Warfare & Tactics

FW missions provide a way for the victors to continue to make isk even though the other side has given up and ceded the entire warzone.

You are completely correct with those statements; I have not done a gallente mission to save my life, nor will I ever probably do one. And I do suppose the same would be true otherwise for the galente missions since the passive regen probably would not work at all to compensate. There might have been an incursus setup I tinkered with awhile back that could ahve worked, but as you pointed out sensor strength and the overwhelming number of missiles, significantly more than even the amarr missions deal with, are the defining factors that do not normally allow for that kind of thing to happen. I have been optimisitic, and have shuttled a few fits here and there over to one of my friends who I talk to who was in gal mil quite a bit, as well as Loren Gallen while he was still acive.

That being said, ship engineering is a big part of my life in this game. I have been continuously disappointed by how overpowered the rats seem to be in anti-caldari missions, so putting my stock into something like that harpy build is my way of saying i literally have no idea what kind of frigate could stand up to those missions and run them effectively compared to a t3 or Hac.

Speaking of a hac, Maybe my sacrilige setup I run pirate missions in null might be able to be adapted to this in a pinch:
[Sacrilege]

[High Slots]
Heavy Missile Launcher II, Scourge Fury Heavy Missile
Heavy Missile Launcher II, Scourge Fury Heavy Missile
Heavy Missile Launcher II, Scourge Fury Heavy Missile
Heavy Missile Launcher II, Scourge Fury Heavy Missile
Heavy Missile Launcher II, Scourge Fury Heavy Missile
Improved Cloaking Device II

[Med Slots]
Conjunctive Radar ECCM Scanning Array I
Conjunctive Radar ECCM Scanning Array I
Cap Recharger II
Gistum C-Type 10MN Microwarpdrive

[Low Slots]
Medium Armor Repairer II
Medium Armor Repairer II
Corelum C-Type Energized Thermic Membrane
Ballistic Control System II
Ballistic Control System II

[Rigs]
Medium Capacitor Control Circuit II
Medium Capacitor Control Circuit II

[Drones]
Vespa EC-600 x 5
MWD/cloak trick and warp stabs to negate camps are ideal; haven't lost it to a gatecamp yet. Drones are for emergency jams if there's a hictor or something on the camp, or if someone drops in on your mission and you're not paying attention. They can be swapped to t2 combat drones at your leisure. It's also good bit cheaper than a t3, and has a better active tank than an ishtar. Not entirely sure on the details with comparing it with the ishtar's drones, so I'll leave that up to you guys. Whole setup is permastable without any implants, btw.

Something from your persepctive off attacking militia members might be good to contribute

I think a large part of the past 3 pages - those parts not dedicated to point out how imbalanced missions are, at any rate - have been focused on demonstrating that the OP was based on incorrect assumptions / theories about what was wrong or needed to be fixed about FW.

Your point about system upgrades being useless is well taken, though basing Tier totally on WZ control in terms of systems doesn't seem like a good fix at all. That rewards whatever faction can throw the most cloaky stabbed farmer at backwater systems noone lives in, and forces the factions (like, I dunno, Gallente) who tend to be undermanned compared to their opponents into a neverending deplexing grind just to stay relevant. Part of the beauty of the current system is that we can ignore systems that don't actually matter because they're strategically irrelevant based on player populations and conflict zones, and focus on crushing the bastions of Caldari might instead. The rest is just cleanup, as it should be.

In short, because the current system isn't tied simply to the number of solar systems under your flag, it allow players to decide which systems - if any - are crucial and worth actually fighting for. That's what makes stories such as the siege of Eha or the fall of Innia or the assaults on Enaluri and Oicx so compelling - those systems matter because the players in the militias decided they mattered. Not because they needed to plant one more flag in order to be able to AFK mission run for mad LP.

If you want to make system upgrades useful, there's a million ways to do that. Just as a swag off the top of my head, I would be very surprised if (as part of the summer rollout focused on industry) didn't give FW corps a bonus of some kind in upgraded systems. It would be trivial to give pilots in an FW corp increased refining efficiency or lower manufacture / research job costs depending on the system upgrade level. Not only would that make system upgrades useful and worth throwing LP into even when you're not roflstomping the WZ, but also give additional incentive for industrialists to be involved in FW and to live and build in lowsec. It'd be a unique mechanic and instantly incentivize a more robust market and social landscape in a lowsec ecosystem that is already a fertile ground for such things. At least on the Gallente side - the rest of ya'll are too screwed up by infighting and toxic BS and too heavy a focus on isk making / LP farming to truly enjoy the fruits of such a visionary change

FW is a beautiful creation in part because it's limited access. While some folks think there needs to be player pirate militia thingies, pirates already play a distinct role in FW space and add a much needed dimension. Making them into just another faction diminishes their unique quality. In addition, most pirate corps aren't that dedicated to any one RP faction - the thought of having to defend / capture territory, with all the potential loss of access to space and material, kinda runs counter to the necessary freedom of operation those groups often crave. Besides, they've all got militia alts anyways, so are they really all that left out at the moment?

