NPC Fleet Members w/ Gambits & Custom Formations | Space Strategy & Tactics (NOBLOB)

EVE Technology and Research Center Player Features & Ideas
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Alright, hello there!

I know it’s long but please read! Especially CCP!

I’ve been playing for a while. Pretty sure I had 2 other accounts, somewhere around the time this game came out, one at the start, one a few years later. Didn’t come back until 2013 or so I think? Anyway.

Alright so a tiny bit more background. This game along with a few others got me interested in not only business but computer science as well, taught myself to program(sorta), not a professional or anything. I love game design though, and one of my projects is a space game, not the one I’m working on for sale unfortunately.

I figured perhaps some of my ideas could apply here, as well as what I’ve seen and heard from friends that have come and gone to the game over the years. I just got ganked too before the server went down for maintenance. Was pissed and frustrated at first. But that is no big deal, I want to touch on some things that have always scratched at the back of my mind for this game. But first I will give some praise.

The new Structures and system are awesome, I like the no war dec on corps with no stations. Though we did have a station at one point, it is still a good idea in my opinion.

Alright So here goes, I will try and be as succinct as possible and break this down with hopefully some sort of proper formatting and organization.

I don’t mind getting ganked once in a while, the problem arises when the Corps are so large or the groups of players are so big I can’t get any revenge, the Bounty system in my opinion does not really equate to what I would call a bounty system and is broken among a few other things in the game, but I will leave those for another thread, unless I can amalgamate them all into one eventually, this did start off as a bigger thread but I think it’s best if I keep it short and sweet.

Even hiring Merc corps or pirates, is usually out of the grasp of most players.

I sat and watched these guys sit at a gate for an hour at least, cloaked. ganking people, one after the other.

Sure that’s cool, I could go do that too, but there should be some way to make the game more “even” for solo and smaller groups vs bigger groups.

So I propose

NPC Fleet Members AND Using Alts in your active client account as FLEET MEMBER “NPC’s”.

To make it balanced and acceptable to the gankers, every NPC Fleet Member(NPC Hirable Pilots) should cost 2 slots of fleet member capacity. Normal - (Real Player Character(This includes alts that are in your account of the active client) will take up 1 slot like normal.

NPC Pilots

  • YOU Get standing + Skill with given Corp/NPC
    = Hire pilots (NPC PILOTS) (NPC pilots are never as good as a player(human) pilots in attributes or skills (They have randomized attributes and skills based on their RACE|CORP INCLINATION|LEVEL(BASED ON YOUR STANDING),
    and YOU or your CORP must provide them(HIRED NPC PILOTS) with their SHIP and FITTINGS.

  • Each NPC Pilot costs ISK/hour or for special Pilots Loyalty Points per hour.

NPC Pilots can pilot any ship, help you mine, defend you exploring, hauling etc. (GIVEN THEY HAVE THE RIGHT SKILLS)

This all would come with a package of “CUSTOM FORMATIONS” + and + “GAMBITS”

So for Custom Formations, a window where you can drag and drog POSITIONS and create formations based around YOUR SHIPS position in the window. You APPLY/SAVE like a fitting.

Then you can also create “GAMBITS” (Have some “TACTICAL” / “STRATEGIC” Skills, perhaps split into different kinds of strategy (Like american football “Plays”) Except they are custom, like Dragon Age or Final Fantasy 12 gambits.

ie. Action, reaction, reaction, action (Customizable GAMBITS) (if, else, else if, NOT, AND, etc etc)

You could mix these with the “FORMATIONS” let the player experiment to their hearts content.

ALL IN ALL

This is about equalizing force between groups of gankers, corps, etc. There needs to be a way for solo players, ppl who dont have enough time or a rigid enough schedule, (be it yearly, monthly, weekly) to play the game in it’s entirety.

None of that should break the game. It should only enhance it. Bots can’t really use it anymore than they do with multiboxing because Gambits would be involved, all you can do is DESIGNATE targets as a fleet commander etc.

