The game does not require that you play, only that you are subbed.  The majority are subbed.

As far as your little station hopping thing goes.  Nothing is accomplished by doing what your stating.  Neither of you are flagged.  If one does flag you have 5 minutes to dock up or die, or spark out.  They still have to sit there flagged up.  Sure we have have two sides all spark to one outpost, but it takes two to tango.  The tango'ers then have a "penalty" of there flag.  A great anti spark measure.

Sparking is beginning to be seen as a "hostel" act.  The crazy thing is, you can only do these "games" at three terminals.

Uno -  http://clip2net.com/s/5xccDx
Dos -  http://clip2net.com/s/5xccPt
Tres - http://clip2net.com/s/5xccZK

All the rest have a cool lockout feature.   That would be why AFTER missions are changed, and they will be changed.  Those three islands will become, next to useless.  Well Kinda useless.  Someone what useless. 

We talk of how easy it is to move fleets into station.   How can you move a fleet into a locked OP.  Well first you have to pull it out of stability.  That would assume there are zero defenders.  With sparks it gives the defender a advantage, as it should.  As the attackers already have one MASSIVE advantage.  Surprise.  They can choose when, or when not to attack a sap.

The main "problem" is those three outpost, in all reality gamma, alpha and the rest of the betas are working as intended.  Giving out rewards to those who keep the outposts, and rewards to those who attack the outposts.
Even so I dont see this as a complete problem.  As similar things happen in Eve as well.  Low Secs have always been hot Hot HOT!  Log offs, clones, *** happens there.   You dont go there unless your either stupid, ignorant, or want to have a small scale fight. And, yes there are missions there too! 
With that being said there is just more "Space" in that game, this one not so much.  Right now, I wouldn't do much about it, later I would personally love to see more space to get lost in. 

I'm rambling now, forgive me.

This is what we have now...They key is to move off of ABT, TMB, or ICS B.  All of the "commanders" for some reason want to fight around these outposts.  No idea why, actually I do, that is where they have most of there stuff.  The defenders also know this, and they setup to counter them!  The attacks have to change there choices, mix it up, move around, come in from different angles.  STC gives them a added opportunity by unlocking all of our outposts.  Giving all sides a opportunity to play the game, and have fun.

You speak as if there is a massive divide that must be filled, between newer players, and vets.  I would argue that in time we are all equal.  Time is the great equalizer.  Attackers have one major advantage that your choosing to ignore, surprise.  At any part of the day, they can choose to attack whenever they wish, with what ever they wish.

Stations are not won or lost over one fight.  They are won by a goal, and the drive to see it through.  Even the most hardened enemies can be broken, but that comes down to tactics and leadership. 

If you have a fleet of 7 guys, and a fleet of 15 chasing you, if one or two hostiles jump infront of you, run TO them and kill them.  Or ECM through them.  There are so many ways to get around a massive force that will not "deblob". 

In short, on gammas we already agree that the defenders should have the advantage.  Betas are no different, as every 12 hours is a opportunity to inflict damage on the defender.  With so many ways to do it.

Spark teleport has no impact on a small group of players pvping on the beta islands. It may play a role in a small group of players trying to take over a beta outpost against a numerically superior force. But I still say they aren't gonna be able to do that even if you were to get rid of spark teleport completely.

I wish the game had the problem of a 30 man noob fleet attacking a Beta.

Prepare

I don't think you are grasping Hitchen's argument.  You are semi correct in that Hitchen's used his argument in the discussion of Atheism and Creationism.  But the underlying logic of his argument is the same logic that pretty much every countries legal system is based upon.  Innocent until proven guilty. 

Your example doesn't even make sense in the context of hitchen's logical argument.  A correct use of your example would go like this.  Doctor 1 subscribes to the standard system in place, that to save a patient from a brain tumor you remove the tumor, and remove as little of the brain as possible or none at all.  This method has empirical data backing it up, and has been used and performed many times.  Doctor 2 (You)  comes in and says "Doctor 1, you are totally wrong, completely remove the brain to save the patient.  I have no evidence that my method is correct but I believe it to be correct". 

The point of hitchen's argument is the same as the legal system.  The Defendant doesn't need to prove his innocence.  The prosecution must prove his guilt. 

The second part of hitchen's argument is that Doctor 1 doesn't even need to respond to doctor 2's argument because 1) it has no evidence to back it up 2) Doctor 1 doesn't need to defend anything, because doctor 2 is the person trying to change the established system.  The burden of proof lies with Doctor 2, or the prosecution, to prove that they are correct.  Not the other way around.  This is why it is known as "Innocent until proven guilty"

So again, to use this logic, YOU must prove that the system is broken.  YOU are the prosecution.

Now, this thread has become a corporation dialog between two old enemies.  And it is pointless for me to continue this argument so, I'm done arguing.  Dev's I leave this matter in your capable hands.  I would just like to stress that before you change a working system.  Make sure the system actually needs to be changed.  Adding tedium to a game like this will drastically affect travel time (one of the worst aspects of this game), especially when there are systems in place already that restrict this system from being abused.  Not to mention that the system itself is open to all to use. By adding in cool-downs and other restrictions like it, you will be arbitrarily restricting peoples ability to play your game.

Even when there were literally Hundreds in GC.  You were able to move gear into stations.  Sparking is only going to get worse with more population.

Seems the only people interested in balancing are the same who have seen the peaks and valleys and want to keep the game at peaks while others just care about epeen.

Imagine if beacons werent nerfed how badly the spark mission abuse would have continue to translate in to billions and billions of currency.

I think that is a good example most people who know about it can relate to.

Once sparking abuse translates in to omfg wth is going on we are 5,000 greenlight players that are quitting now, then people take it seriously?

One good thing so far though is a timer that starts if you undock.  I think Arga brought that up.  That allows people to keep the ridiculous mission gathering, that also allows people to manage inventory and whatnot.

So, if players commit to undock and do whatever, they are stuck there on island for an hour.

Wow, imagine the concept of actually staying in one place.  You guys dont even remember what it was like to actually have to travel.   So many concessions for the last few people playing.

sigh

I'll just leave this here:

http://forums.perpetuum-online.com/post/73938/#p73938

Gunner ... if it was up to me this game would have

... no orange bots anywhere whatsoever
... roaming observers on Alpha (one of the best early game moments for me was getting destroyed almost instantly by a Kain observer right outside ICS Alpha.)
... neuting and demobbing lvl2 npcs
... a cloaking nexus

I don't like games on easy mode.
SpT is not easy mode .... even now you have to carefully choose which sparks you set up and have the equipment there to use.

I suppose the same thoughts behind SpT should also be applied to mobile teles? because clearly they should not be used either, correct?

You are not really thinking ahead about this ... as long as players do not get more than the current 10 possible sparks plus their death spark, they will never have enough sparks to do what you all are suggesting. and if/when the game gets bigger and has more pop, the sparks will be even less of this "overwhelming broken mechanic" everyone is trying to make it out to be.

Regardless you guys have your opinion, I have mine ... It's not changing unless I see a reason it should ... and so far all I've heard is the same jack *** argument repeated endlessly on your side, as if repeating it makes it ... true.

I don't care if you agree with my opinion, but I do take exception to the idea I want things easy. That is not the case. Don't confuse the ability to do things easier because of time and effort invested into the game, and wanting the game to be easy.