Player Owned Starbase Structures (POS's etc), their removal, when? Impacting upon PI Chain

In their last update, CCP previously stated that they were planning to remove the old Player Owneded Starbase structures (POS’s, ship arrays etc) at the latest from the game Jan 2020, having had a transition period of four years ! since upwell came in. When is this actually going to happen as we are already, once again, 6 months post this with no mention of it happening or of a new timeline.

I ask as the old structures are impacting upon the P4 chain, being bought up on the market at below refine price, refined into P4, with the P4 then being sold back onto the market, thus underming production lines. All P4 prices have gradually crept down, as have their corresponding P3, P2 and are now at rock bottom

I know that the old structures being refined is not the sole reason for the drop in PI prices, basic supply and demand is also playing its part, but their refines are clearly impacting upon the chain.

Back in 2017 they were then stating then they were to be removed from the game shortly

“We now believe that we are approaching the right time to start phasing out the older Starbase industry structures and taking the next step towards eventually transitioning completely” they said.

“The phaseout process for any Starbase structures will be a multi-stage process. We won’t be rushing things” Not rushing things is an understatement

I appreciate that some players still use POS’s, ie forward quick deployment etc. but the facts are they are technically obsolete, upwell should be the way forward and they should no longer be in game

CCP please remove asap as you did with the Sovereignty Blockade Units when they also became obsolete, the old structures are not needed, they go against what you are attempting to achieve with upwell structures and they are impacting upon the PI chain, they should have been withdrawn from game years ago

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No thanks.
I still use these for many things as they are fairly quick to assemble and disassemble.
Maybe give us an easier way to clear the old ones.
Maybe if it’s offline for more than a few months we can hack it and steal it.

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Can you give some examples of when you use them as opposed to upwell structures???

Just in my case, I use a POS as base in my PI-WH.
I can place my Epital here, and drop some stuff in the storage.
Nothing I could not do in Upwellstructure too,
Sure.
The different is the price and the auto-def-mode.
And the obvious lack of loot because I didn’t set up an SMA.

In the last year I lost two Upwells, but never a POS.
Maybe because my FF has a 12.5M shield and then the RF for two lousy T1 transporters.
In an Upwell is allway the chance to get more, and the salvage of the structure.

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So, whilst it suits, its can be done with upwell. Is their anything which players use a POS for that can’t be done with Upwell. I appreciate it may be quicker and cheaper to deploy a POS but is there any use of a POS that upwell can’t perform. In otherwords, is their a specific game play mechanic which supports the needs for POS’s to remain in game?

Well some (evil) players use a POS as a honey pot to generate kills.
In other words, they use the self-firing weapons, which are ready to fire with real nice DPS at any time.
An unbeatable advantage over Upwell structures.
An upwell normally cannot kills anything.
The weapon damage too low, the tackling a bad joke.

In a POS one player can control several weapon turrets and create an amazing impact .
A good POS Gunner controling a large faction POS is able to keep a medium-sized battle fleet very buisy.

Even a Fortisar without propper supportfleet is batha-poo.

In other words :
Upwell is good for larger Corps,
POS is unbeatable for single players and smaller groups

I was curious so I went off to investigate -

https://zkillboard.com/corporation/98294911/ - get the correct killmails URL

So, a POS can always nail a frigate @ 350km+ with its small guns even with AB and moving over 600m/s - sometimes it misses, but rapidly makes up for the miss :stuck_out_tongue_winking_eye:

I don’t mind POS - I grew up in one. I’m also a POS gunner - so many easy kills to be had with them.

Apart from the fact they are the last parts of the bad code CCP can’t fix, they can have a mix of anchored and online modules inside and outside, they have magic bullet code and are 100% automated vs 1 guy in an ibis. Don’t really see a problem with them. Send 50 people to any tower and its going to explode eventually

POSes aren’t obsolete until CCP introduces FOB Upwell structure.

When invading hostile WH it is crucial to start moving assets in the second you are there, so 30min POS anchor time vs 24h Upwell structure is a BIG difference.
Also, you can deploy POS in static to farm it up and leave in a single day easily

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POS are still used as forward operating base. A small tower can be setup and taken down in 15 minutes - try that with an Upwell structure!

