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Post-escalation Incursion Changes

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Jenn aSide
Soul Machines
The Initiative.
#141 - 2012-05-11 14:01:59 UTC  |  Edited by: Jenn aSide
Xorv wrote:

Your comparison to running nullsec anoms solo, is flawed in that there is a great deal of effort and teamwork far exceeding anything in High Sec Incursions to create the environment that they can run anoms solo. Nullsec residents require constant teamwork to maintain that environment and they do so against other players not NPCs. Same is true of Wormhole space. There's simply no way your going to be able to justify High Sec Incursions earning remotely that of PvE activities in areas of space more open to PvP.

The high end earners must be considered, and part of why they can earn so much is that they can go out in very expensive pimped out ships without serious risk of losing them as would be the case in Lowsec, Nullsec and WH space.


Perfectly said (underlined the most important part), and I it troublesome that ccp is just talking to professional incursion people when talking about fixes, Incursion content MUST be balanced with everything else, and on a per character basis. I'm a casual incursion runner, I want them to be good (group pve content which then encourages pvp involvement is great for this game), but too good anything is bad in a game like this.
CCP Affinity
C C P
C C P Alliance
#142 - 2012-05-11 14:02:21 UTC
Jenn aSide wrote:
CCP Affinity wrote:
Keep the discussion on topic - short term fixes


This seems to suggest that there needs to be a [/i]fix[/i].

With people in shiney ship organized "communities" adapting to the situaiton already, STILL pulling in 100 mil an hour, any "fix" bears a high risk of simply reverting to the protected high sec super shiney isk printing that you were trying to fix in the 1st place.

That's what happened with null sec anomalies, you guys "fixed" them to the point where people fled to the (at the time insane) high sec incursions, only to re-fix them into the (in the case of forsaken hubs) super titan isk prining machines. It's ok now because of the titan nerf....now it's super carriers in those anoms lol.

(Side note, the occaisional NPC Interdictors in null sec anoms triggered randomly by the entry of a super cap might be a good idea, pass it on :) )

I know incursions are not perfect as is, but please tread carefully (and i'm sorry, talking with members of a farming community isn't all you should be doing, eve is one game, not a series of "special interests", you should think about non-incursion folks too), especially with regards to the high sec incursions. The goal should be to encourage people to places other than high sec (where consumption good for the economy happens), not giving them incentive to stay there or flock back to it.



Again, this is why I am on the forums listening to the opinion of everyone who wishes to post

♥ CCP Affinity ♥

Follow me on Twitter

Game Designer for EVE Online

Team Astro Sparkle
CCP Affinity
C C P
C C P Alliance
#143 - 2012-05-11 14:04:34 UTC
Jenn aSide wrote:
Xorv wrote:

Your comparison to running nullsec anoms solo, is flawed in that there is a great deal of effort and teamwork far exceeding anything in High Sec Incursions to create the environment that they can run anoms solo. Nullsec residents require constant teamwork to maintain that environment and they do so against other players not NPCs. Same is true of Wormhole space. There's simply no way your going to be able to justify High Sec Incursions earning remotely that of PvE activities in areas of space more open to PvP.

The high end earners must be considered, and part of why they can earn so much is that they can go out in very expensive pimped out ships without serious risk of losing them as would be the case in Lowsec, Nullsec and WH space.


Perfectly said (underlined the most important part), and I it troublesome that ccp is just talking to professional incursion people when talking about fixes, Incursion content MUST be balanced with everyhintg else, and on a per character basis. I'm a casual incursion runner, I want them to be good, but too good anyhting is bad in a game like this.



I'm pretty sure I've said this already but we are going to balance them vs other PvE, not just based on other Incursion sites. I am also not just talking to professional Incursion runners, I am talking to an entire forum of people :)

♥ CCP Affinity ♥

Follow me on Twitter

Game Designer for EVE Online

Team Astro Sparkle
xVx dreadnaught
modro
The Initiative.
#144 - 2012-05-11 14:05:13 UTC
Daneel Trevize wrote:
@Jenn aSide
3/4 races are reasonable to armour-tank. Armour-tanking fleets must be viable, sites & site classes should permit those with spare midslots to rival those with spare lowslots. Just because pirate faction shield BSs can pull in a decent rate, doesn't mean everyone else should be ignored, but instead a spectrum of efficiency ensured.


