Upgrades for the Love of the Game

In the latest Lost In Eve podcast done by Jade and Jayne, they bring up for the first time in what seems like ages the Wormhole Idea Factory. Or as I usually refer to it, the Terribly Unnecessary Ideas that might or might not apply to wormholes.

Jade and Jayne intend to take the top ideas to the new CSM to share with CCP. So if you haven't looked at it yet, take a few minutes and poke around.

Its not like I think they are all bad, in fact, I'm going to go over some of my favorite ideas. These aren't my favorite because they make the wormholes more profitable or easier, nay! These are my favorite because they are generally great ideas that not only make wormholes better, but the make the entire game better. And all this at the low low price of CCP to implement them. Team Best Friends Forever? Are you paying attention? Because I'd rather you implement these things over “cleaning out my character sheet” whatever the hell that means.

But before I dive into my top 10, I'll list some of the stuff that makes the Idea Factory more like the Terribly Unnecessary Ideas no one needs. Some of these clunkers are voted really high and I'm still scratching my head as to why.

Terrible Ideas

...

By being terrible, I'm not saying the people who submitted them are terrible or failures or stupid or anything like that. Indeed, there are no stupid ideas in any brainstorming exercise (which I think the Idea Factory is, a big brainstorming session), but that doesn't mean we should run off any implement them anyway.

Science Class Ships

This one just isn't fleshed out enough for me to care. Not only does it hinge on terribly unnecessary, but the lack of actual true ideas in this one other then “Hey, we need Science Ships!”. How about we flesh this one out before submitting? Like maybe come up with some ship concept art. And some actual real use. Give CCP some actual direction. Because let's be serious. We already have a salvaging ship. We have an exploration ship in the Zephyr (which is admittedly lame), and hacking ship in the Echelon. And I almost guarantee we will get a analyzing boat for next Christmas, as it only makes sense considering their previous gifts. What science stuff are we missing right now? Anything? To give a bonus to PI is almost dumb, as it makes no sense for your production on planet to shoot thru the roof when you are in one hull, only to crash in another. There is no ship that should have that kind of effect on a planet, unless you are flying around in the Death Star. Then people listen to your demands to work faster. The worst part is this idea somehow is number 2 of the all time popular ideas. I have no idea how an idea with so little behind it got so far.

That shield is too strong for blasters!

AFK button

All the ideas and things that need to be fixed and this is what is important? Please.

Fix POS guns

This isn't that terrible until you think about it for a while. The idea is you give sleeper AI to guns of the POS. This way the guns destroy ships instead of just dumb focusing on one. I guess the smaller corps really want this because, well, they are small and want a super defended POS when they are gone. Two things immediately spring to mind here. 1. The dumb AI is exactly why you train Starbase Defense Management. Then the terrible guns become Alpha wielding guns of doom. That you control. 2. CCP never intended POS's to be the end-all-be-all. To make them unsackable is complete un-sandbox-y. You want to defend your POS? Roll up your own sleeves and get to it. The AI and POS shouldn't just do it for you. Additionally this is important this change doesn't occur as it effects Nullsec wars.

WH Stablizers

What? You want to give those PVP WH corps the ability to keep your hole open long enough to crack all of your shit? Instead of most? Random exits that change all the time is one of the traits that define WH space. Let's keep it that way, eh?

Other Terrible Ideas that aren't negative

Salvage drones – need I say more?

WH agents – no need at all

Selectable Drone AI – how about we fix it instead? Someone once compared drones to children, they don't listen to you or do what you want, and get you in trouble all the time. I laughed. Then somberly realized he/she was right.

Massive sleeper hubs/stations to hunt you down – Industrial corps will love that

Ice in WH – there is a reason its not in there guys

T3 mods – or in other words, mods that can be reconfigured in flight, like switching your blaster to rails and vice versa, or switching your hardeners to whatever you need whenever. Yeah, gamebreaking.

Free Warp – CCP got rid of deep safes for a reason. This would just bring them back.

Return to drone bay when warping out – only if you want to die. Repeatedly.

Clone Vat Bays work in WH – What? No more free trips to hi-sec aboard the pod express?

Ship Signatures – going dark????? its called a cloak people. We already have this functionality.

Completely Unnecessary

These are the ideas that are not terrible but also not entirely useful. Most of the time because we already have the functionality the idea suggests we should have.

Able to Determine the Mass of the Hole

Anyone who's read this post in my blog, or lived in WH space for any longer then 3 minutes who knows what they are doing knows we can DO THIS ALREADY. This idea is #4 of the top popular ideas! And before you say, “well, we should be able to determine EXACLTY how much mass is left.” What? Why? To make it even easier for you to close the hole? Its already stupid easy. Besides, one of the hallmarks of WH space is the feeling of the unknown. If I know exactly how much I can fit thru the hole, or how much time is left, kinda takes out the mystery and excitement, dontchathink? Usually coming across an End of Natural Life (EoNL) hole is a big red stop sign. If somehow I could divine in 3 hours and 26 minutes exactly the hole will close, kinda takes out the idea of it being dangerous and the thrill of maybe being trapped on the wrong side.

Inter-Connecting corp/alliance PI

Apparently making it boring for just you isn't enough anymore. Number 6 all time idea, also completely unnecessary.

Eliminate the clickfest that is restarting your extractors

Another PI thing. Wasn't CCP supposed to fix that? Hmmmmm This one is #7

Meta Level Sorting

In WH space? I can't remember the last time I got a X5 web from a sleeper. Why is this necessary? Look if your going to go this far, might as well revamp the entire UI. Its all bad. #9

New Corp Logos

This has 62 votes. 62! This is what is causing you to lose sleep at night?

