Lessons from Hulkageddon II?

The week long Hulkageddon II event is over.

If you look at the statistics on the kill board, you will see that over a twelve hundred exhumers were destroyed along with over 300 mining barges.

Along with that, over 200 of the pilots were also pod killed as part of the action.

They even managed to knock off a dozen Orcas and, according to the kill board, one carrier.  I’m not sure how that last one fit in.  Was somebody drone mining with it, or was that just a target of opportunity?

And what does all this mean?

Certainly the people who participated in the event voluntarily had a good time.  Achievements were made, prizes were won, videos were shared.

And they will point out how many macro miners… automated mining bots… they knocked off.  And, certainly, messing with the botters is a cherished tradition in MMOs.  When you zap a bot and you see his pod continue to fly back and forth to the belt for hours after the kill, it is hard not to feel a sense of accomplishment.

But not everybody who lost a ship was a bot.  Some of them were just regular players.  Those in mining barges especially, which are lightly tanked and thus easily killed, were likely to be newer players.  People like that got screwed.  Somebody’s fun became their misery.

And you can take the cliche attitudes that people throw around in EVE.  Don’t fly what you cannot afford to lose.  Don’t ever assume you are safe outside of a station.  Don’t AFK.  EVE is about PvP.  Sandbox, landmines, blah blah blah.

But all that amounts to is throwing a teaspoon of kitty litter over the steaming cow turd that is the loophole in the way things work in EVE Online.

Because you cannot deny that a loophole exists when a group of people can slaughter hundreds of mining ships in high security space and face little or no sanction.  They slip past CONCORD, head to a belt, blast somebody, get their own minimally equipped ship blown up, collect the insurance payout, grab another ship and do it again.

CONCORD doing its usual bang up job

Don’t like the security standing hit?  Just make an alt and finance it with your main.  A few skills and you’re ready to go.

And I am not anti-pirate.  That is a legitimate play style in the game and part of what makes EVE what it is.  I am not even anti-ganking per se.  If you’re willing to pay the price, you ought to be able to do what you want.  But the price does not seem to be high enough at the moment.  An event like this shows that there is something out of balance in the game.

How do you fix it, or do you even try?

A few possible changes come to my mind.

  • Don’t offer insurance to people below a certain security level
  • Don’t pay insurance claims if CONCORD kills you
  • Make the attacker pay for the insurance outlay for the victims ship if CONCORD gets involved
  • Make CONCORD more responsive
  • Have CONCORD pursue low security players when they enter high sec
  • Give mining ships better default tanks
  • Give mining ships a huge shield booster bonus
  • Remove insurance from the game

I am not sure any of them are actually good ideas.  They all change the flavor of the game to some extent as well as leading to other avenues to be exploited.

Somebody attacks a freighter full of donuts though, and suddenly...

So what do you do?

How do you close, or at least tighten up, this loophole without killing off that which makes EVE the game it is?

Does EVE need big changes?  Little changes?  Or do should we just leave it alone?

What lessons do you think come out of Hulkageddon?

36 thoughts on “Lessons from Hulkageddon II?

  1. Julie Whitefeather

    I wholeheartedly agree with what you have said – especially about the price for ganking in high sec not being high enough. Saddly, CCP is unlikely to do anything about it. It seems that it is just “business as usual”. The organizer of the event declared it was simply “evil and mean spirited”.

    Events such as this are likely to give a great game a very bad reputation in the long run. When a game loses a player who just started playing they don’t just lose a subscription – the company who makes the game gains a detractor.

    Thanks for the article.

    Like

  2. Ben

    Have a look at carrier kill mail
    There were mining drones and a hulk in it, and it was setup with a cargo enlargement fitout. So this suggests it was being used for mining or mining releated activity and therefore is fair game

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  3. Julie Whitefeather

    @ Ben: Hulkageddon was not about afk mining, it was a side affect. The organizer said so…it was about being mean spirited and nothing else. It gives the game a bad name and drives away players. Worse yet…now there is a place to be driven away to, and it launches on February 2

    Like

  4. mooklepticon

    I like your changes. Personally, I like the one about no insurance for CONCORD losses the best. I like CONCORD being more responsive as well. It’s called a high speed chase. You see ’em on TV all the time.