The Ditanian Fleet were the first to do Mom sites as well as HQ's and they fly exclusively Armor fleets.
Jenn aSide
Soul Machines
The Initiative.
#145 - 2012-05-11 14:10:23 UTC  |  Edited by: Jenn aSide
Daneel Trevize wrote:
@Jenn aSide
3/4 races are reasonable to armour-tank. Armour-tanking fleets must be viable, sites & site classes should permit those with spare midslots to rival those with spare lowslots. Just because pirate faction shield BSs can pull in a decent rate, doesn't mean everyone else should be ignored, but instead a spectrum of efficiency ensured.


But isn't that a deeper issue than incursions? That's Armor (sry, I meant armour :) ) vs shield tanking, and it's an age old problem, not something that is unique to incursions (and something that coupld be fixed by mid-slot damage mods, in the same way you have both low and mid slot tracking mods, but thats a whole 'nother discussion lol).

Trying to balance incursions against something that is a deep core issue in the game should not be a dev focus IMO. The armor tankers just need to train shield stuff to adapt.

If you buff incursions to the point where armor tankers are doing as well as shield fleets can, it' just a super buff to shield fleets......
Jenn aSide
Soul Machines
The Initiative.
#146 - 2012-05-11 14:12:21 UTC
CCP Affinity wrote:
Jenn aSide wrote:
Xorv wrote:

Your comparison to running nullsec anoms solo, is flawed in that there is a great deal of effort and teamwork far exceeding anything in High Sec Incursions to create the environment that they can run anoms solo. Nullsec residents require constant teamwork to maintain that environment and they do so against other players not NPCs. Same is true of Wormhole space. There's simply no way your going to be able to justify High Sec Incursions earning remotely that of PvE activities in areas of space more open to PvP.

The high end earners must be considered, and part of why they can earn so much is that they can go out in very expensive pimped out ships without serious risk of losing them as would be the case in Lowsec, Nullsec and WH space.


Perfectly said (underlined the most important part), and I it troublesome that ccp is just talking to professional incursion people when talking about fixes, Incursion content MUST be balanced with everyhintg else, and on a per character basis. I'm a casual incursion runner, I want them to be good, but too good anyhting is bad in a game like this.



I'm pretty sure I've said this already but we are going to balance them vs other PvE, not just based on other Incursion sites. I am also not just talking to professional Incursion runners, I am talking to an entire forum of people :)


I see that, but you should only talk to me, as I am the King of EVE. Didn't you get the memo? No?

Good help is hard to find Cool
Gonzo TheGreat
Donuttown
#147 - 2012-05-11 14:57:58 UTC  |  Edited by: Gonzo TheGreat
Sansha are supposed to have limited forces and CONCORD a limited pocket.

Make X incursions spawn in a week through k-space.
Each incursion has Y (limited) forces which are divided into different sites, there will be Y_1, Y_2 etc number of each available site, if they are farmed fast, the spawn rate decreases (or just spawn them as normal, if they are finished, no more spawns).

The whole community doing incursions will have to do a balance of sites, not just farm VGs etc. Meaning, there will be a self/fleet profit compared to the whole incursion profit.

If all the VG sites are finished (farmed) and the constellation control drops so people cannot do the higher level sites due to difficulty, it's their problem because the community derped as a whole. So, after a few of these derps, either they learn to do things together or just take easy isk and run. In this case you can add VGs back with reduced payout or no payout at all, that they have to do to regain constellation control. Call these sites "Incursion Maintenance".

If the community can make agreements as to keep the mom site to farm the incursion, they can also make enough decisions to balance the sites being run. After all, they are claiming they are doing incursions for the social experience, neh ? so this means they will become closer and start cooperating together to do things with each other.

PS : also, Sansha in wspace. No, we don't want incursions. But they are supposed to use wormholes to attack empire right? It would be nice to have some sansha sites in wspace. (from an RP standpoint this also makes sense).

PPS : Buff Scouts.
John Maynard Keynes
Science and Trade Institute
Caldari State
#148 - 2012-05-11 15:13:38 UTC  |  Edited by: John Maynard Keynes
Problem:
RIsk/Reward scaling Null Sec/High Sec

Solution:
Is as simple as it would be painfull to Incrusion farmers.

Make incursions a low sec ONLY event with high rewards.

It would also help to revive low sec btw.
Col Ostomy
Caldari Provisions
Caldari State
#149 - 2012-05-11 15:40:45 UTC  |  Edited by: Col Ostomy
John Maynard Keynes wrote:
Problem:
RIsk/Reward scaling Null Sec/High Sec

Solution:
Is as simple as it would be painfull to Incrusion farmers.

Make incursions a low sec ONLY event with high rewards.

It would also help to revive low sec btw.


