EVE Search - Committing to Combat

Check My IP Information

All Channels

Test Server Feedback

Committing to Combat

» Click here to find additional results for this topic using Google

Monitor this thread via RSS [?]

Pages: [1] :: one page

Author	Thread Statistics \| Show CCP posts - 0 post(s)
James Duar Merch Industrial GoonSwarm	Posted - 2007.12.26 10:32:00 - [1] CCP have often stated they want people to "commit to combat", and something about that statement has always seemed wrong to me. In fact the more I think about it, the more the idea that people have to commit to combat does not make sense to me as a good principle to balance the game, particularly because it essentially goes against human instinct and most sound military thinking - you always need an escape plan. Most phenomena in EVE revolve around people fighting the perverse "commitment" to combat that they have to make: 1. Nano gangs. Work precisely because they can choose when and how hard to engage, but also stand a good chance of retreating as the tactical situation develops. 2. Sniper warfare Fleet sniper warfare developed for 2 reasons - the first is that if they're in range and you're not then you're invulnerable. The second is that staying at range ensures you can warp out. 3. Blob/Counter-blob warfare Consisting of equal parts of the above, blob warfare is another combat commitment problem. Bringing overwhelming firepower is necessary to ensure a target dies in a timely fashion, because if an enemy reinforcement blob appears it's possible none of your ships can escape (hence the nano phenomenon). Basically what I'm saying is the idea people should have to commit to combat has never been true to the way EVE is played, and applying it as a balance principle is just insane (see the proposed interdictor nerf). Speed in particular is currently as popular as it is because it allows you to react to the tactical situation of a fight - whereas something like a battleship currently cannot do this at all. It is either tanking/ganking or perhaps running for the gate. Somehow CCP need to promote other options for ships to disengage from combat, ideally providing a means by which to observe and attempt to stop such manoeuveres to the other side (i.e. not cynoing out as Titans and MS's once did).
Liang Nuren The Avalon Foundation Knights Of Syndicate	Posted - 2007.12.26 10:37:00 - [2] Somewhat perceptive post. I also tend to bring ewar to a fight so that I can disengage when it goes against me. -Liang -- Gain Forum Fame Now! Want To Trade Liang Nuren For Your Character! Post in the thread or send me an Evemail. ^_
James Duar Merch Industrial GoonSwarm	Posted - 2007.12.26 11:02:00 - [3] Ewar is another good point - it's original popularity pre-nerf was precisely because 1 good jam meant you could escape being warp scrambled, and it's pretty integral to how force recons fight.
Tnanever Risen	Posted - 2007.12.26 11:04:00 - [4] Very good post...that really is how it works. "Committing to combat" should only involve what it actually requires, which is committing resources. Maybe a corp will move dozens of fighting ships about 20 jumps and organize a raid...all of which required many hundreds of millions of ISK. Isn't that enough "commitment"?
Zilkin Murder-Death-Kill	Posted - 2007.12.26 11:08:00 - [5] Very good post. I personally think that "committing to combat" is somewhat behind(though definitely not the only reason) of the popularity of blob warfare. To those things you listed which to I would add at least remote rep gangs and capitals. Gathering a big blob is the easiest of those choices to achieve because there isn't nearly as much SP reqs and you aren't necessarily required to bring as expensive ship. Being able to form eg. sniper gang has much higher requirements on the skillpoint amount for the participants and requires your ship to have very specific fitting. So basically in many ways blobbing has the best "risk vs reward ratio" of the options listed. As the OP says forcing "committing to combat" isn't in my opinion nearly as good guideline as CCP seems to think.
Adunh Slavy Ammatar Trade Syndicate	Posted - 2007.12.26 16:37:00 - [6] I could go on for hours about this very thing the OP brings up, I'll spare you all the rant and simply sign it. :) The Real Space Initiative - V5 (Forum Link)
Meditril	Posted - 2007.12.26 17:59:00 - [7] I am happy to see that someone else also thinks that "commit to fight" philosophy is broken. I prefer something like "chasing and hunting". It should be possible to avoid an enemy, but the enemy should also get the option to chase and hunt his victim in a much better way than now.
d026 THE LEGION OF STEEL WARRIORS.... R0ADKILL	Posted - 2007.12.26 18:18:00 - [8] Quote: In fact the more I think about it, the more the idea that people have to commit to combat does not make sense to me as a good principle to balance the game, particularly because it essentially goes against human instinct and most sound military thinking - you always need an escape plan. i think thats whats the beauty about eve. you have to do stuff you never ever would do in rl. you need balls and RISK IT but you can screw up! if you take that away, eg more means of escape. why undock at all?
Maverick 52	Posted - 2007.12.27 06:36:00 - [9] OP hits the nail on the head. I just don't know what they could do to fix it.
NightKhaos Gallente Seridian Mining Corporation	Posted - 2007.12.27 12:33:00 - [10] I don't play to fight. I don't play to get that 100 million ISK ship I just lovingly paid for and couldn't afford to pay full insurance for get blown up. I play to have fun. I wish some people would get this. Recently, a corp member was bored, so he fired a salvo of missles at my mining barge. I don't know what's worse, the fact I wasn't fully insured and I don't have enough money to replace the ship now, or the fact nobody seemed to care. In fact my crop took his side when I got annoyed. So as well as something being done about this "commitment to fight" thing, I think the fact CONCORD doesn't raise an eyelid when a crop of fleet member fires on you also needs addressing. If you want to practice fighting, you should have to initial a duel, from both sides, and pay CONCORD a fee (if in high sec of course). Committing to fighting is committing resources to fighting. Never, ever, send a fleet into a battle you know they can't win. It is not only a waste of resources, it is a waste of time. CPU: Intel Core2 T5500 @ 1.66 RAM: 1024 GPU: nVidia GeForce Go 7300 GPU Drivers: 2.1.1 NVIDIA 100.14.19 Sound Card: HDA Intel Sound Card Driver: ALSA Version 1.0.14 Kernel: 2.6.23-gentoo-r3

