High Sec War Limitation ideas for a healthy War Declaration System

PvP Gameplay Center Warfare & Tactics
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Hi there.

I got some ideas for a better High Sec War gameplay, one that is in favor not only to the aggressors, but for the defenders.

I have sent these ideas to the CSM members I trust, but with recent events involving a dedicated content maker and his fellow alliance members discouraged by High Sec griefer entities, that abuse the broken wardec mechanics, I feel it is time to share a possible solution to the problem and discuss it.

I was not sure whether to post this in the Players Features and Ideas section, decided to post it here, but please move it if you think it does not belong here.

On the topic.

It is clear that the War Declaration system in EVE is broken. High Sec griefer corps and alliances declare war against almost every corporation and alliance they see. Each of these entities have hundreds of ongoing wars, this is freaking ridiculous. It is so easy for them to pay the war taxes.

I have come to suspect that wealthy Null Sec entities support the High Sec griefer corps and alliances, in an attempt to push players towards low and null, eventually gaining more pilots under their wings - more power for them. While this is not necessary bad, they are right to do it, it also pushes smaller player corporations and players out of the game. And this is getting more and more serious, needs developers attention.

Players in newbie corporations feel discouraged and in many cases they just quit, instead of trying to push harder. I can uderstand them, because the overwhelming odds that they are against, can be too much for new pilots, who just want to have their time to learn their craft in the game and be able to defend themselves as a growing corp. A better balance is needed.

And about the High Sec griefers - I feel that these guys just have the most boring and non-challenging task in the game ever. Overkill - killing defenseless haulers with T3 Cruisers, or killing single pilots with a fleet of assault cruisers. Camping for hours at gates, well this may be ok, but most times when the players defend, they use out of corp alts to move their stuff and the griefers may be really bored while camping. Not to mention that when griefers meet a matching force, they donā€™t take the fight. They just want an easy kill and are too much of cowards to take a good fight.

I think it is time for them to HTFU and become the real war mercenaries they claim to be. That would involve hunting targets actively, gathering intel, destroying structures and most of all - fighting against capable fleets in a meaningful war in High Sec.

This is why I am sharing the following ideas. They surely need more work, but I think they are a good place to start brainstorming, for making the wardec system better for everyone.

  • Growing war taxes with every next war dec

It is ridiculous to see how High Sec griefer corps wardec hundreds of corporations with no difficulties for paying the war taxes. It is the most toxic thing and it pushes people out of EVE. Here is a proposition to address this.

With every next war that you declare, the tax should grow exponentially. Meaning that a corporation would be able to declare war towards up to, letā€™s say, 20 different entities. Anything more than that would cost billions upon billions to maintain.

  • Member ratio war tax restrictions

With the growing war taxes for every next wardec, it may become evident that griefer corps would like to split their members into smaller corps, just to be able to wardec more entities. This can be addressed with member ratio restrictions: If the aggressor corp or alliance has more members than the defending entity, the aggressor should pay higher tax. The higher the member count difference, with the aggressor having more numbers, the higher the tax the aggressor should pay, coupled with the growing tax for every next wardec.

Similar thing would be there for when the aggressor has fewer members than the defender, but to a lesser degree. Meaning that they should at least try to go to war against matching member number entities, so that there can be a meaningful conflict.

  • Smaller corps excluded from war decs - consider this part scratched.

A small corporation should be able to declare war, for when they want to join an ally in a war for example, but if they have letā€™s say, less than 20 members, other entities should not be able to declare war towards them. This will ensure that small growing corporations can have time to grow and learn how to defend themselves.

These things, if balanced properly, may bring some meaningful gameplay to war declarations. A war should have a solid reason and good and engaging gameplay for all the involved players.

These ideas need more thinking, but I think they are good enough for a start.

I would love to discuss these things with you.

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Not only no, but hell no. Players would simply place all of their structures in high sec in a 1-man corp that would be immune from war decs (due to having less than 20 members) and add their actual war decced corp members to the access list. That would be absolutely zero risk to structures. Not going to happen.

