Player Features and Ideas Discussion

This thread seems great. The only issue is that it does not help Goons farm easier or safer, therefor CCP will never implement it, sorry. :(

This thread shall rise to the visibillity of the first page of F&ID!

Anyway I read up about SOV after looking at a SOV map again and found this thread. Looks like some very nice ideas.

Even though I admit you completely lost me after "Warfare". Modules? Specific structures? Dead space gates? Sorry but that doesn't sound very interesting or useful or "not tedious to engage".

From what I can see right the main problem of the SOV system is that it is too easy to hold SOV.

From what I can see an attacker on any system has to go to a system(1), deploy(2), online(3) and defend(4) sovereignity blockade units, wait a bit(5), then attack the sov claim unit(6) and win against the defending fleet that probably shows up. I haven't done this in game before but that sounds like a lot of effort.

The only thing the defender has to do is pay the sov bill (if nothing happens) and show up sometime in the process above to disrupt it.

Examples of things that don't happen:

Pirate raids
Sov expires because noone showed up
Sov claim prices rise exponentially with the amount of systems claimed
Sov units need fuel that has to refilled every 3 or 4 days
Population of the planets somehow playing into it.

I.e. any kind of push for the sov holder to do anything but pay some bill every two weeks.

Assets in these regions are mostly invulnerable and provide no targets for roam fleets, the intelligence tools consist of taking a ship and going there to see if there is a potential target which can take any number of hours, PvP activity has no influence on profitabillty of the system therefore the ones where PVP isn't are the better ones - which is btw motivating players to avoid player interaction, not seek it.

In summary SOV is held because attackers don't know if anything is there worth the effort (and mostly there isn't) and don't bother to challenge it.

Frankly it should be fairly easy to come up with any idea that ties player activity to the sov status making active systems more desireable for the potential attackers.

To the entropy idea. Maintenance should be easy while control is still high. After a week or two of total inactivity, it should start to get more difficult again, until eventually it is controlled in name only, with no benefits to holding sov at all. Making it exactly as hard to keep as to gain forces alliances to constantly be on the offensive, as the defender has no inherent strategic advantages as you proposed.

This provides a counter to massive unpopulated sprawl. Done right, it gives an incentive to create coalitions of smaller entities than the current corps as the smallest level of entities organized, and scale in a less heirarchical fashion up to major power blocks, as a coallition with only a very few active systems would end up paying bills just to put a color on the map.

Roughly 3500 systems, with about 40,000 characters logged in (at least when I'm logging in), makes for about 11 characters per system. There's no shortage of characters, and how crowded highsec is proves that. The issue is how difficult it is to get into nullsec.

Bump for a good thread.

If structures would produce goods when not in use (mining structures produce compressed ore, research produce research components, etc), than it will be profitable to raid unused and abandoned systems. You'd gather a couple of friends and blow up modules with valuabe stuff inside.

Benefits of this proposal are twofold:
1. You provide passive income to system owner, also giving raw materials instead of isk helps with local industry.
2. You provide atractive target for small pirate gangs.

This leads to player induced system decay. If raiders would be unopposed, they'd simply farm the system untill there are no more targets to shoot, effectively removing sov from current owner.

That means local system defence fleets are necesity, and that leads to more small gang warfare

A more indirect mechanic for entropy could be implemented with the "Corruption" aspect reflecting pirate faction activity and influence in a system. While it won't flip a system, it makes it easier for someone else to do so by reducing the required population control percentage to contest sov and allow conquest of structures.

Corruption would increase over time and decrease with pirate kills with a minimum corruption defined by DeCo adding corruption and a maximum restricted by planetary security in Settlements*. Amount of corruption defines the quality and quantity of ratting anomalies, signatures and belt rats. To balance the possible bounty income loss Settlements* can produce trade goods and other commodities that can be exported for ISK.

Point of this whole system is to create sov mechanics that offer choices, consequences and customizability compared to the linear, static and rigid system we have right now.


*Settlements is something I am currently working on formulating out. Gist of it is that every planet gets at least one disitrict where a settlement can be put on of different types, which can be fitted in different ways to gain benefits for the planet and/or provide stability/security.

These then can be attacked through covert operations by other players by dropping a covert command center, landing supplies from orbit and engage operations of sabotage, theft and/or propaganda until uncovered and removed.

I'm going to bump this discussion because I really liked the idea and wanted to hear what others thought of this one, and not on the one that was posted above this.

As to that one, I'll just say that imposing restrictions isn't the answer. We need to change the tools we have access to and the ways those tools interact.

In part Sov is messed up because force projection has outstripped sov mechanics. It's too easy to bring huge fleets to bear anywhere you need them and trigger RF in multiple places in rapid succession. if I'm living on your north border, I shouldn't be able to attack your south border.

We need to change both, as addressing either one alone would require too drastic a change. I think this concept is a very good step towards meeting a compromise in a way that integrates DUST514 as well.

Great Idea, they may change their minds yet

Check the date of the OP, please.

This is an outstanding idea.

CCP, after 12 years, still hasn't come up with anything remotely close to as cool as this.

Kinda sad, to be honest.