Gort Storm Guard Elite	Posted - 2007.12.27 23:41:00 - [11] Edited by: Gort on 27/12/2007 23:43:43 I agree with the OP. There's a whole side of the game missing when the mechanics only work in one direction. Yes, I enjoy a good battle. For real enjoyment, however, take a blockade runner through the Catch pipe and see if you don't get sweaty palms. I believe that even in purely belligerent meetings, disengagement should be a relevant, and available, tactic. I know there will be negative replies to this, but there needs to be an element of chance in the activity at hand. (As in "real" engagements.) Otherwise, why bother? It's just dueling spreadsheets. Thanks for the excellent original post. Gort Edit: ECM drones are often carried as a last ditch "get out of Dodge" tool. -- When in doubt, empty the magazine.
Stakhanov Metafarmers	Posted - 2007.12.28 13:11:00 - [12] Originally by: Gort Otherwise, why bother? It's just dueling spreadsheets. Agreed. 90% of PvP happens before a shot is being fired. It is nonsense to nerf it in favor of the 10% ammo exchange part. The lachesis is fairly useless as a combat ship now , but I still use it because it fits a pirating niche.
Ephemeron Caldari Provisions	Posted - 2007.12.28 14:13:00 - [13] Edited by: Ephemeron on 28/12/2007 14:14:31 I believe the current state of EVE PvP offers a good balance between "commit to combat" and "ways to escape". There are several game mechanics to force the enemy to commit to combat. And you have listed several good ways for people to stay uncommited. The interplay between different game mechanics is pretty interesting and reasonably balanced. I really think we shouldn't try change it. For example, the devs are thinking about speed nerf and part of their reasoning is to force fast ships to be more committed to engagement. That's a balance shift. We have pretty good balance now. I hope we don't mess it up.
Snowcrash Winterheart2 Gallente Concordia Discors	Posted - 2007.12.28 17:09:00 - [14] /signed Perhaps EVE does needs a "I surrender" mechanism? Something along the lines of 30 seconds of invulnerability to retreat BUT your ship jettisons all of its modules and cargo hold in to a can, possibly shutting down your ability to target anything for 5min as well (so you can't leg it, rearm and rejoin battle easily). ----- Four paws... four sets of claws.
Wu Jiun	Posted - 2007.12.28 17:28:00 - [15] Originally by: Snowcrash Winterheart2 /signed Perhaps EVE does needs a "I surrender" mechanism? Something along the lines of 30 seconds of invulnerability to retreat BUT your ship jettisons all of its modules and cargo hold in to a can, possibly shutting down your ability to target anything for 5min as well (so you can't leg it, rearm and rejoin battle easily). vomits Now see what you did there James Duar you created a monster...
Snowcrash Winterheart2 Gallente Concordia Discors	Posted - 2007.12.28 17:39:00 - [16] Originally by: Wu Jiun Originally by: Snowcrash Winterheart2 /signed Perhaps EVE does needs a "I surrender" mechanism? Something along the lines of 30 seconds of invulnerability to retreat BUT your ship jettisons all of its modules and cargo hold in to a can, possibly shutting down your ability to target anything for 5min as well (so you can't leg it, rearm and rejoin battle easily). vomits Now see what you did there James Duar you created a monster... Ok, then how would you implement a method of surrendering? ----- Four paws... four sets of claws.
Tsanse Kinske WeMeanYouKnowHarm	Posted - 2007.12.28 22:56:00 - [17] It's all about finding some sort of balance. People shouldn't always have to commit to fights, but they should gain some advantage for doing so. That's the purest expression of Risk Reward. People shouldn't always be able to escape from fights, but they should have a chance to do so through in-game means, which can be leveraged by their skill, sp, preparation, and teamwork. People trying to keep others from escaping should be able to leverage their chances with their own skill, sp, preparation, and teamwork. It should be a contest. Of wills, of cunning, experience, of cooperation, of circumstance, and occasionally of dumb luck. I think CCP sees it this way too, despite some talk about "committing to fights". That doesn't mean though that their preferred balance points aren't different than yours or mine. * * * In the beginning the Universe was created. This has made a lot of people very angry and been widely regarded as a bad move. -Douglas Adams, writing about EVE