The idea would be that if there are only 3 of us we can still fight a corp that has 30 REAL players, because WE leveled up the new NPC Hiring skill so we could hire NPCs into our fleet to fight the other guys, but balanced, which is why 1 NPC would take 2 slots or something to some such effect.

.

As for Space Strategy and Tactics I’ll post anoter post about that later. Even this post I haven’t thought out the best way to say it yet, but I figured I should post it anyway.

For the strat and tactics tho. The game needs to put some limitation (oh no that word) on blob fights. Some way to split fights up so they are smaller skirmishes, perhaps some rethink on scramblers and how they work, and bubbles and their sizes, or something.

Something must be done.

Eventually I want to touch on a whole bunch of subjects. But I’ll leave with these few things quoted, that I’ve heard lately. Which brought me partly to write this, cause I don’t have enough time, and the Monopolies of Eve are too big, and I just can’t compete, even if I had 5 friends.

(Which brings me to another thought. CONCORD Anti – Trust (Anti Monopoly law) :open_mouth: could be a mechanic 0.o. Get too big, get fined and lose standing and targetting with sanctions :O) haha.

Anyway. I will refine this post as I refine how to say this idea better.

But any thoughts? I figure this can be implemented (I forgot crews, crews would be cool, and tie in with the new Shooter they are making if they did it right).

Anyway.

Thanks for reading.

(Complaints from friends who have left the game, different one, over years nd years, same or similar complaints tho)

** "The game feels too much like work"

and that

“war and PVP isn’t really all that fun, especially the bigger you go”

  • (Blob Fights)

  • (Sure they look cool… but who has the time for that, #1. #2 there is nothing strategic or tactical about a "Blob" battle.…)

“Who wants to press F1 and sit in station all the time, it’s broken”

  • Avoidance of going out to play for periods of time, I think can perhaps be easily solved.

"What is the point of this game?"

  • (Big problem for sandbox MMO’s, especially survival/crafting based ones)

  • (For me this isn’t so much a problem because I try and make a goal for myself)

-(This will be the last one I touch on) – in the future of course…….**

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There doesn’t. You’re not locked out of gameplay because you are solo/small. Other players are just more competitive because they spend more time and effort into organisation.

And absolutely no pets. No pets. Ever. Under any circumstances. Never going to work.

The idea that npc fleet members take two slots rather than one does nothing to stop a gang making multiple fleets. Especially mining fleets…

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Nah those are 2 things for sure. First off. Some players dump money into this game. Part of the reason I left last time is I introduced some friends, they spent real money, skill injected the crap out of themselves and reached way higher skills than I did, after years of me subbing. So they left to null I wasnt ready yet. Now I am somewhat ready, I’ve been there before, it takes too much dedication and like you said organization.

2 things that the game should not depend on heavily, are Social connections (real ones, not Skill based ones) and how much real $$$ u have.

"And absolutely no pets. No pets. Ever. Under any circumstances. Never going to work.

The idea that npc fleet members take two slots rather than one does nothing to stop a gang making multiple fleets. Especially mining fleets…"

It does if you limit it.

I dunno like my friends quotes there, they are somewhat right. Its just a job if only a few select people can realize their ambition because they have either, more friends from real life or Call of Duty and some gaming clan online, than someone else.

The Sov also spans too far for each, like I said (Need some anti trust law hahaha)

(Or maybe more SPACE)

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You can limit fleet sizes, it’s just arrays in arrays etc, or some hashes, I am doing this for a living now trust me, no mechanic is impossible.

The game is stale and repetitive (and yes I’ve done everything (except wormholes haven’t gone in there yet), that ganking and the way war works, the complaints I hear from other ppl just randomly in chat, I like this game I wouldn’t have invested so much into it already if I didn’t.

But there comes a time when like, who wants to play when u have to rely on drunks o r $$holes etc (I’ve been that guy :wink: ), and the corps just die out. I think its a problem of size, and because of that organization.

