Why is stealing a mission item only a suspect level offense?

PvE Gameplay Center Missions
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So I haven’t played in several years, just checking back to see what’s changed, and after reading various forums posts (both old and new), I’m under the impression that this clearly undesired mechanic is still here. For anyone too lazy to read the title, I’m talking about entering another player’s mission zone and stealing the mission item.

There’s plenty of evidence this isn’t even a desired mechanic. After all, any experienced player will know better than to fight the thief (probably), and basically have to just wait until the next downtime to complete the mission again. Worst case, they just get a GM to reset the mission. So the griefer gets nothing and the victim is slightly annoyed. It’s mainly just a problem for newer players, who might be smart enough to get away, but won’t be expecting their mission item to just be gone. I remember having a terrible experience in this regard, bad enough to turn me off of EVE entirely (who wants to play a game where everyone’s an asshole?)

If it were a desired mechanic, there’d be no reason for the downtime or GM’s to reset the mission.

Looking at the forums, there’s been various ideas floated around, and (as usual) everything is shot down instantly by others, with arguments ranging from “you brought it on yourself” to “I don’t see how this is a problem”. I don’t expect much else to happen here, but figured I’d throw my hat in the ring.

So that brings us to my thought: if attacking a mining ship or a freighter in high sec causes Concord to vaporize your ship, why doesn’t the same apply to stealing mission items? You can make the argument stealing in general is a crime, but mission items in particular are basically the highest of value loot in these sectors. There should be very real consequences for stealing them, not a reward of getting to ransom it to the poor soul.

This would also give the mission runners real counterplay, as, just like with mining and hauling, the thief would basically need to kill the runner before Concord kills them in order to get even a chance at a reward.

And, of course, this would basically just affect high sec. Concord won’t save you elsewhere, so this feels like an appropriate balance against an otherwise broken and unfun griefing mechanic. It would have no effect on general looting, just the mission items.

But let me know in the comments how I’m a carebear, EVE is harsh and cruel, etc., for wanting missions to suck slightly less for newer players. Let’s just drop all pretenses on that one. I know you want to. It’s how all these other topics have gone, after all :slight_smile:

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If someone steal your loot, did he attack you ?

Whats the difference between take your mission loot and take other loot ? → nothing, its just a suspect offense ! Nobody gets hurt and the thief get suspect so everybody can shoot at him. Why didnt you shoot at him ? Why didnt you safe your Mission Item that nobody can grab it ?

I´m doing Missions by my own in HS and ive never done this experience that anybody comes in my Mission and Grab my loot oO How this can happen ? I try to understand … you drop a MTU to get your loot and he blows it ?

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From my experience this is only done in very specific missions, like Epic Arc Missions that you can only do every 3 months or COSMOS missions that you can only to once per character. In normal missions you can simply “fail” the mission and accept the next one, it’s really no big deal.

Also stealing a mission item is no attack on the player but on his business, and you are allowed to ruin other player business ideas all day long.

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People use combat probes to find people in the middle of missions. In HS I would assume it’s mostly to get salvage, but then you also have people who are just jerks and want to ruin someone’s day.

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Failing the mission is a standings hit. Gms will reset missions

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i kniow, i´m one of them oO but why does someone cry about losing mission items and i never made this ecperiance ? maybe its their own fault if someone choose you are an easy target to harras ?

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What about COSMOS missions?

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My quick take as I tell all mission related threads is that these missions were made probably since the start of this game. Many missions have just silly rooms with the same type of snake rock. It will be a long time before CCP determines how to redesign the mission system. These systems in EVE appear to have been designed in pretty much their own bubbles. Meaning unless something really stupid/exploitive happens CCP will fix it.

I am confident if CCP did a decent job with the mining balance pass they can do a pass on missions prehaps when I am an old man. :laughing:

Watch your MTU. Watch for neutrals on grid or combat probes. Don’t afk if you are being watched. Do the mission in a prompt manner. This is probably the reason why I don’t do SOE as that area is too populated. I can make decent enough ISK doing it somewhere else with a different faction.