This is not a bad idea. It seems it would naturally lower the amount of isk/hour in because pilots would be less likely to bring ~4bil isk super ships to blitz Vanguards in 6 minutes. If they do bring those kinds of ships, think of the kill mails and tears that could be had.

Maybe change spawns to 1 high sec, 3 Low Sec, and 3 Null. Leaving High Sec isn't a bad thing and would balance out the isk vs risk a lot better than just lowering payouts.
CyberRaver
Deep Core Mining Inc.
Caldari State
#150 - 2012-05-11 15:52:35 UTC  |  Edited by: CyberRaver
Short term fix:


Bring them back to what they were, then re-evauluate the situation after summer, thats what will work

Hell just reduce the payouts by a few million per site, there you go incursions fixed, you canconcentrate on new content :d
Deumos
Republic Military School
Minmatar Republic
#151 - 2012-05-11 15:54:33 UTC
It has been said that having 5 TCRC's in a system isnt a good thing which i would agree at high infleunce,but when you get it down to a reasonable level they are the fastest HQ to run for shield fleets.I dont want the number of them restricted when you get the infleunce bar down to a reasonable level.If you do plan on restricting the number of them Affinity,i think you should speak to nomatech about what point it would be reasonable to have 5 TCRC'S in system with the infleunce bar.I have done a TCRC at 100% infleunce and its totally pointless doing them,because it takes so long that its not productive to do them to help get the infleunce bar down.

TPPH's can you please take a look at them them.The issue with them is that you got three rooms with a tower bash at the end,and you need to get the fleet to all fit a ab if they dont do 200m/s,because the gates are 60km or something away which takes a while with a 40 man fleet.In all other sites you may need one or two people sometimes to do something,and going quick gets the site done quicker but not the entire fleet!!!Some people would like the second room removed or would just like the gates moved alot closer so you dont need a ab.I think this site would be much better if we didnt need a ab for it for people that dont do 200m/s.
Crest Cutty
The Country Club Crest
#152 - 2012-05-11 16:18:03 UTC
CCP Affinity wrote:


The original goals for Incursions were to provide group game play, high end PvE opportunities and high risk content. I would like them to eventually be at a point where they have a high enough risk to warrant a high end reward. I would also like the incentives to come from a growing community but a place to experience a PvP like style of gameplay within a storyline setting. I will provide more info on this after we sort out the short-term problems.


If those were your original goals then just change incursions back to how they were before. High end fleets were making high end isk. There was a large community running them and there was PvP style of gameplay with npc opponents. The idea to have high risk in empire space, where you push the pilots who are risk averse, was...short sighted? If you want to introduce risk take it out of empire.

Trying to introduce risk into a risk averse population is destined to fail. Instead please design around those players who are in hi-sec; min-maxing, sisi optimizing, spreadsheet junkies AND casual weekend warriors.

I don't have the access to the stats that CCP does but I don't see "high end" armor fleets anymore since they got rid of legion blitz fleets and the "high end" shield fleets are hard to keep going because there just aren't that many nightmare/machariel pilots anymore because the variety of better isk streams available to pilots with enough sp to fit/fly them properly.

Short term fix, leave incursions alone until CCP can devote the proper resources to the project.

Or don't listen to people who are not flying in "high end" fleets (armor/pug). You wanted something challenging that offers rewards to the best of the best pve pilots, well you got it. Keep that mara way the hell out there so it can only be killed by high end fleets (t2 guns), get rid of NMC, NCO's and make assaults more difficult. More torps to give armor fleets the ability to sig tank and punish shield fleets. Adjust the speed/range of rats to require well rounded gunnery skills in order to complete the sites with any type of reliability. After doing all of this up the rewards to the 150m/hr level and voila you have "high end" content with "high end" rewards...
Daneel Trevize
Give my 11percent back
#153 - 2012-05-11 16:37:43 UTC  |  Edited by: Daneel Trevize
Jenn aSide wrote:
But isn't that a deeper issue than incursions? That's Armor (sry, I meant armour :) ) vs shield tanking, and it's an age old problem, not something that is unique to incursions (and something that coupld be fixed by mid-slot damage mods, in the same way you have both low and mid slot tracking mods, but thats a whole 'nother discussion lol).

Trying to balance incursions against something that is a deep core issue in the game should not be a dev focus IMO. The armor tankers just need to train shield stuff to adapt.