James Duar Merch Industrial GoonSwarm	Posted - 2007.12.29 03:13:00 - [18] Originally by: Snowcrash Winterheart2 Originally by: Wu Jiun Originally by: Snowcrash Winterheart2 /signed Perhaps EVE does needs a "I surrender" mechanism? Something along the lines of 30 seconds of invulnerability to retreat BUT your ship jettisons all of its modules and cargo hold in to a can, possibly shutting down your ability to target anything for 5min as well (so you can't leg it, rearm and rejoin battle easily). vomits Now see what you did there James Duar you created a monster... Ok, then how would you implement a method of surrendering? It's not surrendering that I want, but "disengaging". To use an RL analogy (hurr!) in naval combat if a battle went sour on a ship, it always had the option to try and steam away from the enemy. Now this might work, or it might not - it depended on damage, the intelligence of the captains, gunner accuracy etc. This is why speed is so popular with roaming gangs - it's the only way to reasonably escape an engagement, or indeed pick and choose to any extent (without logging off to hide). The thing is, speed is a bit one sided - if you run, you're pretty quickly out of range/can't be hit by anyone's weapons. There are no options like blowing out the radio tower, or shooting the engines, disabling guns etc. that let you take chances with how a fight goes. I don't quite know (yet) how you'd implement a more diverse range of ways to disengage from combat for all ships, but you see my point - the whole "you must fight to the death" nature of combat means those marginal battles which are the most fun happen less often.
Daelin Blackleaf Aliastra	Posted - 2007.12.29 03:25:00 - [19] Commitment to combat... perverse. Ok. This is a game it is not real life. A large part of the satisfaction derived from this game involves yourself and others taking risks, knowing that you have something on the line and knowing your opponent does to. It's similar, in some ways, to gambling. You place a certain investment on the table, the more you are willing to bring to the table the more likely you are to win, however skill and experience play a large part in determining success. You want more ways for a person to decide he doesn't like this particular hand and would like to retire taking all his chips back out of the pot. The more escape methods there are the more meaningless and less satisfying it becomes. To defeat an opponent you have to cause them to lose assets until they deem it no longer wise to fight you. If you cannot achieve this combat becomes largely pointless and territory becomes a mockery.
NightKhaos Gallente Seridian Mining Corporation	Posted - 2007.12.29 16:55:00 - [20] Edited by: NightKhaos on 29/12/2007 16:56:44 Originally by: Daelin Blackleaf Commitment to combat... perverse. Ok. This is a game it is not real life. A large part of the satisfaction derived from this game involves yourself and others taking risks, knowing that you have something on the line and knowing your opponent does to. It's similar, in some ways, to gambling. You place a certain investment on the table, the more you are willing to bring to the table the more likely you are to win, however skill and experience play a large part in determining success. You want more ways for a person to decide he doesn't like this particular hand and would like to retire taking all his chips back out of the pot. The more escape methods there are the more meaningless and less satisfying it becomes. To defeat an opponent you have to cause them to lose assets until they deem it no longer wise to fight you. If you cannot achieve this combat becomes largely pointless and territory becomes a mockery. I think you misunderstand our intention. We are willing to fight, and we will fight if forced, but a tactical retreat is a viable tactic. If you have lost about 1 Billion ISK in equipment in ships, would you stay and let the other side finish you off? You would want to retreat too. Folding in gambling is not only used, it is encouraged. What we do not want is NOT to be able to fold at all. CPU: Intel Core2 T5500 @ 1.66 RAM: 1024 GPU: nVidia GeForce Go 7300 GPU Drivers: 2.1.1 NVIDIA 100.14.19 Sound Card: HDA Intel Sound Card Driver: ALSA Version 1.0.14 Kernel: 2.6.23-gentoo-r3