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This is just a clarification thing, i could have been drunk but i could have sworn that items like reports or militants just magically appeared in your hold these days

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Some mission items, yes have been looted after killing target ship. A few you still have to obtain manually. Its fine how it is

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By that logic, blowing up a player’s ship is not an attack on the player but on their business. You’re not destroying the player’s pod, after all.

If you want lore reasons (which you shouldn’t, balance is more important, but I digress), then consider that stealing salvage normally is just stealing space junk, while stealing mission items is sometimes outright kidnapping.

I´m doing Missions by my own in HS and ive never done this experience that anybody comes in my Mission and Grab my loot oO How this can happen ? I try to understand … you drop a MTU to get your loot and he blows it ?

Having not done a mission in a long time, it might be less common or different now, but what basically happens is someone probes your location, invades your deadspace, blows up your MTU if you have one, and then steals your mission item out from under you. For a veteran against a newer player, this is a trivial task, since the victim won’t even realize it’s possible. And that’s assuming the newer player doesn’t try to attack the invader, causing them to lose both the mission item and their ship.

And obviously mission items aren’t just any other loot, since the person stealing it will frequently try to ransom it. If it was any other loot, there would be no point in ransom.

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:face_with_raised_eyebrow:

You just blew up your creditability. I have done missions very recently and I don’t see this as a major concern. Just do missions away from SOE/high population areas. Ganking chances go down so much by getting away from SOE.

If you do COSMOS I will assume you know what you are doing tbh.

I will wait for someone to actually come here with a specific/verified case of someone following around a person to steal their mission loot. Name and shame the experienced players who do this.

This is nothing new. People have been hunting MTUs since the start of EVE online. Is there actually something new/exploitive going on in 2023? Sorry man, but from my POV this looks like you are finding a minor problem to blow it up into something bigger. This doesn’t pass my smell test.

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Survivorship bias. People this does happen to tend to quit :smiley:

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Source? You dont have one

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you realy crate a topic and cry about ppl which steal your mission loot but you didnt fly missions ? oO

W T F is wrong with such ppl …

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And there it is. The griefers arrive right on cue once again to try to defend an indefensible mechanic. Relying on personal attacks and insults because the facts are not on their side. Anyone who thought I’d run a mission recently clearly didn’t read the very first line of my first post. Such people aren’t worth arguing with, so that’s the last I’ll mention them.

Instead, I’ll return to the point of this topic: Why isn’t stealing a mission item a criminal level offense?

Let’s not deflect here. Just answer the question. And no, “because that’s the way it is” is not a valid answer. I’ve also already explained that mission items are not like regular loot, and stealing them should not be treated the same way.

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because its not an agressive act to kill your ship

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So what?

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It’s really not that hard.

You combat probe someone down. Typically I do this to blap MTUs.

But sometimes you warp in and recognize the mission. And you recognize mission target/blown loot can. You B- line it to the target and blap/steal it.

Then hold it ransom.

And if they get mouthy with you, you eject it, and blap your own can with the item in it right under their nose.

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The people who quit over MTU and loot stealing of a pitiful lv 4 missions need to grow a thicker skin lol. Like good luck in 99.9% of all multiplayer videogames.

You also imply this (loot stealing) is happening left and right apparently. I contend most mission runners who actually know how to min/max their ships and run lv 4 missions AWAY from populated areas are doing just fine.

This also plays into the strange FACT people who want to cry foul over gankers/MTU hunters is that HS space is MASSIVE. I mean MASSIVE. There are so many regions with so little population density that being ganked is almost a nonexistent chance. (Source: The In game Map Filter)

I can make virtually the same ISK doing other lv 4 missions with different organizations than SOE. Do it in a safe manner and not have to worry when there can be +10 people in the same mission system. And the only downside is I may increase my travel time but I fly a BR so that is negated.

If you are doing missions and do not own a blockade runner you are doing it wrong. BR was the best darn SP investment I ever made in this game.

Alright, I’ll answer this again. The reason for this is because CCP when they designed missions 20 years ago did not think of this as a consideration. It would require CCP gutting out missions and coding in special rules for loot within mission sites. As I am 99.99% sure that will break the game as we have seen every patch. Hope this helps.

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