Warfare & Tactics

This is not quite correct, the exploit was really a market manipulation on certain items that were then destroyed by the freighter load, and it was not a problem with general LP rewards for normal PVP engagements.

Regardless this was fixed and concerns over excessive pay-out could be dealt with by a hard cap of some kind.

It also creates no ISK or assets, LP is an ISK sink.

PVP rewards fixed at Tier 4/5 level would be a good for FW.

Doesn't matter. PVP function in EVE food chain is to burn resources not to create new wealth. And is actually the only activity in EVE doing this.

People fight and to the winner the spoils. In FW the winner not only get the spoils but also an LP bonus, we're already borderline as is now, if we push the bonus more then what is created (in term of LP and loot) is more than what is destroyed; this is not only a backdoor for several game exploits and cheats, is also a plainly wrong concept.


But beside any theory and idea it has benn already tried and failed badly

Just think you need to remember how exploitable the previous system was.

Not only was the LP for items destroyed where the price had been artificially inflated, but the Tier mechanic at the time also gave significant LP and ISK reductions at level 5 and this is where this was cashed out.

None of this is in place anymore.

PVP LP rewards could be uplifted in line with the rewards already allowed through the current system but fixed in line with a higher tier. It seems counter productive to reduce LP PVP rewards for factions that cannot maintain higher tiers.

As long as payouts are even close to the value of the ship+modules, its a bad mechanic. You blow ship up, get insurance payout and then some LP's on top of that to cover for the module losses. Since you'll have a good portion of modules dropped, you would (theoreticaly), still be able to make isk out of blowing your own stuff up. So, while I'd love to see more payouts from pvp alone, I'm afraid that anything your regular pvp-er would consider a decent payout would be considered even more decent mechanic for exploitation by your average exploiter

I'm all in favour of increasing the LP rewards for PvP, but the mechanism needs refinement. The nub of the issue is twofold, as you say.

- More genuine incentives and rewards for PvP, without generating exploits.
- disincentivising farmers. More on this later

At the heart of the issue of farming is that LPs have an equivalent ISK value. They can be cashed in. Donating them to an i-Hub is entirely voluntary. So a lot of people are in FW farming just to leach LPs, not return them to the FW objectives. Social 'pressure', from fellow militia members, is meaningless.

At the end of the day, the 'farming' plexers are unconcerned by competitive PvP, and any cargo they get, and the value of any ships destroyed. They're looking to not get destroyed at all, by flying cheap stabbed frigs - then either running off when confronted, or, semi-AFK, writing off the loss of a 500,000 isk frig as collateral damage.

The profits from plex farming are enormous, when compared to the level of skills and equipment to get into it, and particularly when compared to the other carefully balanced isk faucets in the game. 40,000+ LPs an hour is achievable by any character that's barely crept out of a noob ship. If you choose the right items from the LP store, you can convert and cash in at a rate that's pretty much 70m isk an hour - at the bare minimum if you're at Tier 2. At T4-5, this gets silly - 300m - 400m isk an hour, for a week old noob, in a 500,000 isk ship, with little risk. For just sitting there, then running away.

This is broken. I don't care what anyone else says. It is.

Boredom notwithstanding, plexing is by far the easiest money in the game. About as boring as mining, and more profitable until you've a much higher level miner. About as profitable as L4 security missions done efficiently, but with none of the hassle: 200m isk battleship setups, NPC fighting, looting, salvaging, selling etc. Less dangerous than ratting in 0.0.

Forget about the war, or even what Faction you're in, or why - that's just background noise. You just plex, cash in your LPs, ship your items to Dodixie or Jita. Easy money. I am surprised more players aren't doing it until they're up to the task of Incursions and the like.

Not only is plexing highly profitable, the issue is that the core 'currency' of FW hub / tier success is LPs - and they're being 'leached' from the core FW mechanic in a way that negatively impacting everyone in a militia that is in FW for the win, not the cash. Tackle that, and you change the picture. You could do something like:

- Create an entirely separate plexing 'currency' that is not LPs, and has no monetary value. It can only be obtained from plexing and PvP, and can only be spent upgrading hubs. Make it so there's little financial benefit to plex farming at all, but to compensate, increase the leaching / topping up faucets / sinks of whatever this currency is to compensate.
- increase the LP rewards from PvP kills quite a bit, based on the ship value / mods value.

or, if you want to keep LPs as the plexing reward currency...

