EVE General Discussion

Not really. Once you know the tricks, they are easy to avoid. Sure, they're a challenge for the newbies but its easy to learn to spot the traps so you don't fall for them. As for the loot/salvage ninjas, they don't really hurt the bottom line much and they are pretty rare. They're just the guy that grabs the coin on the sidewalk before you and gives you a raspberry. You chuckle and move on. Decs and Ganking will always exist in HiSec, but you just change your behavior slightly and it's a non-issue. Thus my comments.


I wasn't really counting that mini-game which I think of as an on-going charity event. So yes, I agree, the only competition there is bragging rights.

I would say the when I played runescape when you made law runes you there was gankers pk just waiting to kill you it was a easy kill it got so bad in the end jagex changed it and most of the gankers left the game wads left , so jagex did loose wads of cash but 100 million accounts later game is still going .
the day they change the game for more safe pve in certain areas no ganking then half the players might leave the game so its a massive risk for ccp to much revenue loss could close them down . example if they lowered the price of plex then players would not be able to sell it on ebay then more revenue for ccp .
so if you want a game model with safe areas you need to find better ways to get the pvp players onboard or it wont happen anytime soon .
would also say long term future the game will have to move on after a while players move on many reasons so in time they will have to plan ahead with a formula to suit all this can be done like with some of the suggestions you have made .
I haven't done no pvp in eve yet but are active alpha tester in total war arena and total war series also in world of warships so I do a bit of everything missing me mate hopes he come back .

Pilot Day, in a fair and unbias way there's has been in recent times from other new players such as you come to the forums and bring up this subject. Not so much as it had been, but the fact of the matter is that Eve is a sandbox. We have control over every facet you can think of to certain limits if I'm correct. There is risks, and there is rewards. No matter what path you choose or I chose to be a pirate, we both have our own destiny. We can make our legacy have far reaching impact within the cluster.

Being wardecced is not fun I agree, but it is a way of life for those of us who choose to wardec a corp. alliance, or even a coalition. I agree it does put a dent into your playtime and I symphathize with you, but I am not discouraged. If I undock and loose a ship, so what I can always reship and go again, provided of course if the undock is clear or not.

I hope you will sit back and take into account that you signed up to play, but you also need to realize the mantra of "Risk and Reward". Do I take risks to undock? yes very much so, do I get rewarded, very much so. Can I sit back at the end of my playtime and feel good about what I did, very much so. Even if I get podded, I don't even worry about the losses I just go on my merry way to another session knowing I can do something that I enjoy and feel good in the end.

Effort and responsibility....mostly responsibility.

If I'm going to expend effort, it's going to be to whinge about how I don't want to take responsibility. CCP should do it for me. I pay, therefore I'm entitled.

Mostly this.

Wardecced some corps, just to try it out as well as ease my newbie corpmates into PvP. The amount of stuff I have been called during those two weeks was incredible. It is not all highsec players that feel this way, but the ones I wardecced felt they were entitled to safety and we were being assholes for disrupting that peace.

As I explained to the CEOs of those corps, if you can't defend your corp and you tell your corpmates to stay docked and logged for the duration of a wardec, then you probably shouldn't create that corp in the first place. The worst thing is, that those CEOs are recruiting total newbies and then just leave them out to dry when conflict arrives. They don't give a damn about their corpmates. While I didn't get in contact with all the newbies, I did persuade one to leave the corp and seek out a better corp or look into EvE Uni. Damn, I hate those CEOs that just recruit newbies and tell them to go mine, while they just stay docked in some citadel and do jack **** themselves.

CEOs like those, are the reason why new players leave the game.

I persuaded 3 of my IRL friends to finally join me in EvE. Feeding them skill injects and blow up/getting blown up in lowsec and WHs, seems to be a great strategy to keep people playing EvE so far compared to leaving them alone mining in highsec.

It is commonly known that the player count has decreased over the last couple of years, and almost certainly a multitude of reasons why. Opinions on why are like noses, everyone has got one.

The game is old; it just doesn't appeal to people anymore
The industry is moving away from monthly subscription MMOs
People play games on tablets and mobile phones nowadays.
The actual number of players was masked by large volumes of multi-boxers which were culled when input broadcasting was banned
Multiple character training made multiple accounts less desirable
Gankers are ruining everything and chasing new players away
Scammers are ruining everything and chasing new players away
Change X or Change Y by CCP chased players away
Goons ruined everything and chased people away

To be honest it could be any of these things, all of these things, or none of them. We don't really know. My personal theory, and I stress that it is purely speculation, is that consistent decreases to the level of risk within the game in an attempt to keep the more vocal, conservative elements of the playerbase engaged resulted in the decline.

