Assembly Hall

According to stats CCP DIagoras recently shared with the community, the number of both Titans and Supercarriers nearly doubled during 2011. Whether or not you agree that there are already too many of these ships in game, it would be hard for anyone to deny that this kind of growth is not good for the game in the long term (2-4+ years).

Many ideas on how to fix the problem have been tossed around, most of them involving re-balancing of HP, DPS, force projection etc. While tweaking the numbers could certainly get the job done (no one used Motherships pre-dominion), it would be at the expense of all the current Supercap pilots and producers, all of whom have a lot invested. With that in mind I propose something else.

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Addendum: a brief explanation of the problem as I see it.
There are many different ways to look at the current Supercap situation, and depending on how you do it you will find different problems and in turn propose different solutions. In this proposal I'm not suggesting that the balance of the ships be altered, because even though that might solve some problems it also creates a host of new problems (player dissatisfaction, ship / skill reimbursement etc.).

So, assuming current game balance, this is the problem as I see it, long term.
Supercap numbers will continue to grow (based on current trends), as will the size of Supercap fleets fielded. This eventually leads to a point where the fleet itself represents so much ISK that there is nothing in the game worth risking it for. You may not think that point has been reached, but assuming Supercap numbers continue to grow that point will be reached eventually. The situation you have then is that whoever can field more Supercaps wins (this is fine), but they will do so without a proper fight. Whoever has less Supercaps would be a fool to committ them to a fight, especially with new logoffski mechanics and TiDi.

Less fights = less fun. You won't see anything like the cap fight in 3-I.
I think there are signs that we've already reached this point (several entities folding rather than committing their supers), but even if you disagree it's only a matter of time. If nothing is done, there will eventually be fleets of 1000 Supercaps. If you don't believe me you don't know what EVE players are like. At that point, you can be sure that there won't be any Super vs Super fights, ONLY ganks.

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Proposal:
Remove all Titan and Supercarrier BPOs from the game.
Refund current BPO owners with the NPC price.
Introduce extremely limited BPC drops from FW complexes.

In-fiction justification:
Supercaps are weapons of mass destruction, and the empires do not want individual capsuleers to wield such power. Therefore the blueprints can only be obtained through theft from military complexes.

Intended consequences:
Supercaps will start dying at a rate higher than the rate at which they can be replaced. Over time this will lead to more reasonable Supercap numbers. Alternatively, Supercaps will be used much less in which case their presence in the game is less of a problem.

Side effects:
#1 Prices of Supercaps on the market will increase significantly.
#2 Nullsec entities without a Supercap fleet will no longer be able to build one that can rival existing entities' fleets.
#3 It's artificially limiting the sandbox.

I don't have a problem with #1, but I could see a lot of people being concerned with #2. However, entities that don't have Supercaps today won't be worse off if this change were implemented over night. In the long term I think they would be better off with this change, as the Supercap fleets in the game will diminish in size. Currently it's almost impossible for a Supercap thin entity to catch up in the arms race anyway. With this change they would be able to whittle away at enemy Supercap numbers.

As for #3, it is, but we as players are ruining our own fun and need some reining in.

It must be a really good idea if you can't attack the idea and have to attack the player instead.

The only part missing is the explanation of why supercaps proliferation is a problem.

Apart from that, the OP shouldn't need to defend themselves from pointless arguments such as "you are in an NPC corp therefore your argument is invalid." bringing in supercaps pilots to explain why this proposal won't work is like bringing in some nano pilots to explain why nerfing ship speeds would be a bad idea.

This proposal only needs to explain why supercaps proliferation is bad. What is the problem? Why does it need to be fixed?

In the meantime, the adhominem attack are helping keep this proposal in the public eye.

Lets flame out every single poster from this forums section, so there will be just full blown retards left, like Drake Draconis, talking to themselves.

Thoughts?

Supercaps are obvious problem, if you dont see it, or you still need explaination you must be blind or you are just plainly trolling.

