Yes. you CAN play it lots of different ways. And, you can reap the consequences of the way you CHOOSE to play. Or, apparently you can whine and try to get the game changed to your advantage after you made poor decisions. Oh, and of course you don't want to give back any of the benefits that came along with those poor choices; either.

Edit: And to the idea that a rank 5,000 player is not significantly stronger than a rank 1500 player..... then the rank 5,000 player has made still more poor choices, because he certainly should be stronger, a LOT stronger. But, I suppose we should just erase THOSE poor choices, too?

I'm completely unympathetic to Hallucinations. But generally speaking...

Yes, some people choose to rank quickly, perhaps too quickly, but I would actually like to see rank restrictions lifted off of top-tier shared NPCs and don't think opening the BT up* from 2001+ would be too big or terrible a change. I mean, as long as you include Attiroths and/or other NPCs nobody seems to care about after a certain point along with the good ones, I don't see how it would be too difficult or game breaking a change. And as was stated, while there are a few ridiculously powerful super high-rank ships, there are several who are perma-halced, and if you are rank 2001, you've probably already seen your share of monsters -- would it be such a big shock to the system to start receiving daily visits from the likes of Topper or Sun? If you PVP, big deal... if not, you're already halced, so again: big deal.


(i.e. once you are rank 2001, you are "fair game," and anybody from rank 1-9999 can get a badge off of you)

Still don't like it Pongo.... You are talking about fundamentally altering a long-standing (as in years and years, if not from the very beginning, idk) basic mechanic of fundamental game play. Battle Tab restrictions have been there for literally longer than I have been playing- possibly since the very beginning of the game itself.

If, miraculously, Hallucinations made it to rank 5k+ without understanding them; I have little sympathy for him or others in his situation.

If, as is MUCH more likely, Hallucinations made it to rank 5k+ while choosing to ignore the negative consequences but, oh yeah, gotta enjoy the positive ones, again, I have little sympathy for him.

Everyone has made choices (and mistakes) in the game. Either grow a pair and own the choices you made or whine about them as "unfair". Seems everyone will make their choice. Furthermore to say it will have no consequences for the players affected is completely ridiculous. They played by the rules, they built a good ship (or not), they made good choices (or not), why should they now be punished by becoming a target for another player THOUSANDS of ranks above them just because he made poor choices and now wants to nerf the game to his benefit so he gets the advantages of those choices, but not their corresponding negatives?

While we're making the ridiculous changes to accommodate Hallucinations, why not make a change to accommodate ME? I made the mistake of building my ship too large, too fast. I demand that the game be nerfed in my favor now. I demand a new artifact.....the "ship bot bomb" that can be fired at all the SSBs out there and instantly make them add decks whether they want to or not. 'Cause hey, you know, I made poor choices but it's not my fault, right? Lets punish the guys who understood the game better, developed a better strategy, and actually made better choices than me by spending considerable amounts of time building their SSBs. I demand the ability to nerf them at my sole discretion without any consideration for the fact that they simply understood, and played, the game better than me. I'm special. Accommodate me!

Oh, like I said: I have zero sympathy for the guy, too.

But I have been sympathetic to the idea of changing up NPC/PVP for the uber high ranks since as long as I remember; supporting the idea has nothing to do with Hallucinations. So I will just agree with you about no individual sympathy, but disagree with you on the general point.

The best way i can think of, and easiestto fix pvp for higher ranks is to at least double the badge reward for normal badging once you reach 1000. Triple for 2000. Caps at triple

im with pongo..and many others...raise the range of npc viewability ...i really dont think its unfair for kelthors, to troop carriers, etc to show up for much longer.. no risk for me for prolly a year or so...but i cant make a great argument against it. If the idea was to not flood people's tab with junk npc elites, as some low ones are crap..ok...but the upper level ones should be just that...from min level to join on them to whenever....

As far as pvp, just because it's always been the way it is, isnt the all winning argument that things SHOULD be that way....but the setup has worked for virtually everyone to now...so i think its the accepted norm and it would be shocking/unfair, whatever to severely alter it now midstream. Heck some people would argue for an even more limited bt range. However as they rank the downside of that desire should drop quite a bit if they have intentions of heavy pvp. You can still make a pretty decent meal these days even up into the 2k's off ships that are around, but if things went either way it would be super duper unfair to either the high ranks or the low...not close to fair or better for even the majority.

Just to be clear on my position on this issue..... I have no issue whatsoever with adding more content, NPCs, extending NPC limits. I've stated in numerous posts many, many times that I support these ideas. This thread was originally about Pvp, and that is where the issue comes in. As Juice has just said, no matter how you slice it changing such a basic precept of the game at this late date will be grossly unfair to the vast majority of players who followed the rules, and logic, to simply benefit the few who either didn't figure out the implications of mindlessly auto-ranking before hand or simply didn't care because, somehow, they thought those rules shouldn't apply to them.

Adding content for high ranks, new NPCs for everyone, extending NPC limits, etc etc are game tweaks and, to me, are perfectly acceptable.

What Hallucinations and, apparently, others are suggesting is not a mere game tweak. It is fundamentally altering one of the long-standing principles of the game. Principles that many players factored in (in many cases for years and years) as they built their ships and planned their strategies. This, to me, is not a tweak; it is near game-breaking.

i dont know why every one is soo against changing pvp for higher ranks.
once u get past a certain rank there is really not much difference in ship strengths. disabling rank 2k or 3k ships will depend on how they have built their ships not their rank. Freelancer also posted along this line as well.

Yeah, that's how I feel, too.

A rank "Laughable" 900 against an "Insane" rank 200 usually = disable for the lower rank. 700 ranks in the kiddie pool is a big difference. After a certain point, though... not much. Especially given the cost of colonization, the fact that 5 rank points are hardly anything at all against high artifact production, etc.