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  5. Mule

    Hulkageddon was about giving isk spamnmers more money. Lets’ see if we have this right 1200 hulks go boom and two days into hulkageddon the price of a hulk is up 20 mill? Tell me the isk spammers aren’t going to make a few Euros or dollars out of this so called contest. I was banned out of the hulkageddon channel when I mentioned the pirates were actually helping the isk spammers. Next hulkageddon this pilot is going to quit for one month. Screw hulkabuffoon and the people behind it

    Like

  6. Wilhelm2451 Post author

    @coppertopper – I don’t know… do I count as an EVE player? If so, it might be interesting to check back in, say, June to see which internet spaceship game I’m playing, because I guarantee I’ll be playing one of them.

    @mooklepticon – The “no insurance for CONCORD losses” has a simplicity to it that might make it viable. It doesn’t do anything to directly discourage ganking, it just raises the price a bit. As I said, it isn’t like I want to stop ganking, but the insurance payout makes it seem like the game is subsidizing it.

    Like

  7. TheDrgnRbrn

    Please…. This is EvE. It has been this way since day one. Its one of the few MMOs left on the market where there is risk involved every time you log on.

    Sure, I feel a little bad for the new players who got ganked. But hey, they got through the pain of losing their first ship pretty quick. The only thing that would prevent this kind of thing from happening is PvP flagging, and that WILL kill the game. Most of the suggestions sound like someone has not played the game very much.

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  8. Wilhelm2451 Post author

    @The DrgnRbrn – 3 years in and I don’t claim to be an expert, but your dismissive response (see above about pulling out the usual cliches) pegs where you’re coming from.

    But I do agree that PvP flagging would be a disaster. I wouldn’t even bother suggesting something like that. It just bothers me a bit that suicide ganking seems to be subsidized by the insurance system.

    And as an aside… The Dragon Reborn? Seriously? That’s your handle of choice?

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  9. Jenni Concarnadine

    I can see both sides’ creebs — meanspiritedness versus choking the game.

    On the other hand, AFAIK there is no *obligation* to mine, and I and mine simply didn’t, and I know other like-minded.

    My suggestion — for a programmer somewhere (prob’ly not within CCP) to find a way to detect macro-miners and identify them. Then it becomes an overt war against players, since there won’t be macro-ships to be blown up, because they’ll have been hunted down 23/7 by carebears after their ore.

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  10. CunningB

    The none / reduced insurance payouts would be the only change I would like as a long time EvE player.

    Anything that makes Hi-sec safer than it is now would be a real shame, one of the whole aspects of eve i love is the sense of worth everything has make it so that your ships are neigh invunrable somewhere and that worth is destroyed (In the same way that loss-less insurance is a bad thing).

    At the end of the day Hulkageddon was widely advertised, people new it was going to happen, newbies were warned via the corp channels, and it was a conversation the dominated many of them for the week, if you didnt want to risk losing the hulk/barge it could have been parked or you could take a little time and find a system that wasnt well travelled and mine there.

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  11. mbp

    I am glad to see that no-one is suggesting that suicide ganking be eliminated completely. The notion that you are never completely safe is a vital part of EVE. Any of the insurance tweaks you suggest would certainly rebalance the risk versus reward of suicide ganking – but then again even without insurance how much does a cheap destroyer with 8 guns cost? Not very much.

    I wonder if something innovative could be done with the security system instead. The use of disposable alts is a loophole although I have heard that recycling alts in order to wipe a security record can get you banned I have yet to read of a real case where this happened.

    One option would be account wide security status. I know a lot of players would hate this but it is really in keeping with the ethos of EVE. You can do what you like as long as you are prepared to accept the consequences. The current situation where every pirate has a squeaky clean alt to haul his loot back to Jita is actually an anomaly.

