POB Change Suggestions - Printable Version

Swapping to transports makes sieging more egalitarian: all factions can siege equally effectively without gating access behind the chosen few with access to heavy battleships.

Siege ships become far more vulnerable, instead of being the biggest, tankiest area-control class in the game. Defending siege ships becomes far more important.

Adding heavy-duty pseudo-capital ships for transports allows battle transports like the Uruz to be 'retrofitted' into non-trading Q-ships. This has implications outside of POB balance, but could also be paired with an overhaul of heavy transport turrets.

Ammo adds an upkeep cost and investment to sieging. Looting the ammo becomes a de-facto reward for defenders who manage to kill siege ships. Setting ammo this way also allows us to balance DPS and cost on the basis of an idealised siege cash cost per core level.

Module recipes should be changed to require less of a time sink, and more of a cash investment. Time input is one of the main reason POB destruction causes so much animosity. Adding the bulk of the cash cost to the commodity purchase price also allows us to use POBs as an actual cash sink, instead of a cash redistribution mechanic from the owner to suppliers.

Enabling decay only when FOW is depleted and setting that decay to a fixed % value ensures that abandoned bases die within 20 days. It also removes current exploits relating to the low decay rate.

Setting weapon platforms to consume Armaments allows POBs to be 'bled out' in a siege situation, making life far easier for siege transports when a POB has been softened up first. Randomised platform location means platforms cannot be targeted automatically by AFK sieging.

A /siege command would remove the invulnerability from a POB for 14 days on that character. This requirement means all ships participating in a siege would be explicitly recorded in the server logs, making the enforcement of relevant rules far more straightforward. This also removes the issue of random ships taking potshots at POBs and getting sanctioned for it. Being able to subscribe to a base as a defender means there is very little chance of a declaration being overlooked, as they will be notified as soon as they log in to supply / play. The siege command could have the waiting period built into it, i.e. invulnerability turns off either 8 or 24 hours after first use depending on the core level. If a time delay was built in, this should be paired with a /siege join #t command that would enable others to add themselves to another ship's declaration instead of making their own from scratch.