Wherever I May Roam

And the road becomes my bride
I have stripped of all but pride
So in her I do confide
And she keeps me satisfied
Gives me all I need
And with dust in throat I crave
Only knowledge will I save
To the game you stay a slave
Roamer, wanderer
Nomad, vagabond
Call me what you will
-- Wherever I May Roam, Metallica

So, I recently wrote a post about Low Sec, but I left it partially written. Unfortunately, I sort of forgot about that, edited it, and hit "Publish". I wrote a few things about the good and the bad of low security space, but I didn't share any of my ideas about how to make it better.

Typical Low Security Space: Nothing to see here, move along...

As I roam around low sec, my thoughts often flow along the lines of "there is nothing here". Some pirate groups which have hunted what little prey there is mostly to extinction. A few FW plexers that will do anything not to PVP with another player. Some roamers that will only take fights when their (largish) small gang dramatically outnumbers and outclasses (ie. having more support than) any opposition. Don't even get me started on gate campers.

Low sec still needs the "killer app". Something that will bring more people there. There are a few good moons, but that mostly just brings large entities with lots of friends. There is exploration, but its not a very big draw. There are a few DED complexes, but they are rarely run. There is FW, but it mostly draws cloaked, stabbed T1 frigs. 

One idea I had was expand on the idea of what makes low security space low security? The empires nominally own it, but they don't really control it. They just take note of your misdeeds (well, at least Concord does). Enter pirate factions into Faction Warfare. Have empire nations do "incursions" into low sec. Get rid of people with people orbiting buttons. Make them really destroy some ships. Make it so when people warp into your plex, you want to fight them (ie. the reward for doing so is high enough to make you evaluate your chances of winning instead of just warping off). Right now there is no penalty for leaving a plex. Make it a BIG penalty, like it counts down at 10x speed or resets entirely when you warp out.  It would be really sweet to do the Serpentis' dirty work and earn Vindicator and Vigilant BPCs without having to go to null sec.

The problem with low sec is there just really isn't a reason to be there for a lot of people. It's risky, but not much potential for reward exists. Make it so the "Big Leagues" are in low sec and high sec is the "minors". 

I know I was pretty much rambling, but my point is CCP should re-purpose some of the existing content and mechanisms to put some more life in to low sec. Keep sweetening the pot until it draws more and more players. If Malcanis' law kicks in too hard then back off a little bit (what I mean by this if large null sec alliances abandon null sec for the land of fruit and honey then you probably opened the ISK faucet a bit too much). I would like CCP to put stuff in space for people to fight over. Right now I almost exclusively encounter other players on gates, stations, and FW complexes (a few brave miners notwithstanding). I would love some feedback on this.