I recently joined FW again about 2 months ago and have been having a great time getting good 1v1 frigate and dessie fights. The thing I never really noticed before was how horrible the lp payout was for combat. Granted most of my battles I lose, but for my rare wins I am only getting between 200 - 500 lp for winning the fight. To me this reward seems pathetic, since FW is based on fighting and conquering territory.
I believe the lp rewards could easily be increased by 3x - 5x to encourage more combat in FW space. This seems like very low hanging fruit, that CCP could adjust without disrupting the game in any way.
My question to whomever makes decisions for Faction Ware at CCP is:
Why should FW mission runners get such high lp rewards, while contributing nothing to system control or the war effort in general, compared to someone fighting and dying for their faction to gain or defend territory, which is what FW is about.
They are in Min/Amarr FW space, look for systems with 80%+ contested and you should find lots of targets.
I find it’s best to try and match ship types as much as possible, ie t1 dessie vs t1 dessie or t1 frigate vs t1 frigate. If you go there with a Worm as an example, and expect to find fights against an Atron or Rifter, you’ll waste your time.
For me, I could care less about a red or green KB, it’s about good fights.
I agree the lp seems low for the risk involved with pvp. If I had to guess, I would say its low to avoid abuse. Say you made more isk in lp value then the ship you destroyed is worth. Two people/alts in different factions could just take turns blowing up each others ships and get fast profits, or if everyone did it the lp value would become worthless.
I had considered that abuse could happen. CCP supposedly has some very smart people hired, so I am sure a formula could be found factoring in total loss, insurance and lp payout to make sure abuse would not happen.
My lp payout (using 1100/lp) for kills ranges between 3.5% and 9% of the total loss value. Meanwhile, mission runners are getting 100% lp payout for almost zero risk and having no impact on FW status.
I think CCP could do better to encourage more explosions in Faction Warfare space. Perhaps basic insurance payouts should be eliminated for FW because of the constant war status? When I die, I still get an insurance payout even though insurance was never purchased. Perhaps insurance should only be paid out if it was purchased in the first place?
That is an interesting read, but it does say at the end that CCP fixed the manipulation issue.
I am not expecting a great amount lp for combat, but I think 20% of the kill value in lp wouldn’t break FW that badly. ie., 100 mil kill = 20 mil isk converted to lp = 20000 lp, especially if insurance payouts were removed to try and curb an exploit of using alts.
Thoughts?
Quite honestly, anything CCP does in any part of the game usually has some sort of exploit that players find and use to their advantage. Even though combat should be rewarded more, I don’t want it game breaking either.
