Jita Park Speakers Corner

For years EVE has been the mmo of choice for one reason. Its cruel and harsh nature, its unrelenting fine for stupidity when you do something..stupid.

http://cdn1.eveonline.com/community/csm/CSM9Summer_Minutes_2014.pdf

Read down from page 77, CCP is planning on stopping awoxing as we know it. This will kill EVE, it will become every other MMO out there only difference is it will be in space...wait...Star Trek already did that. Awoxing punishes the lazy and stupid, and very rarely hurt the new player, and if awoxing scares a potential player away from EVE, they wouldn't appreciate the game it truly is. The thing is I don't even do any scamming, awoxing, or ganking in game but I appreciate it for it makes my gameplay much more rewarding and exciting. If I wanted to moderate challenge with little risk/reward I would play some other **** with better graphics. The cruelness of this game makes the game. Anyways rant over I just wanted to see if more people has an opinion and wanted to voice it before CCP dooms the game for us all, I mean if this goes next will be ganking and scamming..

Thoughts?

If only there was a part of EVE that CONCORD didn't police.

I would say go to nullsec, but there's a big blue donut there that kinda stalls the free pvp argument. Awoxing is such a minor concern, I don't know why it really even got on the radar for the nerf hammer.

The justifications that CCP listed for getting rid of Awoxing, are asinine. In 4 years of EVE, I have never seen an awoxer; they're a rare source of storis, more myth than fact. But they make the game interesting (CCP seems determined to eliminate things that make the game interesting).

Eliminating awoxing makes EVE a friendlier place for newbies? I've never felt particularly inclined to join a newbie corp specifically to kill new players, because frankly it's boring.

The only thing that sets EVE apart on the MMO market is the cutthroat, remorseless, high risk game play. Take that away, or blunt it, and we might as well start playing any other theme park MMO. Visually speaking, it goes from Vikings (the show) to Asterix and the Vikings (disney-esque cartoon vikings). IE, a game for adults, to a game for children. I don't like to play children's games.

Your hysterical hyperbole is showing.

First, they do happen, they just don't tend to be very big. Most awoxing that occurs tends to be some guy just going crazy on a few ships until the intel gets out or he get eliminated. If they were awoxing titans instead of mining barges or ratting ravens, maybe people would care enough to keep them in the game. But by and large, that isn't what is happening. They tend to be pretty gutless in the awox attempts; probably just a lack of patience to wait for something good to come around, or its spur of the moment and lashing out like little boys.

As for the second part, if it was cutthroat, remorseless and high risk game play you were looking for, today's awoxers are really none of those. Almost every single time I've seen an awoxer, it has been in a renter alliance or someplace just as easy to infiltrate on your way to killing a Golem. These aren't the cool kids actually looking for PVP. Again, maybe if they were doing something consequential, someone would really defend their usefulness to the game. but they aren't. They're pretty much trying for coward kills.

Agreed that removing the ability to shoot corpmates for non awox reasons could be an issue. But let's be honest, the entire concept of shooting anyone without incurring aggression or Concord sanction just seems a bit contrived. The game has basically created this loophole that avoids sanctions. For what? So some dude can say "but it adds to the game"? He could shoot someone anyway. This is basically just saying he should probably incur a sanction and the corp should be able to give him the boot more easily than now. Why should they get a free pass and make it difficult to remove them?

Howdy. I've not made it all the way through the minutes yet, but there's a bit of fuss over the talk of AWOXing being removed. I said in an earlier mail I didn't believe it led to trouble for newbies, but I guess if CCP's deliberating removing corp aggression, it's not for no reason?

I'm a believer in highsec aggression and I've been dissatisfied with the current state of that game. I'd made a draft of a forums post/mail on that subject a couple weeks before now. It's similar to the talk in the CSM session, so I'd like to present it in response to that.

I like AWOXing. I like that EVE players have this tool to harass or take revenge and a unique way to pirate. Suicide ganking requires a group and wardecs are impotent. I don't believe it's something EVE needs or that removing it kills the spirit of the game. That's a little nuts. But I do like it and it's a part of why I personally joined the game, despite not practicing such things myself.

The goals behind the draft was about changing some highsec rules to allow for greater degrees of personal or group success at the cost of greater degrees of exposure to other players, and to provide room to remove wardec dodging. So here it is.

