A lucky escape

Just after I logged on to Eve, three reds - two Cynabals and a Stiletto - paid us a visit. I jumped into my Hurricane and joined the hunt, which resulted in a couple of fun skirmishes at the gate. It was a good fight, with some remarkably polite and witty banter in local. We couldn't really catch them as they kept kiting us, and perhaps that's what saved me: just before I got blown up, they lost their warp scramble lock on me and I was able to warp out. I don't think I could have made it if they'd have kept point on me a few seconds longer..

Diversity Online

I have read some of the discussions about the all-new permanent Goon-sponsored Hulkageddon, and it made me think of Edward Castronova's book Synthetic Worlds, published in 2006.

In this book, Castronova described four types of inhabitants of virtual worlds: explorers, socializers, achievers and controllers. Most players show elements of all four types, but usually one of them is dominant. I’ve given a short description and a translation into Eve Online professions earlier in this blog post: A different mindset. It’s not too long but still relevant! The crude TL:DR version, applicable to the subject at hand: achievers (who just want to create wealth, the peaceful way) are totally different from controllers, who want to dominate, compete and prevail, using violence if needed.

Eve Online seems to be tailored to the tastes of the controllers, with its’ strong emphasis on player versus player combat and the lack of basic safety that permeates all of New Eden. Yet, to keep its’ economy going, New Eden also needs a measure of achievers: the guys who create and build the stuff that we all use. Eve Online really does have something to offer for those achievers, with its’ evolved economy and in game industry, not to mention its’ beautiful space vistas and the positive social interactions that can be had in corp or alliance.

For years, a tenuous balance has existed between achievers and controllers. Every achiever miner - at least every one who can be bothered to read up on the game they’re playing - knows mining is never safe, not even in highsec. Yet the number of highsec miner ganks is usually low, and while disturbing to them, it doesn’t really impact the average miner all that much. Yes, there’s the yearly Hulkageddon (a controller type of event if there ever was one), so during that time the miner takes it easy for a while, perhaps goes play something else for a bit, until Hulkageddon is over again. Occassional newbie miners will be ganked and some of them will unsub, but enough survive to keep the game going. And so, an uneasy balance between achievers and controllers has existed for years.

But now that Hulkageddon is becoming a permanent part of Eve Online, one has to wonder what will happen to this balance. If achievers are denied enough space and time to achieve their goals, what will they do? If Eve Online fails to satisfy their gaming urges, why would they stick around? It’s not unlikely that these kind of players will move on to greener pastures. That has nothing to do with rage quitting or lack of 'htfu', it's just that Eve Online may be developing in a direction where more and more achievers find that it does no longer fulfill their gaming requirements.
These achievers might be able to adapt, or become more like a controller, but they simply don't want to; it doesn't fit their personality. As Jester keeps pointing out, we are buying entertainment for our dollars or euros: if a game ceases to be fun, the player ceases to pay.

If the new permanent Hulkageddon is successful enough to upset the balance between achievers and controllers, I see a real risk for user retention. If that happens, there won't be a 'summer of rage' - the achiever isn't that kind of player, I think - but a slow and steady leak of this player type might occur.

The question is: can Eve Online survive without a sizeable contigent of achievers? My guess is, that the New Eden economy can. Mining is a typical starter occupation, so there usually are a lot of newbie miners around. Also, controller minded pilots may fill the void left by the achievers, as mining becomes more profitable once again. Yet it remains to be seen whether a smaller group of miners can produce enough raw materials to feed the New Eden war machine.

And, over time, we will probably be left with a less diverse and hence less interesting population in New Eden. I consider that a shame, and a loss for all of us. It is also a long term risk for CCP: a monoculture is more vulnerable to external threats than something more diversified.

The new Nemesis and more

(edit - this is the new Nemesis, not the new Manticore. Duh..)

If you are interested in the next Eve Online expansion, Inferno, you can already take a look on the public test server Singulary. Triggered by a negative comment on our alliance forum I loaded the latest Singularity patch, to see the mess for myself, but contrary to my alliance colleague I must say I'm impressed with what I saw!