    Another radical change might be to attach an immediate penalty to any drop in security status. For example if you commit a crime in a 0.8 system then you are excluded from 0.8 or above for a short period (few days to a week perhaps) even if you are still nominally in the black.

    Like

  12. Wensley

    Insurance payout does need to be removed from suicide attacks. Beyond that the mechanism is fine. Sure, this was a concentrated attack, but this kind of thing goes on all the time. If nothing else this should have alerted miners to the importance of being aware of what’s going on around them and the risks of being AFK.

    All the punitive measures discussed here are over the top. It is easy enough to protect a large mining operation from pirate gankers. All you need is to have someone watching the gates and be aware of suspicious behaviour. Sure, its not exciting, but nor is mining and that’s what having mates to chat to is for.

    A final note. CONCORD exist to punish not protect. This is clearly stated all over the place. Faction police will try and stop outlaws from entering systems and will follow them around when they do. They also follow you to a belt and get there before CONCORD often.

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  13. Kirith Kodachi

    I think both sides of Hulkageddon need adjusting:

    1) Insurance payouts for suicide-ganking needs to end, NOW. You want to attack someone in high sec, you lose your ship end of story. You might still profit but having that insurance payout on top of possible enemy loot is ridiculous.

    2) Mining ships need to tank more. Whether that means adding a slot or two to allow the option of more mining or more tank, or better fitting to fit a decent tank in exchange for less mining ability, I don’t know. And pilots in those ships need to recognize the danger and adjust their fits to accommodate more tanking ability.

    All in all, the whole thing leaves a bad taste in my mouth. I don’t want Suicide ganking to disappear as I feel it has a valid use case, but 1200 hulks for virtually no meaningful repercussions? Seems off.

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  14. Random Poster

    “One option would be account wide security status. I know a lot of players would hate this but it is really in keeping with the ethos of EVE. You can do what you like as long as you are prepared to accept the consequences. The current situation where every pirate has a squeaky clean alt to haul his loot back to Jita is actually an anomaly.”

    This is what has always bothered me about Eve. Everyone preaches about it being a game with consequences but iits not really since one can just do as you say and use an alt to do all the stuff they can’t do on their main because of bad rep, sec status, whatever.

    Hulkageddon itself had no effect on me personally because i’ve never shot rocks and never will.

    @wilhelm

    What’s wrong with The Dragon Reborn?

    Like

  15. stnylan

    When I started playing EVE, back in early 2008, was the height of Goonswarm ganking people. In retrospect I have always thought that was a good time for an industrial player to start playing EVE, because for my first weeks I was operating in an environment where you paid attention to local and looked for systems to mine in that (due to lower population) were less likely to be popular targets for ganking.

    Personally I would remove insurance entirely from the game because I think its a broken mechanic, and not because of ganking. I would dearly however love some form of transferable kill rights to make a proper bounty system.

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  16. HarbingerZero

    “Everyone preaches about it being a game with consequences but iits not really since one can just do as you say and use an alt to do all the stuff they can’t do on their main because of bad rep, sec status, whatever.”

    QFT. Calling yourself the Dragon Reborn is just one step shy of calling yourself Legolas or Drizzt.

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  17. Maeve Trinity

    I am an industrialist. Have been for the 2 years I’ve been playing, in and out of null sec space. Admittedly I’ve always had a bit of curiosity of the piracy aspects of EVE, and have many people in New Eden who are Pirates I would call friend, even though I know they would pod me in a second given the opportunity.

    So I took my alt (also, 2 years old).. and participated in Hulkageddon.

    Not because I am mean spirited…. but I knew it was going to go down whether I was part of it or not. So I set my Hulk safely in its hangar and I took the opportunity to learn. To learn how to defend myself by putting myself in the place of those who would attack me, and to learn the complexity and dangers of earning low security status.

