Today we came across neutrals running a Mining Ambush in a high security system effected by the Havoc insurgencies. This neutral did not go suspect as a result of this, leading to very limited methods of engagement.
I believe the objective was to run the site until few NPCs remained in the final wave because once that happened, the neutral left and enemy militias moved in to rapidly finish the site. I believe this undermines the competitive integrity and overall balance of the game.
A fix could be to give timers to the neutrals that engage with the NPCs or to gate the site. Although I would prefer the former as there is fun gameplay around warping to the mining sites at range to pester enemy fleets.
FW sites, when entered by neutrals, will grant suspect status. I believe the intent of this was to remove any sec status losses for FW players, as neutrals sliding into their sites would be suspect, removing a barrier to pvp.
Insurgency sites do the same.
Mining Op Ambushes and Open complexes do not have an acceleration gate.
When Insurgencies occur in high sec, neutrals are able to enter mining op ambushes and open sites without gaining suspect status I believe because there is no acceleration gate.
If the corruption level is less than 5, neutrals in a mining op ambush or open site without suspect status cannot be engaged without a CONCORD response. These neutrals can, however, engage the npcs therein.
A mining op ambush is won by clearing a number of waves of npcs. Neutrals clearing the npcs can allow a single militia aligned player present on field to gain the LP reward and drive corruption or suppression.
An ill equipped militia aligned player can be aided in capturing an open complex by neutral players clearing npcs, allowing the capture timer to tick and that ill equipped militia players to gain LP and drive corruption or suppression.
Proposed solution: any player that lands on grid of a mining op ambush or open complex should be assigned suspect status if they are not aligned with a militia.
In addition to this issue:
High sec systems that reach corruption level 5 remove the CONCORD response to pvp activities and instead assign suspect status to those that would normally gain criminal status. CONCORD still responds to criminal timers gained by killing pods.
Structures in high sec corruption 5 systems are subject to attack by pirate militias.
Structures in high sec are not capable of changing their safety settings and are locked to green safety. Because of this they are unable to defend themselves as the green safety prevents you from going suspect.
Proposed solution: high sec structures in corruption 5 systems should be given the option of changing their safety settings.
There is also currently an is an abuse/exploit of the crimewatch/kill right system.
High sec systems that reach corruption level 5 remove the CONCORD response to pvp activities and instead assign suspect status to those that would normally gain criminal status.
Engaging a neutral still gives a Kill right to the pilot thats getting attacked.
Kill rights are only gained on criminal timers which is gained by killing pods (in high and low sec) or ganking someone (in high sec) which isnt corruption 5.
One cannot argue and claim “corruption 5 only prevents concord interfering”
If that was true we would still do a criminal act, and we wouldnt gotten a “suspect timer” but rather a “criminal timer”.
Because If u get a criminal timer you will get concorded in other high sec systems aswell. But you dont. (made a new post about this tho)
This game has too much complexity, its overwhelming for players but its also hard to balance for devs and the result is underused content and increased exploits.
If the current maintainers dont understand the value in keeping things simple, sooner or later someone else will take over that do or the game will cease to exist imo. It is what it is.
It’s a strategy both sides can use.
We utilized it because we couldn’t fight the Fraternity-Angel Cartel head on when they jumped the Mining OPs with 40+ Ships. For us we didn’t care about the LP, so sometimes we didn’t even warp in to get any rewards if the enemy fleet was in system. Our reward is that the Angels get nothing.
I think it’s a fair mechanic, giving even Highsec people who don’t wanna do PVP a little chance to defend their system
Doing a site with only neutrals feels more like a lock out from the game than a defense.
Not to mention the concept of faction warfare is geared towards pvp. So to be able to defend against the insurgency without pvp is undermining the purpose.
