I know this is not my first post on Abyssal PVP, but as you might have noticed on zkill, it is almost dead. The gate now only spawns for the first 1-2 hour after downtime and then the gate won’t show up again until next downtime(I am aware that it is summer and activity drops). Also, there is still no better solution for the stalemating issue(even thought I and several other players brought that up multiple times).
Problems:
1. Stalemating:
After 8 min there is a 25% resistance drop, this helps in some cases, but not always. For example, when 2 Deimoses meat each other, there is no way one would break the other. So the timer just runs out and both die. This is not fun and not the way it was intended. It should be two enter, one leaves.
2. Gate spawn rate:
In December, when I started Abyssal PVP, the gate was open all the time when I wanted to play. Since April, the gate only spawns from DT until 13:00 Evetime and then it is done until next DT. Also, the Arena has never been realy available to US TZ pilots, which is bad. There is no lack of PVP pilots, the real problem is that the arena is not available like 90% of the time. Even on weekends there are now only 4-6 kills per day, in January it used to be about 2 full pages on zkill(!)
3. Ikitursa:
When that ship got released, I was really hyped, until I found out that now everyone uses that and only itself can kill it. I know that it might is not possible to ban one specific ship from gate activation(only whole classes can as far I know). The Ikitursa is also balanced very strangely. Its resistance profile exactly matches its own dps type, which I don’t understand the point. The empire factions T2 ships have resistance profiles against the opposite’s faction dps(Minmatar have better EM/Therm resist as amarr does that dps and gallente have better kin/ther as caldari does that dps). But Triglavians opposite faction are the drifters that do equally distrubuted omni dps. There is no counter against that ship exept itself and only after resistance drop.
4. Loot:
What I also pointed out several times, is that loot sucks. Most of the time you only get 5-10 mil worth of materials and some damage mod mutaplasminds(where even the unstable ones are only worth 30 mil). When you risk that another player comes in to kill, you want better loot. For example low sec sites pay more than hi sec sites as other players can freely engage you there.
5. Pay 2 win:
The probably biggest problem is that you have to spend 5 bil+ to be really good. Most newer players can’t afford that. I know there are some cheap fits like the orthrus, but they get wrecked by regen gilas(which are usually PVE pilots that took wrong gate by accident).
Solutions:
- As mentioned, add more resistance debuffs, like 50%, then 100% and finally all resistance set to 0. It should also affect Ewar resistances(especially neut resistance). Also make the arena shrink after each effect. This would be a nerf for those TD Orthruses and Damp ships that just want to make sure both die. The ships would then just get moved relatively to the new position.
- Make the gate spawn 100% of the time, no matter what. So everyone can do abyssal pvp and is not forced to log into the game at specific times. This will balance by itself. First, more pve gilas go in to get the extra loot, which then leads gankers in that want to kill pve gilas. Then it will bring in ppl that look for a real fight.
- The Ikitursa(and all other Triglavian T2 ships) need a look. I don’t know what the point is to give a ship a good resistances against its own damage type. Giving it onmi resistances(like the Tiamat and Hydra) would make more sence, since Drifters do omni damage. 40% for all shield and 45% for all armor resistances make more sence. This would allow more ships to kill the Ikitursa other than itself. For example high dps vigilants, Orthrus, Cerb etc…
- Improve the value of the loot. If you risk your ship, you want better loot than just 5 mil of materials. For example you could add PLEX and Skill extractors, and some skins to loot table. Maybe also a small chance that the cache drops random faction and officer modules and pirate ship bpc’s + implants. This would make the arena more attractive for everyone.
- Add a small arena to tier 1 and 2 sites, where only ships can enter, that cost less than 100 mil(hull + fit). The loot will not be as good as the normal arena, but it would give newer players and players not willing to spend billions of isk a way to participate in Abyssal pvp.
Quality of Life:
- Add Local chat to arena so you can chat with the other player and not have to open a private chat to say gf every time
- Add a timer until the resistance drop enters
I am aware that not all of the players like instanced pvp as EVE is a sandbox game, but I have to add that almost all MMORPG games I know have that in some form. You just log in and then the server checks for active players and you get matched randomly.
Let me know what you think
