I like this idea. From a lore perspective it makes sense that you would need to pay a fee to Upwell to connect to their network. If you aren’t connected then your structure works like the Blood Raider shipyards. No invulnerability and a single timer.
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I’d still advocate my terrible idea of moving Fozzie SOV from nodes to destructible/capturable PI Command Centers and reviving orbital ammo.
I disagree with all the poll options. POS fuel ■■■■■■■■ was annoying, I was happy when they changed it for citadels to only consume what you use.
I agree with moving SOV to structures (medium and large citadels) because SOV current structure mechanics just don’t make sense from an RP, sci-fi, or common sense stand point.
You designate a citadel as the “capital” of the system, when it gets destroyed, SOV is lost. That change along with an ISK or Fuel cost on all structures–and removing void bombs–would go a long way towards creating combat content on citadels.
Entosis links and the associated grind fest needs to disappear completely - It was a bad idea at inception and it still is.
The magical transformation of Outposts to Citadels removes a large part of the need for entosing, turning iHubs and TCU’s back into a content creation things rather than a cat and mouse game of who can bring the most Griffins would go a long way to bringing meaningful content back to everything Sov related.
As for the question of structure spam, there is no need to add additional costs to owning them, all that needs to happen is for the vulnerability to be brought down to something better than (24 hrs between timers) it is now.
Offline, abandoned Citadels (much of the structure spam in Perimeter) would die quickly if there was some incentive (24 hr timer) to shooting them.
Has CCP’s reputation always been in freefall? I just started playing this year and it’s been controversy after controversy and mistake after mistake. Are they really this bad at managing their own game or is the community a little oversensitive, I seriously can’t tell which is the more correct perception.
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Honestly, it feels like a mixture of both. The relationship between CCP and the playerbase is often antagonistic, and long-term design vision seems to be lacking.
Pushing a button that “swaps the structure used battery set” for a new battery set that lasts for a couple more weeks.
Low effort, requires no hauling and no ISK, only human interaction.
If structure batteries runs out the structure becomes vulnerable all the time and no more asset safety.
That sounds a ‘fun’ idea. I’m sure that will make people enjoy owning a structure and having to push buttons in addition to all the hauling of fuel they have to do for services just to satisfy your want for one less timer to blow it up.
And I’m sure it would never be abused to get people to drop stuff in a public citadel & then deliberately run the timer out and blow it up to loot their stuff and grief them.
That sort of thing simply isn’t reasonable to do if the structures can ever be public. Nor should people have to push buttons just for the sake of pushing buttons.
This topic is still going - I am still against a fuel cost for structure placement, but having some sort of “net work connection fee” (for the lore) feels to be the best way to keep the number of structures balanced.
Reduce/remove a number of NPC stations in game - or make them so players can’t interact with them - pushing players to use more player owned structures and services (if in HS/LS it creates a reason to go to war. war system needs an update as well) creating content drivers. Yet the system needs to be balanced in a way that prevents the powers that be from creating a massive donut again. Having an NPC tax on the structure owner means they need to decide if they can make it an investment that can pay for itself when the place it.
The system should try to get as close to real world business management as possible. Everything in RL has upkeep cost. Smart business leaders figure out the best way to use as little capital to possible to have the biggest return. Even empty buildings have upkeep in taxes and maintenance.
example:
Corp A lives in a remote area for industrial reasons and find that having an Upwell structure for refining/industrial purposes is needed, plus they make would enough from taxes to pay for the monthly cost of fuel and NPC tax.
Corp B has capital to place a number of structures to meet what they see as the needs for the players in multiple places, and spread out their services across a region. Yet they don’t have the ISK revenue to maintain all the structures fuel and fees, and thus their business module fails
Corp C, much like B has upfront capital to invest heavily, but pick target locations with more control and focus on creating a market hub, where players come to, so they can exchange goods for ISK/goods. They make the ISK to pay for the fuel and fees from their controlled market.
Tyranny and excessive fees are put into check due to the possible NPC markets in the region as well.
To me: the EVE economical system is all ■■■■■■ up now that we have tons of player structures popping up all over the place, with no real built in check and balance system. The system shouldn’t just let people throw up more storefronts in an area already overwhelmed by storefronts.
How the fee system should work is up to CCP, but the easiest would be to just charge ISK.
What about reviving the charters? I always thought it was strange that they sold them for daily expenditure.
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I posted this on r/eve a few months ago. Figured I should re-post it here for critique.
Increase the base vulnerability time on Upwell structures;
- 4x for M-Size
- 3x for L-Size
- 2x for X-Size
Add a Service/Module that configurably reduces vulnerability in hourly chunks - down to the original vulnerability times. Set hourly fuel cost to be equal to the total number of hours reduced.
Example:
If you want to reduce the vuln. of your Raitaru by one hour per week, your structure consumes 1 * 24 * 7 blocks each week to do so.
