What is to stop me from playing games with standings to fool the system?

I'd imagine it'd be based on the ratter's standings. Neutral or hostile to the ratter is considered "hostile" by the system.

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Okay, so, I am getting my ass handed to me by the rats, so I warp in my neutral alt and all the rats warp away immediately.

Or maybe I don't actually want to fight - I just want to troll the living hell out of the ratter. So I simply warp in to every complex he tries to run, causing all the rats to warp away, then immediately warp out.

Not saying it is a hopelessly bad idea, you just have to consider how Eve players will break it.

Essentially it is a hopeless idea.

Not because it is bad, but because of the complexities of programming an AI that could do these types of things.
To stay at a reasonable lever of complexity AND size for a game like EvE an AI will for the foreseeable future have to rely on a pre-programmed series of actions based on what the player is doing, the burner missions are a perfect example of this.

Besides who says that it would be good for the game to have all PvE content behave like real PvP?

This whole notion centers on the failed idea that if players were exposed to a PvP like setting and had to fly PvP fit ships in their PvE activities they would transition from PvE to actual PvP activities.

After all that I have no problems with CCP adding a series of optional more PvP like missions at all levels into the game. pehaps changes to the burner missions would be a good place to start.

Tackle can never be a requirement as it invalidates ALL long range fits.

Tackle can never be a requirement as it invalidates ALL long range fits.

This is hardly the first time this has been suggested. Hell, it's not even the first time it's been suggested by me (just not this year).

It's too bad that they screwed up Burner missions so badly. This is what we should have had for Burner missions, instead we got stupidly powerful mindless NPCs, who are just as predictable and easy to kill (with the right setup) as regular NPC's.

Just curious though, how does the game tell whether a hostile player warped in or a friendly one? Standings?

What is to stop me from playing games with standings to fool the system?

rats stick around until acts of aggression are committed

so if the new player attacks the previous ratter, rats warp off
if the new player attacks the rats, more rats warp in

I'd rather go stabs or self-destruct than entertain a roamer.

You entertain one roamer, 25 of them come. Not entertaining a roamer is pretty damn basic ratting policy.

ED: Since most roamers are going to have more SP than me (because I have only 2010 char with 2 years break as my best), I will lose my ship anyway, so self-destructing is obviously better choice - you can't counter lack of SP. And stabs are SOP for ratting in dangerous areas.

the last time I saw only one roamer show up was years ago. Now the only thing warping into me are gangs. which no matter how pvp I fit my ship isn't going to be well against 4 or more hostiles

When you have enough fingers to count the number of jumps required to reach Catch, Stain and Curse, roamers are your everyday pests.

won't change people wanting to dock up with neutral in local in 0.0, they may be open to the idea of pvp based on where they are but when ratting its to make isk not to pvp if there is a chance to lose isk then they won't do it.

move to better space I would say then. dek is nice.

They tried it.

We got those ****** burner missions.

This is hardly the first time this has been suggested. Hell, it's not even the first time it's been suggested by me (just not this year).

The basic problem with combat PvE in eve is that it's too different from PvP. It's a predictable, mindless grind where your ship is hilariously over-powered compared to the NPCs that you are fighting, so to make it interesting at all, you fight dozens of them.

Not only is this boring and predictable, it requires using ship doctrines that are very different from, and useless in, PvP. As a consequence, there are no interesting ratter vs. roamer fights. Roamer warps in, ratter tries to run, and he either gets caught, or not. What could have been an interesting fight is either a one-sided gank, or a miss.

So, here's what I'd propose:

Content Scaling: Fewer rats, but tougher, and that have more player-like behavior, for instance, have to point them, or they'll warp off if they're losing. Instead of having dozens of rats on the field, have one warp in as one is going down. Vary the rats that warp in to provide changing, challenging scenarios for the player. Have the kinds of ships that you face change depending on the ship that you brought, as opposed to a Sanctum always having the same thing. It should almost have the feel of a PvPer's dojo, where you are training for fights against players. Bounties of course would have to be higher per unit, to adjust for the smaller number of ships.

