EVE General Discussion

So I have been following the CSM process and anyone on the forum who has been reading the candidate threads know the I am a High Sec player, but saying that, Im not a care-bear either having spent some months in faction warfare. But bare in mind, this is from the view of a 8 month old player with high and low experience and not much else.

Now if you want to read my thoughts on highsec, continue from this point - If you don't give a rats arse about my semi Eve political drivel, then skip to the bold HERE a few paragraphs down.

Also please excuse the typing, grammar and spelling as this was all done on my iPhone on the way to and from work...

One of the common themes with the anti-highsec CSM candidates were to nerf the rewards of highsec and buff everywhere else because highsec you can make a tonne of ISK an hour and it does not encourage group participation.

So using mining as an example why this is wrong, anyone who spends anytime mining solo will know that you make at best, 11m ISK an hour, as a group with Orcas and whatnots, then probably 18m ISK an hour. Assuming 100% refine and 0% tax and the player(s) use Jita to sell their minerals.

Say for your average person who might play 2 hours a night with one day off then most optimistic projection solo is 132m ISK a week. Which is just enough to PLEX an account.

Now, just to clarify, my definition of earning enough ISK in game is so you can PLEX with some change to do other things.

So mining as a whole IMO, is actually just about right, would be nice to make more, but hey, it's all dependent on the market.

But, if you work as a group, you can almost double your income, which again also puts down the argument that highsec care bearing is not sociable - In fact I'll argue the contrary, mining is actually an activity you can do on Eve and be very social and help build the bonds for future corps and alliances.

But all arguments that mining is too profitable is complete nonsense because its reward is not pre-set, its entirely based on the economy of Eve, mining is a profitable activity because the demand for minerals make it so. How do you solve this issue? You get more people mining and get more minerals on the market. Simple supply and demand.

Making it easier to gank miners will only serve to push up the value of the minerals and make it more profitable.

So the whole argument is a total nonsense.

Of course gank miners for the lol's, nothing against it, but it shouldn't be too easy unless you like seeing inflation in eve running out of control.

As for mission running, well that's a whole different kettle of fish, that does have an effect on the eve universe in that its an ISK and item faucet that pumps money and resources into the game. Although again, even with a tengu running level 4s solo your income is totally dependent on how quickly you can pop the rats, a newish player in a battleship will still need 3 hours to complete a level 4 mission to make 60m ISK at most. So again, that profitable? Enough to PLEX with change, which eventually goes into very shiny mission running ships.

Mission running I do have a bit more of an issue with given as they do tend to be anti-social activities. But with level 4 missions being a bit harder I hope to see more group activities in this area, but of course you have to reduce the reward in line with the number of players working together, but hopefully you make that up in speed.

I will confess I have digressed somewhat from the title of this post, but I felt I had to air some other thoughts regarding highsec before getting into the meat of my blitherings.

HERE I get to the point.

My suggestion is that Hi-Sec isn't broken, it works fine, we'll it managed to introduce me to eve long enough for me to start venturing out of highsec, my point is that today's gaming noobs, the yoof, the younger generation are fed and suckled on the insta-gratification of modern day gaming which is why Eve has a hard time retaining new players.

What do I mean by this? I'm sure if we look at a demographic of players in Eve the majority of them are late 20's 30's and older. Or at least, that's the players I talk to day in and day out anyway. Yes there are a few younger players in their teens.

Although pretty sure someone will jump on here to prove me wrong.

But what can we glean from this, why do the older players find eve so appealing and why do we stick it out for years and years?

Simple - We grew up on games that were HARD. Older gamers are gamers who are generally very good at games and like ones with steep learning curves. We have fond memories of games that gave no second chances, you lost your lives, there where no check points, no saves, and if you was lucky, you didn't have to rewind the cassette tape to wait 5-10min to reload the entire game.

I remember playing a game where it was driving on a road that got faster, it was a slow increase, but it got fast, insanely fast. I would play for hours on end just to get a little bit further in the game than I did in the previous run only to crash and have to start right from the beginning again.

I use this as an example because it reminds me of how Eve works as a game. You earn your ISK, you buy your ship, you take it out, you die, then goto10. But each time you get a bit better, you tweak it, and out you go again.

Eve was made by a generation of programmers and designers who would have cut their programming teeth on these sorts of games.

By comparison, today's games are a piece of cake, I can honestly say no other game other than Eve has provided me with the level of challenge it does with the exception of 2/3 games I have played in the last 6/7 years.

I mean, who remembers playing Doom for the first time, getting through the levels only to desperately be trying to find a med pack because your health is at 1% and your being chased by a group of Barons?

I stopped here...this isn't a common theme against Hi-sec. The argument against high sec is the risk vs. reward doesn't balance with low and null.

High sec income:120m/hour is becoming standard in incursion communities.
High sec risk: Ganking(as much as you see it on the KBs, the chance of actually getting ganked are fairly slim. and you can avoid it if you are careful), incursion logi falls asleep and forgets to rep you...anything else? Oh, wardecs...drop roles, take a 24 hour break and hop corp.

Nullsec income: 100m an hour if you are very good and in the best space. This means a fully upgraded SOV system.
Nullsec risk: EVERYTHING. You even run the risk of not being blue anymore when you log in, then you can't dock and everything is gone.

Also, the nullsec income is usually hindered by cloaky alts, CTAs, and profits are even slimmer due to the cost of hauling your loot to a place you can actually get a good price for it. Let's not even talk about all the effort that goes into maintaining SOV other than CTAs.

So recap: Hisec has higher income, less risk, and less hinderance.

