Dear CCP,
As one of the many purveyors of crime and anti-social behaviors who frequented this game in the days before “Retribution” and the subsequent safening of of high-sec, I’m writing from a state of retirement (playing other games).
As far as I know, the majority of your player base still has no desire to live in null. I think the statistic was 70% living in high sec before I left. I’m betting that hasn’t changed.
I still have no desire to go back to nullsec for so many reasons. I tried a few months ago and still find it intolerable and too damn orderly.
I’m waiting for you to realize that crime was a really important and valuable portion of the content you provided to the 70% of your player base who doesn’t leave high-sec. I believe those people are now bored.
Let me know when you want to bring back mechanics that allow people like me to bring compelling and interesting villainy back to the game.
I still haven’t replaced how good this game used to be.
Yours truly,
Mo
The current state of mechanics is just not that much fun. That’s why those who adhered to my play style have mostly quit.
That’s why, if you go to Umokka right now, you will observe a pristine field of miners and mission runners who are unopposed and undisturbed in their infinite grind for isk. Local chat will be silent. There will be no fleets in sight and nobody will fight, nor have reason to fight. It will be peaceful, serene maybe.
Their only oppositions are time and boredom.
I would argue that time and boredom will push them into yawn-quitting soon enough.
I’m not sure what about my killings isn’t compelling or interesting for the parties involved… as every fight of mine is driven by drama and interaction… and I fly small stuff they actually have a chance of killing!
It’s unclear to me what about that is deserving of your contempt. I think it is the criminal nature of my behaviors that lends meaning to my fights.
I think you are right for the most part, although I wouldn’t call preying on the weak good fights. A kill is a kill and all, but imo good fights are the ones that make you sweat because you have some interesting opponent. Each what they like I guess, but yeah, EVE is only grind now, too safe, no need for conflict. I proposed to make it smaller, scratch 3 of 4 systems away and see how that goes.
This discussion is not what I intended to convey in this post.
However, I don’t understand this elitist snobbery against criminal pvp’ers.
The fights in question are with me suspect flagging in a T1 frigate or hauler. In those, I’m literally driving through the belts pissing in every bowl of cheerios I can find. Most belts have at least one ship that could kill me.
You act like I’m only at risk from noob ships, but I’m flying around in a lightweight ship suspect flagged in a mission system. Everyone can kill me.
After I kill one of those “weaks” you reference, is when I see if I can get an escalation (their corp, friends, or other opportunists who want to kill me). Sometimes, those escalations are really bad news and I cannot win them.
I depend on flying innocuous garbage craft to inspire people to take fights. That comes with the risk of getting into an actual fight in a t1 garbage-craft… which is/was my play style.
Why is this so inherently less worthy than the T1 mashing of null, the hub humping of the merc corps, or the blobbing of faction warfare?
What I do isn’t winnable unless my technique is excellent. If you look on my KB at the stiletto I killed recently, that was a fight I accepted in a Merlin against a Dramiel and a Stilletto (both from a merc corp). I killed the Stiletto and was working my way through the Dramiel when they received reinforcements. I detailed the fight in “Mo reads it wrong” on the forums.
I will never understand the snobbery against those of us who play this role. It’s a hard role to play well.
I can give you quite a few examples of me winning unlikely fights because I take just about any fight I can get. If you want examples, I’m happy to share.
I probably had misread your post. What you say about your fights make sense and I don’t want to judge any form of PVP to be less “worthy”. If a fight requires technique, preparation and good enough execution, it should be a fun challenge.
Interested which mechanics you talk about in your opening post. What do you want CCP to bring back?
What exactly is the mechanic you would like to see changed? There is nothing currently preventing you from going suspect and flying around, flashing yellow, looking for trouble.
I can do the universal aggro thing but it’s hard and involves lots of luck… but more than that nobody fights around can baits anymore.
More than anything, I want can flipping back so other people will flip cans and get into fights. Whether I want to take that risk or not, I can’t have fights by myself.