I think most will agree that over the years changes have been made that have made the game safer for people. Naturally, not all changes are equal, and not all changes have resulted in more safety, but on balance, the game is now safer. Crimewatch changes, EHP buffs to ships that aren't traditionally designed for combat, faster CONCORD response times and larger consequences, rulings removing player discovered combat strategies such as Hyperdunking, bumping changes, watchlist changes, the implementation of jump fatigue, giving freighters low slot options, corporation "safety switches" that prevent awoxing, and so on. I'll not argue about the validity of the changes. CCP implemented them, therefore CCP has decided that they were necessary or worthwhile for whatever reason they feel like.

The consequence of many of these changes is that it is more difficult for players to interact with each other in space, especially on an involuntary basis than it was previously. In all parts of space, you're at less risk of involuntary interference from players now than at any other time in the game's history (except possibly very early on in the game where the actual number of players was so low you just didn't SEE people at all if you went out far enough, and perhaps pre jump drive era). Players adapted to these changes of course (see CODE. as a reasonable example), but it did leave SOME play styles for dead or greatly reduced.

So during the period of these changes, we also see a decline in the number of users active in the game. There is a correlation, certainly, but I'm certainly not going to claim that is the same as causation.

If I had the power(tm) I'd engage in a little experiment though.

I'd roll back some of the deliberate or incidental changes that resulted in a safer EVE, or even better, try and introduce new rewards and risks to the game, and see if those changes resulted in more or less players. CCP's current strategy has been pretty consistent over the last few years, but doesn't seem to have improved player numbers.


If EVE is on the decline for other reasons, then what difference would it really make? If it turns out that the correlation IS causation, then maybe EVE could experience a (very bloody) renaissance.

Just a thought.

It's ten years on and everybody huddled in hisec.
Don't talk to me about your null pvp final boss main that has a trader alt or mission runner in empire, just nah.
PVE in eve makes you PVP content.
There have been ample encouragements to get out of empire, changes to sov, ships that can explore mine and fight there.
No, hisec is still a blaze of crumb hoovering.
Get out of hisec.

Go **** with a corp in empire.
not some punching bag right out of the rookie systems but an established one.
try and hurt them.
and no i dont mean smack a stargaff, actually try and hunt one specific group for a week

Didn't ask for a task that can be done, just takes more time and more effort than simply logging on, looking at a list. then using a locator. Basically what your gripe is about. (BTW, I don't like the change either but not for the same reason as you and many others.

I'm asking you to show me legit numbers that hi-sec is safer now than it was around 2011 or around and before.

I did say I was basing my theory on an observation that user numbers are down as safety increases. I explicitly said that I couldn't prove a direct link. So sorry, I can't provide the numbers you're looking for.

That said, it doesn't take a significant leap of logic to conclude that mechanical changes such as:

buddy list changes
EHP buffs to mining ships
Corp aggression safety switch
creation of ships like the DST which have a curious inherent resistance bonus to a certain Gallente destroyer damage profile
Rulings outlawing Hyperdunking
timeout limits placed on bumping
jump fatigue


all of which I think you will agree reduce the opportunity for involuntary player interactions, translate into safer space on a *mechanical level.* I don't know how the outcome of those changes could be interpreted in any other way. If I could I'd go through every change in the game ever made and try to balance the "increases risk" versus "reduces risk" column but that's not really possible. Sorry about that. The contentious part of my theory is as follows:


despite the adaptation of the player base to those (and other) mechanical changes, the overall outcome is less player interaction, which translate to smaller subscriber numbers.


Unfortunately I wouldn't begin to know how to collect data to try and validate this claim. Like I said, its a theory of mine. On the other hand, if I had the means to introduce more risk, or reintroduce old risks to the game and then observe player numbers/logins etc, THEN I might be able to prove my theory that more safety actually translates to a smaller player base.


By the same token, I KNOW you can't prove that there's more ganking now then there was in earlier years, pre-EHP buff to mining ships and lowslots for haulers. I apologize that I can't find them myself because I'm at work right now, but I have seen statistics linked multiple times on these forums that despite the whales Miniluv and CODE. kill, ganking is at an all time low in terms of volume (though perhaps not ISK value). If someone could help me out by posting that data (I think it even might have been a fanfest presentation?) I'd appreciate it.