Skip to main content

Revisiting Tags4Sec

“So Sugar, any new thoughts on the Tags4Sec?”

It was an unexpected question in the quiet depths of my chatroom. My mind has been rather muzzy these past few weeks and it was a slow churn until I produced, “Not really,” as a response. Then I wondered if that was a good response. It seemed like it was. I wasn’t raging out about Tags4Sec. Nor did I find it a forgettable feature that had passed its shelf life. In many ways, it had settled down into a normal part of life. These days people ratted, collected tags, sold them or adjusted their security status. Several players had returned and their first words were, “How do I use this.”

I know my opinions about Tags4Sec. The words spill from my fingertips and splash across the bright backing of the internet. My own opinions at times bore me. Talking to myself can, surprisingly, become old. The opinion expressed to me was one that I found interesting.

“I can’t help but think CCP missed an opportunity here.”

“Oh?”

I was interested in my bitter friends opinion on what CCP missed. I asked him to tell me and sweetened the offer by saying that I would write it out and hopefully separate his opinion from my own. There are many fantastic and interesting ideas and thoughts out there in Eve. I hate to see things missed. My own thoughts are not the be all and end all.

For those interested, or not, or just unknowing the tags spawn in a predictable system pattern. We figured it out the second or third day and stayed mum on the topic. It seems to have filtered out into more common knowledge.

Low sec is composed of systems of 0.4 to 0.1 security. Tags4Sec come in 4 flavors. The flavor that increases the you from -10 to -8 spawns in 0.4 systems. That is the least sought tag. People who hover around -10 are normally comfortable with their status. It is not something that randomly “whoopsie” happens after a roam.

Some say that they are no longer worth farming. Worth is very situational. I checked prices when I started to write this. The tags that move sec from -10 to -5 sell for around 2 million ISK each. The tags that move sec from -5 to 0 are the ones selling in the 30-50 million ISK a piece range. I think for a commonly spawning item that is a very nice pay off.

What was pointed out in this discussion over the Tags4Sec was that due to the spawns being hard set to X tag rat spawns in X sec there is little to no reason for people to go hunting tag rats outside of the 0.2 and 0.1 systems. The 0.4 and 0.3 systems do not have the value for someone hunting tag rats for ISK.

There is a general scheme in Eve where system sec status means something about the system. It affects mission rewards, ore, anchoring, site types, etc. But in low sec, where there is only a fanning of four sec system types they mean almost nothing. I’ll have to point out that there is a bit of a mission reward difference for running level 5 missions. But, considering the amount of Eve players who do not even know level 5 missions exist, they are somewhat of an unknown, niche.

Putting tags rats into particular sec systems makes sense following the grand scheme of sec system and product produced. Yet, the flow of low sec leaves security status relatively unimportant when looking at the larger picture of putting content into low sec. If tag rats spawned, randomly, through the entirety of low sec people would have to constantly scan all of the low sec systems instead of cherry picking the two favorite flavors.

It also points to over supply. When low sec lost the 1/10 and 2/10 static complexes we were told that they were being removed because of farming through the entire game. Despite our comments that in low sec we got to blow up the farmers vs high sec where CONCORD petted and gave stamps of approval. So, if farming is so bad as to rip a part of low secs backbone out and leave it damaged and maimed, would not randomizing the spawn of tag rats help to stop farmers from settling into systems and soaking up the more popular tags while sitting under the orange blazing beacon of a 0.2 or 0.1 security status of a system?

For those of us who live in low sec, we live there for many reasons but rarely is that the status of the system. My bitter friend pointed out that Bosena is a 0.4 system and has more ship kills than Egbinger, a 0.1 system. The value of the tag rat in Bosena, where there is a higher danger, is not worth doing. Now, if the rats spawned randomly, the Bosena belts would be worth skimming even if dangerous considering the tags are worth more than the ships.

