Art by Redline XIII
During the assassination of Julius Caesar, he was stabbed 23 times. However, the autopsy concluded that only two of those stabs would have been fatal. This means that the other 21 stabs failed to achieve anything and could be considered just whoring on the kill. So, 21 people could falsely brag that they had something to do with the death of Julius Caesar. Fast forward a couple of millennia, and we see this same principle at work with the destruction of the NC Keepstar, and indeed the majority of keepstars in the game. Only a handful of people deliver a fatal blow, while other people join in as an attempt to show that they were vital and important to its death.
For those unaware of the events of November 19, Northern Coalition. (NC) attempted to online a Keepstar in the region of Vale of the Silent, in H-5GUI. This move was something the Imperium had issue with, and they dispatched many subcap fleets to neutralize the threat. After the dust had settled it was clear who delivered the killing blow. The fatal stab that destroyed the Keepstar was that of the Initiative’s Ravens, who used long ranged tactics, keeping away from an enemy whose defensive tactics were largely sending in supercarrier fighters to counter-attack. However, the Ravens chipped away at the Keepstar at range, micro-jumping every few moments to maintain their distance. The NC capital fleet sat on the KS, but was countered by subcap fleets which suppressed the enemy fighters – fleets of Imperium Cerberus, Ishtars, and Jackdaws. This maneuver kept chipping away at the Keepstar, to the point where its destruction threatened the capital fleet protecting it. The supercapital fleet then evacuated, leaving the Keepstar to its demise.
As the Keepstar entered its last moments, the majority of the fleet commanders, both on Imperial and NC sides, warped to the Keepstar and fired on it, simply get on the killmail—to be the 23rd dagger which stabbed Caesar. Most just wanted to to claim they were there and contributed to its death, when in reality, the damage they did was probably the equivalent of giving Caesar a manicure.
So what does this all mean? The way I see it, people feel they are entitled to be on a killmail now. They feel entitled to say that they helped destroy something when in reality they did not achieve anything. Even NC players shot the Keepstar so it would be on their killboards.
Going over the battle, I feel that INIT should have been given the sole responsibility for the destruction of the Keepstar, but only the Keepstar. Support was provided to them by other Imperial members who protected INIT battleships from waves of fighters—the carriers and the Jackdaws. These kills were handed out to the Imperial fleets. INIT didn’t care about getting on all of the fighters’ killmails, or even most of the hostile Muninns that harassed them. They were too busy applying the damage to destroy the enemy Keepstar. I feel, then, that there should be a minimum amount of damage you need to apply to be appear on a killmail. This change would help make sure that people are focused on a specific task, not just trying to get on the killmails by shooting as many targets as possible and hoping some of them die. This change should make players more focused when it comes to shooting and make players feel more responsible when they are rewarded by being part of a killmail.
Vertigoe
Couldn’t disagree with you more. The way you see it those Ravens could have killed that keepstar with no help. Every person in that system contributed to that kill whether they camped a gate, guarded a cyno so more dictors could jump in, killed fighters trying to kill the ravens.
Your proposal is a step backwards. You would disallow a tackler getting on a kill mail as they did no damage, someone running a target painter or webs same thing.
November 29, 2018 at 6:20 PMOrionshock
You do understand that it’s not that simple…
With out the supporting operations, the defending fleet would just turn their attention to the Raven Fleet and obliterate it.
Certainly the Ravens hold the heft of the work, but with out the entire attacking fleet contributing to the fight, it wouldn’t have worked.
“Whoring” on the KM is about the only way to get even a record that a given pilot was present let alone did anything. Sure, the Battle Reports show some if it.
Big difference between glancing at a KM and digesting a BR.
But lets grant this KM Minimizing effect, what about EWar and Logi? do they also get wiped from the KM as they don’t do damage ?
November 29, 2018 at 6:24 PMLibluini
The way I’ve heard it, Caesar was stabbed by so many, so that everyone could reasonably claim to be innocent, a prudent measure because he still had a lot of supporters. In short, you have this backwards.
November 29, 2018 at 6:47 PMMoomin Amatin
I feel that this is one of the dumbest things I have ever read.
The KB is the only metric publicly available to show that you participated in something. So why the hell not let people state “hey I was here and I helped in some capacity”?
A target painter applies no damage and nor do webs or points. Without them there are many engagements where you would not be able to kill anything. Logi, scouts and a host of other roles have significant value as a force multiplier.
Are you really proposing that the efforts of people should go unrecognised at all?