I long for the days when there were other people looking for fights… I started in PvP killing can flippers, and it used to be a viable way to play because there were so many of them.
Now, can flippers are rare. Most can’t and won’t take a universal aggro fight.
It’s hard now to get a fight because:
there are so few can flippers that there are no can baiters… the cans in the belts are actually miners trying to mine.
young players have no reasonable way to try criminal PvP because it’s really really hard. Can flipping and baiting was the heart of casual small ship PvP in eve and it’s just a dead scene.
There is no reliable way to control your engagements. It has become feast or famine. You either get no fight, or I get to fight 3 T3s who were mobilized to deal with you. You just have to accept that every couple of fights is going to degenenerate into something you cannot win.
I miss fighting can flippers and baiters. It used to be a whole community who provided drama, casual PvP, and a show to watch. Sadly, this newer, friendlier, Eve had no place for us. I think the game is poorer for it.
grats on trying to make cheap pvp available for all who want it …
the thing with can flipping is now you don’t get to choose to fight just one noob miner . i’d think the very thing going suspect changed, not knowing who’s going to engage you , would be something you’d enjoy … i mean , you know you can kill a week old player in a venture , but maybe not that more experienced player belt-hopping for rats or you …
OI don’t want to fight people who mine. I don’t have a problem popping one now and then, but I usually end up feeling guilty and either paying the ship or teaching them stuff.
I want to fight the people who want to fight people who mine. Or people who want to fight me. Sadly, they all left.
If your just flying around looking for fights. And you apparently don’t care about fighting miners. Then why not head into low-sec? There are plenty of people just like you looking for good fights.
If your goal is to target miners. Your right not many people jetcan mine anymore. Almost like after years of being targeted by can flippers and getting some decent options for barges people smartened up. No one owes you easy kills.
Don’t fight on gates or stations then. Plenty of other places to fight. Especially in FW space.
Besides low sec status is a badge of honor for criminals. And if your flying small fast stuff anyways it shouldn’t matter.
Mostly you just sound confused. You want to play the criminal but you don’t want the sec status that goes with it. You want good fights but don’t want to go to low-sec. You don’t like gate and station guns, but mostly prowl HS belts.
Really it’s sounding more and more like you just want easy, consequence free kills.
That always depended on whether or not the victim was in an NPC corp or a player corp, if the former then yeah flagged only to the person flipped, if the latter you were flagged to their whole corp.
Maybe at some point I’ll get to fight you op Sounds fun. Although a fast learner I’m still a noob, and an alpha, but if you’re flying small T1 ships then maybe I would get my chance^^
I’m always willing to teach… and I’m alpha as well as I’ve stopped paying.
I suspect it would be a pretty fair fight.
If you really want to do this, let me know. Also, google “welcome to PvP, v2” for a tutorial I wrote a couple years ago. It’s necessary to understand damage and maneuver mechanics before we start fighting.
I’m just going to quote a years-old blog post of mine:
What stories do highsec carebears have to tell? “Hey, you guys remember that time we ran that incursion and shot the Sanshas? No, the 107th time. Yeah, that was great!” How about “I’ll never forget the time my agent gave me Angels Extravaganza twice in an hour,” or “Yeah, I’ll never forget the first time I mined in a mackinaw. It was amazing!” No? But I bet they can tell you about the first time they got ganked. Or the first time they killed a ninja salvager. I’ll never forget my first war and the lessons I learned from it.
Belligerent Undesirables create the stories of highsec. We are the bad guys those white knights desperately need to take them beyond the “what now” endgame of shiny PVE ships and wallet balances.
Case-in point- here is a blog entry a guy made about something my griefer-corp and I did… the interesting thing is that he wrote this three years after we did it. Note: start reading on the 7th paragraph.
What mining op, L4 mission, or coop activity could burn itself into someone’s brain like this? As this details a good experience he had, imagine how good he felt at the time to be able to retell if this clearly 3 years later…
Criminal nuisance corps (and extortionists) like mine added the value that made Eve real.
