A Small Action to Change a Lot

EVE Technology and Research Center Player Features & Ideas
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Well, I noticed some raging threads below about known current issues, mostly filled with ‘Space Twitter phrases’. It motivated me to put together some dots as a solution to solve the big problems.

Well, shortly:

  • Remove Cargo Scanners.

Why?:

  • Some pilots, by some reasons, scanning all Data/Relic cans to crack the most profitable ones. The issues of these actions are next: the space remain filled with trash exploration signatures; players from one time zone will skim the cream, while players from another time zone will just lost their available time; this will make harder to settle too OP traps near the tastiest can.
  • Some pilots, by some reasons, will select the Besieged Covert Research and will run the most profitable. This will summon mainly unprofitable sites selectively, one by one. So, everybody will scan them previously from 50km range or above and will ignore all. This turns the content passive. BTW, I must admit, I saw players during my long-term exploration, which closing those trashy unprofitable sites to summon new ones.
  • Top tier gankers prefer to suicide gank only the most profitable Transport ships. This ruins the main EVE concept – the higher is the risk, the higher is the reward. In other words, some freighter players must take all the risk to deliver the goods for profit, while other players just must to do a mathematical calculation to get the digit, which will determine their actions without risks for profit. Some players, by risking, will lost too much at once, while others will lose too little without risking. By seeing a Freighter, without knowing exactly what is in their cargo, will change the game, will change the ‘dice’. Current Security status isn’t a thing, which can influence on all these things. With very low Security status you can fly everywhere, you have enough time to undock and suicide gank somebody, you can easily and not expensive repair your Security status to a required level.

Collisions:

  • This request can interfere with current Transport Blockade Runner ship bonus. Well, that bonus can be replaced with new one – Immune to all Ship Scanners.

How to?

  • Well, CSM elections are soon. Go to CSM Campaigns and read who and what offers. During last year a lot was done for Null-Sec. The Current CSM year (mainly) must be a year for: High-Sec, Industrialists, Low-Sec (including FW). You can ask the respective people for these changes. It’s just too many things to update and repair there.
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Id say yes.

But its never going to happen.

Your post is good, arguments rational, well considered and makes sense, but its never going to happen.

The irony is that people claim they want a more hardcore EVE, but its just talk.
The reality is they enjoy the comfort just as much as anyone else.

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The cargo scanner whine is indeed a rare and exclusive whine. Thanks for sharing op.

HTFU

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I don’t believe the site spawning is dependant on specific time of day (e.g. downtime). Completed sites respawn somewhere else within the constellation after a set time. They also despawn by themselves if they are left alone (that includes half-completed) for a certain period of time and then respawn within the constellation as well.

Please correct me if I’m wrong.

o/

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The early bird gets the worm, besides I don’t think the spawn mechanics work the way you seem to think they do.

A similar “argument” has been made in the past with reference to people in certain timezones stripping belts out because they could login immediately after downtime; the answer to your argument is the same as it was to that one.

HTFU

Some pilots, by some reasons, will select the Besieged Covert Research and will run the most profitable. This will summon mainly unprofitable sites selectively, one by one. So, everybody will scan them previously from 50km range or above and will ignore all. This turns the content passive. BTW, I must admit, I saw players during my long-term exploration, which closing those trashy unprofitable sites to summon new ones.

Efficiency in action, there’s nothing wrong with maximising the return on your time; you can do it with pretty much every activity in the game to give you an edge over others.

Top tier gankers prefer to suicide gank only the most profitable Transport ships. This ruins the main EVE concept – the higher is the risk, the higher is the reward. In other words, some freighter players must take all the risk to deliver the goods for profit, while other players just must to do a mathematical calculation to get the digit, which will determine their actions without risks for profit. Some players, by risking, will lost too much at once, while others will lose too little without risking. By seeing a Freighter, without knowing exactly what is in their cargo, will change the game, will change the ‘dice’. Current Security status isn’t a thing, which can influence on all these things. With very low Security status you can fly everywhere, you have enough time to undock and suicide gank somebody, you can easily and not expensive repair your Security status to a required level.

If you undock in a freighter with cargo expanders and eleventytrillion isk you deserve to explode, even more so if you use autopillock. Suicide gankers are the only risk that NPC alt haulers have, corp haulers have the added risk of wardecs, but if you haul during a wardec you need to DIAF anyway.

Suicide ganking isn’t free from risk, the difference between gankers and their prey is that the gankers have accepted the risk associated with their gameplay and account for it in their gameplay; their prey mostly blame the game for their own choices.

