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[Forum]The Great Compromise

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NanDe YaNen The Funkalistic	Posted - 2008.10.07 02:26:00 - [1] The result of discussion in at least ten different monstrous threads regarding sov and also a place to talk about potential big-picture changes to 0.0 in the context of steering the Devs in a direction for great justices. All of them. The Triangle of Concerned Parties: 0.0 Alliances Interests are enhancing the value of 0.0, easing the logistical nightmare, making sov more meaningful, better sov warfare. Concerns are that increasing 0.0 volatility will undermine an already shaky and kinda meaningless 0.0. Not BoB Lesser alliances who find the "get mowed down by 100 dreads" nomad lifestyle kinda..."I pay for this game too." Interests are lowering the barrier to 0.0 entry, increasing viability for a hundred pilot alliance to pull hundred pilot weight, and increasing volatility such that cap fleets are not the sole measure of sov projection. Concerns are that increasing the strength of 0.0 holders will skew the balance of power in favor of super alliances. Empire Pirates, carebears, and hisec bling-blingers. Concerns are, like the Not-BoB's, that increasing the income and prominence of 0.0 will simply squelch empire play such that empire becomes a relative slum even for isk farmers. We Are Not So Different Compromise Point #1 Compromise goal is to lower 0.0 access barrier and provide avenues for the not-BoB's to assert their presence while at the same time lifting the position of 0.0 powers and providing avenues for more meaningful sov. Make 0.0's biggest income generator accessible from day one with minimal investment; then make the form of that income useful only to 0.0 powers with established infrastructure. 0.0 wealth will be easily accessible to all, leveling the playing field at a very nascent stage, while at the same time leaving a hierarchical source of economic power less exposed and more to the tastes of large alliances. Raw materials through mechanisms are responsive at the sub-cap level while production can be controlled via mechanisms that are responsive at the cap level. Implementation proposal will follow at some point. Compromise Point #2 Compromise goal is to address the issue of poor sov combat as well as providing a more versatile fight broker that scales better with engagement size, provides impact via tactics, simplifies process of sov, and gives CCP more possibilities to distribute load in the future. Concensus reached in a thread fathered by Goonswarm's Fahtim was that the proper sov instrument will be a multi-grid solution based at planets. System will create simultaneous combat at multiple grids that will amplify the affects of better mobility and force distribution. Planet base system is simpler and more consistent than moons. Multi-grid solution also adds more balance by reducing effectiveness of pure blobbing. Compromise Point #3 Compromise goal is to preserve the place of Empire while allowing 0.0 to flourish. Similar to cap-ship production, add new facilities and hulls to further provide a sink for 0.0 income as well as increasing the appeal of 0.0 without overwhelming empire player productivity with the excess wealth of a 0.0 flush with bling. Structures that form the basis of utilizing productivity gained from structures in point #1 should be expensive, flashy, a point of uberness for alliances that make the leap, responsive solely to cap threats via sov mechanisms in point #2 , and provide unique goods to 0.0 holders that are NOT marketable in empire, thus protecting empire economy from the end result of that income buff. Implementation proposal to follow at some point. Please discuss these compromise solutions for 0.0 improvement in broad terms and attempt to direct discussion towards wide-reaching aspects.
Herschel Yamamoto Bloodmoney Incorporated	Posted - 2008.10.07 03:05:00 - [2] As with most of these types of threads, some very interesting points and proposals are raised. Your points 1 and 3 - get resources of some kind from 0.0, usable primarily/only in 0.0, and make them the primary profit source - lead to an interesting idea. Two end products of the type you describe already exist - capital ships and POS/Outposts. Obviously, it would overthrow a large variety of the existing economy if those were to be transitioned to something other than minerals and cash as their source, given that both are large-scale sinks of their respective types - much as inflation isn't a problem now, it could be if you removed large cash sinks without making corresponding adjustments - but it might be possible. What if, for example, all POSes, outposts, and components thereof were made from blueprints, and those blueprints used minerals sourced primarily/only in 0.0 space? You'd throw the economy for a loop in the short term, though I suspect people would stockpile to bridge the gap, but it might yield the sort of situation you describe. Replace a large portion of the cash bounties from belt rats with component drops, which means the primary source will be 0.0(although empire can source it at dramatically reduced efficiency) and that should cancel out the loss of a cash sink I propose. Ratting suddenly becomes the only source for 0.0 infrastructure, which might shift some emphasis to small-gang raids, and which yields the desired result of making the raw source open to just about everybody while leaving the manufacturing closed. To make the loop complete, make the only feasible way to produce POSes be an Outpost, and the only feasible way to produce an Outpost be via POSes - say, ludicrous time requirements, with -90% time modifiers on factories of the appropriate type(or, if you're feeling really mean, a similar material modifier). You can bootstrap your way up from Empire stations, but you won't want to. As ever, I'm just pulling things from my posterior when I muse about 0.0 overhauls. But I'm curious about other people's thoughts. ------------------ Herschel's Lottery #1 - Win a Kronos!