Get Ready to Rumble: Make combat anoms accessible through ded gates, and have those gates scale to whatever the player inside brought. If he's in a frig, you can only get a frig through, similar to the way FW sites work, only with more player choice. If a hostile player warps in, the rats warp off, leaving the players to fight. If a friendly player warps in, the content scales to match the new players on the field.

+1
well written ideas, i like it, one step at a time we can make pve more like pvp

Why do you all want to bring your snorefests to my pacy pve?

I doubt that. The AI that would simulate how a player flys a tackler, or a logi, or a DPS ship, whether its a kiter or a brawler, really isn't all that complex, when you think about it

I did. For the reasons that I stated. The necessity of having to do PvE in a ship that's more or less useless for PvP makes ratter vs. roamer encounters uninteresting. They should be more interesting.

First of all, I'm pretty sure an idea has to be tried before it fails.

Secondly, that's not my reason for suggesting this at all. My focus here is primarily 0.0 anoms.

I I don't think that missions should be the focus of this at all, though the idea could be applied to low-sec missions. I'm thinking more of 0.0 anom runners.

Bring a tackler, if you want to fly a sniper, and make sure that the AI adapts the NPC fleet comp to what you brought, and that the reward scales appropriately.

If you want to solo, bring a brawler, or a shorter range kiter. It's no different from PvP, where you don't solo in a ship without a point.

Imagine rock-paper-scissors PVE where the fleet comp of what you're facing keeps changing as you kill ships, getting more challenging for you. Would be really cool. Despite my tag, I might even rat again. It would also be awfully cool to warp into an anom wondering what kind of solo or small gang PvP setup you were about to face.

The necessity of having to do PvE in a ship that's more or less useless for PvP makes ratter vs. roamer encounters uninteresting. They should be more interesting.

There are lot of posts based on the same flawed premise that you can change a persons personality with game mechanics.

You cannot.

Throw as many flavors of stupid as you wish at the simple fact if life and it still wont change.

Okay, so, I am getting my ass handed to me by the rats, so I warp in my neutral alt and all the rats warp away immediately.

Or maybe I don't actually want to fight - I just want to troll the living hell out of the ratter. So I simply warp in to every complex he tries to run, causing all the rats to warp away, then immediately warp out.

Not saying it is a hopelessly bad idea, you just have to consider how Eve players will break it.

it is not isk, it is the hand wringing behind the key board.

The risk of loss has been almost eliminated due to the isk faucet that is wide open at the moment. No worries in losing your pod's, no worries on losing anything any more.

if some one wants to inject risk in the game, you would have to cram a sht ton of high end plants in your head to get the thrill back again.

No, isk no longer is a viable argument, it is an excuse.

You entertain one roamer, 25 of them come. Not entertaining a roamer is pretty damn basic ratting policy.

ED: Since most roamers are going to have more SP than me (because I have only 2010 char with 2 years break as my best), I will lose my ship anyway, so self-destructing is obviously better choice - you can't counter lack of SP. And stabs are SOP for ratting in dangerous areas.

My I interest you in some very, very, very hard anomalies that if you don't bring a few corpmates will be the end of what you just flew in with?

The first burner missions were too difficult and too expensive for my taste, so I say no dear agent. But again I have found the ultimate pve challenge for small gangs Sleepers.
Too easy you say? Have you tried to engage 6 Sleepless Guardians at once? Your 3 billion marauder was just sacrificed to bob. Now we get three weeks of sunshine because of that sacrifice.

Yeah let someone gank you in class 5/6 sleeper anomalies, what could go wrong.. I'll tell you, since it happened to a buddy and I while doing a sleeper relic site.
We were in the last wave and doing well 'only' two battleships left on the field but you cannot compare those with Blood Raider or Guristas. We were orbiting the center of a structure at a wide orbit and a Heretic and a Phantasm appear on grid.
My corpmate asks me on comms if we should tower up and I took a few seconds and said "no, we could shoot them instead.."

Said and done. The Heretic goes down and we started to chase the Phantasm which bailed with no shields left (he was buffer tanked).
W-space is awesome. Use your immediate environment to your advantage. We made about 50m each for creating content and 15 minutes of excitement.

PVP is only boring if you are in lowsec with station humpers that cannot loose a single ship and undock archons on you, that typhoon must survive, it's the last one in EVE.