There are obvious things they can do to fix their own gameplay. It’s called “playing the game” really, stuff like choosing the right ship, fitting it correctly, setting your overview, paying attention, not going AFK, getting a mining permit, asking your local New Order Agent for advice… all common sense things to do, yet so many carebears don’t even get the idea that it’s up to them to improve their game and rather cry on the forums.
This is why it is important to help them. In order to be able to help them you first have to shake them out of their catatonic state and prep them to receive information. I will not go into details here, let’s just say it involves non-trivial amounts of anti-matter.
Gankers won’t care about anything else but pew-pew until all the players left in the game are gankers. Then they’ll eat each other like sharks and EVE will become what they want it to become, a graveyard.
I don’t think so. I think it’s an over-protection reflex from the hunted. The secret is out. The word has gotten around to where a lot of new players know damn well that they are hunted down for the glory of zKillboard and they don’t want to become a trophy so what do they do? They get smart and learn to avoid being hunted either by becoming hunters themselves, by learning how to avoid ganks or by simply not playing.
I don’t know where people get the idea gankers don’t care about anything, or how we arrive at the conclusion that shooting people for any reason one might have is somehow a violation of some unspoken social contract in the Eve universe.
It has always been the case that anyone can shoot at anyone for almost any reason, or no reason. They just have to accept the consequences of the decision to fire. Being shot or being killed is a sort of litmus test. Do you take ownership of your decisions? Do you take ownership of your mistakes?
Not every ganker will behave the same way, but every one I’ve run into will respect you if you are a good sport, own up to your error, and resolve to overcome it and do better next time. They care about your character. They care about whether you’re the kind of person they want to share a universe with.
If a player sees another player who has to have everything their way, who can’t tolerate losing, who won’t tolerate others in the shared universe being free to act as they please, who can not separate the virtual world from the real one, and degenerates into an impotent barrage of verbal abuse when defeated, then it’s a pretty rational response for the first player to dislike the second and want to shoot them if they see them.
I also think it’s a bit off the deep end to claim that gankers would destroy each other until none were left. The Eve universe is meant to sustain constant conflict. Some people can trade blows all day every day and that’s what they call entertainment. You can always build another ship, or have a corvette handed to you for free. If nobody can afford to build any ships, there will be as many corvettes as needed for every person to still have a ship.
PvE players have long sought to exclude themselves from the PvP core that Eve was built on. I think we get threads like this because CCP gives up ground. Increased war costs, allowing player corporations to be war immune, and forcing structure ownership on those who declare war. It all creeps towards conflict being opt in, but it doesn’t make it opt in outright. Like dangling a snack in front of an animal on the other side of a glass pane. It’s no surprise that people are still lunging for that snack on the forums to this day. CCP tempts them, but keeps the treat always just out of reach.
It seems to me now that I’ve had a lot of coffee and some time to read this stuff that the best thing to do is make highsec into a nightmare. If huge numbers of people who are into PvP turned suicide ganker for a few months and made life in highsec nearly impossible the people who live there would be forced out into low and nullsec, and a few into wormholes.
If all trade routes could be shut down the trade hubs would collapse and there wouldn’t be much of an option but to move.
I’m just guessing here, but I think the largest continuous population is in highsec, it they were forced out it would spread them all over the place and there would be a better distribution of targets.
I guess people doing this would be worried about Concord standings, but really, what does that matter if highsec is no longer a good place to go shopping or to sell your stuff?
I think there’s plenty of resources on how to do this, even if people do it as alts using the invite thingy to give them a million skill points for cranking up their dps on day one.
CCP would take a while playing catch-up while this was happening, but the real question there is how would they respond? Do they want destruction or for people to pay real world money for being safe?
I know of someone in Hek who is -10 security status and sits right on top of the trade hub killing the hell out of all sorts of people. If he can do that it can be done to all of highsec. Personally I would hit the trade routes first and then spread out making mining and ratting impossible just to see how it goes. If it seemed to be working I would then blockade the gates into and out of trade hubs.
So…
All we need is a whole lot of reckless people willing to go all the way over the edge and displace a huge population.
What’s the worst thing that could happen? All of highsec joins Goonswarm?
Yes because the same people that state quote are those that blob, hot drop, camp and gank with impunity. Then complain why no one wants to a) fight them or b) leaves the area.
Talking from a low sec perspective :
The “big boys” love to dunk everything that moves, other than each other. When it comes having a “gud fite” on equal level that appereantly is too risky and muh KB could get painted red.
These are the exact same people that go out and cry about muh content, no gud fites.
People that complain about lack of juicy targets are the same people that base their entire PVP Idenity on risk averse engagements.
They want ganks. Not fights.
There is only one way to put an end to this.
Remove standings. No more blue, red, neutral etc.
Make it near impossible to form multi alliance coalitions and on top of that nerf alliance and corporation member limit.
The only way to bring juicy targets and gud fites back is to create a ton of splinter groups that struggle for territory.
It has nothing to do with High Sec. The underlying issue is that the ideology of blue blue blue that creeps into all walks of EVE. From Null Sec Blue donut, into low sec and even WH space has NAPs.
I completely agree that the blue donut mentality is awful for the game, but completely disagree that it is the motivation behind “ganking” style gameplay (suicide ganking, hotdropping, cloaky camping. etc) and that those playstyles are bad for the game.
Eve is so compelling to so many people because it allows non-consensual pvp in all sorts of asymmetric situations, and making every fight an evenly balanced gudfite would undermine the essence of the game.
Its not bad.
Its bad when the blobs do it to everybody but each other.
That is the issue.
Snuff in LS for example can roam in dreadnaughts because they are butt buddies with every other group that could potentially take them.
I agree that the big guys teaming up to constantly oppress small groups rather than fight it out between themselves is an issue, but I don’t think that’s what most people have meant when talking about lack of targets.
I and I think others mean that the quantity and quality of PVE targets that small-medium groups to hunt is about as bad as it’s ever been.
Maybe instead of each individual trying to ascert their opinion that the “big blue donut” is a problem – maybe instead of that , CCP could ballz up and take a good look at the psychology behind the player which make the reasons for the behavior.
I swear - CCP is spending all its time and energy on 2 things
Skins
Trying to alter the behavior of their pilots to fit their narcissist’s vision of the game
(instead of designing a game that is an eco system of players of various communities).
The problem isnt risk / reward for the fish/krab activities anymore in null. It’s simply reward.
Little reward in capital ratting of any kind, little reward in capital mining. You could make comparable “safe” isk running abyssals in a hisec backwater system, or make adequate money mining with orca’s in hisec, or just do some incursion fleets.
Overfishing? No, its the destruction of the ecosystem that supported the fish that is the problem.
CCP should have the data enough to realize that the true reality of their game , at least at one point , was there really wasnt such a distinction between pvp and the bears. I met so many miners that turned into blops pilots but would still droll over a PI chart.
The CSM and CCP’s own poor judgement is to blame for this false type casting of play styles and the direction of ruin we are headed.
