Alz Shado
Ever Flow
ORION FEDERATION
   |
Posted - 2007.01.16 20:10:00 -
[91]
I'm actually embarrassed by half the posts in this thread. For everyone of who wasted their, and my, time with "OMZ UR NOOB! STFU" postings, there are ten hard-working players who would gladly welcome and help new characters get acclimated with the Eve lifestyle.
Yes, part of that lifestyle says that you're never completely safe, no matter where you go outside of dock. And yes, piracy is a legitimate profession, even encouraged by the developers, so there's no built in advantage for sticking to the straight and narrow. This is part of the Eve Philosophy, that the developers won't punish you for playing a certain style, provided you know the benefits and the drawbacks of each.
Another element of the Eve lifestyle is the balance of Risk vs Reward. Never leaving the station is one way to avoid risk, but that rarely ever brings a reward. Mining cheap minerals in Empire is a way to minimize risk, but the rewards are barely worth the time of more seasoned veterans. It's possible to still be killed, by belt rats, or by suicide gank squads. NPC belt rats don't have any reason to fear the risks of their actions.
And neither, apparently, do the suicide gank squads. Fleets of untrained alts that serve no purpose other than to spoil the fun for someone else and have no need to consider consequence or punishment. The intangible reward of ruining someone else's day has no material risk at all associated with it. There's no chance of loss when these characters can be recycled and recreated without any cost, as if they never existed, like NPCs. And players receive no benefit to thwarting them, or even any kind of revenge that can be achieved. The worst thing that can happen to an alt ganker is that his target escapes and he's wasted his time.
The key here is time. When we're dealing with intangible reward, we have to consider intangible risk. If CCP truly wants to address this issue, then just affecting that temporary account's security isn't going to solve it. But consider if each slot for an alt had it's own security rating that affected any character created in that slot. Call it "Karma", the fate of being reborn after being a bad person should mean you achieve a lower initial status in your second life. Any new character would have to wait 24 hours per security point under -5.0 to be recreated, and when he is the character starts with that initial low sec status.
I'm not saying that miners should be perfectly secure in high space. But griefing is NOT role playing. Suicide bombers exist in the real world, and by extension would exist in the Eve world as well. But like the real world, let's not reward them for their actions. Instead, lets make sure the next time they're reincarnated, they're held accountable for their criminal acts. After all, that's the risk we all take every day.
|