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Naht
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Posted - 2003.09.28 03:20:00 -
[1]
Edited by: Naht on 28/09/2003 04:41:41
Hopefully the following ideas will generate a useful debate on what CCP can do to fix the current state of PvP:
CCP developed EVE with the expectation that pirating and bounty hunting would establish a balance between players seeking non-corporate PvP. Unfortunately, the initial risk* of getting involved in PvP battles was deemed too expensive by many players and they instead choose to avoid PvP. Additionally, the few pirates and bounty hunters looking to turn these professions into a profitable career were not provided the proper tools for hunting down worthwhile targets.
As a result players interested in turning a profit pursued other careers and players still interested in PvP predominantly took up terrorism** and decided to engage (for the most part) in PvP combat with other players that would have preferred to avoid it entirely (gate camping rather than, for example, raiding megacorps***). For reasons stated above enough bounty hunters were not available to balance the gate camping and CCP has now artificially supplemented the bounty hunter profession through the increased deployment and effectiveness of Concord agents (NPCs).
This presents EVE PvP with three problems.
Players that would like to be pirates are unable to find profitable targets to extort on a somewhat regular basis.
Players that would like to be bounty hunters cannot justify the risk to attack pirates.
Megacorps (and probably many other smaller corps) have grown at an unexpected rate because they have been able to operate in low security systems without sufficient risk.
These three items form a triangle of dependence.
-If pirates were able to use effective guerilla tactics on megacorps, megacorps would be forced to spend their money on either their own security forces or on hiring bounty hunters.
-Bounty hunting (or at least the security industry in general) would then become a viable profession as the payments and rewards are increased to balance the risk. Allowing bounty hunting to become a profitable enterprise would create a rank of pilots willing to disrupt the gate camping blockades. The blockading terrorist-pirates would be easy prey for these experienced bounty hunters (<-edit) due to the predictability of the terrorist-pirates' tactics.
-Disrupting the blockades would force the terrorist-pirates to become less predictable and therefore begin engaging in guerilla warfare and opportunistic raids against the valuable assets held by megacorps and other corps operating in low security space.
-Making low security space more dangerous via pirating increases the risk to sufficient levels to justify the gains available in these low security systems.
-Increasing the risk will slow the growth rate of megacorps and sharply decrease the success of smaller corps in low security space, unless they can afford to raise the funds necessary to hire bounty hunters or support their own security forces.
Additionally the following effects should be realized:
-Pirates would have very little desire to enter high security space with malicious intent because it wouldnĈt be as profitable for them and they would be sighted too frequently by bounty hunters or informers.
-Concord could then have their effectiveness decreased as the terrorist threat level to the Empires diminishes and a graduated response could be implemented as suggested in other posts. This graduated (but quickly scaling) response would allow the occasional unsuspected guerilla strike against a worthwhile unprotected target, but not the wholesale slaughter of random targets.
-The current oversupply of manufactured goods would benefit greatly as the EVE market would actually see an increase in PvP. Hopefully, demand would rise to levels where high output at low margins would actually be profitable to savy manufactures and traders. The high output at low margins would force corps to have manufacturers specialize in their tasks to keep up with demand while maintaining the low costs necessary to mitigate the high rate of PvP.
The above theory and suggestions are certainly a bit idealistic and they rely on the balance of many issues.
However, as I see it the fundamental flaw in the current situation is the lack of bounty hunters. Therefore my question to the EVE community is where did all the players disappear to that wanted to become bounty hunters or members of their corpĈs security forces? For I believe this is your moment to shine.
My second questions is to those more experienced in these matters than myself. What else will it take to make this work as I believe CCP intended?
Edited for page break.
Edited "experienced pirates" to "experienced bounty hunters".
Gravis Corp |
Naht
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Posted - 2003.09.28 03:21:00 -
[2]
Edited by: Naht on 28/09/2003 03:25:54
Page 2
Disclaimer: I have participated in very little PvP combat, aside from being at the wrong end of a m0o battleship (and at that only for about 5 seconds), IĈm not a member of a pirate corp and IĈm not part of a mega or even medium sized corporation. Given that, IĈd like to further point out that IĈm not claiming the above and the resulting discussion as fact, but merely my interpretation of my limited experiences and the relevant experiences that IĈve been able to extract from these forums.
* I believe the PvP risk has begun to turn a corner with the extension of insurance terms to 3 weeks and the significant drop in ship prices. I believe it will further drop once tech II items become regularly available and ships are no longer equipped with rare pirate drops that are very difficult to replace.
** IĈm sure IĈll get some flak for referring to gate camping as terrorism, but the definition of piracy that IĈm using is here. If someone has a suggestion for a better way to describe the action of destroying a playerĈs ship and pod without knowing their intention or without having the intent to steal or extort from them, IĈll gladly change my word choice.
