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New Dev Blog: Player-owned Customs Office

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Alain Kinsella
#621 - 2011-10-18 22:31:27 UTC
On the one side, the POS fuel I'm making in Empire (using three extracting planets) will be a better passive income, even after subtracting any donations requested. Thank you.

On the other side, there's no interest anymore in my scouting out and scanning a single Low planet in order to optimize my production. Would have been nice to know that earlier, but I have other ways to compensate.

"The Meta Game does not stop at the game. Ever."

Currently Retired / Semi-Casual (pending changes to RL concerns).
Misanth
RABBLE RABBLE RABBLE
#622 - 2011-10-18 22:32:07 UTC
First implementation from CCP I actually feel positive about, for quite some while.

Extra tax in highsec, all rest destructible seems like the perfect balance for this imho. Looking promising.

AFK-cloaking in a system near you.
Deviana Sevidon
Jades Falcon Guards
#623 - 2011-10-18 22:32:48 UTC  |  Edited by: Deviana Sevidon
Hans Jagerblitzen wrote:


This is the kind of logic that breaks down almost immediately.

What benefit is it for an Alliance to run around nuking POCO's, and than setting up their own, than blocking people out??

Why do you think its fun for them to own a dead planet?

Why do you think all alliances want to even bother with PI??


1. They will run around and block other people and destroy their POCOs for the lulz, becaus they are bored and because they can, that is the main reason for almost anything in EVE and I can not see a reason why it should be different this time.

2, Why take sovereignity in a low quality-dead end system with no useful moon stuff. Because they can take it and they don't want someone else to take it.

3. Because they need fuel for their own POS, but even if they don't, someone or something neutral = target = killmail

....as if 10,058 Goon voices cried out and were suddenly silenced.
Dominus Alterai
Star Freaks
#624 - 2011-10-18 22:33:19 UTC
I love how they're gonna roll out with this anyway even though so many possible game breaking mechanics were brought up.

And as for the people saying that alliances won't blockade planets, they already do this with asteroid belts. I don't see any difference between protecting your ore from ninja 0.0 miners and the soon-to-be-extinct ninja PI person. They are protecting there assets, like any large alliance would. As for customs offices in low-sec space, there needs to be a low-sec alliance that is willing to open their customs office to the public for a reasonable price (when compared to lower high-sec taxes vs. more low-sec resources). To be blunt, I know of no alliance that lives in low-sec that is willing to let random people come in to do PI. I'm not sure people know, but standings with these alliances cost ISK...lots of ISK if they are good/famous. SO, unless you want to make smaller corps/alliances drop around 2-3 BILLION ISK in order to do PI in low-sec, then yeah, sure, this patch is especially for the little guys....

...CCP. Ruining their own game since 2005...

Reducing your holes to a quivering mess since 2009.
Bloodpetal
Tir Capital Management Group
#625 - 2011-10-18 22:33:32 UTC  |  Edited by: Bloodpetal
CCP Nullarbor wrote:

Probably for the best.



You kinda look like the Blade Runner Dude (Not Han Solo Cool)


Blade Runner Dude

Where I am.
gnome proper
Republic University
Minmatar Republic
#626 - 2011-10-18 22:33:36 UTC
Ehm... Wow?

Thanks for finally adding some harassment/small gang targets.

That's about 7 years late. Big smile

Seriously, this is good stuff and should provide some interesting dynamics.
YuuKnow
The Scope
#627 - 2011-10-18 22:36:09 UTC
I like the plan! Here are my concerns/requests.

1. 20mil isk and 6000 LP points seems a bit too low of an startup investment cost for the potential lucrativeness of these stations. We are essentially talking about a money making machine so I would support a higher startup cost, lets say 80-100mil and 20000 LP points. This would also be a new isk sink which the game desperately needs. The higher startup cost necessitate that the stations be more durable however.

2. Now that there are player own custom offices then the next step would be the ability to form individual contracts with other corps or other players for different tax rates. It could be made on a individual corp to corp basis (or player to player basis) or even a variable tax rate based off standings so that the owning corp of the station can set different favorable standings for different corps/individuals to allow them different tax rates. This would allow corporations to establish agreements between corps/pilots for exclusive mining rights and encourages more corporate-to-corporate or corporate-to-player interaction. More politics and more interaction = more fun.