The new inventory system has some rough edges, but in my opinion it's certainly an improvement over the current version, which essentially is 'cram all open windows on the screen, no matter what'. Just last week, I chatted with an older Eve player who'd been in the Eve Online beta program, and played for a while when Eve was launched. He remarked that, upon returning nine years later, so little had changed (pilot name edited):

[ 2012.05.05 21:22:48 ] Pilot Name > I am not being in any way critical, but ALL the main interface is IDENTICAL to 9 years ago.  I mean EXACTLY the same
[ 2012.05.05 21:23:04 ] Pilot Name > I know you dont want to change stuff for the sake of it
[ 2012.05.05 21:23:13 ] Pilot Name > and dont fix it if it aint broke
[ 2012.05.05 21:23:17 ] Pilot Name > but 9 years
[ 2012.05.05 21:23:20 ] Pilot Name > seriously

The inventory window is one of those areas that went largely untouched for years, and it's good to see an improvement. There's some valid comments and concerns in the forum thread, but overall - yes, good work.

And then, there's the new Nemesis. Despised by my alliance mate, I must again say that I like it. To me it looks like a nasty, mean, backstabbing predator.. like a bloodthirsty bat. Doesn't that sound appropriate for a stealth bomber?

The back does look better than the front, though:

Drunken ops death roam: great fun!

When I logged in late last night, it was quiet in our neighbourhood, and all but one of my corp mates had already logged for the night. Looking for something to do, I heard Lucian Ghorric on Teamspeak: ‘last call for the death roam! Do you bio, stock up on beer and something to eat and form up at the pos.. we leave in 5’ (funny detail: one of the participants is still a minor, and he was advised to ‘get some lemonade instead’). Even though it was late, I thought.. why not join! I’d just bought a couple of fitted/rigged Rifters, I had time and opportunity. 

Lucian announced the “drunken ops death roam’ in alliance mail a few days before, but I forgot all about it as I assumed I wasn’t going to be on at that time. It’s a funny way of PVP: everyone flies an empty clone and a cheap ship, and the intent is to consume alcohol, and score as many kills as possible before being slaughtered somewhere. You aren't even expected to bring your ship back home.. So I did my bio, grabbed a few beers and a Rifter and headed to the fleet location! At that moment the fleet consisted of about 15 T1 cruisers and frigs, with a few pilots still on their way.

We moved out of HY-RWO down the pipe out of Catch to 0-SHT (obviously pronounced as ‘Oh-Shit’) and steadily worked our way into Curse. The forward scout mentioned a few neuts here and there, and there was some funny banter in local when we happened upon some pilots who often try to disrupt our PVE activities.. this time the roles were reversed! They chose not to engage us, however, and after some final insults in local we moved on. We left Curse and went into Scalding Pass, entering via ARG-3R which is currently owned by Bringers of Death. They are in a bit of a failcascade currently, and there was pretty much no one around in their space. Things got better when we moved into Imperial Legion territory: the forward scout engaged a lonely Cyclone at the gate, he jumped through straight into 17 cruisers and frigates.. he died soon. Score one for the drunken ops roam!

We pressed on to Wicked Creek where - in the end - our roam would find it’s expected end. After a couple of uneventful jumps, we stumbled on a populated system: UM-SCG.  It's currently owned by The Unthinkables, and there were thirty neuts in local! Us Frigate pilots quickly warped to the belts and anoms in the hopes of catching a ratter or miner; the cruisers went to the station. 

But just when they landed, one of the frig pilots yelled on TS he had caught a ratting Hurricane in a belt! Warp to me warp to me! All warped, including the cruisers.. but just as they left the station.. they saw a Hulk undock! If only they had stuck around for a couple of seconds more, we might have gotten that Hulk. Would have been a great kill, what a shame! The Hurricane got away too, he cloaked and warped before the frig pilot could get point and within range. So back to the station we went. 

They played undock/dock games for a while, and even though we were close to killing stuff a couple of times (including a Tempest, a Scimitar and a Guardian),  they managed to dock up safely again and again. Then they changed the game: three carriers undocked, followed by a whole kitchensink fleet! Against 15 T1 cruisers and frigates! We felt very honored of course, but still got out as fast as we could; all of us got safe in the system next door. Of course they followed.. a cloaky Tengu, a covops frig, a Hound.. all cloaky stuff which we didn't catch. A few of us, sufficiently inebriated by now, asked them in local to leave the carriers behind and come get us in a fleet of BC's, as we were just looking for a good fun fight. They duly complied: the main body of their fleet jumped a short while later, and it was mostly battlecruisers. We jumped out, to H-HHTH this time, and reapproached gate, this is where we were going to make our last stand!