Counterargument: Well, why doesn't everyone just move to high sec if it's that awesome. Because that would mean whole portions of the game were worthless...CCP doesn't want to see half the game go to waste and neither do we. Nullsec is a good aspect but there needs to be some incentive to go through all that effort.

EDIT: And yes there are Tech moons that provide piles of isk...but do you think any of the individual pilots that fill the CTA fleets see any of that? No way...lucky if they get their ship replaced after it goes boom. We're talking about individual income here...

It's all about the risk vs reward. Sometimes it's good, like in wormholes. Sometimes, it's not so good, as seen in nullsec.

So another nerf hi sic, buff null sec thread?

That's why you keep most things in NPC 0.0 stations and just a pvp ship in the sov stations.

The problem is null sec is broken. Nerfing high into the ground will just mean those people who make their isk there to pvp with in low / 0.0 will be even more risk averse. From the sov system, to industry, to the isk making possibilities for the average 0.0 player, null is in need of a drastic overhaul. A lot of older players have simply given up on it all together until something is done to improve it.

This is all that really needs to be said for any past, present, and future nerf hi-sec/buff null thread. It's the simple truth, and everyone knows it. The spin doctors will be along any moment now to try and unravel this thread as they do all the others, but the fact remains.

Blame it on the sov grind. Blame it on RMT. Blame it on the big blue doughnut. Blame it on null bears filling CSM seats and eventually seats within CCP itself. Blame it on lack of industry/trade/pew/whatever. None of it matters. What it all comes down to in the end is it's the fault of the players that live there, specifically the big power blocks and their endless horde of yes men.

These two know the F'ing score, well said

i remember playing medal of honor underground...

played through once without cheats to say i did it.

lol, after that though, i said **** it and typed in the cheats.


seriously though, this new generation of gamers IS spoiled

I don't believe that risk aversion or instant gratification addiction is the problem in high-sec. That problem is common to all parts of EVE with the possible exception of W-Space (not really sure and haven't lived there in a long while to have an opinion on it's residents).

The mission runner doesn't want to risk his shiny new toy. The low sec guys fly mostly sub BS hulls ... anything else and it's risky. Nullsec just stops the moment a neut/red comes in local. These folks went out to null to get "gud fights" and everyone is docking up as soon as there's a target in system! Awesome. Wanna talk about risk aversion? It's not exclusive to high-sec mate.


Even with that quality of player, the balance between risk vs reward is screwed. People normally attack the miners at this point. Mining is one of the few parts of EVE industry that's correctly balanced in it's risks and rewards.

ICE Mining sucks, so it's pointless to debate it any further. Mental Note to CCP: -> ICE ROCKS THAT POP! <-

High-sec will yield around 10-15mil/h for a maxed out miner.
Low-sec will yield around 20-25mil/h although you need to find a quiet system (they still exist!).
Null-sec will yield around 40/60mil/h. The 60 mil come with the rorqual bonuses and not sleeping on the job! ;)



The real tragedy comes in the absence of any sort of industry (not counting building capitals). The biggest imbalance between null-sec and high-sec is industry.

High-sec simply has everything better (regarding industry), except POCOs on PI and PI itself.

Right now it's just more efficient to building everything subcap in High-sec and then transport it down to null-sec. It's cheaper and safer. I've made a couple of suggestions in some other thread, but it's basically the list below.

Changes to empire

• All station facilities get reduced slots (yes!) (+/- 30%)
• All station facilities get reduced efficiency (refining at 40%, copy / R&D take 15% longer, Invention has lower success rates -10%, etc)
• All station facilities get heavier taxing (broker fee's, setup costs for jobs, etc)

Changes to nullsec (when compared to the above high-sec)

• All stations get a boost in slots (+/- 40%, etc)
• All stations get a boost in efficiency (refining at 50%, copy / R&D are 15% faster, invention has higher success rates +10%, etc)

Changes to general stuff

• POSs in 0.5/0.6 can use refineries (these need to be more efficient than refining in NPC stations)
• Ice belts that deplete just like regular belts.
• A cool down timer between jumps for all jump capable ships (including titan bridges), except black ops. (I'd say 10m but every JF pilot would just say "he's ******* nuts!")
• Limit the amount of mass that a jump bridge can handle per day. (similar to WH working)

Why all these changes?

Let's start with the changes to empire. You actually get something better out of a POS. Owning a POS is more efficient than using the NPC facilities. Why? You need to risk it. You need to deploy it and defend it. It's a pure conflict driver as the moon slots will become a valued commodity. You risk more, you gain more.

NPC stations can't and won't be the building power house that they are right now as you'll have longer cues due to the lack of slots. The idea is to make it inefficient to build in high-sec while showing that null-sec is just more convenient.

Taxes as isk sinks, reduced inefficiency leads people to POSs (which drive conflict) or null-sec (which drives conflict).


The changes to null-sec. High-sec won't be able to produce at the same rate, nor can the JF pilots just flood the local market with imported goods due to the changes in jump capable ships and jump bridges for those brave ones thinking of hauling in a regular freighter plus the changes to ice belts should make the fuel prices go up, making it less inviting to jump everything in from high-sec. Imports to null-sec should come from transport ships. Everything else will become too much risk for too little reward or just nor profitable.

This will open up space for local markets, either region wide or alliance/coalition wide (like VFK is today). The point with VFK is that now it's seeded with JF imports. After this it would be seeded by local builders.

My 2 cents. Thanks for reading.

huh....

I should run for CSM. I have nothing relevant to say, no platform to stand on or for and I make no promises that can't be kept.