To add to that, if the attackers are smart enough, they might have WH control and so you won’t even be able to roll.
1 Like
What some individuals here purposefully try to ignore is the armour timer effectively forces the attacker to reveal themselves (were there no people at home during the shield attack which is often the case). It is on this intel whether there will be a fight. This is a perfect example of a tactical advantage that diminishes with the numbers you have. With the mid timer gone it will be solely on the attacker to bait out smaller groups.
It is outright absurd (and what I feel simply dishonest) to comment and make assumptions based on the times one haven’t had a fight on armour timers being on the side of the vastly bigger fleets 
The added caveat of no asset safety in wormhole space and the total time they’ll be getting to evac is just 
5 Likes
Tien Tien,
Living in wh so long I forgot all about the asset safety they have available in high sec. 
So the fact that they give high sec 4 days to mount a defense and only 1.5 days in wormhole space makes this situation even more egregious. They really want to drive the small players away, and drive everyone out of wh space that cannot afford a large structure and fleet. I don’t understand the reasoning behind this and really do not understand why they are trying to fix something by breaking other things even more. sigh
I really want to keep playing in the EVE universe but they are making it more and more difficult to do so. I really hope they reconsider these changes.
7 Likes
@CCP_Aurora You still gunna do it?
5 Likes
Lol. I can only shake my head about how stupid this change is. Whoever thought THIS is a good idea to make the game better, does not play the same game as I do, for sure. Is this a bad April’s Joke or what?
I mean, I do understand that it is probably not wanted that solo players own structures in this game, but even a small industrial corp can EVEN NOW hardly maintain a citadel in this game (entirely on its own, not counting these altchar-corps who can call in “friends” anytime they like).
In highsec you get wardecced within a week, in lowsec you just get eradicated within a week. In WH your ONLY deterrent is the 3-day-grind and the unwritten promise to evacuate/logoff everything and give the attacker no single kill nor any loot so he wastes 3 days in your boring wormhole just to get a lousy 600m core. Thats your only way of survival as small corp that cannot field 50 guys in perfectly skilled and trained PvP ships.
The defense-weaponry is crap, it doesn’t shoot back on its own, there is guaranteed loot-drop for the attacker… holy moly someone must have thought quite hard to find a way to make it even WORSE. Every Medium Tower is more deterrent than these citadels. No idea how anyone can possibly think THIS is a GOOD change.
15 Likes
@Brisc_Rubal thank you for being the only CSM member to discuss here.
So this point with asset safety completely ignores the existence of wormhole groups who rely on M sized structures.
Let me try to provide a viewpoint from that side.
Say you and a group of 5 people want to try wormholes, so you pool together 2B for Astrahus, Core and some fit for it and modules. Its not so cheap, is it? If you count the core and modules, fuel, equipment, etc. (to compare with Fort which was ~15B with equipment).
As a small group, you will have very hard time actually making 15B unless you already have that much isk, for reference, see here and here.
Now you go in, and claim some empty wormhole to live from.
Currently on TQ, you could do that quite easily, and not many other WH groups would bother with shooting your structure, except to provoke a fight. Simply because the 2 timers will mean:
- ~2.5d +/- 3h for the attacker to be in your wormhole, or keep a seed there (logged off scanner)
- ~2.5d +/- 3h for the defender to batphone friends/mercs to get in the wormhole and stage defence fleet
Both of this is PITA from the attacker’s side to do, so unless you piss off someone so much that they want to evict you, or if you are known for being extremely wealthy, nobody will usually bother. But you can still do nanogang PVP as that small group.
Remember there is no asset safety in wormholes.
After these changes, those ~2.5 days are now 1.5 days. As I mentioned in my previous post here it will mean that any small group can’t even go for a meetup without laptop.
Imagine the 6 friends in this group going for a weekend away from their computer!