As their fleet jumped in, we waited for a certain Drake pilot to primary. He had been a bit of a loudmouth in local (nothing untoward, the chat remained friendly throughout, but still) so we wanted him dead. And we managed! Next primary: a Hurricane! His shields dropped, armor melted.. But by now our cruisers and frigs began to die rapidly, and just as I thought we were going to finish the Hurricane, my Rifter exploded, and shortly after I managed to say 'gf - ty guys' in local, I was given a pod express ride home back to HY-RWO. 

Pretty soon all of us were back in Catch, laughing and cheering as one after another 'suddenly' appeared in HY-RWO local. We scored two kills, we 'painted the killboard red' as promised (there were no survivors)  and we had great fun. Small gang pvp.. still the best pvp! And thanks to The Unthinkables for giving us the fight we were looking for!

A quick note on apologies and apologists

A short recap, for those who missed the latest installment of eve-drama. During the Alliance panel at FanFest 2012, The Mittani (leader of Goonswarm and just reelected as chairman of the CSM) made a remark amounting to an encouragement to harass a potentially suicidal player.. 'if you want to make the guy kill himself'. Much drama ensues, and The Mittani further fans the flames when he goes on the eve-o forums to tell  people to 'deal with it'. Cue further media attention, and lenghty forum threadnaughts where indignant calls for his resignation from the CSM or even a complete permaban for The Mittani are countered by Goon-friendly apologists, telling everyone to 'HTFU' or something akin to 'it's just a game, people'. Somewhere during all this, The Mittani is either called by CCP or sees the footage of this own inebriated remarks. We don't know for sure what happens, but one thing is sure, Mittens suddenly apologizes profusely and apparently - but hey, he's a Goon so you can't be sure - sincerely.

The amusing part is, that lots of people have put considerable effort in defending The Mittani's remarks, explaining why he wasn't wrong when he did what he did. Or stating that '10.058 people' didn't agree with criticism of The Mittani's conduct - which is kind of a weird defense, given that those 10.058 CSM votes were cast before this all happened.

The Mittani's apologists must find themselves in a weird position, now. They defended his behaviour, and then he comes out and flatly states that "There's no excuse for what I did". Makes me wonder.. do the defenders stick with that they said earlier, and think The Mittani was wrong to apologize? Or do they not accept his apology as sincere? Either one is possible, but I still find it quite an ironic situation.

The new wardec system: thoughts and exploits

Back in 2008..

PVP? What is that?
When I entered Eve Online in 2008, i didn't know what the acronym 'PVP' meant. I had never heard of it, and certainly wasn't looking for combat; I was just looking for a space simulator to explore. And what a beautiful simulator it was - and today it's even better, what with all the new nebulas and such. Obviously, over time, I got to know the meaning of 'pvp'.. up close and personal :) Still, pvp was rare for us, back in 2008, 2009. In those early years, we used to hang around in highsec, doing missions or exploration, or mining, while chatting a bit in our player corp or alliance. We'd often solo stuff, but join together for those 'hard' lvl4 missions. Lowsec was to be avoided; nullsec an epic unknown. Every now and then we'd be wardecced, which meant 'dock & turtle' until the deccers got tired of hanging idly outside our home stations;  the war would be retracted, and we'd resume our casual Eve life. Relax, kick back and admire space! Over time we discovered ways to avoid wardecs: we'd hop between alliances, play with alts for a while, wardec ourselves with alt corps and such. After all, we weren't out here to fight, but to unwind and relax a bit.

HTFU
This play style doesn't really fit with CCP's testosterone-laden 'HTFU' attitude, most recently seen again  oozing out of Iceland's HARPA congress center. As announced at the Fanfest there, loopholes in the current wardec system will be removed, and wars become an unavoidable part of your highsec life. Even if you are the relaxed, casual carebear kind of player that we used to be. We lived in small corps, numbering in the dozens, with alliances of a few hundred pilots: prime wardec material under the new system! If you are in such an alliance or corp, you might very well find yourself in a very nasty position once this new system comes online. You can hire mercs, but that probably won't do much to counter the fact that, as an industrial player, a wardec is effectively paralysing day to day operations: you can’t expect (or probably, afford) mercs to babysit your every move. No more casual space games  for you..