Daelin Blackleaf Aliastra	Posted - 2007.12.29 20:12:00 - [21] Originally by: NightKhaos I think you misunderstand our intention. We are willing to fight, and we will fight if forced, but a tactical retreat is a viable tactic. If you have lost about 1 Billion ISK in equipment in ships, would you stay and let the other side finish you off? You would want to retreat too. Folding in gambling is not only used, it is encouraged. What we do not want is NOT to be able to fold at all. Not at all. A tactical retreat is a viable tactic in real life, where killing people isn't generally considered fun, or in an RTS with limited map boundaries, where you'll kill them eventually, but not in such an open environment as EVE. Yes I would like to be able to disengage at will, but more than that I don't want everyone else doing so and other people don't want me doing it either. Your comment about staying to lose 1 billion in assets is exactly my point. If I was confident enough to bring 1bill to the table then if I don't win I should lose it, no one forced me to invest that isk. Also known as don't fly what you can't afford to lose. As for folding, we have that in EVE it's when you tire of losing assets and retire to empire. It's called victory and is pretty much the only way to achieve a victory through combat. Also when I fold I don't take my money back out of the kitty... I lose it. If you want to fold in a battle you can always self-destruct. If you want to fold in a war you can retreat to empire. I believe I understand your intention perfectly and, just like WCS and the current Nano fad, it goes against everything that makes combat fun and meaningful. It's fun if your the only one doing it. When everyone is doing it it's just boring.
James Duar Merch Industrial GoonSwarm	Posted - 2007.12.30 06:05:00 - [22] Fun and meaningful combat is when you can actually manoeuver, which is why people run nano gangs in the first place. If you can't manoeuver then really it's just DPS/tank spreadsheets fighting each other, and we have all the things people currently claim to hate - nano gangs and blobs etc. Of course, the reason people hate them is because they're the only way to manoeuver - two nanogangs can't really fight each other, which means you're either being ganked or not fighting them most of the time.
Refazed R A G E	Posted - 2007.12.30 06:40:00 - [23] Originally by: Daelin Blackleaf Not at all. A tactical retreat is a viable tactic in real life, where killing people isn't generally considered fun, or in an RTS with limited map boundaries, where you'll kill them eventually, but not in such an open environment as EVE. Yes I would like to be able to disengage at will, but more than that I don't want everyone else doing so and other people don't want me doing it either. Your comment about staying to lose 1 billion in assets is exactly my point. If I was confident enough to bring 1bill to the table then if I don't win I should lose it, no one forced me to invest that isk. Also known as don't fly what you can't afford to lose. As for folding, we have that in EVE it's when you tire of losing assets and retire to empire. It's called victory and is pretty much the only way to achieve a victory through combat. Also when I fold I don't take my money back out of the kitty... I lose it. If you want to fold in a battle you can always self-destruct. If you want to fold in a war you can retreat to empire. I believe I understand your intention perfectly and, just like WCS and the current Nano fad, it goes against everything that makes combat fun and meaningful. It's fun if your the only one doing it. When everyone is doing it it's just boring. not every battle should be the alamo where one side or the other is eventually overwhelmed and killed by a larger force. Skirmish warfare requires you to be able to hit a target and retreat quicker then your foe can mobilize and follow. Without that ability we would be left with suicide fleets and blob vs. blob warfare. Victory is achieved through the accomplishment of an objective, not through beating your opponent into a pauper. Your objective could be anything from 'take their space' to 'lets kill the nano gang in our space' to 'lets go gank their carebears'. All these scenarios can be fun and frustrating. They all stand a chance of succeeding or failing based on experience, planning, and dumb luck. All the scenarios are what give eve pvp it's flavor.
