Dersen Lowery
Knavery Inc.
StructureDamage
154
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Posted - 2012.11.16 04:13:00 -
[1] - Quote
Hans Jagerblitzen wrote:I don't see empire space being cut out of the equation, but to achieve this proper balance some things may have to give, whether its tax rates, fees, slot availabilty, or mission income. These will no doubt be wildly unpopular by highsec residents who value their safety , but the problem right now is that there isn't much sacrificed FOR that safety to begin with. Biting the bullet and forcing players to choose between maximum industrial output and minimal risk isn't going to be easy - and I think its part of why we've seen CCP avoid this necessary next step for over a year now. Time is running out though, and the game will continue to fall into a rut if the hard decisions aren't made in the next pair of expansions for 2013.
As far as high sec goes: it's best suited for small, casual corps and people still getting their feet wet and learning the game (not that it's the only place to do either, of course, that's just what it's especially good for). So if it's possible to mine some, mission some, trade some and explore some, and earn a decent enough living to stay in the necessary ships and save up for a shiny thing or two, that's a good baseline. Taxes and fees are the price of life in any empire, and lore says that the empires are wary of giving access to their advanced tech to capsuleers, at least for use in their space (i.e., T1 manufacture should be by far the most available). Factional Warfare would be the obvious exception.
For nullsec, I'm going to guess that the stick of getting rid of mineral compression (or at least, nerfing the heck out of it) combined with the carrot of better access to resources in useful proportions, would go a long way toward making nullsec resource harvesting a real thing. Also, there is no reason why a nullsec or WH resident shouldn't be able to buy research, refining, and manufacturing facilities on par with anything in Empire. The POS tax needs to go, except maybe for small, cheap models.
I'm not as sure what to do with lowsec. Maybe it should be split up into different kinds of space, since it is anyway by factional warfare? I don't think its current role as "that place that's between high sec and null sec" is of any help in establishing an identity for it. But the Empires funding FW would be less hesitant about sharing their military secrets with the capsuleers who are fighting for their cause (i.e., lowsec POSes should be more able to do T2 and T3? manufacturing than is possible in high sec, in addition to capital construction).
The real trick is that farms and fields don't coexist well with war zones. I don't envy the people tasked with untangling that problem. |