EVE General Discussion

TLDR crowd: you only need to read to the divider to get the gist of this post.

Before I even step up on my little soapbox, and before you even start typing your snarky little reply about how Eve is supposed to be dangerous and whatnot, let me make one thing absolutely super-duper double-plus clear.

I like PVP. I like that everything except sitting in dock is at least a little bit dangerous. I like that I can kill people who have offended me, and vice versa. I love that preying on carebears is a valid career path.

That said, I cannot fathom what the developers were going for with the corporate war system. For those of you who have the attention span of a squirrel on speed and assume everyone wants to know about it; I'll sum it up in three quick points so you don't have to give yourself repetitive stress injuries from typing tldr all day.
1. From an in-universe standpoint, it makes no sense.
2. From a player standpoint, it seems to do absolutely nothing but encourage griefing.
3. The fact that you personally enjoy ganking people is fine, but does NOT mean Eve is "All about PVP, all the time, everywhere."

TLDRers, you can stop reading now.

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Now, for those of you who have a longer attention span, I'll continue on. This is part rant, part question: I'm happy to admit that I'm new enough that I may just be completely missing some things; and if so, I'd love to stand corrected.

I started playing quite recently, and up until today, I was loving the game - and the fact I'm posting this instead of just walking away hints that I may love it yet. I loved that danger and reward went hand-in-hand, that the best way to profit fast meant taking risks and making allies. I HATE working with other people, and I still love that it's encouraged. It's realistic, it's sensible, etc, etc, sing its praises to the heavens, etc.

However - I loved the OPPOSITE, as well. I loved that the security system meant that the entire galaxy was not like a Mad Max film 100% of the time. I liked the fact that although there were places where I had to be constantly looking over my shoulder, there were also places where I could let my guard down a bit, secure in the knowledge that only someone with a serious grudge would be willing to make the sacrifices required to kill me.

Then, my first war declaration notice arrived in my inbox (from some random 2-member corp with members I had never even met, let alone had a chance to **** off.) I did some research. I assumed the site I was reading had to have been wrong. I did more research which agreed with the first site. I sat in shock for a minute. "For a palty two mill, which is pocket lint even to my newb ass, a person can (and had) simply declared herself above the law, re:me? Seriously?" I mean, come on - this is the equivalent of, in real life, being able to pay about five bucks to the government and then being allowed to mug someone in the middle of a shopping mall, follow them to their car and slash the tires, go to their home and break all their windows and steal all their possessions, and then **** on the corpse afterwards for the lulz. Oh, and the mugger gets to be armed (the players declaring war on us have been playing and presumably training up their skills for years) while the victim does not (two new players who aren't even past the end of the first subscription period.)

We have nothing they can realistically want aside from our sweet angst, and we have no realistic chance of defending ourselves unless they are the absolute most brain-dead veteran players in the galaxy.

I've probably lost a dozen ships already before this wardec - I honestly enjoy taking risks! - and none of those have bothered me in the slightest. I accept that when I wander my newb butt into .2 security systems or sit around with a hull full of valuables, I'm making myself a target, and I'm fine with that. I have NOT lost any ships to the corp that has declared war on me; but nonetheless, THIS is the thing that is causing me to hate the game right now. Just the IDEA that this is possible offends me. If two corps want to agree to have a little scrap in high-sec and go "Hey, CONCORD, we both think you should leave us to our business," that's awesome, and I support it 100%. But allowing someone to say "Hey, CONCORD, I think I shouldn't be subject to your laws now, kthxbye," is absurd, both in- and out-of-universe.

Now, I know I have the option of sitting in an NPC corp, and I don't mind paying the taxes that go with it; but I miss having some of the basic organization abilities that come with a corporation (such as being able to use the corporate wallet for convenient loot dividing after rolling around the galaxy with my buds) and I cannot see the benefit of forcing me to stay there just because I don't want to get ganked anywhere and anytime some random bored long term player feels like it. Why in the name of all the gods would you want to force newer players to choose to either 1. Sit in an NPC corp; or 2. Get griefed?

