So it occurred to me earlier some of the potential dangers that come with alpha accounts and a lack of consequences for them when something bad happens. (Might I remind people that consequences are a vital part of this game)

Don't get me wrong I'm not against alpha's being introduced, But it needs to be done correctly. It has the potential to lose CCP a fair few subscribers who will probably earn them more than any alpha could.


So my point is simple for those of us who subscribe if we do bad thing intentionally or accidentally it sticks, you earn a reputation.

Known Ganker, Awoxer, Thief, Pirate, Scammer. Awesome FC, Alliance leader, Funder of major wars - With that you do you earn a reputation, Good or bad. That sticks.

Okay you could create a new account, but you lose some of your SP (Not as much as you used to due to injectors),Standings with empires, you may lose assets.
For a lot of people its a fair bit of stuff to lose. Plus the RL cash you have invested into the account
And if you want to take skills with you, then be prepared to stump up cash to do so.

However for an alpha, that's disposable.
It opens up ways for people to come in do anything they want from the list of actions that can get you a bad reputation and simply create a new account for free and lose very little SP. There is no consequence to the person using the alpha. It could result in:

war-decs = Create new account
kill-rights = Create new account
-10 standings = Create new account
The list go's on and on


I understand that any of us who subscribe could do that, But it'd be a lot to lose for us I'm not prepared to lose 40+ mil SP, and even less prepared to stump up -ú50+ to take it with me

An alpha doesn't have that to worry about, they cant extract skills anyway, so just create a skill plan and start again, be done within 15 days.. Anyone dedicated to cause trouble could just create 2 accounts at a time so they have a backup for when one has to be disposed of, then setup another whilst using the spare. Bang problem solved.


It seems too abusable for people and could only serve to damage the community in the long run. I'm also fully expecting to see people creating disposable accounts just to be throwing around, Sexist, Homophobic, racist, Etc... references anywhere is space.

And before people suggest doing IP bans to people that to that, All I would have to do is call my ISP to get my IP changed. (Might be different in other countries)


Apologies for a wall of text but I feel it needs to be said, And not in a thread that it'll be lost in just to keep people quiet.


TL'DR As subscribers we have things to lose if we want to do bad things on our accounts, An alpha won't they can just create a new account if anything goes wrong and lose next to nothing.

This an interesting idea of how it "could" go. Abused mechanics (mostly) get changed by CCP once they are a hindrance to the overall development of the game though.

good to think of these things, but making your own thread and not just adding this into the official thread means i expect this to be locked.

good thoughts, wrong place.

Try doing bad things with a new toon. Alphas can't extract so you loose ALL your SP.
IMHO if someone is up to mischief and cares enough to figure it out how to he will most likely sub to do more. Your possibilities as an alpha are rather limited.

Known Ganker, Awoxer, Thief, Pirate, Scammer.

Anyone dedicated to cause trouble could just create 2 accounts at a time so they have a backup for when one has to be disposed of, then setup another whilst using the spare. Bang problem solved.

And before people suggest doing IP bans to people that to that, All I would have to do is call my ISP to get my IP changed. (Might be different in other countries)

I expect it to be locked too. However it would be hidden in amongst loads of comments in the other thread and barely acknowledged. Here people can be made aware of the situation, If it gets locked then I'll take it as they don't care about feedback.

Your choice of 'baddies' only really has one profession (pirate) that requires more than a trial alt's worth of SP anyway. And I'm not sure how that could be abused either.

I'd be more concerned about faction warfare alts which don't have to care about standings, since you can have an army in each militia.

While I agree with OP, that probably also reinforces the 15 mil SP minimum or GTFO rule. Some alliances even call for 50 mil SP.

It is quite possible we'll see Alpha-only corp rise.

There is still the problem what you can achiev with an Alpha char. CCP is most likely limiting the amount of Alphas to one and only the Alpha can go online, nothing else. That's IMHO the main reason for the launcher changes. A Alpha with just T1 weapons will not pose a threat even to a hulk. Someone calculated that you will need to double the gankers with Alpha which will double the costs (ships, weapons etc.) and so ganking with Alphas will not make big money. And you Need a lot people because no multiboxing. You may play around with virtual machines but if it's worth it...

