That’s what we are talking about, changing the mechanics.
I just suggested a flagging system that would not make this the case.
X =/= 0 in all cases. Once again it’s about intention and flagging, if you are X metres outside the docking ring, and you click “dock” to the station, it should be clear that your intent is to dock, not to try to bump someone between you and the docking.
Sure, if all touching flags both parties the same, but there is no reason for that assumption.
Yes, I get what you are saying. But all it does is move the boundary. It doesn’t eliminate it. The game code only follows the rules written into it. It can’t think for itself.
So if you move the boundary, you don’t eliminate the problem. You just move it to a different point in space.
I’m not saying this applies directly to Eve, but under international maritime law, the smaller, more maneuverable ship, must give way to the larger less agile ship. I’m not saying this is a good idea, but it could be one option to see how to set the flag for who is attacking whom.
My intent isn’t really to move the boundary, but to use the player’s interaction with that boundary for the game code to determine the intent of the player.
If bumps are hostile, then flags should be set. If flags can’t be set because accidental bumps happen and we can’t tell who bumped whom, then these things need to be fixed or addressed.
Of course the current mechanics are one way, but this is P F&I so it’s about changing the mechanics.
What about my bullet point in post #116? 
Yes. It’s been proposed before.
The immediate response to that is for a ganker to get into the biggest, heaviest whale freighter that can fly in highsec and sit along an autopilot line. Any other freighter or smaller ship then has to “give way”. It doesn’t, receives a flag…is engaged and killed.
Similarly, sit it on the boundary of the docking ring from a gate and wait for other ships to drop out of warp and then bump into you as they try to reach docking range.
Similarly, warp into an ice field at 0 and then wait for the ice mining fleet to warp to you and bump you. They all go suspect and you are free to kill them in the rest of your fleet.
Similarly, … the examples can go on and on.
They are all based on the assumption that the smaller ship gets a flag for bumping into the larger ship and no matter what rules are put in, there are 2 aspects to CCP designs - (1) risk is part of the game, and (2) players will always find ways to use the mechanics as best they can.
That combination - CCP builidng risk into the game and players using it to their advantage - mean that any change will still lead to more threads in the forum and this specific suggestion has been proposed dozens of times before and not one time has the suggestion been detailed enough to be a “solution” that is better than the existing solutions that already exist in the mechanics.
I am not a ganker. I am however a hauler. You’ll often find me more on the side of keeping the current risks in the game, than removing them. I don’t want the game to be made safer. Risk presents challenge and in hauling, not being ganked, because you take precautions, provides an advantage. I’m all for change if it makes sense, but also where it maintains risk. No risk is boring.
Also true for me, be it DST not freighters. I don’t want to make Eve safer or prevent ganking. But if it’s a hostile act that has the same effect as tackle, then it should be treated as such by crimewatch.
And thank you for such a long reply to what I did not intend as a serious suggestion, but just one example about a rule that could determine intent, but what about my actual suggestion made in post #116?
I realize that it could have flaws or need additions or amendments, but so far it has just been ignored.
Yes, but crimewatch is dumb.
It can only follow the rules programmed into it. It cannot know the “intent” of the player, only the action of the ship.
So while I agree, bumping has a purpose that is aggressive, making bumping cause a flag will lead to many situations where people don’t intend to bump but do (because not all bumping is aggressive. The vast majority of it in the game isn’t intended at all), receiving a flag.
Once again 100% ignoring the now twice posted suggestion under which this would not be true.
Not ignoring it at all. Just seeing the holes in it that are there.
The suggestion that ships have to target to bump, or all shipsfly through each other is fine from a “EvE is a game” perspective, but not an “EvE is real” perspective.
CCP have always taken an “EvE is real” approach to the design, with many compromises because EvE is also just a game. It’s real more than just the metagame.
So whether ships just freely passing through each other, but then magically not because one is target locked sits well with people, that’s not for me to say. To me it seems illogical, but my perspective on that is no better than anyone else’s.
I’m not sure which “it” you are referring to? “It” is:
Your “holes” are:
This is addressed in the suggestion, and not a “hole”.
Also addressed in “it”, this would no longer be the case.
So far you haven’t quoted “it” a single time, and you haven’t addressed any idea put forward in “it”, much less pointed out any holes in “it”.