    I personally thought Helicity did a bang-up job organizing the event… it brought a lot of people together, and shockingly, the people I flew with weren’t the sniveling f-bomb dropping ass-hats I imagined they all might be. They were just like the people I flew with in my industrial corp. Organized, friendly, and even honest (ship salvage payout was always equally distributed amongst the fleet, of perfect strangers… pirate strangers, mind you).

    I also will agree though, it hopefully brought to light a glaring flaw in the system. That money can be MADE suicide ganking in high security space, via insurance (I could fit a catalyst, with T1 guns and faction ammo, and the insurance payout was MORE than what I spent on it all together) Piracy and danger should go hand and hand. But Hulkageddon is an example where danger is minimal at best, and money can be easily made with a fresh character with only a day or so training.

    My 2 cents is that there should not be insurance payouts for ships lost to CONCORD.

    Additional defensive and escape methods for mining barges should be implemented. I watched first hand a Hulk pilot trying to escape, but with 4-5 destroyers warping directly onto you at once, and then unleashing all hell on you, you simply have zero chance.

    Macro miners don’t attempt to escape… and personally, I feel no pity for them.

    Otherwise… now that the simplicity of this is so well known…. I think it will become more and more common, and not exclusive to events like Hulkaggedon, where Helicity was kind enough to give a very fair and far warning that it was going to happen.

    As far as EVE losing subscribers…. well if the record online numbers the past few days is any sign of things… I think a bit of action in EVE is actually attracting people to sub, or resub.

    Like

  18. Windypundit

    I’ve only been playing a few months, but it seems obvious that rewarding suicide gankers with an insurance payout is a troublesome consequence-free game mechanic, so put me down for stopping that.

    I think I also like stnylan’s idea for tradeable kill rights to fix the bounty system.

    A third option might be to add a game mechanic that prevents new or low-skilled players from aggressing in hi-sec. E.g. Concord requires all new players to have their ships peace-bonded which prevents them from activating weapons against other players. Add a skill called Combat Ethics (which can’t be trained right away) to unlock hi-sec PvP. This will force gankers to spend time developing their characters and therefore have some skin in the game.

    What frustrates me the most about suicide ganking, however, is the failure of the in-game means of protecting vulnerable ships: Fleets. If you want to mine or haul in lo-sec for some reason, you have the option of bringing a few corp mates along to protect you. But in hi-sec, the same Concord response that fails to protect miners will protect an obvious gank fleet until they actually open fire.

    I suppose you could protect miners with a fleet of temporary alts who suicide gank the suicide gankers, but that means the outcome of events depends on a fight between low-skilled temporary characters. That doesn’t sound like the game EVE wants to be.

    I don’t know what a solution to this last problem would look like. Perhaps demote EWAR from a Concord offense to criminal flagging? This would allow protective fleets to EWAR gankers, but would still place them at risk for EWARing other players in hi-sec.

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  19. Balsakian McGiggles

    I really think the mindset that you guys have of trying to protect noobs is a good one, though misdirected. I personally don’t have any mining skills trained on my character, so for shits and grins, I looked to see how long it would take for me to train up to fly a Hulk. 63 days. Now this is on a character that has a base of 15 on all attributes other than Charisma.

    Now, if you’ve been flying in EVE for 63 days and you still haven’t figured out what’s going to happen when three or four Catalysts warp into your belt, then you deserve to lose your ship. EVE is a game that reward intelligent players. People that sit in belts even though several people in non-mining ships roll up aren’t intelligent.

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  20. Rieger

    “And you can take the cliche attitudes that people throw around in EVE. Don’t fly what you cannot afford to lose. Don’t ever assume you are safe outside of a station. Don’t AFK. EVE is about PvP. Sandbox, landmines, blah blah blah.

    But all that amounts to is throwing a teaspoon of kitty litter over the steaming cow turd that is the loophole in the way things work in EVE Online.”

    Is it really a cow turd or is that steaming pile really at the heart of what makes EVE different?

