Player Features and Ideas Discussion

WHAT IF... a ship used a passive weapon system, in that it could launch a cloud of mines at an area.
It would work something like this: The ship spots a target mining or doing something similar.
The ship takes a swarmpack, (named for this tactic), and fires it at a target point.

The swarmpack then flies to the area, missile style, and bursts apart into an expanding cloud of mines. The mines expand into a cloud 15 km in every direction around the center point. (15km radius, 30km diameter) Mines would not be active until the cloud finished expanding, or else the mines would cross detonate upon release.
(A second cloud would mutually destroy all mines in overlap areas, as they would cross detonate, creating a cleared area where the clouds overlapped each other)

Now, a careful pilot could navigate through these, and avoid hitting too many so it would survive.

Area of strategy, possible that clouds could be placed next to each other to saturate larger areas, keeping in mind overlapping areas are cleared, so solid clouds are not really possible of great size.

Gates could find these also a navigational hazard.

The ship, like the SB with bombs, would be able to only carry a limited amount of these. They would also only persist a limited amount of time, DT would eliminate them, assuming an even shorter duration did not do so.
(5 minutes plus 5 minutes per skill level. Minimum skill level 2, so effective time is 15 to 30 minutes)

I can think of a few ideas to reverse engineer it, using current game elements, but like anything else, it has to be wanted.

(The mines could be recoded jet cans, with the skill specific timers to poof. Just like the 2k range decloaked a CovOps, the same range could detonate a small smart bomb effect with 3k blast radius)

(The entire cloud could be a coding used in a blast, but locked to be paused by minizones, each unpaused when the ship entered the individual zone. The visual appearance would be not unlike a cluster of soap bubbles for that.)

Not saying it would be simple, but I think they could do it without it becoming more effort than it would be worth by far.

I don't like the idea of there being a weapon that can kill you while your attacker is AFK, POS guns are fair enough because they're only at POSes at moons, but you describe being able to put mines anywhere. Also your idea of navigating through a minefield, in this game is really cute but it's never going to work, you don't have enough control over your ship to expect players to pull that kind of thing off.

Objects in space cause a lot of latency, so I think if these things were in the game, they would be used to generate lag and cause time dilation to kick in so that people can kite unfavourable reinforce timers into their stronger timezones. Spam mines around gates so that no hostile fleets and cloakies can't get in, have a few blockade runners keeping your mine ships supplied so you can keep spamming minefields everywhere.

No thanks.

Your comments seem more aimed at mines in general, since some of the effects you describe are not related or probable with my idea.

By lag / graphics load, the mine cloud I described should be less intensive than a standard bubble. They even have these moving now, with the release of the Hictor, so a stationary one is an unlikely strain. The individual mines can be left out, having a red sphere present serves the purpose. (Mines are normally hidden anyways)

AFK killing? Won't work very well... The time limit on these makes it improbable for an attacker to simply stick these everywhere, especially when combined with their inconvenient size requirements to carry around. You are just as likely to get a swarm of interdictors putting bubbles everywhere, and they are already in game.

YES!!!

Moar destroyer ideas, please!

+1

"The initial idea I had come up with had conditions set on mines. Mines only remained if the mine layer was on grid and not cloaked. Once the ship cloaked or left grid the mines would auto detonate. There would be a limit to how many mines could be layed by a single ship."

"There is no reason a specialized destroyer could not be used for this, they certainly could use more variety."


I like the idea of mines myself as a defensive tool. How could this be used in EVE, heres a thought.....your on a lo/null sec roam when you encounter a superior force. FC orders a tactical withdraw to XXXXX gate. They purse. Having a minelayer in fleet he orders it to lay mines at the gate to cover fleet jump out. Or he orders the layer to deploy mines on other side of gate as well as a bubble or two to hinder pursuit. An FC using this tactic/tool could possibly choose to engage pursuing fleet or continue withdraw to another system.
As far as a ship to use a Dessie is a good choice the Coercer already has the look. But how about a Tech 2 version of the mining frigate. They already have a decent cargo hold and utilitarian look and there is no use for them above what they are used for now.

Just my 2 cents worth. Fly reckless.

/me coughs politely
That would be me.

I would have a second account just to pack these mines around a gate so I could mine peacefully.

Errr, by mine peacefully I mean like being a miner on asteroids, not just a miner of gates, which could also be called a miner I guess.

Ok, I would be a miner by both definitions then.

(I could deal with this T2 frig too, but the destroyer just feels so fun...)

I agree with your point, but give me a second to picture Jita with mines... got it.

Like any weapon, I would expect the damage done to other craft to cause status changes, not to mention bring concord running.

As this would be possible to not be in the same system when it occurred, I can see it not being allowed in high sec, or optionally being treated as immediate damage upon setting the mines with concord.

Yeah, I was thinking more of nullsec on this design. Any place a warp bubble could be placed, kinda.

Who says it has to be a race thing.