Read my edit above, which was at the same time as your post.
It’s not an approach I personally like. It’s not immersive at all, but that’s just my view.
By comparison, the current mechanics are far better and produce more risk for the hauler. More risk is better than less risk. More personal responsibility for safety is better than shifting responsibility to CCP, especially when a lot of the issues that arise already have counterplay that people don’t use. That’s just my view though.
Yeah, I saw it after my reply, but your edit didn’t get an edit flag. (More new forum problems.)
I agree that I would favour immersion. But, I think in this case it would be some sort of air traffic control, and docking/jump queues around stations and gates. That would fix the bumping problem and make things more “real”, but that is a whole host of other problems. (I’m not suggesting this as a fix in anyway.)
We already have ships flying through each-other in updocking, we have ships flying through planets while in warp, so I’m not as worried about immersion breaking. TBH, I can’t recall actually ever bumping into another player ship that I wasn’t in combat with, so I don’t know if this would really affect things.
I’m not arguing with your view, but your view if the very problem that brought me in on this thread. You think that intentional bumping related to a gank is hostile, which we agree on, but you don’t think that setting a flag is a correct response. Since we disagree on that, we can’t have any meaningful discussion past that.
You preferring counterplay vs. crimewatch isn’t a “hole” in my idea, it’s disagreeing with a base premise. We can’t talk about how to build a boat, if we can’t agree on what water is.
You have actually made my point (which wasn’t about fixing bumping, but the broken way in which things are being discussed) so thank you. 
I think you made your own point in that regard.
Intent is impossible to determine and ships press approach on eachother all the time. You’re gonna give out flags to people who are just doing everyday movements (for any of a million reasons).
What are some of those million reasons for which you right-click on a ship (in space or in your overview) and then click “approach”, but you didn’t intend to approach it with a collision being a possible outcome?
You are saying there are millions of ways to intentionally interact with another ship in space, without intending to interact with it.
If you “press approach” you intended to interact with it, that is the definition of “intend” (unless it was an accidental click in the client) and “interact”.
Do you think there is any value at all in having a timer to trigger the suspect flag, say ten or fifteen minutes, or a number of bumps, and that the bumpee can attack the suspect without limited egagement…
I started realising as I was writing this that I have been dense, and I think I get what you have been getting at regarding determining ‘intent’
How does the game know who instigated the bump?! This could be used to make the freighter go suspect and get free gank-
mach bumps freighter INTO another ship for ten minutes, say bumpers alt in gank BS, mach AND freighter go suspect, mach quick aligns off, freighter is killed by BS with no sec penalty or loss to concorde.
At least with the current mechanics, there ARE counters to bumping, including the not usually mentioned check space for celestials that the bumper may be aligning you towards at speed, despite preventing your intended alignment, and spam warp (just heard this one)-
as well as all the usual opsec and precautions.
Perhaps bumping as interdiction works in high sec because concorde are their to punish not protect, and making bumping a ‘suspect’ activity could render them innefective.
It really would be the wild west.
This is my suggestion: if there is no “intent”, there is no bump, ships just pass through each-other*. For there to be “intent” one of the pilots had to intentionally interact with the other ship, the one who interacted gets the flag on the bump.
*This only applies to player ships that are not hostile to each-other or already marked with a flag or a combat log-out timer. So it doesn’t affect PvE, or any active PvP, only ships/players not in active PvP, who have done nothing to “intend” to engage in PvP.
If two ships are flying past each-other and one of them clicks “bump the other guy” it is clear to see the “intent”, if accidental bumping is removed, then the only way to bump, is to “intend” to bump.
I don’t think this has any value at all, if the bump is a PvP attack, it should get a flag, a delay timer is not really good. If the timer is designed to determine if it’s an attack, I think there is a better way than minutes of bumping or number of bumps.
I think the conclusion I have come to now, is that the current mechanics as we have them are as good as we are going to get,
unless CCP have a complete overhaul of all gameplay in which case we have nothing to go on.