If you are a new player and need time to learn the ins and outs of EVE, play on the test server first and learn the ropes.

Letā€™s be honest here. Most new player corps would come to the forum and cry a river if they got war decced by even a single corpā€¦

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Hmm, good point here, thanks.

Well I guess that small corps should not be excluded from wardecs then. Do the other points seem fair to you?

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The problem is not the war dec system itself. Itā€™s been in itā€™s current state for pretty much the entire 15 years of EVE, and the game is still going. The problem is the cost associated with a war dec. It is too cheap, and that is only because there are now a few thousand ratting and mining super bots in null that can bank roll as many war decs as they want with billions upon trillions of ISK. Increase the amount to declare a war by a ridiculous amount (Iā€™m talking multiple billions per war dec, and exponentially increasing with each one).

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Maybe, but they are easily evaded by the aggressors hopping between corps and alliances. They can declare wars from a one-man corp and then all pile in after, or switch to another if scaling fees get too high.

Wars arenā€™t an easy one to solve. Kudos to you for trying, but there appear to be no easy fixes that target the ā€œproblemā€ wars while not eviscerating the war mechanic for the good ones.

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Keep discussing. Offer ideas if you have anything that could be a solution.

I will think more on it in the coming days. I am sure we can come to a good solution sooner or later.

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i often wonder if the bulk of those complaining about the wardec system are West Europeans (like myself). There seems to be a cultural expectation that you donā€™t have to spend any money on war preparation, but can instead loudly claim ā€œI donā€™t wannaā€ and people should yield to your opinion. It doesnā€™t work in RL, and it especially shouldnā€™t work in a game like EVE where the stated intention of the developer is Competition at all levels.

Vast swathes of highsec are almost devoid of population. Most wardeccers are lazy. As long as you donā€™t build the biggest structures close the major trade hubs, or insist on permanently living in the busiest mission systems you will be as good as safe from wardecs. (And I speak from experience from living for years in highsec with friends.)

CCP likes to compare EVE to building sand castles, but is should be more clear that all these sandcastles are build on the intertidal zone of the beach, in danger of being washed away on every high tide. If that is too dangerous for you, use the many publicly available structures in highsec. If your end-goal of EVE is building a sotiyo or fortizar in Perimeter and expecting is to stay there unmolested you havenā€™t understood the game at all.

A guy playing EVE for 15 years and still being stuck in a ā€œI need to be safe in highsecā€-mentality is absolutely not an example to follow. It is the gameplay equivalent of eating Mac and Cheese for your entire life because you might dislike some of the new dishes you could try.

The biggest problem for EVE is silly people telling new players that null-/low sec is too dangerous instead of telling them it is where the fun can be had. It is in telling new players that although they have played EVE for 15 years and have 100m+ or 200m+ SP they still consider nullsec too dangerous. They should be telling new players to apply to any of a number of player alliances that are happy to accept new players and give them training, skillbooks and free ships to fly and blow up.

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Indeed, more belts than locals is always a good sign, it makes spotting predators easy.

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Wardecs are just fine ding dong.

120 some odd decs active and a legit 400+ jumps in an intercepter hunting. All 20ish targets found were either docked, cloaked, or in a safe spot in dead space. Mercs blanket dec because carebears blue ball them.

Check the wars in merc corps, most of them will be 0/0 killed/lost both sides.

The mechanics of the wardec are just fine. Its the player search features that are broken. If it were easier to find certain players there would be less blanket decs.

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More weaklings crying that highsec isnā€™t safe

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This isnā€™t a direct solution to the problem, but more of an alternative tack to take on it, butā€¦ What about making it easier to find mercenaries to defend you in game?

We have a directory of wars, but this approach sort of leaves in in the hands of the mercenary to find a defender to protect. A directory of mercenaries who are willing to take employment as wartime allies and links to a sales pitch with information about their effectiveness in those wars might encourage defenders to shop around for some teeth instead of throwing in the towel.