3. If contracts were possible then it would be nice if planet resources weren't depleted as quickly they are currently. When resources are more durable then contracts would be more meaningful and more lasting in that they have more political and financial weight. It would also grant more incentive to establish contracts in the first place and use the customs offices. Perhaps the customs office would have scanning that will find the 'deep planetary core' resources that ship scanners could not find and thus will be able to setup PI in the larger/longer lasting resource deposites (the ones that simple individual ship scanning can't find). The RL analogy would be the difference between a small individually owned oil dereck and a large corp-owned off-shore-fishing platform.

4. Customs offices could have onboard scanners that can detect launched cargo from the planet (in order to detect PI that is not going through the customs offices). This will allow them to setup "hits" on players not using their office (ie a secret call to a mercenary to 'hit' a cargo drop).

5. The cargo space needed to haul one of these out to space seems a bit low. It should take at least 4-5 trips for a indy or one large trip for a freighter to set up a station. This will require that the a coordinated effort between the corp (a dedicated hauler and armed escort) to set up the station. Or perhaps the station could be 'jumped in' with the use of a NPC bought cynosural field for customs offices. Players would buy the field emitter in the market from NPCs at the cost of 300mil isk apiece, but save the player the hauling duty. Alternatively players would need the freighter to haul the equipment to the planet (but the cost would be lower at 80-100mil isk as above).

6. The current customs stations look so boring. The graphics are bland and they have no imagination to there design. Can we have better looking stations? How about a variety in the design with each design having strenghts and weaknessess (for example a Minmatar design vs a Gallente Design).

My 2isk

yk
Raid'En
#628 - 2011-10-18 22:38:12 UTC  |  Edited by: Raid'En
there's something that would calm a lot of people who fear this change, and that must have been told already ; allow a way to transfer ressources to the owner of the CO. a shared hangar that only people able to manage the CO can access, and where anyone can send things.
so people on prospection planets can easily send their stuff to the hangar for people running factory planet to get them, or to the landlord who will do the hauling himself.
a way to make the transfer for a fee would be nice.

imagine this ; player A want to make money with extraction of PI, he have the skills, but can't handle hauling stuff from low/null.
player B is member of the CO owner corp. he lives here and so can easily haul things out, or use these on place. he's pretty interested by buying things from player A. but currently, and even with the change you talk about it would be a pain to do it.
meaning there's good chance player A will never do it with the current system. but if as i talked about some hangar functionnality was added...

people are scared because lots of people use PI alone, without the help of a big corp.
if you add a way to transfer the stuff to someone else without being here, then these guys won't be scared that much, cause they will still be able to do it, and it's someone else who will bother with the rest, and he will have another reason to do it ; not only will he get taxes, but he can also got more money by buying directly the stuff for cheap, and doing the logistics himself
Pat Irvam
Doomheim
#629 - 2011-10-18 22:39:44 UTC
Hans Jagerblitzen wrote:
Pat Irvam wrote:

:( not saying its a good answer just an answer from the new ccp that listens to use, told only csm about this in august, and is trying to repair its rep with this in time for christmas.


The devs have talked about this from day one. There was ALWAYS talk of a space elevator, that controlled resource access, that would be ownable, and fought over. It wasn't implemented first time around, and everyone complained PI was complete carebear bullshit, with nothing competitive in the slightest way. They said from the beginning that reason to fight over resources would set the stage for Dust 514, and this is nothing but a long overdue iteration that has always been talked about and public information.

Devs arent fleecing anyone. They're giving everyone the iteration on PI that has been promised, and begged for a year now, and *GASP* now people are bitching that they've finally done it. It just has a fancy name so people have ignorantly acted like this is some shocker suprise designed to destroy the pain-free activity they've grown accustomed to. This is extremely typical of the forums - players beg for a feature, than moan when they finally get it. Grow up everyone. You have to get off the nipple and onto solid foods eventually.

Eve will always evolve. It will always get more challenging. It will ALWAYS go in the direction of handing more control over to players. Anyone not cool with that fundamental design element, should invest in a different game.



Never said I didn't like the feature. I dislike ccp saying we thinking of this then after negative comments saying well this is how it is, its already done for deployment. This could have severe impacts on the economy and ccp has not sampled a large enough player base. Most of csm are use to alliance null not low sec or wormholes. This has a ripple effect that ccp needs to consider with a more conservative deployment. Saying that we will fix it if we break pos fuels is not good enough given their track record on iterations. Hell they have made the assumption that people wont blow em up for luls or lock out worthless planets or be nice and give neutrals reasonable access in null and wh space. This is eve and most of us are ass holes. CCP not understanbding this speaks volumes of how they have planed this to play out ie they have no clue.
Bodega Cat
Expedition Spartica
#630 - 2011-10-18 22:42:54 UTC
Inappropriate Euphemism wrote:
I am typically a big fan of changes that increase player interaction and risk. I like the idea of where this change is going. I don't profess to know with certainty the results of the change, but I think that my own PI will be drastically and negatively affected.

