TL:DR Summary, bounties will be based on a system multiplier.
This multiplier will get adjusted constantly based on what’s happening in the solar system:
Excessive ratting? Multiplier goes down
High level of player combat and death? Multiplier goes up
Empty system? Multiplier stabilizes at an equilibrium value.
Of course there’s a lot going on behind the scenes to set the rate of change, but the three points above are all you need to effectively plan your bounty hunting activities.
Discussion protip: The article has no numbers, doesn’t explain the impact of PvP as a numerical value on the multiplier, doesn’t establish criteria for what is PvP, etc., so making assumptions about it would be silly.
I wonder if there will be a floor on how low the modifier can go. I suspect most would just take the X% nerf to continue what they’re doing today.
Wouldn’t a flat nerf to bounties and an increase in escalation spawn rate achieve a similar goal? It’d get people moving blingy ships around. I don’t know if bots run escalations but it might narrow the suspect pool down to just those that sell all of their escalations.
According to the article, you’ll still be able to rat, but the bounties that are paid out will be reduced by the multiplier (plus whatever new mechanic CCP has planned for the ESS).
Better than for your shortsightedness. Why is there no official dev blog discussion topic? That’s the second high profile dev blog today without one. Are you afraid of something? Maybe criticism?
Empty system? Multiplier stabilizes at an equilibrium value.
It does not even reward leaving systems alone or finding left alone systems. If you want people to spread but don’t properly reward the spread, you can’t really expect people to like this crap.
I hope this means you’ve implemented a check similar to zkillboards ‘kill padding’ to remove such kills from the ESS multiplier equation?
It would be silly if optimal ratting would require killing alts in cheap ships a few times a day, because I’m certain people will start doing that en masse.
This will be gud. I hope CCP will not post anything about stopping “tests” when they start, because of some strange exploit making peeps gain trillions of ISK in few sites, because someone forgot to remove a 0 or two.
Yes, this sort of gaming the system will be critical to whether it works or is simply exploited into uselessness.
I would guess that a good many players would take up to a 20% modifier in stride, and keep doing what they’re currently doing while complaining about the ISK hit. If modifiers start to get to 25-30% or higher, people will start moving.
Hoping they get the details balanced well, but not holding my breath.
Well yeah, a system not being used for PvP or PvE shouldn’t get some kind of reward lol, it punishes folks for turtling into systems, but encourages folks to PvP in systems. If you just have to leave a system empty to restore it’s multiplier to normal, then the goal of forcing people to spread out has been accomplished.