Daelin Blackleaf Aliastra	Posted - 2007.12.30 15:35:00 - [24] Picture this, I'm in someone elses space with my hit-and-run ship killing their miners, haulers, and anything else that makes an easy target. Anything that poses a challenge I run instantly. Provided I have nothing better to do I can make a mockery of an alliances territory regardless of the size of their fleet. There is nothing they can do to remove me unless I mess up (which of course I would eventually but not before inflicting massive damage in ships and time to the enemy). OR I bring a hit-and-run gang into your space, you bring a standard gang of ships. When my gang encounters yours then if we think we can beat you we'll engage, if not we'll run. If we engage and the tide turns we run. This means that I can get a win or a draw, you can get a loss or draw. The only solution is to bring a similar gang of your own then whoever feels they are least likely to win can run. In a game where the only way to really claim space is to grief other people out of it you need to be able to inflict harm to their wallet. In a game where both sides gamble neither should be able to easily withdraw. There already are modules and tactics that allow you to disengage from combat that have sensible counters. There are also already a modules and tactics that allow you to take the **** that are pretty much impossible to counter given a skilled pilot. Combat in EVE is already approaching the point of being worthless beyond POS sieges (and a whole lot of fun they are too) I'd like to see it made more meaningful, not less. Skirmishes, battles and wars should matter. For that to happen stuff has to blow up. The only way skirmish warfare could ever work is if stationary assets were of such great value compared to ships that killing the enemy is meaningless provided you can blow up their stuff. Then for either side to achieve a victory would require the successful assault or defense of said assets and kills and losses would be relatively meaningless. POS warfare certainly does not count, the only time it comes close is when a Titan or MS is cooking inside. The rest of the time the average POS is worth a lot less than the average gang.
Refazed R A G E	Posted - 2007.12.30 16:16:00 - [25] Originally by: Daelin Blackleaf Picture this, I'm in someone elses space with my hit-and-run ship killing their miners, haulers, and anything else that makes an easy target. Anything that poses a challenge I run instantly. Provided I have nothing better to do I can make a mockery of an alliances territory regardless of the size of their fleet. There is nothing they can do to remove me unless I mess up (which of course I would eventually but not before inflicting massive damage in ships and time to the enemy). OR I bring a hit-and-run gang into your space, you bring a standard gang of ships. When my gang encounters yours then if we think we can beat you we'll engage, if not we'll run. If we engage and the tide turns we run. This means that I can get a win or a draw, you can get a loss or draw. The only solution is to bring a similar gang of your own then whoever feels they are least likely to win can run. In a game where the only way to really claim space is to grief other people out of it you need to be able to inflict harm to their wallet. In a game where both sides gamble neither should be able to easily withdraw. There already are modules and tactics that allow you to disengage from combat that have sensible counters. There are also already a modules and tactics that allow you to take the **** that are pretty much impossible to counter given a skilled pilot. Combat in EVE is already approaching the point of being worthless beyond POS sieges (and a whole lot of fun they are too) I'd like to see it made more meaningful, not less. Skirmishes, battles and wars should matter. For that to happen stuff has to blow up. The only way skirmish warfare could ever work is if stationary assets were of such great value compared to ships that killing the enemy is meaningless provided you can blow up their stuff. Then for either side to achieve a victory would require the successful assault or defense of said assets and kills and losses would be relatively meaningless. POS warfare certainly does not count, the only time it comes close