Player Features and Ideas Discussion

Easy. Base sov on presence of military ships over a certain amount of time - short enough that takeovers dont take weeks, but but long enough that nul does not return to ping-pong games.
Yes, I have thought longer about this and posted a thread all of its own in the Features and Ideas forum... so look below if you are interested in the details. Oh, and please leave a comment there if you think it would not work for some reason.

Alliance X has 500 plaeyrs.
Alliance Y has 10 000 players.

Imagine: Taking a system takes 100 active combat pilots in the system for 24 hours being active. Alliance X can take one system per day and have to force people to play for almost 5 hours every single day to attack or defend space. Alliance Y can ask every pilot to be in space for an hour per day and still can assault or defend 4 systems.

No matter what you do to "prefer small gangs", larger numbers will always run over the small gangs either via attrition, financial superiority (shinier ships in larger numbers) or just by blobbing.

Remember, if a group of 5 can do X, a group of 50 can do potentially 10X.

you can do that now

you just don't, because it requires actual effort and commitment

Never not self-quote... \o/

I am guessing, and a dedicated statistican could probably work it out and present a nice graph or chart, but I am guessing that today the large blocs have a very low pilots/system-quota.

Well, a few "random" examples:
Northern Associates. + NC.: 750 systems, 16.000 pilots - 21 pilots/system
Goon Swarm Federation + PUBL0rds: 350 system, 15.000 pilots - 43 pilots/system
xxLegionofDeathxx: 75 systems, 1.600 pilots: 21 pilots/system
Black Pearl Alliance: 3 systems, 1.400 pilots: 467 pilots /system
Yulai Federation: 7 systems, 1.300 pilots: 186 pilots / system

Of course, in the age of coalitions, what would really matter is the coalition qoutas. Maybe someone would be so kind to calulate that?

And there are lots of alliances with more than 21 or 43 pilots. A few of them certainly eager to stick their foot into that sov space.

Of course, the large group has the advantage that it can shift its pilots towards contested systems. This, however, would make other systems more vulnerable to attack. I would guess (again, I am guessing) that a twice as large group can probably hold a four times as large territory before it becomes so stretched out that its little-used system will sooner or later be singled out by groups looking to claim sov. There will always be groups probing if they cant take a system here or there from a space-large entity. And as with the lionesses, if enough do so at the same time, the elephant herd will lose one member (one system will fall).

Over time, I would guess that pilots / system will be evenly distributed, with an advantage towards larger groups, but not any more with exclusivity for the large blocs as it is now.

Slow down, you are getting too far in one direction, and not the direction I was pointing at in the first place.

First, I am not expecting smaller groups to claim space despite the opposition of larger ones, as I have this impression from your writing.
No limit to social interaction is needed, for my interest to be given action.

I want smaller groups to be effective against larger ones, not replace them.
I want to demonstrate the philosophy that it is easier to claim space than to protect it from attack by others.

For this, you can keep all the social interaction you like, but we need to remove the artificial barriers protecting the gaps in system defenses.

That can mean anything, including these potentials:
Option> A Black Ops capability to create and support a gate camp OUTSIDE the boundaries of two connected systems, by subverting one of the gates to divert selected traffic into a deadspace area not part of either system itself.

Option> A deep agent in the target alliance can anchor a deployable blindspot in the space of an alliance, giving hostiles a safe location to rally for surprise attacks.

The ideas are on a similar theme, in many cases, where a smaller force can use it's leverage in a limited capacity to cause significant impact, but nothing that would be likely to cripple an alliance.

That is in no way true.

Null isn't broken because people can talk to each other. It's broken because there is little enough reason to stab an 'ally' in the back because everyone NEEDS hundreds of blues when it counts because thanks to power projection any fight that counts escalates to include everyone.

'Human nature'? Prove it. You dont see this type of behavior anywhere else in the game.

If an ally couldn't magic their fleet across the game to bail you out or protect something vulnerable, these groups wouldnt even venture let alone manage the sprawl they do.

And if a smaller groups could hit the holdings of a larger entities to any degree, groups wouldn't be as large as they are and neither would blue lists.

It's not human nature to want to form up into a 4 digit manned lagfest. It's the exact opposite. People want action, content not stagnation and lagfests. It's the mechanics of the game we have to thank.

Human nature... lol. Who even comes up with this unsubstantiated crap?

And here comes Captain 'Morale Killmails' to drag his tired lines out hoping no one will notice it will do the exact opposite of what he claims.

Go ahead and reply to my previous comment citing nothing will ever impact goons so we should let you author sov 3.0
Everyone totally buys it.

We have two days to respond to any reinforcement timer. No matter how much you nerf power projection our fleets will be there waiting for you and you will not be able to scratch them.

And just ignore that part of fixing this mess means the only way to hurt someone shouldn't revolve around a static object with 2 day timers.

Your circular logic gains you zero points. You just run around the same track of self-reinforcing talking points. What are you, an evangalist?

POS timers grant an awful lot of stability.
With proper warning, that rag tag fleet attacking can be met with a well ordered capital fleet and support ships.

Which would you suggest eliminating?
The timers
The rag tag fleet's chances of success
Capital fleets

Honestly, I don't see all three co-existing at the same time.

Logi boats can be pushed into a different direction as well, though I feel it assumes a significant amount to say they are the deciding point in this context.