- Make it that every 'LP' farmed in a defensive plex automatically puts either the entirety, or a good portion, of the leached LPs directly into the i-Hub in that system. A proper 'hub tax', at source.
- You just pay people, in cold, hard ISK, for successfully completing plexes at a moderate level commensurate with equivalent level mission rewards and the time spent on them. They really shouldn't be paying more than 20m for a hour of work. 10m would be fairer. So about a quarter of the current value.

http://community.eveonline.com/news/dev-blogs/73491

The mechanic - where the prices of things in the LP store were adjusted by Tier level - was removed months ago in favour of a system where LP gains are affected by Tier level. Faction LP store prices are now fixed. The Tier level only affects LP gains.

The old 'Goon mechanic' of stockpiling LPs, then rapidly cashing in after a Tier 5 push, when LP store prices are much more attractive, is dead.

There is a market impact of Tiers on the value of LPs still, although it is not now as pronounced after the changes.

- The market price of Faction ships and some faction exclusive implants does swing a bit with Tier level of the corresponding faction. At higher Tier levels, these ships are cheaper. At lower Tier levels, more expensive. But not by loads.

- Some non-FW exclusive items, like implants and datacores, also experience a 'swing' but again by far less as there's other sources of those goods.

So the pro-farmer farms LPs at higher tier levels, holds on to those LPs, then when the Tiers drop, spends the LPs on Faction goods and makes a better profit. On Faction ships, I would suggest it is of the order of 10-15% per Tier. Perhaps more for some of the bigger ticket items.

EDIT:

I've had a quick look at the market prices for some Faction frigates, as they're a reasonable barometer of 'value' for LPs. They don't vary by that much. The Minmatar Fleet Firetail is the cheapest at around 14m and has been for a while. Last time I was able to check, Minnie were on T4 or 5.

By comparison, the Caldari Navy Hookbill is around 20m isk or just under, and they're on T1.

So you could reasonably deduce that the relative earning power difference of LPs between T4/5 and T1 is 50% (edited for maths percentage fail). Not that huge. About 10% a Tier. The higher you go, the less stuff is worth.

At lower levels, Faction exclusive stuff is 'worth' more. But at higher Tier levels, you're getting a lot more LPs for your efforts. A lot more. Way more than you get from being at the bottom tiers in relative LP value improvement. Being at higher Tiers is better. Dropping down the Tiers does allow you to cash if you've stockpiled LPs, though, for about a 50% gain from T5-T1.

Although, in fairness, my assumptions might be skewed because the Firetail is crap, and the Hookbill is the better ship, driving up demand.

Yes, we know.

But, again: doesn't matter, exploits or not, making PVP kills a way to "create" wealth is a bad concept. In EVE balancements PVP role is to destroy wealth and assets (someone have to do it), not to create new ones (there's mining, PVE and industry for it).

Even if in FW we're still playing EVE, and in EVE you kill, destory ship and assets and gets the spoils.

Exploits and out of cotrol unpreidcted outcomes are generallly originated by enforcing bad game concepts or when some bright DEV subvert the core, estabilished EVE design concepts.

The only "spoils" in FW are increased LP from dominating the Occupancy War - nothing else. This would be similar to being able to spawn DED sites at a faster rate if you were in 0.0, for example. Are we saying there are several game exploits and cheats available with better spawn rates of DED sites in 0.0? And are increasing the frequency of DED sites a wrong concept?

At one time some people argued that this was just a cycle. More pvpers would join amarr since there would be more carebears on the side with higher tiers and better pay. Amarr would trim the fat of the whiners and carebears. Isn't that a good thing? Or are we finding that is not really how it works?

Seems like you really want to go in reverse from the idea of consequences. No tiers, no goals for a militia as a whole. I think this sounds pretty mediocre and allot like pre inferno fw. People could brag about winning sov before inferno. But really there wasn't much bragging was there? Think about why no one cared then or now. It had nothing to do with consequences. People cried to have ccp add consequences in inferno now you want them removed. They are really irrelevant.

Your proposal will change very little and in fact distract ccp from what they really need to do to make fw sov plexing more fun and worth bragging about. Yep its the same thing they always needed to do. Make sov war plexing a pvp mechanic.

I need these so clones don't cost me 50m.