A few ideas to make the game more playable

Council Of Stellar Management Assembly Hall
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Some recommendations to please pass on to developers:

SHIP CREWS
I would recommend including a crew purchase option for large ships - in other words you can hire crew as you would a ship segment or add on for a vessel - each level of crew adding a higher bonus to certain ship stats.

NPC HIRE
Also, perhaps create NPC mercenary guilds where you can purchase either an NPC escort ship to accompany you or an NPC cargo vessel that can accompany you on mining missions etc. (non-agent missions - use drone like commands to control them) to transport ore back and forth - this is handy for solo players and would encourage them to stay or even start the game - not everyone wants to be part of a corp.

SHIP ALERT in low sec
Also include a ship alert that let’s you know when a negative security value player enters a low sec system where you are and also an alert when combat scanners are being actively used in a system to warn player characters risking expensive mining ships etc. in low sec and null sec space. Active scanning can be picked up by specialized passive sensors fitted to the ship - this would encourage more characters into low sec and null sec space

SELF DESTRUCT
Also, the option to self-destruct your ship causing damage to ships around you within a certain radius depending on the ship and contents (weapons ammunition etc.). Because I have never understood how my massive ammunition laden battleship can explode and not damage vessels 1000 meters off my bow. This would also make pirates more wary and again encourage people into low sec. Of course, the self-destruction would kill your pilot and any crew

Anyway… a few ideas

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This is a counterintuitive idea for EVE. Your pod provides direct connection to every single relevant ship system, which is why capsuleer ships are so powerful. You can directly manipulate and command the ship’s systems with your thoughts. A larger ship crew cannot possibly make the ship work better.
The contrary is the case, a larger ship crew would cause the ship to lose a lot of its capabilities and performance. There are several reasons for that: Command latency, inefficient command execution, command processing time in the brains and between crew members, crew coordination, just to name a few. Larger crews cannot logically and reasonably make ships perform better in EVE’s setting.

And to preempt the useless argument about industry teams in the past: They could make things better because we were not directly interconnected with the industry facilities like we are with the ship systems.

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As per lore, every ship bigger than a frigate has a non-capsuleer crew. Your other suggestions simply attempt to remove the burden of you actually paying attention and having some situational awareness, while your last suggestion is pure pettiness…

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  • I feel the crew idea is superfluous and just adds a pointless layer of micromanagment. I’m tired just thinking about it. I know crews are part of the lore but honestly I never liked that - what’s the point of controlling a ship with your mind if you need people to crew it anyway?

  • The NPC hires just disincentivise player cooperation, which is A Bad Thing (and I say this as a mostly solo player) and would be very hard to implement with a good degree of reliability.

  • The criminal and combat probe alerts are just lazy shortcuts so you don’t actually have to play the game and pay attention. This is the opposite of “playability”.

  • I don’t see how a self-destruct blast of 1000m would deter anyone, it would need to have a bigger range and be stronger than a smartbomb blast to be meaningful. If you increase the range and damage, I’m sure suicide gankers would game it mercilessly. I also don’t think it would encourage anyone into lowsec, as you’d lose your ship either way and most gankers would simply adapt to stay out of range.

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How rude. You’re a ganker yes? I would prefer some polite constructive criticism rather than just an attack. Folks don’t go into low sec because they are simply going to get mugged and murdered… situational awareness… how can you be situationally aware of some ass cloaking up to your expedition frigate and fragging you? Do you just jump out of the system every time you see a negative security capsuleer enter the system? It would be useless going there in the first place. Everything is slanted against capsuleers trying their luck in low sec and in favour of the ganker muggers mugging you. Some sort of targeting alert or security alert is not irrational and would help you with situational awareness… and pure “pettiness”… a massive battleship full of high power missiles or other ammunition simply exploding and causing no damage to nearby ships… how realistic… just nothing… no shrapnel… no nothing… again easy for the ganker muggers… destroy without any risk to yourself? Stupid… don’t answer me again unless you can be more constructive rather than insulting

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Maybe you didn’t understand what I was saying because your response makes no sense to what i was suggesting. Or perhaps I didn’t word it well. let me clarify.

Just like a ship upgrade, rig etc. you could add a crew purchase say skewed to engineering… faster acceleration and velocity or an experienced weapons crew resulting in higher hit percentages … how can treating a crew add on similar to a rig or equipment addition lower capabilities and performance?

