Playerbase Siege Adjustments

[Haste]

After observing several weeks of active player base sieges, we have concluded the current numbers favor the attacking side far too much. Therefore, we're making the following adjustments upon the next server restart:

Hull repaired per repair commodity per minute: 240 -> 400 (further multiplied by the base's core level).

Shield reinforcement thresholds (the damage a PoB's shield can take prior to increasing its resistance to damage by a flat 20%):
Core 1: 1250000 -> 1500000 (Maximum possible damage dealt per day: 5000000 -> 6000000)
Core 2: 1250000 -> 1500000 (Maximum possible damage dealt per day: 5000000 -> 6000000)
Core 3: 1500000 -> 1825000 (Maximum possible damage dealt per day: 6000000 -> 7300000)
Core 4: 1750000 -> 2300000 (Maximum possible damage dealt per day: 7000000 -> 9200000)
Core 5: 2000000 -> 2750000 (Maximum possible damage dealt per day: 8000000 -> 11000000)

In short: bases now repair at a substantially higher rate. The maximum damage that can be dealt has also been increased to partially make up for this change. The result is that successfully repelling a siege for day will allow the base to repair a more significant amount of hull. The total number of successful sieges required for higher core bases to be destroyed has also been increased.

We will of course continue keeping a close eye on base sieges and have further plans to improve weapon platforms, focusing specifically on their scaling against larger groups of enemies, where they are currently lacking.

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I've slightly adjusted the above thresholds as we're also making wear & tear damage no longer scale per core, causing high core bases to die very quickly when unsupplied. Wear & tear damage is now 200 per minute across the board regardless of core level. Bases with insufficient crew take three times as much (600) instead.

[Lord Chaos]

WP lacks real hull damage, weapon platforms that can actually kill something.
They take 1 construcction slot and materials to build as well as time,
Weapon Platforms should be powerfull enough to repel small attacking group.
So the Siegers dont sit on top of the base just waiting the vulnerability time not even giving the chance for a defense to be setup.

Of course this would have to be balanced in a way that 1 WP isnt too powerfull.

Sugestion: You can make it like if you have 1 WP Mk1 snub killer, you get access to build 1 WP Mk2 more powerful - have no idea if this is possible

So bases that have one or few WP can still be sieged wile a base that has like 6 WP is going to bring the pain to the Siegers

[Firewolfy]

this looks better but my only nitpick (havent fully the math on this yet) is the fact that max damage was increased by a little much? i guess things still even out, as long as pobs cant be killed too quick, thats alright. Also , please please please, return hull damage to pob platforms. a large force can stand outside a pob and spawn camp defenders. give them something like 50% of the hull damage they did before 5.0 patch at least so that people cant just bypass them easily. All in all, looking forward to the changes.

[Stewgar]

+1.

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It ain't about what you are capable of, it's about what you're willing to do.

[Haste]

this looks better but my only nitpick (havent fully the math on this yet) is the fact that max damage was increased by a little much?

Remember that that same max damage is heavily cut into by increased daily repairs that are further "amplified" by reduced wear & tear. It looks like a big hit on paper but the number of successful sieges required to take down everything but a Core 1 base has been increased. Core 3s are the biggest beneficiaries.

i guess things still even out, as long as pobs cant be killed too quick, thats alright. Also , please please please, return hull damage to pob platforms. a large force can stand outside a pob and spawn camp defenders. give them something like 50% of the hull damage they did before 5.0 patch at least so that people cant just bypass them easily.

The balancing act for us here is that we want platforms to be effectively a non-factor for an undefended (by players) base. Even with relatively small values, platforms that do hull damage may have more of an effect on sieging an entirely undefended base than we might want. Especially smaller sieges, which we deliberately want to enable. I'm going to tinker with them and figuring out an anti-spawn-camping mechanic would be cool, but it might take a little bit more tinkering than just "hull damage but not a lot".

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[Firewolfy]

Another question as was pointed in another thread, should it be allowed for attackers to have a load of unaligned / hired guns to help kill the defenders? and not just people of the faction(s) who has declared the siege.

[Kauket]

Another question as was pointed in another thread, should it be allowed for attackers to have a load of unaligned / hired guns to help kill the defenders? and not just people of the faction(s) who has declared the siege.

If Defenders can call for fighting assistance, why not for attacking assistance. Works both ways.

[Lemon]

That lolwut who brought in SCRA OF Carrier to /1/2 without any RP was pretty funny, but there's no way you can prevent/enforce people from shooting stuff during sieges

[Fab]

If Defenders can call for fighting assistance, why not for attacking assistance. Works both ways.

It's not that simple because of this rule:

2.4 - Attacking POBs without valid roleplay / siege declarations is not allowed.

As I discussed here, this allows for ridiculous sights with dubious, if any, RP justification. The only outside attackers/helpers on this siege should be Zoners at maximum because they'd take the advantage to strike the navy, and that's it. Coalition, Rogues, and other unlawfuls have no business (indirectly) attacking an installation. Hired mercenaries make sense because they're paid to do it.

Excuses like "They owe me one" or "I put some bounties up" are not valid justifications. it is as absurd as me coding a bot that scrapes the API and automatically bounties every single ship that logs in. It's a bypass.

Defender side actually made some valid RP - some agreed, some didn't, which is good. However, absurdities like a coalition carrier in Liberty's gutter assisting the destruction of an independent base makes absolute no sense at all and is indeed four dimensional mental gymnastics.

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ARES / Faction Information / Feedback

[Kauket]

They are not attacking the base.

Likewise anyone can hop along to attack the attackers that are intending to besiege a base. Once upon a time, I did argue against this too when we had Order gang up on our base in Kappa ages ago when ONLY the Corsairs were sieging it. But its ultimately dismissed because apparently anyone could show up.

I don't - and can't - control who wants to show up, that's their own decision.