The ESS has a global beacon, meaning it will be visible by all players, allowing them to warp directly to it. Note that the new scan-block deployable does not interfer with this.
The ESS has around 150.000 Hit Points (ca. 90000 structure, and 30000 each in armor and shield).
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The ESS can be scooped up by the owner of the ESS (the player that deployed it).

The payout level of an ESS is reset if it is destroyed, scooped or when it is accessed and the system-wide pool is distributed.
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The current payout level of the ESS is visible in the name of it, and can thus be seen anywhere in the system.
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It takes time for the ESS to print the tags and hand them out, this time is 40 seconds.

The ESS has a warp bubble with a radius of 15km. Warping to the ESS brings you to the edge of the bubble. This warp bubble has exactly the same functionality as a normal one.

Anyone can access an ESS, not just the owner.

The increased payout is reset each time the ESS is emptied, so you can do that, but then you-¦re never getting the full payout.

Also, those of you saying "no one will use these things!" are fooling yourselves. Anyone destitute enough to actually shoot red crosses for money in this game will leap willingly into a 5% bounty increase carrot, no matter the risk.

Less cash for players, more PvP around deployed ESS = more GTC/PLEX sales \o/

The problems with this implementation basically boil down to two major issues:

1) Interceptors exist

Interceptors are currently bubble immune and cannot be locked before they warp off. They invalidate nearly any defense you'd put up to guard your ESS. A lot of the balance here assumes you can guard it, which isn't really the case. There's no real viable way to kill an interceptor before it gets there, and with the ability of the interceptor to steal, warp out, and warp back in in 40s to get its tags the inty is virtually unkillable. This may be more of an issue that giving bubble immunity to interceptors was simply a mistake, but it makes the intended balance here not work.

2) A massive inbalance in the risk/reward that makes it a bad bet

You're asking people to risk 15% of their income for a 5% boost. That's a bad bet, especially considering point 1: you can't really do anything to affect the odds. You're going to wind up in the red most of the time, and 5% is not enough for people to want to play this game. Plus, the fact you are dumb enough to deploy an ESS means you're suddenly going to get a lot more interceptors in your space and you will lose a lot more often: word will spread about the people dumb enough to drop ESS that you can steal from and interceptors will decend on your space, losing you the money you risked for the ess, and losing you the money you'd have made while you safe up because hostiles are in your ratting system.

Looking forward to these as a way to maybe force a fight from bears who usually dock up untill i leave system.

However if you drop one and leave, you'll be notified the moment they get in it's area. Since they are unlikely to blow it up with a few interceptors they'll have to bring something bigger... in a bubble.... to a spot you can warp to directly.

Please explain who would drop on and destroy a structure like that. 500k EHP is far more than a roaming gang would be able to burn through. That would be a flat buff to null income. Might as well just boost ratting income and save the extra step. I do agree that the benefit from deploying one of these is a bit underwhelming. So, I'm not sure how widely used they will be.

Based on feedback, we're looking at three things:
- Time to get loot - lot of good points that the time needs to be increased
- Interceptors too good - we're looking at ways to decrease the efficiency of using an interceptor to steal
- Too effective as warp bubble - we're looking at making it less viable

Thanks for the feedback so far. Any test feedback from Sisi would also be much appreciated.

But there was that one time they fixed...and another time they...wait...no. No. CCP pretty much never fixes broken nullsec shit they leave behind.

You see, some people give constructive criticism as to what works and doesn't work with the concept. Others simply QQ that the sky is falling and emote over the proposed loss of bounties. For example, none of the 5 posts you typed in this thread is constructive in any way. If you actually read the posts that discuss potential issues with the concept, you'd find CCP's response and efforts are generally spot on. In the mean time, keep QQ'ing all of the forum though, it's rather entertaining (in the obnoxious three year old throwing a temper tantrum way).

Because the ISK coming into the game from Null Sec bounties every day is insane and we want to minimize inflation.



This is subjective. Some will feel the risk is not worth the gain, some will feel the gain is worth the risk.

Am I wrong, or is the ESS essentially a siphon on null-sec ratting bounties?

I don't give a rats ass about the isk it drops. I want the locals to form up and fight.

In the current environment, if I roll into the area with 3 thorax, a sabre, and 2 inties, the locals have no reason what so ever to undock or leave their POS. The only conflict we can instigate when raiding their territory is catching a ratter, and that's why small gang PvP is leaving nullsec.

there's a difference between the people who think they should be able to affect sov through small-gang warfare and the people who think they should be able to inconvenience individuals in that sov enough to get a fight

If the ESS is NOT deployed by the local inhabitants, it won't change anything in game. No harm, no foul.

If presented with an ESS region and a non-ESS region, I'd probably go to the region with ESS's deployed. At the same time, that means the region with ESS's deployed will have more content defending their space. While many alliances are too nullbear to desire the increased activity, there are plenty of groups out there that would welcome the action. Frankly, I thought goons would be one of those alliances!

How much of an income boost would be worth the hassle of additional roaming gangs traversing your region?
How much enjoyment would your home-defense group gain out of additional small gangs entering the area?

And as a side note: We can QQ inty gangs all we want, but we reap what we sow. Last time I took an 8 man cruiser gang into VFK looking for some fun, yall j-bridged around to pin our group in a pipe with two 30man helldeath gate camps. That's completely ok, but it forces our hand to bring inties instead. On the otherhand, I think nullified inties are a terribly broken thing.

POS and small fights don't work so well. For siphons to generate small-scale fights, they needed to be deployable at 500+ km's from the POS (i.e. outside of POS weapon range, but still on grid).

You have a point here... I play this game for PvP. I carebear some, indy some, but when I log in I do so to pew pew. So when I'm out ratting, I like being interrupted by hostiles. This is a very different mindframe from the nullbear that simply wants to make isk, and loathes the distractions I create. From their perspective, I can see why they would vehemently oppose any game-objective that forces them to fight to keep it.

It has been shown multiple times in this thread that properly fit interceptors are literally uncatchable due to the way server ticks work.

1.) The amount in the ESS is proportional to the number of ratters in system. So the rewards for raiders will be most in systems filled with enough players to properly defend it. Spending 10 minutes in a system with a local population of 1, just to recover 20m isk in loot is not worth your time, unless you are only 1 or 2 players, because the local will not bother to defend it otherwise.

Yes, and most of that boils down to "ratters are cowards and will vehemently oppose anything which negatively impacts their ability to be cowards".