Player Features and Ideas Discussion

At least this time you brought something pertinent to discuss instead of just trying to build an argument I wasn't making.

I find it interesting you say the pay increase between high and low is nominal. I think it's the first time I've seen someone try to argue that low sec payouts are only slightly better than high sec payouts. Usually people say low is better but not better enough for the high likely-hood of running into PVP.

I also find it interesting you would call hi 5's a high income source when no one else was even hinting at the payouts being high, simply that the payouts should be better than 4's but less than what low offers.

Oh wait, I found yet another of your scarecrows... shame, shame.



I'll play along this time though and solve your problem for you. Buff low sec payouts. Make them worth the "additional time required for logistics" and your whole point is solved.

There's still plenty of reasons to put 5's into high sec, the best argument being providing group missions that require only a few hours of commitment instead of the several hours that incursions typically require for a group to accomplish anything.

My point, just so you don't get confused and try to quote me saying something I'm not even arguing, is that hi 5's would provide additional content for people that enjoy PVE missions, want more of a challenge than 4's, but are only have a limited amount of time to play. Please note, not once did I say anything about making high sec safer, having a higher income than low 5's, or wanting a way to make missions pay out a high amount of income.


Providing content for people that like to PVE in high sec in no way detracts from the people that go to low/null. The people that only PVE aren't going to go to low/null no matter how many benefits you toss that way. The people that might go to low/null if the design was more appealing can be lured there with better design, but trying to drive them away from something they enjoy will only result in driving them away permanently.

Make high fun for those that like it, make low/null fun for those who like that. In the end some of the high sec folks will cross over and both areas will see expansion.


I know it's tough, but this time please try to make sure you respond against the ideas I'm actually saying and not the ones you like to make up so you can "prove" your point.

Although I'm fairly sure your point will be "high sec is bad, mmmkay... everyone should be in low/null or they should GTFO."

You can buff low without "totaling" the economy and null is already buffed just needs some mechanic work.

I'm looking long term with where I'd like to see the game go, and I think your answers are short sighted. We've gone round and round in this discussion and in the end we will never agree. You think high sec is ruining the game, I think the game will be ruined without better high sec. You have your reasons and beliefs. I have mine. I won't continue to argue this though as only time will tell who's plan is better.


As for the payout difference being minimal you summed up the biggest problem with PVE in low by saying you have to waste time trying to deal with the people hunting you. I'd think changing the way missions work to require more of a PVP build instead of PVE would go a long way to solving the problem.

Heck I'd like to see missions in both hi and low changed to use PVP builds instead of PVE. Better training for moving into low/null later and makes the game more competitive instead of giving the overwhelming advantage to gankers.

However that discussion is not what this thread is about.

Just to add to what Zim has said:

I have lived pretty much the last 18months solid in 0.0 and due to my RL commitments can't log in that often. I can make far more isk quickly and with no stress when being called by the wife/child/dog (take you pick) in high-sec than I can in 0.0.

In fact apart from one lucky site I got I haven't made any isk in 0.0 for the last 6 months. If anything 0.0 needs reverting back to what it used to be before the anom nerf.

Not trying to get into the high-sec bias argument but what High-sec needs is more content within what framework it already has not LVL 5 missions.

What I cannot understand is that so many players are fine with the concept of buffing low sec and null sec, but balk when it is suggested to simply nerf high sec instead.

It is essentially the same thing, buffing low and null results in the situation we had previously where the economy goes insane and rapid inflation occurs. As long as high sec players are earning the same amount, it equates to a high sec nerf. Albeit one that creates an unsustainable economy.

IMHO CCP need to sit down and look at the payouts of incursions, missions and low/null sec activities and begin rebalancing them so they are consistent and in line with one another.

Lets say they reduce lvl 4's from 50m to 25m on average. I'll use my personal expenditures of ISK to show the result. I used to average about three hours per game session so I would now make approximately 50m for the three hours I'm online. That's considering an hour for travel, to chat, bio, and what not since I almost never just sit and run missions the entire time.

50m is about 1/5 what I'll need to buy a new Scimitar which is the next item on my list of things to get. Your adjustments mean it would take me at least a week of playing to get enough ISK to buy and fit a new Scimi. A week of work to get something that I intend to use in low sec and will probably die relatively soon. Something that has almost no insurance return on so when it's lost I have to start from scratch.

Honestly, if I have to spend five days to earn enough ISK to go PVP (possibly just one time) I can't really see any appeal to going out to PVP. 15hours to get something that will probably never live past 4 hours. Sure, you could say I have no skills and I need to learn to fly but the fact is the only way to gain experience is to get out there and do it but if I have to spend the majority of my play time grinding ISK so I can do other activities I'll just find another game. Which is what I basically did by playing WoT about 8x more often than I did EVE.


Lets look at the other side of the coin though and just buff low sec PVE. Not getting into null because I constantly hear how null has lots of money but SOV mechanics, tech, and supers are the big problems, not ISK faucets.

So anyway what would buffing low sec do? Recently there was a buff to FW payouts and mechanics and that hasn't ruined the economy... well except for some exploitation that supposedly got fixed. Buffing FW hasn't ruined the economy so far. Double the payouts for low PVE though. The economy won't even notice the change since so few people go to low no matter what the payout. Low sec's problem is not risk vs. reward, low sec's problem is there are PVP averse people that just don't want to go out and shoot at other people. The mechanics of low sec are what keeps the population out, not the rewards.

I realize though you want better rewards for the PVE people that operate in low, so buff low rewards, it's a pittance of the income in the game and won't break anything.

