War

[Kitsune]

The way Eve's space is lined up really precludes the possibility of a superpower 'winning' the game.  Nullsec is too big and too spread out to allow for such things.  Even if a coalition rose to power and took over like old BoB, it's virtually impossible for them to take the whole of nullsec, or even half of it.  Anyone kicked out of their space can just fly off to the other side of the galaxy and be pretty sure that the people who kicked their asses won't be able to reach them anymore.  Of course, they'd have to deal with the current residents of that area of space who may not be very friendly.

If worse really came to worst, you can build subcaps and caps in W-space.  No supercaps, but if an alliance chose to burrow into a wormhole and start rebuilding, they could get a fair start without high odds of their foes getting a big enough force into their system to stop them.

[Gets]

Space is truly vast.

[eldaec]

I think that really depends on how large a coalition of real people you think you can run.

Exact numbers are difficult to gauge because of alts, but Goonswarm is probably something approaching 2000 neckbeards, the clusterfuck is say 4000. If you can organise say 20000 people then sure, take over tranquillity. How you keep them entertained once you've won Eve is another matter.

[tgr]

Once 0.0 is taken, take over empire.

[Sir T]

That's what BOB used to say.

You know, listening to that that DREDDIT vid Comstar posted, something once again struck me. I'm always surprised hos people seen to adore Molle so much even though he always comes across as a arrogant emotionless insulting jerk, and his motivational evemails are even worse. I've never understood it. I can understand the lack of emotion to a certain extent, non native english speakers often come across that way as they don't get how to pronounce the words, but come on.

[Stabs]

That's what BOB used to say.

You know, listening to that that DREDDIT vid Comstar posted, something once again struck me. I'm always surprised hos people seen to adore Molle so much even though he always comes across as a arrogant emotionless insulting jerk, and his motivational evemails are even worse. I've never understood it. I can understand the lack of emotion to a certain extent, non native english speakers often come across that way as they don't get how to pronounce the words, but come on.

It's a style that worked superbly for the Daleks.

[Kageru]

The way Eve's space is lined up really precludes the possibility of a superpower 'winning' the game.  Nullsec is too big and too spread out to allow for such things.  Even if a coalition rose to power and took over like old BoB, it's virtually impossible for them to take the whole of nullsec, or even half of it.  Anyone kicked out of their space can just fly off to the other side of the galaxy and be pretty sure that the people who kicked their asses won't be able to reach them anymore.  Of course, they'd have to deal with the current residents of that area of space who may not be very friendly.

That changed when super-capitals became a tool for a small number of pilots to exert huge amounts of power and when gaining super-capitals required holding secure and lucrative null-sec space for many weeks (plus keeping the pilots whose super-cap abilities makes them desirable properties). Which is why there's an arms race towards them.

If you try and build a super-cap force from scratch, without the full support of the nearest super-power, don't expect many of those build orders to come to completion. Even if they don't dislike you it is part of retaining their own supremacy (just as PL will travel quite a distance to kill a CSAA if they think they can get away with it) and generating nice killmails.

And the existing super-capital blobs are nearly sub-cap immune given that the server puts a limit on how much opposition they can face.

I think Molle's advantage is history and legacy. Carrying forth the flag of a once-feared and respected alliance gets people to listen. And inertia plus mass will discourage a lot of challengers. But once it pops there's very unlikely to be a resurgence.

[Furiously]

But once it pops there's very unlikely to be a resurgence.

I think he's moving into fool me thrice territory for his followers.

[Phildo]

CVA is still relavant.  Or at least Dyntheos is.

[Endie]

CVA is still relavant.  Or at least Dyntheos is.

And they say solo pvp is dead!  I am particularly impressed that he killed Vortura's crow despite it being fitted with no less than four auxiliary thruster rigs.

[Endie]

Also, the new Peactime Reimbursement program has made a substantial difference to the makeup of goonswarm frigate roams: https://killboard.goonfleet.com/km/515311

[Sir T]

IT alliance is down to 671 members from 6000 and 9corps out of nearly 30 http://evemaps.dotlan.net/alliance/IT_Alliance/corporations 

[Phildo]

Also, Atlas alliance has reformed as AtlasDOT and has taken a bunch of space in Querious.

[Gets]

I'm unironically thinking "Thank God!"

Peacetime has already started developing stupid blue-on-blue drama and very boring gatecamps.

[Trouble]

Peace. Peace never changes.

[tgr]

I avoid such drama by just not logging in except to change skills while I wait for war to break out again.

At least this means I get to catch up on all the other games I've discovered the last few months.

[Numtini]

I was considering going on the trip to Geminate. But with my time limits being what they are, war is the best thing for me. Nice scheduled ops.

[Kageru]

I joined a home defense fleet to try out my shiny new stiletto and discovered why no one bothers doing them. Most of the time it ends up with the intruders warping to safe and cloaking up / ctrl-q at the first sign of any remotely threatening opposition.