For two million, I can now be killed in highsec without repercussions. If you think I should be fine with that, consider the reverse - suppose I could pay two million for a "peacedec" or some lame thing like that and suddenly have CONCORD follow me around like my own personal security force in lowsec. The current wardec system is exactly as stupid as that.

So you mean they'll form zombie corps with 15 people online who never talk or use teamwork?

That's new.

Yes, obviously I understand this: the entire point of my post is that I understand this is true, but do not understand WHY. Why encourage people to live in an NPC corp like 30-somethings living in their parents' basements? Why would you NOT want me trying to get all my non-Eve friends to come join my Super-Radical No-Girls-Allowed Eve-Club(!!1!11!)?

My recruitment speeches loose a little something when they go like this: "Hey, you ought to give Eve a try! We can play together! I mean, you can't join my "guild" unless you want to get murdered by random people, and we'll have to spend a half hour at the end of the night manually dividing up the proceeds from our loot sales, and you'll want to stay in an NPC corp and be laughed at for it for like a year, but I... Actually, screw it. Let's go to the bar."

Precisely. I don't want high-sec to be a gank-free zone, but it should require some sort of risk/penalty for the ganker.

I'm not sure raising the cost is a solution, though. I mean, the people most likely to abuse the system are bored players who have been around forever and have long since passed the point where they have nothing really left to spend cash on. If we price it for them, we price it out of reach of mid-tier people who aren't using it solely to grief strangers; making it an even worse system than before.

Few things here. First, you are seriously missing the point to my main post, to whit: war decs in general add nothing but grief, subtract from realism. I don't care how much you like/don't like PC/NPC corps or the decision making process surrounding them - the war dec system is absurd from any angle.

Second, what do you think pros and cons are, if not things which encourage people to make specific choices? Adding massive cons to something is absolutely an encouragement to do the opposite. If you're going to try playing semantics games with me, at least do a good job of it.

Third, your "myth" is currently my reality, so don't even bother trying to convince me of that piece of garbage.

"I Heartily Endorse This Statement."

I kinda agree, everything is (kinda) fine except the cost. Make wars MUCH more expensive and i think it would add depth.

OP, I agree, but I'm not sure what would be a better system which would keep this game unique and pvp-centric.

What you could do, since you don't seem so risk averse, is move to low-sec or nrds null sec during the war dec. I notice high-sec griefer corps like the one you describe are afraid to venture into low-sec. They will only go to the bordering high-sec system like a little kid afraid to go into the deep part of a pool.

That's good to know, but it doesn't address the core problem, which is that the mechanic itself is flawed and unrealistic.



This is definitely a step in the right direction. I was bouncing around a similar thought earlier, but for some reason I only considered "average" SP numbers and derailed myself by thinking about sticking tons of low SP alts in the corps. Sleep deprivation probably to blame, heh.


The thing about this is that I do not consider Eve to be PVP-centric, honestly. Eve is realism-centric, which isn't quite the same. If I wanted straight PVP, I'd fire up Halo or something; Eve is so much more. PVP is a big part of PART of the game, but all us PVP assholes would be bored to tears if we had to mine/refine/manufacture all our own gear. We might not enjoy hanging around high-sec all day, but I think we all have to admit that those high-sec guys are an important part of our game. I may not want to work in a fast food joint myself, but I sure do appreciate that someone's there, serving my my french fries.



Excellent advice, from my standpoint (though validating a lot of what Krixtal Icefluxor and Ilnaurk Sithdogron mentioned, in my personal case, the war dec has so far been toothless.) However, like I said above, I also accept that there ARE plenty of risk-averse gamers around, and they shouldn't be forced to suffer griefing over it - they're already paying for it through the basic economic sanctions that come from staying in high-sec, and that seems like a fair trade to me.

All irrelevant. You do not see how Goons see.

2 Trillion ISK fee is not a deterrent to them.

Solution must come from elsewhere (i.e CCP).