EVE General Discussion

So I'm watching Twitch and Jason Kusion 12 box and annihilate freighter after Orca and freighter. Before I quit 5 years ago, I ganked a few freighters myself, so I'm not against it.

I'm just impressed with how well done it is now by him, CODE, and friends. It's definitely down to a science now.

The only real question I'd have is, lore wise, why do the Empires allow such ganking to be so....easy? You'd think the flags / timers would've been longer at this point of the game for attacks in high sec.

I'll have to think on this.

That's a pretty good answer.

I'd assume, though, because of commerce. Freighters / craft are detonating every 5 minutes ish by -10 characters with no repercussions. Additionally, just because the capsuleers are effectively immortal, the lore stated (at least back before I quit) that there were non-immortal crews on these ships.

So the Empires citizens are dying.

Ignoring the fact that the ability for -10's to easily do this make CCP look incompetent (because that's hilarious, honestly), lore wise the Empires / CONCORD should be doing more to stop it based on the crews and lost commerce alone.

Capsuleers have become a force the Empires fear and can no longer control. We are steadily weakening the Empires' grips on their own territories and power. The only forces in New Eden that can possibly hold a candle to Highsec piracy involving Capsuleers at the moment is:

A: Other Capsuleers acting as "white knights"
B: CONCORD

Right now both of those leave something to be desired, especially the former (Here's looking at you, anti-ganking community). Embrace the New Era, carebears. The winds of change are blowing through Highsec and your comfortable, carefree lifestyles are quickly coming to an end. Praise James 315 and the noble Knights and Agents of the New Order of Highsec.

It's as hard as other players make it. There are plenty of freighter pilots who get ganked approximately never.

The fact that a good portion of Eve players are painfully stupid doesn't reflect on CCP in any particular way.

Like I said, I've been gone over 5 years and when we did it we were using Battleships on scouted targets to ensure loot.

These appear to be throw-away characters utilizing PLEX / buddy accounts flying destroyers.

How has it been made harder? Like I said, I've been gone and I KNOW we were "newbs" doing it since we hadn't sat down and spreadsheeted it out, but this looks easy.


You're ignoring my main point, though, in that it's risk-free for the ganker. The balance is all out of whack in that regard.

As with most things in EVE though... it is not up to the NPCs (see: the DEVs) to provide "risk" or "real punishment" for other player's actions.

That is up to the player.


Here are some other example of things that have no "real risk" unless another player decides to "become" that "risk."

- Farming Faction Warfare sites: you go into a complex with a frigate, you kill the NPC (you need only deal ~200 dps), and you wait until the timer hits zero.
(no joke... that is literally how you farm Loyalty Points in Faction Warfare)

- Running distribution missions: talk to agent at Point A, make sure mission doesn't go to low-sec, accept, load up cargo, go to Point B. Complete mission. Return to Point A.
(note: distribution missions are often used to quickly grind up standing)

- POCOs: find planet that has no POCO, anchor your own, set tax rates, receive bacon.
(again, no joke... they are literally that simple. No fuel, no reoccurring cost... just build it and set it up).


I am sure others can list more examples... but you should get the point.

For some activities, the only REAL "risk" comes from other players. And it is up to the players to do something about it.

That's because it's not much of a point. They're risking their ships (guaranteeing their destruction, in fact). The fact that they've min/maxxed that to a pretty low cost is not as interesting as you would like to pretend.

Smart haulers optimize similarly to limit their risk. You're seeing a bunch of stupid people get blown up and are trying to make that about something other than the stupid risk the victims failed to plan for.

I would agree with this. If you aren't making at least 500m ISK per day running level 4 missions in highsec, you are doing something wrong. You could lose a 1+ billion ISK faction battleship every week and still easily make enough to PLEX 4 accounts every month with enough change to buy yourself something pretty.*

*Depending on how much time you have to actually play the game, of course.

Decadence is rife in highsec, and I firmly believe if it wasn't for the regular cullings that the gankers bring us, it would lead to a universe filled with Donald Trumps.

Oh... there are plenty of incentives.

In fact, there are a plethora of counters and avoidance techniques that gankers use for their own logistical wings (yes, gankers have logistics wings... where do you think they get all those ships, guns, and ammo?)... some of which are hilariously simple.

But... sadly... there are some people that are either too greedy, too lazy, too anti-social, or too short-sighted to perform any of these counters.


Here are some solutions:

- tank your ship! Even freighters can do this now (with Reinforced Bulkheads). And if you have spent 1+ billion ISK on a ship you might as well also invest in some Mid-grade Slave Implants (boosts armor amount by ~33%).

- have a webber. You need only a friend or alt character in a frigate enter a "duel" with you and freighter. Once you initiate warp, have your friend/alt double-web you. If done right, you can cut down the align time of freighters to 5 seconds.

- bring a booster. Like the webber and tanking solutions, but more indirect. A warfare link booster can increase the resistances and raw HP of your shields and armor by non-insignificant margins... making you VERY tough to gank.

- bring logi. People think that this will never work... but it does. The point behind bringing logi isn't to prevent a freighter from taking any damage... it is to keep it alive long enough for CONCORD to spawn.


You may notice that all of the above requires other players to help. Guess what; ganking almost universally requires multiple people to take part in it. If a freighter pilot wants to be truly safe, they have to invest just as much effort and manpower as the people trying to kill them.

As someone that has ganked from beta I can say it really isn't harder. Ganking has received nerfs (insurance, boomerang ban etc) over the years but there have been boosts (destroyer dps buff, introduction of talos/nado etc).

Freighter pilots have the capability to avoid ganks or at least lower the chance to a tiny amount. Gankers tend to prefer to pick the lower fruit. So like many things in life you don't have to be the fastest runner just faster than some of the others :P

Scout ahead, use a web alt, don't carry +3b in the hold, watch the anti-ganking intel channels, keep your head down and don't get noticed. All of those things will lower your chances of being ganked greatly. If you only have one account than consider using a MWD orca or DST (HUUUGE tank potential) instead. Use one of the empty slots (or both) on your account for a scout character. Set the character in the choke point that you travel through. Choke points exist for all major routes and gankers setup there because moving 120 gank ships and setting them up takes a lot of time and effort. So just log on to the alt and look around for reds or known gankers. Then pop on to your freighter pilot who is a couple hops away and fly through if the coast is clear.

I provide this information as someone that has 12 gank alts with 4-13m sp each (three of them are around 4m the rest are +9m) and has engaged in large scale ganks against specific targets.