    The vast majority of the MMOs out there are a vanilla mosh of sameness. The same underlying premise with a different shirt thrown on and touted as the next great things in online games. Is the fact that this is even possible in EVE a bad thing, or is this much more of a byproduct of the openness and flexibility in the game? I know that there are a lot of people who aren’t going to enjoy EVEs kind of play. I have tried to introduce a number of my friends to the game only to have the majority of them simply not enjoy themselves. At first I was worried about that, I thought that EVE needed to grow to be as big as WoW and that maybe CCP needed to make some game play changes to soften things up a bit to let EVE appeal to a broader population. Then I realized that is exactly what they can’t do. EVE has thrived and CCP grown over the years by offering something different. I think it is a mistake to apply a lot of the same lines of thinking from other MMOs to EVE.

    A lot of the memorable things that have happened in EVE could only have happened in EVE because of the flexibility of the game. The most recent example was the war dec that Cribba received. Mercenary corps and pirate corps alike showing up to help defend his tower and destroy the attackers.

    I think in a lot of cases in EVE the best thought isn’t “What game changes can CCP make to change X” but it is more “What can I do to change X or make it work for me” I could go on about all the “solutions” that you mentioned but in most cases the changes that I think would be best lay with the players and not with CCP.

    My 2 cents.

    Like

  21. Maeve Trinity

    @Balsakian McGiggles Once 3 or 4 catalysts warp in on you… no matter how awesome you are…. the simple fact is the Hulk aligns and warps slower than the time it takes the cats to gank you. Even aligning in advance is useless, as bumping is a common strategy. I know this because, like I said, we DID this to a Hulk trying to escape, he knew we were there, and was already moving before I even had him locked. He still went down, regardless.

    Your point there is moot.

    Like

  22. SynCaine

    Someone flying a hulk or even a retriever is not a noob (in terms of time anyway), lets just start there. A mining frigate kill is one thing, a retriever is another. Second, there is/was plenty of warning about this. If you REALLY wanted to afk mine (how else do you lose a Hulk in high-sec, honestly?), don’t do it during that week. Finally, the attackers need pre-planning and organization, being able to kill a retriever in high-sec is a decent-enough reward for that IMO.

    I don’t fully disagree that perhaps the balance is off in terms of payouts and all that (the no insurance for concord kills seems reasonable to me, although you then also punish a noob for accidentally shooting someone outside of a station), but I completely disagree that such player-driven events don’t benefit EVE in the long run (and it’s history of growth would support this).

    If you were a noob who lost a ship in this, hey, you were part of an event and learned a lesson. Next time you will know to fly out of that belt or run missions for a week. Plus hey, those minerals are now more valuable since demand for ships just went up :)

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  23. Wilhelm2451 Post author

    @Reiger – No, cow turd. But only one cow turd, not a whole field of them. You must have missed when I said I didn’t want to change EVE or make suicide ganking impossible. But the whole lack of repercussion for suicide ganks seems pretty out of whack with the loss of the attacking ships covered by insurance. That is just the gratuitous kick in the groin. Not only did we kill your Hulk (and good luck with that pitiful insurance payout, because you get what, 30 mil for a 200 mil ship?) but our losses were covered!

    But then, I have viewed the whole insurance mechanism in EVE as some sort of bizzaro world crutch since I started. Has the EVE economic report ever published the figures on how much the insurance commission pays out versus how much it takes in? I’d love to see those numbers.

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  24. stnylan

    Well I haven’t checked recently so I don’t know if this is still happening, but a few weeks ago it was possible to buy a battleship off the market, insure it, undock from station, self-destruct, collect insurance and the insurance payout would be greater than the cost of the BS on the market + the insurance premium.

    Besides, losing insurance altogether would I think better fit with EVE’s image.

    @syncaine – actually it is relatively easy to get into a Retriever, the skill reqs aren’t all that much if one just focuses towards it (as many new miners seem to) so I can quite understand new players in retrievers. With the fast initial skilling introducing in Apocrypha, and only requiring one L5 skill (and a rank1 at that) I would think being in a retriver in about a week is quite possible.