If we had to activate a ‘bump’ module, or just a switch all ships possessed to display intent to bump, then this would be a huge nerf to bumping without balancing the risk to the bumpee at all, as
the bumper would have to decide to go suspect BEFORE interdiction, whereas there is no attendant need for the bumpee to decide BEFORE they are bumped that they are ‘innocent’ by the activation of a similar module-
I think this could be used to gank without sec loss and concorde- and would bring back a form of can flipping, only it would be ship fiipping- if thebumpee was prepared to both bump and gank
And it would allow combat ready ships susceptible to bumping themselves to avoid interdiction altogether
And canny freighter pilots with an alt to kill suspect baiter would be 100% safe from consequences, as opposed to 95% safe or even 99%,
it would be totally risk free for those who understood the mechanics and bait for those who did not.
I don’t see how it is an improvement on the current state at all- and I started out wanting something like this
(Ill admit, this was partly because it could allow epic mission runner baiting and AG in missions, and because I just like explosions).
Isn’t this how things are supposed to work? I set my safety to green and this declares me as “innocent”, and the game prevents me from doing anything that could give me a flag. The ganker, sets their safety to not-green and this declares to the game that they intend to do something that could give them a flag. It’s not unbalanced or unfair, it’s the nature of the safety system.
Intentional bumping is not always a hostile act.
Edit to add the following:
Every group I’ve played with for any period of time have had fun events where intentional bumping took place, sort of internet space ship “jousting”, if you will, conga lines, etc; where the intent was to bump another ship in a playful, interactive manner.
Also, I mentor new players, and I use bumping as a teaching technique to demonstrate ship movement.
So, taking those situations into consideration in this context, you have to be able to define the intent of the bumper, cause using just a simple “click” “approach this ship” does not define intent.
Because not all intentional bumping is related to ganking, or even hostile.
I liked your post because you are making me think this through and that was why I made the op in the first place, to get my head round bumping as a mechanic.
It’s not about fair, I think-
I believe now it could be used to bait the wary and uninformed, benefiting the ganker and possibly bringing back suspect baiting in a big way
while at the same time allowing players who understand the mechanics to move huge shipments across space with zero risk, rather than a balanced risk.
(remember also, moving large valuable cargos across space is logistics and the backbone of any war- it is hardly a neutral act and many consider it PVP as pilots compete for arbitrage opportunities)
Your green safety is to stop you from accidentally performing an action that could have you concorded or going suspect, its a safety- it does not declare innocence but protects the player from accidentally locking a gate with hot weapons etc, it is a ‘safety’ to prevent someone from committing criminal or suspect acts by mistake.
Consider this scenario.
I wish to kill a DST which my alt has scanned and which contains a very valuable cargo.
I wish to do this in high sec, without incurring sec loss or concordunken.
I set my gank fit but tanked BS at a gate I know the DST will be coming through.
I have my fast aligning bump ship ready.
I set the safety on my BS pilot to green- to safe- but I am not innocent and nor are my intentions, I merely want to ensure I do not commit a criminal or suspect act.
When the DST starts to align I bump it with the Mach, into my BS character who has safety on green, eventually this will turn the DST suspect and my gank BS can kill it without consequences.
My bumping ship may now be suspect also, but the DST cannot kill it, and if they bring friends I am fit to bump fast and align fast and can GTFO.
My gank BS at no point has a suspect flag, so anyone defending the DST will be concorded, especially if the bump ‘victim’ can attack without limited engagement.
(as discussed earlier, if the bumpee attacking the suspect bumper gives limited engagement then this is just free ganks for anyone- and would be even more OP for the bumper/ganker- and make baiting even easier).
Now we can say, wait, if the DST has their safety to green, if we ‘extend its use’ from being a ‘safety mechanism’ to a ‘don’t want pvp so my bumps are innocent module’ then
the bumping mach can set their safety to green, get no suspect flag, and the DST cannot align, and my gank BS must suicide it the old fashioned way.
So already I am thinking how this could be applied to ganking bling fit mission runners, ‘bump baiting’, or say in FW could turn bumping from an act of interdiction to actually using enemy, neutral, or friendly ships as missiles to get free flags and easy kills of pirates, without sec loss etc.
EDIT: if green safety was changed from safety to ‘declaration of innocence’ and this meant green safety ships would just pass through others with no bump, then any new eden entity can move any cargo for war or otherwise, where and when they want, with zero risk. And that would break the game. And many of them are not innocent in the sense of not wanting pvp, though all could set their alt haulers safety to green.