N+1 Problem Redux

Listening to the latest High Drag podcast episode I was struck by a misconception some of the hosts had that I heard before. Specifically, that FozzieSov will break up large fleets into several smaller fleets during an invasion or fight over a particular station or structure as they move to cover all the command nodes exposed, thus alleviating the N+1 problem that plagued the fights in Dominion Sov.

To reiterate from a post I wrote last October when discussing the Phoebe capital ship jump changeshttp://www.ninveah.com/2014/10/clearing-cache.html, the N+1 problem can be stated as thus:

All else being equal, the side with n resources is at a disadvantage to the side with n+1 resources.

There is nothing in Fozzie Sov that will prevent this axiom from continuing to hold sway.

Take for example a fight in Faction Warfare over a system. Two opposing fleets are clashing to run the plexes and either keep control or take control of the system. All else being equal, the side with more pilots in ships will win the battles, drive the opponent out, and have more time to run the plexes. There are a lot of variables in play, of course, such as what fleet hull size can fit in which sized complexes, like if the defender is flying a fleet of 10 frigates in a novice plex and the mixed 15 ship attacking fleet can only get 7 of their frigate ships into the novice plex, and these situations create terrain and conditions that requires planning and proper execution to overcome. But in the end the side that has the bigger fleet and can cover all the plexes has the advantage and will win the system.

In Fozzie Sov, the scenario is different yet surprisingly similar. As far as I know, their won't be any gates preventing ships of certain sizes from helping take over command nodes and the command nodes being attacked are spread over a constellation instead of a single system. But in the end the side with more ships and superior coordination and discipline will win the battles and complete the command node hacking. There is no where for a small fleet to hide and at the same time prevent the command nodes from being capped.

Further to this, I am not sure that fleets will even break into smaller fleets to attack. In Faction Warfare, a fleet may spread its forces around to multiple plexes, but a single commander still directs the fleet and any threat see the disparate pilots coalesce on a point to attack or retreat. I suspect fleets in Fozzie Sov will react the same way, although the large distances involved may prove me wrong.

All of this to say, Fozzie Sov does not solve the N+1 problem.

What it does do, however, is introduce more variables into the decision making and actions of the fleets involved. Where Dominion Sov was characterized by massive fleets smashing into each other at one timer or another, Fozzie Sov will hopefully be characterized by more dynamic fights over multiple systems where the battlefield terrain and distributed decisions will hopefully allow for more things to be unequal over a fight and give more chances to a smaller but more coordinated and capable fleet to win the fight against the larger but less professional fleet.

In other words, Fozzie Sov wants to turn this:

Into this:

And everyone in null sec and beyond is eagerly waiting to see if it is going to happen.

Clearing the Cache

Let's talk more about the dark side of Phoebe and the jump changes.

First, let's state the problem that plagues all competitive multiplayer games but open ended games like EVE the most, the n+1 problem:

All else being equal, the side with n resources is at a disadvantage to the side with n+1 resources. 

In EVE, n can refer to the amount of ISK, skill points, friends, experience, etc. Basically, there is always an advantage to have more of things available to you than your opponents. This is a fact of gaming life. Games try to address some of this with caps on players, points, ship types, or diminishing returns on adding more of something, and so on as in tournaments so that what is being measured in the competition is player skill and ability as much as possible. But in the wild, so to speak, there are no effect limits on collecting these resources and hence why so much paper is spent discussing how to give "the little guy", i.e. the side on the lower end of the n+1 problem, the ability to punch up against the "big guy".

A common refrain out of null sec when new changes are announced that they don't like is always "this change benefits the big coalitions more than the little guys you want to balkanize null sec with because they have more of [insert specific resource here]". Well, no kidding! The larger and more organized group will ALWAYS have an advantage over the smaller and less organized groups unless the former choose not to take it. This is not a surprise. The goal of changes should be to give so many decisions and actions for large groups to take that they cannot press the advantage in all areas at the same time.

This is what the jump ship and fatigue changes in Phoebe are trying to do: limit power projection of all capital fleets AND force large coalitions to make choices about how they use their n+1 advantage to the best effect, hopefully leaving opportunities open for smaller groups to gain footholds in the game. Right now, there is no choice to be made when faced with the question of smashing a smaller group because of the ease of tactical and strategic deployment of capitals, or rather the only choice is "do I feel like it?" and that's not a good gameplay design.

So we get Phoebe. And one of the responses is "well, the large capital using coalitions will just put caches of capital ships all over the galaxy and use jump clones or interceptors to get to them when needed".

Yes, yes they will.

The groups we are talking about are some of the most organized and affluent in EVE's history, there is literally no mechanical solution to force projection they cannot buy and/or maneuvure around with enough effort. But that's the key word there, isn't it? Effort.

Yes, they will create stockpiles of capital ships in various NPC stations and POS around the cluster (easier with regular caps than with super caps). Yes they will be able to avoid the jump fatigue mechanic with interceptors and/or jump clones to get to the caches as they need them. Yes, they are still going to be able to throw their weight around considerably.

But hopefully the effort of making and maintaining these caches in an operational and ready to go state adds enough complexity to force projection to cause these large powerful groups to have to make decisions that leave gaps in the defenses. Hopefully Phoebe creates decision trees where all paths cannot be explored to the fullest for these large groups so that gaps occur where smaller groups can exploit and have content. Right now the decision tree is a single line back and forth across the map; there are no gaps, there is no fun content for the smaller groups.

Time will tell.