Planets - Beacons primarily, affects all planet attacks

[Child of the wolf]

Intro
Hey folks! We all know what planets are (I hope); and anyone who's so much as looked at them knows they have beacons. These beacons are useful little buggers, they allow you to find your planet no matter where it is, no matter who has it, no matter what phase it's in (MPDSD / no MPDSD). They come for the small price of a bil each, and any dual planet you come across is guaranteed to have about a hundred of these little buggers on them.

The problem
They cost a bil each, and (that I know of) have no limit. What does this mean? Essentially, that there is no way to steal a planet that's worth anything stealthily. Yes, you can phase (merlins) the planet regardless; but, in my opinion, that shouldn't be the only way to keep a planet that's worth taking. Simply: If the planet is worth taking the effort to 'stealthily' steal it, then it's going to be loaded up with beacons.

Why do I think that this is a bad thing? Well, a lot of people would argue it isn't, but I ask you all just to think about planets for a minute. After they're taken, you have 12 hours in which to take the planet back with no resistance other than planetary defences. On top of this, it's easy to keep a planet MPDSD'd 24/7 regardless. So to 'steal' a planet, you already need to get above and beyond lucky, then you need to hide it! Isn't it hard enough without beacons?

A solution
This needs to take several things into consideration (in my opinion):
- Ease of retaking a planet soon after it's been taken.
- Possible RL issues.
- Newer and older players.
- Ability to 'hide' a planet.
- BALANCE!
To those ends, the solution I'm proposing has to be semi-complex; but as planets play such a large roll in the game these days, I feel they're worth the time and effort.

Issue 1: Retaking the planet -
At present PPT will affect the planet 12 hours after it's been taken; I believe this is too 'general' of a solution to truly deal with the situation. The problem is, there are two reasons to take a planet: 1) to deprive an enemy (war), 2) to aid one's self (personal gain). With this in mind, I believe that the planets should be affected accordingly.

In war time, PPTs will affect the planet after 12 hours; this will allow planets to be taken with 'less' retaliation, which will allow wars to actually have difficulties. Explanation: Your fleets are on high alert due to the ongoing war, and thus manage to manoeuvre the planet into your 'protected' space earlier; though at what cost(meaning the war itself)? Naturally, to stop people from just hitting 'Declare war' and then taking the planet, the war would have had to have been declared at least 24 hours prior for this to take effect (your fleets need time to prepare and analyse the best route; any planet attack before then will use the old route).

Out of war time, PPTs do not affect the planet until it is fully in your system (aka, 24 hours after taking the planet back). This will allow people who can only log on once a day to regain the planet rather than being hopeless. Explanation: Your preparations were kept to a minimum in order to avoid alerting your enemy to the threat; you have the advantage to surprise!

Issue 2: Possible RL issues -
This is always an issue; it's why we have vacation mode (though the 1 day thing makes emergencies hard, that's for another thread). As planets 'vac' with the account, the only issue left is emergencies. This really isn't an issue out of wartime, and even then, only really for duals. Beacons are a perfect way to recover your planet later, but due compared to the problems they cause, it's simply not a good enough reason.

I suggest a 1 week 'planet evacuation'; during which the planet is completely evacuated. As the people on the planet are what makes it do what it does (sorry, bad sentence but that was the best way I could think of to explain it), the enemy simply passes over it as a 'useless rock'. This mode encompasses all your planets (conquered planets must be fully in system before they benefit [eg. 24 hours after conquest]); making them useless to both you and the enemy for a full week of active play (eg, if you vac after three days, when you come back your planets are useless for four more days).

Issue 3-5: The actual beacon changes -
(NOTE: I'm dealing with these together because I hope to cover them all in this one change, and because they all overlap. Issues are NOT dealt with in order, rather as a single whole.)
'Hiding' a planet is a useful tactic; both in wartime and without. In war one can permanently deprive an enemy of a useful resource. Outside war, a group of people can work together to remove a single, specific planet from a powerful target without fear of it being found and retaken: though at a cost of the person who took it being blamed. The tactic essentially consists of taking a planet from someone, then having a friend take it from you after the 24 hour period in order to 'hide' where it finally is. A tactic that beacons do not combat, they annihilate.

When beacons were introduced, I don't believe Jason thought they would be as easy to obtain as they are today; however even if they weren't, I still feel they're over powered. The solution then, cannot be to simple increase their price; as eventually the new price will be easy to obtain and the whole problem with reappear. Increasing prices would also lead to it being substantially harder for the newer players to use a beacon than the older players, which must be avoided.

