DENEB STATIONS
My Opinion
Whats up with Deneb? Is it supposed to be Itani controlled given its blue color on the navigation map? Maybe the fact there are three (3) Itani guarded stations in Deneb should be a hint? Perhaps it's because it's a relic of the past and has yet to fade despite the changes to Deneb. Deneb seems to have this strange territory war going on within its vast interior of ice crystal fields amongst the blue clouds of gas hiding deadly machinations of turret Gauss fire and the various fleets of fighters and capital ships. Why is there no Serco station? No stations to conquer and control? No manufacturing of arms to fight the enemy? Why does it seem so boring and almost one sided? Why am I asking so many damn questions? Maybe its due to how odd the situation is. Deneb seems like a simple fix but is it?
/opinion

My Suggestions
I. Add a Serco controlled station to the Deneb/Geira Rutilus Wormhole sector.
- A. This station would be permanently controlled by the Serco just like the Deneb/Eo Wormhole sector for the Itani.
- -1. Station defenses and item offerings are similar to the corresponding Deneb/Eo Wormhole sector station.
II. Turn all non-wormhole sector stations into conquerable stations and add 1-3 similar stations into their sectors.
- A. Each station has their own defenses similar to the conquerable stations in Grey Space.
- B. Each station can manufacture components relevant to the controlling nation.
- -1. Manufacturing of capital ships and stuff. (ad. A-1)
- C. K.I.S.S. me (keep it simple, stupid).
/suggestions

Addendum
A-1: Topic II, Detail B, Sub-detail 1. (May 1, 2014)

+1

+100000000 and more...

Deneb seems to have this strange territory war going on outside its vast interior of ice crystal fields amongst the blue clouds of gas hiding peaceful Itani stations where mining, trading and daily life continue in spite of the horrific war going on outside.

FTFY.

There are no border skirmish missions in Aeron's Ice Field anymore. For technical reasons, I think, but the nebulous ice fields of this system still remain firmly under Itani control.

+1 to conquerable things in Deneb.

"Why is there no Serco station? No stations to conquer and control?"

Simple: because while the devs have said they do intend to eventually make the stations conquerable, they seem to be quite content to leave things in a blatantly unfair state for years on end in the meanwhile. As opposed to just dropping in a single Serco station as a temporary measure.

Basically the same broken thinking as their refusal to increase the group limit temporarily until they get around to someyear making the fancier group system. They seem to think that going slightly out of their way is not worth averting years of annoyance.

They seem to think that going slightly out of their way is not worth averting years of annoyance.

It might be a little more complicated than that... having stations belonging to two factions that shoot each other on sight in the same system may bring up some corner cases regarding things like the Trade Guild mission (I really have no idea, this is just a guess. Likely, we'd be seeing a Serco station in Deneb appear on the Test Server first, in any case).

A simpler temporary solution to the balance issue may be to remove all stations from Deneb entirely and redistribute owner's inventories across the nearest Itani stations, but I'm not sure. This in itself might be technically problematic.

I would like to see a different set of rules for the Deneb conquerable stations when they come. An important consideration is that it's not just a guild or conglomerate operating independently that would be taking control of the station, but an entire nation.

Pizzasgood, The Serco fleet is almost always further from the in-sector jump-in point than the Itani fleet. They might have to travel an extra jump after a respawn but when they get there, It's often right at optimal bombing range from the Itani ships. It's not as blatantly unfair as you make it out to be.

I've played both sides, and It's a lot easier for the Serco to jump their bombers out and back in to get a better lineup and easily put 6000m+ between them and any Itani fighters that were trying to kill them. That's ample distance and time to launch your ordinance and get up to speed to escape.

The existence of counter-biases might lessen the overall bias in the system, but does not change how wrong the individual biases are.

And for the record, I'm a fan of either eliminating fleet placement bias, or making it dynamic (e.g. based on whose corner of the system is closer, or having it shift to favor whichever side was losing overall prior to the start of that fight).

Arf. What about small skirmishes. When the Serco trident explodes we have to make 2 jumps to reload + 2 jumps to get back. That's an extra 2 jumps compared to the Itani. Plus the little extra distance Itani has to make to do their first bomb run is what maybe +5 i seconds if that to the Serco advantage. It is as blatantly unfair as it seems to be.

I'll agree the jump in point for Serco is a bit of an advantage in the Small skirmishes. After that, I don't really see much advantage. In Medium, getting in with the Serco Trident and Teradon in an effort to deshield the Itani Teradon at the easiest and most advantageous point in the mission means flying to or almost to the Serco Connie. I see this as neutral as there is plenty of time before the two sets of ships interact in which to get into position. It's been a while since I've played a Large or Battle, but from what I recall, entering near the Itani fleet offered little advantage.

I would also point out that in the missions, the fighter conflict is usually much closer to the Itani fleet than Serco. Other than that, in Medium and higher skirmishes if the solo player is unable to contain the enemy Teradon, the battle becomes a tossup between warring retarded AI's for the solo player.

Yes, I know that these missions are meant to be for groups of players. The reality is that most of them are taken by one player.

