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Suggestion: "Ping" Sensor module
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Adder Nardieu
The Scope
Gallente Federation
#1 - 2012-07-09 14:52:34 UTC
Foreword: Yes, I'm a miner, call me a carebear if you must but as they say, play the game as you like.

One of the things that makes EVE so addictive is the realism. You can choose which aspect of the game to play or not to play. It's the only game I know of where PvP'rs can find whatever niche they want and get away with it. Even if I'm not a big fan of being ganked, I do understand that to some people, being a pirate is what it's all about, and I don't want to take that away.

That being said...I do feel that there is a sligth imbalance. It is possible for a gang to get a 100% scan first try on a potential target with combat probes, and if the other person isn't completely active on their dscan (Ie. spamming the scan button every 5 seconds), they pretty much can't see it coming. If they're running a mission where they can't stay aligned at all times, or if they're unlucky enough to get caught during a move, it's pretty much game over unless they spot that probe the moment it hits, somethign which in itself is not easy to do either if you have over 100 targets on your scan list.

My suggestion: Module designed to specifically detect combat scanner probes.

The idea is based on reality. In real life radar or sonar applications, you have passive and active. Passive is undetectable, but active radar or sonar can be detected by the target, and thus they can take action, which is why submarines don't keep their active sonar constantly pinging for fear of giving away their position.

The module would take up a low slot, and would be required to activate, thus it would have an impact on capacitor and therefore on ship performance. Depending on the quality, it would have either less of a drain or scan more often, or would have a greater detection radius. Example:

Combat probe dectector I:

"Pings" every 10 seconds, if a combat probe is detected within 100,000 km an audible and text warning will be displayed.


This would not break ganking. An afk player will not recieve the warning and will still get ganked. A person in a heavy ship that takes almost half a minute to align will still have a difficult time getting away unless they are smart and stay aligned. What it will do is allow people a break from carpal tunnel in constantly hitting "scan" and give them just a little more warning, in return for sacrificing a module and capacitor that they may have wanted to use instead, such as a MLU or cargo expander. This also does not break regular non-probe hunting, as a gang patroling asteroid belts would not show up on this system.


Thoughts?
Daria Meridian Carlile
Necromatic Inc.
#2 - 2012-07-09 15:03:00 UTC
If this got implemented, i'd fly around low-sec systems just launching a combat probe, scanning, getting the probe back and proceeding to next system.. Just to be a pain in the arse..

Sure this'd be nice if someone is actually searching for ya, but what about the people looking for other things? you'd be "ping'ed" constantly in some places :p
Morwen Lagann
Tyrathlion Interstellar
#3 - 2012-07-09 15:19:11 UTC
I like the idea (even as someone who used to spend a lot of time probing down mission-runners in lowsec), but I agree with what Daria said. It'd have the potential to be rather more annoying than useful.

Also - 100,000km is ridiculously small of a distance, to the point that it pretty much wouldn't do anything anyway because the probes would have to be dropped nearly right on top of your head for it to pick them up - in which case you'd be screwed because if they're that close, you're going to get a 100% hit on anything.

Somewhere between 1 and 2 AU would be more useful. Whether it would be balanced or not, that I'll leave for others to decide.

Morwen Lagann

CEO, Tyrathlion Interstellar

Coordinator, Arataka Research Consortium

Owner, The Golden Masque
Adder Nardieu
The Scope
Gallente Federation
#4 - 2012-07-09 15:30:37 UTC  |  Edited by: Adder Nardieu
Yeah, maybe 1-2 AU would be more useful, it's just a preliminary idea. Maybe I"m not entirely solid on how combat scanner probes work, but it's my understanding that you have to land one or more fairly close to the target in order to get a warpable lock, so you wouldn't get a warning on probes hitting no where near you. I could actually see some new gank tactics coming out of it, using the hunting dog principle....see if your probe causes them to flee, then hope they warp right into an interdiction bubble or tackle trap you've set up in front of the gate or station.

I believe though right now is that it's very easy for gankers to probe down a miner or mission runner, and very difficult for the target to have a chance of getting away. As far as risk reward goes, we've all seen how easy it is for a 1-10 mil ship take down a 100 mil+ mining barge or mission runner. I don't think it should be too easy, but I think there needs to be some options that targets have to fight back instead of just spam clicking dscan. Hell, even just adding a filter to dscan for probes would be nice, if I'm not mistaken probes can be set to filter out things.