Defenders get a free ally (aside from the fee that ally charges), but new player corporations probably donā€™t have any allies readily available, or know who to talk to in the event they find themselves in need of some.

Could be a bad idea, and it isnā€™t one Iā€™ve thought about very hard, but itā€™s not one Iā€™ve seen pitched a lot so I thought Iā€™d mention it. If nothing else, we can complain about how bad the idea is! Amirite?

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I would love to see something change when we had watchlist I used to enjoy the hunt but after they removed that I wasnā€™t into blanket deccing cudos to the other war dec corps who pull that off but Iā€™m to inpatient to be sitting at gate or hub I would rather hunt

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This was promised as a ā€œMercenary Marketplaceā€ during the last revamp. We did get some tools that allow you to open wars to allies in the current system, but it could be expanded and the ability to connect with allies improved. The counterargument to that is that it will just be gamed or used to scam, even with some reputation system or whatever you can imagine. I do think it worth investigating, but I think finding reputable mercenaries to aid you isnā€™t so much the problem rather it is usually just cheaper and easier to dodge the war then to hire help to defend your corp. It only makes sense for expensive structures, and there is already contracts and deals being made to protect these things.

True new players not only donā€™t have allies, but also lack the ISK to hire competent muscle. Unless you appeal to white knights or adrenaline junkies looking for any fight willing to work pro bono, a functioning marketplace would be of little use.

I think the wars themselves need to be made more interesting with things to counter-attack, and organic sandbox objectives to fight over first so that people want to fight for something before you worry too much about how to connect people to allies. But now you are beyond the realm of simple fixes and this will significant effort that I am not sure CCP is willing to spend.

Stuff like this is discussed regularly on the Wardec Project Discord if anyone wants to stop by:

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Most offers for allies are alt corp of the wardeccers that seek to make a few quick bucks on the ignorance of their wardecced victims. If wardec corps were interested in a fair fight it would be little effort for them to add a few of their colleagues to the stack of wardecs that they already maintain. The fact that they donā€™t tells you enough.

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While I agree this is probably true, and that the litany of other pitfalls is valid, I think what I really want to do is make it more obvious that there is an attainable option, and to get a group to talk to someone.

Iā€™m not envisioning a market so much as a directory or phone book. Like pretty much everything in Eve, that ā€˜let the buyer bewareā€™ nature is probably going to sink in.

The feeling of powerlessness is crippling in itself. Just the clarity that potential allies exist could be a morale boost. I donā€™t know demographics, but there are quite a few people who do take pity on legitimate newbros enough to give them a pep talk, or maybe the interaction itself opens an indy corp up to social avenues they would not have considered. In negotiations, players could trade industrial capacity for defense instead of isk. Probably wishful thinking, but I am an idealist.

If there are any white knights or adrenaline junkies, so much the better. I donā€™t really think there are any simple fixes to wardecs, but I think that some of the issues with them arise from a skewed perspective that the little guy must necessarily go it alone, and that people might complain less if they could see any light at the end of the tunnel at all.

Wishful thinking, again, butā€¦ I am still an idealist, and I canā€™t help it. ^^; Iā€™ll let the grownups hash it out and keep my peace.

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Hopping between corps and alliances would be limited by the second point that I suggest in the OP.

I will just add some specific thing - there should be a system that would monitor a corp/alliance recruit activity (on a daily basis) and in the event of many members jumping in or leaving all of a sudden, there should be a prompt for war tax adjustment for the aggressor entity, based on the Member ratio war tax restrictions.

Thus, if implemented correctly (with the right numbers and values) both the Growing war tax with every next wardec and the Member Ratio restrictions, may limit the tricky corp/alliance migration for war declaring entities.

In a case where a single man corp declares war to a 40 member corp, the attacker should have to pay a large sum of ISK because of the member ratio tax. Thus there will be no point of migrating to avoid the growing war taxes for every next war dec.

