Player Features and Ideas Discussion

so what you're saying is that hardly any systems are camped and the only people significantly affected by campers are the ones incapable or unwilling to move...

Thus the effects have been massively exaggerated. (like saying entire constellations are shutdown. pfft)

The easy solution is most definitely to move.

You dont have to own any space. Even if next door is under someone elses control, theres nothing stopping you taking that gate jump and ratting in their sov. But instead, ratting systems are typically waaaaaay back behind the safety of numerous systems and intel channels. There is plenty of room to move around and the vast majority of null is empty.

Dont get me wrong, Cloaking should change. But if AFK cloaking has half the effect most people try to describe then you should expect hyperinflation after its removal.

Remember, null bounties are very very sensitive.

Hey, if the system is quiet enough theres no reason you couldnt rat in it. You cant be serious that you MUST rat in a system where you have a POS. Is that why you think you have to own loads of space and cant easily move?

Luckily most ratters can rat in systems without friendly POS's, and even enjoy the free intel of local to tell them to GTFO, cloak up, or log off. This may be why afk cloakers dont bother most ratters.

As a comparison WH dwellers can only survive by ratting in hostile systems and they dont even get local or risk free-zero volume bounties. They have to haul their earnings back home...



So those who arent bothered by afk cloakers have their earnings nerfed to accommodate for the dumb, lazy, risk averse loners who are? And you may not be able to just leave it as is because...


Just tell me which is true...

A) The reason people cant easily move is because there are few desirable ratting systems/constellations. These few will obviously be the systems/constellations ratters focus into and as such are frequently camped. The removal of such camping will free up massive amounts of isk making ratters.

B) The reason the removal of camping will hardly affect the isk sink is because there are loads of ratters and loads of ratting systems/constellations, and really it is easy to move about and people are just being terrible at eve.

C) You dont really appreciate the 'insane' amount of isk that comes from nullsec bounties, nor how afk cloaking is 'one of the most effective ways of disrupting peoples money making in null sec.'

This, pick one you whiney bastards then run with it. Stop trying to have your cake and eat it too.

I short Marranar Amatin just shot down his own argument.

You can leave now.

And you are applying linearity when in fact it might be quite wrong and stupid to do so.

Suppose we make AFK cloaking impossible somehow--i.e. some mechanics change means it is no longer possible at all. Who cares how, it is just gone.

Assume the above numbers are true.

Will null sec ratting income go up by just 1%? I'll argue no.

Why not? Because ratting just got tremendously safer. It might go up by 5% or 10% as more people join alliances simply to sit and rat most of the time. You assume that there are no feed back loops at all. You assume that a change in the risk of ratting in null will not change the amount of ratting in null.

Maybe you are right, but my guess is you are quite wrong. With safer ratting in null my guess is MORE people will want to do it and the effect will be more people ratting in null and more than a 1% increase.



Oh, and one last thing...inflation/hyperinflation are tricky things. Again linearity DOES NOT ******* APPLY. You can be fine one minute and then be in the crapper the next.

Adios dude...

My view is both HAVE to be changed. Changing one OR the other is imbalanced.

I'm going to name my first Observation Tower "Hawoud Jablomi InSpace"

i know we've had our disagreements and recently seeing eye to eye, but i feel i must point out that afk cloaking is NOT the primary method for resource denial.

Cloaky Hotdropping is the primary method for resource denial. having a periodically afk cloaker is just a means to leverage the power wielded both physically and psychologically by cloaky hotdroppers over an extended period of time.

by extension it is NOT cloaking thats the problem its the hotdropping, more specifically its the covert cyno hodropping from black ops just off the undock of NPC stations.

afk cloakers arent an issue to ratters if such cloakers are not an avant garde to a cloaky hotdrop group, and even if they are, its not a long term issue if those cloaky hotdroppers are wormhole daytrippers because although its a PITA, its not severely debilitating over a long period of time. added to that is the fact that the cloaky hotdroppers are actually legitimately putting ships at risk moving black ops through wormholes, unlike the blops bridgers that sit in station till thefinal second, undock, bridge up and dock back up again.

My fix?

1) covert cynos cannot be online when covert ops cloaks are online (not online not meaning active)
2) black ops battleships cannot open bridges within a certain range from a station, say 10km.


though i appreciate techos that we both agree that cloaks and local are in balance, it is just barely in balance.That balance is neither optimal nor without flaws that should be addressed.
the 2 fixes above are a gentle approach to bring issues associated with cloaking and local into a more optimal balance and thus impart a knock on effect of shifting the balance of cloaking / local into a more agreeable state.

Sorry CCP but I haven't been able to read this thread or even read in great depth the detail about proposed observation structures but this is my view.

There should be a distinction made between cloaky camping a system and afk cloaky camping a system. While I'm guilty of both I have no problems with implementing a mechanic that automatically logs off inactive players after a certain time period. That should reduce the ability of an afk cloaky camper to lock down a system 24/7

The cloaking mechanic is fine and should be left alone. I don't think whole classes of ships should be made redundant (recons, bombers, covert T3s, blockade runners, blops and covert ops ships) because of drastic changes to the ability to decloak or detect cloaked ships.

If you do implement a drastic change to the cloaking mechanic that hinder or deter hotdrops then you should drastically reduce the amount of income available to ratters and miners in null. They are not defenceless, the implementation of jump fatigue has meant that cyno mid points are rarely used (and so more space cannot be reached with a hotdrop) and so less risk should always be balanced by less reward.