating a 300 carrier fleet and hopping around Eve from system to system. Well there is no single solution, "fixing" nullsec requires a lot of changes to sov mechanics, "power projection" resource gathering and distribution, capital rebalancing etc. What I propose is a potential solution to the "Apex Force" of capital ships, nothing more.

Proposal.

What if a multiplier that only affected damage from sub caps to capitals was triggered in a system when capital ship numbers reached a certain limit, say 20 or more of any type regardless of alliance etc. The more caps that keep piling in, the higher the multiplier and the more dangerous subcaps will be to them.

I'm not talking about a measly 5-10% buff in damage, I'm talking about a single volley from one BS being able to take out a titan or 10 bombers wiping out half a wrecking ball fleet in one run if the caps in system approach the ludicrous numbers we saw in B-R5. Suddenly all those lowly, previously worthless subcaps become a real threat to anything bigger than a battleship during an engagement involving hundreds of capitals.

From a technical standpoint something like this already exists to some degree in wormholes. A magnetar multiplies damage and a pulsar nerfs armor resists so it shouldn't be too hard for CCP to implement, though it will need to be done in conjunction with the aforementioned fixes to nullsec mechanics. Lore wise it would be hard to explain but then again so is TiDi.

I'll leave you to speculate on the potential ramifications if something like this was implemented but I believe it would make alliances and coalitions spread out and limit the use of their cap fleets, for even a staging system would become dangerous to massed capitals from a bombing run or Blops. Pilots would become more wary of using blobs of capitals, and instead would try out more varied fleet compositions. It goes some way to allowing alliances without hundreds of caps from getting a foothold in nullsec though it doesn't solve the overarching n+1 (1000 megathrons) problem, though I would much rather face 1000 megas than 1000 supers with triage support. I have no problem with capitals being used but not in the numbers currently deployed, a fleet should be a balanced mix of ships from frigates all the way up to Titans that compliment each other and fill various roles.

I'm sure there are many flaws and counter arguments to this proposal and no doubt they will be pointed out, please do, and no doubt some people will call this stupid and call me a noob scrub Mcscrub for suggesting it, but I think we can agree that the current status quo is not healthy for the game, especially with Star Citizen and Elite round the corner. Another B-R5 would be the end of me and I'm sure nobody would choose to go through something like that again especially considering games are supposed to be fun right?

Any thoughts?

yes but remember your caps would also be just as vulnerable to an opponents lone battleship, the multiplier would be system wide affecting all caps, you would both be taking a risk by bringing in more caps.

If it's not one ship it's another, bumber cars EVE that lets you shoot through anything assures, over the long haul, that the side with the most people that can tollerate the most boredom always wins.

In addition, jump clones and other conveniences like the ability to immediately field another ship after dying pretty much assures that all "solutions" will never change anything.

What is needed is a super-cap killer ship, a pocket battleship that can jam the supers and fire an XL weapon, forcing the use of a sub-cap screen to protect the super-caps. «o»

Its not that his apex force is 1k megas its that the ONLY apex force is a blob of one ship type. If the system was balanced better and an apex force a la 12 super caps needed appropriate screen and protections then the blobs would at least look more, well normal.

The other huge gripe is that currently supercaps can be anywhere and do anything with an absurdly short period of time. In effect if you don't already have one (apex force) you can be a null sec force. If you try to build one, you'll get stomped before you do.

There is nothing wrong with the 'apex force' but the way it operates is a major reason for the current null sec situation.

Apex forces can be badass but they also need:

a) range or deployment time limiting (for example US carrier groups can't 'warp' any where in the world at a moments notice (GOD, would the DOD and Whitehouse LOVE that!)
b) need to be made up in such a way that just carriers don't rule (see point a about carrier groups, how many carriers to other ships are there?)