I never said I wanted to reduce space or for it to be safer, so there is no need for that in response to my post. I am the last person in the game who will want to reduce space and not long ago I argued against 1 idiot here who wanted to do exactly that because ‘‘EVE has too many systems and you can’t find content’’.
This isn’t about that. One can understand how something can be frustrating (turning a 29j journey into a 45j journey, for example) without wanting to change the core elements of the game. It was pointed out how travel in the game between systems is already slow (which is fine), extra bouncing around will multiply that slowness. There is a limit somewhere where too slow is just too slow (if it takes 12 hours to go 30 jumps I hardly believe anyone will want to do that or find it enjoyable). There is a balance point somewhere where adding even more delays and obstacles on the way will just make it unreasonable. I can understand that.
That balance point is obviously also at different points for different players. You and I might stick around and not complain when it takes 2 hours to go 40 jumps (just a rough time estimate for a longer version of the route), but there are players who aren’t gonna put up with that, and I can understand their viewpoint in that it isn’t exactly a fun or an exciting way to play the game. It’s just something you gotta put up with. Sure, I agree, it feels more realistic that it takes a long time to go long distances. But again, there is a balance at some point there.
EDIT: I hate this forum feature where it automatically deletes quotations in my posts. I have to edit them back in after posting. What the hell is that all about?
Extra bounces are only a fraction of the total travel time though in my experience. You don’t do them every time, but only whenever you see possible danger, which in the majority of systems I visit whenever I do long trips appears to be none.
If I do a round trip in my blockade runner to sell a bunch of stuff in HS that I couldn’t sell in null, and to pick up new items I first travel to the edge of HS. Bunch of blue space these days, but I do a quick check on the route in EVE - Check before you jump! to tell if any bubble or smartbomb camps are on the route if they are.
Within HS the trip to Amarr is uneventful, sell or pick up some. The trip through Ahbazon to Jita is more spicy where I pay special attention to Ahbazon itself, but haven’t had any trouble there yet. Then back from Jita to home, in which case the first low sec systems are where I pay attention as well as the route through null.
Only that last part has been trouble for me once back before Pandemic Horde fell, when a few of those systems was still a corner of their space. A bunch of them noticed my ship and started chasing me with probes and dictors, lol.
Besides a few dangerous locations (NS - HS border, Amarr, Ahbazon, Jita, HS - LS border, NS border between empires) the vast majority of the route is simply empty and I can warp straight from gate to gate.
If you start with a quote and that quote comes from the post directly above you the forum automatically deletes it. I assume because the forum assumes it is redundant.
Very annoying indeed.
You can always copy the quote, open your post again and edit the quote in after it has been posted, as this behaviour only happens during post creation.
Why did I never encounter that problem? The only time I lost a shuttle to a gate camp was a Leopard flying into one from camp side while drunk/bored/in a hurry? Guess we don’t use shuttles the same way.
Sry for the late reply, I was on vacation for a few days.
Usually I wouldn’t relight that discussion, but I actually consider you one of the more reasonable forum members that I enjoy a honest discussion with. The others I will simply ignore for now.
Regarding “Pipe Bombs” - I don’t argue that they are not based on the same smartbomb aoe-damage mechanic. However, the order of magnitude to correctly execute a classic RnK pipebomb is magnitudes higher than some guy sitting solo on a gate-spot smartbombing shuttles. You realize that RnK used a Titan to bridge in ships on a perfectly made up spot with a dragbubble and bombed a a dragged-in fleet with an own fleet of ~20+ pre-setup Smartbomb battleships? That you’d need a fleet of ~30 people who all know perfectly what they have to do? And time things exceptionally well? And risk billions (even not counting the exposed Titan) if things go wrong?
That is the reason both have little to do with each other. Yeah they use the same base mechanic, but nerfing shuttle smartbombing would not affect pipepombs the slightest. The killing-effect from Pipebombs doesn’t come from a 1-shot instakill but from multiple dozen Smartbombs of dozens of Battleships firing cycle after cycle after cycle until the trapped fleet is dead. For pipebombing a delayed “spool up” mechanic for smartbombs would literally make no difference at all, since they deal their damage over time.
Can we agree on that one?
Regarding “Shuttle scouting”. I also don’t argue that it cannot be done or is never done. I argue that nullified shuttles have become any kind of problem after the implementation of nullification. From my perspective there isn’t any problem with them at all. Any competent group will have cloaked and nullified CovertOps scouts near the other side’s fleet anyway. And those who don’t could simply use them.
So we can agree that the implementation of nullified ships (especially shuttles) actually was a good change? It still allows ship/gang/fleet combat but removed parts of the easy farming of more or less unarmed ships (shuttles, haulers, covert-nullified-gimped T3s usually used for exploration or safely rolling WHs).
Final thoughts about our question “well how to catch shuttles then”: I know it’s controversial, but at the moment I simply think: You don’t. It’s just a shuttle man. Let it pass. It’s a dude who want to go elsewhere to just play the game with his group. Let him. I am not convinced any more that the game needs killing mechanics for everything everywhere anytime. Maybe I have just grown old or I killed too much stuff in the game to really believe any more that “smartbombing shuttles” (and other instakill mechanics like dock/undock-camping with ArtyGanking ships) and the basically requirement to have a legion of bookmarks all around the game just to not get instapopped if you want to go somewhere and the wrong dude is “camping” there are really good game mechanics and be required in the game for it to be enjoyable at all. If it was up to me, all that stuff could go away. EVE can be so good once you learn how to combat ship-vs-ship, gang-vs-gang, fleet-vs-fleet - in a scenario where both sides actually make decisions that sooner or later end with victory/defeat for one side or the other. And yes, occasionally one can snack up an unlucky hauler or other defenseless target that did stay too long or didn’t pay attention. But being called “lazy” because you didn’t had a bounce bookmark in a system you visited never before and may only visit once in a few months or even years, so you totally deserved to being killed and sent back to Home Station… I would have to stretch myself quite a lot to get on board here. I really can’t see how that makes the game better.