NanDe YaNen The Funkalistic	Posted - 2008.10.07 16:15:00 - [3] Thank you sir ^_^ I believe it is possible to avoid the inflation issue entirely by decoupling the new 0.0 production from the empire economies. I mulled over this a lot in the ACDC thread I was working on, and concluded that 0.0 goods will never inflate or deflate because all that will happen is demand will grow and subside. I summed up the philosophy in the slogan, "Moar ships. Moar pew pew." We all saw what happened when the drone regions flooded the market with nocx and other high ends. Imagine if instead drone minerals were only useful in 0.0. They would be produced in 0.0, consumed in 0.0, and balanced by the pew pew supply and demand relationship. (just a for instance.) A lot of the philosophical base I'm working off of was the result of the thought process in the ACDC thread. I didn't take that particularly seriously, as apparent in the no-holds-barred uber abstracted writing style, but got some surprisingly smart replies. (please come again!) At current, 0.0 looks a lot like what I would call the "Salary Man Model," where mechanics that resemble work are used to limit things like scope creep and single alliance domination. After all the thought process in the ACDC thread, I'm aiming to shift to what I call the "NBA Superstar Model," where the high capabilities of players are balanced instead by each other. Overall, a shift from the game itself slowing us down to more player driven limiting factors. The reason why I've chosen these two monikers is that the salary man works to build what he has while the superstar is paid by the league revenues. We can simulate space as a place for up-by-the-bootstraps self made men or as a giant sports franchise where good players get paid a lot more and while bench warmers make less, nobody spends time grinding. One of the big things I have in mind is the idea of self-constructing production structures for raw materials. Ask yourself, if we need POS's to determine sov etc, why are the players expected to GRIND just to come up with the income to set up/maintain the mechanics necessary to have sov warfare and 0.0 production? It should not fall on the shoulders of players to slave away to build the game they have come to play. As far as where the loop should exist, I'm imagining something like this: You step into 0.0, win a few skirmishes to get left alone, drop some eggs that are about 50m a piece. Add water. Come back in a few days (while fending off counterattacks) and it's a production platform for asteroids or moons etc and is going to earn you 500m per planet or so. The goods exist in some kind of "mineral formation" that requires extraction at a higher level facility, which requires sov and more time/money to build. This produces a more generalized product which is used for basic "space bling." Or it can be sold on up the chain to the mega-alliance with a fully established research facility so they can produce their limited quantity, faction-esque space bling. The idea is to make the basic component of this space bling accessible at the minimal level of presence in a system. The production platforms should be at the sub cap level and get blown up and rebuilt at a fast pace. However, to keep this huge source of dynamic 0.0 from completely destabilizing large alliances and forcing them to run all over space, make the producers of these raw materials beholden to powers with established infrastructure, as 0.0 is beholden to empire right now. As far as making POS's or anything only producible at well established 0.0 facilities, I'm working against any mechanics that raise the barrier to getting into 0.0. The basic eggs etc should be seeded in empire and always fairly cheap. They exist so we can have things to fight over, not have things to grind for.
Drake Draconis Minmatar	Posted - 2008.10.07 16:30:00 - [4] You might want to change not BoB to not Mob : O P Otherwise your going to come off as a whiner to some people... Might as well say Not Goon or something at that rate. It could be any number of alliances with there numbers... call me picky... but the message is still the same. But your points are valid... the Mob Mentality is what I think of when looking at point 2.
NanDe YaNen The Funkalistic	Posted - 2008.10.07 23:35:00 - [5] Edited by: NanDe YaNen on 07/10/2008 23:38:11 gramyre Originally by: Drake Draconis You might want to change not BoB to not Mob : O P Otherwise your going to come off as a whiner to some people... Might as well say Not Goon or something at that rate. It could be any number of alliances with there numbers... call me picky... but the message is still the same. But your points are valid... the Mob Mentality is what I think of when looking at point 2. All three of these compromises will leave 0.0 much better off for everyone, mega-alliances fully included. I doubt goons enjoyed the seventy-something moons in Q-T or any other system. Same goes for everyone. Switching to a planetary sov instrument is a huge gain. As far as the "Mob mentality" I'm not sure what you're getting at. I'll try to answer, but please elaborate further. The instrument, as developed in Fahtim's thread, would work to the advantage of any well organized fleet of any size compared to a jumbled blob of any size. Nicer structures would be an immeasurable benefit. Right now we're relegated to fighting over space-sticks that give rights to a flag on a map or an outpost that looks like every other outpost and will get named something ridiculous because nobody really cares. I've taken to heart what Darius had to say and my own experience in 0.0 as far as lack of gold at the end of the POS rainbow. Giving large alliances a more pivotal role in the income stream of 0.0 without requiring them to worry about every little moon should be a welcome change as well. Under my proposed compromise, losing a few of the new production streams at the base level won't immediately or detrimentally affect a large alliance that can benefit from the steady supply of raw materials any small-time raiders will have to offload. With all those benefits to large alliances, I hope the few hyper-sensitive pilots who get their feelings mistakenly hurt can get over it.
TheStarman Lost Connection	Posted - 2008.10.08 01:28:00 - [6] Edited by: TheStarman on 08/10/2008 01:28:47 Edited by: TheStarman on 08/10/2008 01:28:19 I'd like to shake your hand good sir, to add: There is a lengthy thread somewhere on the forums that includes some kind of 3d modeling that is a proposal on how to make POSes more attractive, it had everything interconnected like the international space station, quite impressive. Add that in so we're not staring at shitty space sticks. Thanks :)
NanDe YaNen The Funkalistic	Posted - 2008.10.13 22:23:00 - [7] Attaching a resources post for those interested. Ties up most of the huge bulk of 0.0 posting that's been going on...well my version of the story anyway. Feel free to contribute, especially the meatier ones. POS Flogging the Dead Horse Been recommended by the CSM to CPP. POS's are in a terrible state and I seriously thought the first time I saw one that it stood for "Pile of Shit." This guy tried to fix the holy hell out of them. Praise be to progressive 0.0 proponents. CCP Considering Production Changes CCP is considering reworking production to include lots of things like meta items and even slightly upgraded ships. Check out the thread here to get more perspective on likely future changes to the marbles available from player run production chains. Space Bling Okay, don't take this one too seriously, but here's sort of where I'm going with the idea of space bling. Although I'm dead serious about space whales, don't get too sidetracked. ACDC - All Capsuleers Deserve Cooler A bit of self-eulogy. A lot of pure abstract philosophy and rambling. In the end, a clear vision of the fundamental value of the game and the basis for what I would like to happen in 0.0. Fahtim's Big Monster 0.0 Thread Here was a nice post where Kelsin, Fahtim, Toman, and myself tried to get some good brainstorm going on some new 0.0 solutions. Some CSM members chimed in occasionally. Some heated arguments. Some productive collusion that followed. Assembly post was eventually made. Limited traction, but overall was a successful thread in my view. Actually, a few versions of the assembly post showed up. What Should Small Gangs be Able to Accomplish? This turned out to be a land mine. Read up and get some perspective on what kinds of objections are being made and the needs of 0.0 alliances. Thread went nowhere, but knowing why is important. For that purpose, good read. POS Decentralization and Streamlined Logistics This was my original proposal for a new sov tool and the origin of the multi-grid concept for big huge fleet battles. The concept was cleaned up a lot and simplified (I like flashy things ) in Fahtim's thread to become what I would be pushing for now. Specific Proposal for Changes to 0.0 Fairly old thread that was near the beginning of this whole project. 32 supports. 272 replies. In short, there are people who favor increased entropy and those who resist "capture the flag." I formed this compromise almost solely because of this fundamental issue. CSM-CCP Meeting Sov Issues A very, very early thread in all of this. Probably the source of most everything that has followed.