Cosmic Sigs Ids should persist over downtime

Why is this? If you have them bookmarked, downtime doesn't change the mark.....

Scanning Improvement

This one wants to be able to drag extra copies from the scan results into your cargo hold for corpmates. I just have to ask.... why? You DO realize you can make multiple copies from your very own people and places tab. Right? Or am I being trolled here?

Start with Full Shields from POS hangar

The ship only remembers how much shield it has at base. The reason is, everyone's skills may be different, so it can't assume the one getting in is going to have the same amount of shields. Because of the shield recharge mechanic, you get them back. For free. Is it annoying when I get into my shield buffered cane for PVP action? Yes. Some huge bug that ruins my game? No. Its because they recharge. If I'm in that much of a hurry, I get a corp member to top me off with a Basi or Scimitar. In the grand scheme of things this is really low on the totem pole, and not worth CCP mucking about with the very complex shield recharge equation to pause my ships regen here but not here and so on and so forth. Equally not good for CCP just to assume you have full shields, because then it becomes a true exploit when someone dumps a 24k shield Drake in that's defending his POS and gets all his shield back in 30 seconds instead of having to wait out the shield recharge time.

Other unnecessary nominations include Head on a Pike, multiple anchoring of POS towers and mods, scaling probe position, T3 drones, more variable lifespan on wormholes, warping to zero again, spellchecker... etc.

Ideas that are Great for the Game

These are the big ones. Pay attention Team BFF, these are the winners that not only improve wormhole life, but improve all aspects of the game you all should have thought of already. But we won't begrudge you if you just do them even if you didn't think about it first. Here they are, in no particular order.

Ability to Scavenge Offlined and Abandoned POS towers and mods

YES! Where do I sign up? I find this stuff all the time, and would love to either take it and use it myself or sell it for a tidy sum. And not to mention its good for the environment. This is a number 1 Idea that is truly in the correct spot.

Alliance access rights to POS assets

This is a good idea that doesn't really tie into either unnecessary ideas or terrible ones. In reality what we really need is a better UI, or at least better Corp Management UI. Seriously, stop me if this sounds familiar.

Corp Manage Dude: Yeah we at Planet 4 moon 7. Just a sec tho, don't warp as I'm adjusting the settings so you don't get shot.

Alliance Lacky: Oh, that's a really good idea. I've got like over a bil on this Orca in ships and stuff.

CMD: Okay, you should be set, go ahead and warp.

AL: kk, in warp now.

(a minute goes by)

AL: woah woah woah dude WTF your shit is shooting me!!!!!!!!!111!1111

CMD: What?

AL: shitshitshitshitshit scrammed! I'm almost out of shields!

CMD: What's going on?

AL: Dude your shit is shooting me!!!!!!!!1111

CMD: Um, it shouldn't be. I'm sure I set it right, let me look again.

AL: LOOK FASTER!!!!!!1111 IN ARMOR!

CMD: Um, yeah, um.... I think... there!

AL:........

CMD: Dude why are you in a pod? I thought you brought an Orca?

Yeah. Lets try not to have any more of that. Fix the Corp Starbase UI please.

Corp Shared Bookmarks

Or, if this concept is too hard, how about we lift the restriction of only being able to copy 5 bookmarks at a time? This should have been done a long, long time ago.

T3 Production

Yeah, why can't I assemble my T3 in WH space?  Why can't I do this from my POS and switch out subsystems.  CCP is apparently working on this, but not fast enough imho.

MOAR T3

Need I say more? I would love T3 frigs but I think it would make all other frigs obsolete. However, T3 battleships are a perfect place to go, as T2 battleships suck, and everyone rolls faction. Come on CCP, is beyond time for this.

Item Stacking in POS hangars

Also should have been enabled long ago.

Kill Logs

This one I think is just a cool idea that everyone would enjoy. Why do I have to post that to a site then give my buddies a link? Shouldn't I just be able to drag it in the chat box, and when they click on it a window opens up in game that looks just like, durr, a kill mail? It shouldn't even be that hard. And would make linking mails not such a pain in the ass. This idea is pretty close to being unnecessary, but I feel this is something that should have been in the game a long time ago. Let's make things the players want to do EASIER CCP. They will all love you for it.

Create Ship and Module Repair Facility for WH

This one is actually in the Idea Factory not once but twice (seriously, its number 31 and 37). Since we can BUILD ships in a POS, it would only make sense we should be able to REPAIR them as well. Add a timer so it isn't gamebreaking or something. This is functionality we should already have, yet oddly we don't.

Browser Bookmark Folders

Yeah. We need em. I have a giant list of bookmarked websites. Can I have some way to organize them or put them in folders or SOMETHING? It would make everyone's life easier with all the EVE Online websites we all have bookmarked. And it would allow me quick access to the ones I use the most, instead of wasting time searching through a giant list three times to find the one I'm looking for.

Corp Security Improvements

This is two ideas actually that work really well together. First is the “Give Ship Maintenance Arrays divisions like Corp Hangars” and the “Use of Secure Cans in WH space Corp Hangar” although I thought we could already do the latter. If not, the two of these steps would be a great way to help tighten down security so it isn't so easy to steal your stuff. A lock will only keep an honest man out, but it helps a long ways for piece of mind.

So CCP, you have your list. Get cracking on that code!