I've regularly avoided entering the discussion on hi-sec, lo-sec, and null-sec and why any one is better than another. In reality there are differences that should be addressed and in my opinion CCP needs to realize that putting more "loot" in lo-sec is not going to make it any better.
To help explain this I want you to consider New Eden to be an ecosystem. With that said please imagine hi-sec to be the land ecosystem. Here a person is relatively safe from danger. Of course there are criminals here that are willing to forgo the protections of civilized society in order to damage other's property but in general they are the exception rather than the rule.
Skipping ahead a bit I would like you to imagine null-sec as the deep sea ecosystem. Here, in the deep of the sea humans are able to hide, to fight small battles at will, and to field the mighty warships that have made us great. We have flexibility here! We can establish empires here! We can take empires here if we do not like how they are run! We can hide within the depths of the sea and disappear into the dark if we must. These are the problems and the benefits of the ocean, as well as the reason so many pilots love null-sec space.
And now... just consider lo-sec to be what it really is! It is a tidewater, a break between the land and the sea that ebbs and flows. At times it is fine; a grand place to stage fleets for money making ventures. But at times it isn't so friendly; being the most unrelentingly turbulent place that can be imagined. Yes, I have already painted lo-sec space in a negative light and I won't apologize for that. In lo-sec CCP has created an area where no pilot wants to go except for those few who prey on the pilots who either: are forced to pass through or are too new to understand why it's dangerous. This area of space is more ridiculous than anything because it doesn't fit the fiction or the form of the game yet we are expected to accept it as pilots.
While this seems like a fair system because every pilot must pass through the slums of lo-sec to get to their destination; in reality it is not. Personally, I no longer pass through lo-sec with anything other than a frigate that has a cynosural field generator attached. By using Jump Freighters, or other capital ships I am able to almost completely by-pass low security space. Many alliances do this, which leaves only the singular pilot or the poorer alliances in lo-sec space.
I have heard all of the arguments ranging from "alliances as powerful as CVA started in lo-sec" to "if you don't want to be there don't go there." If you think about both of those arguments they don't hold water in my opinion. Firstly CVA did begin in lo-sec but that was a staging ground for a concerted attack on 0.0 space and (what many current pilots seem to overlook) tat happened in a time LONG before the area was truly contested. Secondly, I know many pilots who don't want to be in lo-sec. They often want to go to 0.0 where they can use their interdictors, their stealth bombers, even their frigates at full effectiveness. However in order to do so they are forced to pass through lo-sec space where they may be killed by pirates who know that those pilots are only passing through.
So what should CCP do? I know I don't have the answer, but I do know that it won't matter if they make lo-sec space rewards a 100,000,000 times greater than any other area, the drawbacks will still keep pilots out. It need much more work than a little better reward system which seems to be the plan of incursion...
No comments:
Post a Comment