Drake Draconis Minmatar	Posted - 2008.10.14 00:12:00 - [8] Edited by: Drake Draconis on 14/10/2008 00:13:39 Mob Mentality = Large groups of people with such massive amounts of influence by sheer numbers have the ability to effect/affect smaller groups of people via the threat or action of "steam rolling". Smaller "guys" can't fight against such things without a great deal of suffering and loss.... few survive... even fewer remain. Either they end up joining the "mob"... serving it... or leaving. That's why I said you shouldn't say "not Bob" as its a personal attack IMHO. You could change that to "Not Goon" and it would still be the same message. But what you are referring too is the classic gaming syndrome with larger communities... the Mob Mentality. And since the super alliances that now exist number in the thousands... its pretty easy to push people around. Fortunately the population of everyone else outnumbers them.... for now. I'm quite sure there are members/corps in these larger alliances that are not as bad as there reputation tends to indicate.... at the risk of stereotyping of course. So don't typecast the super alliance or A super alliance... give the impression your above prejudice and just indicating the tendencies that come with the territory of being that large.
NanDe YaNen The Funkalistic	Posted - 2008.10.14 01:04:00 - [9] .......meh. BoB is probably flattered by the reference. Or maybe they're screaming "We've thinned down our numbers to only the very best and are now only about one thousand and that's mostly alts and after all we've accomplished this comparison is so unfair! NanDe YaNen should be banned 4-ever!!!!!!!!!!!" .....which I highly doubt Back to more relevant things, I'm still panning around ideas for integrating the whole planetary production chain with CCP's ideas for reworked industry and my idea for "space bling." Idea in short is to have meta items capable of being produced by smaller alliances with planetary resource income. Meta items require minerals and progressively more "mineral formations" or whatever from the planetary side for higher meta levels. This way, as an alliances production capabilities get more and more uber, it ends up producing more and more luxurious goods. To isolate production from affecting Empire, I was thinking that each item could have 1) The name changed to reflect the producing alliance (item is a dummy that references an existing meta item) 2) A stat that requires user to have same alliance ticker in order to be able to use...or something similar. Same idea for the slightly better ship models. Harbinger MK I, Harbinger MK II etc. These should have slightly buffed stats and ever so slightly buffed fitting. Add an extra "configuration" slot that can be fed a special rig that can't be placed on other ships. (This is all ripped off the CSM-CPP thread and slightly worked on by me btw) Rig buffs the bonuses or maybe adds new bonuses etc. Research Facility + Manufacturing Plant (better names desired) Requires intermediate sov and a decent sized investment. Can be destroyed only if sov captured and can be captured instead. Produces BPC's based on some metric I haven't decided yet. These get used together with the planetary resources to produce meta space bling and slightly better T1 ships etc. Development Institute + Industrial Complex (better names desired) Requires capitol sov and a large investment. Same destruction rules. Produces higher level BPC's based on a similar undecided metric. Used with planetary resources for faction-level space bling, MAYBE cross-faction-esque ships, and definitely for implants. Has a hit-or-miss "can you HQ it?" invention feel and requires lots of planetary income per item, but produces really uber stuff that is unique to the producing alliance. This provides a clear path to having the best shyt involving processes that use resources that are quite volatile at the initial production level but mostly useful at the "I gots sov 4" level. The intra-alliance consumption system would guarantee empire producers won't have the stuff being dumped on their markets. Kinda Draconian, but also kinda cool. Interstellar Alcohol Conglomerate Mega Neutron Blaster MKIV Would be really awesome if these structures could be built with a modular design system such that one alliances prized assets are differentiated from other alliances assets. Paths for upgrade as well. How does something like this sound?
Goumindong Amarr Merch Industrial GoonSwarm	Posted - 2008.10.14 01:17:00 - [10] Quote: Make 0.0's biggest income generator accessible from day one with minimal investment; then make the form of that income useful only to 0.0 powers with established infrastructure Point the first is already working but does not achieve the intended goal. POS are relatively cheap and you don't even need Sov to put one on a dyspro moon. Requiring infrastructure in order to reap the benefits or to make those benefits useful entrenches the existing alliances. It is just those benefits[money, ability to build super-caps] that keep 0.0 alliances so powerful compared to start ups. Any effort to increase the value of 0.0 needs to come exclusively in the form of the general non-infrastructure related activities. 0.0 Sov space needs to have much better asteroid fields and rats, to encourage people to come and kill them and mine them. New logistical structures that would be put in place need to have no tie to existing sovereignty mechanics. Their value to those who are taking effective ratting, mining, and missioning area is in the power they afford the people who are trying to control the space in the first place, which makes them effective incentives to pvp.[as well on the other side] The only reason that dyspro moons do not fulfill this requirement is that dyspro is a corporation wide endeavor. This means that the individual pilots will unknowingly shy away from attacking and creating such infrastructure since they are unaware of the positive externalities[their corp having money externalizes benefits onto its members], and even if they are aware may not act anyway. As well, the difficulty in taking down said resource is too effective a barrier to entry if we want more competition for 0.0 resources. Originally by: NanDe YaNen Concensus reached in a thread fathered by Goonswarm's Fahtim was that the proper sov instrument will be a multi-grid solution based at planets. System will create simultaneous combat at multiple grids that will amplify the affects of better mobility and force distribution. Planet base system is simpler and more consistent than moons. Multi-grid solution also adds more balance by reducing effectiveness of pure blobbing. Compromise point the second will not work. It is impossible to remove blobbing by enforcing simultaneous combat. Multi-grid solutions are possible, but multi-grid solutions still must resolve around a single contention point or fail in that one side can blob and win and the other has no such option. The only way I can see that working is by letting dreadnoughts target stationary objects from off grid via a target painter and allow POS guns the same luxury[while severely limiting their on grid effectiveness against smaller ships]. Though this produces other problems. Quote: Compromise goal is to preserve the place of Empire while allowing 0.0 to flourish. Compromise point 3 is futile. While wealth is not a zero sum game, player participation is a zero sum game(more or less). If you want more people to come to 0.0 they will need to come from somewhere. This somewhere will be high-sec, since there are even fewer people in low-sec than null-sec. Empire is already where the majority of PvP good production is handled[since there is no risk of losing access to a t2 BPO in a station and there is ample supply of invention goods], with low-sec handling the majority of non-super capital capital production.