Requiring PvP to capture a plex is a bad and restrictive mechanic IMO. Not to mention ridiculously gameable. I for one already have opposite faction alt, and will happily supply her with a bazillion free unfitted frigates to blow up so I can cap plexes. We didn't get to use them to cap Innia, after all, so at least they'll be dying for a good cause.

That said, I'm all for boosting the LP reward for PvP and particularly increasing it within plexes or around infrastructure hubs. How to do that in a way that isn't easily gamed in the same way as the previous Goonswarm shenanigans is an interesting design challenge, and not one I'm equipped to offer good insight into. One potential avenue would simply be to disregard the value of any modules that weren't actually fitted - those in the cargo hold for instance. Limiting the bonus to fitted modules lost inside plexes would more accurately reflect the risk / reward mechanic while limiting to some degree the stupid edge cases. You'd still have to take care about Catalysts fitting 8 low meta or civilian blasters that for some reason got pumped to an average market price of 1 billion isk each, but I'm sure that the brilliant minds at CCP could create some kind of script / database query to look at high LP payouts based on ship size and figure out which modules were being market manipulated and by whom - and level the banhammer accordingly.

Missions impacting WZ control is a horrible mechanic given the farming population disparity between some factions and the terrible mission balance between factions. Besides, giving farmers an efficient way to earn LP instead of clogging up my plexes with stabbed cloaky T1 frigates with 3 day old alts means less frustration for everyone.

Regarding mission balance, we've been talking that one to death for a couple pages, and I think we all agree things need some definite improvement.

That an adequate response to your request for feedback?

Yeah, coming into a plex uninvited just to steal LPs is annoying, but I don't feel it's an issue that warrants a game mechanic change to deal with. Just ask them to leave. If they don't, just move on. Most of the time folks like that will get chewed up by any competent combat pilot, so leaving them there to die isn't the worst option. Generally, it's just a matter of someone not knowing the prevailing ettiquette, and simply talking to them fixes the problem. I've even had times where my alt has worked with other plexers to pop the rats in Large plexes so we could run them, after having had to ask them to leave the plex I was in.

Militias aren't alliances, and shouldn't be treated as such. Folks not in your corp, or not in corps you regularly fly with, shouldn't automagically be treated as friends in every situation just because they show up as purple on your overview. It's especially annoying where general militia pilots are concerned - there's no way to tell who is just new to EVE, who just prefers to be in a NPC corp instead of a player corp, who's an alt just making iskies on the side, who's an awox alt who will tackle you for their PvP main to snag, etc etc etc. All part of the game, and none of it is "broken" - any "problems" generally rest on mistaken assumptions we players make about pixels on a screen because of what color they show up as on the overview and what their corp ticker is.

That is fully what I wanted to hear; a thoughtful, detailed and refreshingly neutral response for such a partisan topic. Thank you.

Part of what I was alluding to with feeling that more points should be shifted over to system capture is that the gameplay should shift more towards being group-oriented. Making money is all well and good, but the potentially ludicrous payout needs to be balanced by working cooperatively. Part of the reasons why incursions are so popular and work as well as they do is BECAUSE they're designed around being a group activity from the start with all the money you make from them.

Yes, plexes need to be enforced more, but as a big block of this has been about as you pointed about, is missions and farming. Increasing more elite NPCs to fight in the missions are good, but I legitimately believe that missions should affect the contested level of a system reflective of their level. However, as with the other things, they should be proportionately more difficult for the amount of return you make. Making them so the 3s and 4s of the same calibur of difficulty as the normal ones, excepting the necessity of specific target kills, would either force people to invest a good amount of time, risk, and money into more expensive ships like t3s and hacs if they don't want to fly smaller ships in a group.

I think the problems that we keep running into with wanting fundamental rebalances that would be fair for each side in terms of reducing farming, and equalizing the difficulty of pve in one militia vs the other, lie from encouraging better and more balanced gameplay without opening things up to be any more over-exploited than they are now.
The bit with missions affecting contested level? About refocusing points towards system capture? Each of those are ideas I like because they refocus the effort of people who try this profession TO overexploit it in the first place; to get a quick buck without putting too much risk and effort.

Channelling that energy constructively is where I believe the answer lies; the changes that will eventually come that work will not force people into playing differently from restricting things more, or making things more scripted. Balancing a decidedly UNbalanced system like this involves looking at the issues that it has, recognizing what can and can't stay, and using the things that CAN stay (or have to, because it's impossible to make them leave), and channelling their energy into acting in a way that's not only acceptable, but is helpful and constructive. As I stated before, that's why incursions work. They should be structured more like dungeons where it's a requirement to be in a group.

hmm I see your point on this. The sov system does list off systems and their strategic value; perhaps if they integrated more points towards system capping they could allocate more towards strategically important systems? While many issues persist with mission balancing, having a solid system of determining system value based both off of market activity, position, and resources would be a great start towards building a better warzone.