The possible solutions are numerous, though there are two that I feel worth a mention, and one that I believe will come up but isn't even worth thinking of.
The bad solution: Introduce 'anti-beacons', or beacon hunters or what have you. Simply put: be able to pay (in units or naq) to remove the old beacons. This is just as bad and poorly thought out as the beacons themselves: it not only promotes mindless button clicking, but eliminates any alternative.
Possible solution 1: A beacon power-source. While in your realms, you know where the beacon is and automatically keep it charged. When the planet leaves, however, the beacon must be hidden; and lets face it, what enemy will charge a beacon for you anyway? The instant a planet is taken, the beacon timer starts counting down, after 3 days to a week (would have to be tested; I'm leaning towards a week personally) it goes flat and the beacon is no longer operational. All beacons are on 'battery', not just one! You can't get around this by simply putting a thousand beacons on a planet and allowing it to be constantly running (well, for the next three years anyway); once again, that would promote mindless spending, not tactics.
Possible solution 2: Limit the number of beacons that can be placed on a planet(Too many beacons on a planet interfere with other communication devices); probably to four or five. This limits the amount of times a person can 'find' a planet; meaning that you have to 'out-manoeuvre' them so many times. It also adds uncertainty because how would you know if a beacon had been used? They're hidden!

While personally I prefer the first solution (timers), I feel the second one is definitely worth mention, and each has their own flaws and strengths. Both solutions are better than the current system, allow people to recover planets to a degree, and to 'hide' a planet. The other two changes (PPT timing and planet evac's) were added in here because beacons directly affect both issues, though truly they deserve their own topic.

Conclusion
Oh, wow. I didn't think that would take so much explaining! I hate seeing poorly thought out/worded suggestions; I think that if you're not willing to put at least a half hour's thought into it yourself then the admin has no reason to either, though I may have gone overboard. All my suggestions are based on what I know; there may be errors in it, if so please say something! This suggestion is made as someone who doesn't have a dual; and who isn't in any of the current 'wars' (if you'd call them that, once again though, another topic). That being said, I have tried to look at it from the perspective of the people with the planets as well as the people without; however I still feel that planets are too defensible even without beacons all together. I know why beacons were put in, this is an easy way for multi's to make Naq; however the value of planets has dropped significantly since then, the time and effort this would take is better spent on farming if you're just after Naq (and tbh, I feel that multi's are the admins job; the players shouldn't have to suffer because of it). Taking all that into account, I've tried to come up with the best solutions I could, and if you still can't defend your planet well then it's new owners are clearly more worthy of it. All that being said, I welcome and encourage suggestions, alterations and criticism - as long as you provide reason!

Thanks for reading! If you didn't, please don't ask me to shorten it; if you don't care enough about the subject to read that then I don't care enough about your opinion to alter it - no offence.

[xXJanitoXx]

/read
and thumbs up im with solution num 1

[Sarevok]

Terrible idea, sorry. Reasons follow

Possible solution 1: A beacon power-source. While in your realms, you know where the beacon is and automatically keep it charged. When the planet leaves, however, the beacon must be hidden; and lets face it, what enemy will charge a beacon for you anyway? The instant a planet is taken, the beacon timer starts counting down, after 3 days to a week (would have to be tested; I'm leaning towards a week personally) it goes flat and the beacon is no longer operational. All beacons are on 'battery', not just one! You can't get around this by simply putting a thousand beacons on a planet and allowing it to be constantly running (well, for the next three years anyway); once again, that would promote mindless spending, not tactics.

No. Reason why? Lets see. You take a planet, and commit to spending the resource to stop it being re-taken in the first 12 hours. You then PPT for 4 days, and Merlin the planet for the next 3. Basically, the planet is NOT take-able, and ALL beacons are now "flat". Meaning everyone has to be able to take their planet back within the 12 hours, or risk it being lost to the universe.

Possible solution 2: Limit the number of beacons that can be placed on a planet(Too many beacons on a planet interfere with other communication devices); probably to four or five. This limits the amount of times a person can 'find' a planet; meaning that you have to 'out-manoeuvre' them so many times. It also adds uncertainty because how would you know if a beacon had been used? They're hidden!

No again. You wish to limit someone to either a weeks uses of beacons (once a day, to see where it's at), or at most a month (once a week). My question is why? Why should it be so, if someone has spent 100T on a planet, why shouldn't they be allowed to then place 100+ beacons on it, to be able to try and get their investment back for as long as possible?

however I still feel that planets are too defensible even without beacons all together.
And if you still can't defend your planet well then it's new owners are clearly more worthy of it.