I’ve been in the game 18 years… please allow me a little more respect in your responses

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  1. So a huge battleship with 1 capsuleer controlling it? I’m sorry this simple ridiculous conundrum makes you so tired… seriously… how is just adding an extra slot to add a specialized crew superfluous or micromanaged… just add it and no more attention needed ergo no micromanagement… and you don’t control it with your mind… you control it with some mouse clicks

  2. NPC hires disincentivise? There are no such thing as mercenaries? What is difficult about controlling mercenary ship with simple drone commands which are used in game already… defend… orbit… engage… or a mercenary hauler… offload at “station” and return… how difficult in a complex game like EVE would it be to enter this into existing code… Solo players need help… I’m glad that you feel you can cope your way… how about considering other players needs? Somewhat selfish and narrow vision.

  3. Lazy? How do you pay attention to a combat probe pinging you and then next a cloaked mugger dropping right on top of you and blowing up your expensive purchase… how does situational awareness help you there? If you had an idea you had just been pinged by a combat probe it would increase your situational awareness… maybe this idea takes away the laziness of the mugger which is your only concern… modern technology in aircraft lets you know when you are targeted… why not in EVE… oops again… anti mugger… let’s not encourage more folks into low sec… again rude response

  4. Fair cop here… I didn’t think about the suicide bomber angle… however if not self destruct again explain how a huge battleship full of ammunition explodes without any affect on the vessels around you… perhaps the concern here is the added responsibility of the mugger to have situational awareness of blowing up a vessel and being impacted by the explosion… poor mugger will have to have situational awareness which you are imposing on the mugged… that’s lazy

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To add to the suicide bomber aspect? Picture it on Jita undock.

m

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Again… scrap the suicide bomber… however damage from ship exploding through combat is more believable

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Yes, exactly. The capsuleers absolutely do control the ships with their minds, it’s one of the basic cocepts of the game. It might even be sort of realistic that the ships still need crews and having a capsuleer just reduces the workload and improves efficiency or whatever, but I still don’t like it personally.

NPC hires disincentivise? There are no such thing as mercenaries

Hire player mercenaries. I dont care about your needs of having everything be made easy for you. Either join a corp, get alts or learn to deal with stuff yourself. Playing solo is possible, but it has drawbacks and limitations, as it should be in a multiplayer game. And if you think this would be as easy to implement as drones, I’m not sure I can help you.

Lazy?

Yes, lazy. You pay attention to local and d-scan (most of the time you can see the probes when they ping you), fly aligned, fit for tank, use a Venture, mine in a remote system and then haul the goods out, join a corp that gives you protection, plenty of options. I both got ganked regularly and did the ganking in this game, I experienced both sides and they both are given tools to do their thing.

explain how a huge battleship full of ammunition explodes without any affect on the vessels around you

Explain why ships need to constantly have their engines on and why there is up and down in space, why new asteroids and pirate bases appear out of nowhere etc. It’s a game, it’s not realistic in every respect and it doesn’t need to be.

poor mugger will have to have situational awareness which you are imposing on the mugged… that’s lazy

Oh, not again with that strawman. The mugger always needs situational awareness and risks getting baited and dropped on, not having enough DPS to break your tank before CONCORD flies in, etc. There are even people who PvP with mining ships, now that’s a way to deter pirates!

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I’ve been in the game 18 years… I’ve been in corps for long periods… I even ran a corp… I’ve also been solo for long periods and I don’t see the harm in being able to hire a mercenary to help you… I believe it would encourage more players and not lessen the… it would encourage more folks into low sec… and

“I dont care about your needs of having everything be made easy for you.”!!! Well firstly that explains a lot about you and is bloody rude… As above… I have run a corp… I have been solo… let’s help the solo players out a bit more… more of a ganker I think and not wanting the easiness taken away from murdering muggers… perhaps it is the ganker being lazy and this game is definitely more skewed for muggers… KEEP YOUR INSULTING COMMENTS TO YOURSELF

Lazy? I pay attention to local… how the hell do you see the probes that ping you? I am interested to know… I fly alligned… fitting for tank only last as long as it takes the ganker to get through the tank once they have warp scrambled you and webbed you… just delays the inevitable… I’ve been here 18 years… pay my suggestions a little respect please