I primarily produce P2 products, though I do have one planet producing P3 products. I do PI in low-sec where there aren't a lot of other residents. I expect that if I don't put up a customs office of my own, none will exist. While I have the capability to do this, it's a fairly big investment for the risk I'm undertaking. I live near null-sec and there are a few big alliances nearby; at least one is a very notable alliance with a large supercap fleet and reputation for using them for everything except sov warfare. Never underestimate the will of players to do something just to ruin another player's day -- especially if that player is a combat pilot and the other player is an industrialist or a "carebear".

I don't think the planets I use are housing facilities for any other players; I used the "see structures from other players" feature to see who else might be there, and no new structures appear -- but I kind of figured it was just broken. So there is really very little benefit to offset the risk as nobody will be paying me anything.

I can't find enough information on rocket launches to know if it's a viable alternative -- I see lots of references to a small capacity which suggests to me it's not.

Low-sec has always been a good place for small groups of industrialists who are good at evading criminals. It's been the half-way house between high-sec safety and null-sec politics. There are no warp disruption bubbles. There are gate guns and global criminal countdown timers. There are NPC stations. This change kind of drops low-sec PI into the deep end of risk with null-sec without offering any additional reward -- null-sec planets are better than low-sec planets.

I've seen it suggested in the thread already, but why couldn't CONCORD sponsor the low-sec customs offices (or perhaps the NPC faction which holds sovereignty in that space) with the same tax rate as high-sec until a player comes along to take over and build a customs office? Barring that, at least make rocket launches competitive with customs offices in high-sec in capability and rates.


This needs to get highlighted and commented on by the dev's

You are in a rare but important minority of someone in low sec actually making your living. Its your game down there (and you are not just a ninja) so its important that they take into consideration what you need to not only just continue to thrive, but maybe even prosper more if you are good at what you do.

Hopefully what you suggest is appreciated, and considered. A default concord station for all low sec systems for this purpose.
Amro One
One.
#631 - 2011-10-18 22:42:55 UTC
I see all these people complaining about the CO being attacked.

Earth to all, they just normal Small Lab POSs sitting at a moon called a planet.

Mind boggling I know.

Thank you CCP for Buffing War Dec'ing options.

P.S. - Will all you illiterate player read the damn blog at least 5 times before making comments. As CCP CLEARLY, yes CLEARLY, says everything you need to know.
Henry Haphorn
Killer Yankee
#632 - 2011-10-18 22:46:48 UTC
Welcome back to taxation without representation.

Adapt or Die
Chicken Pizza
One-man Armada
#633 - 2011-10-18 22:48:01 UTC
Hans Jagerblitzen wrote:
Pat Irvam wrote:

:( not saying its a good answer just an answer from the new ccp that listens to use, told only csm about this in august, and is trying to repair its rep with this in time for christmas.


The devs have talked about this from day one. There was ALWAYS talk of a space elevator, that controlled resource access, that would be ownable, and fought over. It wasn't implemented first time around, and everyone complained PI was complete carebear bullshit, with nothing competitive in the slightest way. They said from the beginning that reason to fight over resources would set the stage for Dust 514, and this is nothing but a long overdue iteration that has always been talked about and public information.

Devs arent fleecing anyone. They're giving everyone the iteration on PI that has been promised, and begged for a year now, and *GASP* now people are bitching that they've finally done it. It just has a fancy name so people have ignorantly acted like this is some shocker suprise designed to destroy the pain-free activity they've grown accustomed to. This is extremely typical of the forums - players beg for a feature, than moan when they finally get it. Grow up everyone. You have to get off the nipple and onto solid foods eventually.

Eve will always evolve. It will always get more challenging. It will ALWAYS go in the direction of handing more control over to players. Anyone not cool with that fundamental design element, should invest in a different game.


