Warfare & Tactics

I am currently a member of the 24th Imperial Crusade and noticed that there are war targets in Amarr. Not a crazy concept, maybe they are just jumping gates and the Amarr Navy threatening them with destruction never comes to fruition because they jump to a safe, planet or next system.

However, I have come to find that it is quite common for war targets to sit at 0km and 0m/s on the Amarr Emperor Family station and explode anyone coming out. The Navy NPC's never respond despite the message you can see saying there will be consequences when they first warp in.

I saw someone in Militia chat talking about this issue and others started to mention that it was an exploit and to report the player involved. I did not want to report anyone that had done nothing wrong and so went to the help channel to see if it was truly an exploit (it seemed to me a clear case though). I was told that it is not an exploit yet, and to make a forum post so the issue gets attention and may be designated an exploit in the future.

To me, from an immersion standpoint, it makes no sense that in the capitol of the empire, people the empire is at war with can sit outside a station an attack with impunity. Furthermore, the message that pops up on the screen is very misleading because the Navy never shows up to do anything. What is the point of the Navy or that message if they don't actually attack? If this is intended functionality then I do not think any message at all should be displayed.

I do not know the mechanics of how the war target(s) in question accomplished this but the people in Militia chat mentioned alts and warping in/out to fool the NPC Navy into allowing them to sit outside the station without being attacked. Does anyone know if this is how it works?

It is not the end of the world each Militia has to defend their respective high sec portions of space, just slightly annoying. I DO think ganking, in the fashion similar to pirates ganking miners should be allowed. By all means, if you warp into me and can pop me then warp away before naval response, well done. It's the sitting there blowing up multiple people without response that seems odd.

Through talking with some more people and experimenting a bit, it seems another popular tactic that is perfectly legit is to simply undock at the same time as someone they want to kill in Amarr. This doesn't violate any game mechanics and seems to be a fair way of ganking (I'm fine with this). Telling this method apart from the one in my OP can be difficult if you are not paying attention when you warp into the station. I have seen both though.

In the FW area you cannot dock at the opposing factions stations, which prevents the second kind of gank. I guess they don't do that in high sec because you would be locked out of trade hubs?

Anyways, given that war targets can dock at enemy faction stations in high sec, I don't know you could ever necessarily prove someone was using the tactic in my OP instead of the one mentioned here without Fraps or something. Lessons learned, just need to make a neutral hauler alt like everyone else =)

Mostly I just want to know what is going on. Some people in Militia chat are saying exploit. I have played very little and so am trying to find out what to do. I think I did the right think going to the Help channel and they had the same assumption as Militia chat when I explained the situation as I saw it, exploit. Then after talking some more, experimenting and getting blown up a few more times, I figure out about the undock thing.

If that is what is happening then cool, no problems. Is that what is happening? My Shuttle that got blown up at 100km was there observing trying to see if the player mentioned was actually docking up or just sitting there. However, they warped to me after about 15 seconds from sitting on station at 10km and 0m/s and blew my shuttle up before I could observe too long lol. Were they there for only 20 seconds, were they there for minutes like someone in Milita chat was claiming, I do not know.

I have made no accusations about anyone and am simply trying to learn. If you are willing to teach, then please do.

same thing has happened as long as FW has existed and it is hardly an exploit, it can be if it done on certain way but i am sure those guys are legit.

A few things:

- just because you don't see the NPCs visibly attacking a player, it does not mean they are not. I've done more than a few high-sec raids during my time in FW some odd years ago. The Faction Navy NPCs (of all factions) have stupid long engagement ranges and can easily hurt people within 40 to 50km.
They even apply their preferred Electronic Warfare within sub-20km ranges.

- a lot of people use the term "exploit" to describe tactics and/or mechanics they do not like.

- this tactic is as old as the hills. If CCP wanted to do something about, they would have. Especially after the Faction War Revamp some time ago.

- the reason for allowing "hostile" FW players to dock in high-sec stations belonging to their respective enemy is because the odds are already stacked in favor of the defending faction. There are NPCs engaging these players, your FW allies can freely travel the space without interruption and assist, no "neutral" interference to worry about, etc (aside from reps of course, but they will go suspect as soon as they start repping)
Adding more "penalties" would make it unreasonable to attack in high-sec.

- It may not make sense from a Role Playing perspective, but it does allow for more dynamic and risky gameplay for faction warfare players (and yes, the hostile player is also at risk... probably more so than anyone else. They have simply planned ahead, stacked the odds in their favor, and are hedging their bets that no organized force will confront them).
Even in high-sec a FW player is not supposed to feel safe. At all.

But you can attack the pilot who is in enemy militia and farming the kills. It is not that difficult.

Go to lowsec.

I do understand the mechanic, but that still doesn't make it okay. Having some off grid abandoned drones taking the aggro for the guy camping the station doesn't make sense at all. Why would the militia police continue to shoot his abandoned drone instead of focusing on the WT itself? It's a broken mechanic that is being exploited by players to benefit themselves in highsec because it's a broken mechanic.