There was a recent shout in the main about a change to the EWD. This was supposed to make the EWD fail more often. This is a definite play toward the attakers in hte game and continues the swing of the game in that direction.

The change that should have been made is that the EWD warp path should be hidden from all scans. If I don't know where I'm warping to then no one else should either.

The primary change to the EWD is based on base hull size. The bigger the ship class the less likelihood the EWD will work. In general, attackers were using the fact that they had ewarps that always worked to their advantage. So it really isn't necessarily skewed to the attacker.

We also added an instant message when you are attacked and your ewarps engages so you will know that you were initially hit, this will give you a chance to run to sol before you wake up there in a pioneer.

The EWD failure was based upon the average tech of a a ship divided into the max tech level setting.

The max tech level setting is 600 so a ship with an average tech level of 300 had a 50% chance of the EWD failing. A ship with and average tech of 400 had a 66% chance of the EWD failing. The design of the EWD was supposed to be that the larger the ship the less likely the EWD would work.

Every ship in the game has a BASEHULL size that is totally outside the purchased hull. You can't see what that size is but the different base hulls are...

Probe = 1
Cargo Ship = 1
Pioneer = 50
Stealth = 70
Super Cargo = 10
Columbus = 120
Endeavour = 150
Razorback = 170
Voyager = 200
Excelsior = 250
Alliance Raider = 300
Battle Cruiser = 350

If you have a Voyager with an average tech of 300 it used to have a 50% chance of the EWD failing. Now we add the base hull to the average tech. Now the Voyager has an 83% chance of failing.

If you had a Columbus before with an average of 150 tech it would have a 25% chance of failing. When you add in the basehull it now has a 45% chance of failing.

A maxed Pioneer had a 25% chance of failing and now it has a 33% chance of failing.

We added the basehull for all ships a long, long time ago and intended for it to be used on many things like this but never have implemented it.

HA! Little people crying because now they can't be assured their EWD will save them every time the big bad wolf comes out to play. BOOYAH!!

Anyway, as a real arguement to Max Headroom's suggestion, I offer this. While the person who is initiating the EWD has no idea where it is going, it still leaves a trail. If I start randomly walking around in the snow, I might not know where I am going, but if someone is following me, they don't care if I know where I am going or not, all they care about is following me. Same with a hunter. He shoots a deer, the deer wanders off. He doesn't care where the deer is going, because he is following the deer. He doesn't need to know where the deer intends to go in order to get there. He follows the deer. Again, your aunt is visiting you from out of state. You meet her at the interstate Waffle House, she follows you to your house. She doesn't know where you are going, but she relies on her ability to follow you to get there.

Well the big fix is the message you will get... before if someone shot ya and you Ewarped , there was no Instant message... Now if you are wandering and find yourself moved and didn't notice a probable attack you will get a message and can run to sol.

I guess I read too much Sci Fi where the angle, speed and time factor into the warp equation. if the angle of entry is off a fraction of a degree then the exit could be off by galaxies. And how would anyone else know how long I've been in warp. Thus the pursuer has a snowball's chance to follow into the correct sector.

Of course PJ will say its not really warp but a wormhole.

This Is exactly why I'm trying to make this point. The game is set up for you wolves to prey on the little guy. Everyone complains about newbies quiting and giving up in the game. Either we make it fair to them or explain it in a consistent manner so they can stay alive long enough to learn.

The only time a new player becomes prey is for 3 reasons

1 - They have joined a team that has Huge players in it.
2 - They have attacked so much their alignment is no longer Neutral
3 - They got themselves a bounty for attacking the wrong players.

Other than that they can only be attacked by players in thier range so that statement is off kilter a bit.

The attacked so much they are no longer neutral bothers me after reading about a builder becoming evil attacking indy's.
That should be addressed some how.

Also I note that mostly you are off line when attacked. Very few people get nailed online. I don't mind the way it works, but to be fair, there should be either something you can buy, to hide your trail, or a better chance for the person to get away.
Since probes now leave a trail, perhapes you can automat a probe ewd to fire when yours goes off. So the guy following has a 50 50 shot.

I have often thought abought this part of the game.... The only Idea I thought of was an offline Auto attack when your ship (or Planet) gets scaned or an offline aggressive MODE.... Planets that fire there weopons while you are offline is something I desire...

Well, there is a way to mask your trail it's called Cloak Tech. I don't think we will add anything new to mask trails because it is easy to do right now if you are creative.

I have no idea what you are talking about when you say "warp" other than an instantly created random wormhole. The angle of entry wouldn't matter much there, and you don't have to worry about time because General Relativity messes up that too. The truth is your getting so much into theoretical physics and science fiction, I would just say forget it. Its not worth debating what scientists aren't sure about. Oh, and Griswald... "Same with a hunter. He shoots a deer, the deer wanders off." Generally, if you don't drop it, the deer SPRINTS off. >.< Even if you give them a good half an hour to go bleed out, lie down and die, without pushing them, they can still go far! "Wonders off..." geez. If its the evening hunt, then it'll probably get cold enough over night that its ok and you can come look in the morning some more, but if its the morning hunt... ugh.

Valience, yes, the deer will try to escape if you don't down it in the first hit. But unless you are totally inept, you have injured the deer sufficiently. Perhaps you do not have as much hunting experience as other people do, but it is not uncommon to track a wounded game animal for upwards of an hour. Very rarely will you EVER see a hunter drop a deer in one shot, where the deer stands.

Actually, I dropped my first deer. But my point is exactly that: they sprint off usually. Not "wander," and it does require tracking for a while. I was just nit picking for fun though. Nothing more, just bored.