No, everyone didn't beg for this feature. Everyone didn't beg for PI competition. SOME people wanted it. SOME people didn't. I don't know where you get off making the assumption that I wanted PI to change in the least and now am contradicting myself. I never supported a change like this from the start. Maybe you should re-evaluate your information on who wanted this and who didn't.
Jada Maroo
Native Freshfood
Minmatar Republic
#634 - 2011-10-18 22:49:07 UTC
As so sort of balancing factor it'd be nice if the command center capacity were expanded to 2000m3 and could launch as much. It's still "slow boat" PI but allow for some less productive but more ninja-like PI.
Chicken Pizza
One-man Armada
#635 - 2011-10-18 22:49:13 UTC
Henry Haphorn wrote:
Welcome back to taxation without representation.


God bless Icelandica.
Cailais
The Red Pill Taker Group
#636 - 2011-10-18 22:53:27 UTC
Helothane wrote:
Cailais wrote:
Helothane wrote:
So those who belong to an NPC corp cannot extract from planets in low sec, unless someone else has set up a customs office at that planet and allows other corps to use it? If the player can't have roles, then he/she cannot set up a customs office.


I dunno you could like use the launch pad and rocket the stuff up?

C.




As mentioned before, that is very limited in terms of volume. There is a timer after you launch before you can do so again, and it isn't trivial.


Then just use a planet with someones custom office on it - you're paying tax as it is now anyway: just this time the ISK goes to another player, rather than an NPC ISK sink.

C.
Issler Dainze
Tadakastu-Obata Corporation
The Honda Accord
#637 - 2011-10-18 23:02:49 UTC
The closest CCP has come to an idea that made low sec interesting agan was PI. I was actually finally getting some of our members interested in joining me in low sec again to see more isks from PI planets in the low sec near where we operate. For a smart induistrailst with a sneaky transport ship you could make some isks there. Not alot, but enough to make it worth dealing with folks that want to mount your corpse on their buffer panels.

Now CCP is going to show us what they clearly think.

1. They don't understand their own game. They are working on poorly conceived changes in secret that stand to ruin Eve for solo and casual players. We can only expect there are lots of other really bad ideas in the production pipeline at this moment. These bad ideas are way more important to CCP than delivering on the other things they have already promised us but secretly given up on.

2. CCP thinks all players have to be in corporations, or more correctly allinaces with giant super cap fleets. If you aren't CCP considers an irrelevant loser.

3. CCP has an economist but he must be in charge of auditing the coffee fund because he certainly isn't being involved in changes in game mechanics that will have devestating effects on the markets.

4. Even though CCP has deliberately (and seemingly with great pride) created a game that makes the most noble folk act like rat bastards they continue to expect "the next change" to make these same folks already driven to feral behavior and canabalism to join hands and sing "kumbiah" and introduce a new era of harmony and cooperation. Here is something that should be on every wall at CCP".

EVE ONLINE MAKES EVEYONE EVIL IN THE END!!!


5. CCP in the end only really cares about "end game/power blocks/null sec/shooting people in the face" but they still can't even get those things right!

These proposed changes have never more clearly demonstrated that

- CCP does not "get" or care about casual or solo play
- Have a clue as to how to fix low sec and make it a desirable element in Eve
- Understand event the most basic elements of Eve that drive actual player behavior in Eve
- CCP will continue to work on new things in Eve in secret while promising and failing to deliver what they already have committed to us

I want to clarify that I have gone on the record as aksing for CCP to "work on things in secret" and surprise us. I still want that but they need to think things through a lot more than they did with this craziness before they commit resources to their "new" ideas.

This idea should have been killed in the first meetings because it fails in the following obvious ways when implemented anywhere other than nulsec where it might make sense.

1. Increases risk while providing no increase in reward.
2. Creates yet another static target to shoot.
3. Fails on the economics almost immediately.
4. Doesn't make and sense from an RP perspective.
5. Assumes behavior not found in Eve (non-evil cooperation and partnering)
6. Increases the difficulty of the small organizations or solo players for no reason

So CCP please please please rethink what you are thinking of doing. You won't make Eve any better in the end if you go on and do this. I have a way to change your idea that I will put in a seperate post.

Issler
Holy One
Privat Party
#638 - 2011-10-18 23:02:59 UTC  |  Edited by: Holy One
This is going to hurt the casual player the most me thinks.

25 planets (5 characters, 2 accounts) in low sec, in one system. All my isk comes from this. I make min. 1m scourge fury missiles a week, which brings in around 1.6bn a month gross (nowhere near that net see below). That pays for plex on both my accounts and leaves just about enough to small gang/fleet pvp in null. Which is what I enjoy doing. Not pve.