NanDe YaNen The Funkalistic	Posted - 2008.10.14 01:35:00 - [11] Edited by: NanDe YaNen on 14/10/2008 01:43:11 Originally by: Goumindong Requiring infrastructure in order to reap the benefits or to make those benefits useful entrenches the existing alliances. I'm aiming for something much more granular and straightforward. Say 25m to throw it up. Add water. Reap income. Sub-cap gang can knock it out in a day. That's volatility that small alliances will benefit from as they can live under the radar and rapidly regain their territory if wiped. Kind of "capture the flag" but it's only one part of a two-part compromise. Originally by: Goumindong Requiring infrastructure in order to reap the benefits or to make those benefits useful entrenches the existing alliances. Exactly. Part two is to elevate stable alliances to an extent above the circus that will become resource production with fast turnover at the subcap level. This is why I called this thing a compromise. It benefits the large and the small and enriches their means of interaction. Raising income through ratting and mining just means more ratting and mining. That's not a game to me. Skill training is automated for a reason. I'm in favor of moving 0.0 income to a more passive system as well, where your successes in PvP and war industry affect your ability to field passive income generators. Originally by: Goumindong It is impossible to remove blobbing by enforcing simultaneous combat. Multi-grid solutions are possible, but multi-grid solutions still must resolve around a single contention point or fail in that one side can blob and win and the other has no such option. We already hit that pony until it was blue in the face. Check out Fahtim's thread. There's even a Q&A by Toman addressing your concerns. Easy to find in the second assembly thread I believe. Point 3 exists because with all this passive income flying around, some empire players might wonder if empire will just become a huge joke compared to the bling of 0.0. In a way, that's what I hope happens, but more in the sense of 0.0 being a different ballgame altogether.
Goumindong Amarr Merch Industrial GoonSwarm	Posted - 2008.10.14 12:34:00 - [12] Originally by: NanDe YaNen I'm aiming for something much more granular and straightforward. Say 25m to throw it up. Add water. Reap income. Sub-cap gang can knock it out in a day. That's volatility that small alliances will benefit from as they can live under the radar and rapidly regain their territory if wiped. Kind of "capture the flag" but it's only one part of a two-part compromise. How long does it take to take 25m. Any effort to induce players to move en-masse into 0.0 cannot have an infrastructure component. Even mining has a problem they have large infrastructure components[logistics]. You need to encourage people to go there and stay there for the duration, then you need to encourage them to come back. The barrier to entry needs to be more or less nil, only the cost of the ships you are flying. Otherwise you are not going to create any significant pressure on 0.0 entities. [or there will not be a limited amount of resources to go around, which means less pvp, rather than more]. Quote: Part two is to elevate stable alliances to an extent above the circus that will become resource production with fast turnover at the subcap level. This is why I called this thing a compromise. It benefits the large and the small and enriches their means of interaction. 0.0 space is a zero sum game. Two entities do not co-exist. There is a limited amount of resources and as one side gobbles it up, the other side necessarily loses. If you are inducing small alliances to push into sovereign space then you are necessarily reducing the power of large alliances. There is nothing wrong with reducing the power of large alliances, but you cannot possibly do both at the same time. They are mutually exclusive. Quote: Raising income through ratting and mining just means more ratting and mining. That's not a game to me. Skill training is automated for a reason. I'm in favor of moving 0.0 income to a more passive system as well, where your successes in PvP and war industry affect your ability to field passive income generators. That is exactly what we have and its not working. Its not working because large alliances have huge efficiency gains as they grow when it comes to putting up, taking down, and protecting passive income generators. They have to do less work per person than a small alliance has to in protecting limited resources. Quote: We already hit that pony until it was blue in the face. Check out Fahtim's thread. There's even a Q&A by Toman addressing your concerns. Easy to find in the second assembly thread I believe. Link? I recall reading it, but i also recall it failing to properly address the problem. Quote: Point 3 exists because with all this passive income flying around, some empire players might wonder if empire will just become a huge joke compared to the bling of 0.0. In a way, that's what I hope happens, but more in the sense of 0.0 being a different ballgame altogether. Point 3 exists yes, but its not compatible with the other stated goals. These positions are mutually exclusive, and any "compromise" is going to compromise on just how much participation you want to drain from empire and just how much power you want to remove from existing alliances. Any solution that fails to acknowledge that fact will fail, because its goals will be impossible.