Otherwise, feature parity was achieved with the introduction of FLEX structures in the Onslaught expansion. They could be removed at any time. I doubt they will be reimbursed for ISK - more likely it will be 100% reprocessing with any abandoned in space simply removed after a specified date.

People have been complaining about structure spam and Forsaken Fortress addressed that but structures are the main consumers of PI - if people are building fewer structures, the price for PI will fall.

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I’m afraid that because CCP is sooo fixated on Triglavian-invasion-content right now, we have to wait for probably long, long time before they remember about their other promises concerning somewhat neglected aspects of this game (like said POS, faction warfare, etc.)

Current situation with POS’s is complicated, to say at least. Many players still uses them on daily basis and they are important tool in their gameplay. On the other hand, there are hundreds abandoned control towers, defensive arrays and other structures that just decay in silence. Owners don’t care about them. Destroying them - is not worth the time and effort, compared to possible profit. If there will be an option to hack and steal them - well, that might be some new content, but I don’t think that CCP is going allow that to happen - as they are planning to get rid of POS’s. Maybe they’ll come up with similar idea like that recent abandoned upwell structures pinata party lasting for 2 weeks. Just let anyone interested insta-kill any abandoned POS’s… because CCP like destruction and milions of ISK burned down, that looks cool in their charts -.-"

As for me - I like POS’s and I think they should stay in-game, as they are valuable addition to a single-player gameplay. Yes, they need some updating to current game meta, but there is no meaningful reason to cut them out.

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The other factor in decreasing of the demand for structures is mining nerfs, which are massive and led to plex going down as well

As for the abandoned POSes - I believe ccp will just unanchor all of them one day

Nobodies built any POS structures for at least the last two years, their build cost is much greater than their sell price, Any movement you see on the market are either players buying POS’s and modules when their sell price dips under 50% for refine and resale, or players buying then relisting.

From what I hearing, the main game mechanic for them currently is as an FOB. What have CCP said about bringing out an Upwell FOB structure of sorts, anything? Timelines? as it appears this may be holding things up.

Agreed, but whilst this subject is ignored PI, amongst other things, suffers.

It really sounds like CCP need to make up their mind on the subject. Either introduce an Upwell FOB asap and withdraw POS’s one way or another, or state formally they will be kept in game and run parallel to Upwell. 4 years of muddling messages and mechanics with no end game is not the right way to do it… but then again, thats how CCP rolls as we all know

This is exactly what is holding things up. It was stated, that POSes will stay until all their functions are replaced and after FLEX structure release the last use case is FOB which is admitted by CCP. They plan to introduce Upwell FOB, but there is no timeline at this point

POS are still being used a lot in small Corp, Alliances.
U barely need 1.5b to store your Super Carrier. A small corp or Alliances cant afford thous Keepstar in any system they want, so all you need is medium POS and Array to store Super.
Same goes for mining in next system, from place you live or more than a few jumps from you. U simply set up small POS, put compress array and mine. After 5-12h. depends how long are you mining, you just take your POS down in just 30min and jump back.
You cant do that with new structures.
Put up citadel? Takes 24h. Take down citadel? Takes 7days.

Sorry for my bad English :slight_smile:

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Upwell structures require a large corporation, wheres one player can easily manage a small, even medium POS. I ran a Sansha medium POS in wormhole space easily by myself. Upwells? No, I don’t think so. I’m all for the change. I’d just like to get compensated for the POS and all the things I have with it though.

Dray Cil

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Just because you don’t use them does not mean others dont.
And I’d rather not say what I use mine for thanks.

ha what a joke, they are removed because they cant figure out what all the code is to delete without breaking the game. lol

omg yesterday i saw a big ass POS with maaaany guns in low
i was , oh those things are gone , maybe ill try to loot some stuff and , naaaa , i bet is a bad idea
them i saw this topic , I’m glad i didn’t come close to that thing

I was about to say I’d be upset if they removed POS before adding a smaller, more mobile base or structure. Possibly even just a small corp structure it solo player gig.

Also, I make nanites repair paste materials and I haven’t noticed anything.

I had an alt just attempt to anchor a compression array within a small POS force field, and was unsuccessful. Did I miss a step somewhere?

Anchor Control Tower
Fuel and online tower
Launch and anchor the array by setting the ‘green box’ - when it’s set, WTF do I hit?