Are you serious? Your a very funny man.
Consider this, if you would. Before saying planets are to defensible...
10 planets, with 500k defenses each costs 350T naq. Equivalent fleet hangers is about 264,000. 264k fleets can take up to ~2T worth of planet defenses. Yet these planets with only 500k have a defense power of 1.5T (about 75% of the fleets power)
10 planets with 600k defenses costs 510T naq. Giving about 320k fleets. This can take up to 2.46T defense power. With a planet defense power of 1.8T (about 73%)
10 planets with 700k defenses costs 830T naq. Giving about 407k fleets. This can take up to 3.14T defense power. With a planet defense power of 2.1T (about 67%)
Save 800k and 900k, i'll jump to 1M
10 planets with 1000k (1M) defenses costs 5310T naq. Giving about 1030k (1.03M) fleets. This can take up to 7.94T defense power. With a planet defense power of 3T (about 38%)

If you consider THAT, i hope you re-consider your statement about how easy it is to defend a planet. When the more defenses you put on them, compared with fleet power, the GREATER the DISadvantage of planet defenses there are.

[MEZZANINE]

Cant read all that, toooooooo long

Does anyone really use beacons ?

Planets worth keeping are adequately protected, the rest are disposable and easily replaced

[Tropic Thunder]

tll;dr

I say no.

[Child of the wolf]

No. Reason why? Lets see. You take a planet, and commit to spending the resource to stop it being re-taken in the first 12 hours. You then PPT for 4 days, and Merlin the planet for the next 3. Basically, the planet is NOT take-able, and ALL beacons are now "flat". Meaning everyone has to be able to take their planet back within the 12 hours, or risk it being lost to the universe.

Fair point; if it would be put in place it would have to last a little longer than a week, maybe a month. Yes, it's still possible to merlins the planet for the month before a friend takes it, after than the planet is effectively gone. I don't see a problem with that, though. Before I spend the resources on a planet, I consider if I can afford to lose it; if I can't, then I don't.

No again. You wish to limit someone to either a weeks uses of beacons (once a day, to see where it's at), or at most a month (once a week). My question is why? Why should it be so, if someone has spent 100T on a planet, why shouldn't they be allowed to then place 100+ beacons on it, to be able to try and get their investment back for as long as possible?

And why should people who spend hundreds of trillions have no way to hide it? I understand, people don't want to lose planets, but as was pointed out - Jason said planets are meant to be lost, not held forever. More on this below.

Are you serious? Your a very funny man.
*math*
If you consider THAT, i hope you re-consider your statement about how easy it is to defend a planet. When the more defenses you put on them, compared with fleet power, the GREATER the DISadvantage of planet defenses there are.

And how many planets are worth those kind of defences? And how many types of planets are worth hiding? Yes, you get the occasional 800k UP planet that's worth a moon's weight in naq, but then again, a planet that large is there to take advantage of the planet 'feature', so they don't have ten of them. The only other kind of planet worth either the defences, or the effort, is a dual. In both cases, the planets are merlin'd constantly. If you get lucky and find it out, then have the fleets available to take it, then the owner doesn't log back in within 24 hours, then you can take it. Keeping that planet however, means keeping it merlin'd yourself. What happens if you want to sell it? What happens if you want to give it to a friend? You can't, because there's a billion beacons on the thing, meaning whoever takes it is going to be massed and sat on because of it. I don't know about you, but I don't think that's how planets are 'meant' to be, I think they're meant to be like any other commodity, and actually change hands.

Tl;dr? Then don't post on it. Simple.

Does anyone really use beacons ?

Planets worth keeping are adequately protected, the rest are disposable and easily replaced

Once again, duals and massive UP planets. You know, the only kind you'd ever try to hide.

[quote="Tetrismonkey']Also Admin Jason has already stated that planets are ment to be taken, not kept forever...[/quote]

That's exactly what I'm hopping would come from this! In the rare event that a planet worth keeping is taken, then it has at least a hundred beacons on it, making hiding it almost impossible. Essentially, all that happens now, is the planet is being loaned out. It goes back to it's original owner eventually.

[Richard B Riddick]

no offence, but dumb idea, and the beacons don't need to be constantly sending out a signal, u send a signal out, which triggers A beacon, and each beacon has a different code to activate.

and if u have it to just sit there and wait for an activation code, it could last a VERY long time, and the beacons are on a planet, so it's not like they are limited to a suitcase in size, on top of that, this is Sci Fi, where ships can move whole planets, so i'm preaty sure that the power sources would be very big, so it could last a LONG time

Now to why your idea is a bad one for game reasons:
but still, who cares, 12 hours to retake the planet, and if not then beacons are only change u have, and your idea of limiting it to only 3 days to a week, 3 merlins, and 2 ppt's (which almost everybody uses) and beacons gone, dumb idea, and if u buy a planet it's not like oh, SUPRISE, there is a beacon on it and now i'm found, u already know that's a risk when buying the planet.

[Sarevok]

No. Reason why? Lets see. You take a planet, and commit to spending the resource to stop it being re-taken in the first 12 hours. You then PPT for 4 days, and Merlin the planet for the next 3. Basically, the planet is NOT take-able, and ALL beacons are now "flat". Meaning everyone has to be able to take their planet back within the 12 hours, or risk it being lost to the universe.