Alternatives..?
Of course you can remain in NPC corps; they don't get wardecced. But the fact is, they are large, anonymous and impersonal entities, and bad ad helping new players adapt to New Eden. I don't think that stimulating players to remain in NPC corps is a good, long term strategy for (new) player rentention! CCP explicitly raised taxes on NPC corps in 2009, to stimulate players to join a 'real' corp instead, citing the ‘isolated and impersonal’ nature of NPC corps. So, in CCP’s opinion (and I concur), NPC corps shouldn’t be regarded as a long term ‘solution’ for highsec casual pilots.

..big
For highsec carebears, the only alternatives I can think of, is to play with corp/alliance sizes, either big or small. Join together in a large enough alliance, and wardec cost becomes an issue to wardeccers, perhaps enough to ward off frivolous wardecs. Yet the counter effect could be, that a larger carebear alliance becomes a juicy enough target to negate the shielding effect: deccing a 2000+ carebear corp, while expensive, is sure to get you a lot of kills. Or Goons might do it, as a 'victory lap', just for the heck of it.

..small
So the opposite might actually work better: form a 5-10 man corp and stay out of alliances. Fly under the radar, as it were. Yet these small corps are very vulnerable, long term: as soon as one or two people become inactive, the corp runs a serious risk of dying. This strategy, as the previous one, isn’t a viable in the long run, and might also be bad for player retention.

What irks me somewhat, is that CCP is forcing a play style on their customers here. Certain ways of life in New Eden will, most likely, become untenable after the new wardec system is implemented, and CCP doesn't seem to care very much about that. You either adapt to their preferred play style, or you unsub. In this regard, HTFU goes both ways I think. "We didn't want those subs anyway" :)

Wardeccers and mercs, unite!
What worries me, is the potential for exploitation. I haven’t been to Iceland, and there isn’t a lot of information available on what was specifically discussed at the roundtable. But, it is to be expected that mercenary contracts on wars will be much more expensive than the initial wardec. I can see a situation where a wardeccing griefer corp and the hired mercenaries to fight them, might be alts of one another, or at least working together covertly. Good cop, bad cop: first you declare war on a random highsec corp, and then your alt mercenary accepts a war contract issued by the very same highsec corp! For the show, arrange for some cheap gank ships to be blown up to show that the mercs are worth their money.. and easy ISK is pouring in. In effect highsec corps will probably be paying these players one way or another, either by 'surrendering' which will cost them ISK, or by hiring them as mercs. ISK ATM incoming!

Put differently, the investment is 20 mill + 500k per player, the return is as of yet unknown but potentially much higher.

Uncertainty
It remains to be seen what the day to day effect of this new wardec system will be; too much is uncertain. Of course CCP has never cared for the kind of casual carebearing pilots often found in highsec alliances, and it shows: as it stands now, these players are left with the (probably expensive) bill for this wardec change. To be honest, I'm not sure what I would have done if I were in CCP's shoes. After all, the basic fact that New Eden should never be 100% safe for anyone is still valid, and should remain so. But from my perspective, it seems CCP is willing to sacrifice a part of their customer base (a part to which I used to belong) to satisfy another part. Or their own thirst for a hearty serving of HTFU, of course.

Goons bring the numbers

As TheMittani himself explained a while ago: Goonswarm has an edge over other alliances, when it comes to new player retention in Eve Online. All goons are part of the somethingawful.com community: when new goon pilots join, they are immediately .."surrounded by their fellows, ushered into massive alliance warfleets, mentored by veteran players, and showered with isk and ships". A normal newbie Eve Online pilot on the other hand, (an 'Eve born' as Mittens calls them), is often alone and confused, usually forced to overcome the learning cliff by themselves. A more difficult experience! This translates into player retention: goon pilots are more likely to become or remain an active pilot after their trial ends, largely due to the support of their pre existing out of game network. In the same vein, Test Alliance Please Ignore originates from Reddit.com, and likewise is able to bring a lot of dudes in space.

TL;DR: Goons have an easy time recruiting new pilots when compared to traditional 'eve born' alliances; Goons (and TEST) have the numbers. Over 14.000 pilots between the two of them, actually.

Mittens has used the numerical advantages of the Goonswarm in securing a a place in CSM6 for himself. A place which he has used effectively, promoting the CSM to a much more important position than before.