I also think that yes, solo players should have a way to compete. (MILITARISTICLY)

If not when my plex runs out I might as well be gone as well, I don’t think any of my friends are coming back until the game is “fun” rather than “work”

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Each corp already has a limit, why not allow people to have NPC’s fill that limit until REAL PEOPLE join their corp (All based on Skill of Course) and like I said NPC Members could cost LP/ISK and even other things (unlike the REAL PEOPLE) who cost what u negotiate with them.

This could also put corps on more equal footings depending on corp leader skill levels etc.

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What I am trying to propose would fix people staying in stations, if they won’t come out and fight

It would fix people feeling like its work too, because they can create corps or alliances with just a few friends(But still have the FORCE MULTIPLIER! Of a “Staff”. They can afford). I think with the right incentive to AMBITION and reward vs risk and challenge my friends would come back lol.

And I definitely want to see something that causes more skirmishes. Like I said, stale, even when I was in Nullsec, and half the time I couldnt figure out wtf was going on, jump 50 jumps just for them to call off the attack, haha, no one knows whats going on. Because there are too many REAL PEOPLE, tryig to work together.

Doesnt matter how much teamspeak people have, only a select few will be so disciplined to do that.

I guess maybe thats part of the game. We already have drones, I don’t see why custom Gambit run and custom formation fleets with Semi Nerfed NPC Pilots, would be a bad thing.

They’ve already got the groundwork in code for it u can see with the upgrades they did to Carriers and Superweapons…

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There is another game, actually most Sandbox games suffer from the same problem.

CCP I am sure likes the multiboxing cause it gets them more money. Haven and Hearth, another great game (Which uses LP or learning points as well) has the same problem, lots of bots, and centralized, monopolized power)

This is because there isnt an equal footing where there should be, when it comes to Kingdoms and Players working with Players (+ the lack of AI for players to use in place of the lack of a real person for group members)

And every sandbox game will continue to suffer this problem until they introduce Player Driven/Guided/HIRED AI.

You can already see there are faaaaaaaaaaar too many ships in the stations, for sale, how many unused things are in this game? Just sitting out there. I thought the idea was there is supply and demand, seems to me there is oversupply of everything and every market pretty much is rigged haha.

Ah well. I won’t be able to convince anyone I guess.

Just hope someone reads this, I can’t see how it would be a bad thing, would only make the game more interesting.

Ciao, some mining then away i go lol.

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Having Hirible/Payroll payable - NPC Pilots/Members of Player corps could also make Espionage cooler.

Especially if they made it so you couldn’t tell the difference between an NPC and a real player (How will you find your MOLES now??? Muahaha. I am a mean game master lol. In the details screen etc. Like only really be able to tell if you encounter a player with some in his/her fleet (and pay real close attention to their behaviour).

Guess theyd have t o get rid of that local tho. But local could be replaced with a ledger of some sort (Bounty Ledger) and (Tags (customizable?))

Would make hauling more engaging earlier on too, I think in general it’d make everything more engaging. Alright that’s it I’ve said enough!

Actually it’d make everything cooler.

Scientist/R&D Come work for you now instead of just the agents. This game is a sandbox for sure. The possibilities are endless for the fun. But like I said it feels stale after all this time.

I mine alot, i do industry alot. But I’ve tried most besides the worm holes etc, that could be fun for a while, I would rather play the meta game, I’m sure everyone else would too. There are still those that wouldnt want to play that and just join corps and play, I dont want to interfere with that, I just want to bring the two communities “together” in a way like the miners vs code, could be way cooler, if it was Miners and CODE and their respective fleets (only possible cause now independent players hve their little underclassed NPC fleets, banded together to fight back. (Stuff like that, I don’t fear code thes days haha, maybe I should 0.o.)
Imagine a Braveheart in space haha.

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Remember, you can edit a post…

But to your idea, I don’t see how you think that solves anything. Artificially limiting group size or providing hireable NPCs won’t equalize anything in an open sandbox game. All the will happen is that fleet/group of 10 you hope to compete with with your NPCs will split into 10 groups of their own and hire the same NPCs equal to your fleet, and bring the combined fleet all against you. You’ll still be outmatched.