[tgr]

Yeah. The main problem I have with 0.0 as it is currently was initially properly quantified by mpozoy a few weeks back. Prior to that (while people were clamoring for the complete removal of JBs), I was saying that if JBs should be removed, then the systems further out would have to be worth more to make it worthwhile to actually live there, to offset the added strain of importing everything like we do now. However, mpozoy and/or someone else mentioned how it was impossible to actually live and make everything we need in 0.0, so we're importing millions of m3 of stuff from jita every day.

However, if we did what mpozoy suggested and nerfed empire radically, and boosted lowsec/0.0 so it was more desirable to live in 0.0, including making it vastly easier to do manufacturing etc than it is now, then we'd have an easier time of actually living out in 0.0. Combine that with making it more interesting to live there, by having more things to do than mine, rat and do home defence, then maybe 0.0 would feel a bit more alive than it is now. As it is, I'm not feeling the urge to log in to rat or mine, and I basically just log in to help in the war efforts. vOv

However, these changes aren't really all that viable as all the pubbies'll whine like crazy if they try, but to me 0.0 is just for war over epeen these days. Not somewhere to actually live.

[eldaec]

I was considering going on the trip to Geminate. But with my time limits being what they are, war is the best thing for me. Nice scheduled ops.

We've discovered this previously with Bat Country, we aren't well equipped for peace. Except for Moki.

[Sir T]

They've already nerfed empire mission running about 3 or 4 times. The only way they could make it even worse is offer no bounties or loot at all.

There's VAST amounts of veld and scordite etc in 0.0. Its just that absolutely no-one mines the stuff. In a corp of mine we tried to one night and pretty much the entire op quit after half an hour. Everyone chases the high value rocks that can make you 20 million an hour. Mining Veld will net you precisely fuck all, even in 0.0.

[Fordel]

They could nerf empire down to only level 1 missions and veld and people still wouldn't leave it (though they may quit the game). The guy who is happy mining shitty rocks in empire doesn't want to deal with all the hassle that is 0.0 or even Low-sec.


Conversely the people who can and are willing to deal with 0.0, are also the people least likely to be satisfied with the tiny returns from shit-rock and similar things.



You would have to make 0.0 'as safe' as empire for the would be veldminers and you would have to somehow convince them that you wouldn't just start shooting them for shits and giggles once you got bored on your next defense op.




Though I'm guessing by this point, the only people who still mine at all are macro bots.

[tgr]

I wasn't even talking about mission runners, because fuck that noise. I was talking about living out there, i.e. manufacturing, copying, researching etc. I forget the exact numbers, but I think it was so bad that if we were to create T2 ammo for a full maelstrom fleet, 1 day's capacity (or half a day, I'm not sure, but it doesn't really matter) of manufacturing slots in the entire deklein region would net us 6 minutes of ammo. I think that it was also claimed that 1 hisec system had about the same capacity as deklein, but it might be 2 systems.

I'm not sure it's really that bad, but on the other hand it wouldn't exactly surprise me. In any case, we're importing way way too much from jita every day, which means that we're basically out here just for the epeen, botting and moonmining rights. 0.0 should (in my view) be able to cut all ties easily from empire if it so desired, and it would be beneficial if empire dwellers actually had a reason to try to get out into 0.0, and the deeper the better because the higher the rewards would be.

[Numtini]

It would be good to be self-sufficient, but mining some kind of overly valuable ore on the frontier and sending back home for everything else to be shipped is rather realistic.

[Kitsune]

Outposts are crap compared to NPC stations when it comes to available slots for research and construction.  To some degree that can be made up with POS labs and construction, given that POSes are faster and cheaper to build and research.  But things fall behind again when you consider that one system in hisec can have half a dozen stations floating around in it.

And even if you do decide to pile up POSes, there's the factor to consider that unlike NPC stations, your production line could be attacked and destroyed.  Your very expensive production line.  So not too surprising that people aren't falling all over themselves to risk it when the cost of jump freighter space isn't very high.

[tgr]

I don't mind having something shipped out to deklein every day, as there are always going to be something which isn't readily available where you live, but currently we're apparently importing several million m3 pr day into deklein, and that includes some very basic modules.

[Sir T]

One of the advantages Delve had was a full range manufacturing slots in NOL, which was a conquerable station originally, and the NPC stations that allowed them to do serious manufacturing in Delve itself.

These days you can upgrade your outposts but its hugely expensive, and goes pop is someone takes it over. And the outposts are expensive as all hell to run as well.

Its also very true that most alliances do their serious manufacturing in empire itself through alt corps, which is probably a large part of that millions of M3 imported.

But the sad truth is that an individual member can make colossal amounts of money in 0.0. I used to clear 80 million in a night of ratting in Fiethabolis and I didn't work too hard doing it. I'd be lucky to hit 80 million in a week of mission running in high sec (and don't suggest low sec as I might as well coat my ship in curry sauce and serve it with chips) However its falls down in the Alliance level as, as has rightly been stated the tools to be fairly self sufficient just are not there.

