EVE General Discussion

AFK cloaking is like Schrödingers cat, it's threat and it's not.

Edit: I love the poco idea, specially with Dust on the horizon.

So now you've just broken all cloaks and their roles with your idea, let me ask you this. What about the extra intel you've just gained, on top of the already powerful tool you have?

Do you think this is a balanced approach?

Thought these might be of use:

Nullsec Development: Rules and Guidelines
Nullsec Development: Design Goals

Would be inclined to agree if you could prove they were AFK as opposed to very patient or running multiple alts.

Good ideas Zagdul.. nice start to the discussion.

I have some problems to add - from a "just a grunt in the alliances" standpoint taht I think needs addressed more than anything


Time Required
What about those of us that cannot log in every day? or even every other day? Most alliances tell us the fack off. Having a life and living in 0.0 are incompatible in my experience.. and going on a fleet op with less than 5 hours to stay on eve? yeah.. not going to happen.

my wife HATES it when i join 0.0, and my physical health suffers (i stop hitting the gym/mountains as much)

Rich Alliance, Poor Grunts
Alliance rakes in the dough - grunts have to rat/mine to make money (which to a certain extent is fine) .. but in the time invested to fund PVP was too much.. especially considering how money flush the 0.0 alliance i was in was.

but then, maybe our ship reimbursement program just sucked nuts :P

The thing is, game mechanics in EVE reward time. It's the nature of the beast and very few things will be able to change this, it's true for empire or null sec.

The difference between null sec entities and empire is that Alliances, or corporations for that matter, hire you in to support the space. We don't have 'concord' in null. It's up to each warm body behind a computer to provide security or defend. Therefore when you chose to take up null sec life as your style of gameplay in EVE, you have to make some sacrafices.

Now, just like with choosing what aspect of EVE you wish to enjoy, choosing an entity in EVE online who caters to your playstyle is also important. For example, in my alliance there are multiple corps who all have different atmospheres. Each corp is asked simply to contribute towards the betterment of the alliance and they are all required to bring ~something~ to the table for the ultimate goal of power, isk and control of space. How the corp chooses to contribute and devote their time, I just ask that their contribution is on par with what everyone else brings to the table. Many null sec entities operate in this fashion, so lumping all of 0.0 life into a time sink, or lack of fun sink is just not an accurate assessment. It's very possible, you just never got into the proper corporation who supported your playstyle.


To address the concern with Rich Alliances / Poor Grunts, this can't be more accurate. As it stands right now, there is very little, if any benefit to a grunt participating in the betterment of an alliance and this isn't because null sec alliances aren't trying. It's because the majority of isk sinks which are incurred are done in null sec. Sov bills are a huge sink. Not to mention the sheer costs of being an effective null sec alliance. The amount of isk involved is astronomical and so far, CCP has done nothing to make it easier, only more expensive with less forms to generate new isk for null sec. For empire, it pretty much remains static, however for the people in null sec, unless you're an organization who can compensate losses during wars, you're really not able to stand on your own as a Grunt. This is why my ideas for improving sov and the rewards for inhabiting it begin to take form as a positive way for individuals to feel as though they are contributing in a positive way while increasing their income.

Even PVPers help.

It's very much a top down way of distributing isk and alliances are forced to tax members simply to survive. It costs my alliance roughly 150b a month just to operate on a daily basis.

I've never been forced into 10 hour ops unless I chose to. This is a gross exaggeration. Not to mention that it's impossible to force an enemy to fight. In my coalition, we encourage time limits on our fleet ops and focus on a wide vareity of timezone recruitment so that we have better coverage and better flash formups.

Our objective is to formup in 15-20 minutes max, be on field within 10, and complete the objective as quickly as possible to get people home. Every coalition, alliance, corp is different however and some people are far more demanding of their pilots. Again, I think you just chose the wrong group of people to fly with.



Any competent alliance does. The question isn't whether an alliance should or shouldn't, it's that it's a requirement for member retention. How that isk is generated is many times taxed on to the member base, not the alliance due to the way income is primarily generated in null sec (hint: moon goo) making most efforts that to support only a greater entity, instead of a two way street. Right now, in order for an alliance to become stronger, they need more moons so the alliance can support it's members instead of the space providing an income for the pilot via reimbursement. Alliances are encouraged to get really big, blob your enemy and take more space because there's no benefit to focusing on smaller sources of income. There's no value in the space itself, only the moons. So, current game mechanics state that in order for me to become more powerful, I need more moons + space. Not focus on the space itself and populate it to grow smaller portions and make it profitable.

If space were more valuable to an individual, they would then make a choice of 'which alliance/entitiy supports my play style' rather than 'who's the most powerful and can benefit my wallet so I can rat the hell out of the space'. You would find more organizations based around groups of people who enjoy working together, rather than people recruiting just to add another number to the blob.

Right now there are two ways for a null sec Alliance to grow their income:
1. Tax members (market, repairs, docking, office rental, poco tax, corp dues, etc etc etc.)
2. Moon income (alliance level)

There are very few ways for a common grunt to generate income, most ways require special roles.


The problem is that current efficient ways to generate isk in this particular MMO are encouraged by solo behavior due to penalties for being in a group.


Hard limits on how many systems an alliance can hold is a horrible idea. That removes the sandbox in that if I want to have a powerful large space empire, I can. You suggesting to remove that doesn't support this playstyle.

Instead, encourage alliances to not want vast swaths of space because maintaining it is more of a hassle. As it stands, isk costs aren't a valid deterrent, it's actually an incentive to take more. More space = more available moons = more income. The way to do this is by making smaller areas more valuable but challenging to maintain. The amount of warm bodies behind the computer will become more of a factor in how much space is manageable for an alliance rather than simply their military might. Smart entities can fortify their space and make challenging space difficult.

Hard limits solve nothing. If they implemented it, I'd just create holding alliances to manage the space I want to hold.

Hard limits =/= sandbox.

What you are suggesting are band-aids for things YOU think are broken without considering other playstyles.