*** Megacorps would probably argue that they are not willing PvP combatants either. However, I'm making the assumption that Megacorps achieved their size and wealth by taking advantage of profitable mining activities in low security space. I feel venturing into low security space must be a risky activity and should be akin to inviting PvP. Specifically, I feel that Megacorps developed as quickly as they did because they were not targeted by pirates for the risks they took in low security space.
Edited to correct url.
Gravis Corp |
Naht
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Posted - 2003.09.28 03:46:00 -
[3]
Actually, I would think it would be more profitable if there was an effective way to attack miners in 0.0 until the corp gave up a weekly / monthly protection fee. I think the point I was trying to make is that bounty hunters need to be able make gate camping cost ineffective due to its predictability and pirating needs to be more profitable to stop the random terroism at the gates.
I'm not directly advocating allowing pirates into high security space, or even medium security space on a regular basis. I'm suggesting that bounty hunter players need something that will make it possible to keep the pirates out as needed without Concord's help, thereby restoring the PvP balance.
Gravis Corp |
Naht
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Posted - 2003.09.28 03:55:00 -
[4]
Edited by: Naht on 28/09/2003 03:56:29
 Quote:
We can't do roidfield heists because people have ample time to flee before our magnetic fields are allowing us to lock onto them and there aren't much other forms of pirating available (other than maybe empire-space-kestrel-suicide pirating).
Ok. Good a solid reason where there's a problem, and now we have the beginning of a good debate.
What about the argument that your presence in the system prevents the miners from going out and mining? You don't even have to be in the same belt, as you're now using fear of an attack as the basis of your extortion. If miners can't mine the corp is limited in its profitable activities. You just have to extort an amount that is sufficently less than the value that can be gained from the corp remaining in the system / constellation / region.
Edit removed typos.
Gravis Corp |
Naht
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Posted - 2003.09.28 04:29:00 -
[5]
Edited by: Naht on 28/09/2003 04:30:39
Quote:
1 thing more, nobody hires anyone. There must be some changes in the market level and isk acquisition for this to happen, I thinkmthat it was intented too as the game was picking up more advertisement from word to mouth from beta 3 4.
Another good point. Currently NPC corps provide the isk basis for trade and other NPC bounties. Would part of a solution be to have Concord instituted bounties on PCs? Now you can reduce Concord's direct role while increasing the benefit to becoming a bounty hunter.
I can already see the issue of a pirate pod-killing themselves to collect the bounty. The only solution to this that I can think of would be to make it cost prohibitive for them to do so. Implants certainly help (at least at their current prices), but then there's still the abundant supply of clones.
I'm not convinced that limiting clone access to low security status players is the solution to this problem though. Any other ideas?
Edited for typos.
Gravis Corp |
Naht
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Posted - 2003.09.28 04:35:00 -
[6]
I completely agree. I don't want to see piracy fade away, but with the exception of a few examples on these forums, I haven't heard of much pirating happening now.
In my original post I mentioned three elements that need to be addressed. The first one was:
-Players that would like to be pirates are unable to find profitable targets to extort on a somewhat regular basis.
Gravis Corp |
Naht
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Posted - 2003.09.28 04:51:00 -
[7]
Quote:
mega that is needed to construct anythink valuable as a weapon or ship, vanish. PvP is affected by every aspect of the game.
Good point. I'd left out the issues of the mega shortage, baby roids and monster scordite because while certainly relevant they seem to be covered fairly well in other posts.
If I'm not mistaken CCP has commented that they are addressing ore distribution as part of the new mining skill(s) and we now know TomB is aware of the baby roid and monster scordite issues through the last csm meeting.
I also hope that the Devs might take a look at what we have to say here or that at least a Polaris member or GM will flag it as something they should take a look at. I suspect this is very much up to how well we maintain the maturity level in the debate. So far, very good!
Gravis Corp |
Naht
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Posted - 2003.09.28 05:17:00 -
[8]
Quote:
Bounty hunters can find better things to do then chace down a space rat. I rather mine Bistot, exploit trade or chain farm for my ISK.
I would argue that while certainly valid activities that you are more of a jack-of-all-trades due to this variety, rather than a specialized bounty hunter. I suspect the pirates you are hunting however are a bit more specialized.
Quote:
Bounty hunting for fun isn't even possible in this game. No way to track down any individual and if you run into a lone rat he will see you in local and hide in the middle of no where. Frustration is not fun.
Here I'd argue that there's no need to track down bounties as the situation stands. With the existing gate camping I'd suggest that there's plenty of isk to be made from the predictability of pirate behavior. The number of pods killed on the starmap should be a more than sufficient tracking mechanism.
