The long short of it is there is only one way to boost standings with the main Empire factions without tanking the standings of the Empires opposed to them through derived standings, and that is the empire epic arcs and the SoE arc. These arcs are time-gated behind a 90 day re-completion timer. All other methods of increasing faction standing involve significant risk of damaging your standings with other factions, making them effectively non-viable if you want to maintain positive standings with all four main empires. As for why that’s important, there is a lot that goes into it, but essentially it’s a mission runner and high sec player thing the particulars of which are best left to another discussion. The point is, if that wasn’t meant to be viable, the epic arcs wouldn’t work the way they do. In any event the penalty is too severe and as a mechanic doesn’t serve a purpose. That’s why I think the penalty should be overhauled to be more meaningful and fairly balanced.
As an aside, and from a lore perspective, the volume of ships and lives lost in New Eden everyday is simply astronomical. Each one of these battleships has literally thousands of crew. In light of this, and in light of the conflicts all four empires are involved in (to say nothing of conflicts between Capsuleer states), what amounts to 50k dead seems like a trivial concern to warrant such a severe response from an entire empire. In effect this is an isolated incident in a backwater region far removed from the center of Imperial (the rats in question were Amarrian in this case) power. That weakens the plausibility of the ‘you attacked us’ argument, thought it doesn’t address it entirely.
I know, thats why I suggested a viable solution for that problem. Declining/failing normal corp agent missions simply shouldn’t cost faction standing.
While safety being red is a good practice in general, and almost a requirement in order to enjoy high sec, it’s not really needed to enjoy lowsec.
Nah, they want you to subscribe another account and pull missions with the alt whenever the main gets a poor offer. If your alt gets a poor offer sequence, too, then maybe you should have a second alt, too. And a third one. […]
So, I’m safe to abort the Anmatar Mandate mission asking me to shoot at Thukker Tribe, because USIA wants to powerlevel my Anmatar Mandate standings afterwards, or shall I go and shoot Thukker Tribe instead so USIA can fix my Thukker Tribe standing?
This is sadly at the crux of it. I didn’t bring up the multiboxing issue previously because I don’t want the discussion to descend into a pissing contest about multiboxing, but this is certainly at the heart of the design choice.
So the standings screen changed during havoc. It used to show raw standings decrease/increase. Now it shows a percentage. Standings for declining a mission beyond 4 hours is still -0.001 for faction.
I doubt ccp will change how standings are affected. You can use eve wiki or eve survival to see how changes are made in standings if you do something against the enemy or friends of enemies.
No usia cannot fix thukker. If it doesnt have an arc, we cant repair standings. And since we found out we could repair faction, weve sold over 400b in faction standings
You keep trying to give me information I already have. Perhaps by now you should trust that I know all the tricks and soundbites.
Briefly scanned this thread and didn’t see it (but saw lots of “You’re telling me stuff I already know” 
)
Whenever I accidentally accept a mission, I just create a support ticket and the GM’s remove it. I’ve done it for 15 years. Happens maybe 2-3 times a year. Never had them refuse.
Hope that helps.
I have to admit, support has been very good to me. I don’t ask unreasonable help and they have always responded in good time. The only people in CCP that I have respect for over the yrs.
Apologizes to the new devs to whom it’s just a job.