Player Features and Ideas Discussion

Ok, Mike made some good points there.

How about this, as an option...

Make PvE ships capable of indirect PvP, on a meaningful level that more than balances the potential of a cloaked threat?

By indirect, I mean have PvE pilots able to set up fast-anchored objects that can support defending them.
These objects are impractical to use offensively in hostile space, because the act of setting them up can be easily interrupted, and thereby prevented.

While it would NOT play as such, the objects would have similarity to defenses in a two dimensional tower defense game.
They would react to capsuleers exclusively who were in their range, and of the standings specified by the owner.

Other things like an anchorable that restores either shields or armor, or possibly offers a temporary shield against attacks on the hopes that friendly forces can arrive quickly.

The whole defense of the PvE player is already resting on efforts made prior to the arrival of a hostile, that being the gate camps and places to get safe.
This would be no different. These would be more temporary, but still require proactive effort against an opponent not already known to be a threat.

Balancing these would be surprisingly easy, with optional limits about range needed between them, to allowances for how many could be on grid at the same time.

There are far more nuanced solutions. I personally prefer specialized scanning ships that must engage to decloak. These ships could have limited combat ability similar to covert ops, and thus be in serious jeopardy against a combat craft unless operating as part of a fleet, and even so the cloaked ship might manage to escape before backup arrived, or be able to bring in its own backup.

Your solo PvE guy hunting the campers out of his way would not be safe from actively cloaking pilots, your afk cloaker is no longer perfectly safe, your alliance can work to secure space, your cloaker can try to escape or devour the hunting scout ship before he is caught. People that put in effort are rewarded, people that do not or go afk get eaten.

That is not what I would call a terrible idea, but it sounds like it may carry a meaningful burden compared to the current system.
Considering the distance between staging area to activity area, the distance to carry needed items can become daunting.
Being the hostile means you are far from support, by comparison.
I believe we want to encourage visits by solo and small groups, and I think increasing the effort required will work against this goal.

The version I suggested, relying on the local residents, allows a local force to offer temporary protection during the setup phase.
Noone realistically expects PvP to babysit PvE long term, but for a brief 10 to 15 minute setup a roam equivalent could hang around till things were prepared.

PvE miner or ratter, having setup enough defenses to offset typical cloaked threats, can then operate with confidence.
Not impunity, or absolute safety, but rather knowing they had a good enough chance to work and survive so that camping them became trivialized as a concern.

Should the PvE player feel it necessary to flee, the defenses should both help this happen, as well as represent a consolation target for the hostile to shoot at. Defenders can appear in order to protect these defenses, promoting interaction on that level.

I would suggest that the simpler ability to neutralize the threat currently associated with the cloak, would in turn make hunting them a far lower priority.

If I am doing PvE, and I can anchor various things around me that let me operate without an overwhelming expectation of hopelessness in an encounter, then why should I care about a supposed hostile in system?

It loses meaning, the same way it would be in low sec or high sec.
You still pay attention in low and high sec, but seeing non-allied players is not the same alarming event often portrayed in null right now.

I would focus on not allowing cynos on grid with opposing forces. Make that hot drop a non-event, rather than the reason the home team forfeited the game.

This is a sandbox game with a very limited set of rules regarding what players can and cannot do. As such, PvP (broadly defined as one or more players having an impact on one or more other players) is going to be the dominant form of play. Nothing is being warped, this is just the way things will be.

This is a game where people are invariably going to end up as predator or prey. If you refuse to accept this your time in the game is going to be generally frustrating. Time and again, CCP has reinforced this view for the game (e.g. suicide ganking, bumping mining ships, cloaks, etc.) In each instance where somebody has wanted relief from some activity in game that they did not like they almost never get it from CCP.

And I am not discounting anything out of hand. Look, if I shoot a rock in an asteroid belt before you get to it that is a type of PvP. I got there first and got the resources before you did. And now you can't get those resources Granted, there are plenty of such resources so you will not be too upset. You’ll just look for another rock to shoot. That is what null sec alliances are like. A lot of fights take place over resources like moon goo and such. CCP wants conflict and from my perspective the more of it the better. So it isn’t me that is discounting things, IMO. And yes, every play style puts targets in space. What kind of target you are is up to you. If you undock in a PvE fit ship, yeah you’re a softer target than if you undock in a PvP ship relative to others in PvP ships. However, you’ll be a hard target to the NPCs. This is a game about choices and tradeoffs. If you elect to always undock in a PvE ship…well you made that choice and have to accept the resulting consequences.

