Player Features and Ideas Discussion

After seeing this oft-repeated call to make cargo scanning more difficult, I was reminded that we should be doing the opposite. So, in response I propose this feature: the Automated Cargo Scanner deployable.

This deployable automatically scans ships within 150km and sends a notification to the owner if it detects a ship passing by with cargo above a defined threshold. Pirates can deploy it at gates/stations and if it finds a ship, it sends the owner a short notification with the pilot's name, ship type and cargo value (or optionally all the contents) with say a 5 minute delay.

It would also have to lock and scan each ship one at a time, perhaps even with a delay between scans, so not every ship would be scanned, especially at busier gates/stations.

The deployable would be free-to-attack in highsec like mobile depots (you go suspect), but also would come with a 24h reinforce timer. The deployable could not be scooped while reinforced though (and would be non-functional), so it would hopefully serve as a conflict driver and the pirates could come to defend their scanner if some do-gooder was trying to kill it. It would also cost a moderate amount so that the owners would have some incentive to show up to defend it.

The benefit of this scanner is that it would automate some of the more tedious aspects of piracy, (like the mobile tractor unit does for salvaging) and potentially allow gankers to cast a wider net and not just concentrate in choke points. This would allow gankers to better prioritize their attacks on expensive targets providing more safety to empty haulers. As was said above, it would also serve as a target for anti-gankers/white knights who often make the complaint that there is no effective way to strike back at gankers as they don't risk enough.

The only downside I see is that it could be used to give automated intel on the pilots that fly though a system and what type of ships they fly. Although perhaps this is not a downside after all depending on your point of view. It could also be used to provide some automated advanced alerts to intruders to say sovereign nullsec, but it could be tuned to be unable to lock small ships fast enough to prevent it from providing complete intel on a gate or station remotely.

No.

It went from not good for being to pay to make something in eve easier to totally bad when you mentionioned SOV guys could use it as a picket to scan incoming ships.

I would go for it if local is removed from any region the module is deployed in. It would create content as folks that want local would come out to destroy it and folks that didn't want local would defend it.

Easy solution to your "problem": youtube.com

Wow, the only one huh?

How about its basic function.....it has a HUGE downside in terms of game balance, especially a totally new metric im calling, 'effort vs reward'.

This may be the most entertainingly accurate post I've read all day.

+1 to your post, -1 to the OP.

It does nothing to affect game "balance". It serves only as a source of intel and as a potential conflict driver.

The point about notification spam is valid. The original idea has that filterable by value, but still a notification every 5 minutes might tax the system.

Perhaps the intel is not relayed automatically by notification, but the owner has to visit the structure to view a data log. It would be less useful for scouting immediate gank targets, but still serve as a source of information for stalking potential future targets.

Had a wonderful post forming for the -1 side of this idea. Then I read this and realized that I would not be able to do any better so I will just say see this for my objections.

Your really that lazy ?

Not supported.

-1

Haha, eve community never stop to amuse me.

I totally support this structure if it will be "criminal" and any one can kill it without gaining any suspect or combat timer.

Well, I did start writing this proposal firmly tongue-in-cheek in response to that other thread. But after looking at the comments here, which aside from a valid UI concern, all amount to just "I don't like it" or "quit being lazy" I am convinced there is a place for something like this proposal. Not in this form sure, but as part of the new Observatory Array structures. These observatories will most likely have some of this functionality already - they are called Observational Arrays after all - so they will likely be able to track users in system, and perhaps their ship types or even their cargoes.

Such intel should come with ways to counter it too - smuggling modules for example that hide ships and/or cargo from the Observational Array and ways to feed false information to the Observational Array.

Eve needs more intel gathering tools. Intelligence tools are facilitators of conflict - they allow opponents to find each other, as well as trick each other into fights. Highsec could also use some ways to make criminals put more 'skin in the game' and giving them structures to use is one way to do that. This proposal helps both of those, but even if I don't ever expect this deployable to be ever released, I would be surprised of some additional intelligence gathering tools related to this idea are not put into the hands of players by the time these new structures are fully implemented.

We live in interesting times for New Eden. These structures are going to result in a complete upheaval of the status quo.