If you buff incursions to the point where armor tankers are doing as well as shield fleets can, it' just a super buff to shield fleets......
You fail to understand balancing with current mechanics. Shield-tankers can fit TEs, but those modules don't compare with the effective tracking improvements of a 60-90% web, which is also effective for all shooting at the target (which helps other fleets in contests too). Thus, to balance you make sufficient rats come within web range, a range which isn't something that scales with hull size unlike guns.
There are reasons why I would love that it did, but it doesn't.

So to balance current shield vs armour, you let shield have highest theoretical DPS with more lowslot damage & TE modules, and let slower armour ships have a chance to use their mids by requiring tracking that only scripted TCs or webs can provide. Shields have to fly away & kite but can't permakite, armour have to fly towards and tackle & lose a bit of time getting into range. That's Eve done right, not only having shield as the option for best isk.

xVx dreadnaught wrote:

The Ditanian Fleet were the first to do Mom sites as well as HQ's and they fly exclusively Armor fleets.
It's not a question of whether they can do it, or do it safest first time, but equally efficiently once sites are min-maxed. For 3/4 races.

Never mind how bad railguns are (for all stats) as a racial issue, or that artillery has a far larger difference in alpha for their dps than another other ranged weapons system. You could do something like half their alpha and double their RoF and they'd still be the slowest, hardest hitting weapons for a given dps value. And once something's alpha'd you don't care about DPS so much. Machs volleying things could take out rats at their guns cycle rate, rather than several volleys of other ranged weapons with 10% higher theoretical dps.
RebelMC
Hedion University
Amarr Empire
#154 - 2012-05-11 17:27:33 UTC
I have read almost every post on this thread and while I lack the intelect of some of you :) there are some commen themes showing through the cracks.

I don't want to make this thread politcal but try to interpret what has already been said with out all the complexities.

1. Have seen a couple of post from alliances members such as TEST whom seem to see that the new supernerfed incursions are a good thing but still want the ability to be able to gank carebear pilots in highsec by removing concorde from incursion areas.

2. I have gone from running incursions on an almost daily basis in vanguards (armour) to being in a position that the group that I ran with can't even form a fleet any more as the risks out way the profit by such a large amount they are barely worth doing for most players now.

3. While it is true that some elite players could earn up to 160 million isk per hour (based on non stop nco's) this figure only applies to fleets that had 90% bling , the vast majority of players did not earn anywhere near this figure and those same people are now lucky to earn 60 mil an hour but at a much higher risk.

Whilst I am aware this is an incursion thread this next point is still appropriate

4. There has been much talk since patch day that you earn more money per hour running level 4 missions, however these were seemingly nurfed also as in most bounties seem to been reduced my half and the loot has been decreased also at a guess I would have to say current level 4's are like doing the old level 3's from an isk standpoint.


I am sorry to say that this "escalation" patch seems to be very pro low/null sec favoured as a whole hence my original politacal remark. Pre patch people in low/null/wh could generally make alot more isk than those in high which I have no problem with, but post patch the divide has moved to the point where many players especially carebears have no options available to increase their income ie incursions.

While this game is does have a pvp focus , I dont see why that focus should be forced on everyone in order for them to enjoy and succeed in the game if they don't want to, because as it stands I know many that log on half as much as they used to and some not at all :(
Lyron-Baktos
The Scope
Gallente Federation
#155 - 2012-05-11 18:03:12 UTC
^^ exactly. you cant' balance something out on what only happens 1% of the time to only 1% of the player base.
yugi272
Ministry of War
Amarr Empire
#156 - 2012-05-11 18:27:02 UTC
Make an incursion counter so people can do X-vanguard sites in any given time, afterwards either wait for the cooldown or move to Assaults and do some of those to remove the timer and again do some vanguards, and cycle again?

Without the need to do HQ's ofc as we all know those are hard to form, keep together and in general not easy to manage.

CCP you should lurk in DTF, the population is going down by the day, fleets are harder o form and last not too long once they are formed..
Col Ostomy
Caldari Provisions
Caldari State
#157 - 2012-05-11 18:50:37 UTC
yugi272 wrote:
Make an incursion counter so people can do X-vanguard sites in any given time, afterwards either wait for the cooldown or move to Assaults and do some of those to remove the timer and again do some vanguards, and cycle again?

Without the need to do HQ's ofc as we all know those are hard to form, keep together and in general not easy to manage.

CCP you should lurk in DTF, the population is going down by the day, fleets are harder o form and last not too long once they are formed..