With all due respect,we are not talking about "Rank 2k or Rank 3k ships".
We are talking about specific ships that have ranked way outside that range.

There are 3 people that don't have a chance at a full BT.
That is 3 out of whatever the total is for every other ship in the entire game.

By all means, everyone should feel free to speed rank up to Rank 3693 if you really feel the need for Shockwave, Topper and Hallucinations to all have a full BT.
Scratch that, pretty sure Shockwave doesn't care so just make it Rank 3158 for Topper and Hallucinations.
Of course that would also get you in the Top 7 leaderboard for ranks, but I'm sure volunteers would be most welcome.
Sheesh, that more than anything should give you a good idea of just how far outside the BT range these ships have chosen to go... to actually get in range of them you need to get to No 7.

Honestly, the only guys without a full BT have gone way beyond the BT range of everyone else.
Deliberately. Knowingly. By choice.

As it stands now:
At Rank 1500, you can be targeted by every person in the game except the Top 12 highest rankers.
At Rank 2000, you can be targeted by every person in the game except the Top 5 highest rankers.
At Rank 2250, you can be targeted by every person in the game except the Top 3 highest rankers.

As Sun Tzu (No 4 on the list of high rankers) has mentioned many times, he has no shortage of targets in his range.

So what is the actual "problem"? Is personal responsibility for choices not a thing anymore?

Don't disagree with anything you've said. I've just always thought the BT range should be a little smaller at lower ranks, somewhat bigger at higher ranks, or that it be free-for-all above 2k. The principle being that generally speaking, there's bigger strength difference and more targets:rank the lower you go, less strength difference and fewer targets:rank the higher you go.

I don't think it's going to happen, nor do I think the current system is super terrible awful or a big "problem;" I'll live regardless of what happens or doesn't happens. Those are just suggestions I've always been OK with. Of course, I reserve the right to change my mind if I ever hit rank 2001 and find myself disabled twice per day by the same rank 4000.

lol

Yeah, as it is now mathematically it's almost a free-for-all anyway above 2k except for those few ships that are outliers.
But as I said in an earlier post I'd have no problem with a BT Guarantee that drew up the highest 15 rankers into the pool for those at the very top.
Not sure how the extra people drawn into that pool would feel about it of course

Apart from the very top of the tree, everything else is kinda as it should be I think.
For example, even at my relatively low rank of 1610 there's only 9 people that can't badge me atm, so there's certainly plenty of range and targets out there for almost everyone.

back to the topic:
for people willing ranking way out of game content including PvP is available a built in solution: reset

That said, I do not recall when last time would Shockwave, Topper or Sun Tzu complain about PvP. To state any reasons, would be pure speculation. But I would bet, that they did plan their rank up.

Any attempts to make to topic less obvious, by mentioning other stuff, like NPC rank limit, well that is different topic and serves here only as coverage for obvious situation. Also, this was brought up for debate in other threads in past, if you wish to discuss it, rather revive these threads or make new.

Thank you for supplying the numbers and stating the (non) issue so eloquently, Diego. The bit I highlighted from your post is the REAL issue, imo. A certain few players don't want to be held accountable for their actions. And, in this case, by few I mean very few. They made the choices, the reaped the rewards, now they don't want to deal with the consequences. Just a thought....If you give in to Hallucinations request to nerf the game for him and 1 or 2 other players at the expense many, many people below them in rank who have played with a better strategy.... How are you going to compensate those people who are now unwillingly, and against the game mechanics, now a target for players far above them who chose to ignore the rules? How are you going to make them whole and instantly give them all the benefits Hallucinations enjoyed that they were denied (by their choice----as they PLAYED WITHIN THE CONFINES OF THE RULES).

I have a solution for Hallucinations and anyone else in this situation that hasn't been mentioned yet.......How about you play by the same rules as the rest of us. You want more people in your legitimate badging range? How about you freeze rank for about 5 years and let the rest of the player-pool naturally rise to become within your badge range with their superior strategy of managed ranking versus mindlessly auto-ranking.

-1. Not surprisingly, ship "strength" is only one factor that contributes to PVP. A bloody huge energy bar that helps you auto-rank on base leveling is just as big of a factor. Build a big enough energy bar and you can afford to paper cut even the tougher ships -- if your finger doesn't cramp up or Chrome doesn't give you the dreaded "Aw, snap" in the middle of your attack. Stretching battle tab for the super rankers with those huge bars practically guarantees them lots of targets they'll be able to knock over continuously because those very top rankers will be able to reach MUCH further down for targets. This suggestion also has very negative consequences on the BTs of lower ranked ships that have just slipped over 1k -- limiting their target reach due to the large number of ships in that range and thus making PVP harder for them. And, super-ranking is just as much a conscious decision as whether to build a large or small ship -- but there is no way to undo the decision to build a large ship either without resetting.

Few of those energy builds were built out of the player's selfless dedication to the legion. Most got where they are by convincing the legion to change base output to percent contributed (at least part of the time) so they got to suck the bases arti-output dry at the expense of their comrades. In one extreme case, a legion switched to percent contributed all the time to help one base ranker help them reach level 8 -- not thinking very well about how long it would take to get a return on investment on the arti points they lost for a lengthy period. If they ever get an ROI that is -- the legion in question is one of the many floundering legions now. And once the super energy build has achieved their goal, they usually sell energy for planets, CTP, etc., that further improves their ships at the expense of the other ships buying their energy.

I also have to agree with the argument voiced earlier that the biggest problem is at the low ranks as the resets seem to be keeping the game from growing. If we can't keep new players, this game is on a path to wither and die. Focusing on the few super ranks that have pushed themselves out of PVP-range will not help the game thrive.