What you want already exists in a way, at least in highsec. There are both suber NPCs that infallibly join your side when you are attacked non-consensually which serve as a massive force-multiplier for a solo player in highsec, and lesser NPCs who harass and sometimes kill those out to get you if you are a law-abiding citizen or militia member. Sure, you can’t hire CONCORD or the Faction Police/Navy both to do your bidding against other players, but honestly you would want that as what would stop your opponents, and the larger groups from hiring them to attack you?

I won’t be an absolutist and claim there is no place for NPCs, or even ones you can hire, in Eve, but you have to remember in a sandbox game like this what is available to you is available to the other guys, even the bigger groups and better organized ones. In fact, unless controlled in some way (which I am not even sure is possible) it will be exploited by them to increase the power gap, leaving you even further behind.

I think the only way I can see it working is to expand say Faction War such that massive NPC fleets are constantly fighting and the player can join up with one. The NPCs would have limited behaviour would support smaller groups against larger ones, and in general wouldn’t be able to be leveraged against other players, at least ones that hadn’t explicitly joined the conflict. It’s artificial sure, but would give access to objectives and entities, both NPC and PC, to play with for solo and small group players. But in the “real” sandbox game, powerful NPCs controlled by players would just be power creep leaving a solo player even farther behind than before.

At the risk of making this too personal, I think you are just bored of the game. A sandbox game like this will always advantage grouping up and N+1 so you have to either accept that and find a way to play the game as solo player that interests you, or ally with others, especially if you want to compete militarily. If you can’t, best to take a break and perhaps play one of those other non-sandbox games that limit fighting in ways to provide more balanced fights and see if you like it. Absence makes the heart grow fonder and you can always come back.

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Concord isn’t good Enough.

If I can hire NPC pilots even if they are semi good, if the game allows for it I should be able to Outwit my enemies

Perhaps standings should be more Dynamic, then we could also have “Calling in an Ally Fleet” of NPC’s, sort of like a CRUISE MISSILE or ARTILLERY drop in Battlefield.

The limits are already there. Corp size is arbitrarily limited. There are multiple ways to deal with many corps ganging up on one.

There are many ways to make that possible, mechanics wise it just takes some thought. Power gaps are fine, it’s just the size of the gaps that matter. I guess I am a lone voice in the wilderness though. Everyone says “The only thing to do in EVE is PVP” I see that all the time in chat. There is more. And then there is MORE, which is what I’m getting at. The economy would eventually rebalance itself/

I would love to PVP, but unless I want to depend on another corp or joining one, for my ships its pointless (im not about to throw away all my assets for wars

(That is, Someone elses wars). I would gladly spend cash and mats and time building ships for a Fleet of Pilots, but how am I going to find any that listen or (somewhat listen (could be another NPC Pilots mechanic (will/stubborness))

And those corps that I do join, usually die out etc, or whatnot. Constantly at the whim of others. No chance to take any grasp of “Destiny” or whatnot, no fun, just work. I

f I fight I just lose money and then I just have to buy PLEX. Meeting random people every month doesnt help either. Trying to build something just to have it fall apart (which would be fine if you could build it in the first place). Most people mine or ratt until they realize its just not fun anymore.

There needs to be more! You don’t think the game feels stale?

It is near impossible to make cash in hisec or losec. I invest, there is nothing and no one to help defend it, it’s pointless really. Just a money sink. If I am going to have to worry about if someone in my corp is a spy or not Id rather have a corp(of semi good, maybe really good, who knows? Like a ship itself, of NPC Pilots) that can defend the incoming raid etc. Wouldn’t you?

All I am asking for is a way for people who want to play the more Administerial part of the game, or who don’t have all day every day, etc etc, to play, to have a chance to compete.

That’s all. Currently the game depends on real life connections, real life money, and is a money sink unless you have those two things in great order. I don’t mind subbing but I’ve been plexing til now. And for some reason that’s gotten a lot more expensive.

