Because 1 lets you instantly put points into whatever you want and completely skill for something in an instant. 2 and 3 force either you or the seller of the char to constantly make decisions over the course of two years and live with those decisions when FotM changes.

2 and 3 reward forward-thinking and planning out what you want to train, 1 rewards dumping a bunch of cash into the char and getting an instant FotM char.

Characters bought and sold have had the time spent on them and are the result of choices made over time. The whole point of skill levels, is so you have to decided is it worth train that skill to level 5, or should I train other stuff to level 4?

No matter what excuse is used to justify buying SP, it all boils down to the same thing. The removal of those decisions and consequences.

Buying a char comes with them, buying SP does not.

Bingo jasper's struck a good point. make a limitation of how far you can backdate your skill points 6months to a year maximum will enable you to 'catch up' with others of your characters age group slighty.

But would not induce 'farming' inactive accounts for the use of backdating all your sp into a nommy titan or something of that ilk.

OK. I see your point. But isn't it enough that such dumping would effect in lower total SP than with normal training?

So you're saying that if someone had to move country like I did and then have no broadband for a year, But the money to pay for an eve sub we cant backdate even though we would have paid for a sub if we were able to download the client?

Even though we would be paying for a full years subscription?

Yes, because any dumping of skill points onto a character, however small or large, is abusable; and if there's one thing I know about Eve, it's that people will abuse the crap out of anything they can, however they can.

And I do understand Jasp3r's point about returning chars wanting to 'catch up', but Eve is supposed to have consequences, and a "whoops, I really did want those SP after all" button is completely contrary to the whole mindset of Eve. This is the same situation as the "let me delete skills and re-use the SP" threads, it might be kinda nice for some people, but it would be abused to no end by others, and the abuse would be worse than the benefits.

I realise that most people that are already ahead don't want any kind of catch-up advantage given to those returning.

So you're saying that if someone had to move country like I did and then have no broadband for a year, But the money to pay for an eve sub we cant backdate even though we would have paid for a sub if we were able to download the client?

Even though we would be paying for a full years subscription?

My idea:

1. You can buy missed skills only once per character. This applies for the life of the character. This prevents players from buying a years worth of skills, putting the character into hibernation, then doing it again one year later.

2. You can only buy up to 75% of missed skills. This prevents someone who has paid and played since Day 1 from losing their earned advantage.

3. You lose 5% of missed skills as a penalty. This somewhat covers the 'bad decisions' that would have happened had the person played through that time.

So you're saying that if someone had to move country like I did and then have no broadband for a year, But the money to pay for an eve sub we cant backdate even though we would have paid for a sub if we were able to download the client?

Even though we would be paying for a full years subscription?

How about...

When resubscribing, players get the option to pay the full amount since they left and then they get a cerebral accelerator that doubles the training speed for that period going forward.

So, you don't get an instant win (which rules out the flavour of the month issue) and have to plan and queue skills in the same way for the next 1-6 months... they are just training at twice the speed.

From the perspective of the re-subbing player, it still takes away the feeling of training time lost.

So, if you are in fact rewarded for leaving the game for whatever reason then it totally goes against game mechanics. And yes you would be rewarded. Being able to freely invest skill points really is a massive advantage.

Fair enough, everyone is entitled to their opinion... you can't please all of the people all of the time. There should be a vote which includes currently unsubbed players.

This isn't HoN, WoT or LoL - if you want "pay to win," go play those games.

EvE is a game, where your choces have meaning. Stop playing is one of these choices and it will have consequences.

Vets will at some point have to give way on a few of these issues. What good is it being ahead if there is nobody to be ahead of? We need ideas to bring players back and I don't think a catch-up training speed implant for resubscribing players is a bad one.

I think gold ammo is different as it would affect all players and almost 'require' people to pay money to stay ahead in fights. A catch-up implant would not give anyone an advantage.. their skill numbers would be the same as if they'd never unsubbed and it would take the same 'overall' time.

This does seem to be a "I don't want people catching-up to me" issue, which is natural.. but imagine what it means for the player count and CCP... more players returning than what might have without it; and then when they do a lump sum to CCP. A small price to pay for the vets I feel... how is it any different from the officer edition?