What is the issue to be fixed?
Titans can be produced easily enough to field fleets of them beyond the original design considerations.
How to fix the issue?
Add a step to the production process that involves different content than nullsec sovereignty holding.
Why is this the best possible solution?
Does it need to be the absolute best? It was obviously the best that the OP could come up with, and it does provide a nice tie in to bring more interest in what many people consider underutilised fleet wars content.

There was plenty of idea there to discuss, but since it pisses in the nullsec sov holders Wheaties the poster gets attacked instead.

Who? WN in Branch I guess, but who else died without fielding a super even once?

Really, as any attempt for CCP to limit supply for supers will be met with vehement protests by current super pilots/bloc's that require supers to project its power, i doubt any changes to limit supply of supers by a significant margin will go through (unless CCP suddenly gets a massive pair of balls and just flips super pilots off, which would prolly be a bad, if amusing move) What is more likely is getting a hard counter to supers, be it EWAR ships that can effect supers, or a new t2 subcap with capital guns

I remember that one, someone tried do that not that far ago and it ended bad for him

I actually think this is a great idea.
And don't give me any crap about kill board and corp stats, very few players actually post with their active characters. This is one of several markets alts I have.
There is currently a big problem with large scale null sec fleet battles.
CCP has added the time dilation which has greatly improved the performance of these large battles.
However it is getting more and more rare to see these battles.
If the other side drops more supers than a retreat is called. And alliances with massive assets and incomes continue building supers getting stronger and stronger and nobody bothers to attack them as they can not hope to defeat such a huge fleet.

If super BPO's were eliminated as the OP suggests than cap fleet battles would change very much for the greater good. With even the largest alliance not being capable of rapidlty replacing losses of supers there will be a lot more planing and thought put in before risking those ships.They will save them for when they are really needed,or can really change the course of a battle.

I would even go to the point of putting a hard cap on the number of supers permitted in the game. Once that hardcap is reached no new BPC's will be seeded until a super is destroyed. Super were intended to be rare. not the current state of having super cap blobs.This would allow smaller alliances to keep poking away at larger alliances and gradually dwindling their super cap fleets regardless of whether they win or lose the battle. if they pop a super they are one step closer to eventually wining a battle.

The idea of Titans and Motherships was that they would be rare. even a massive empire would only field a few. for there to be hundreds was never the intention.

For this to be fair though the super cap pilots will also need something big in return. If super cap blobs became a thing of the past many super cap pilots would sufer as they can not dock the super and jump into another ship. They would be stuck in a ship they rarely used. they can leave it sitting in a POS but that is very risky.

I propose a new outpost platform mod. With a fully upgraded docking ring, an outpost could be capable of docking supers. This would be at the expense of not being able to use those platforms for other outpost mods basically limiting it to being a super cap staging station. Even adding the ability of docking them at capital ship maintenance arrays.This would make the outpost a huge strategic target once the enemy determine what outpost you are using. Which could add more espionage type activity to the game.

Supers are an amazing idea and a great addition to the game but the super cap blobs seem very game breaking to me. By controlling the numbers and allowing them to dock in appropriately upgraded outposts I think two of the biggest issues with super caps would be greatly reduce. In addition If super caps were actually rare as they were meant to be they could be much more powerful without being game breaking. Not only would they not have needed a nerf but they could even be boosted so that if you did risk losing them the boost it would give to the fleet would be worth it.

I think this is a brilliant idea...

A couple of thoughts:

1.) BPO reimbursement: I think just giving back the base isk of the BPO is probably too little, especially since most BPO holder's already have an entire production line setup. I would recommend reimbursing the base cost of the BPO, providing them with a single BPC, and then giving them 1 additional BPC per ME or PE level. This will allow current BPO holders to maintain their current production while your NPC sources start to get farmed.

2.) I'm not convinced the BPC drops should be tied to FW plexes. Part of my apprehension comes from a limited understanding of FW, but I think such fancy drops should be tied to the final room of a new series of escalated plexes. It makes complete sense that the "NPC's" you shoot are Empire NPC's, complete with tags, empire standing losses, RP, and the like, but I would imagine the series of complexes would typically be a nullsec feature. Whatever the means for the NPC drop, it's important the sources are ubiquitous enough to prevent BPC hording.