“At the risk of making this too personal, I think you are just bored of the game. A sandbox game like this will always advantage grouping up and N+1 so you have to either accept that and find a way to play the game as solo player that interests you, or ally with others, especially if you want to compete militarily. If you can’t, best to take a break and perhaps play one of those other non-sandbox games that limit fighting in ways to provide more balanced fights and see if you like it. Absence makes the heart grow fonder and you can always come back.”

Well then u have proved my point, I shouldn’t be bored, I’ve been back all of a week!

The game is stale because long time players, those who have sat on the top for a long time, monopolizers and gankers have enjoyed the game as it is for too long, and the game has just gotten stale. I dunno what to say ¯_(ツ)_/¯. It has so much more potential.

As a programmer and game designer, I dunno, we’ll see. I’ll see what the new pathces bring.

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Eve is a game where you get out as much as you put in.

There is no artificial way to improve your chances to compete against a bigger number of players that would not be abused by the bigger number of players.

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Well if that is the consensus I guess I will play out my days for the end haha.

Cause what i proposed still has risk vs reward.

And really, as a game, like I said real $$ and real social contacts, should not affect it. That is the fundamental issue here.

There are many ways to implement mechanics for corp management etc that doesn’t require making everything so big its unmanagable. Same with the non optimization of PI or other, purposely convoluted things in the game.

That’s just me though. Like I said I;ve played a long time too. I understand how the game works. I just think it’s broken, I don’t think I’m alone in thinking so.

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Name them. I see no way to prevent multiple corps full of hired NPCs from ganging up on a solo corp full of hired NPCs.

I’ll agree with this. There are a lack of objectives and conflict generators in general in the game, especially in highsec. Highsec is so safe and flush with resources, it does get boring rather quickly and people fade away. This is part of the reason CCP has been so focused on game play outside highsec until recently, but that doesn’t help much for players like yourself who seem to strongly resist grouping up with others.

What do you need cash for if you are just mining or ratting and have an omnipotent ally like CONCORD on your side? You shouldn’t really loose anything in highsec once you understand the game unless you start looking for trouble.

But plenty of people make plenty ISK in highsec. The game is designed so taking risks outside of highsec pays better, basically in exchange for you offering yourself up as content to the other players, but many people have built lucrative industrial operations in highsec. Sure, you won’t get rich belt mining or casually running missions, but even then, Incursions, blitzing Burners, or now Abyssal pockets will make you levels of income similar to those outside of highsec. Plus, you can leave highsec to collect wealth, even as a solo player ninja mining gas, doing exploration, PI or whatever in more dangerous space.

I’m not sure what you are envisioning, but it is fine that this game isn’t doing it for you. It is pretty complex and diverse, but if you have given it a shot and can’t find anything interesting for you do there is no shame in deciding it isn’t for you. Top level I’ll agree with you there could be so much more game play, and CCP has failed to deliver many things over the years, including the grand vision of CCP Seagull for more space to colonize. But when you start to drill down, it becomes obvious that how to make the game better and more interesting for the diverse types of players that play the game, and on the limited developer resources CCP has, becomes challenging.

I don’t think micromanaging NPCs is some sort of panacea that is going to make the game more interesting, fun, or more active, outside of perhaps a few specialized and controlled situations. Sure, they could build some mini-game where two players in say an abyssal pocket control NPC fleets against each other and that might be fun for some players, but that really isn’t part of the core game and idea of Eve.

As for gankers, whether it is the suicide fleet popping overloaded freighters, or the large nullsec group that blobs the top wormhole group to head shot them and take their stuff, it is all a reflection of the core unbalanced nature of the game. Ganging up on other players is how this open-world PvP game is suppose to work. I’m not sure the same people have been on top forever as there is churn in both players and organizations, but it will feel like that to a solo player as there always is someone more powerful when you are at the bottom of the food chain. That is never going to change, even if the top dogs are dethroned and replaced with new canines.