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First, why shouldnā€™t a single person be able to attack a larger group? Many wars are of this type - guerrilla actions - with a small group, or even solo players, waging a war of harassment on a big group. Personally, I donā€™t think large groups deserve protection - who would be able to afford to wardec Goonswarm or the other large groups under such a system?

But that aside, they still can just hop corp. Form corp A with 40 people to wardec target corp X (and a few more). Then all hop to corp B with 40 people to wardec corp Y ( and a few others). Then hop back when the war gets interesting or a war target shows up in a trade hub. Or if they are really dedicated, just make alt corps stuffed with free alphas to ā€œbalanceā€ corp sizes and make as many alt corps as they have the patience for to still declare war on as many corps (and of any size) as they would like.

Sure, you are putting some limitation and tedium on the process, but as long a players can hop between corps at will and join and leave wars, trying to scale costs (or impose hard limits) based on size or war number can be evaded.

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Hmmā€¦ Well maybe if a single man corp declare war to a large group, they would have a tax return when a large group joins the attacker as an ally, provided the overall member ratio is even. Still not sure if the defenders will have to pay a member ratio tax when they have allies join. This can be tricky to implement. There will probably be potential exploits for this thing, so please correct me again if you see a flaw.

The point here is that if someone wants to go to war, they should have a good reason for that and a solid intention to hunt down the war targets and their assets.

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You seriously justify the existence of this post with that monkey whine thread? Oh boy. I know for certain that I shouldnā€™t read the rest of your post, but here we goā€¦

Itā€™s working as intended.

tinfoil

Nope. This is ā– ā– ā– ā– ā– ā– ā– ā– . EVE is a PvP sandbox. The playstyle of wardeccers is just as relevant as that of the newbies. If you ask me, itā€™s actually even more relevant, since all the crybabies that whine about wardecs simply shouldnā€™t play EVE in the first place.
Players quitting over wardecs isnā€™t a problem with the game, itā€™s a problem with the players quitting. Their expectations of what EVE is and should be simply donā€™t align with CCPs development direction. They are not in the target demographic. Simple as that.

Blame the trash CEOs of their corporations.

They donā€™t learn by being nurtured and protected. Theyā€™ll just solidify their false expectations and then cry all the harder when reality finally catches up with them. Hereā€™s a real-world example of what this leads to.

Iā€™m sure youā€™ll disagree, but your post is just more of the ā€œBUT THINK OF THE CHILDREN!ā€ whining thatā€™s become oh-so-common. You want to nerf the playstyle of wardeccers in favor of people that are going to quit EVE anyway, because it simply isnā€™t the kind of game that appeals to them. Youā€™ll end up with the wardeccers quitting in frustration and not solving anything for the people you wanted to protect, because EVE still doesnā€™t match their expectations, since those people want and expect World of Warcraft with Spaceships, not

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If the intention here is to bolster a healthy competition, with uneven wars between hardened veterans and shy newbies that still donā€™t know how to fight and even donā€™t have the ingame skills, then ok, but then, donā€™t be surprised when people start to complain on this thing.

Everyone has some sense of balance, and telling the newbro defenders to HTFU, while encouraging veterans to hunt down said newbies, with close to zero challenge on their part, then this will be a bad call for balanced and meaningful war experience. Are the newbies really expected to become top notch pilots on their first week of playing the game? What was your story then?

I am not saying new players should be overprotected. But there has to be some balance, since some people need more time to adapt.

A 20 member corp declaring war to a hundred entities, and not taking a fight when it comes, while still just hunting helpless freighter pilots and newbies, is just plain ridiculous. Where is the sandbox fun in that?

A war is not something that you declare at little to no cost, against an opponent that still hasnā€™t learned the ropes of the game. See the low and null sec battles - this is where the more balanced fights occur. In High sec it is just overkill.

I am far from wanting EVE to be like WoW. WoW doesnā€™t really have that meaningful gameplay when it comes to losses and victories that really matter. I have never played it.

But when it comes to simple balance in EVE, that would give growing new corps a little edge, so that they can too feel the enjoyment of sandbox PVP, then I would provide any ideas that would lead to a solution.