Mining epriton is not and never has been the only reason for having a gamma outpost.

What about giving npc spawns on beta a targeting priority for combat bots. So as long as there are combats bots nearby the indy bots wont get targetd?

Yea, tbh some sort of defense against a spam of ewar turrets may not be a terrible thing... Even if only for non combatants..

I did plenty of ninja epi mining on norhoop before I had a base to dock in. It didn't take but a sequor load to make it a profitable venture. It puts value on owning a beta outpost again. You are thinking too imdiate Arga. Like all the beta stations will stay how they are currently. It is only a temporary thing atm. And when stations are owned by multiple corps and people are locked out of them. It won't be as big of an issue as you think. Sorry you cant have your 6 accts mining in complete safety anymore. You are a big boy, you will work it out.

It makes me wonder how Epriton was ever mined in this game back when it was a beta only resource. Especially when there were static ore fields were the enemy always knew the location of all the epi fields on the island.... I mean, it sounds like it wasn't able to be done....

Arga, you confuse the idea of a gamma BASE and a gamma ISLAND. Gamma bases are still worth it, Gamma Islands aren't.

So, as for the whining about ore fields under npc spawns. If the reward is worth it, players will do it. We walled off immentium fields from spawns so we could run missions before on Norhoop. And back in the static ore spawn days we walled of spawns from the huge epi field at Uria. It took a couple guys working together to get it done and maybe an hour to do it. The good thing about liquids is you only need to get to one square to mine the field. It isn't any different than having to decon strucutres and terraform to get to that titan field on the turret wall on my gamma island.

I remember ninja mining in a t1 termis so I could sell epi at 14 nic per. I only had to mine for like like 30 minutes to pay for my bot. Everything else was gravy. You get ballsy with the ability for that kind of profit.

This change also makes owning a beta station more worth while. A safe place to dock up and base out of for mining alone is worth it. Plus having the chance of a field spawning near your outpost for some easy epi. And as a consequence, passive and specimen processing saps have good value again and are worth hitting or scooping loot on. Not just Corps and vets, but newbs and small scale producers will probly give it a shot if they cant mine it easily.

The other consequence as Arga so eloquently stated, is that the ability to produce structures on the scale required to wall off an entire gamma island to yourself has now been seriously hindered. Epriton will now be a limiting factor in the amount of structures you can put on a gamma island, especially when that same epriton will be needed for bot and mod production. (Cant imigaine this is an unintended consequence the DEVs overlooked )

So Arga is correct, It probably won't be worth walling off an entire gamma island and spending the time, Nic, and material investment. But it would still be viable to build a small tightly defended outpost on a gamma island somewhere to take advanteg of the Gamma bonuses. Sure you will have to do some hauling in and out and it will require cooperation between corp mates to keep things secure and mine in peace. But this gives indy guys something to do, and gives the PVP guys something to do.

Its not that all the risk is now forced on the indy guys, because if the indy guys cant get epriton to make mods and bots and structures, that will quickly become a problem for the PVP guys.

I remember RG back in the day would secure Novastrov and mine out every field on the island. Doing something like that these days may be a little more difficult in the age of spark teleport. Which should be a good thing. It will take numerous operations on beta to get the amount of epriton big corps will need, This should lead to much greater conflict on the beta islands, on a small and large scale. The argument age of unlimited safe mining is coming to an end. Don't pretend that most of us weren't asking for it.

The only concern I would have, is if you must go to beta to do missions and  improve relations past level 3 still. That the amount of player activity on the betas might hinder epriton mining too much with a much higher population. But then again, players usually find a way to make things happen. That's half the fun of a game like this.

All in all, I think this will be a good change for the health of the game.

+1

(And I am sure this post isn't current, as there have probably been 3 more pages written since I started it. )

That was kinda the point with colixium actually. You had to go out on gamma and set up mining base and be vulnerable to attack. Look how that worked out. Miners will mine safely when it is at all possible. And setting artificial limits on the amount of ore able to be mined per day or whatever is just gonna make corps wall off multiple islands.

We are attacking this problem from the wrong angle. Trying to force miners to pvp isn't gonna fix anything.

That actually has nothing to do with beta importance whatsoever.

Resources have always been unlimited in Perpetuum. It is purely a factor of the amount of time you put into it. If I want a billion titan, I can go mine it. And I will go mine it. Be it on gamma or alpha. There isn't any way around it. Unlimited resources is not the problem.

The new terraforming mechanics actually discourage walls being terraformed very high. It isn't really worth it anymore. And it is more difficult to actually do if you were so inclined.