NanDe YaNen The Funkalistic	Posted - 2008.10.14 14:24:00 - [13] Assembly Thread Toman's version of the proposal with his Q&A included. At the time, 0.0 threads were the redheaded stepchild sextuplets of the assembly hall and nobody wanted to raise any more of them. Not sure about some of your points, but keep working on it so at least the language of this compromise can be adjusted to get the message across clearly. Nobody's talking about increasing the player base in the game. What is being talked about is 1) Not making the game a joke for the 50% or so of players who never leave hisec (who probably will to an extent if 0.0 is buffed) 2) Not making empire such a joke that anyone who can't leave immediately (new players) needs to quit the game. I understand what you're saying about the zero-sum game, but large alliances can't play whack-a-mole across the entire galaxy every time someone trashes one of their production units and sets up shop. The inevitable result of a high volatility asset is that those with the most consistent presence will dominate the activity regardless of the tides the flow over them. Before I answer about the 25m, I'm envisioning that they make the equivalent wealth of 250m by the end of the week. Does that change the nature of your question? Is free a bad thing? I'm all for free. 25m could be too large or too small in some eyes. Being taken down in a day (reinforced mechanic, but no stront) by a handful of RR battleships may be seen as too fast or too slow by some. Without a doubt though, it sits far below the POS level of volatility and will create the whack-a-mole environment that large alliances will have to ignore at some point. They can participate where it makes sense, but will inevitably seek to consolidate their territories to what they can keep in easy reach. For the volatile part of this compromise, that's what's desired. On the high end with the production systems requiring various levels of sov and having capitol benefits etc, stable alliances with the muscle to play on that field will have the upper hand. While nobody is blocking small alliances from getting the proper sov and setting up their own systems, the reality is that they will suffer from sov volatility at the hands of larger powers and have to resort to their advantages at the whack-a-mole scale. The zero-sum will be made more of a mutual relationship by the reality of supply and consumption capability of the new resources. For instance, sub-T2 meta level items can be produced by small alliances using mostly minerals and a little bit of the new "mineral formations" from planetary sources; higher level meta and beyond can be produced by large alliances who can invent the BPC's at their facilities, but these items require an shit ton of the planetary resources. Result is that the large alliances are trying to offload minerals and the small alliances are trying to offload mineral formations. That's a self-contained economy that plays out entirely outside of empire. In a nutshell, there should be new assets for all. Some new assets will cater to large alliances. Some will cater to smaller alliances and corps or even individuals. The mutual relationship via production and realities of the types of volatility that large and small alliances can handle will ultimately keep them in healthy symbioses. That make more sense? Keep posting. I'll work on the language at some point.
Goumindong Amarr Merch Industrial GoonSwarm	Posted - 2008.10.14 15:33:00 - [14] Edited by: Goumindong on 14/10/2008 15:33:44 Originally by: NanDe YaNen Assembly Thread Toman's version of the proposal with his Q&A included. At the time, 0.0 threads were the redheaded stepchild sextuplets of the assembly hall and nobody wanted to raise any more of them. Toman's version is shitty and falls into all the same traps as every other "decentralized" solution. He makes no mention of the obvious defensive strategies and "one sides" lag.[He assumes that one side will have problems because of lag and the other will not, specifically that the small gang lags less than the big gang when the big gang comes to knock the small gangs shit in]. The obvious defensive strategy, since the attackers need their dreads on the field is t blob the freaking dreads while they can't shoot the planet. This obsoletes all the other fights until the main fight is over since one side cannot hope to win the cap fight when their sub-caps are off spending 20 minutes killing the PDS's. Quote: Nobody's talking about increasing the player base in the game. What is being talked about is 1) Not making the game a joke for the 50% or so of players who never leave hisec (who probably will to an extent if 0.0 is buffed) 2) Not making empire such a joke that anyone who can't leave immediately (new players) needs to quit the game. And neither am I talking about "increasing the player base". Look, assuming that the player base does not increase, the number of players getting a use out of space will always total the number of players. If we induce more people to leave high-sec for 0.0 then high-sec suffers[since its the proximity to markets and missions that gives the space its value anyway]. There is no way around this, if you make 0.0 better in order to draw people out, you cannot keep high-sec "the same". It will change, new hubs will be created. Quote: I understand what you're saying about the zero-sum game, but large alliances can't play whack-a-mole across the entire galaxy every time someone trashes one of their production units and sets up shop. The inevitable result of a high volatility asset is that those with the most consistent presence will dominate the activity regardless of the tides the flow over them. No, see, that is exactly what they can do, and its even easier for them to actively defend production with less people due to the way that systems are aligned. High volatility is good, its exactly what you need, but that is not what you are proposing. The barriers to entry reduce its volatility. The logistics reduce its volatility. This means of production needs to be solely based on the activities of players. In short, you want a resource that gives you money when you are there and doesn't at all, period, when you are not. No reinforcement, no 10 minutes of an RR battleship. If the enemy shows up, its production is toast until the enemy leaves. A simple reseeding of belts in 0.0 to double or triple their size and/or value as well as keeping their spawn rate constant would do this. 250m/week is simply not enough to justify consistent presence. And without consistent presence you are back to the large alliance problem. They will dominate that game just as they dominate the POS game. I mean, shit, how long did GS keep those dyspro moons in the north while fighting a full on POS war in Geminate? Now, while this isn't likely to happen on such a scale, its going to happen. Quote: In a nutshell, there should be new assets for all. Some new assets will cater to large alliances. Some will cater to smaller alliances and corps or even individuals. The mutual relationship via production and realities of the types of volatility that large and small alliances can handle will ultimately keep them in healthy symbioses. There is no such thing as an organic small alliance boost. There are only boosts to established entities or upstart entities. More coming