I can almost guarantee that removal of cargo scanners would end badly, for freighter pilots in particular. I can think of at least one large group that could, and probably would, operate a freighter ganking campaign for a considerable period of time that would make Hulkageddon of years past look like a joke. The cargo scanner allows discrimination, removing it may cause a massacre.

It’s long past time that some players were reminded of, or shown the true nature of Eve. If they don’t like it, good riddance.

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As far as we know, it may not respawn in the same constellation, but should respawn almost immediately “somewhere”, thus meaning there is a constant amount of sites of that type in EVE.

The sites wont despawn if left alone, nor will half-completed ones.
They will persist until next downtime, and half-completed ones will be wiped.
Im not certain on sig/anoms that have not been touched persisting after downtime.
Escalations are reset to the last completed pocket, afaik.

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Anyways.

Removing cargo scanners would be good for EVE overall.
Hack the can to find out whats in it, and pop the ship to find out whats in it.

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No, they not. I mean that somebody just hacks only one ore three of those cans by leaving others untouched. This keeps the signature online. In Hi-Sec it’s not a problem, in Low-Sec it’s annoying, in Null-Sec it’s a big problem and in WH it’s insane.

For Null-Sec (both NPC and SoV) the issue is next. A local player hacks only few and most profitable cans with his ALT (loot above 20-30MSIK). Afterwards, he leaves there a sneaky Stratios, T3 or other ship for hours.

For WH it’s obvious. You are familiar with those signatures. Isn’t it? After Scanning down like 10 Signatures to find just one Relic site, where there is only on can it’s hilarious. Isn’t it?

I can’t say exactly about timers, but I noticed one, which lived over 50 mins.

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Instead of removing cargo scanners which is an obvious nonsense that will never happen, why not make the cans unscannable or only filled with loot once the hack is successful?

Sounds much more reasonable and at least have an actual chance to be considered thus implemented.

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Why should you be able to scan someones cargo?

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Why not?

Why should you be able to scan someone’s ship? Same answer.

Asking “why” doesn’t validate anything. Besides the subject is not whether cargo scanners should be part of the game or not as far as I recall what this thread is about, the proposal to remove them was stated for the reason how it influences exploration sites.

I’ve provided a better alternative that actually achieves what the OP wants.

If you hate cargo scanners because they scan your freighters that is neither my problem nor are the subject of this thread thus completely irrelevant why one should or should not be able to use such a tool and under what circumstances and what if any negative consequences it should or not result in. This thread is not about any of that.

Edit: Checked the OP and apparently he mentioned freighters as well at a later part of his wall of text. The answer is simple, it is part of the game. The risk is already there with the loot fairy, with whether the gank actually succeeds or not and so on. Getting intel on your opponent is an option of the game decided by CCP. Beyond that it is mere opinion whether someone likes it being part of the game or not so pointless to argue with that.

In my opinion it is a good addition as without it gankers would face too much of risk their gank not being profitable. The risk vs reward is balanced now as is but without the cargo scanner it would be off balance and we would see less splosions in hisec which would be a loss. I know freighter pilots will not agree but their view is biased for obvious reason.

Of course just as stated this is an opinion, just as whatever anyone else would bring up is just that so in the end comes to personal preference and in the end what CCP decides is healthy for the game.

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The issue, as I noticed, isn’t linked to the time saving actions. Some players warping there at 50km or above for scanning. They doing only few profitable sites. One by one a profitable site will be summoned into none profitable. When there will be 99% of unprofitable sites, after 6hrs passed from downtime, nobody will do those at all. Only few players try to fly close the site by triggering that site.

Also. it removes the RNG and keeps the risks btw, because those sites requires expensive ships in Low-Sec, while other Low-Sec Escalations and Explorations - keeps both risks and RNG. That’s all.

What kind of risks are those? Well, in my opinion, a rookie FW pilot accepts more risks than a well tuned gank squad of different pilots or multiboxing pilots. To undock a multibillion Freighter isn’t an accepted risk?

Maybe yes, maybe no. Probably, at the beginning, somebody will try to prove your words, but truly RNG will balance it soon. Gankers will not spend more time for that, than in Low- Null-Sec battles.

