for those of you who cry "you have more points than us" (Page 1 of 2)

first off, fairness is a myth.

secondly, if you can down an assault or mech with focus fire wouldnt that in of itself be proof that there is a competitive balance? its costs nothing for an arkhe and the same cannot be said for a mech. t4 fittings on top of that is another astronomical expense. and if a total of 15-20 arkhes in throw away gear can down one then that is balanced

Are you saying that unless EVERYBODY has the same amount of points then you wont ever pvp? time progression sandbox games reward the earliest players so if you are going to cry about something thats small like a 240k points difference then please do not buy this game. think in terms of years and the point spreads that will occur over that amount of time. guess you cried alot in stEVE too. You can still be competitive with teamwork. but to think that a starter bot is competitive 1v1 against somebody who has the points and equipment and more importantly put in the time to have those things then you need a new game. The mechanics are basically sound in the game as it is now.

I'm not pvping against people with 240k more EP than me. Perpetuum is going to hit a wall in a few months and they won't recover unless they are more newb friendly. I'm not saying a well organized guild of 50 couldn't come into the game in half a year and completely take over with a huge EP disadvantage. I'm talking about the guy with a few friends just looking for a fun mech game to play, they aren't going to stick around when them and their buddies are blown up by one guy who has been here since pre-release. I've been at both ends of the pvp food chain in other games. Neither one is really that fun to me anymore. When everyone is tightly grouped, it's a lot more interesting. I was considering EVE a year or so ago and chose not to play it for a similar reason.

The problem is that the type of game where time investment does not matter is completely different from eve or perpetuum or any popular MMO.  Both of these games have a cap where diminishing returns begins to take effect and allows new players who specialize to compete, but a 1 week old noob is never going to stand a chance against a veteran player 1v1 and I don't think most would want it to be that way.

Arena style games and first person shooters are the only games I can think of that fit your criteria.  Most MMO games don't let you interact with high level players until you've put a significant amount of time in to level yourself, sandbox games give you the option to compete with them if you have sufficient numbers and tactics which is a big plus over any themepark mmo.

A lot of older players start to diversify their extensions a LOT.  They will put points into electronic warfare so they can do that stuff, put more points into stuff like armor points which wont change a fight too much, and stuff like lower VAT so they make a bit more money.

Coming into this game with a large EP disparity of M2S we were still able to group up and go to beta and kill stuff.   I never felt like we were screwed because we were smart and didnt get ourselves into situations we couldnt handle.

Sure, theres not an EP cap, but the fact the skills get so expensive and so many things to spend it on that you catch up a lot faster than you'd think when you're specializing into one thing like combat dps.

I'm fine with time based progression, if I'm starting with everyone else. I'm saying the game is going to have problems down the road when it takes newbs 6 months to get competitive. If I actually stay with this game for 2 years, I'll be one of those guys that sticks to pure combat and gets to 10s.

I've seen a solution (or alleviation) for that problem in a browser game many years ago. There you had time-based advancement skills, comparable to extensions in this game. The more people had trained one certain skill, or the level of one skill, the easier and faster it was to train for everyone else in the game. Some of the basic skills had like 190% training speed (means the newb was training almost double as fast as the people back at the beginning of the game), as many had completed them, other skills only 110% and so on. This way the vets still remained on top, but the newcomers had it easier and faster to catch up to some extent.

I started eve 5 or 6 years late.  I was playing with the big boys in end game pvp shortly after 1 month.  I was even able to contribute and help! I didn't insta die either.

If you want to solo gank people, yes, you'll have issues for awhile. But as part of a team, it doesn't take much at all.  It helps that larger weapons don't do so well against smaller bots.

someone with all 5's vs someone with all 10's is about 15% difference in power.  Money is more important. Being able to bring in expensive mechs and parts is a huge deal.  If your smart about it, you can get rich at any point.

money > ep.  Its a money game.  Not a level game.  There's nothing stopping you from making money when your low on ep.  ep helps, but its not required.

I can say with absolute certainty that a 2 month old combat agent will be more than welcome in a beta isle pvp group. Is he going to be able to 1v1 an agent with 6 months more ep than him? Probably not, unless the fittings play into his favour dramatically, but if thats what you want from the game I think you are dreaming.

What you are asking for is the removal of the rpg element of the game, which i have to tell you is the main reason people play mmorpgs rather than shooters, which are better for pure fragging and skilled play.

My suggestion is if you don't like the fundamentals of mmorpg gameplay, stick to shooters or SC2 (excellent game).

Everyone got it pretty much covered. In perpetuum, as in that other game:

(general player skill at playing) + (teamplay capability) >> EP

Lege, you didn't start EvE, and you'll probably not play perpetuum because you're thinking wrong. You're thinking with the mindset of a theme park (ie. wow) player, which tends to want everything to be 1 vs 1 balanced and straightforward.

Perpetuum isn't about straight thinking, it's about transversal thinking, because it offers you the choice of a richer gameplay system than any theme park can offer. "How can I overcome my enemy ?" outsmart him if you can't outnumber or outgun him. There's always a way, even moreso in Perpetuum.

Every long time pvper of that other game will tell you the same: it's not about the numbers, it's about the knowledge of the game. After 4 years pvping there, I was able to wreck havoc in a simple frigate or destroyer against better equipped guys. Did the numbers help ? of course, but success came mainly because you knew how to use them properly.

That's what make sandbox games interesting. Older players will always have an advantage in numbers or in cash (as in every game allowing for this kind of progression), but at least here you got a world of possibilities.

Yeah, EvE obviously failed miserably with that kind of model.

thats not how math works.

If we look at 10 extensions and your 10% better at each extension, your 10% better.  if your 10% better at 9 of them and 9% better on the last one, your 9.9% better. 

being 10% better on all 10 aspects would not make you 100% better.