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This game has lost a lot of subscribers since I first started in 2004… the main issue of people jumping out was constantly getting mugged by heartless gankers… I know so many folks who gave it up because they were sick of it… yes it’s a game… I know that

However, it should encourage and not discourage… don’t just poo poo my ideas… are folks scared to give thoughts in here in fear of being ganked by insulting players who want the game to remain skewed for gankers… how ironic

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I mean… as soon as I give ideas… instead of constructive criticism I get called lazy. petty… my ideas are superfluous… (quote) “here we go again”… seems these ideas or any ideas have been attacked before … if it’s a here we go again moment then maybe IT IS a problem… think about that instead of slinging fancy words

And maybe this is why the game doesn’t change… you even get ganked in forum

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No, that would just become suicide, once removed. Load an alt with ammo, undock at Jita, shoot with other alt, watch hilarity ensue.

m

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Because a crew is not a rig or a module. A crew is not connected and integrated to the ship systems directly. Read the lore. Even Battleships only have redundant crews compared to the crew numbers of non-capsuleer battleships.

Because they have been brought up time and again. As a 18 years game veteran, you should know how to search the forums for redundant ideas first. Bringing up the same bad ideas again as a 18 years old veteran is even worse than any random newbie doing it, because you should know better. And you should have an understanding of the lore.

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This is just the way the game is. Play it as you may or don’t. No one cares about your ideas here.
You’re a solo player trying to live in Lowsec? Join a corporation or quit. EVE is a PvP game, that’s it and that’s all.

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I don’t know about scared ( although I consider it very unpleasant ) but more like wary and certainly a huge waste of time.

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I mean… as soon as I give ideas… instead of constructive criticism I get called lazy. petty… my ideas are superfluous

I think I at least tried to explain why I disagree with your ideas. I didn’t call you lazy, I said I feel the mechanics you propose are lazy shortcuts. I just think there is a difference between giving players acive tools or QoL improvements and stuff that automatically play the game for them.

Lazy? I pay attention to local… how the hell do you see the probes that ping you? I am interested to know…

If you pay attention, why would you need the extra alerts? I see when the probes ping me because whenever I do PvE in hostile space, I d-scan constantly. I heard combat scanning can still be done so fast you don’t pick it up, but that takes skill, so I consider it fair play. And I still have a chance to see a ship warping in on my location on d-scan or warp off if I fly aligned (or have a fast aigning ship) and someone decloaks on grid.

I fly alligned… fitting for tank only last as long as it takes the ganker to get through the tank once they have warp scrambled you and webbed you… just delays the inevitable…

Depends on what type of ganking we’re talking about. If it’s suicide ganking then tank makes all the difference between dying in a ball of fire and laughing as your would-be gankers are popped by CONCORD before they can chew through you.

This game has lost a lot of subscribers since I first started in 2004… the main issue of people jumping out was constantly getting mugged by heartless gankers… I know so many folks who gave it up because they were sick of it… yes it’s a game… I know that

The game has been growing for a decade after you joined. Sure, numbers have been dropping in recent years but I don’t think it’s because of ganking or piracy. Personally, I keep coming back to EVE (I played on and off for the past 10 years) precisely because it gives players so much freedom, including the freedom to be ruthless bandits. I spent most of my gametime as a defenseless explorer being hunted by pirates or locals in null and loved it. I started branching out into active PvP and ganking other explorers later. I’m still a PvP noob but I enjoy both sides of the game.

insulting players who want the game to remain skewed for gankers… how ironic

On the contrary, I want the odds to be pretty even - as I said, I find myself on both sides of the stick so it stands to reason I want to have a chance in both roles. I just think the tools for the prey to defend itself or avoid the hunters should require them to actively pay attention to the game, not watch Netflix until an automatic alarm buzzer pops off.

I dislike the ideas you proposed and tried to give my reasons for it, but I didn’t mean to insult you.

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The servers will melt. Same thing of bumping causes ship damage.

(No I am not an IT/Server guy) I just have a strong feeling EVE’s servers can’t handle that.

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Would they? If you simplify it to just be calculated based on e.g. ship mass, it shouldn’t be more of a problem than calculating smartbomb damage.