And his ideas for randomization:
"I'd like to see some randomization to the rat spawns, say 50% of the primary type, 25% of the next sec status up/down, 25% +2 sec status. So someone in a 0.4 has a chance of seeing a 0.2 rat, and vice versa"
It was a good conversation with a lot of valid points. Tags4Sec are a good step towards giving low sec a food source. Its implementation has been a net positive. Now, a few more tweaks to settle it into the system would be nice as the Odyssey 1.1 release approaches.

Comments

  1. I've got to agree with you here. I live in FW low sec and, to be honest, I couldn't tell you the exact sec status of any if the systems I normally roam other than they are somewhere between .4 and .1. It just doesn't matter much unless you are specifically hunting tag rats and since i'm managing to keep my sec status positive (gotta love shooting valid war targets) I haven't had to worry about that.

    ReplyDelete
  2. One thing I noticed: just by shooting the special Tag rats you can make up a lot of sec status, even in .3 and .4.

    A nice fringe benefit if your routine includes trawling the belts for ratters anyway.

    ReplyDelete
  3. And believe it or not I actually do check the security status of systems. The best ore is found in .1 & .2 systems.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I actually had a line for you for a bit but thinned it down to 'almost'. I try to avoid those big words like all and everyone and no one because there are plenty of niche cases.

      Your pointing to the ore shows that it should matter. And it does. We get small groups that set up in MH all the time in the lower sec systems hoping to mine.

      Then pirates.

      Delete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Maybe one day!

 [15:32:10] Trig Vaulter > Sugar Kyle Nice bio - so carebear sweet - oh you have a 50m ISK bounty - so someday more grizzly  [15:32:38 ] Sugar Kyle > /emote raises an eyebrow to Trig  [15:32:40 ] Sugar Kyle > okay :)  [15:32:52 ] Sugar Kyle > maybe one day I will try PvP out When I logged in one of the first things I did was answer a question in Eve Uni Public Help. It was a random question that I knew the answer of. I have 'Sugar' as a keyword so it highlights green and catches my attention. This made me chuckle. Maybe I'll have to go and see what it is like to shoot a ship one day? I could not help but smile. Basi suggested that I put my Titan killmail in my bio and assert my badassery. I figure, naw. It was a roll of the dice that landed me that kill mail. It doesn't define me as a person. Bios are interesting. The idea of a biography is a way to personalize your account. You can learn a lot about a person by what they choose to put in their bio

Taboo Questions

Let us talk contentious things. What about high sec? When will CCP pay attention to high sec and those that cannot spend their time in dangerous space?  This is somewhat how the day started, sparked by a question from an anonymous poster. Speaking about high sec, in general, is one of the hardest things to do. The amount of emotion wrapped around the topic is staggering. There are people who want to stay in high sec and nothing will make them leave. There are people who want no one to stay in high sec and wish to cripple everything about it. There are people in between, but the two extremes are large and emotional in discussion. My belief is simple. If a player wishes to live in high sec, I do not believe that anything will make them leave that is not their own curiosity. I do not believe that we can beat people out of high sec or destroy it until they go to other areas of space. Sometimes, I think we forget that every player has the option to not log back in. We want them to log

And back again

My very slow wormhole adventure continues almost as slowly as I am terminating my island in Animal Crossing.  My class 3 wormhole was not where I wanted to be. I was looking for a class 1 or 2 wormhole. I dropped my probes and with much less confusion scanned another wormhole. I remembered to dscan and collect my probes as I warped to the wormhole. I even remembered to drop a bookmark, wormholes being such good bookmark locations later. My wormhole told me it was a route into low sec. I tilted my head. How circular do our adventures go. Today might be the day to die and that too is okay. That mantra dances in the back of my head these days. Even if someone mocks me, what does that matter? Fattening someone's killboard is their issue not mine. So I jumped through and found myself in Efa in Khanid, tucked on the edge of high sec and null sec. What an interesting little system.  Several connections to high sec. A connection to null sec. This must be quite the traffic system.    I am f