Goumindong Amarr Merch Industrial GoonSwarm	Posted - 2008.10.14 15:57:00 - [15] Originally by: NanDe YaNen That make more sense? Keep posting. I'll work on the language at some point. It makes sense, its just intellectually bankrupt. You cannot change the 0.0 sov mechanics without impacting the status quo. You should not even be trying. The question is instead, what about the status quo is bad, why is it bad, how do you change it? Well, aside from specific balance points, the complaints from the large alliances are threefold. 1. Shooting POS is boring. Its boring because there aren't any people around and there are a shit tonne of POS to shoot. 2. Lag 3. Small gangs have nothing to do. ____________ The complaints, aside from specific balance points, from the small alliances are fourfold. 1. Shooting POS is boring 2. Lag 3. Small gangs have nothing to do 4. Holy shit we're going to get crushed _________________ You can do something to fix number 1 and 2 and 3. Number 4 is impossible. But we will talk about that in a bit more depth later. Fixing number one is easy, reduce the number of structures that are necessary to destroy in order to flip Sov. From a game standpoint it doesn't matter what the structures are and where the structures are so long as they are limited and don't interfere with other mechanics of producing Sov. You can also make them easier to destroy, easier to fuel, etc etc etc. Moons are, actually a good place to put these structures. Stations already go on planets and we have a bunch of moons around to use. Stars are the other point, but it might not be that a central sovereignty point is what people want to focus on. Here is a way that you can reduce the number of POS simply and speedily. And while it ain't perfect, its better than moving it to planets. Alright, so we reduce the number of POS and make their defenses weaker. Now we have to do something about lag. Lag is the tough one. Because you are dealing with a central point of contention. And, in order to really effectively have a fight, you need to have a central point of contention. Spreading them out creates blobs at one side or the other. One way of spreading the fight out would be to have one fight spread across two grids. The fight is threefold. 1. Defending your grid. 2. Finding the enemies grid, 3 attacking the enemies grid. Blobbing any one grid will leave you unable to damage the enemies important infrastructure. If you can't damage the enemies important infrastructure they are just going to keep beating on you until you die. I.E. lets take small, cheap friendly ships, give them a target painter s that only work on modules, capitals, and POS structures. Then we let any dread within 100km shoot the target of that target painter. If one side doesn't go after the others dreads, then its a race to kill the painters [which will be carried to the front lines en-masse by carriers just as they now provide frigates], before the enemies destroy a target. And such, the side that is not doing offense looses. If both sides are doing only offense then at least we have two fleets in two areas. We have successfully split the fight for a single point[the POS] into two points[the POS, the Enemy Dreads] and maybe even three points[The POS, the aggressor dreads, and the defender dreads] Point three is the hardest. Letting small gangs be good at sov warfare means that large gangs gangs will be even better. Such, small gangs need to have efficiency gains built in some place. There are a number of problems with this that mainly rely on the Eve system architecture. You see, systems in eve are mainly arranged in pipes. This means that a number of attacks on various structures doesn't gain much over a single force attacking one and then going down the line. more to be continued
NanDe YaNen The Funkalistic	Posted - 2008.10.14 16:21:00 - [16] Originally by: Goumindong I mean, shit, how long did GS keep those dyspro moons in the north while fighting a full on POS war in Geminate? Now, while this isn't likely to happen on such a scale, its going to happen. A POS requires a capital attack and nobody wanted to invest in an assault on GS at the time, especially when they likely had no capability to hold the assets or defend anything they put in place. It's that simple. On the flip side, if it were possible to cut the legs out from under GS with sub-cap gangs, GS would have seen a much higher loss in domestic production on the home front. Hell, that's where I would have been. That's what I mean by high volatility. I went exploring all over GS and found the same things over and over. A few people in a station system here. A paladin hitting the station as soon as I hit local there. Nothing really to defend. GS's home front was not as exposed as you would think. There was nothing to rally a sub-cap gang to go hit. I faced greater risks from gatecamps set up by other alliances and corps at regional choke points. In a high volatility environment, those gatecamps would have been instead attacking GS assets. I hope highsec does recede a bit because of the exodus of players with the skills to get involved in the skirmishes over planetary income. By isolating the source and sink of the added production to a 0.0 phenomenon, empire won't turn into a slum for the players who start out there/choose to stay there. The entire T2 production stream will still be in place, and that leaves a lot of activity and opportunity for trade, which is all that empire needs to preserve its place. The missions are still there. The mining is still there. The low-risk income for start ups is still there. The lack of exposure to the 0.0 alliances via PvP is still there. This is what I mean by preserving the place of empire. Originally by: Goumindong No, see, that is exactly what they can do, and its even easier for them to actively defend production with less people due to the way that systems are aligned. Not seeing the advantage you're getting at. While GS can wipe most alliance's best fleets by getting their numbers together, can they do it in every system where every upstart 0.0 tycoon chooses to attack them? Can they do it against every raid from every other neighboring alliance? If the income lost to GS and gained by the raiders were large and required an expendable investment, would an alliance like GS feel much more hurt at the level of this mechanism when they were away from home? I believe the answer is yes and that GS leadership would opt to rein in their assets to what they found essential and what would net them a gain as far as the required presence to maintain the asset. GS can't fly across the galaxy to meet every gang that rears its head. Sure they can win here and there and by great margins, but can they do it everywhere at a minutes notice? Sure they can make a tour of an entire region and incap everyone's income generators with minimal losses, but can they hold anything like that? I believe the answer is no and that alliances like GS will quickly realize that while the rewards are high, the player load is simply too high to have to repeatedly make these attacks over and over again. Maybe localized GS cells would be able to fight this mechanic to an extent, but this splits up GS's numbers and makes them progressively more vulnerable to any other alliances best fleets, and this nullifies their initial advantage of size. Sub-cap vulnerable, low HP, and cheap would present the most challenging environment GS's of 0.0 can ever face.