Making X-Vangaurds will only make it easier for john q pubbie to get into a group and punish well organized groups who play with each other often. Where does the rule end? Tell miners they can only mine so many rocks per day? You can only run x-number of level 4's a day? IMO the issue isn't that people farm incursions, it's the amount of isk vs the risk involved. If your are bringing in wheel barrows of isk and have zero risk, that in my mind is an issue. NPC rats do not count as risk as you can pretty much sleep during a site. Being dropped on at any time by an opposing fleet to destroy your group is, and its something you'll never see in high sec. If the goal is to make it high end content with high end pay, you shouldn't be exempt from danger for the amount of isk you bring in.
Jenn aSide
Soul Machines
The Initiative.
#158 - 2012-05-11 18:54:48 UTC  |  Edited by: Jenn aSide
RebelMC wrote:

3. While it is true that some elite players could earn up to 160 million isk per hour (based on non stop nco's) this figure only applies to fleets that had 90% bling , the vast majority of players did not earn anywhere near this figure and those same people are now lucky to earn 60 mil an hour but at a much higher risk.


Entitlement, thy name is Incursions....

This right here is what I've been railing against, 60 mil an hour anywhere in eve for shooting rats is ok-ish income much better than I made in my 1st 2 years of eve as a mainly high sec mission runner, that's for sure (even adjusted for inflation).

Now, thanks to badly implemented/easily farmable high sec incursion content (like the old vangaurds), High Sec players are thumbing their nose are more isk than they should have ever been able to make per hour in high sec to begin with. Unbelieveable.

High Sec gets automated game generated police protection, for the good of the game as a whole it simply cannot and should not have ways of making "game money" as well as places that have higher levels of risk.

Quote:

I am sorry to say that this "escalation" patch seems to be very pro low/null sec favoured as a whole hence my original politacal remark. Pre patch people in low/null/wh could generally make alot more isk than those in high which I have no problem with, but post patch the divide has moved to the point where many players especially carebears have no options available to increase their income ie incursions.

While this game is does have a pvp focus , I dont see why that focus should be forced on everyone in order for them to enjoy and succeed in the game if they don't want to, because as it stands I know many that log on half as much as they used to and some not at all :(


That last sentence doesn't make any sense at all.

It's the exact same thing as saying that Soccer (Football for you foreigners...I mean non-Americans :) ) has a focus on feet yes, but that the game should not penalize people who just want to use their hands to throw the ball in the net.....

Simple equation. Live in High Sec, accept less income or take risks in unprotected space for higher profits. Some of you high sec peopel really want to have that cake and eat it too.

No one is judging your "playstyle", simply reminding you that every playstyle choice does and should come with consequences.
Jenn aSide
Soul Machines
The Initiative.
#159 - 2012-05-11 19:00:40 UTC  |  Edited by: Jenn aSide
Lyron-Baktos wrote:
^^ exactly. you cant' balance something out on what only happens 1% of the time to only 1% of the player base.


You can and CCP should. I forget who says it but there is a long time forum poster who said something to the effect of "anything you do to help noobs will only end up helping veteran players even more".

Same thing, CCP makes incursions so good people in un-shiny ships and totally disorganized PUG groups can make good isk, the "shiny communites" will use them to break EVE's economy to tiny little pieces with their farming of it lol. What's hard to understand about that?
Asmodes Reynolds
Rayn Enterprises
#160 - 2012-05-11 19:35:52 UTC  |  Edited by: Asmodes Reynolds
CCP Affinity, after reading this thread, there is nothing that you can do"short-term" to fix this incursion problem the reason being "Concorde protection" allows people to to fly officer fit faction battleships

- An Incursion fleet flying faction battleships fit with officer mods. Allows that fleet to effectively break any balancing done using payouts/Time it takes to run the site.

The shiny fleets are currently flying with factions fit ships , if you Nerf to pay out/Site time, they'll just upgrade to officer. (because there is virtually no risk of losing it because of "Concorde protection" )

- if you Nerf the payouts and/or time it takes to do the site, enough where Faction battleships Fit with officer mods can't break it, Then the barrier for entry has been raised so high that you're going to lose 98% of your community.

- Unless you are willing to limit what people can fit on their ships when running the sites ( Which you won't do because that would break the concept of Eve)

CCP Affinity, Do you see a way around this problem without removing Concorde? ( anybody.. )

On a side note.....

RebelMC wrote:
words words words...

1. Have seen a couple of post from alliances members such as TEST whom seem to see that the new supernerfed incursions are a good thing but still want the ability to be able to gank carebear pilots in highsec by removing concorde from incursion areas.

words words words..


RebelMC , you're assuming that Concorde would stop us if we really wanted to? If memory serves me I believe our community has done its own type of incursion, on a major market hub recently? Thank you for the suggestion I'll keep in mind.