Another idea that I had was a signature scrambler. FItted on a ship, it would throw off probe readings proportional to how close the probe is to the target, or some other factor that would require more than just an instant 100% scan followed by a gank 10 seconds later. Yes, the gankers might discover you, but what if instead of landing 10km from you, the scrambler caused them to land 20-100km from you, depending on the quality, skill level of the scrambler level, skill level of the prober? If fitted properly the gankers could still feasibly catch the target, and if aligned or paying attention, the target could still have a chance of getting away.


I'm a big believer that you should get what you pay for. I believe that miners and mission runners should have the option to pay for defensive modules that require them to sacrifice other capabilities of their ships in exchange for increased protection from other aspects of the game, in this case gankers. If anyone else has suggestions towards that end, I'd be happy to hear em.
Daria Meridian Carlile
Necromatic Inc.
#5 - 2012-07-09 15:45:14 UTC
If assume you're refering to high-sec..

A mission runner can easily survive a ganking attempt from a single person if he tries (unless the ganker is throwing a lot of isk in the ring)

As for miners, well, a well fit hulk expensive as it may become) can also survive a gank attack, be creative.. I do believe very few miners are actually scanned down, but merely found while sitting in a belt..
Adder Nardieu
The Scope
Gallente Federation
#6 - 2012-07-09 15:51:39 UTC  |  Edited by: Adder Nardieu
Negative.

Part of this comes from mission running (some highsec missions ask you to go into low) and these are the ones where your dscan list is just so ridiculously big it's hard to see probes. It's nearly impossible for the long range weapons on a battlecruiser designed to kill mission ships to hit a couple of gankers build for extreme close range fighting (talking interceptors and heavy assault cruisers). Some will say don't accept missions that take you into low, and honestly, I might just do that, but if that's how it's gonna be, then why should those missions be there in the first place? I'd happily give up a gun slot, an armor hardener or capacitor booster to avoid being jumped on while being attacked by mission rats.

As for the miners...I've seen it in high sec where probes have been used to jump right on top of the barges instead of having to warp to field and find yourself 30-40 km from the target. It's feasible they had bookmarks to put them in the field instead of the standard distance that a normal warp drops you in at, but to put them within 10km of the mining ships...I think that was more than just a book mark.
Martin0
Center for Advanced Studies
Gallente Federation
#7 - 2012-07-09 15:54:53 UTC
This thing already exists, is called "directional scanner".
How to use it:
1- create a new overwiew tab with only probes in
2- switch to said tab
3- open the ship scanner
4-click on the directional scan tab
5- check "use active overwiew setting"
6- spam "scan" every 5 seconds

It even find stuff up to 14 AU away! And it's free!
Adder Nardieu
The Scope
Gallente Federation
#8 - 2012-07-09 16:00:17 UTC  |  Edited by: Adder Nardieu
This thing does not already exist.

You're saying that the defense against a few dozen lazy clicks (setting up probes) and a little bit of dragging (repositioning/resizing said probes) should be to constantly click a button every 5 seconds regardless of whatever else is going on at the momment? There's a little bit of a disparity there in risk/reward, or more specifically, the risk of carpal tunnel. Also, last I checked, I don't believe it's possible to set an overview tab with just probes in it, unless they changed something.

There are obviously people who are gonna disagree with it. Gankers who want it to stay easy to find targets that have little chance of fighting back. Call it miner tears if you want, but what kind of tears are harvested from people crying that it's no longer easy mode?
Daria Meridian Carlile
Necromatic Inc.
#9 - 2012-07-09 16:04:57 UTC
Adder Nardieu wrote:
This thing does not already exist.

You're saying that the defense against a few dozen lazy clicks (setting up probes) and a little bit of dragging (repositioning/resizing said probes) should be to constantly click a button every 5 seconds regardless of whatever else is going on at the momment? There's a little bit of a disparity there in risk/reward, or more specifically, the risk of carpal tunnel. Also, last I checked, I don't believe it's possible to set an overview tab with just probes in it, unless they changed something.

There are obviously people who are gonna disagree with it. Gankers who want it to stay easy to find targets that have little chance of fighting back. Call it miner tears if you want, but what kind of tears are harvested from people crying that it's no longer easy mode?


Again, miners are not scanned down in general (checking belts is just so much easier than scanning them :P ) and if you're sitting in a hidden belt, well then the scanner would probably be using core scanner probes to avoid the "pinger"

Scanning a high-sec system for potential missioners ready for the gank is by no means an easy task, there can be tons of ship in a system you'd have to weed out, then you have to sift through ships you're actually able to gank.

A benefit of this could be for low-sec misssioners, but not much besides that..