ISK is only a balancing factor for the peasants at the bottom of the socio-economic ladder.

Know your place, peasants!

This seems to me to be true, assuming I understand the question. I'm relatively new to Dust, having rebooted after about a 9 month hiatus. I have 25M SP, which I think places me somewhere in the peasant pile, maybe squarely in the middle.

For me, ISK controls my gameplay. I have to be cautious about the suits I drop in order to maintain a constant positive cashflow, and save up a bit to invest into bigger suits. I've built and stocked about 15 proto suits with the best gear I can wear on them, but I haven't dropped one yet because I'm afraid it will hurt to lose it.

I can easily see how more established players, free from those concerns, look to factors other than ISK as their "balancing factor", but for me and those in my heap, it's Priority One.

How much ISK you have?

ISK is only a balancing factor for the peasants at the bottom of the socio-economic ladder.

Know your place, peasants!

About the same as my SP actually... 25M. I try to keep 50 of each of the suits I like to run in stock, and slowly build up stronger suits while keeping my balance at 25M, which I use to gauge whether I'm staying ISK positive.

This seems to me to be true, assuming I understand the question. I'm relatively new to Dust, having rebooted after about a 9 month hiatus. I have 25M SP, which I think places me somewhere in the peasant pile, maybe squarely in the middle.

For me, ISK controls my gameplay. I have to be cautious about the suits I drop in order to maintain a constant positive cashflow, and save up a bit to invest into bigger suits. I've built and stocked about 15 proto suits with the best gear I can wear on them, but I haven't dropped one yet because I'm afraid it will hurt to lose it.

I can easily see how more established players, free from those concerns, look to factors other than ISK as their "balancing factor", but for me and those in my heap, it's Priority One.

over 120M isk right now, and i still love to run in free suits when I can, gotta gotta save them dolla dolla bills. Only recently I started using some of the salvage and strongbox 'aurum' equipment i've been getting so that helps me save isk and still have some good stuff.

Do what I do. Save up for a loyalty suit in a class you run and play Spambush. Imagine the savings!! \o/

Can't even express how important apex suits are, or even bpo gear from packs. I used to make alot of isk running cheap dren suits. If they become sellable i have multiple copies to sell or trade. Now i use alot of apex suits with quafe weapons and mlt bpo high/low slot mods. Sometimes i'll put more expensive things on my bpo suits, but i can still make isk losing them. using bpo suits only i can make 50mil in a day just running pubs. Look for me in ambush, i am almost always running bpo's. Especially against protostompers. as long as the match is profitable for me & i make it costly for my enemy, that defeat screen is not so bad. Save your isk. Buy cheap gear & focus on building sp. That is where real power is in this game. Also if you don't have apex suits i see std bpo suits going for around 10 mill everyday. That can make you isk all day. Don't give up & don't run gear you can't afford. if you are really broke i know it's sin to mention, but RUN LOGI. almost all the logi's seem to be dead, but there is really no better way to make isk.