Goumindong Amarr Merch Industrial GoonSwarm	Posted - 2008.10.14 16:21:00 - [17] The only way to make said attacks do that[and this is the only way to effect an organic way to make small gangs useful, which is to make the efficiency gain in adding another ship to the existing fleet lower than that of having that ship go off and do something on its own, which occurs mainly in the time cost of travel] is to vastly reduce the ability of POS's to defend strategic POS modules[bridges, generators, maybe jammers, but probably not]. As an aside you would then git rid of fueling as well. The idea that logistics would be getting the stuff up and protecting it since it was easy to destroy. Like a 5-10 man cruiser gang could do it easily in a few minutes. Give them the properties of a repping BS. Once the repair rate is sufficiently broken the gain in efficiency in killing the target becomes linear rather than exponential.[repair is unnecessary, flat hit points could also work]. If you make the strategic POS module effect sufficiently time sensitive[a broken jump bridge doesn't matter if its up when the enemy jumps trough], easy to replace and easy to destroy then attacking them for the heck of it isn't very valuable. But during a sov contest, sending forces to destroy those structures that aid in the enemy bringing ships to the front[and then camping the pipes] and ensuring that they stay down becomes a valid option. As well as if course, dedicating forces to ensuring that the structures stay operational. Then you have a balancing act regarding ensuring that you can reinforce the fight, that your enemy cannot and the fight itself. As always, the sole determiner of the outcome of sovereignty has to be fight over the single point. But you can extract efficiency gains by running interference on both sides if the structures that allow that to happen are sufficiently volatile. 4 is something you just cannot fix. Though you can make it easier. The reason you cannot fix 4 is because not only is "more people > less people" good for the game[since it encourages newbees to participate in the fight, and keeps the hegemony of the rich and old from turning the game into a shitty WoW clone], but because more people always means advantages in a cooperative game. The only way that you can reduce the strength of established alliances is to increase the number of small alliances and individuals. When there are a small number of players, the power of the large established block can easy cajole the others into working for their own ends. E.G. lets take a three person game where the winner is the one that wins a fight between the three relatively equal people. There are no rules, what is the optimal strategy? A: Form an alliance with either as quickly as possible then beat up the odd man out. Then after they are gone, try beat up the other guy. Your chances of winning went from 1/3 to 1/2. Sometimes, people kinda kike the guy they teamed up with to beat up on the odd man out and they form a more lasting bond. This is how corporations, alliances, and power blocks are formed.[again, remember, no rules]. If you want to shake up 0.0 you will have to encourage the formation of new power blocks, that means you have to give small individual entities a reason to go to 0.0 space and hope they don't ally themselves with the current space holders. [either way you have increased density]. The last time this happened was when new space was introduced into the game. Since its unlikely we will be getting new space every expansion, its much better to slant 0.0 income towards active players to draw people out of low-sec and empire with the promise of rewards that they don't need infrastructure to get at. only a little more coming
Goumindong Amarr Merch Industrial GoonSwarm	Posted - 2008.10.14 16:23:00 - [18] Now, of course, this doesn't cover the specific balance problems of fueling[seriously a boring stupid mechanic which only serves to exacerbate the feeling that POS need to be hard to kill, if no one is coming around to fuel it, they aren't going to be able to defend it if you come to knock the thing down], titans[Actually all large AoE's since they break the entire idea of efficiency loss from focus fire], and capitals[oh hey, why even bother having battleships when you've got 60 carriers?]
Goumindong Amarr Merch Industrial GoonSwarm	Posted - 2008.10.14 16:32:00 - [19] Originally by: NanDe YaNen A POS requires a capital attack and nobody wanted to invest in an assault on GS at the time, especially when they likely had no capability to hold the assets or defend anything they put in place. It's that simple. On the flip side, if it were possible to cut the legs out from under GS with sub-cap gangs, GS would have seen a much higher loss in domestic production on the home front. Hell, that's where I would have been. That's what I mean by high volatility. Actually they did bring caps on a number of occasions. It has nothing to do with whether or not they brought caps and everything to do with the fact that reinforcement timers let is get back and defend when necessary and that we didn't need to be there in order to make money. Quote: Not seeing the advantage you're getting at. While GS can wipe most alliance's best fleets by getting their numbers together, can they do it in every system where every upstart 0.0 tycoon chooses to attack them? Can they do it against every raid from every other neighboring alliance? Because there is more to power than the forces on the field at the moment.
NanDe YaNen The Funkalistic	Posted - 2008.10.14 16:34:00 - [20] Originally by: Goumindong 1. Shooting POS is boring. Its boring because there aren't any people around and there are a shit tonne of POS to shoot. 2. Lag 3. Small gangs have nothing to do. ____________ The complaints, aside from specific balance points, from the small alliances are fourfold. 1. Shooting POS is boring 2. Lag 3. Small gangs have nothing to do 4. Holy shit we're going to get crushed This is exactly what we were going after in Fahtim's thread. By all means, create the perfect solution. I think we were pretty close and at the very least in the right direction. I'll posit that 1. exists primarily because of 4. and the subsequent lack of any clear avenues to fight. Once it's over, it's pretty much over. 3. can be fixed by more mobility requisites (via multigrid solution) and with a sub-cap volatile asset below the POS or sov conflict scale. The mechanic you proposed with the target painter is quite similar to having simultaneous points of contention in that the speed and support will determine who gets to use their dreads and who gets trapped out in dead space where the action isn't going on. While the vulnerabilities created by a multi-grid solution will create avenues for a defender to blob the detachments from the main force, is this not the desired solution to 1. where nobody shows up because they're afraid of 4? Have a feeling we're very, very close to a damned near perfect implementation.

NanDe YaNen The Funkalistic	Posted - 2008.10.14 16:37:00 - [21] Originally by: Goumindong Actually they did bring caps on a number of occasions. It has nothing to do with whether or not they brought caps and everything to do with the fact that reinforcement timers let is get back and defend when necessary and that we didn't need to be there in order to make money. Again, POS's lack of volatility is what lets this work. Shorter reinforcement timers (maybe 12h) and less HP/firepower would have turned those into GS loss of income.
NanDe YaNen The Funkalistic	Posted - 2008.10.14 16:42:00 - [22] Originally by: Goumindong Because there is more to power than the forces on the field at the moment. I assume you're talking about GS's ability to project sov and the threat of wiping another alliances sov? If GS had to worry about the subsequent full out assault on their planetary income out in the boonies, if GS faced the fact that the defenders would just come back the next day and re-whack the mole, this projection of power would lose influence. GS could come tear down all of the towers or planetary defense stations or whatever, and all that would happen is the defenders would give GS the runaround and go hit a bunch of their planetary income points...or if the multi-grid solution works out well enough, they might stick around and try to pick off sub-cap detachments of GS.
