PM is imperfect. Always will be. It's the nature of humanity and the nature of gaming. Combine that with the the surest way to upset the greatest number of people is to try and please everyone.
That being said, I think the orig idea is still sound. Limit red to system tech or lower.
There was a comment made about podding someone who's sniping your harvy cry that you couldn't pop. Expanding on that issue if I may: They can do that now in white.
It's annoying. It can become harassment per Astreaus' common sense guide.
The principle behind the guide is actually pretty simple: Don't be a dingus. :mrorange:
I do feel, however, that the constant battles are also a symptom of the reduced cry rates and higher ship prices. That's an issue that could be dealt with by turning the currently un-used CQ planets into harvy farms as suggested in another thread. Everyone here has had a time or few thousand where we get drawn into fights over grinding spots. Cry spots are the single biggest cause of angst that lead to verbal chat wars, leading to bent feelings, leading to clan wars, leading to all the other crap that we daily heap onto GM's.
I feel it would be pretty simple to code harvy planets into the game and would allow players to farm away from places where people are doing their missions or hunting for BP's.
Space and resources. Humanity has been fighting wars for both since the dawn of man. Right now, with predicted Sirius ship costs and the backlog of people ready to move into the new system, the amount of both (space and resources) are scarce. I would expect there to be more fights and claims/counter-claims of harassment to explode in the coming weeks. A measure of peace could be had by making both space and resources a little more abundant. Sol for example: There's Jupiter, Mercury, Uranus & Neptune, all vacant.
Put in a simple map: 10 harvy spots, 10 e-fields. Vacant of all else. That's 40 spots. In Sol alone.
Vega has Dante and Colossus
Antares has Remo
Gemini has Iga
Mizar has Cosmo
Sol we covered above
Draconis has no blank planets (food for thought on expansions, have a planet just sucked through the wormhole and "imported" into the system)
Anyway, aside from three planets in sol, there are already maps in place. Simple thing to add harvys.
If that were done, I bet half or more of the fights and claims of harassment would cease. People would get to grinding for Sirius and their BP's and a measure of calm would be restored.
The two issues are, at least to me, related. Limit the fights to fair fights of skill and clans. For those who want to grind without constantly bumping heads with half the sever over grind spots, expand the grind spots.
Make the unused planets part of the story line. Complete the system missions for access to that systems mantis cryo mine.
For Sol you could mix it up a bit given all the vacant planets: Complete sol, gain access to the Mercury grinding. Complete Gazica, get access to Jupiter. Complete the hive, gain Uranus. Beat Sirius, you get intel giving up the location to the secret mantis cryo mine under the ice covered oceans of Neptune, loaded with lv70 harvys.... What a way to get people into the story missions eh? Your "bonus" planet too crowded, do some missions and keep moving foreward!
There was a dramatic pregnant pause of players who got to the hive but didn't finish the story once they gained access to the rares and and got the tech. They went to go grind on earth/moon and thats when you saw the massive explosion of problems. The backlog of players with no where to go, no where to grind without constant turf wars. Make the cry drops on the sol bonus planets only slightly higher from the system completion planets, and the access gives you no so much increased cry, but simply room to grind.
By "slightly higher than the system planet", this is what I mean.
A 5% bump over Earth amounts On Mercury.
A 5% increase over Gaz amounts on Jupiter.
A 5% increase on Hive amounts on Uranus.
A 5% increase on Sirius amounts on Neptune.
That would make the amounts less important (but still higher) than the ability to grind without constant crowding.
It would also solve the "low-stalking-high" issue raised previously as lower level players would have to complete the story to get there, leaving the "normal" planets a free-for-all (Think "INCENTIVE to advance"!)
I realize that's off on a bit of a tanget but like I said the two issues are (I think), directly related.
Solve one, help the other. Solve both and, to quote another space epic, "restore blance to force, you would".
) playing the game we will have more than one different kind of morale.