Perhaps we are stagnating a bit in recent years. It does feel like the entrenched powers are a little too entrenched perhaps. CCP just made changes to limit their power some in highsec with the war declaration changes this week. Maybe more space needs to be made for newer entrants, but unfortunately that isn’t going to solve the power gap which seems to just be growing. I think a massive shake up is in order to reset the power gap some, but even if the server was completely wiped, the larger and better organized groups would quickly start pulling ahead in power again.

But even with that CCP could do a better job at making space and providing objectives for the little guys to go after, too trivial or annoying for the big boys to bother with. I’ll +1 any suggestion that makes that happen.

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Your Hired NPC’s take the place or slots of what could have been corp members. The multiple corps thing needs to be dealt with in what was to be my second post. About getting rid of BLOB fights and making combat more skirmishy, or from skirmish to full front line battle, there are ways this could be acheived, so the server/game doesn’t have to slow down, and so more tactical maneuvers and new cool mechanics could be introduced. But I will expand on that later maybe

“but that doesn’t help much for players like yourself who seem to strongly resist grouping up with others.”

It’s not that I don’t like to, I started MMO’s with Everquest, I love group play and grouping, it’s just I lose so much more personally, when I do, and especially time, time wasted on shoddy ideas or lack of ORGANIZATION, so there has to be a way to limit sizes of things, not artificial. Perhaps make it so only so many can jump on any given sphere of space (='s the mass of a certain amount of ships based on Fleet Captain skill or something)

I love grouping etc. It’s just lose lose usually. And Lots of people want to strike it out on their own. Just like my real life country, but just like my real life country, its all owned by someone haha, and you can’t even get a foothold in, I’d have to know 100+ people. at least if not more, and theyd each have to know 1 person. I dunno we will see after the new patches I guess war etc is changing.

I have PI and I dont stay in hisec I go to losec and go to those asteroids and try and find the scanned ones, trying to find something as I go, with all these BPs all researched to create, only to find invention I misunderstood ah, lol. But no matter. Thats not the stuff Im talking about, that part of the game is fine.

It’s that the entire game is in favour of the aggressor, the monopolizer etc. Real life rules aren’t like that (specifically because there are no rules in real life, none that aren’t an illusion that is… Besides things like the laws of physics etc.)

I dont want limits on sov etc, just bring the lower class closer to the upper class
so there is some real conflict. So that bonds can be made, blood can be frozen and we can run our corporations like Tycoons and pirate captains etc alike.

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Nothing will ever be too trivial to bother with for the gankers etc. the only solution is Player driven/hired NPC’s. Trust me.

I have thought long and hard about this, and for other games long before this one

The way you get the balance is that perhaps when u have a corp you have to pay out something, like the starbase leases for instance(not starbase leases at all, but like the reverse almost, you have to have so many STRONTs (Payroll Stronts) to actually Employ either Players or NPCs, (just the NPCS can also cost ISK and Loyalty Points to Hire). And depending on how well u do or something, u can hire more, something separate from ISK and other corp generated things where larger corps always have a massive advantage.

I am not trying to ruin peoples games, I am just saying the staleness needs to be rejuvenated somehow. The Structures were a start but I dunno…

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You don’t have to justify yourself. There is nothing wrong with wanting to blaze your own path and not rely on others for whatever reason. I have a strong streak of that myself.

But I really don’t see any way of limiting group size, blobbing, or balancing the sides in most aspects of the game, at least that can’t be abused. Maybe as I said, controlled environments can be built into the game that do that, like FW 'plexes and now Abyssal arenas, but in general, the game is suppose to be an open virtual world. Artificial limits can be avoided or abused with alts and collusion with friends making it probably impossible to have an open, yet more balanced game.

I don’t see it like this at all. For almost everyone, 99+% of their wealth is safe in invulnerable stations or wallets immune to attack by any aggressor. There are so many ways to evade a potential attacker, and in highsec a huge financial disincentive to be attack you provided for free by NPCs that you can use to remove any profit in someone attacking you. If anything, this game suffers from too many ways to avoid conflict and commitment in recent years that is dragging down economy rather than too much space violence.

