Blog Banter 30: Finally, Our Long Interstellar Nightmare is Over!

In my post “Assumption of Risk” I talked about how risk is part of EvE, and that portion is diminishing.  Poetic Stanziel the brought some light to EvE-University’s contribution to the issue.  I am operating under the assumption that EvE Online is a PvP-centric game.  If I wanted to play Hello Kitty Online I’d find out the URL and start playing that.  You assume a certain level of risk when you PvP flag yourself in any game.  Not many people know what the PvP flag looks like in EvE so allow me to show you what it looks like.

Click on This and PvP is in Your Future!

EvE is getting away from this.  Frankly I think we might see the last highsec killmail sometime in the next 18 months at the rate CCP is going.  The changes to wardec mechanics make it so that they really aren’t worth the trouble.  Changes to ganking that are already on SiSi indicate that harsher penalties for highsec ganks might be in the cards.  I don’t want this, other PvPers don’t want this, and PvE players don’t want it either.  With less PvP there is less demand for ships and modules, with lower demand, there is lower prices and profits, and with lower prices and profits people, especially those buying plexes, cannot afford to play the game.

So I’m going to improve things in part by rolling back changes.  Decshields – Gone, Refunding ships for people who undocked with a timer – Gone, Warnings before repping people who have aggro – Gone (although you will get a replacement warning when someone with an aggro timer joins your fleet.)

The wardec mechanics will change completely.  Voting timers are gone.  As soon as there is a majority, BAM sanctionable action.  When you go to start a dec you have to decide what kind of war you are creating.  I envision a system where there are different objectives and conditions that, when met, make the war cheaper to renew (or end it if the defenders are successful.)  In addition the dec sticks to the corp, if they join an alliance then the alliance gets involved, if they drop, the dec against the alliance drops and the dec against the corp sticks.

Finally – neutral reppers.  It’s over.  You can’t stop neutral scouts, covops, whatever.  But neutral repping is done.  Doesn’t work anymore, if someone is at war CONCORD blocks you from repping.

Station games are another thing on my shit list.  We need a station window, and to change how docking timers work.  I’ve made suggestions before on this and while it’s not a perfect list, it is better than what exists now as far as problems.  I’d also change the “skin” of stations so that your distance from the station is measured by… your distance from the station not the weird bubbles we have now.  EVERY station becomes a kickout MUAHAHAHAHA.

So yes better highsec PvP (for me.)  That’s what I’d do.

What about Major Kong?