You can’t say, I made a bad decision, in retrospect, so CCP please change the game. Especially when a priori your thought the decision was quite good.

And what you call abuse of cloaks is not abuse, it is using cloaks as they were intended to be used. And as I have already proven, AFK cloaking and local are inextricably linked. This is why a balanced solution is to revamp local/intel and cloaks…at the same time.

Anybody claiming that such an approach is to just get “easy” kills is just being obtuse and unwilling to look at things from the perspective of what is good for the game vs. what is good for me or my style of play. Hell, I’ve even stated I’d be happy if the new intel system in some ways provided even better intel than local does now. For example, having observatory arrays be linked in a constellation or even a region allowing one to access that information while say docked at the array. If you put an alt in the array, and have 1 or 2 other characters ratting or mining you could have an even better level of intel and safety. Of course, ideally the observatory array could be vulnerable to attack, either one that corrupts intel such hacking or simply taking them offline (destroying them even if it is in the vulnerable window). This way both sides get something.

Conflict is good for this game. It drives subscriptions, it drives industry and mining and invention. Huge amounts of ISK is destroyed via conflict. Putting more emphasis on PvE will likely not have those kinds of effects. Yes, I know some players really prefer PvE, but that is not what this game is about.

No, it is the belief that you should not be protected by the NPCs...especially when you were just slaughtering them wholesale. It is a daft and goofy mechanic.

And deploying guns is just a bad, bad idea. It would be used and abused. How about I come into your space with a covert cloak and deploy said guns and use them against you. Put them at the undock of your station. How many guns per player? 2, 3, 10? That is a potentially huge force multiplier.

Yes, you can almost see the problem, but then you just go v0v it is just the PvP players whining when in reality it is just not good for the game.

Nothing...

And there is the problem that if you are jumped he probably has back up. In which case, no amount of tank will likely help...unless a brand new wave of rats just spawned and they use ewar...in which case the rats become your buddies!

Goofy, I know.

I understand you want to take it to the hostile, but I am addressing options to encourage a PvE ship to remain in the field.

Like an ingredient for a cooking attempt, too little has no benefit, while too much makes the food bad.
There is a limited range for this idea, however, where it can produce improved play.

As I originally stated:
Balancing these would be surprisingly easy, with optional limits about range needed between them, to allowances for how many could be on grid at the same time.

Adding to this: no ability to anchor such objects on grid with gates or other primary items, (Outposts and POS's).

Now, the idea that a cloaked hostile COULD leave something like this on grid at a belt, or other encounter area for PvE?
If the residents avoid the areas while a hostile is present, sure, why can't they do this?

It would add another level of absentee player conflict, where the cloaked hostile could leave gifts and go elsewhere, instead of simply AFK Cloaking.

As for rats, it is a dumb mechanic because rats in anomalies do not leave. I could maybe see it in belt ratting where they have been know to warp off, but not in anomalies. And most ewar does not work on rats. For example they have infinite cap. You cannot damp them, and pretty sure trying to jam them is useless too. So here we have a situation where using points is literally pointless. Using all other forms of ewar (except maybe target painters) is also useless...but for some reasons these rats will attack any ship using them.

As for the notion of anchoring guns, it is basically a way to continue with solo play in a game where solo play has always been a serious challenge. And for the most part the solo ratter ratting in his own sov is really not all that challenging. There is a way to get extra guns on grid if there is a cloaky camper...bring more people. If we go back like 300 posts (literally, I discussed this in my now locked thread) you can rat in a group. Heck you could rat in multiple groups all in the same fleet. Now you have the extra guns needed to engage that hostile. You can also fit a better omni tank as well without as much risk of losing your ship to the rats.

Trying to come up with a solution that continues to allow solo play in the face of a foe (AFK or not) who might bring friends...strikes me as...well not a good path to go down.

I agree that just upping the ante against the camper is the wrong path. That's why I advocate being able to hunt him down instead. It returns it to a level playing field where he can bring friends, the locals can bring friends, everyone has to stay awake and aware to stay alive and be successful.

If the method of hunting him is similar in power to a covops scout then it's not a death sentence. If it's a toon in a newbie frigate it deserved to die anyway, and probably will. If it's something with more teeth, the cloak hunter can be killed quickly and the camp moved- he can't go afk, and he can be overpowered if he does not escape quick enough, but it becomes a contest rather than a default win for either side.

That camper can be in almost anything, and there are plenty of ships capable of devouring a cov-ops in seconds. Making them huntable does not mean perfect safety for the residents, it just restores a balance of effort for achieved effect.