I am glad this has been finally addressed!

Nidhogg wrote:

The current coalition is formed against M2s and has no interest in staying together after M2s has.....lost/given up/left the game/sought peace?

Yes.

Disagree completely.

The game needs more PVE features, more fluff features that will give players something to do on their own and in their own time. At the moment the choice is grind plazma, grind ore, or look for artifacts. Thats a very poor choice - and its already showing that its not keeping people in-game. What numbers came back after the expansion, have mostly left again.

POS only caters to the existing players who are involved in the game. Lets face it, to a new player Perpetuum is just plain BORING.

Arga wrote:

That's just 2 threads i didn't read it in than, but as i've always been a huge proponent of PVS content, i don't disagree with the game needing more, however I do think the issue of getting something onto the beta islands is needed sooner then more missions.

Free-roam PVP, as far as I can tell isn't enough. Although as I said, I'm skeptical that POS is going to do it either, even outposts. The trouble being it seems like it has to provide some additional benefit to be desireable, which currently means that any corp capable of gaining this advantage, will do so, and futher their lead in the game. Making it even harder to 'topple the king'.

About the only thing I can think of, are gamma Islands; three islands only reachable from a remote beta-II teleport, where player stations can be built, that have only epitron on them. These islands aren't won through intrusion, you have to build your POS on it, and then defend it, but it's not a destructable POS, if you destroy 8 CPU panels around the complex, then you can dock and install your own CPU's, then the station and its defenses are yours. once destroyed, you can't replace a CPU until they are all destroyed.

I agree with the middle section of your post there. The idea for gamma islands is fine and all, but IMO we should be looking at getting more people in the game FIRST. Lets make alpha islands more intresting, it'll suprise you how many issues this will solve if the player base was larger and player retention was higher.

I'm pretty sure the devs have this in mind. Their blog post about the expansion alluded to this somewhat, and if the message from the natives post is genuine (not sayin it isn't...) then we have more to look forward to in that regard.

I think we need to dredge up your old post about being the pioneers arga. Remind people that this is still a work in progress, and that the potential is there for this game to be amazing.

i would say one outpost alone is not enough too.

situation - one corp has the power to own 16 outposts, and one corp hardly managed to capture one - the stronger corp would instantly declare war against that one-time lucky corp and wipe them from all islands...

First, don't troll up my thread and get it closed... *i'm looking at you*

From the start I've been saying that the current outpost based "King of the Hill" model is broken. There needs to be ongoing persitant costs to owning an outpost and not just benefits or once a corporation has gain the hill top for any significant time, there's no way to unseat them.

The game REQUIRES there to be an end-game NIC sink of some sort. Maybe the devs assumed they would have more time to implement it, but it's clearly become an issue.

The ability for 1 corporation to gain dominance in the game has nothing to do with exploits or cheats, it does involve social engineering, fairly common game strategy game tactics, and taking full advantage of the broken end-game.

Something many players have not figured out is that sand-box games are not about bot vs. bot combat, or mining, or running missions. Perpetuum is a Stategy game, a multiplayer game of "Risk".

It's disingenuous to blame the current state of the game on any one corporation, as its the action of all corporations that effect the game play. It was 'inevitable' though, due to the mechanics, that one dominant corporation could eventually gain an advantage that was insurmountable, and do so through completely legitamate means.

A few of the 'mechanics' that I suggested earlier;

A Syndicate Tax on wealth, basically a Corporate income tax combined with a property tax.
An Operation fee for outpost ownership, with a multiplyer for more than 1

And as many others have said, the POS system.

This isn't a call to penalize anyone for being good at the game, these checks and balances should have been in the game from the beginning to moderate growth while the server was gaining population and economic stability. Nor is it a slight against the strategic manuvering required to gain dominance, but in a game that has no unavoidable penalties, its a simple strategy to acheive dominace (although implementation of the strategy does require skilled players).

Sucks to hear that.. Hope everyone in your family got out safely..

Try to look at the bright side; you get to buy a brand new gaming rig

WoW is in some other direction....L2P....kthxbye