November 29, 2018 at 7:11 PMAlaric Faelen Moomin Amatin
Yeah, must be a slow news day at INN that this idiocy even made it to air.
November 30, 2018 at 3:53 PMShoop
I don’t think a damage minimum would change anything, other than we would lose more ships as people try to hit that number instead of supporting the main fleet like they should.
If INIT didn’t plan to have coalition support, they would have brought a different doctrine, not tried to solo it in ravens. Trust me, they have bigger ships. Anyone thinking this is about not giving recognition needs to re-read the article and consider how much recognition is really necessary.
If all you use to measure your personal, corp, and alliance progress is zkill, your playing eve wrong. Should we add to kill mail info the player that made the hull, modules, drones? What about the people who scouted, coordinated, and everyone else necessary to have a successful op?
Maybe the author wanted us to take away from the article to whore less and push for your own success, even if it doesn’t make kotaku or zkill. Just my pair of pence
November 29, 2018 at 9:24 PMGuilford Australis Shoop
The current killmail system is one of very few areas of EVE that seems to satisfy almost everyone. I think most people are happy to be able to document their contributions to the big battles of EVE. And it’s not insignificant that the current system allows the roles you mentioned (scouts, coordinators) as well as logi, EWAR, tackle, and a host of other contributors to grab some glory. The ideas raised in the article would not allow that.
To anyone supporting more restrictive killmails, I’d ask whether they’d be more or less likely to join ops if they thought there would be no permanent record of their participation to look back on or show to friends. The answer (at least for every active player I know) is manifestly obvious.
November 29, 2018 at 11:15 PMGuilford Australis
There are already mechanics in place to prevent unreasonable whoring – such as requiring damage within 15 minutes of the kill and requiring damage to be applied in the system where the kill happened.
Sure, killboard-jockeying turns some players into mindless zombies. The “Elite PVP” alliances (both historically and in their greatly diminished current form) famously avoided risk in combat for fear of what might happen to their killboards. But killboards also document one’s high moments, low moments, victories, defeats, and accomplishments. Isn’t that part of the mythos of EVE – writing one’s own story?
November 29, 2018 at 9:24 PMDeni'z von Meanace
To be a killmail white is broken mentality its just a fake stats providing for your ego. But reading that Imperium seen a danger from that KS and only INIT cares to manage it? Looks like I read it upwards some it was joined IMP ops so all participants had their roles and doctrines settled before the event, right? Not saying that only INIT was smarter than others.
November 30, 2018 at 12:08 AMLoki
ok props for well written article, but fkn LOL at caring about killmails
November 30, 2018 at 1:48 PMAlaric Faelen
Well that’s a stupid idea. Forget all the new players we take out to fights- I guess they should spend hours of their time in TiDi but go unacknowledged because they didn’t cross some magical line in the DPS sand.
Forget people training into any support role for the same reason. Because we all know that the only part of PvP is doing DPS.
All so sad people can get an inflated sense of achievement from a video game. Ugh, some peoples’ kids……
The fact is that if you are flying a DPS ship of the line, you are pretty much just an F1 monkey. If anything it’s THOSE people that should be taken off kill mails. If your contribution was ‘be fleet warped by the FC, target what the FC says, press F1 when FC says’ then you are just a drone with a name. You have achieved exactly what drones do in Eve.
How very impressive.
Or…you could actually do more than smash F1 on command and fly something that wouldn’t qualify for a KM because they were hero tackle, logi, EWAR, etc. The things that require more skill and effort than being a glorified drone for an FC.
November 30, 2018 at 3:52 PMCarvj94
A very large amount of null residents feel like tiny ants to their group currently. If kill mails had more requirements scouts and logi would have no proof they’d helped out at all and they’d lose their drive to continue those roles even faster than they do now.
December 1, 2018 at 5:26 AMGarreth Vlox
You got the Caesar analysis wrong, you fail to understand why people whore on keepstar killmails at the end of a fight, and you demonstrate your complete ignorance with regards to how fleet fights work by not realizing the ravens would have been annihilated without all the other sub cap fleets on field keeping the enemy fleets busy. This is probably one of if not the worst article ever posted to INN.
December 1, 2018 at 8:06 PMGanthrithor
Huh?
Every ship counts. Why shouldn’t you be on a killmail if you showed up and helped kill a thing? Fuck, even the dudes who sat and guarded some chokepoint stargate five systems away should be able to be on the killmail, if practical: they helped.
December 1, 2018 at 10:39 PM