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1) Wardec-free corporations

This is a common idea and I'm listing it first in an attempt to set the tone of the post. I believe players should have the right to form a social group at whatever level of play they're comfortable with. I think we already know what the idea behind this is. A corporation that has all the normal features, but can't be wardecced and doesn't allow for corp members to shoot each other without committing a crime or using the duelling feature. If a player is uncomfortable playing at a higher level of risk, they're not going to face that risk. But a feature like this'd allow them to fly with friends, with corp hangars, taxes, standings, channels, bookmarks and roles.

(e: the minutes talked about a possible toggle for turning corp aggression on or off. if such a toggle was implemented, i think the toggle should start a one-week timer before triggering, and should give each character a popup warning. i also think it shouldn't be triggerable, on or off, during wartime.)

(ali aras mentioned something very similar in the session. fozzie said it didn't change the issue... why is that? i don't really understand. i've never been a recruiter or anything. hell, i'm playing skillqueue online right now. i assumed awoxing and newbies was trouble for highsec pve corps. i don't hear about the few corps around me [lowsec groups] having trouble with recruiting due to corp aggression rules. falcon talks about recruiting for a pirate group and having trouble due to awoxing, but awoxing in lowsec would happen even if there was no allowance for corp aggression)

(regardless of that opinion, i think it's something worth doing)

2) ... but players gain a disadvantage by not putting themselves at risk

Although I believe players should have a right to form a social group, they do not deserve to enjoy the same benefits at low levels of risk than people who desire to challenge themselves for greater profit. Currently it's possible to practically remove yourself from many risks (corp folding) without paying the penalty. I believe that someone who exposes themselves to risk and manages that risk well is entitled to greater opportunity, a chance for a higher degree of success in their endeavour than someone who refuses to face risk at all. Even in highsec. A corp that is unwardeccable (e: and unawoxable) would be taxed at a lower rate than NPC corps, but still face a high enough NPC tax that there's incentive for forming a normal, deccable corp. The corp wouldn't be able to claim sov or erect corp structures. Again, this is a fairly common idea.

3) Remove tax loopholes and stop taxing pointless things

Currently there's no incentive and no proper reward for a miner to join a corp. And I want miners to enjoy the opportunity to expose themselves to greater risk in highsec - for a good reason. Currently there's no good reason (mechanically) to leave an NPC corp with a mining character. I'd like mining to be taxable and taxed by NPC corps. I don't care how it's done lore-wise. Lower-strength mining lasers or CONCORD teleporting ore out of your bay. Incentive for miners to form normal corps. I'd prefer mining, even NPC-corp mining, wasn't nerfed, though, and this effectively amounts to an NPC corp mining nerf. Perhaps raise the gross yield on mining so that the net yield after tax will be the same per hour as it is now.
At the same time, I don't think an NPC corp (or wardec-free corp) member should be paying tax from activities carried out in lowsec or nullsec. Lowsec activities might be taxed at half or less, because the safeties gained by being in an NPC or undeccable corp don't matter so much. (almost don't matter at all, really) Wealth gained in nullsec shouldn't be taxed, because what advantage did the NPC player gain from being undeccable there? Bugger all.

4) Remove wardec loopholes

One goal for the above suggestions is to provide room for wardec loopholes to be addressed, with the aim of creating a more dynamic highsec wardec environment. This bit's hard and I have no good suggestions. I don't like corp folding to shed wardecs. I don't like that everyone can leave a decced corp and they don't suffer much penalty (after enjoying the rewards from their npc-tax-free corp, i don't think an individual should be wardec-free). I don't like that a tower can be taken down when a wardec is made, even though there is a timer on structure building for a new corp.

But even though I don't like those things and I'd like wardecs to be dynamic and meaningful, there's a good chance they'd still only be used for harassment and Jita undock camping no matter what efforts are made to change them. I don't know how to fix that or if it should be 'fixed'.

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I was going to go on about wardecs but it's not really relevant here. Actually almost none of that post is really relevant, balls. There are meaningful wardecs around. There's not many, but they're there. When expressing dissatisfaction with wardecs, I guess I'm more dissatisfied with some of the wardeccers themselves than the people folding from harassment decs. It's not even a scene I'm involved with, so why the hell am I trying to comment on it?

The parts of the post I think matter are the parts on 'hobby' corps and taxes. I'd add this to the post but for THE BAREFACED LIES OF CCP'S WEBSERVICE.