Earlier today, CCP Greyscale posted an item in the Eve Forums (not even a devblog..?), about an upcoming nerf to Titans. I won't go into the details, mostly because I don't know enough about Titans anyway, but the intended effect of the nerf is to severely limit a Titan's effect against subcapital ships. You won't, it seems, be able to kill large amounts of subcap ships with Titans anymore.

This means that sov warfare in Eve Online will become a numbers game: the alliance that can field the most subcap ships will have a clear advantage over alliances that are now relying on supercapitals and/or Titans to project power. I know that in New Eden, superior FC'ing or excellent use of strategy and tactics may give an outnumbered fleet an incidental victory over a numerically superior enemy. But, all things being equal, it's increasingly likely that raw numbers will - in the end - make the difference, once the Titan nerf goes into effect.

Time to adapt your strategy or up your numbers, then, if your current survival strategy relies on supercapitals! So how much time have those alliances been given? How much time do they have left?  In CCP Greyscale's words:

"These changes should hit TQ some time in April. If there is a sizable release in April then expect them to turn up then; if not then we'll announce deployment dates for these changes closer to the time."

In other words: CCP doesn't know or doesn't want to say - yet. CCP has just provided all alliances relying on their Titans, with a very uncertain deadline of anything between two to six weeks before their current strategy becomes useless. Two to six weeks.. that is awfully short notice. There is no way in Jita that an alliance like RAIDEN. can find a way to overcome the drawbacks of this nerf, in such a short timeframe. Where are they supposed to get the raw numbers that Goons have, in two weeks? Everybody knows it's impossible, and the amount of goon gloat and :smug: on the forums in this regard is telling.

With this nerf, CCP is interfering directly with the balance of power in New Eden as it is now. This is their right, and perhaps they even have to from time to time, but it should not be done without allowing alliances to properly adapt before the nerf goes in effect. I cannot for the life of me come up with a sound reason as to why CCP hasn't done that here. But it sure makes Goons happy, and I can't help myself but to think that their ability to 'bring the numbers' - read subscription fees for CCP - might have something to do with it.

Don't spread, please

Last week, while patrolling the pipe between HED-GP and GE-8JV with a couple of other LEGIO pilots, we  ran into a sizeable enemy fleet. From the beginning it was doubtful whether we could win this engagement, but there wasn't much to do but fight, as the enemy was already engaging us. Quickly the FC ordered us into position; the skirmish was on.

The FC called targets, beginning with the enemy logistics: Scimitar primary! As I was about to fire the first round of missiles, an enemy Ishkur targeted and scrammed me; he also fired his few tiny guns at me. Instead of following the FC's orders, I loaded precision missiles, determined to kill this Ishkur first, before attending to the FC's orders. The first volleys hit the Ishkur where it hurt, but I didn't quite succeed in breaking his tank. And so I kept firing at him, when my DPS was badly needed elsewhere.

When you are targeted, and someone begins to do nasty stuff to you, your first, primitive, instinctive response is to kill it. The drive for self preservation is usually strong in humans! And yet, what I did was stupid..

The skirmish got ugly, for us; we lost one ship, then another one, and then a third one got down. By now the FC was clearly agitated, as he noticed us doing a little bit of damage here and a little bit of damage there, instead of focusing our fire. Apparently I wasn't the only one shooting at the only ship that was actively targeting me. Of course I was way out of line, here, and so were my fleet mates. We misbehaved like a bunch of n00bs!

The problem is: when people focus on shooting just the ships targeting them, few enemy ships will die. Spreading the damage over multiple targets, means that hostile ships aren't damaged too bad, and get a chance to repair themselves, either through remote repairs by their logistics, or through their own ship's self repair.
Also, ten ships in half shield can still fire their guns: they can apply the full amount of their dps on you. Now focus your fire and kill one of them; that's 10% less damage that comes your way. Kill another one.. you get the picture.
This may all be very obvious to many a PVP pilot out there, but it's a lesson I forgot and had to learn again. Which I did.

Ironically, if you want to survive such a skirmish, the wise thing to do is follow the FC's orders, ignore who's targeting you, and kill enemy ships as fast as possible. And get that reptilian, instinctive self preservation mechanism under control! Otherwise you'll lose your ship.. just like I did. Yes, I lost my Drake that evening, and deservedly so.

