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I generally agree with both the Phase 1 and Phase 2 sov changes, although I think it is unfortunate that they are delivered in the form of a stick without any corresponding carrot, or at least a discussion of it. Here are my thoughts, from the perspective of a small/medium corporation (~50 active members, 10-20 online at a time, though admittedly in a huge alliance), for what kinds of "carrot" (incentives) I'd like to see.

All I really want is a sov system where a corporation (or small alliance) can live in one system and do things together.

What I currently have:

• PvE - Sprawl. Currently, PvE is not worth doing together (wildly inefficient if active ratting, plus afk-ratting gives similar rewards) and PvE cannot support more than a handful of members per system. This gets further conflated by being in a large alliance, and we end up spread all over a region.
• Corp PvP - As a result of being so spread out, it is difficult to form for PvP fleets, either for home defense or roaming. In addition, because it isn't realistic to form up fleets to defend ourselves, attacking players can only realistically hunt for ganks, not fights.
• Alliance PvP - Join fleets, shoot things, no real complaints here except for the lack of reasons to shoot people and the relative scarcity of people to shoot. It's far more optimal to harrass sov holders than actually try to claim their space.

What I want:

• PvE - Increased player density within a system, either though increased anomaly count or some mission equivalent (see Endie's proposal) or through something like an incursion equivalent (group ratting for decent isk in actual pvp-capable ships).
• Corp PvP - Assuming greater player density, we can be in one place and thus form up to fight people who want to fight us.
• Alliance PvP - A strong enough incentive for small alliances to risk moving into nullsec, and still be able to get decent fights and make some profit even if they are quickly driven out.

Here are some things that I think would help:

1. Provide bonuses to system income based on sov level:

• Sov Level 0 - no change
• Sov Level 1 - X% bonus to bounties received / ore mined
• Sov Level 2 - 2X% bonus to bounties received / ore mined
• Sov Level 3 - 3X% bonus to bounties received / ore mined
• Sov Level 4 - 4X% bonus to bounties received / ore mined
• Sov Level 5 - 5X% bonus to bounties received / ore mined

Result: An incentive at the individual level to live in your sovereign space.

2. Provide group PvE content

Sov Level 0 - no change

Sov Level 1 - Scout incursion site on constant respawn

Sov Level 2 - Additional anomalies (of the good ones, or rebalance so they're all "the good ones")

Sov Level 3 - Vanguard incursion site on immediate respawn

Sov Level 4 - Additional anomalies (of the good ones, or rebalance so they're all "the good ones")

Sov Level 5 - Assault incursion site on immediate respawn

Result: Increased player density and actual group PvE content.

3. Provide bonuses to alliance income based on sov level:

Sov Level 0 - no change

Sov Level 1 - X% of bounties / ore mined / industry fees / market taxes are placed in the IHUB and can be taken by anyone - basically an ESS-style system where friendly players can take for their corp or alliance and hostile players can steal.

Sov Level 2 - 2X% as above

Sov Level 3 - 3X% as above

Sov Level 4 - 4X% as above

Sov Level 5 - 5X% as above

Result: Corp/Alliance-level incentives, based on player activity, to both hold and attack sov.

4. Incentivize smaller-scale conflict

Sov Level 0 - no change

Sov Level 1 - Command Nodes gated for Frigates and below

Sov Level 2 - Command Nodes gated for Destroyers and below

Sov Level 3 - Command Nodes gated for Cruisers and below

Sov Level 4 - Command Nodes gated for Battleships and below

Sov Level 5 - Command Nodes not gated

Result: Larger alliances will always be able to push out smaller alliances; this way the smaller alliance can afford to fight back - if they keep their sov level low, so they can defend effectively with cheaper ships. Heck, they can probably spam the Sov Lasers at lower sov levels and just hold off an attacker indefinitely. Mess with how exactly a system like this works and you get all sorts of neat tactical/strategic outcomes (ex: different types of command nodes spawn, so instead of only having the ones listed above, you have every type spawn at every sov level, but mostly the ones listed above at each sov level).

I fully realize that I'm not a game designer, so take this more as "examples of mechanics that do things" than "things I expect to actually happen". I do, however, think it would be incredibly useful for CCP to start discussing the benefits of holding sov, and certainly to consider (and explain to us!) how those benefits can lead to increased conflict.

Edit: I don't talk about industry at all because I know nothing about it.

All of the new "fight generating" additions made by CCP ended up being anything but fight generators. Siphons/ESS being the prime examples. The issue is these are fundamentally asymmetric. The optimal gameplay is not to actually fight over them but to ninja them.