If this group of friends see this and calculate with it, they would simply use POS instead where you can have up to 40hrs of reinforcement, simply because of the prices of POS compared to Fortizar. While it is feasible for the group, it just feels like a “workaround” around a bad design since POSs were supposed to be removed ages ago, and the QoL is terrible for their usage.
While I can agree that WH space is supposed to be the most dangerous, it shouldn’t be so that these changes force you out, if you want to have a life.
It also feels it will incentivize smaller groups to 1) quit eve, 2) join bigger corp/alliance. And I know many will choose option 1. Simply because ree ccp, changes are always for nullsec boiz.
And forgive me for saying it, but the changes proposed in this patch are exactly that. There is a problem in sovnull, so rest of the k-space and j-space will be a collateral damage in those changes. It is pretty obvious from all the comments here in the thread that HS, LS, NPC NS, WH space are all very very concerned.
Thanks for taking the time to be a CSM representative 
.
13 Likes
The major blocs are cancer to the game. So many bluetrals and NIPs and other stupidities that prevent any real conflict aside from boring wars with hours of blueballs. But CCP gives alliances almost no incentive to not join blocs. Alliances already have to join a bloc in order not to be rolled over by whatever bloc decides to eliminate them. Everybody needs a few batphones in their pockets and a bottomless pit of ISK to survive.
After these changes, that reality will become even more stark. Those that don’t have batphones and the ISK for a Fortizar and Azbel will just be swiftly eliminated thanks to these changes, rolled over by whatever bloc decides to eliminate them.
It’s horrifying to see CCP cater to the big blocs so much. Want to really change things up, CCP? Apply these rules to L and XL structures too. Or even better yet: just ignore this plan altogether and focus your energy on finding ways to incentivize small gang/alliance growth. Stop creating gameplay mechanics that only favor the rich in this universe. Find mechanics that reward small gang and alliance warfare.
9 Likes
All of this. Absolutely. The lack of changes to timers means that small gangs have to be even more prepared for their assets to be entirely destroyed if a few key people in their group leave for a bit.
3 Likes
I think this is the really important part of how the changes will impact wormholes. All your stuff is on the line from the first reinforcement, so every time a few people ref a structure when you’re not home means you have to either go max form for immediate hole control, or you prepare to evac everything. There’s no other option.
Been trying to think / game out ways to make this less onerous for smaller wormhole corps, and really there’s not many options. Introducing small-class structures that you can quickly anchor to give you that additional timer might work - you can evac your stuff to a different structure and use the final timer on your home as the Intel part, but that’s finicky and expensive (both in terms of cost to the corp, and cost in dev time). Maybe the best option is a special module that only works in wormholes that brings back the armour timer. Again though, costly in terms of dev time.
5 Likes
Might be interesting. I was also thinking that maybe asset safety should be a station service module, which would have downsides - like polarized guns do, something along those lines. Basically so that asset safety would have a cost (it already does). But this would then force you to pick which stations are asset safety ones, and which are not.
This will definitely create content. But it is beside the point of this forum thread.
1 Like
My comments here were directed specifically at the lowsec people.
I’ve already said I think WHers need help, and I’ve asked CCP to add two days to the timers for them specifically because of this issue.
1 Like
Its not “more days” small groups need in WH. If you get attacked by any serious attacker you NEED all 3 timers.
First timer will be shot while you are not even online. Can be done in cheap non-related alpha altchars because you know - Citadels do not shoot back (hilariously stupid!). You get absolutely no info out if it who or what will come to the final shooting. And you won’t find any allies who will bring in a large PvP-Fleet because 2 fuckin’ no-name Altchar-Brutix’ reinforced your Astra. That is why you absolutely NEED the second timer:
Second Timer you evaluate the situation, you can try to have Gunner online and a small rag-tag fleet of maybe 10 ships with a bit of logi, just to make sure whoever scratches at your door has to bring a serious force and cannot just come with some bomber or battlecruiser-alts. In most cases the real attacker has to REVEAL himself to overcome a defenders gang with the support of a manned Astrahus. And that is why you NEED the third timer, because at that point you can make the informed decision to evacuate or call for help. Because potential allies can then consider the final fight worth the effort or not and there is a slight chance someone will come to help you and everyone gets good content. Or they can tell you that there is no hope (from knowing the attacker) and you should directly evacuate.
