After being initially gobsmacked at the 98% SS loss rule on co-op I've come to see it as being an absolutely game changing mechanic wrt preventing dumbass spam bot farming.

I think this would be an absolutely incredible update to express, as that seems to be the server that suffers most from this phenomenon due to people logging in with a bunch of turns and just spamming SS at bots.

Whilst there is some skill in selecting good PS targets from amongst the wreckage I think that making SS also require a little bit of thought would be a vast improvement to the current low-skill meta of DR camping bots.

Whether losses reduce on built acres would be less significant with the length of the set (but maybe final land goals would be a touch higher with fewer higher quality low DR grabs?). Whether or not this mechanic has the secondary effects of making med-tech worthwhile would possibly be magnified, but I haven't really run any numbers on that so...

tl;dr - see post title!

I'm in favor of this - at least a trial period of say 4 weeks or something.

I've been pushing Slag to implement this 98% SS loss on express since early last coop round....

The SS losses is for NPC hitting only, correct?

Thats a good question. Id assumed it was for any SS.

I think if it was NPC only it would most certainly increase PvP activity. I'm sure opinions would be varied about that :)

Some notes about this suggestion
1) people log into coop and spam bots, what it's done in reality it's push that time later in the set when people have more econ built. So the spamming is actually more concentrated, not less.
2) current coop meta is lower skill, at least compared to alliance.

We have Coop now, I don't think increased PvP would necessarily be a bad thing. Those old e2025 express games were the thunder-dome and I found that madness fun.

I do agree we need something. 1A NPCs have def allies. Coop NPCs have the SS losses protection. Express could use something.

Another idea to curb SS spamming is to increase the c:c DR penalty. Those type of players repeatedly hit the untags that dont buy defense early on and typically stop hitting when returns get into the 100s - make them hit that returns number quicker?

Kind of related, I think this issue is a good thing. With the advent of the Advanced Search Tool and Calc SS Def In Turrets - land grabbing got significantly easier. With the express server, a casual player can set aside a weekend and play completely from their phone. They'll always have turns and something to hit (hitting is fun!). Increased SS spam = increased player base? I only play express every once in while so I don't know if the actual gamer population has increased or not.

This is a great idea. Make those fools plan out their strategy, and throw some effective combos instead of just being a one punch pony.