Player Features and Ideas Discussion

The people who never go in LS would not go more as the risk would still be there. It might be lesser because it require 6 camp to be sure to get caught instead of one but you can still draw a bad card and then, you really didn't do anything wrong but you are completely out of luck. Even with a count, it becomes painfull if you try to get somethign expensive past a gate. You jump the scout in and see nothing? Well now check local. If you are alone, jump the ship in because there can't be a camp. If you see someone, then you have to check all 6 spots to have a chance at safely jumping your stuff in but if you have them BM'd, the other guy might too so he could warp from on entry to another while you cycle through them.

All of that without really being sure there will be more explosion. Both your scenario and Reaver's one would obvioulsy sometime happen but more of one over the other? Nobody really can tell.

As for null sec, the issue is travel over many jump which can leave you with any ship sometime being singled out and killed by a camp. The ship might be one of the N+1 dps which leave the fleet going or it might be one of the token support roles in the fleet that really make the comp shine. Anything you lose needs to be replaced by a new ship which mean waiting for the guy to fly back and forth or returning with him. Saying one jump could kill a fleet because it's FC could be dead alone is a little pushing but over enough jump, you never really know how many "backup" of whatever role you brought could get killed. A gang could camp just one entry point and blueball everytime a large group spawn instead of just a token unlucky guy. It's EVE after all so even if gates gets "wonky" chances are people will take fight they think they can't lose much more often than the one they can. If you bubble the spawn point and camp around it, there isn't much the other side can do to prevent you from warping out as soon as the engagement looks too hard to take. You can't even force bust a gate camp because you don't know what % of your fleet will spawn on the right point to push them away. Even with only 6 spawn points, a fleet of 100 would still, once in a while have token guys drawing the worst card and and find them self in a situation they didn't "deserve" and with no practical way of getting out of. Losing ships is not really a big deal. Losing one because the game gave you a middle finger you could not protect against is more irritating.

I like the idea of bringing more rabbits into lowsec.
(I'll define rabbits as: defensive flyers, potential victims, and other non-aggressive pilots)
(I'll define wolves as: aggressive residents, pirates, and other target-seeking pilots)
I don't know the numbers, but it would seem that most of the folks in lowsec (not counting parties who fit neither type) are wolves, with rabbits being a much smaller slice of the population. Part of that is likely because rabbits are much less likely to live in lowsec and are often just passing through as quickly as possible, but nevertheless it leads to a target poor environment despite the relative lack of safety on part of most rabbits.

I think a good solution needs to support both the rabbits and the wolves--to some extent, as a rabbit, you're going to have to judge the risks and accept a certain level of unknown, but that unknown should be in the hands of the wolves. It's difficult enough to give the wolves enough power to satiate them without driving their prey away, I think it's important to keep out factors which are beyond the control of both sides as much as possible. Just as the wolves wouldn't know where the rabbits will land, the rabbits also don't know where the rabbits will land. Rabbit fleets will quickly become disorganized and likely still manage to flee, but may get split up and stuck. That's no fun for either side. If the rabbit fleet got trampled instead, they immediately find themselves back at home base while the wolves get to savor their juicy kills. Nobody is stuck waiting--and that's perhaps another big factor: nobody wants to be at the mercy of a random Russian Roulette system, and nobody wants to sit around waiting for a chance to make a move.

I have an alternative solution:
Split up highsec into four main continents--one for each empire, and containing one major trade hub each. Then add a stronger gradient to lowsec security, with fairly strong security at the top end, while the bottom end is little more than disallowing bubbles and bombs. Provide multiple possible paths between highsec islands with exactly one path between each that never goes deeper than the high end of lowsec. I'm of the feeling that 0.5 security space should be turned into the top end of this new lowsec gradient, and I think that would cleanly divide highsec into four main continents without adjusting the sec status of any systems. (can someone check for me?)

Upper-end lowsec security could come from navy ships that spawn to protect gank victims--they would lack the instakill weapon that CONCORD has and would themselves be killable, but could pose a significant threat which could go a long way to put the balance in favor of the defender. Should they be ready to put up their dukes, they may make themselves into a less than desirable target. (Keep in mind that the navy ships would not be the same ships which engage in faction warfare but would be separate ships balanced specifically to defend against illegal attacks in lowsec.)

This would lead to several very significant effects on the New Eden economy:
1.) players need to put more thought into deciding whether to travel between empires or stick with what only one empire has to offer
2.) prices of region-specific goods will go up in the other regions (example: Rifters will cost more in Caldari highsec)
3.) upper lowsec may see defensive fits such as battlecruisers or battleships built for solo combat which would be ineffective when solo in lower lowsec and unnecessary in highsec, this would push for invention of new fitting styles
4.) players will be able to test the waters before plunging straight into danger, and it may help newer players (or players who are simply new to being outside of highsec) to better understand where the danger is coming from and help squash a lot of the unfounded myths going around highsec about what life is like outside of highsec
5.) players who want more danger than highsec offers, but aren't ready for lowsec, can play in upper lowsec to find their sweet spot. I hear a lot of people argue that players have a binary attitude on danger in which given a choice of gradients they will almost unanimously choose either the lowest or the highest safety but I believe this is completely false and that it only appears to be true because we don't have any gradients, and thus everyone is forced to adapt to a system in which 0.5 sec is far safer than 0.4 sec.
Please, nobody try to explain that lowsec is less dangerous than highsec. I am talking about the level of freedom of choices a player has to fly in reasonable safety, not the maximum level of safety that can be obtained by a wise and experienced pilot.