    A hulk of course is a different matter.

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  25. Strangeape

    Simple solution! Start an intel channel for all the miners, and track where the pirates are! I haevn’t participated in hulkageddon, but i’ve mined more than my fair share in nullsec, and i think the same principles apply!
    IMHO, contrary to nullsec, Helicity was kind enough to give a warning at large, and not even a cryptic one, he gave the dates and the whole thing prior to the event. Griefers or not, i believe people who got ganked, save a few, have only themselves to blame for that.

    I agree that suicide ganking needs some serious looking into as the penalty for doing so are next to nothing compared to what you’re getting out of it, and like Whillem said, it SHOULDN’T BE IMPOSSIBLE TO SUICIDE GANK SOMEONE, but there should be consequences, where there are non as of now.

    Anyways, that’s my 2cents on the subject.

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  26. Rieger

    “@Reiger – No, cow turd. You must have missed when I said I didn’t want to change EVE or make suicide ganking impossible. But the whole lack of repercussion for suicide ganks seems pretty out of whack with the loss of the attacking ships covered by insurance.”

    See, that is the thing Wilhelm, I never once mentioned suicide ganking or any other specific mechanic or changes. I understand that you don’t want to make anything impossible, but what I think is that there are changes that players can make that will stop most issues. You even have listed a number of points in your post.

    This is not related specifically to suicide ganking, but applies equally to all aspects of EVE. I just think that the idea that CCP needs to make changes when any of these things pop up is the wrong attitude to have pop into our minds first. I think that in the vast majority of cases players hold the solution not CCP and I think that in itself is one of the reasons EVE stands out in a sea of MMO uniformity.

    While insurance may or may not need to be changed in this specific case isn’t the point I am trying to get across here. Think about the problem and come up with creative solutions to that problem, that is what EVE is all about.

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  27. hulkageddon

    I think it’s important to note that in many posts on the forum, I have myself commented that the insurance system right now is complete nonsense.

    I hope my event highlighted this fact to CCP.

    while i remain of the opinion that highsec should be dangerous to a degree and AFK mining is evil, suicide ganking should NOT yield insurance payout.

    Ganking will never leave EVE, as the DEVs themselves approve of it, but it should be a more rare and deliberate act: i.e. pick a target of very high value to offset ship loss without insurance.

    I think that is an acceptable middleground for EVE.

    -Helicity

    Like

  28. bluelinebasher

    * Don’t offer insurance to people below a certain security level

    Or make it increment per crash like real insurance rates. Jack it if you are found to be at fault? You have to pay clone upgrades to protect more skillpoints, why not be charged more if you are involved in 5+ crashes a day? Safe flyer for a year? Discount!

    * Don’t pay insurance claims if CONCORD kills you

    As someone mentioned already, one misclick or bad smartbomb and CONCORD ends your day. Losing and refitting another ship should be punishment enough. If unprepared, that’s a massive pain in the ass in itself.

    * Make the attacker pay for the insurance outlay for the victims ship if CONCORD gets involved

    Nah. If the attacker feels bad they can always throw ISK away. Maybe a portion of the insurance goes to the victim based on at fault. Space court? Hire space lawyers and claim adjusters?

    * Make CONCORD more responsive

    More patrols might make sense, but they would need to be in play like rats. If rats can litter belts, an occasional big brother one wouldn’t be so bad. I don’t think it could stop an alpha strike tho, so it seems pointless. Unless it’s like driving around here, and everyone slows down to 5kms when they see one.

    * Have CONCORD pursue low security players when they enter high sec

    Or make something similar to a FW annoucement? If there’s a way to flag it to turn it off, maybe.

    * Give mining ships better default tanks

    Yeah, I want the mining ship from the Star Trek movie. I think every Eve player laughed at it being a mining ship.

    * Give mining ships a huge shield booster bonus

    Just a chance to warp out if pre-aligned. If unable to do that when at the keyboard, then there may be some room for improvement.

