Player Features and Ideas Discussion

I know what you guys might be thinking, here comes yet another thread on how to improve highsec combat.
Just bear with me please.

Almost everyone knows that there are several inherent flaws concerning wardecs in Eve.
They're extremely easy to avoid, there's no real incentive to fight and most of the time fighting actually works against you.
So yeah, not a lot of people are inclined to fight.

To fix this, we need a reason, an incentive, for people to actually stand up for themselves.
What I'm proposing is the following: HQ's.

The headquarters system would be a new mechanic, that corporations can use to give themselves several advantages over other corporations.
It would give a bonus to mission payouts (both isk and LP), rat bounties, POS fuel costs, POCO taxes, job installation costs, the spawning of "private" asteroid/ice belts (only the corp gets the bookmark, but the belt can still be scanned down pretty easily and non corp members mining the belt would become suspect), etc...
But only in the system where the HQ is present. The HQ would also function as an ESS concerning bounties, with only corp members with a specific role being able to access it.

To compensate this, the reverse would be true if you were not in a corporation, or in a HQ system.

The bonuses and penalties would be quite significant, to actively encourage people to form corporations and band together in a certain system. Ranging from 70% original payouts in a non-HQ system, to 110% in a HQ system.
Similar percentages would be applied to the other aspects.
Furthermore, the contents of regular asteroid belts could be reduced significantly (both in terms of ore present and types) as another way of encouraging miners to group up in corporations.

Of course, these are quite the significant bonuses, so you can only have one per corporation (duh) and your corporation needs to be at least 1 month old before you can place your HQ. If you lose your HQ, you'll need to wait another month to be able to place a new one.


Now of course, there is the question, how is this going to promote conflict?
Quite simple actually.
A HQ can only be anchored at a planet, of which there are a very limited number of. This of course means that in the "good" systems, there will be fierce competition to actually have an HQ, since there can only be so many.

Now, having more structures to shoot is not a good thing, so that would be the only "structure" and it would be very low on ehp (think around the area of about 200k ehp tops). The rest of the conflict would be fought using a style of capture points similar to faction warfare.

Points of different sizes would appear in the system, and the aggressors and defenders can fight for control over the system (no acceleration gates for these points). Of course, a large size point (which takes longer to capture) is worth more "control" than a single small size point, which encourages players to either take risks, or go out in a large group.

As control over the system shifts to one side, the bonuses to the defenders shift accordingly, until, just like in faction warfare, the HQ becomes vulnerable. Once vulnerable, you can shoot it and put it into reinforced, but since it has a very limited amount of ehp, the focus shifts from defending the HQ to actually gaining control over the system. (the HQ only has structure HP and will enter reinforced at 25%)

After a reinforcement timer of about 2 days (end time more or less specified by the defender), it becomes vulnerable again, however, it needs to be repaired to 100% before a new reinforcement timer can start.

Of course, there are some special limitations to be considered.
For instance, as soon as a war goes live, the HQ cannot be removed, and you cannot withdraw the bonus payments from the HQ until the war is over.
If the HQ is destroyed, the ENTIRE payout is dropped in the form of tags, ready to be picked up.

Furthermore, to prevent corp hopping, members that leave a corporation during a war will have the war follow them until the end-date as it was when they left the corporation. This is mainly to both encourage people to stay in their corporation and to prevent corp hopping (which is a truly terrible mechanic). Of course, this "sticky" wardec will follow people no matter where they go, be it an NPC corporation or another player corporation.
Evading a war will still be possible, but there will be some severe consequences in the form of reduced income and a certain amount of risk for a period of time.


Thoughts?

Basically another structure no one is going to use because the rewards don't outshine the increased risk and effort? Very good. Now that this is out of the way: could we now please turn our attention back to Low sec and 00 sec and make these areas of space worth living -- WITHOUT ruining High sec any further? Thank you.

Sounds Fun.

I find myself in complete agreement.
There is very little fighting going on in WD because those who get WD have no desire to fight or be involved in PvP.
Many prefer to simply turtle up in a station and wait out the WD, or do like me and clone jump all over the EVE universe to see if they are serious enough about the WD to try and hunt you down.

All of you that are into PvP need to understand that there is an entire group of casual to serious players in high sec that want nothing to do with PvP, all they want to do is log in, go mine, run complexes, manufacturing, distribution of goods, market trading, missions etc and then log off. There is no amount of rules changes, game changes or any other type of changes you can make that will change this fact.

Force them to buy one of these stupidly easy to destroy structures to be able to have a system to call home and band together as a player corp and you will only serve to make the situation in game worse than it is for you PvP players. How you ask well everyone will simply bail out of player owned corps and into an NPC that you cannot WD, then what will you do? Oh here's a thought why not WD other high sec WD corps? after all you are looking for the PvP action aren't you? Or is it the stupidly easy kills that make up the majority of those from high sec WD that you are looking for?

While the boosts to mining, bounties and mission payouts sounds good it fails when applied to the game.
Miners rarely stay in one system, preferring to move around because each system and each belt spawn has a different mix of ore types.

Most mission you run are not in the system where the agent is located so the question is would you apply the bonuses based on the location of the agent or the mission?

Most serious mission runners have multiple agents across multiple NPC and in multiple systems located in all 4 major factions space and as such your proposed bonuses would not apply to the vast majority of the missions they run. So how would this bonus be an incentive to them to form a corp and put up one of your stupidly easy to destroy structures?