While I don't personally use the "corp mate shooting mechanic" alot - it does have it's uses for non awoxxing purposes. Ever heard of testing new fits, etc? No matter how old you are in this game, u have never used EVERY fit conceivable. Nor do you want to instantly test that fit in 100% consensual, risky, PVP. (or even non consensual PVP) So that right there is one way for all of us to say that keeping that mechanic does have it's merits. I know personally I don't want to have to daisy chain duel requests when I want to test out a BS fit, etc. (Hell I don't even know if it's possible as I've never tried considering it's only function would be for this purpose if corp shooting got removed. As I've never daisy chained duels for actual PVP. Nor would I really want to considering the areas that's prevalent in would be rather suicidal to do so.)

So ya..don't really care about Awoxxing, even though I do believe it has it's uses. but I've never personally done it, nor have I even seen it done. But if they are going to start messing with mechanics that have existed since I first began this game around 11 years ago, they need to look at ALL the use cases! (check my history including the linked char.)

Likewise if they are going to remove/change something due to the NPE - they better have a darn good reason and it better not change the majority of the game or even set the building blocks for more changes that could impact the majority of the game down the line with the slippery slope routine.

EDIT: Also while we are on this issue, I thought up a case where this could potentially screw a form of Awoxxing that actually benefits the game. While ALOT of us, from vets who PVP constantly, to even new players, hate CODE - they do serve an important (albeit detestable) function in some areas of highsec. - To gank the hell out of people who utterly abuse industry. Heck I have several real people (some are bots as well) on my watch list that completely obliterate entire systems in mining barges. It irritates the hell out of me because I want to be able to kill them, but unless I spend mountains of isk to ruin their day in the form of griefing them (smartboming them going down to -10, then tagging back up to positive and repeating the process), so they move on and give others a chance to mine those resources, I can't do anything against them. I can simply do what I do now - add them to watchlist, swallow my pride, and contact freaking CODE to see if they want "free kills."

So awoxxing (when we can actually do that to said individuals who aren't protected by a damn NPC corp) - serves a function of leveling these guys out. I'm sorry but seeing one dude or in a lot of cases, bots, decimate entire systems, is not a "good form of gameplay."

So hopefully that's not too off topic. But it's tied to this Awoxxing issue and I'm not even in support of it. I just know that while these elements of the game are rather detestable, they do serve a necessary function.

LAST EDIT : I say they are detestable because they don't only keep their kills to these individuals. (players and/or bots who ****/pillage entire systems/constellations of belts)

How would automatic API checking work? I mean, the things I check for in an API might be slightly different to what you check for? Or is it just more a matter of an API accompanying a Corp Application?

State Charter is an interesting idea for High Sec corporations, one I think is worth discussing.

But back to the topic at hand, AWOXing..... I've been in High Sec, Low Sec, Null Sec and now back to High Sec. I think it's vital I vet anyone applying to my Corp to watch for things like AWOXing, which lets face it, doesn't just show up on API.

I think it fits in with game lore nicely, a Corporation would handle internal security matters internally... infact, I would like to see this extended to High Sec Alliances, cos surely an Alliance of Corporations would have their own Security too.

I think it's important that New Players learn early on about the dangers of life in space, while they are in a position to recover from the loss relatively quickly. I think you will find that if a new player is AWOXed, corp mates will usually help recoup losses, if not the Corp reimburse them.

In those cases where the AWOX has cost billions, well, wouldn't it have been better than the victim learn earlier about the dangers of carrying too much or blinging a ship too much?


The NPE should be extended to show people how Low Sec operates and how life in space, even in High Sec, can be dangerous.



I "AWOX" myself all the time, my Freighter never goes anywhere without a Rapier hitting it off each gate, it's the only way I know to enjoy a part of the game I like (being Freighter Pilot) without incurring losses (cos not ever ganker looks for 1b+ Freighters). The webbing trick might be an exploit, but as long as speed fit Machariels can bounce ships as ridiculously as they can I'll exploit that every chance I get.


I don't think removal of AWOXing will ruin Eve, but I know it is pushing out one style of play. The dedicated Spy/Infiltrator/AWOXer, which will spend time infiltrating a corp looking for that big kill. If you want to improve the "community" feel of the game and the overall NPE, concentrate on gankers more than AWOXers. (that said, I'm not against ganking per se, I've enjoyed doing it myself - just it is a bit more of a grief for New Players than AWOXing I think ---- if you ask all those people who answered exit surveys again after explaining that ganking and AWOXing are not the same thing, you might get different answers --- and while we are on the subject of exit surveys, how many closed alt accounts were closed due to cloaky camping? - but hey, that's low and null only right? they can take care of themselves)