Quote:
Bounty Hunters like to work alone, pirates like to hold hands with corp buddies and gank individuals or weaker forces.
That sounds like bad tactics on the part of bounty hunters to me. As the gate campers and megacorps have demonstrated teamwork reigns supreme in EVE. Unfortunately, PvP tactics are far from my forte, so hopefully someone else can chime in with some useful suggestions on this topic.
I agree with the rest of your post, especially as terrorists convert over to pirating for profit and using guerilla rather than siege tactics.
Gravis Corp |
Naht
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Posted - 2003.09.28 16:53:00 -
[9]
Edited by: Naht on 28/09/2003 16:56:50
Sarae: Quote:
PvP simply isn't fun anymore. It consists mostly of a few people sitting at a jump-in spot with tons of drones out, shooting hapless travelers as they jump in and are lagged out.
This point is fairly central to my argument. Why is it that gate and jump-in point camping are happening if PvP isn't fun? Someone obviously thinks its fun since there are a number of players still doing it. I think it would be more fun to take on these players and attempt to breakup the blockade, yet this isn't happening.
Mynobe: Quote:
One idea would be to turn this game into PVE and have PVP be a subset of that.
I agree with your points expressing and reiterating what's wrong with the current PvP situation, but I think the game in it's current state is a good foundation (and doesn't need a drastic change such as conversion to PvE), but as you point out that foundation still needs some tweaking to encourage players to take PvP risks.
Demangel, more good points about what's wrong.
Now the real question is within the existing foundation how can we help CCP fix it?
Gravis Corp |
Naht
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Posted - 2003.09.29 02:06:00 -
[10]
Quote:
Disbanding NPC CONCORD and..making a real CONCORD form eager to police players.
I think there will be a need for Concord as an NPC entity for quite some time, if not forever. Replacing Concord with PCs is a great goal for the community to shoot for, but in addition to correcting the balance of PvP (hopefully this thread will reveal and evolve a few more ideas to this end) I believe you will need a much larger player base to respond to the amount of trouble that PC pirates can cause in a universe as big as EVE.
Pirates can strike wherever they choose once they have identified a profitable target. If there's no Concord to respond immediately (and it's unlikely that players will ever be able to respond quickly as a crime is in progress) the risk to pirating will be too low, therefore upsetting the balance of the profession.
EVE will always need to have at least a graduated NPC response (scaling quickly) from Concord to eliminate any terrorist or excessive pirating activates in Empire space. Bounty hunting will most-likely remain an activity that presents retribution from the victims after the crime has been committed.
Gravis Corp |
Naht
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Posted - 2003.09.29 02:14:00 -
[11]
Quote:
About bounty hunters having probs bcoz ppl just know who they are, well, theres certain things my corp has done to try to cut back on this.
I hadn't even considered the issue of identity from the bounty hunter's point of view. Very valid concern. While the pirate's reputation can instill fear that can generate profit, the bounty hunter's rep must certainly hinder their abilities to hunt.
Quote:
Someone mentioned some gameplay changes, mainly the removal of MWD's, and the changing of ship speeds. This point i fully agree on, as i believe MWD's are a real reason that eve's developed into a scaling mmorpg, get one ship, use that till u get enuff money, get next bigger ship, so on and so forth, which is not what i believe eve initially planned to be.
Can you please go into a bit more detail of how MWDs and speed are causing issues? I don't quite understand the point your making or how it relates to a player upgrading to progressively larger ships?
Gravis Corp |
Naht
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Posted - 2003.09.30 00:23:00 -
[12]
Quote:
MWD's basically give the big ships the speed advantage that the little ships should have
Quote:
the MWD has inbalanced the trade/transport side of eve
Good points, now I understand. Although a little more drastic of a change then I fear CCP is willing to undertake, good solutions too.
How cool would it be to look in your hanger when heading out into a PvP situation and choose your fast agile frigate over you slow but heavily armored battleship because the frigate is the better tactical solution for this particular mission. But you're right, speed, agility and tracking are the big three that need to be balanced for this to work properly.
Gravis Corp |
Naht
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Posted - 2003.09.30 00:41:00 -
[13]
Quote:
Naht first off your whole premese is off.
Damn! And I was doing so well so far. 
I think we're just arguing a bit of semantics here as to what PvP means, but I can see your point and I think you can see mine.
BTW I'm glad to see DV, Heroes and EVE Marshals contributing with their experiences.
Gravis Corp |
Naht
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Posted - 2003.09.30 21:16:00 -
[14]
Quote:
can we get an auto reload function in game please?
Hey! No hijacking the thread.  But it was a nice *BUMP*
Gravis Corp |
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