The other game that did it right was Dark age of Camelot.

So on Buckingham the new plex sizes seem to be in place and the warp in now seems to drop you 10km from the button, that is very close not really sure that is a good change. It is nice that you start right on top of the rats though.

I assume the NPCGÇÖs have not changed yet, the medium seems to have the rats from the old major, I hope this will change before the 4th.

So on Buckingham the new plex sizes seem to be in place and the warp in now seems to drop you 10km from the button, that is very close not really sure that is a good change.

-one last thing, it would be REALLY cool, if plexing sites with a group of people increased the difficulty of the plex and gave better rewards and more sovereignty control. It's pointless to plex with other people as a team because the point split is so bad. OR just make plexes that are built for balanced groups (good idea with the new cheap logi ships)

I really like this idea in general. Encourages grouping, rather than current ninjaing, where you spend 10 mins capping the plex, and someone shows up at the last minute and steals half the LP.

However, the balance of scaling is really difficult to get right. I just got out of GW2 which had scaling difficulty based on the number of people. But it was still pretty bad. Beyond a certain point, there were so many people that things, no matter how many and how tough, got completely obliterated within a second of spawning because there was just so much damage going on.

i don't like it very much that the flag moved that close to the warpin. This makes all kiting or sniping setups even more risky to use as they already are, since you will have to prepare to brawl if you want to fight inside a plex. Right now on TQ you still have the chance that the wt is at the flag and not at the warpin, this option won't be there anymore after the change.

I believe the reasoning behind this change was to create more fights and encourage pvp setups in plexes. But i am not sure if thats the right way to encourage those (people would just run earlier... close range dscan and warp). I posted somewhere some time ago that i would prefer to give the plexer a good reason why he should stay and fight. Easiest way i can imagine would be backwards running timers if you leave the plex. Dev response was "still in discussion" or something like that... Seems like CCP decided against it. :-(

I think they are doing the backward timer too.

It is a matter of kiting ship vs brawling ship.

It is a matter of kiting ship vs brawling ship.

Right now brawling ships need to make a tactical decission if they want to capture the plex. After spotting the enemy on short scan you have around 30-40 seconds of time to move from button to beacon. If you can manage it, you just might be able to snatch the kiting ship at the acc gate exit. If you can't, you are in for a tough fight where you'll try to slingshot the enemy in before they eat up all your EHP.

With the new change the brawler ships can just camp the exit beacon AND run the plex simultaneously. The kiting ship pilots will hesitate to enter plexes.

right. but why has it been changed? It limits the options for no good reason. At least i see none.

It is a matter of kiting ship vs brawling ship.

Right now brawling ships need to make a tactical decission if they want to capture the plex. After spotting the enemy on short scan you have around 30-40 seconds of time to move from button to beacon. If you can manage it, you just might be able to snatch the kiting ship at the acc gate exit. If you can't, you are in for a tough fight where you'll try to slingshot the enemy in before they eat up all your EHP.

With the new change the brawler ships can just camp the exit beacon AND run the plex simultaneously. The kiting ship pilots will hesitate to enter plexes

I would rather do it like that: Let the beacon/warpout distance as it is at offensive plexes and move the warpout to 10km at beacon at defensive plexes.

They won't hesitate. They won't enter at all unless they want to lose their ship.

there is no difference between defensive and offensive plexes. They are the same thing.

There is a big difference: in offensive plexes you need to shoot npcs in defensive plexes you get in and grab a cup of coffee.
Moving the button near warpout in defensive plexes would make them a litle bit more exciting and more rich in variety.
But do that with offensive plexes and you will see as I said only brawlers like double repped incursus in the plexes.

They are the same from a mechanics point of view, it's just that the rats make things different for either faction, the only way I can think of doing this would be to have two buttons one for either faction, linked with one timer but one closer to the warp in for the defender.

You are not thinking hard or long enough

- Defender spends 10s on timer after which it begins to count down on its own even if defender leaves vicinity/plex/system.
- When a timer has been set to auto-run, initial spawn withdraws as "poddies got our backs!" and future spawns are halved (read: double spawn cycle).
- When an attacker enters capture range, timer immediately resets if on auto-run, but spawn cycle remains 'gimped'.
- Half of LP-for-Kills (LfK) within a plex earned by a defender counts towards system VP pool and LfK is doubled on grid.
- Defensive plexes yield no LP on their own (more than covered by 2x LfK).

= Defensive work suddenly requires actual defence as the gunless frig running from all enemies will effectively hand plexes to the enemy.
= Defensive LP farms are eliminated.
= Aggressive/effective pew defence can make more LP than current "run-away!" stratagem.
= Defender acquires ability to defend system even though plexes themselves are lost provided they kill enough of enemy to counter VP gained by plexes, essentially trading ISK/stockpiles (and killboard epeen) for system VP.
= Attacker has to be on the ball in any/all systems being targeted lest defender use auto-run to seize plexes.

But...alts.

What stops me or my corp from using an alt in the enemy militia to gimp all the plexes before we take them ?

The NPcGÇÖs now seem to have changed; I only encountered one wave of one NPC in each plex. NPC is there on warp in no more NPCGÇÖs spawned.

My vexors drones easily dealt with the cruiser in a medium, I returned in an incurses to tackle the next wave no more NPCGÇÖs.

In the same incursus, single rep about 200dps with void I then: -

Easily killed the frigate in a Rookie.

Tanked the destroyer in a Small for a bit before killing it.

Killed a cruiser in a medium facility.

Killed a battlecruiser in a large compound. This took a little while (couple minutes tops) but orbiting close I was in no danger. Did not even need repper.

I assume these are not finished and that more will be introduced. In the larger sites I feel it the frigates (not present now) that will need to be beefed up, a single battlecruiser is easy to speed tank.

So combined with frigate revision, FW will be nothing but?

CCP obviously need to tweak some more if all sizes can be done in a single hull as the whole point of the NPC/Plex revamp is to avoid that very scenario .. doesn't much matter if the frig is gunless as now/before or if its a generic pew fit, they should have a hard time in mediums and an impossible time in majors .. we need it to require appropriate ships and or gang operations dammit!

What options are there to avoid the solo frig scenario:
- Neuts on cruisers, BCs, BS?
- Webs on cruisers, BCs, BS?
- Tackling frigs added to pool (kill first and exploit tracking I guess, so bad option)?
- Destructible sentry guns?

All this talk the "npcs are too strong" the "npcs are too weak." Its a waste of time....

It sounds like rats active tanks need to be beefed up a bit. But really I think its foolish for ccp to assume rats will be the protection of faction war. To the extent CCP keep focusing on rats as the defense, plexing will remain a farming pve game.