Player Features and Ideas Discussion

The idea is simple: Replace clone costs with "clone insurance." The premium could be the same as the current clone costs, or might need to be raised or lowered. The term could be anywhere from 30 to 90 days. The trick is that if you have paid your premium, then you are "covered" up to the designated level of SP for the term of the policy, no matter how many times you get podded within that period. So as long as you have an adequate level of insurance paid up, you will not lose SP when you are podded at any time during the policy period.

The ISK sink for high SP players would remain, because you still have to pay the insurance premium as long as you intend to undock. In fact it will probably be a more effective sink than the current mechanic, because everyone has to renew their insurance when the term ends, unless they're not undocking at all. The way it works now, the "cost" looks very large on paper, but in practice very high SP players might not pay an actual clone upgrade cost for years, or ever, since they just avoid anything that would result in loss of a clone.

In addition to making a more reliable ISK sink, this would remove the perverse incentive for bittervets to ship spin and avoid PvP --- especially small scale high risk fun roams in cheap ships --- simply because the clone costs alone are prohibitive for a very high SP clone, and dominate all other costs related to PvP. You still have to pay a cost to cover the risk, but it's a cost that once paid leaves you free to choose to PvP as much as you like, in whatever you like to fly, with your choices dictated only by the more direct ISK vs. risk calculations that are inherent to all PvP.