With respect to the OP, here is what I am seeing.

A lot of the participants in Deneb seem to be new players exploring the game, with a few old farts like myself taking an occasional mission. The very nature of these missions means that those participants are under powered because they often cannot access the equipment needed for a bombing rag. I expect this is quite discouraging for players when someone like myself jumps in and starts blowing crap up and they are struggling with the fighters and watching their efforts get shredded.

With respect to this, I would suggest better instruction or advice be given at the start of the skirmishes.

I would also like to see the dependence upon bombers be reduced with respect to a single player having an impact, particularly for the Small and Medium skirmishes.

Frankly, I would like to see individual / group intelligence required to win in Deneb. Not all skirmishes should be counted equally. Battles should score the majority of points and Fighter the least. HOWEVER, players should be able to initiate smaller conflicts in the sectors surrounding a Large, Medium or Battle. Those victories or defeats should lend towards an advantage in the larger conflict in the same way winning general hive skirmishes weaken the queens and defeating the queens weaken the Levi.

I'm all for station ownership changing hands in Deneb. However, the stations need to offer the winning side some limited advantage- perhaps manufacturing capship parts with lower requirements than those in Grey space. I don't really care what the advantage is, so long as it exists, cannot be stockpiled and is 'real'.

Deneb is currently a source of considerable developer focus. Not exactly on the points you guys are raising, but rather on addressing the fundamental technical issues that caused a lot of progress to stall on that aspect of "Dynamic Warfare".

I understand the gameplay balance in the system is also off-kilter and undesirable. Hell, it's not even what I originally specified. But, with the new server-side mechanics we should be able to "fix" everything in a much more.. complete manner.

(And Pizza, in point of fact, we did bump the group limits, and it blew up in our faces in testing, and we have never addressed the underlying technical problem. But I've talked about all that before..).

On the one hand, there's only a few Devs. On the other hand, VO time isn't really measured in years so much as it is in decades…and still the most basic shit goes unaddressed.

I'll see ya'll in a year or two. Maybe the game will be incrementally closer to 2.0 by then.

"I'm all for station ownership changing hands in Deneb. However, the stations need to offer the winning side some limited advantage- perhaps manufacturing capship parts with lower requirements than those in Grey space. I don't really care what the advantage is, so long as it exists, cannot be stockpiled and is 'real'."

You mean in addition to the obvious advantage they automatically give, of having a local base to operate out of? Or did you forget that part? :P

-1 to the OP.

while I like the ideas, they will do absolutely nothing to attract more players to the conflict up there, or to stayin the game itself.

This Deneb debate has been had so many times, I really have no interested going through the motions again. Bottom line is there is no reason for people to play up there right now unless you are trying to level up. There are no badges, no military ranks, no special drops, no really significant benefits or consquences to losing or winning. Even if the stations were made conquerable, nobody would give a shit unless you can make something REALLY valuable in those stations. Case in point is the existing conquerable stations -- which have zero value to us once we have completed building a trident.

There are no badges, no military ranks, no special drops, no really significant benefits or consquences to losing or winning.

It's fun to chuck Avalons at NPC capships, but beyond that, the only real game-affecting reason to do the Border Skirmish missions is to level up or affect the (mostly useless) war convoys.

I should have been more clear. What I meant by advantage, besides the natural best starting position, was an incentive or incentives to motivate players to participate in Deneb in the first place.

Deneb sucks due to limited player interaction.

In theory it's great, but NPC wins and losses where no players even attended the battle seems lame in my opinion.
It's like watching Deneb TV or something just let it all happen without any intervention at all.

Then to compound the problem if you do try to win the weekly totals for Deneb the NPC overules this because you can't be there 24 hours a day fighting to insure the NPC's don't regain control while your sleeping. This pitfall I believe is due to limited player numbers in Deneb.
This might be different if there were players there all the time each and everyday it might not be an issue. But since there is not, then it is an issue.

Serco or Itani, win or lose, the NPC's are in control of that as it is now.

Don't get me wrong. I think it was constructed well with more players intended.
However, since there is not, there is no fall back position; and the NPC's control the outcome each week whether it is Serco or Itani.
I wish it required a player in the battle to win or lose.

Now with more player interaction I have to agree the muiltiple jump requirements for Serco is a disadvantage.
However, with NPC's and only 1 serco player, it's not really much of an disadvantage.

It's the player interaction itself that seems to create the variable degrees of advantage vs disadvantage.

Itani players and Serco players in Deneb = disadvantage for Serco.
NPC and Serco players = no real disadvantage
NPC and Itani = no real advantage

Oh well thats my lengthy opinion about it.
Nice to know they are working on Deneb at all this is great news actually

Serco or Itani, win or lose, the NPC's are in control of that as it is now.

Uh, You can definitely sway the course of the war each week with only a couple players. I've done it. There's weeks where the NPC effort seems stronger on one side or another, but you can always make a difference.

Itani players and Serco players in Deneb = disadvantage for Serco.
NPC and Serco players = no real disadvantage
NPC and Itani = no real advantage

I want some of whatever you're smoking. I bet spidey will pay a fortune for it.