Wormholes

Should also keep in mind what changed since we have new the notification system with the audible bell.
At current state it's pretty easy to track targets down.
I suspect that the fairly increased death of supers has alot to do with this.

And then listen to the latest wormhole podcast about log offs

Speaking of w-space, a lot of times it's in fact the same tool. Because one main use for non-mutually agreed watchlists is watching players that camp your wormhole or watching corp that you camp. In these situations being online is hugely correlated with being in a specific system. And that both sides can mutually watchlist each other is even worse – at that point we have a substitute for local. There is no balance in this mechanics, as the game give you no sound option to deny that intel.

You can't call it a game mechanic at all and it does not reflect how well adapted(good) you are.
Its a workaround newbies not knowing about and more important dont care about, because they are busy learning the real game mechanics and trying to play it actually - which is often prevented by similar "tricks".

cool.

pls no desperate

this.

I think its too powerful a meta and Eve would be more challenging and spontaneous (ie interesting) if if it didn't exist.

I can think of two ways to upgrade it:

Possible Upgrade #1: Make it a mutual decision that both players agree on.

- player adds a contact to their contact list and sends the standard 'you have been added to my contact list' notice
- receiving player receives the notice and clicks a box "allow online notification"

that way only if the two players are friends will the 'player online' notification be available. Non-consenting players can't be watchlisted.

Possible Upgrade #2: watchlisting players happens automatically when each has set the other individual player to blue.

- a player gets a notice when any of his 'blue' bros comes on that also have him blue
- doesn't apply to automatic blues such as corps/alliance blues as it would cause too many contacts

I think the first upgrade is better.

yk

Spoken like someone who has no idea the time it actually takes to hunt a target in wormhole space.

In WHs there is no local and people are often in cloaked ships. Watchlists prevent hunters from spending hours watching a empty wormhole. They tell you if your target is online so you have a possibility of continuing the hunt. or if he is offline so you dont spend hours of wasted time while your target is logged off doing stuff in that horrible sunshine.

watchlists enable pew in wh space and prevent hours of boredom. They don't hand you targets on a platter.

Man, I get so sick of people standing up on pedestals and beating drums of ideological purity. You are like the special interest groups here in the U.S. who are always pointing at the racism of this policy or the sexism of that one or how this one idea is socialist(!!!)--all the while ignoring the other aspects of a situation that are the conceptually the same but benefit you.

Abusing these appeals to conceptual authority is damaging to the very ideas you claim to be espousing. "No Free Intel!" sounds kind of great as a game design principle. But if what it actually means is no free intel except for the free intel that you find beneficial, then it's a crap design principle.

If you're going to keep beating on that drum, you need to actually mean it. Otherwise the hypocrisy is painfully obvious, and you just look stupid. But you shouldn't mean it because it's ridiculous. We will never eliminate all sources of free intel in this game, and you would riot if anyone seriously tried to.

Get off your soap-boxes and address the actual issue at hand. Try to make a real argument that amounts to something other than, "Whaaaaaaaa! The bad man made my ship go away, and then I poopied in my panties a little. Waaaaaaa!"

You can dress that up however you want. But pretending that No Free Intel means anything other than that when you say it is just silly.

If this question is being asked in the context of a general examination of in-game intel (Local, D-scan, probe scanning, locator agents, etc.) then +1 to requiring the consent of the watched.

If there's a need, you can deal with edge cases as they come up, e.g.: making the emergency warp on disconnect easily distinguishable from a standard warp.