If your want to reduce your Keepstar’s vuln. period from 42 hours down to 21 hours, be prepared to depart with 21 * 24 * 7 blocks. If you have a Keepstar, you can afford a measly ~88M ISK/weekly in its upkeep.
No structure ends up being safer than before. If someone wants to maintain the same level of safety without putting bodies on-grid, they pay in fuel. An unfuelled, undefended structure is now much easy to dispose of. Unguarded Astrahausen are no-longer safe because their timers are set to right before DT on Wednesday.
And an addendum: Re-kajigger the cost of Upwell stuff slightly to account for the purchase of this new Service Module. All existing Upwell stuffs get given a freebie installed on patch-day.
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Everyone should have to manage and take care of their assets. The lack of having to do this is why your overview is a cluttered mess in places like Perimeter.
I don’t understand the thought process that the need to tend to your structures is too hard on smaller groups and wormholes. I mean keeping posses fueled has worked in the past and requiring the same shouldn’t be too much to ask unless you are trying to be too greedy or ambitious.
Because Citadels are not just a replacement or analogy for POS, but also for outposts and are intended to tempt people out of stations.
Stations do not require hanger fees, Outposts did not for 95% of their time require any direct upkeep fees (Yes there was a Sov bill but it was the same regardless of if you had an Outpost, so the Outpost itself was free).
It’s also not interesting for players who use the structure to suddenly find out things like ‘Oh now we can loot your assets because so and so let the structure maintenance lapse a single day before the hull timer of the citadel’.
Yes, the timers over several weeks is possibly a little long, but Citadels need the timer above the rest of the structures, and the asset safety is important also for seeing them actually get used.
And yes, I’m repeating this before anyone calls me out, because it’s that important and people keep ignoring this aspect and pointing at POS.
So how do you suggest CCP control how seemingly trivial it is to control and maintain a structure that provides so much safety and accessibility?
I see things like instantly tethering upon jumping through a cyno and frown, especially when garage door cynos were ruled as an exploit and this is essentially the same concept. I understand that these upwell structures are designed to take the place of stations and posses, but I don’t really believe that they are balanced well enough to do so without unfavorable mechanics and issues associated with them.
I understand that my example of literally riskless cynos are an unpopular opinion, but it’s part of eve. JFs and capitals are near invincible while moving unless you are a multiple stroke victim, and that’s just one aspect of why their lack of balance is worrisome.
Well. Used to be you could light a cyno right next to a pos. Then ccp added a minimum distance because that particular thing was an issue. I can see a few options. Reintroduce a distance greater than tethering. Cynos give a weapon timer.
But changing all citadels in all areas of space to fix a cyno issue is a bad approach.
Ditto if there isn’t enough reason to go to war over them in highsec. You need to make more reasons for conflict. Not nerf the citadels down (when they are already paper thin in highsec). I spoke a lot on high sec citadels when they were getting introduced but ccp focused too much on the null and wh balance and didn’t even really consider high sec and the new state of things.
Ccp have already indicated they are going to look at void bombs since they’ve made it pointless bringing any weapons that use cap.
But a blanket and massive increase in tedium to owning a structure isn’t going to fix these issues. And if a structure truly is inactive it’s easy enough already to remove it.
I’m too opinionated and biased to contribute to productive ideas for balance. I do really dislike asset safety and how tethering works. Mainly because I’m the type of player that can learn to adapt or roll with the punches if my assets were lost in a citadel.
Sometimes it just seems so shortsighted the way CCP releases things with an intention to make a balance pass in the future… a pass that more times than no takes way too long and allows too much cancer to exist before addressing. Meh.
Yeah well. Asset safety has to exist if they want to lure people out of npc stations. Otherwise it will be like pos where except in wh space no one puts anything of value in a pos to start with. And you still get no loot for shooting a citadel even then as a result.
You aren’t some special player here. Others can roll with the punches. But it just is so easy to avoid the punches all together by simply not putting stuff there to start with.
I just stopped using public citadels for my researching and switched back to NPC stats because the owner couldn’t keep their rigs fueled and played around with permissions, costing me a few ships and would’ve cost me my BP library if I hadn’t had an attack of paranoia when I noticed the issue.
Citadels in hi-sec don’t really need asset protection, IMO, and wanting ass-pro in null is possibly the silliest thing I’ve ever heard of.
You say right after listing one of the reasons asset protection is needed for them to achieve their goals for Citadels which include public use. Since if the owner had decided to lock you out randomly it would have been the only way you could have recovered your items.
As for Null, what do you think Outposts currently have. They have 100% safe assets in them. Removing that and making it destroyable would result in massive swathes of dead Null, and the few super powers being the only people left.
Don’t kid yourself, it’s 100% needed. WH’s only work without it because they have no NPC stations or Outposts, and never had anything but POS to begin with, which meant that you had to put your items at risk. Changing that in the other areas of space where NPC stations do exist isn’t a viable option.