That is essentially what is wrong with this SOV proposal. There is no reason to actually fight head to head when you can ninja, if they show, repeat, over and over. They are turning what was an EHP grind into a timer response grind. Again, optimal gameplay will be to ninja. There are several ways to solve this issue.

I personally like the idea of the module not being on anything smaller than a BC but that might be too far. Having POS be anchorable at planets next to stations/ihubs etc might also be a nice mitigation strategy. You want to force defenders to defend and live there but not have swarms of griefers just burning down half the galaxy with minimal effort.

As far as supers, defenders can slap on on an Aeon and park it on a beacon too. Anyone that hotdrops gets counterdropped by the blob.

Just quoting my prophesy to say - I didnt mean it, it was sarcasm!

When you removed the ability to teleport capitals across the galaxy, we said - fine, strategic assets should move strategically slow. But now you are making those strategic assets strategically worthless. Capitals should be the key in sov warfare, not the bloody interceptors. Of course, there should be support, and they should move slow, etc. But you cannot just erase them from the equation. You cannot promise us that you'll find them another role. You will not. This is their role.

When Fozzie and later Rise started their "tiercide" initiative - everyone were happy. You were bringing back a lot of ships back to life. Now you're about to destroy the most iconic class of ships. Dont do it.

omg omg omg, I was reading a post about the ESS and I'm like "can we put this node thing in an anomaly, that would e hilarious".

Please do this CCP so in addition to being a non-consensual PVP game, EVE can haven't non-consensual PVE too!!!

Pretty much all of whom would have no reason to continue to be renters after this change. NC.'s supercaps will be no particular threat to them. Sure, you can make an example of some, drop a supercap fleet and flip sov back . And then when you leave they just flip it back with a cruiser fleet, because they don't NEED caps to grind the HP now, just their magic laser.

The number of renters able to field and willing to welp a 30-man cruiser fleet to reclaim sov after you leave is MUCH higher than the number of renters who can both field and afford to lose a structure grinding fleet. Are you going to go blap every single one? With what? With who? How long until your supercap alts get bored of jumping 30 gates in order to blow up a 30 cruiser renter fleet? Not once a day, but four or five times a day because every renter and their multibox accounts can assemble a cruiser fleet to revolt. So you stop doing it in supercaps, and fly T3's because OMG WARP IS SLOW... only a 500 man T3/ishtar fleet is not the same kind of hammer that a 500 man supercap fleet is, and it STILL can't be everywhere at once. Oh, and while you were doing that, Brave came and flipped half your home systems in their Eagle fleets because they can.

And if you DON'T get bored doing that, great. More explosions for everyone!

The existing deterrent to sov conflict is structure grind, not supercaps. Supercaps were a deterrent to STRUCTURE GRIND, not sov conflict. If you remove structure grind, supercaps are short-circuited and stop being a deterrent to sov conflict. They will still be very useful for winning large strategic battles, but they do nothing to stop people from pecking away at your sov. ONLY active, live pilots in space during your prime time window will stop people from pecking away at your sov.

Why? If you stuff too many people into a single system, guess what your attacker should do then? He should reinforce things in a different constellation to draw more of your people there, while you do the exact same thing. Sooner or later one of you'll mess up and lose a system, or maybe both'll mess up and lose a system, and the next day you'll trade even more systems.


If that's the case, then what we would've ended up with is that the CFC/N3 and friends would be the exact same entities today if we hadn't gotten dominion sov as a replacement for the POS-based system. And I doubt that'd be the case. The old system was way too dynamic and allowed too much of a multiple fronts war (where a day or two of absence could mean you lost the system, or at the very least lost a LOT of your control of that system, as opposed to today's week where you had to win just ONE fight whereas the attacker has to win each and every one of them) to end up with two coalitions spanning their own half of the map.

Yeah, that's right instead you will be paying protection ISk or you will have your SOV flipped every 2nd day and no way to fight back because NC. is still gone be stronger than your 10 man corp.

I'm mostly happy with the underlying premise. There are a few things I think might need tweaking, but on the whole I'm positive to it. It's Jenn aSide who's saying there are deep, grievous flaws with it. I'm just wondering if these grievous flaws can be quantified, so I can see if I agree with Jenn or not.

People rent because they don't have a supercap fleet to grind down structures or defend themselves when they get welped. The current sov mechanics vastly favors alliances with large capital fleets who are able to grind structures very quickly.