The current link between EVE Online and Vanguard exists, but it suffers from being “passive”, it’s something you look upon after the action and it happens in the background.
I think there is a way to replicate the active part of orbital bombardments in Dust without feeling into the same design traps and that while freezing new kind of gameplay for EVE Online, benefiting both games really.
Pretty much, re-using the atmospheric sites that were used during an event (can’t remember which one) where Capsuleers went into the atmosphere of a planet, to represent Capsuleers providing assistance to Vanguard clones.
The catch is that, instead of have a single location in the atmosphere of a planet, you have multiple, the equivalent of rooms and each room targets a different location in Vanguard, and provide different kind of assistance to Vanguard players.
This has the advantage of doing two things over the previous implementation of Dust.
- This creates sites that can be contested but at the same time allows for multiple people to provide assistance to the same battle.
- This allows to provide different kind of assistance to Vanguard other than direct damage in the form of bombardments, you could have nanites dispersion, Electronic Counter-Measures, etc…
Organic Solo-content for EVE Online
As someone would approach a planet and target it, they would be offered the option for planet entry, and that would allow they enter in a random location along the ones generated for one of the battles happening on that planet.
However, taking account the lack of accelerator gates and the gravity well of planets, ships would be dispersed, one by one through the different locations of the planets. And only if those have not been secured yet.
That would break any kind of force concentration and allow for solo pilots access to a kind of content that is friendlier to them.
To further break force concentration, you could have pilots align randomly with one of the forces deployed planetside for some planets, would further break force concentration and force people in the same fleet to potentially have to shoot each other.
This content would be perfect for people who to reduce the chances of being blobbed.
Cooperation with the Vanguard
Capsuleers and Vanguards on the same side could communicate with each other on which location planetside needs support => “We need help at site Bravo”, the Capsuleers above would then look for a “room” in the atmosphere that targets that site with a bombardment or nanite dispersal for site B.
Then Capsuleers in the atmosphere could call Vanguards for help => "I need help, I’m in “room” 14
Vanguards on the planet could then deploy a drone to room 14, or could use the same orbital cannons as in insurgency maps to damage enemy ships in that room.
Conclusion
With this system, you would have an active participation of both Vanguards and Capsuleers in what is happening in EVE Vanguard. You would have something where Capsuleers are more involved, doing something more than pushing a single button, and without having to worry about escalations due to being in an open grid. Vanguards would benefit from a fine-grained assistance that they can request, and would benefit from having multiple allied Capsuleers covering multiple sites.
Afterthoughts
Specialized modules could be introduced to dissociate the type of assistance from the room.
Those modules would have to be usable outside of assisting Vanguards though, EVE Online has enough hyper-specialized modules.
“Extraction” maps can only work with that system if the teams are the corps.
A planet being blockaded could be avoided by making a planet atmospheric entry available from anywhere in the solar system.
Thank you for your time.