No amount of days will help here, only a combination of all 3 timers offers at least a SMALL chance to defend what you have built up. If its only 2 timers you simply have no other choice as small corp to directly go into evac-mode, because you cannot know what will come to the second timer and you will find no outside help until it is clear that this help is worth the effort and not just wasted time.
IF you really want only 2 timers for M structures, then you have to make them at least as hard to attack as fully equipped large towers. Auotmated defenses, a few thousand DPS on their own and a shield that at least requires 5 Battleships shooting it for HOURS to reinforce it the first time.
9 Likes
Thank you,
Even acknowledgement of there being issues helps ease.
By even just extending a timer you can give little guys the time to assess, decide whether to get friends to come help or if evac should happen, and time to do it.
Good points all true , except it will be only 1 timer. The first timer was removed years ago when the vulnerability timer for initial attack was removed.
2 Likes
I have a few concerns about this change as proposed:
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Two fairly significant changes to overall defensibility of Medium structures through the removal of Shield Damage Cap, albeit a defensive aspect that rarely actually comes into play but does increase the amount of time an attacker needs to be vulnerable during the initial attack on a structure combined with the removal of a second reinforcement window to them, after already having nerfed their defensive capability with Anti-Capital weaponry and removal of their Bomb Launcher.
While individually some of these may be important, they combine together to repeatedly nerf a specific class well beyond their viability well below what some of their stated roles is. The shield cap for instance on its own is probably fine, but when taken with the totality of the changes that have been stacked one after another with the previous set seemingly done with minimal feedback even acknowledged as valid concerns, being largely dismissed outright, it can be extremely discouraging for engaging in the discussion or providing feedback to the change. To say nothing of issues that can arrise by changing so many variables at once.
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Comments suggesting that the removal of a full reinforcement period and 75% their hull buffer constitutes a “minor” reduction in their defensive capability
A reduction in the buffer when launching significantly raises the difficulty in defending a contested launch, which, although somewhat uncommon, still is a potential niche case. Additionally, the lack of the Armor Reinforcement significantly reduces both aggregate time on field for an attacker and the staging times required. Having to be in-system for a timer half the amount of time, and form fleets do represent a logistical challenge for an attacker to overcome, one which for some may be trivial, but also constitutes a non-insignificant factor in any fortification’s defensive capabilities.
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Comments suggesting that bad data should be used simply because it is the “best data they have available.”
If data doesn’t measure the desired effect, it doesn’t measure the desired effect. Conclusions can’t be drawn effectively from it, and I’m almost certain CCP should be able to get more data internally…not that it helps most of us here discussing it. Leading with imprecise data that doesn’t actually measure the desired effect can lead easily to incorrect conclusions and even incorrect methodologies needed to address the issues in question. Best available data can still be bad data and bad data doesn’t help with conclusions
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And finally a Lack of Clarity regarding what the actual problem this is attempting to address and how this addresses. How are Medium Structures not filling a niche of a viable, affordable solution for “medium-scale operations in space, such as serving as a base of operations for a small- to medium-sized corporation, or as an outpost for larger corporations or even small alliances.” In what way(s) are they not in a satisfactory position, and importantly how does this change address this or fix it?
Decoupling Medium Structures from Larger structures due to a lack of granularity in structure balance is a good idea certainly, but not all complaints…in fact most complaints I’ve heard about Medium Structures are not addressed by nerfing of them, as most of the complaints I’ve heard about Medium Structures are not about Medium Structures specifically but overall structure proliferation. Assuming a part of what this hopes to address is structure proliferation as defense-in-depth, as has already been pointed out, this changes very little other than raise the barrier of entry, solidifying it as a tactic that can only really be used by larger entities, either by doubling the number of M-set structures or by switching entirely to L-set structures.
