EVE General Discussion

I've been playing since December 2007, so basically the start of 2008. I got into EVE at the Trinity expansion and was instantly hooked on the ideas the game presented.

• Non consensual open world pvp
• World Building / Empire Building
• Offline Leveling

I was writing my life story about all the alliances I've been in since 2008, but then I realized it was kind of a long winded rant that wasn't going anywhere. Instead I want to offer you my perspective on what nullsec used to be, and what it is now.

Then (2008-2010)
Nullsec used to be several medium sized alliances competing for resources and space against each other, they would form temporary coalitions to defeat a common enemy but those would dissolve quite fast and the next era of nullsec sov wars would begin.

There were few supercapitals and the Titan had the classic doomsday, which was ok because Titans were rare (supercap proliferation was in its infancy). There was a far wider range of fleet doctrines because the missile / nano nerfs hadn't been leveled yet. This presented an interesting and ever changing battlefield.

People actually lived in their space and sov was tied to owning POSes in a system.

The Transition (2011)

The sov wars that led to the downfall of the NC (and its later Resurrection). The supercarrier era, many FCs wouldn't even fight if the enemy had one more super than their fleet did. Coalitions were forming to fight other coalition in a death spiral that created the NAPs we know today.

This got pretty extreme. At one point I was a scimitar pilot in the NC, and I remember several occasions where we formed on a Titan for 8 hours and went home without a fight. One day the FC actually told us why, and we were collectively pissed that one supercarrier was enough to destroy all confidence in our abilities.

There was a transition in nullsec mentality towards the meme spewing ~gudfites~ CoD culture we see today.

Incarna sealed the deal here too, lots of people quit not just because of Incarna but because of how crappy nullsec was.

Now (2012+)

Many nullsec alliances laugh at holding sov, preferring to sell it to those who still think it matters. Individual alliances no longer matter, as we are now in the coalition era. The current strategy seems to be let the enemy take all your space, wait, and take it back when they get bored.

-A- has taken that philosophy to the logical extreme by dropping all their sov and waiting until the CFHBC (lets be honest they're the same group - some alliances even are members of both) to get bored with beating up on them.

The most successful alliances are supercapital blobs that use titan bridging to power project across huge regions of space for the sole purpose of ~gudfites~.

Many people no longer use their space for money, they just do incursions on a hi sec alt in TVP.

How can we fix this?
If we want to return to the classic nullsec of 2008, there are 3 problems.

1. Supercap proliferation - They're proliferated. That's the problem. Something needs to be done about supers, and I don't mean nerfing them. They need to be buffed so that they're worth fielding but made easier to kill so that fleets have a chance. I have no idea how to do this, maybe you do?
2. Incursions - The white elephant in the room is hi sec incursions. They've made it more worthwhile to farm isk in hi sec instead of exploiting space. They need to be nerfed, or nullsec needs to become an isk faucet of epic proportions. Either one works but both have drawbacks.
3. Little Things - Nullsec game mechanics are still stale and crap even after the Dominion expansion. Sov needs to be based on system activity, not based on timers and shooting large stationary structures. Holding sov should offer defensive and economic benefits to the holder that make it worth living in, and outposts need to be destructible. Lots of little things.

The following are NOT problems with nullsec in my opinion.

1. Teh Blobz - Ever since my first trip to nullsec in 2008 the blob has been the staple of nullsec warfare. Sure the blobs are bigger now, but the idea is still the same. The blob isn't keeping new alliances out, the fact that half of nullsec is a NAP is.
2. Lack of Small Holdings - Nullsec has never been about small holding, it has been about empires fighting for survival and dominance in an ever changing landscape of drama and politics. Small holdings are wormhole space and lo sec, try there.
3. Titan Bridges - The problem isn't the bridge's power, it is that it is so easy to use and there are so many titans available to do it. Solve the problem of super proliferation and you'll bring this into line.

"The most successful alliances are supercapital blobs"

Dead wrong. Stopped reading.

2008?!! Bittervet.... right...

Let me keep it short. This is eve online if you want to do something about it do it. You want to make something about eve then do it. You want to protect your pos do it nobody stop you. But if thats the right choice well ...... you know.

What if: instead of paying to hold sovereignty, you GOT PAID to have sov. A specific amount per system. Good money, like really really good money. Wouldn't all of nullsec erupt into war as the ~elite pvp~ dudes who dont care about sov in its current incarnation because its useless want to take some?

Hell even the little guys could get in and snatch up all the unclaimed systems. Base payouts upon truesec.

lol.

I'm not disagreeing with you. What has been the most common trend is waiting for the tree to rot within and then someone comes along and pushes it over.

problem is that very few actually have the will/ability to fight against these coalitions and those that do really have no reason to risk fighting

waiting for them to rot is just easier really, no 1 wants to deal with super blobs and sov grinding

its been this way for quite some time now and i honestly dont think CCP has any idea how to fix it, hell i cant even think of any bad ideas to fix it

Any system that lacks 100 player-hours/day of activity averaged over 1 week from the holding alliance reverts to no sovereignty.

That may be a bad idea, but it would definitely kick up sovereignty transitions, and would provide mechanics other than structure bashing to create changes in sovereignty.