Jita Park Speakers Corner

So, this blog and this blog summarize the problem pretty well, so I'm going to provide links to them for those who want a better definition of the problem. This post will be for the TL;DR crowd.

Super duper TL;DR: Eve has too many resources. Remove a large number of resources from the game to drive conflicts.

Basically, Eve has too many resources. There is too much wealth. This is true in highsec of course, and most obviously so there, but it exists in low and nullsec too. Why would anyone fight over who gets access to an asteroid belt when every system practically has an infinitely spawning number of them. When I can go into my backyard and mine infinite steel, I have absolutely no reason to ever risk tangling with the junkyard dogs to get steel from the scrapyard. The reason that there is not enough risk in deep alliance nullsec is the same reason there is not enough risk in highsec. There are too many resources, and thus, nothing to fight over. Agents should have limited numbers of missions, single asteroids should be rare and valuable, moon minerals should move around making alliances chase after them. PI resources should completely deplete over time. In order to create meaningful conflict in eve, the opposing party must have something the first party wants. Most of the conflict currently in eve is for fun. "Good show ol'chap" and all that. If you reduce the resources to the point where they are actually valuable enough to fight over, then of course, people will fight over them.

Now, this will of course, make the game much more brutal, much more difficult, and it could very well break the game if not implemented carefully, I understand why CCP has made all the resources effectively limitless, but the game has reached a point where it can support scarcity, and even, if it is to survive longterm, it might need scarcity.

Now, that's not to say that resources should flat out deplete from the universe until there are none left. No, they should just be scaled back, here are some ideas/examples to get a discussion started:

*Limit the number of missions an agent will give out to a certain pool. If that pool is drained, the players must find a new agent. This will spread out people in highsec, and possibly even force them into lowsec. If people come into your system and start using your agents, thus draining them? Good! That makes you angry? Good! Go get those people! Fight them! Defend your resources. (this shouldn't apply to lvl 1 agents so that entry level players will always be able to mission run) give lowsec agents and nullsec agents a larger pool.

*Make asteroid belts shift into massive individual rocks. When these rocks despawn, they respawn somewhere else in the constellation, possibly on a timer. More valuable resources are of course in low and null, but you still need to dig around to find and exploit those resources. Lowsec is dangerous, but if all the rocks in highsec are stripped, it provides an incentive to go into lowsec. Will risk adverse people still stay in highsec? Yes, of course. But there are others who will be willing to take the risk to reap those rewards.

*Make wrecks not just provide some random rig components, but make them provide enough components to constitute the majority of the ship they came from. With the drastic drop in incoming resources, salvaging will become a very important profession.

*Constantly expand the outer borders of nullsec so that there are still technically, always enough resources in the game for the playerbase

These are at the end of the day, just things to throw out there. What the topic is really about at the end of the day? CSM is this something CCP would actually be willing to do? It is a risky move for them and it would have to be done very carefully, but if implemented properly, could in and of itself, add an amazing amount of depth to the game, drive conflicts everywhere from highsec to nullsec.

As a note, there is one player group that will be permanently shafted if these changes go through, and those are the casual players that live in highsec or nullsec, rat or mission run as they desire, and in general do not aggressively try to make their way. How do you keep those players sated to keep subs up, while making the game harder for everyone who wants to achieve more?

Well, if level one missions are always available, there will always be a source of a small amount of trickle income. It will be much less then they make today, but in the scheme of things everyone will have much less then they do today. That's the point. The greatest rewards should come for those willing to be bold and fight for them. Battleships will become a rarity as the resources to build them become scarce, having one will be a symbol of power.

So, thoughts, opinions?
Is this something doable?
Will this be good for the game?
Am I a horrible person for even thinking these thoughts? (cry moar plz)

I'd like to hear from the CSM on this, and from the general playerbase. This is in my mind, one of the major underlying issues in eve, and its something that needs to be discussed very thoroughly.

Yes, cry moar plz.

EVE doesn't work that way. Reducing the amount of resources wouldn't make people fight more, it would make them consider whether to fight at all if they can't readily replace their losses.

On the contrary, more resources = easier to replace ships = people more likely to fight.

A lot of people don't like to PvE in order to get ahead in a game, so maybe CCP should tap that demographic by furthering this ~everybody wins~ philosophy?

Just make the highsec belts respawn variable

ie: 50% of highsec at any given time don't respawn roids and only generate spread out oases of grav site pockets.
40% generate belts as normal
10% of highsec generates 'motherlode' belts that have 5x the quantity of rocks that a normal belt would, a net zero change.

However it would make resources in highsec more contestable for both the 'arid' and 'rich' mining areas, with more miners being forced to cluster around each other to get a desired area. With that, wardecs and such would take on relevance since highsec players would be able to effectively contest things of value between other players. It would also benefit active miners moving around and hunting out the next 'motherlode' while mining bots and botlike players would find their home systems in an 'arid' state.