Goumindong Amarr Merch Industrial GoonSwarm	Posted - 2008.10.14 16:48:00 - [23] Originally by: NanDe YaNen Originally by: Goumindong Because there is more to power than the forces on the field at the moment. I assume you're talking about GS's ability to project sov and the threat of wiping another alliances sov? If GS had to worry about the subsequent full out assault on their planetary income out in the boonies, if GS faced the fact that the defenders would just come back the next day and re-whack the mole, this projection of power would lose influence. GS could come tear down all of the towers or planetary defense stations or whatever, and all that would happen is the defenders would give GS the runaround and go hit a bunch of their planetary income points...or if the multi-grid solution works out well enough, they might stick around and try to pick off sub-cap detachments of GS. No, i am not. I am talking about how a perfect defense is never tested. Also, i just got to the point where Kelsin wrote the proposal. No wonder...
NanDe YaNen The Funkalistic	Posted - 2008.10.14 17:01:00 - [24] Originally by: Goumindong No, i am not. I am talking about how a perfect defense is never tested. Think you're getting a little ahead of yourself, Kanye Originally by: Goumindong Also, i just got to the point where Kelsin wrote the proposal. No wonder... Nah, we pretty much abandoned anything with the toxic "small gang" phrase and just went for a more balanced sov tool. Most of the input on that thing came from Fahtim and I. Toman wrote the Q&A on his own. ...Did I link the right thread?
Drake Draconis Minmatar	Posted - 2008.10.14 17:01:00 - [25] @ OP in response to my response My Best friend told me that diplomacy consists of 90% BS and 10% Fact. Its a necessary evil... and honestly... it makes things go smoothly. But oh well. ^_^;;; And personally.. I've learned the hard way... not all people are total jackasses. Just the ones who tend to ignore rationality and reason...and lack discernment. Oh and yes..I realize I can be a jackass myself... but at least I'm not the type to hold a grudge and ill be more than happy to retract my statements ^_^;;;
Goumindong Amarr Merch Industrial GoonSwarm	Posted - 2008.10.14 17:06:00 - [26] Edited by: Goumindong on 14/10/2008 17:07:17 Originally by: NanDe YaNen Originally by: Goumindong No, i am not. I am talking about how a perfect defense is never tested. Think you're getting a little ahead of yourself, Kanye Originally by: Goumindong Also, i just got to the point where Kelsin wrote the proposal. No wonder... Nah, we pretty much abandoned anything with the toxic "small gang" phrase and just went for a more balanced sov tool. Most of the input on that thing came from Fahtim and I. Toman wrote the Q&A on his own. ...Did I link the right thread? Yes you linked the right thread. Yes, Kelsin still wrote it. No I am not getting ahead of myself, you are not understanding what was said. Its educational. First understand why the statement is true and you will understand where your understanding failed.
Goumindong Amarr Merch Industrial GoonSwarm	Posted - 2008.10.14 17:11:00 - [27] Edited by: Goumindong on 14/10/2008 17:15:25 Originally by: NanDe YaNen think we were pretty close and at the very least in the right direction. No. There must always be one objective. Not one objective after other sequential objectives. Just one objective. Nearly all other solutions result in consolidating forces being the best option[the only way to make consolidation not optimal is by splitting the battlefields so far its near impossible to travel between them, and that presents many many more problems.] Quote: I'll posit that 1. exists primarily because of 4. and the subsequent lack of any clear avenues to fight. Once it's over, it's pretty much over. Nope. 4 primarily exists because its impossible for Iraq to assault the United States of America. Some organizations are just bigger and badder than others. This is a natural progression in semi-cooperative games. There is no getting around it, you're gonna get crushed. If you set it up so that they could "not get crushed" then you're still gonna get crushed, except instead of being crushed by someone because they had more guys its going to be because they had more money or were playing the game longer. Blobbing is much certainly the lesser of the three evils.
NanDe YaNen The Funkalistic	Posted - 2008.10.14 17:22:00 - [28] Originally by: Goumindong There must always be one objective. Not one objective after other sequential objectives. Just one objective. Nearly all other solutions result in consolidating forces being the best option[the only way to make consolidation not optimal is by splitting the battlefields so far its near impossible to travel between them, and that presents many many more problems.] That sums up exactly where we were going with requiring simultaneous points of contention. I read your proposed strategy for why the attackers would always fail against such a structure, and the thing is, there are a hundred FC's who would find ways to counter your defense and a hundred more to find counters for those attacks, which can only point to effectiveness of the solution. GS isn't perfect. No defense is perfect. Players aren't online 23/7 (though some KIA in TDE may beg to differ regarding my current activities...) Perfect offense isn't perfect defense. You can't win them all. You can't be everywhere at the same time. Some attackers have nothing to lose. The laws of entropy will take over. You need to elaborate and not because I'm misreading what you're saying. Come out from behind the magic curtain and we'll talk about it :-)
Goumindong Amarr Merch Industrial GoonSwarm	Posted - 2008.10.14 17:39:00 - [29] Originally by: NanDe YaNen That sums up exactly where we were going with requiring simultaneous points of contention. Uhh, so you're saying that you want the "PDS" 3-5 systems away from each other? Cause otherwise, no, you're not. Or you're foolish in thinking that the nodes will be defendable. Quote: You need to elaborate and not because I'm misreading what you're saying. Come out from behind the magic curtain and we'll talk about it :-) A defense does not need to be perfect to be successful. A perfect defense is never tested. Defenses are only tested when there is a question to their success. There is no question to the success of said operations. Success is determined on an individual basis, the possible actions of third parties take little part. Such, they do not occur. It is only a matter of scale that prevents GS's space being taken by a coalition of alliances[and the alliances we make], the same efficiency advantages that protect large alliances with hard to destroy assets protect them with easy to destroy assets. In order to reduce the power of the entrenched alliances you need to increase the number of players, diluting the power of the larger groups. You will not do what with mechanics that retain the entrenched alliances advantages, you need to wholly remove said incentive from that cooperative structure. Quote: Some attackers have nothing to lose Impossible, rookie ships will blow up the node before they can make an impact
Goumindong Amarr Merch Industrial GoonSwarm	Posted - 2008.10.14 17:47:00 - [30] Originally by: NanDe YaNen That's not so much a law of the game as it is a symptom of the failings of the POS as a sov tool. No, it is very much a law of games.

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