I think in a system like I described above, 0.5 and 0.4 security systems would begin to see a lot more rabbit traffic. While anything above a paper tank is pretty safe in 0.6 and up, tanked combat ships could be pretty safe in 0.5, you and your buddy could fly safely in 0.4, and even a slippery ship might be pretty hard to catch in 0.3 sec as long as it stays near stargates and stations and remains on the move. This influx of rabbits being caused by improved safety will lead to wolf frustration as it becomes difficult for them to catch the new more resilient defensive flyers, but if the rabbit population goes sufficiently higher than the wolf population, it will lead to complacency on part of the rabbits, which will allow a lot of room for keen wolves to spot weak prey, while the other rabbits shrug at the kill and move on.

"As for null sec, the issue is travel over many jump which can leave you with any ship sometime being singled out and killed by a camp. The ship might be one of the N+1 dps which leave the fleet going or it might be one of the token support roles in the fleet that really make the comp shine. Anything you lose needs to be replaced by a new ship which mean waiting for the guy to fly back and forth or returning with him. Saying one jump could kill a fleet because it's FC could be dead alone is a little pushing but over enough jump, you never really know how many "backup" of whatever role you brought could get killed. A gang could camp just one entry point and blueball everytime a large group spawn instead of just a token unlucky guy. It's EVE after all so even if gates gets "wonky" chances are people will take fight they think they can't lose much more often than the one they can. If you bubble the spawn point and camp around it, there isn't much the other side can do to prevent you from warping out as soon as the engagement looks too hard to take. You can't even force bust a gate camp because you don't know what % of your fleet will spawn on the right point to push them away. Even with only 6 spawn points, a fleet of 100 would still, once in a while have token guys drawing the worst card and and find them self in a situation they didn't "deserve" and with no practical way of getting out of. Losing ships is not really a big deal. Losing one because the game gave you a middle finger you could not protect against is more irritating."

For me this paragraph pretty much defines the current position on super combat. "It's perfectly OK to lose my ship as long as it's on my terms under the conditions of my choosing" You need to remember - the game wouldn't be giving you the middle finger in your above discussion - the guys camping the gate that you got popped on would be giving you the middle finger. You're pretty much saying that if you can't do what you want when you want to do it, then the game is screwing you. That's not a good way to play the game.


I'll say again that it's not reasonable for you to portray every jump as a perilous move that will slowly whittle your fleet down to where it's no longer vialble. You're pretty much saying for the game to be fair it should let you take an unbeatable fleet from A to B without risking its integrity. If every jump you take is littered w/ adversaries I'm thinking "yeah, pvp!!" (smugly I'm thinking you need to get better at policing your space).

I haven't read the rules in several years, but it never used to say SOV null was supposed to be easy. You used to have to work at keeping your space (that includes working to keep your members happy in your space so they don't leave) - has something fundamentally changed?

In a situation in which your exit point into a system is not predetermined and a fleet can be split up multiple ways, you are to some extent at the mercy of the random number generator. A well-organized fleet can get past this hiccup nearly every time, but it still impacts the fleet more some times than others, and it incentivizes having more roles centered around leadership structure which leads to leadership chaos and detracts from other important roles.

I might be convinced to side with a system in which your entry point into a system is not the same as the exit point (ie. it drops you at a beacon instead of at a stargate) but I can't agree with not being able to know where you'll wind up.

We should get back on topic though.

One concern I have with the suggestion you made is on the thread topic: if player ships coming through stargates land at a position other than the stargate, we'll need to place gate guns at the landing beacons as well. This sort of change can disrupt the balance of lowsec travel and should be considered along with such a suggestion.

The game is giving you the middle finger because you could not prevent the loss no matter how much effort you could put in once you made that jump. That's what I mean. Of course it's part of a PvP game to lose said ship if you end up in such a terrible situation but you only ended up there because the game rolled a dice for you and it got a bad result. You jump with a fleet of 15 and you are alone "rolling" the spawn point number 5. GJ, you are not in a bubble with a gang shooting at you. You report your misfortune to your fleet but die while they warp to you. You lost a ship which is no big deal. People lose ship all the time. The reason why you lost a ship on the other hand is wrong because you did nothing wrong. EvE is supposed to punish you for mistakes, bad play and lack of effort. I don't remember it being supposed to punish you at random because of a diceroll. That's why I think it's a bad idea. There is effectively no defence against this RNG excep N+X (as opposed to N+1 because only one more pilot won't really help) to raise your chance of not spawning neck deep in **** by yourself.



We get enough bad idea in here so please keep up with your idea that have one or more good side to them even if not completely good.