HIgh sec PvP is a complex situation that has no easy answers, as I stated earlier the PvP players need to understand that just like real life you cannot force people to fight. So instead of looking at how to force those who do not want to why not concentrate on a system where you all that are into PvP can get together and slug it out?

The problem with highsec Wardeccing is Griefers. Large corps and alliances picking on smaller, sometimes half inactive disorganised corps etc. "experienced" players ganging up on people. People complain about people in highsec not defending themselves against wardecs or standing up for themselves as though they can actually do something about it. A corp of ten people cant really defend against a larger corp or even one of like size in better ships with more sp.

I think it would be quite unfair to force people to undock or whatever some people are suggesting on highsec corps..

Example.
When i first started playing i was alone for a week. I joined a high sec corp. 80 people, only 10 active/communicating with everyone else routinely or even used teamspeak. I didnt use ts until after 2 weeks. These guys mined and did missions.

Long story short.......A mega corp camped us in the station for half a month 24/7.
Undocking guaranteed a blob in t3's and hacs. They talked **** in local.

If anything ruins eve for people, especially new guys, thats it.

In reply to Angeal above me, I for one enjoy having a game available to me that is not nerfed, coddled, bubble-wrapped and safety-zoned to the point of being a pillow-fight simulator.

For the days and times when I don't feel like being in the jungle, I have another MMO where the management takes a stricter stance about player behavior. EVE is fine.

Well, fact of the matter is, all those actions are PvP.

They're not directly combat (which I think you meant), but they are still PvP (or at least subject to it).


Go Mine -> Those rocks you mine, I cannot.
Run Plexes -> The loot you get, I cannot
Manufacturing -> you're making it more expensive for me to.
Distribution & Trade -> you're ruining my margins
Missions -> The M1-4 gear you get is messing with the markets. The minerals you (might) refine out of the "trash" is affecting that market. Or, I can just show up and steal the completion trigger.


Now, the classic "carebear" argument for many of them (specifically the mining and exploration topics) is usually along the lines of "you can go next door" or "it comes back at downtime" as reasons why given actions are not PvP.

However, the thing they're not considering is that by making me wait (or go next door), they've just given similar negative gameplay to me, as someone else gives to them with Antimatter.




No they don't. For a given faction and system sec (e.g. Amarrian 0.5), all the belts in all the systems have the same mix of ores. Now, granted, every cycle a miner completes in a belt does alter the amount of available ore ... but that's getting into such fine detail that it's like arguing over rivet / weld seam placements in a cast resin model of a Rifter sitting on your desk.




Least you've gotten this one right.



well, that was short lived...

(edit, yeah I really can use quote blocks guys...)

Even I know that missions send you to systems other than the one you want. Why would anyone put this thing up when most of the time they're not going to be in system with it?

Also, how do your sticky wardecs apply to things like marmite, who have been at war with most of the cfc since march, non stop?

Still trying to sort out the multiple quote thing, that and I prefer to write my responses offline it allows for a delay in posting that gives one a chance to review your own post before it is to late.

Posted by Angeal MacNova

"CCP should rethink certain aspects of the game. Yes it's a PvP game, and yes there should be a balance with risk vs reward but some of the crap that some people do in game, that CCP turns a blind eye to, has nothing to do with either. "
PvP is only a portion of the greater whole of the game , EVE is not PvP only game do not ever forget that.

Posted by Alvatore DiMarco
"In reply to Angeal above me, I for one enjoy having a game available to me that is not nerfed, coddled, bubble-wrapped and safety-zoned to the point of being a pillow-fight simulator."
I agree completely with this. I play this game because it is unlike virtually every other MMO in existence. See here we have options to play how we want, want to be a pirate you can do that, want to be a miner you can do that and the list goes on. The element of uncertainty that this mix of possible game play options provides makes EVE unique and it is one of its major attractions to those of us that play. Even though I am a carebear and proud of it I still believe that PvP in all its forms are an integral and important part of EVE and I fully support them and yes that includes high sec WD as frustrating as they may be. But I will say this, the day CCP tries to force me to PvP when I am WD is the day that all of my real cash paid for accounts unsubs and moves on to spend my money elsewhere and I am sure there a significant number of others who share this opinion.

These from Velicitia
"Well, fact of the matter is, all those actions are PvP."
PvP - player versus player/players. Not sure how mission running or mining fits this universal description of PvP but then we are all entitled to our own opinions. I guess in some off the wall way your comment makes sense but then someone buys all those minerals and modules from us mission runners and no one is forcing them to do it. What this thread is about is a small groups desire to FORCE everyone else to do something they do not want to do.

"confirming that the "large" corps in hisec with huge counts of inactives (not to mention disorganization) are the bane of EVE."
Sorry we cramp your style but get used to it this is common for us casual gamers, we get bored and take breaks from a game from time to time. What do you think CCP and the CEO's of the corps should do?

This game is a sandbox. We should be able to do as we please. Some like to explore, some like to pvp, some like to do industry. Why should have to exit the eve clients to play another game because I want to do one specific thing? Actually, I like to dabble in a bit of everything. That is whats so great about this game. If we get bored with one aspect of the game we can move to another and do something new.

Also, I fail to see the emphasis on using alts for everything.