True enough, but I think the reverse of that is why it would work. CCP setting up certain systems that are more important from a practical perspective, like housing the FW stations for starters, are good because their basic "strategic" value is pretty clear. Each of the FW headquarters, and/or systems like enaluri that have multiple agents, would be worth more. Another good metric for rating the would be by how many other angents each system has; there's on in gal space with a couple of SoE lvl 4 agents and a lvl 5. Intaki would be good since it's the homeworld of the intaki, as would systems with historical importance like OMS.
Having players organize around more beneficial preset lines is not very different with how things currently are; the markets for certain systems are set up around entrenched positions like they are in Nenna, nisuwa, or eha on the gal side. Generally placing more emphasis on holding systems with FW stations is great to begin with, but having more points allocated to them and others is a good way to organize the map strategically.
Another factor that could go into would be temperate planets. If there are colonies there, that and the fact that they're already more important with how the Dust mechanics field just on them, makes more sense for them to be worth more. There's quite a few easy to integrate factors from the game that would pretty much be ready-made for allocating more points to certain systems vs others.

The important thing is that there are quite a few non-arbitrary options to decide how that would look. I would be amenable to them enacting that ONLY if they took a survey from FW pilots to see which schemas would be ok and which would not be ok to integrate for point emphasis.

My general estimates usually assume you can run 1 novice, 1 small, and 1 medium plex per hour on average. Using a baseline of Tier 2, that would be 52.5k LP/hour, plus at least 1 tag worth 2 mil assuming you're offensive plexing. At 1000k per LP standard conversion ratio, that gives us an hourly income for our FW pilot of about 55mil, more or less. Defensive plexing incomes are significantly less, since it's a 25% base reduction, and again adjusted for the system's contested percentage. This of course does not include the time and effort to convert the LP into isk.

For comparison, mining in highsec with barge yields about 25-35mil / hour, essentially risk free.

LP farming through offensive plexing is not broken, and does not need to be reduced. Keep in mind that those figures represent Tier 2 (so some level of warzone control and LP contribution), that you are at much higher risk of loss (even if it's a T1 frigate), and that it is extremely easy to disrupt your ability to earn LP. All those tell me that - given the higher inherent risk - if anything LP payouts at Tier 1 need to be increased to ensure those on the losing side can still afford to play the game. At Tier 1, offensive plexing pays less than highsec mining when all costs are taken into account.

LP income from plexes is probably fine. LP income from broken L4 Caldari / Amarr / Minmatar missions is most definitely not. If you can earn 120k+ LP / hour solo in a bomber, that's roughly the same as running high sec Incursions. THAT is what is broken in terms of FW income. And it's entirely possible to hit that income at Tier 2 for Caldari / Amarr / Minmatar mission runners.

Regarding unique resources, there's plenty of unique resources in low sec as it is. Better ores, better gas, better hacking / relic sites, and better DED plexes among others. The issue is that gathering those resources - aside from those like DED sites that require scanning down - takes far too much time and leaves you far too vulnerable, especially in FW space with as many PvP focused pilots are in space.

On the other hand, I think that CCP is on the right track with system upgrades. At the moment, those give you cheaper clones and more industry slots. With the summer revamp, one could imagine that FW pilots could potentially enjoy lower manufacturing costs and better refining rates with higher system upgrade levels. Tying plex rat difficulty or spawn rates - or even more interestingly, defensive plex LP payouts - to system upgrade level would give folks a reason to upgrade non-station systems as well.

The issue at the moment is that system upgrades are essentially nothing more than an LP sink.

This. So much this.

My impression is that the Caldari and Minmatar militias are as toxic as they are because they're seen as LP ATMs by so much of New Eden. That means they have a higher percentage of pilots who are just there to milk the system for as many LP as possible while contributing as little as possible. Minmatar missions are easier and their warzone is smaller with more agents available, so TLF generates the most LP/hour for bomber alts. Thus Minmatar attract the most of these LP farmers, which makes that warzone particularly toxic since Amarr pilots have to deal with that population all the damn time.

Caldari is second on the list, and the ATM of choice of failed nullbears everywhere, because Jita.

As far as plex farmers and stabs go, the problem isn't the stabs and the cloaks. It's the disparate amount of time it takes to undo their work and the absolutely miserly rewards for doing so. That results in a ridiculously skewed risk / reward / effort equation, which is the real source of the frustration. Something to fix this - timer rollbacks, dual timers, uncoupling deplex rewards from contested percentage - will go a long way to solving this problem without having to create mechanics specifically targeted at cloaks and WCS (which are, after all, valid gameplay choices).