Here's the thing. Nothing what so ever stops a person from starting hundreds throwaway Alpha accounts with Gallentean characters in them, set them to train every skill allowed to an Alpha to excel at Catalysts and just wait the 2 months or so it takes for them to train up.

After that it is just a matter of biomassing the characters and cycle through them so the ganker has always a new character with fresh standings to gank with at zero cost. There's not even an ISK cost involved since it takes them about thirty minutes doing opportunities and career missions to get everything they need.

There is still the problem what you can achiev with an Alpha char. CCP is most likely limiting the amount of Alphas to one and only the Alpha can go online, nothing else. That's IMHO the main reason for the launcher changes. A Alpha with just T1 weapons will not pose a threat even to a hulk. Someone calculated that you will need to double the gankers with Alpha which will double the costs (ships, weapons etc.) and so ganking with Alphas will not make big money. And you Need a lot people because no multiboxing. You may play around with virtual machines but if it's worth it...

Its not so much a list of baddies, Just a list of things that can get you a reputation that's FREAKIN AWESOME!.

Account > Playstyle > Bad Rep > Throw acc > New Account > Playstyle > ......
Account > Train skills > Switch to account > Play, Bad rep > Throw > Train new > .....

Hope that gets the point across, With a trial you cant do that as you are time limited.


Edit: I may have originally misread your comment slightly but have amended my reply.

Seriously, your idea of a bad reputation is different from mine.
Now i know some of us like to crouch backwards into the future in a permanently defensive posture, cringing from even the threat of one of life's slaps or stings, but you have the option to DROP TROU and sprint merrily into the fire waving a hatchet.
I mean the choice is yours.

The amount of evil one of these alphas could get up to isn't worth hiding from.
Cycling catalyst derps to pick at hisec warts is lame, like most things that happen in hisec, lame and paltry.

Maybe I'm misunderstanding, but I kinda thought that was the point of Alphas? People can experiment with different playstyles and maybe get into a different aspect of the game? Or new players can learn what they like and what works without being [financially] chained to an account?

You see a problem. I see a key component of the functionality.

Abuse has been covered ad nauseum in the thread you chose not to post in.

KB

Sure people can experiment with alpha's, and I don't mind the not being chained part. Its just that there IS (Not maybe) people out there ready to abuse it.

Oh and FYI all those things put in the thread I chose not to post in, I have seen very little response to them because of the amount of comments about the change. Kind of feels to me like CCP want to drown out the negative concerns by getting all the positive ones to outweigh them.

TBH, there are people out there ready to take advantage of any change. 2% increase to cargo capacity of Falcon? Boom! Find a way to exploit it.

The Alphas are a good idea and CCP is managing it in a way to keep out 99% of the potential exploits. The remaining 1% will be patched in the days that follow or will just become a new playstyle or "content creation" method.

I realize people don't like change. Considering CCP is tries to implement change for 30,000 highly-organized min-maxers, I think they do a pretty good job managing it.

Some folks will like it. Some folks won't. Some folks will ignore it. Some folks will adapt and maybe exploit it into their playstyle.

The concerns in your OP are pretty minimal. I believe that your tinhattery about CCP ignoring concerns is pretty much the same for every minor change that comes about. You can stress and lose sleep over it. You can contribute to the appropriate threads in the hopes that CCP might take them into consideration (but don't be disappointed if they don't respond.) Or you can just login and go about your business, because at the end of the day this will impact individuals very very little. How much you let it impact you...well, CCP can't control that.

KB

I'll be curious to see how hard it is for Alpha accounts to join corporations in terms of people actually recruiting them - because of how limited they are.

I'll be curious to see how hard it is for Alpha accounts to join corporations in terms of people actually recruiting them - because of how limited they are.

I believe that your tinhattery about CCP ignoring concerns is pretty much the same for every minor change that comes about.