It took 3 months to train the characters from scratch to do PI on 5 planets and not get ganked doing it in low sec. I have to contend with russians, lols, pirates, grifers etc. I have to use a pos for copying prints, blockade runners, ocassionally a carrier and a jump freighter to move my stuff (mostly to haul mins and replacement industrials when they get wtfbbq'd by bored locals and other goodies in and missiles out of my mfg system). All of which takes plenty of time and involves risk.

The changes will effectively end my involvement in PI as my corp is not going to help me (why should it?), I am not gonna quit my corp or create an alt corp with 5 dudes in it that will be griefed out of exhistence almost immediately. I'm not gonna 'be an entreprenur' as I don't have any incentive to - other than to soak up more time and hassle and force me to join a large corp willing to pos bash (thats what this is really) to defend my right to play eve for 'free'.

I hate pve and other grind and repetative actions.

So - no longer will I be able to plex my accounts, my investment in characters is lost, my situation as a casual player who funds his pew pew and skill books from passive mfg/industry rather than hours of grind is completely undermined.

I have two choices: quit eve, or pay real money in the form of a sub to play eve and grind for isk like everyone else.

Neither is appealing to me. I am the 'little guy' despite the corp my main is in and its affiliations, this is how I make the isk to make eve fun for myself ..

Lots of dudes like me, I know them, I speak to them, I play with them etc. PI was one of the few things you could do in eve that if you invested time in to it, yielded a decent enough return to let casual players partcipate in 'the bigger picture'.

Now its going to become far too time consuming, tedious and unpredictable to be justifiable. Not when my space bros are making 100m in 10 mins doing incursions. I'd basically have no choice but to go do that. Or quit. And I got to be honest, the way ccp keeps coming out with these kicks in the pants to casual players ie dudes with jobs and other interests, I'm considering that option seriously.

So CCP is going to lose my two plex every month, the market will lose my 4m missiles (for which there is sustained high demand due to limited supply), I won't be able to afford to lose ships in pvp and I won't be able to play eve for 'free' anymore. Since I do not play more than a few hrs a week anyway, I'm basically the 'casual' demograph being flipped the bird and forced to pack it in.

Or join Test .. or Goons .. and put up with all that politics and sov bullshit. Which, in fairness, you may enjoy. But I never have and never will.

Don't cry for me Sperglords. Just take note; cos you're not gonna be allowed to play this game without spending half your life in it, thus making it a job, or paying a sum of real life cash every month. Many of my friends of six years plus, quit because they did not enjoy grind and did not have the time to make the isk they needed to do what they did enjoy - pvp.

I'm hanging in there, but like a lot of people, my extra accounts and my time and contribution to the economy will vanish when I do.

:)
Dominus Alterai
Star Freaks
#639 - 2011-10-18 23:06:21 UTC
Cailais wrote:
Helothane wrote:
Cailais wrote:
Helothane wrote:
So those who belong to an NPC corp cannot extract from planets in low sec, unless someone else has set up a customs office at that planet and allows other corps to use it? If the player can't have roles, then he/she cannot set up a customs office.


I dunno you could like use the launch pad and rocket the stuff up?

C.




As mentioned before, that is very limited in terms of volume. There is a timer after you launch before you can do so again, and it isn't trivial.


Then just use a planet with someones custom office on it - you're paying tax as it is now anyway: just this time the ISK goes to another player, rather than an NPC ISK sink.

C.



you forgot to mention that it'll be ALOT more isk coming out of your pocket to another player and not the standard CONCORD tax. I foresee tax rates in excess of 20-30% being the norm in low sec.

Reducing your holes to a quivering mess since 2009.
Issler Dainze
Tadakastu-Obata Corporation
The Honda Accord
#640 - 2011-10-18 23:09:24 UTC
OK, how to make this a "better" idea.

1. Deliver to plan in null sec. I think letting planets be part of what you fight over there is a good idea.

2. Review and posttibly change the tax rate in high sec for customs offices. Just doubling them sounds like a lazy first guess.

3. Make the COs in low sec be owned by and tied to the pirate factions in the systems. So that using them and your tax rate depends on your standings with those normally to many of us NPC pirate types. I think this would then make the care bears have to engage in some challenging activities around getting the right standings while not messing up their other standings. Put the missions you need to run to get those standings in low sec. More mission runners in low sec, more targets for the player pirates that like to shoot mission runners! Win/Win!!


Do those things and be sure to balance the tax rates and I think you actually will improve Eve in the end.

Issler