EVE General Discussion

Since the inception of warfare a single goal of every field commander is to defeat the enemy in detail - to, in one decisive battle, destroy an enemy's ability to fight and so conclude a war unquestionably. Oddly enough, this is the most rare occurrence in the history of warfare. It has been done so few times no serious military structure even considers limiting their plans to such an event. The problem with this is a corresponding ambition – he who fights and runs away lives to fight another day. Right along with the ambition to defeat an enemy is the primary goal of keeping one's army intact – to not lose the army.

There are basically two types of warfare. The first is by agreement. Both sides intend to confront their opponent with the intention of roundly defeating them. The U.S. Civil War is one such conflict. Wellington's pursuit of Napoleon was another. The second is called "war of aggression." One side with military advantage invades the other in hopes of conquest. The invaded party (usually militarily inferior) is thrust into a survival mode wishing primarily to stay alive and viable, then secondly to achieve a significant victory in the field. In the first instance, it's unlikely either force will cut and run. In the second, the possibility of disengagement is crucial to the defender's strategy.

Every commander that's ever taken the field against an inferior force has secretly wished for a method, or device to absolutely hold the enemy on the field. Every commander has also planned a line of retreat. Force deployment has always included an attempt to cut off the enemy's line of retreat, and every force deploys to ensure their line of retreat remains intact. In fact, this is the most significant situation all military planning faces. Strategies and tactics specifically account for this above all other factors. Any plan not accounting for this is considered by all competent military commanders as incompetent and the object of ridicule. It is the nature of warfare. All doctrine addresses it, beginning with Sun Tzu's Art of War, all the way to Sandhurst and West Point of today.

Being able to pursue, or evade the enemy in this regard defines a power's ability to conduct warfare. If a force is unable to do it, that force is not prepared to conduct warfare. It defines a weak, unviable force that is easily defeated, or one that is not yet ready to take the field, this is until EVE. In EVE you get the warp bubble. What's the warp bubble do? It does precisely what military strategists and tacticians have spent centuries trying to perfect – it holds the enemy for you. Your tactics don't. Your skills don't. Your preparation doesn't. It does. There's no need to understand how to conduct warfare. There's no need to go to the extremes required to accomplish something. A little device introduced by CCP does it. You get to pretend you've conducted warfare.

Such a device could only be dreamed up and implemented by people with no understanding of the nature of warfare. It's a ditty dropped into what has the potential to be a grand and sweeping arena to demonstrate capacities and capabilities turning it into nothing more than a "power up pill" in a child's computer game. Not surprisingly as a result it's fallen into promiscuous use. It's laughable enough the hallucination of "warp scramming" and "webbing" can be accomplished by another device, without having significantly damaged the function of a warship – you can "damage" a ship's ability to move without having damaged the ship. With the bubble, you can do this to ships in a large area, having fired not one shot.

Proud warriors would be embarrassed to use such devices. Infantile savages would use them with glee. That they exist in the game at all is testimony to the ignorance, and delusional reasoning used by CCP game developers. Want to follow the doctrine of having no choke points in your computer game? Get rid of them. Want to take what has all the potential of a majestic digital creation and turn it to an object of ridicule? Keep them. The laws of physics have spoken.

Another one tips his hand. Nice to know you.

This game needs to get rid of those if we want pvp to have a real meaning, wtf you can just anchor those fracking bubbles and neutralise everything coming trhum/from gates that are already a trap by them selves?

I honestly can't think about any other nasty game mechanic against pvp than this one, it obsoletes even the weakest interdictor and makes the strongest just "something" to have +, if you don't doesn't matter.

Please CCP, get rid of those, for the sake of your game and null sec pvp environment. Interdiction should be/come from players interaction (interdictors) not something you can put there with a fracking inty whatsoever, it's just not cool.

I'm on the both sides, the ones putting them and the one jumping in them, it's just crap for the game !!

It does what? At MOST i've only everseen a warp bubble slow people down, never "hold" them. Holding them requires tackle, strategically spread, and the ability to keep tackle alive.

I might resonably assume you are referring to the experience of jumping through a gate only to find you can not warp off immediately on the other side. This is not your enemy holding you. You not surviving long enough to get out of the bubble, kill their tacklers, outrun their secondary tackle, and get into warp is what killed you (that and not having reliable intel via scouts or spies or whatever)

Bubbles slow people down and occassionally force them to engage in order to retreat. There are numerous real-world military tactics which do the exact same thing to an enemy, and they've been around since we were throwing sticks at each other.

Edit: Read a few more posts, now I think people are just trolling. I give up.

You outline the desirability of gaining the tactical advantage of trapping a foe and then go off on some rant on how it is undesirable.

Quit posting. Seriously.

Useful interdictors ?

In warfare on earth you had terrain, something non-existant in eve.

Bubbles don't shut off your MWD or your AB, they just shut down your ability to WARP. If you fleet gets cut down cause it was forced to retreat through the swamp would you be as angry? I liked your post up until you erroneously claimed bubbles were somehow more destructive then say the beaches of Normandy. We simply don't have such terrain effects here.

I must have better luck than you do. I watch my map, scout my routes and only occasionally get eaten, now mind you it takes a long time to be cautious and it is very frustrating when eaten, but I do enjoy the challenge. You can destroy the bubbles by the way, so I don't see it as perma terrain. if your experience is that on a certain route it is perma camped, then take a different one. If EVERY route is perma camped, then sure don't go into the grinder.

You don't have to go through a gate to get to Normandy. I mean sure the soldiers had to walk on the sand, but they could choose not to land in front of turrets.