My overall concerns personally are that there are too many nerfs being stacked at once on smaller structures, significantly advantaging larger groups and disadvantaging smaller groups. Minimum viable number of days to stage and repel potential invaders in WH systems or worse yet Pochven systems where these structures cannot be replaced. For smaller groups, these constitute major, significant changes to the defensive landscape of M-Set Structures, but for larger groups, these constitute a relatively minor inconvenience associated with them. In order to actually propose some sort of counter-idea for a change to address the issue though, more information is needed on what precisely is the problem. If the problem is that Medium Structures are too difficult to kill, I would have to disagree entirely, but that’s simply a matter of opinion to disagree on. If it’s that Medium Structures are too numerous and too annoying to kill, then this change does very little to actually address the actual issue contained within it, that being structure proliferation within a limited areas. There just isn’t enough communicated right now about what issue this is attempting to address to be able to theorize on how well it would address it, or to demonstrate potential weaknesses in thinking to convince others that this change will not actually solve the underlying issue.
5 Likes
Having more time in the proposed scenario means having more time to evac not that there will be a fight at all. Which I can tell you there won’t be because no legit FC (unless on meth) would take the chance to risk all (literally all in the case of wormholes) just to get jebaited by w/e n+1 fleet the unknown entity attacking you has (that’s cloaked/logged off in system, or few jumps out, or in a nearby wh, or next to a titan waiting a logged off cyno or w/e).
The guy is intelligent enough to perfectly understand this.
My suggestion to all who don’t (or maybe do) want this change is to post a comment with your own thesis and arguments why, ignoring others and not delving into derailing discussions. The devs will (hopefully) sift through what’s posted.
3 Likes
My concerns would be based on the diffrence in who this effects in terms of , industry and mining changes effect individuals whereas these changes effect corporations .
Its on thing changing the price of ship production up then later down , individuals change there playstyle or leave .
Changing things as fundamentally important to how corporations operate is imo a diffrent kettle of fish . Large groups of people are required to change to adapt to the new norm . What people have worked together to create is no longer viable , meaning in some cases these groups are going to disband and EVE is a lot about creating maintaining and be involved with such groups .
These groups are imo less resilient to massive changes , its not as simple a question as wether to produce or not to produce , wether to mine or not to mine as individuals.
Should 12 months down the line you suddenly decide as CCP that these changes were too much and you change things back to more how they were , as they did with industry , I fear the overall effect will be larger and harder to recover from as you are effecting groups and what they work towards together rather than just individuals .
3 Likes
Ah so you break your own word as well too 
Awesome sauce.
How many times have you successfully fought off a “serious attacker” even with three timers on a medium structure?
Situation
The proposed changes will have a devastating impact on smaller groups who do or want to inhabing low-class wormholes so that they can participate in industry requiring reaction output.
Even a single multi-boxer now becomes a threat to medium structures in a class 1 wormhole (ignoring hunter / ransom small pirate corps).
The Upwell core reward for a successful attacker was bad enough, the single reinforcment time makes a bad situation to defend even more difficult.
Remedy
I wish I had a good remedy. Areas to address might include:
- Assets in medium structures and how to “save” a good part of them on structure destruction (e.g. Asset Safety for medium structures in class 1 wormholes?)
- Stronger defenses to allow for a possible defense (structure + fleet that can be mustered)
- Reduced “reward” cost for Upwell cores for medium structures
Other innovative ideas.
CCP did help small corporations who lived in high-sec from perpetual pirate gang wars by allowing them to be invulnerable to war when they did not own a structure. Let’s come of with another innovative process to keep from freezing smaller corporations and alliances out of wormholes and low-sec space