Besides, the aggressor needs to have reason to go through the effort to create content in this game. If your PvP game too heavily advantages the defender, everyone just turtles up and no one makes a move. There needs to be reasons to attack other players and some plausible chance of success or players will not take the chance of losing and just fortify forever, or until they are bored and quit the game. And if you do heavily advantage the defender, like say CONCORD does for peaceful people in highsec, the other side won’t attack until they have overwhelming force so any fight that does happen is completely one-sided, exactly like what highsec criminals do now.

In this game with such a dearth of conflict drivers, many players go to heroic efforts to make up reasons to shoot each other, sometimes resorting to the flimsiest of pretenses. Personally, I think this is a big part of what so many players call “griefing”, but this is really the fault of the game which gives so few objectives to actually fight over that groups, and players have to make up grand narratives, or just become pirates, which isn’t especially satisfying to those on the receiving end of their actions who feel like they are being attacked for no reason.

I still don’t see what this will accomplish. If you want to tilt the balance more against the suicide gankers in highsec you can just increase the power of CONCORD and/or the Faction Police. But if you really let players control the NPCs, the gankers will just use these fleets to out-blob your fleet. Certainly giving players control of NPC fleets isn’t the only solution to whatever problem you think there is.

17

Exactly! I shouldn’t have to always evade. I should be able to fight! (+ Not everything should be safe), There is a serious lack of consistency when it comes to that rule of nothing is safe in eve, to the detrement of the game sometimes)…

The point is I can make lots of T1 Ships, thats usually what the gankers fly, maybe with 1 t2 backup. But I could be that t2 and my NPC pilots the T1’s, maybe return and get my stuff back you know? or more?

Especially haulers, I mean like. Think of it as if it were real life. The Small businesses need a “tax break” the “small” ones. So hauling or mining they can compete, that’s all im saying.

For haulers maybe they get some semi decent NPC escorts. For Miners some decent miner pilots. With enough skill maybe both so u can control an escort and a mining group , NPC or Player or a mix of both, directing the goals.

Increasing the power of Concord does nothing because it still all happens at the gates. OR Is just a REACTION to someone GANKING someone, in hisec, or at losec gates (Gate guns stop u from retaliation if u are less numbered as well). Some people just get away in time after smoking your ship.

All you can do is sit and wait to get hit, or try and strike first and get killed by concord. Pretty bullsh t if u ask me. Or in losec hisec fight them straight on. Til their 100 buddies come calling. For 1 it doesn’t make sense. What are all those Garuda pilots and Agents doing? The concord too. It’s not like the NPC’s dont fly ships :stuck_out_tongue: :slight_smile:

This is why I was talking about getting rid of blob fights, and trying to make it so people could go back with an NPC fleet, against gankers or their corp, perhaps, because then it comes down to not just numbers but planning etc as well. If there are more “running battles” or actual strategic battles, and ship numbers or mass perhaps shot towards a location by one captain that has a limit, it breaks up the fight, perhaps the target of said 1/4 fleet will run and that 1/4s backup will jump in afterwards but not close enough. Things like that.

That’s why I have the tag in there Redesign, because there are a few things that would have to be redesigned.

I dunno. I gotta go though.

Was just an idea. I will play til my plex runs out, see how the game goes til then. Have fun! Thanks for engaging!

Next time im on if I remember and this lets me I will post some diagrams of UI and such to show what I am envisioning it will make more sense I think presented that way :smiley:.

Night night!

18

So let me get this straight: your solution to a 30 vs. 1 war is to give the 30 attackers 30 NPC support ships each, turning it into a 900 vs. 30 fight? And you think this is an improvement?

19

Hey if you solo around npcs that have a mining fleet in system, and you have good standings with them, they will come help you’re fighting players. Not sure of the odds. Happened to me once Poksu Mineral Reserve came in overpopped Moas and stomped some guy.

20

Apparently power in a sandbox mmo should not depend on how many players you can organise.

:man_shrugging: