Well if you want the devils advocate argument…
But yeah, one can make a case either way, my preference would be no rig slots at all personally. Make it clear the structures are meant to be movable as required, and instead have different variants of the manufacturing modules with bonuses different ways. Then you might have a cause to slot 3 manufacturing modules of different kinds to get a wider range of bonus and not slot something else instead, etc.
However this is all a bit of a side discussion and I doubt CCP are likely to revamp structure rigs at this point given the heavy investment into them.
Structure rigs are already a nightmare for industry. Let’s not spread that plague to service modules!
Structure rigs would be fine if they required significantly less material to manufacture, so that one could actually afford to fit them, especially on larger structures (T2 rigs are even worse). Also, like larger structure rigs, if they applied bonuses to a wide range of activities.
Many posts here only consider the price of a Quantum Core vs. the bare structure, and never even consider the insanity that is structure rigs. Makes me wonder if they have any Upwell usage experience at all.
Example of current pricing (Jita) of just one structure rig:
Medium Blueprint Copy Accelerator I: 225 million ISK
Medium Blueprint Copy Accelerator II: 2.4 billion ISK
Large Blueprint Copy Optimization I: 2.05 billion ISK
Large Blueprint Copy Optimization II: none on Jita market for past year
X-Large Laboratory Optimization I: 15.49 billion ISK
X-Large Laboratory Optimization I: none on Jita market for past year
The prices for reprocessing rigs appear to be even worse.
Structure modules can be swapped in & out at will and moved as required. That’s the issue with the rigs, that they can’t be moved around, sold when you no longer need them etc.
Not that you can’t do everything at once in a single structure perfectly.
At worst it’s the current level of spam.
At best it’s a lot less because you don’t end up with old redundant structures hanging around when someone changes their focus.
Frankly I’d expect somewhere in the middle. Which… is less spam than we currently have.
And being able to do everything perfectly in a single structure is just silly. You should have to do some degree of specialising or put more eggs at risk.
I think the point is here if you make it so attractive to blow up then have all the eggs in one basket, especially if proliferation is an issue and the reason for doing this.
Ok, that’s a bit of a better argument. But then why am I bothering to use a bigger structure if my small structure is ideal?
I’ll admit, I could probably lay some groundwork for a system to explain it but it would be a bit different to our current system.
The current system says 1 big structure can replace several specialised smaller structures. Which means you can’t have the one small structure that basket.
Structures are a significant investment in ISK, and require a certain level of usage to be viable. For a significant number of players, they find public structures meet their needs.
The larger structures don’t actually have significantly better bonuses. The vast majority of bonuses is in the rigs, and anything other than a medium is unlikely to be rigged (see pricing above).
Example: Notice the TTT Sotiyo in Iyen-Oursta, and they also spammed a bunch of rigged Raitaru, because it was far less expensive than adding X-L rigs.
If this is truly a null sov problem, could you not simply tie the anchoring timers/costs/effects to the Territorial claim unit in the area? I’m not so sure this is so much a problem as much as it is a valid/unorthodox tactic that a group of people don’t want to deal with to keep their claim on a section of space. Its not like the offending structures are free, or that the defending side couldn’t do the same in return. It really comes off as ‘We want content…no, not THAT content’
Image that, a boring grind content in null that perhaps isn’t so susceptible to botting…
LOL. So that’s why there’s people from literally every one of the major blocs saying ‘hey, CCP, you know this won’t actually stop that, right?’
Ever done a structure bash? It’s a boring grind. The bigger the structure, the worse the grind. Upping the cost of a small percentage of offensive structures won’t change that.
It’s not a bet or even a game if your opponent can’t win it. The point of this whole exercise is that there is something valuable, or at least more valuable, on the line that goes to the victor.
Maybe this could have been done another way with increased salvage or something, but at this point this is the easiest way for CCP to force structure owners to increase their ante if they want to put something in space.
Yes i have done some structure bashing. It’s a hassle. But my point was if that is what it really takes to defend your space, you do it, right? Isn’t that what we’re told “If you can’t defend it, you don’t deserve it”? Since when do the devs cherry pick the content for the rest of us like this? Let’s see cores/guaranteed bounty required as a reward for other things that are a dull grind/necessity in the game as well. A core embedded in every veldspar would certainly make dull tasks like mining more interesting. Maybe 3 or 4 bil cores on supers and titans would encourage more rewarding pvp. Perhaps adding automatic payout to pilot kills whether they are in a shuttle or a jump freighter would make the purists happy. Lots of things in this game have an indirect reward, now we have to offer shiny’s to get the ‘chosen ones’ with the most people and the most resources to undock and defend their own space.
What I said earlier about manipulating people to fit the game still applies. If you are wholeheartely about PVP, you shouldn’t need a shiny bribe to defend your territory. That’s a whole different, deeper problem.
Well looking at the numbers of people leaving and the masscomplains of those that are done BEFORE those people left i’m right another time…
You can deny both points but that will change nothing…
CCP is on the verge of killing pve completely and giving high up to plunder for the big blocks which will canibalize themselves after the dust is settled and after it the game is done…
Mark my words but don’t complain or blame me for it after the rightness of my words show its ugly face…
And what do the structure-killers put up for ante? It doesn’t take 600M in ships to kill an Astra. It doesn’t take 30B in ships to kill a Keep.
Why should the structure owners be the only ones getting asked to ante up a second time?
Yeah, exactly. You do it. You don’t do it because it’s ‘fun’, you don’t do it because it’s a payday. You do it because, just like 90% of EVE, doing what you have to do is how you get to do what you want to do, later. These cores don’t reduce the utility of offensive structure spam, they don’t significant increase the cost, and they don’t make anything more fun for anyone.
CCP does not care anymore and so they realize EVERY idea that comes up even if it comes from the cleaning person of the office or from the dog of a dev…
THIS one is obviously from the hamster in the server…fits to its world…
About their singular product and revenue stream. Yeah, I’ll believe that when they close up shop. They care. They just don’t seem to understand the game or the players.