is when a Titan or MS is cooking inside. The rest of the time the average POS is worth a lot less than the average gang. If I am reading this right you want to see an Eve where an unprepared enemy can blob up and kill your specialized, organized, and prepared gang by the simple fact that they outnumber you? That doesn't sound very fun to me. If people are coming to your space unopposed, killing all your alliance mates then gleefully running away with loot then the problem isn't the hostile gang. its your defense. If someone is doing a hit and run attack in your system bring out ships to catch them. If you come out with your BS/BC blob don't expect to catch a fast cruiser/recon gang. Its like trying to swat flies with a folding chair. There are ways to kill every ship and every gang in this game. They may not be easy, they may require you to take a different approach, they may require planning and preparation, but they are damn effective and the strategy of move counter-move is what makes eve fun. I agree with you on the point that there isn't much to fight for in 0.0 other then the fun of killing someone off. When the only difference between your space and my space is the 1 extra -1.0 ratting system you have there isn't much motivation to uproot yourself and spend months kicking someone out of their space.
Gavin Darklighter THE FINAL STAND Divine Retribution Alliance	Posted - 2007.12.30 18:00:00 - [26] This game would be no fun for me if I didn't have to risk my ship in battle. It is what makes this game so much greater than anything else I have ever played. If you allways had the option to disengage and run, then anyone in their right mind would do so as soon as the battle swayed agianst them. You allready have the option to hide cloaked docked or in a tower. IMO when you warp your ship away from safety, you should be putting yourself at risk of getting caught by a skilled group of players and being unable to escape.
Tessikhet	Posted - 2007.12.30 18:39:00 - [27] Here's what I would like to see: 0.0 alliances being able to respond to aggressors in their High-sovereignty systems in the same way that Concord responds to aggressors in 1.0 space. Concord doesn't have to probe you out or hope you aren't cloaked. As soon as you agress, they can jump right on top of you and open up. I think giving the ability to warp to reds in 0.0 if you have sovereignty just like you can warp to fleet members would go a long way.
Cpt Branko The Bloody Red	Posted - 2007.12.30 19:56:00 - [28] Originally by: Ephemeron Edited by: Ephemeron on 28/12/2007 14:14:31 I believe the current state of EVE PvP offers a good balance between "commit to combat" and "ways to escape". There are several game mechanics to force the enemy to commit to combat. And you have listed several good ways for people to stay uncommited. The interplay between different game mechanics is pretty interesting and reasonably balanced. I really think we shouldn't try change it. For example, the devs are thinking about speed nerf and part of their reasoning is to force fast ships to be more committed to engagement. That's a balance shift. We have pretty good balance now. I hope we don't mess it up. Rifters!
Norma Cenza	Posted - 2007.12.30 22:44:00 - [29] Kill off the dual polycarb, multi ODJ nano-hac's. CCP can then deal with brain-tankers full of snakes and rogues. Interdictors can be un-nerfed then.


Pages: [1] :: one page
First page \| Previous page \| Next page \| Last page

COPYRIGHT NOTICE
EVE Online, the EVE logo, EVE and all associated logos and designs are the intellectual property of CCP hf. All artwork, screenshots, characters, vehicles, storylines, world facts or other recognizable features of the intellectual property relating to these trademarks are likewise the intellectual property of CCP hf. EVE Online and the EVE logo are the registered trademarks of CCP hf. All rights are reserved worldwide. All other trademarks are the property of their respective owners. CCP hf. has granted permission to EVE-Search.com to use EVE Online and all associated logos and designs for promotional and information purposes on its website but does not endorse, and is not in any way affiliated with, EVE-Search.com. CCP is in no way responsible for the content on or functioning of this website, nor can it be liable for any damage arising from the use of this website.