Bromothymol
Ixion Defence Systems
Test Alliance Please Ignore
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Posted - 2011.01.16 23:32:00 -
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This suggestion is what I like to call window dressing problem solving. I see it all the time IRL from industrial safety departments. A problem is identified that everybody would like to see fixed, but the true solutions are too complex, or difficult to implement, so policy makers focus on things that they can change quickly and easily to make it seem like they're doing something.
So the problems here are that blob warfare is too prevalent and small alliances have no way of getting a start in 0.0. The identified sub-problem is that it is too easy to project power across long distances, and so jump bridges (and seemingly capital jump drives) are oggled suspiciously.
Jump bridges and jump drives certainly contribute, but they are not the root causes. Blob warfare occurs because stacking DPS kills things faster, and allows you to win. That is all. It is not limited to 0.0 by any means. My life in high sec saw war decs against alliances larger then us, where we were simply incapable of fielding a force to oppose them. The difference being once the war dec was over, we were able to undock and use the space as we had before.
If you were to eliminate jump based logistics, it would encourage bloc level alliances to enforce control over pipes to high sec, in effect encouraging even larger blocks of space to be controlled and blobbed. In addition, because everybody would need to use all the gates in the region, small gangs would be less likely to slip in unnoticed. So it would encourage alliances to develop defence outposts at their perimeters so the guards could keep eyes on the boarders, and the inner systems could continue with life as usual, secure in the knowledge that nobody could hop right over the outer defenses.
The problem of the "little guys" not being able to get a start in 0.0 is based in one thing. Isk. In order to obtain 0.0 sov space you need to be able to fight off an opponent who has likely been established in 0.0 for some amount of time. For the duration of that time, they were able to mine their moons, generating more income then you ever could during life in empire. So you likely have one or two cap ships, and no ship reimbursement program, while they have been able to build up the means to beat you back. And that's not even considering the costs of Sov structures, Sov system rentals, etc etc.
If, by ingenuity, luck, diplomacy, or sheer force of will, you do manage to claim a system or two, there won't be any r64 or Tech moons there. So you're going to be scraping a living off corp taxes from rats and what minerals you can harvest. Until a cap fleet wanders by and decides to kill your structures for fun (I've been on both sides of that equation).
The presence or absense of jumping via bridges, titans or capital jump drives will not change either of these issues. To fix blobbing the basic mechanics of fleet damage need to be inspected. To enable small alliances to compete for sov requires that the manner by which Isk is earned needs to be inspected. These changes are not going to be a quick "let's remove one transport mechanic" from the game type fix. These are based on systemic issues and will need systemic solutions.
That was a wall of text. Yuck.
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