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I haul, and occasionally I haul huge amounts of ISK in goods. Knowing that my ship will be scanned is part of the game - it should NOT be changed. If I am hauling above a certain threshold, I know to take certain additional precautions - such as an alt flying a combat ship - or using a blockade runner (yes, a blockade runner does not have the same cargo carrying ability but it cannot be scanned). Removing cargo scanners - after use in the game for a lot of years - would generate chaos. Like some of the presumable gankers have stated above - don’t like the fact you can be scanned - either learn how to cope with them or do something else in Eve.

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This is why this thread was made for - to find a balanced solution.

As for me, I didn’t found those Cargo Scanners so useful and important. I don’t use them in exploration or other PVE/PVP area. In my opinion, they allows to dodge the primordial EVE rules to take risks and RNG in certain areas of the game. Also, without these scanners, the main in game concepts will not change.

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Of anything what you say rather should indicate ship scanners to be removed (to keep the enemy ship fit a mystery) while keeping the cargo scanners in to allow people to determine the value of the target seems reasonable.

Note I am talking about ganking or in general PvP here and not exploration sites. For those I think the solution I’ve suggested is the proper solution instead so people could not cherry pick the good rewards.

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'Intel tools like cargo scanners are good for the game - if anything we need more of them. They provide a mechanism for interaction and enable content.

I wouldn’t be averse if there was more play and counterplay were added around that, maybe even in the context of a smuggling/contraband revamp, but it works fine as is. There are ways to hide your stuff from being scanned - heck, there’s a whole ship class dedicated to it - so use them if you want your privacy.

As for the whining regarding explorers - nothing would change. The same people that cherry pick cans with cargo scanners will just leave the garbage behind to mess with the other explorers. You will still have to deal with the same problem of cherry picked cans.

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I think, I found the best solution. Look, even in real life, by passing different X-Ray terminal secure areas, the secure team can’t see exactly what is in your luggage. It can notice only few items.

So, I’m offering to:

  • remove Cargo Scanning for Exploration/Combat site cans;
  • apply a scan chance and/or scan errors, like it works in current ECM modules and Scan Probes. It requires decent efforts to scan something down in space. The Cargo Scanner should scan longer, than a docking command takes part. Because the case when you can be scanned and Alphaed afterwards, while Docking, isn’t so cool mechanic. It’s a super good idea to see only a part of cargo - a balanced stuff between, as you mentioned, a hunter and his prey.

[updated]
I know about the spots, but it isn’t the case…

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Personally I rather keep the ability for gankers to determine the value of the target perfectly but remove the ship scanner so deny them the ability to determine the defensive capabilities of the target. Though am not a ganker so not sure how they react to such a suggestion but I guess they will provide their feedback sooner or later.

As for the docking command thing, I am not sure you understand how it works.

If you are within the docking ring when you click dock the command is accepted immediately and once it is accepted your ship becomes invulnerable even if it is visible for a short period it can not be interacted with.

If you warp to an instadock bookmark and use autopilot after (when the station is set as destination) once you arrive the autopilot immediately will ask for docking permission and it will instantly be granted thus you can not be killed (not even with smartbombs as I recall) nor even targeted. This is both a useful method for freighters or thieves like me who dock up this way during suspect flag to avoid the risk of being shot.

If you warp to station (but not an instadock bookmark) you warp to the docking ring but as is with warp travel you always arrive at a random direction from the point of warp and in a random distance between 0 and 2500 m, meaning you can end up 2500 m from the docking ring and your ship have to use sub-warp propulsion to make that distance. Even if you request to dock your ship have to make that distance before the docking request is accepted and how long that takes depends on your ship speed and acceleration, thus there is no direct relation here with gankers nor their ability to scan your ship or anything such.

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This can open a game of RNG, curiosity, big rewards and fails. The Hi-Sec ganking looks like a pure boring mathematical decision, a logical binary decision, a boring accounting report.

Just take into consideration:

  • I’m not arguing about bumping;
  • I’m not arguing about ship scanners;
  • I’m not arguing about Security Status mechanics (this will not affect the CODE miner ganks at all);
  • I’m not arguing about contract scamming to target a specified courier;
  • I’m not arguing about the Alliance intel to destroy their opponent ALTs in NPC corps;
  • I’m not arguing about Alliance revenge ‘black list’ of Jita squad vs just left players with all their stuff. Maybe not;
  • I’m not arguing about Autopilot;
  • I’m not arguing about Freeport scamming;
  • I’m not arguing about dangerous-sec mechanics.
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Well, this is why they are the “top tier gankers”.

But there are gankers, who gank smaller ships, too, and there is freight traffic going on with 60km3 aka DSTs and with values into the billions of ISK on a daily basis.

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