    * Remove insurance from the game

    Not entirely. But they should rework the T2 gap. Maybe change T1 to be slightly better than T2 instead of full coverage. The drop off in return between 1 and 2 doesn’t make sense.

    So where’s my “I survived Hulkageddon 2” t-shirt?! My training was not impacted and I used the time to mission run without space jerks with nothing better to do jumping in and grabbing the mission loot.

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  29. Spectre

    I was going to write a longer response until I saw that Kirith posted almost exactly what I was going to say (except for the “bad taste” part at the end). Long story short: Insurance either needs to be removed or not paid out when CONCORD kills you and miners either need ships that can take a bit more of a beating.

    P.S. Julie, if you don’t like Eve then don’t play it and stop with your goddamn whining already.

    Like

  30. Sören

    My 2ct:

    * Don’t offer insurance to people below a certain security level
    * Don’t pay insurance claims if CONCORD kills you

    Ack

    * Make the attacker pay for the insurance outlay for the victims ship if CONCORD gets involved

    Maybe

    * Make CONCORD more responsive

    No

    * Have CONCORD pursue low security players when they enter high sec

    Maybe

    * Give mining ships better default tanks
    * Give mining ships a huge shield booster bonus

    Maybe the barges are undertanked. But I am more on the no-side.

    * Remove insurance from the game

    Ack. ATM I’m a carebear and I will not pay 130% for a ship to get back 100% in the unlikely case I didn’t watch the aggro in a mission or the internet for hulkageddon events. I stay with “Dont fly what you cant afford to loose”.

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  31. WTM

    Personally I was glad Hulkaggedon occured, as I had just made the decision to stop mining in 0.0 and the market for my ships nicely shot up….

    Suicide ganking is a part and parcel of eve… and to a point the low insurance payout for T2 ships (i.e. hulks)( is reflective of the fact that if you are flying them, you should damn well know what you are doing, and what risks you are taking.

    That said, the perverse situation that ganker can make a profit on the ship they lose, is one that needs to end….. The cost of suicide ganking needs to rise, so that the suitable victims remain those that should be prepared for this to occur (i.e. those with the isk/sp to wear the loss), and not include relatively new to the game.

    Like

  32. Mithfindel

    For those who have noticed, faction police does attack people with low security status in high security space. Of course, this can be evaded by the fact that they aren’t everywhere and more importantly, NPCs do not shoot pods. (Fast ships might also be able to evade the faction police, and fleets might be able to fight them in lower-security hisec.) This enables that “outlaw” characters can gank in hisec assuming they get help from other character (such as an Orca acting as a mothership, or another character ejecting from combat ships).

    Recycling alts to avoid security hits is as far as I know a ban-worthy office. However, the miner can also take advance of the possibilities given by alts simply by having an untrained alt in a rookie ship (outside of your own corporation, of course) shoot at the mining fleet, thus summoning CONCORD response on the site (which means that if the actual gankers come there, CONCORD response time should be much better).

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  33. paauggie

    Im play mainly as a carebear , and I would plead with CCP not to do a thing to alter the balance of power at the moment. The whole beauty of Eve revolves around the constantly evolving, unscripted storylines that they players themselves write and Hulkaggeddon has already become part of that lore. Space is not, and never should be, totally safe anywhere and I love the thrill of taking out my mining barge under this kind of pressure. After all, even us miners need to get our kicks somewhere. And anyway it’s not as if there are no options available to combat the threat – hire some mercs to patrol your area, or simply dock up for the week and run a few missions instead.

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  35. enwelz

    Suicide ganking ruined the game for me. I lost an industrial with high value items in 1.0 space to one BS. the loss put me below what a plex costs 2 days before I had to renew, and having lost my job in this recession I can’t justify spending money on the subscription. I think it is silly that it is that easy in the highest security space. Wish I could continue to enjoy all the time I invested, and likely won’t return after I gain employment, so fly safe and avoid those douchebags.

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