However, nerfing high sec will cause people like me that like both PVE and PVP to look for something else because grinding lvl 4's isn't fun in and of itself. Fun is getting a new ship, going on a roam, mining with my friends, or keeping someone alive in an incursion. I used to fly lvl 4's because they were a challenge but once they became easy I went looking for other challenges. I've tried exploration (high and low) , incursions, WH's, and trading as ways to have fun and generate income. Incursions were the most fun but I didn't always have the time to move to the site then wait for a fleet. Missions at that point were a distant second even though they were easier to complete. When my choice was log in and grind missions or do something else I typically did something else because there was no challenge to missions and I just didn't have time for incursions.

I like having a challenging PVE experience that tests my skills and abilities. I enjoyed figuring out how to three box missions and as my ship's got better I'd change my tactics to push myself to complete the missions faster. Finally it got to the point I could agro pretty much anything in the pocket and kill it before I had problems. The reason I want lvl 5's is to try a new challenge without fooling with low sec in my PVE ships. I don't expect to get rich from the lvl 5's but I do expect to make at least slightly more than I would in a lvl 4. The added difficulty increases the risk of losing a ship which means I'll need something to save up to get a replacement. Plus I want to make enough to fund my PVP ships as well. If you nerf high sec income then I want be able to afford to PVP and at that point I'm done with the game as there is nothing else to challenge me currently. Buffing high sec will give me more ISK to spend on stuff to get blown up.

High prices + low income = less spending = harder to lose ships = fewer fights = less PVP

My ideal is
moderate -high income + moderate -low prices = more spending = easier to lose ships = more fights = more PVP

I'm not going to low or null to make my ISKies so either it's high sec or I leave the game. Nerf high sec enough and the annoyance/frustration of earning ISK outweighs the fun of the game and then I have to ask what's the point of continuing to pay my subscription if it's not fun.

Losses should matter. Deal with it.


And this'll create inflation, leading to the problem UO has where something costs a bajillion golds. CCP are trying to stop this from happening, and this is exactly the scenario which caused CCP to freak out and nerf the **** out of the anoms, because they were profitable enough that nullsec residents moved their L4 chars back into nullsec to run anoms.


Then I'd say leave it, because the thing you want (L4s with high rewards for no risk whatsoever) is having a detrimental impact on other areas of the game, and experience shows that "fixing" that problem means the monetary inflation runs rampant, which is the very last thing you want in this game. The only other alternative I can think of is if CCP were to increase some of the ISK sinks to match the inlux of ISK into the economy which rebuffing the anoms would bring, which means that you pubbies'll whine even harder about "THE GUBMINT IS TURKING OUR ISKIES" (I wish you would stop using "iskies" :negative:).


If only they'd been insightful, instead of just a longwinded way of saying "don't take my L4s away or I'll quit".

fuuuuuuuuuuu, beat me to it.

We need to start coordinating so only one of us has to reply to his long ass posts.

It's bad because the idea of the game is that losses are meaningful, and it is a game about competition over limited resources. Infinite resources that are attained easily are not something that belong in Eve.

And inflation doesn't really have anything to do with people going out and losing ships, losing ships does not take that ISK out of circulation. If you want an explanation of concepts like inflation and mudflation a good one can be found here.


Logistics ships are cheap and can be purchased easily with ISK earned in high security space, but even if they couldn't you could use spider tanking ships or T1 logistics.

Again though, this boils down to you wanting to remain competitive whilst not actually having to expend any effort to do so.


That is because you fight for no reason, in a game about fighting for resources and empire building it simply makes no sense.

Quite simply if you want to come and mess with us for no reason, but don't want us to be able to mess with you, then you should be at a disadvantage.

As much as I would love to see them this entire discussion is mute because of one practical problem: we do not know the actual numbers here. And as long as CCP does not show them this discussion is the delusional dreams of the OP.
Sorry but its true. CCP already mentioned the level 5s in high sec were a bug. What you want is more ISK.

The problem is that we do not really know if moving level 5s into low sec did have the desired effect. And for that CCP would have to post some before and after statistics. (I did a search and could not find anything.)

So until we can prove that level 5s are still not used as much as level 4s in high sec this is pointless.

Would I personally love level 5s in high sec? Absolutely. I would drag all the new corp members through them to get them a quick and easy start to ISK, LP, standing, and corp fun.
BUT am I aware they would most likely become a solo ISK faucet for most other players: absolutely.

No, one-thousand times no! The last thing the EVE economy needs is more isk creating inflation. Ships are already expensive enough without destroying the value of the ISK by turning on a huge isk faucet. I don't want to see mudflation either because all these mission runners have stockpiles of what used to be expensive ships. Ships need to die to keep the EVE economy healthy, and high-sec mission runners don't lose those ships.
Furthermore OP, you can NOT play EVE Online and 'opt out of PvP'. Even if you have no desire to participate in ship vs ship combat with other players, you still participate in PvP every time you log on. Anytime you buy or sell something on the market that is PvP, any time you mine an asteroid that is PvP (limited amount of roids, competition among miners), etc.

If you want to run lvl 5's go run some lvl 5s, they are already in the game. Low sec has no bubbles, it's real easy to travel through low sec with warpcore stablizers. You can run lvl 5's without having to fight player controlled ships. You just need to learn how to watch out for hostile enemies, and have an escape plan. You complain missions are too easy, well that adds an extra element to it. Quit being so risk adverse, it's not a huge deal if you lose a ship. You can't pay rent with ISK, its a game go out and have fun. Worrying so much about losing a ship in a game that you refuse to play the game is just plain silly.