Hutchins
Minmatar GoonFleet GoonSwarm
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Posted - 2007.11.14 04:11:00 -
[1]
I think that trying to 'counter the blob' is treating the symptom rather than the disease. The real question that needs to be answered is 'How do we make small gang actions relevant without making life hell on sov holders?'. Massive HP reductions look good on the surface until you realize that sov holders are going to have to live in their pospreys 23/7 because every time a 30 man gang rolls through something important is getting incapacitated. Most definitely not more fun. The biggest problems that need to be overcome are:
1. The '51% deathstars' phenomenon. Planetary sov and stacking nerfed sov claims by tower size will help a lot in this area. Several good suggestions have been made in this and other threads, and should be implemented. As long as sovereignty rides on the back of deathstar POSes, the blob will be summoned regularly.
2. Move objectives away from point targets. Towers outside of station systems don't mean jack in POS warfare. Nobody cares about them short of ****ing enemies off by blowing up their moon mining chains, and entrenched defenders have little incentive to do more than turtle up behind stront timers and cyno jammers and let the attackers get bored. To solve this problem, I propose overhauling how constellation sov works.
The current implementation doesn't really have anything to do with combat or logistical effort. Just drop some towers and every so often the Const Sov Fairy comes by and gives some bonuses. I'd like to see this done away with and replaced with a more strategic option.
* Maintain the current status quo of 'simple planet majority = Sov 1 within the system', and existing stront mechanics. Yes, that means there will still be 500 man blobfests, but they will be few and far between. The attacker still has to commit to a decisive battle to take a system, which is as it should be, but it won't be necessary to summon the blob every time a single tower needs to get reinforced. * At the constellation level, introduce stacking-nerfed (to prevent pos spam) 'constellation sov points' from controlled planets in each system + a bonus to constellation sov points for holding sov in a system (to give defenders an incentive to defend sov in these systems instead of just writing them off). * Do away with the time-based sovereignty levels and perks and instead make them purchasable with constellation sovereignty points. Things like cyno jammers and higher sov levels will be bought instead of waited for. The nastier defensive perks can be priced exorbitantly enough that alliances that want them will be forced to hold sov over (and defend) several 'farm' systems to afford these perks in their 'fortress' systems. This will force defenders to plan strategically not just in setting up their defenses, but in fighting from them as well. It will also scale benefits directly with logistic and combat effort. * Allow anyone who has constellation sov points to spend their points on their own improvements, or 'against' the improvements of others in the constellation, causing the owners to either have to pay more for the improvements, or risk them going away. This will give attackers the option and incentive to do something other than throw blobs at cynojammers in station systems. * Tweak reinforced mode mechanics some. Ideally I'd like to see 'reinforced mode' become a sliding scale where the POS' sovereignty claim (and attendant const. sov. point production) gradually weakens as it becomes harder and harder to kill until it goes fully reinforced. This would allow several small gangs working in concert across multiple systems to have the same (or even a greater) effect as summoning the Blob and beating your head against a deathstar for a few hours, but to take the tower all the way out you're still going to have to risk your capitals. |