You know there is a way to have our Mercs and eat the cake too. Go with the limits on allies after a wardec to help the merc market out (and a merc market interface!) and ohh lets see how to let smaller entities band together..... INSTAL A DAMN TREATY SYSTEM ALREADY. You could allow the corps or alliances that are all party to a specific treaty to join a war IF they where a party to the treaty prior to the war being declared for instance, and yet if the war goes south, mercs are an option. Let the players decide the terms of their treaties such as whom they will or will not come to support and which aggressors trigger that, and let the sand flow.

It's funny you should mention this.................

PLEASE

PLEASE

This makes more sense CCP. The larger alliances already have an advantage in manpower and resources to bring into a fight. Artificially giving them even more advantages preventing defenders from getting Allies by a game induced tax is unnecessary. Once some sort of parity is approached, you can start applying fees to keep the kitchen sink from being thrown.

Mercs will still be appealing, in their own niche. For example:

A 10 man high-sec piracy corp decs a 30 man mining corp, demanding ransom or exploding Orcas. At this point the defender is already over the manpower headcount of the aggressor with an apparent 3:1 "advantage." Make them pay an exorbitant fee to bring in an ally. Reality knows that they need some combat pilots. This is where the Mercs come into play. They could be hired for less than the cost of bringing in Allies.

Mercs would also be appealing to bring in an advantage once you have an approx. 1:1 headcount with your enemy for less than the cost of Allies.

Yep, this is a good idea. Especially if it was put in BEFORE having allies starts to cost money. Since having a treaty system would fundamentally alter the way wars are considered and would have a dramatic effect on Merc recruitment.

Lastly, there is a new skill out there, called Armor Resistance Phasing. It reduces the cycle time of Reactive Armor Hardeners (or, well, the one that currently exists) by 10% per level. This skill costs ca. 600k, has a skill rank of 5 and is sold wherever good skill books are sold (i.e. the usual places).

You know there is a way to have our Mercs and eat the cake too. Go with the limits on allies after a wardec to help the merc market out (and a merc market interface!) and ohh lets see how to let smaller entities band together..... INSTAL A DAMN TREATY SYSTEM ALREADY. You could allow the corps or alliances that are all party to a specific treaty to join a war IF they where a party to the treaty prior to the war being declared for instance, and yet if the war goes south, mercs are an option. Let the players decide the terms of their treaties such as whom they will or will not come to support and which aggressors trigger that, and let the sand flow.

I hear that repeatedly attacking a developer of the game is now bannable. I would be careful how many times you attack soundwave, who has done nothing but promote great changes and fixes to this game ever since he has joined ccp games.