Player Features and Ideas Discussion

I usually dislike making suggestions about something I really enjoy but here's my idea anyway...

To remove local In a way which benefits the game and has the approval of the players. (which the player base in mostly in favor off from what I can judge) I'll make a couple of suggestions and relate each one to gameplay and game consistency.

Keep local in hisec systems. First off, it would keep the carebears happy - they like their security, their quiet systems or being able to watch local like a hawk in war time. It avoids driving out the soft and cuddly belly of the eve universe. It makes sense when you think that highsec is inhabited, policed space, with good facilities and monitored access.

In lowsec, I think something a little less safe. These systems are occupied as well, but the regulations are far more lax, with communications facilities nowhere near as advanced or well maintained as hisec. To this end I'd only add pilots to local after they've been in system for about 5 minutes, or If they dock in station. Alternatively make the local channels suffer from delays, or make it update once every 5 minutes - I'm using 5 mins here as a benchmark; it's simply what I consider a decent length of time to be, and is totally up for debate). It keeps things risky and encourages small gang pvp and hit and run tactics when roaming in lowsec.

In nullsec there should be no local comms. If an alliance manages to get sovereignty in a system and builds up the strategic index to some level (I thought 3, but again this is up for debate) then they can anchor a local communications monitor or some such module at a POS. This would allow citizens of the system (or even constellation) to have an active and updated local channel - perhaps this ability could also be modified by choosing who to allow to see the local channel - alliance, allies or everyone. This would revolutionize how people use null. Either having to hold a high strategic level across your active systems or running the risk of wide open expanses of unmonitored space. It would mean that smaller independent corps would be able to slip under the radar and set up in small pockets of space without comms, mimicking the hazards of deep space living similar to wormholes. It would mean that the concentrations of pilots in nullsec block alliances would be pushed further into the central systems, essentially starting it's own complex risk vs. reward strategies. Do you chill where everyone else is and earn little money or do you brave the radio dark to find great riches? It would also give invaders an excellent target - destroying your enemies intelligence is a vital strategy in war!

Using the local like this would make sense in game terms, as the areas of nullsec are not policed or attended over by the megacorporations that would typically support the massive communications batteries required for local channels. In their stead, capsuleers take charge of the day to day running of these services.

Let me know what you think!

p.s I also think it would be great fun in NPC nullsec to only have access to local channels if you have good standings with the sov holding NPC's :D pirates, unite!

Yes I thought it was quite nice too, but does every miner want to learn scanning skills? And also the prevalence of grav sites especially in systems with industry ihubs would make it less important for sov holding alliances.

Also, edit on my original post -------

I just read the forum rules (for some reason i never read them before i post...) and was quite happy seeing no significant local chat threads until i reached the bit where it had a whole catagory on it. So err, mods? Feel free to lock this thread if u want. If you do i'll try posting my ideas somewhere already established. My bad.

Gonna point out something to ya here...

I am a miner.
Local, specially in hi sec, does nothing to help miners or mission runners.

The only exception to that rule is for a war dec, or if someone you know personally enters. And for the latter you can have them flagged to alert you if they come online anyhow.
(The former can't apply if you are in an NPC corp)

This means local in high is showing you meaningless data. You have no way of sorting out the garbage.
Who is docked up in a station? Dunno.
Who is also mining or missioning, (not a threat). Dunno.
Who is passing through, possibly slowly on auto pilot? Dunno.
Who is actually coming towards your location, and a possible reason to align for fast exit? Dunno.

At least with D-Scan you can get a heads up on who is coming near you. If they aren't at least doing that, I couldn't care less who they are or what they do.

Not talking about removing social, or even suggesting it.

Put local on a delay.
Make it so noone pops into local without wanting to, and they can either check a box or say something for them to appear.

Voluntary presence for social.

Every ganked pilot in high sec had local there to help them. The problem is local can't help with intel, especially in high sec.

In many systems there are too many names to even consider trying to track. Insanely useless.

In the systems with a list you can see all at once, you have no way of knowing what is useful beyond what I mentioned before.

Local in high is a crutch that is broken for intel, but keeps being misused for it. Break the delusion and help people play the actual game.

I think local in null is a bit crazy too.

I have heard it compared to a fast food menu in a drive through. A fast ship can zip through too many systems too quickly just using local to hunt with.

Find a target named in a system? Boom, stop looking for which system to probe, local just handed it to you.

As for high sec local hurting anyone, I never said it hurt anyone.
I just said pilots were wasting time by using it for intel, when it doesn't really do anything useful.

You ran into something an awful lot like a war dec, having an entire group you could flag that way. Not something pilots often need to handle that way.

But like I said above,

---

The only exception to that rule is for a war dec, or if someone you know personally enters.

---

Your example was somewhere in between those two, being a group of suspected hostiles you personally wanted to avoid.

local won't go away.. stop your stupid bitching.

Having a hack-able intel unit, where you could hack the intel channel isn't necessarily a bad idea, but it seems much more productive to have a way to easily disable it instead...

Also, I personally think intel gathering needs to be more active... not necessarily with button pushing... but to figure out who is at that faroff planet, you should have to fly your ship near it and check it out. I think the standard state of affairs upon entering a system is you can quickly assess the number of pilots in a system but you don't know who they are, who they are affiliated with, or what they are flying until you recon them within some type of auto-functioning on-board intel long-range scanner.
--- By quickly being able to identify how many pilots are in local, you have a reasonable chance of assessing dangerous situations. This is extremely important for finding a fight.
--- By not knowing if a new local is hostile or not, you have some semblance of anonymity when traveling through space, which is a good thing, as it allows traps, but not obnoxiously biased traps.

Although right now local in null is a benefit for me I think the idea is good, removing local from null and changing the way it works in low would be nice.

With CCP trying to make more high sec players move to low, wh, and null space I doubt they'll do something like what is proposed here.

It's already gone, lol. Check it out in any wormhole.