All you “solo” pilots should team up against the “multiboxers”
As you may have noticed, the discussion is indeed about players forming fleets.
The issue I am describing concerns how individual players operate within a fleet.
By individual players, I mean real people with their own preferences and history. When you have many individual players running a small number of accounts (1–2), the fleet is inherently non-homogeneous. It is unrealistic to expect everyone to be in the same corporation.
At the same time, a multiboxer fields a fleet of clones from a single corporation. Always. This gives them a clear advantage when using tools like smartbombs due to the corporate friendly fire mechanic.
When friendly fire is enabled at the corporation level, members of the same corporation can damage each other without penalties. As a result, a single-corp fleet (which is typically a multiboxer) can freely use smartbombs within their own fleet without any drawbacks.
In contrast, a group of solo players cannot do this even if they form a fleet together, because they do not benefit from being in the same corporation. And I can assure you that if a multiboxer’s fleet consisted of individual players, in the vast majority of cases they also would not all be in the same corporation.
Therefore, saying “What’s the problem? Just join one corporation” is neither realistic nor a fair way to restore balance.
This problem began to surface with the introduction of pirate insurgencies. Lowsec became more profitable, and multiboxers started migrating from nullsec into Faction Warfare. Along with that, some nullsec mechanics effectively migrated into lowsec as well.
After explaining this in the opening post, I proposed a way to restore balance between individual players who band together in alliances and coalitions on one side, and multiboxers with nullsec-style mechanics on the other. In nullsec, after all, fleets are not penalized for using smartbombs.
Drone ships from a single corporation, controlled by one person, are a nullsec-born phenomenon. If that is the case, then individual players should be given the same tools that exist in nullsec to counter such groups.
This is a problem. And the solution is to allow friendly fire at the fleet level, with appropriate safeguards for new players in highsec. The concept of such a safeguard already exists and is implemented in the fleet warp confirmation/safety mechanic.
I hope this clarifies what the discussion is actually about. This is not about individual players being unable to group up — they already do so in alliances. The issue lies elsewhere.