IMO allowing peeps to buy bulk EP for $$$ or ICE would be ideal - many games are doing it and it's profitable as heck for them (crap like 'candy crush' has capitalized on this microtransaction trend and made fat bucks).

BUT there should be a limit of 75% of the current top EP.
For example, if the top EP that could have been earned by an unbroken submission from day 1 is two million the most anyone should be able to top up using ICE or straight $$$ would be one and a half mil.

3 minutes?
There is zero point.  Creating an instant 'scarab from gamma limits directly to alpha core' will certainly not help the game.

But then, I think this game is pretty much beyond help at this point.

Underlying message:

Send more ill equipped nuubs to beta for us to destroy.

Y'know... everyone's terrified about a wipe-all or other changes that will impact all the filthy lucre they've amassed during the slow months of peace... but other people have grave concerns about attracting and keeping nuubs...

How about this suggestion:  Pay to Compete
In other words:  EP packages; 1, 6, and 12 month.  To a maximum EP available on a given account of no more than 75% of the current maximum EP.

So, let's say that a character that started, day 1, and has kept active has 2 million EP  (I don't know the total, so that's just an example number).  Any current or new account can buy EP in packages up to 1.5m after which no further EP can be applied and they'll have to progress based on time as normal.

The EP package would be exactly the same as it would cost for a 1, 6, or 12 month subscription, but all applied immediately.  No other benefits are given (thus standings and goods have to be worked for).  They would, of course, need to purchase subscriptions thereafter as normal (or not, if they go the free-to-play route).

It's certainly not 'pay to win' or even 'get ahead', but can buff them enough to feel a little more competitive than a nuub in his arkhebot.  Since nothing other than EP is provided there is no direct 'I win' correlation from premium purchase items or such.

This will very possibly attract new players, give them a means to become more established than a 0-EP nuub and give them an incentive to stay with just a bit more money up front which will fatten the developer's pockets perhaps enough to allow for some expansion?

Actually... how about a newbie zone, complete with a PvP island or two that can't be accessed if you have more than 100k EP or a certain number of days in game (90) on an account, not just a toon.  It's still on the main server, the center of the newb zone would still be the three primary alphas, but the vets would be effectively limited from stomping in and crushing the newbs at every turn.
After they've spent a couple of months learning, or even from day one, there's nothing barring them from jumping to alpha 2, beta, or even gamma save for TP mobs.

I'd be game with a wipe-all, since the current 1.5m EP players will gobble up gammma, or at least blockade the entry points so that no newbs have half a chance because they'll never achieve parity with the beta players (us).

The problem that the devs face is how to attract, and /keep/, new players (removal of the mind numbing time sinks would go a LONG way) without driving the established players away so badly that they kill the game through word-of-mouth and flame posts wherever it's mentioned.

I'm not a 'new' player, but nor am I an established vet with all of the perks and overwhelming power the vets have amassed, so find myself wondering... what's here to keep me in the game?
I used to enjoy artifacting but that's become a dead horse without a market because the vets already have all that they need and then some.  Mining is mind numbing (strange - on Alpha2 every ore field my scanner points to is under a static red spawn) and harvesting just as bad.
Researching and building is okay - but there's no market to sell to.
Missions?  Alpha... okay.  Boring as sin and laughably limited.
Beta - undocked twice, made it 300m before some yuts goes after me with a MK2 Kain the first time, MK2 Waspish the second in a different terminal on a different island.

So... yeah... nothing to keep new, low EP players in the game whatsoever.

Without accruing EP?  HTF do you expect to keep players if they cannot advance beyond arkhebot level?  That's pretty stupid.

Give a bonus to EP generation for paid subs, OFC, but let the freebies accrue enough to advance without that ever present 'buy tokens/diamonds/coins' popup that so many other games rely on like street buskers.

Maybe not occupied, but certainly hands down inconvenient.
Of four I explored I was unable to progress very far because the teleporters were trenched off.  On the one I use are two 'inactive' base structures - one of which I cannot fathom the construction of because a large portion of it is completely inaccessable to even light bots by slope... I'm not about to slog around a terraforming bot just to find an artifact hit.
And then there's having to haul back the goods, without dying, once my hauler is full.

Especially since it seems that the only MK2 CTs that spawn now are industrial - I've found 45 in two weeks, not a single one is combat mech.  And now I'm down to 4 accessable contacts until they, too, end up spawning inside of those structures  (1/3 of them are inside of physical barriers - walls/slopes put in place by terraforming).

Well, Zoom, consider this:

Artifacts only 'spawn' when scanned for - no need to have every artifact recorded for me on every island until I go to that island and initiate a scan.  That would then populate that particular island for me.

If I haven't 'scanned' an island in 48 hours [using that duration as an example] the scans on that island should depopulate until I initiate another scan.

This would reduce the DB population on artifacts considerably for each player?  [Mind you, I have no idea how it's handled internally, but still, it does seem logical].

If I am actively scanning an island the results should have timers - no need to keep an immediate running tab.  Just a DB cell that gives 'time of artifact placement'.  After 48 hours the DB deletes it and populates another (providing I scan on that island again, otherwise nothing happens, the artifact is not even 'despawned', until I do.  That initiates a DB call and wipes all 'older than 48 hour' results and repopulates new ones).

Also, perhaps a 'stability' score could be implemented.  Stable contacts are relatively fresh - 36 hours or less.  Unstable contacts are 36-46 hours old.  Weak contacts are older than 46 hours and could collapse at any time.

Using the terrain map for the current bot?  IMO it would need to use the light bot terrain map - otherwise I could just do an initial scan in something with the lowest slope tolerance, then switch to a smaller bot, reducing the geographic limitations considerably.

But what you say is certainly valid.

Watch your step, STC -

We all know what you're going to do when any new players show up with the Steam release -  Sit on beta gates and WTFOMGBBQ!!111oneone pwn any new ignorant enough to pop through the teleport in their arkhe, just for the easy LOLs and backslapping each other because your 10 mk2 mechs just pwnt an arkhe.

Being big, having gotten there when there was essentially zero conflict in the entire game, only gives you a solid foundation, it does not mitigate the rot that will begin at the core rather than being whittled away from without.  In every game one entity, one group, always attains dominance - and when it does, it always falls apart from within.

See:  Russia, 1980s.
See:  USA, now.

BoB, Goonswarm, Northern Coalition....