[tgr]

And it would be nice if f.ex the entire alliance could live in a single constellation and be self sufficient at the same time. It might alleviate a few of the problems we have now with tons of systems either having nobody in it, or 1 or 2 botsratters telling you to get out of "their" system., and it might coax more alliances to try to setup in 0.0.

It would be nice to have a 0.0 with more life to it.

[Kageru]

They can't make 0.0 too much more inviting while they have a botting problem. They probably already introduce too many resources into the game from the space they control.

A more sensible PvP game would have pretty much all space be conquerable and controlled so that it can be *somewhat* secured. For example empire would be a trading and noobie mission hub, low-sec would be player controlled NPC stations and null-sec would be grand space empires. Get the treaties system working so each space holding power is interested in having industrialists and mission runners in it's space and offers them some protection in return. At the same time wind back faggotry like cloaky lokies, infinite cloaked invulnerability in enemy home spaces and even loggoffski so that being able to offer protection is actually viable.

At the moment you have a bored but secure island of empire dwellers surrounded by the shark-pool and wonder why no one goes out swimming. But it's pretty obvious CCP is asleep at the wheel (and possibly finding the Eve code-base unmaintainable).

Off that topic I'm working on spaceship command skills at the moment and looking at what would be interesting to fly. Are interdictors actually fun in fleet / gang battles? I know they tend to be a short lived existence but I'm fine with that. Or perhaps it is really hictors that bring value.

 
 

[Sir T]

Sabres are decent pvp ships in their own right. The rest are good for tossing bubbles.

[Thrawn]

Off that topic I'm working on spaceship command skills at the moment and looking at what would be interesting to fly. Are interdictors actually fun in fleet / gang battles? I know they tend to be a short lived existence but I'm fine with that. Or perhaps it is really hictors that bring value.
 

Interdictors are one of my favorite ships to fly in PvP, small gang or fleet.  On top of darting in and out and zooming around so fast it's a great feeling when you know you just dropped two bubbles on a large group of hostile caps.  I've found them very good for pod popping as well.  But then again I also really enjoy flying ECM ships and assault frigates, so take that for what it's worth.

[Kageru]

I like fast ships, so that sounds good.

Going to take Assault frigate, interceptor and covops to V so have lots of fun ships to fly ( Wolf / Jaguar / Hawk, Stiletto / Claw, Anathema / Hound) but it's a short train to interdictor and it gives me a good fleet / gang ship. 

I'd like to add the Harpy to that. A frigate that can hit out to 100km is pretty neat, and it's quite durable, but it does barely any damage at that range. Enough to pop drones and annoy other frigates maybe. Likewise I bought the electronic attack frigates skill but better ECM is in a larger more durable package like the fleet scorpion.

I can't help think we are in for an extended period of peace. The NC / DRF fight is a hideous meat-grinder but both sides are resource rich and barring a massive super-cap welp it is unlikely to come to a conclusion. PL is picking on AtlasDOT down south and by and large no one cares. CVA have conceded providence so it's LeetPvP smugville.

[palmer_eldritch]

The idea that living successfully in 0.0 requires, among other things, the ability to transport goods to Empire and back seems pretty good to me. Alliances have supply lines to maintain and defend, which adds to the stress and ever-present sense of impending disaster which is such an important part of Eve Online.

[Kageru]

To an extent. It makes a lot of 0.0 effectively uninhabitable or inhabitable only if you control the entire region which is a negative. And it would be nice if the industrial side of the game existed in null-sec for those who like building things. The rampant bots and shipping everything from Jita has more or less made the Eve economy uninteresting.

In war news it looks like some groups are considering the next grand war to destroy the NC that acts as an amazing focus of hatred. A leak from Raiden (IT arrogance and super-capitals) stating that they had joined the Russian alliances for no lesser purpose. With Evoke (Leet-PvP and quite good) and NC. (Leet-PvP faggots and hangers on) moving to keep the Deklein Coalition busy and out of the war. The only problem is nobody is really sure how keen the Russians are to re-start the meatgrinder and they've no real reason to like or trust Raiden. Meanwhile Evoke and NC. attacking the Deklein coalition would probably be much like bombing pearl harbor. It's more likely to save the DC from sinking into apathetic boredom and re-energize them than anything else.

[eldaec]

It would make rather more sense to wait until the Clusterfuck actually joined the eastern front before paying people to make them go home, in fact it would also make sense to wait until there was actually an eastern front of any significance before paying anyone to do anything about it, but I know little of the ways of the great game.


The significant parties in the Drone Russians and the Northern Coalition have no advantage to gain (and I suspect no real interest) in shooting each other's POS, it seems like they are each getting dragged into tiresome skirmishes by the minor members of each bloc who don't have space and are squabbling over the crappy regions in the north east in order to get their names on the influence map.

Next major war seems much more likely to be triggered by  forces in the South getting their act together and deciding they want to shoot some POS.