FW has been broken for a long time just simply in terms of mechanics.
1.) The Offensive and Defensive contract generations rates are the same for both factions. So if the Amarr generated 9 attacking contracts per hour so to do the Minmatar. However if the Minmatar own 80% of the districts their 9 contracts are concentrated against the 20% the Amarr own, while the 9 the Amarr generate at spread out between the 80% the MInmatar own. IN the current state we have the Amarr owning between 10-15 districts across all of FW space at any given time. SO while the Minmatar attack the same 10 districts every hour the Amarr have to take and try to hold X number of districts at the same time. And even loosing once removes that district from their control.

We have discussed timed district locking, FW should be able to handle that, whereby when a district is conquered it is locked for a set period of time to ensure other battles can be completed and foot holds can be established.

Now couple that with allowing FW groups or players to select where they wish to fight and you could see pockets of FW players starting fighting in systems EVE pilots are planning to complex before conquest, or to slow down an deplex systems where MInmatar space side forces are strong.

Something needs to be done. The warzone has gotten very static. The one faction selected thing alone might loosen up the deadlock, allowing the two underdog factions to actually keep a district long enough to attack a second one.

I was thinking about the locking thing yesterday. Two ideas:
1) locking could be done by selecting a district to attack or defend and bidding LP on it somehow. This would need to be implemented with team deploy, I think, with everyone in the team contributing the same amount to the pool. If you win the battle the district is safe for a period of time. If you lose, well, the district is not safe and you've lost your LP.
2) it could be part of an expanded link with Eve, where FW corps / pilots spend isk or LP to either create a battle like in idea 1, or simply straight up lock it if it's a friendly district. The other side could then overcome the lock by spending even more.

And to keep the warzone from getting completely deadlocked make it so that if you control 90% of the districts in the warzone, locking isn't available to you or something like that.

The idea Vets gravitate to easier factions is a myth from the perspective of someone with intimate knowledge of numerous "Vet" corps.

Outside of the purist gal/min RP'rs many of the top end corps such as Ancient Exiles, TeamPlayers, and others Gravitate to Caldari and Amarr because they wish for the challenge.

I beg to differ.

I list these corps as fighting for either Caldari or Amarr:

0uter.Heaven
Ancient Exiles.
Fatal Absolution
TeamPlayers
Every corporation affiliated with EoN. is Caldari 1st and Amarr 2nd.
Imperfects
Subdreddit
Dead Six Initiative and indeed ALL of the Lokun Listamenn alliance
State Patriots
Nova Corps Marines
OSG i think q-syncs nightly for Amarr

and that took me all of like 5 min of trying to remember.

That is a indeed a lot of corps, but I still seriously doubt that is the majority of vets or skilled players. On any given time Dust usually has 3-4 (or 3.5) thousands players online (and I would assume the average session is 3 hours), 24/3 = 8 three hour playing blocks per day, 8 x 3,500 = 28,000 per day, plus there is the fact that not everyone plays on the same day, so the actual Dust population could be even bigger. Given how the game's playerbase is not growing much, and the general bad retention, I'd say a massive chunk of the population is just vets, or skilled players of some kind, so yeah, I don't think these corps represent the bulk of the vets or skilled players. This is all just complete speculation on my part.

I have an idea. I should AFK farm on FW on various factions, record how many NPC corp members I see on each team, and also record player-corp members as well. I'm going to try this for many battles once I get home.

If Gallente and Minmatar FW wasn't full of vets, it wouldn't be so hard to get into a battle for them compared to Cadari and Amarr. The general performance of the mercs would also be the same. No other factors explain why Caldari and Amarr FW players perform so much worse.

Who cares? The only purpose for FW is LP. Support the faction that has the goods you want. Past that, it's just bits and doesn't make any difference in New Eden. Even if it does the only thing that matters is still LP and who has the goods.

Don't select the losing side or AFK* if you do.


* And you do know how to AFK Kagehoshi.

Do you think it would help if the factional gear was actually different?

For example: Imperial plates have +25% more armor and Federation plates have -2% speed penalty (so 0%, 1%, 3%)
The State extenders have +25% more shields and Republic extenders have -3% regen penalty.

Things like that which help flavor each races LP items with attributes of how each prefers to fight. The low payout limits stomping with the superior gear because it is even less financially feasible than proto stomping.

They are actually different. They require lower skills. I use a lot of ADV and PRO LP gear that I otherwise couldn't.