Fair point; if it would be put in place it would have to last a little longer than a week, maybe a month. Yes, it's still possible to merlins the planet for the month before a friend takes it, after than the planet is effectively gone. I don't see a problem with that, though. Before I spend the resources on a planet, I consider if I can afford to lose it; if I can't, then I don't.

And how many planet would people ACTUALLY have worth keeping, and consequently worth stealing. Doing this would make planets about as useful as mercs. Having a place, but very little one at that

And how many planets are worth those kind of defences? And how many types of planets are worth hiding? Yes, you get the occasional 800k UP planet that's worth a moon's weight in naq, but then again, a planet that large is there to take advantage of the planet 'feature', so they don't have ten of them.

Lets see. There's UP, Naq, Attack, Defense. The only ones not really worth keeping are covert ones.
All you need to do is check the market for planets worth putting beacons on/hiding with merlins.

The only other kind of planet worth either the defences, or the effort, is a dual. In both cases, the planets are merlin'd constantly.

And what if the person does NOT wish to pay the $200/month to hide duals with merlins, and instead, use planet defenses. Your punishing them for a playing style they choose.

If you get lucky and find it out, then have the fleets available to take it, then the owner doesn't log back in within 24 hours, then you can take it. Keeping that planet however, means keeping it merlin'd yourself. What happens if you want to sell it? What happens if you want to give it to a friend? You can't, because there's a billion beacons on the thing, meaning whoever takes it is going to be massed and sat on because of it. I don't know about you, but I don't think that's how planets are 'meant' to be, I think they're meant to be like any other commodity, and actually change hands.

lol. People get sat on for months for taking like 50B naq from someone with 0 defense. This happens all the time. Check the Galactic Colosseum.
All the beacon does, is allow the person whom it was taken from, to mass more then 1 person for holding it, instead of the original taker.

no offence, but dumb idea, and the beacons don't need to be constantly sending out a signal, u send a signal out, which triggers A beacon, and each beacon has a different code to activate.

and if u have it to just sit there and wait for an activation code, it could last a VERY long time, and the beacons are on a planet, so it's not like they are limited to a suitcase in size, on top of that, this is Sci Fi, where ships can move whole planets, so i'm preaty sure that the power sources would be very big, so it could last a LONG time

Now to why your idea is a bad one for game reasons:
but still, who cares, 12 hours to retake the planet, and if not then beacons are only change u have, and your idea of limiting it to only 3 days to a week, 3 merlins, and 2 ppt's (which almost everybody uses) and beacons gone, dumb idea, and if u buy a planet it's not like oh, SUPRISE, there is a beacon on it and now i'm found, u already know that's a risk when buying the planet.

Flash has a very valid point. The game even says "Activate" the beacon. It's not always constantly broadcasting anyway. When it receives a request to broadcast, it does so, expending all it's power to make sure the owner receives the message. If a nuclear sub can be powered for months, then why can't an in-active device waiting for a signal last for years.


IMO, if you want to make this idea work. Use beacons like this...
Once the planet is taken, 1 beacon (or change it to unit of power) is used each day, whilst it broadcasts its location. When the planet is (if it is) retaken, then they stop broadcasting, and the rest remain. Once all the beacons have been used, then the planet can no longer be traced. If they commit to 100 beacons worth of resources, then it lasts for 100 days. If they want to be cheep, and just put 10 on it, then they have to suffer if they don't get the opportunity to take it back within that time.

[Child of the wolf]

okay, after reading through; I have to admit, there's more problems created than solved. Just thought it was worth throwing out there is all.

[Sarevok]

If you want beacons to be able to be gone, then read my last paragraph. I think this would be the best (if any was done) way to do it. If your only willing to wait 30 days to try get the planet back, then just put 30 beacons. If you want to be able to try for a whole year, then put 365 beacons on it

[repli**cator]

The option to remove beacons would be nice indeed. Or how about the option to see in planet details who has beacons on it? combination of both?

Beacons indeed strengthen the position of untakeable planets (well not in a literal sense) because once a good planet is stolen, the beacons gets activated, you are threatened, you are sat on (with possibly some friends aswell) untill you either vac for a long time/cave or delete.

I'm not talking about my own experience here, but i'm presuming it happens with big players vs average/smaller players.

The end-result of placing a beacon usually is that you get your planet back, either via taking it back directly or via threatening/pressuring (or even rebuying it, who knows that might happen ). Guess it does depend on the planet's worth. But imo all the very good planets are extremely well protected trough other means then just their pure defense or them being merlined.

[Sarevok]

And how do you propose threatening and sitting on someone in the server war will help. That's how they play. So what, someone else is hitting them, oh no, guess they have someone else (and even alliance/empire) to mass with.