Another night, another feast

As Kirith said, PVP is sometimes feast, sometimes famine. Two nights ago we had a famine: an enemy roam much too strong for our team roamed our space, and there wasn’t much we could do except for our bombers to give it a shot every now and then. But yesterday was quite a different day.. Unfortunately I 'wasn't there' for the whole thing as family matters kept interrupting me, but I witnessed enough for a bare bones battle report.

Early in the EU TZ evening, a small gang of 10 or so LEGIO pilots joined up and went looking for trouble in CVA territory in Providence. It’s not too far from our home in Catch, and usually makes for some nice pvp. I didn’t have the time to commit to a roam, but listened in on TeamSpeak anyway: the guys seemed to have fun, trying to catch ratters and miners in D-GMTI and surroundings but no kills were made, although it was a close call a couple of times. After a while the guys  had enough and turned around to head back home.

But they were not alone.. around 15 CVA pilots formed up in response to our roam, and they pursued our fleet all the way back to our home area. CVA was lagging our fleet by a jump or five, so it wasn’t exactly a hot pursuit, and we knew well in advance what was coming. This is where I had to go away from keyboard, but when I got back about 20 minutes later, CVA was already in system.

What had happened while I was away, was that several more LEGIO pilots joined the original roam: both teams were now at similar strength, numbers wise. We had logis and ECM on field too, as did the enemy. To CVA, it would have looked like a fight between comparable forces. But what CVA didn’t know, was that a sizeable Cascade Imminent fleet (blue to us, hostile to CVA) was only three jumps out. And they knew what was about to happen.. and were ready to join us at a moment’s notice. And that’s precisely what happened! CVA jumped into our home system, LEGIO engaged them.. and after half a minute or so dozens of blues pile in. Local spikes to around 100 pilots, several CVA ships go down quickly, the rest burns out of of the bubble and warps to safes. CVA loses a Scimitar, a handful of Drakes and a pod. Nothing dramatic, but it's a lot of logi and dps to lose while stranded in enemy territory.. GF’s are said in local and a few CVA remain, scattered here and there.

Yet there’s more non blues in local. Just before the CVA fleet arrived, an Agony Empire roam also paid a visit to our home system. coming in from a different direction. Apparently shocked and/or confused by the large numbers of pilots of different alliances coming and going in local, they didn’t hang around too long: after the CVA brawl began, they went for the gate, back to where they came from. Cascade Imminent pilots joins ours in the hunt for these neutrals, warping from one gate to another, catching an Eris interdictor at the gate. It is quickly destroyed. The remaining Agony pilots are now scattered as well; one Cheetah slips past a gate camp, another one escapes to another system.. they end up with less than ten pilots, spread over two or three different systems. Over the course of the next hour and a half, our team manage to catch two other Agony ships, first a one billion Loki and then a Deimos. Around this time I join the party again, but unfortunately nothing happens anymore, even though we’re eagerly awaiting a hostile roam that was supposed to be inbound. After fourty minutes I log off again and go to bed.

I don’t know yet what happened later this night, but this morning our killboard shows another couple of Agony kills, a few hours later: an Enyo and a Rokh battleship. To top it off, apparently we also scored a few kills against BrushieBrushieBrushie - an alliance that has been 'trolling' us, by their own words.

Even though I didn't get to participate much, yesterday was clearly a feast to many LEGIO pilots!

Two Titans

Whether Titans should be nerfed or not I do not know, but when I encountered these two humongous ships,  a (Minmatar) Ragnarok and an (Amarr) Avatar yesterday, I was duly impressed.. Enjoy the view!

And, see that little ship under the Avatar..? It's a carrier, a Thanatos. Looks tiny when compared to the Titans, does it not?

Jita cam - the proposal

I know this has been discussed before, but I'd like to mention it once again: the Jita cam. Between the matches of the last Alliance Tournaments, CCP streamed a live view of the undock area of one of the busiest trading stations in Eve Online, as a backdrop for the commentators discussing those matches. Many pilots enjoyed the view! All sorts of ships coming and going, piloted by real players going about their business (literally, often); occassionally you would see laser fire.

I would really like to have this as a permanent live cam! It could be a nice screensaver, it could be displayed on a tv, or be used as a backdrop for Eve Radio. It would certainly beat my mother's fireplace DVD (it has a special feature, an interview with the director.. go figure)

It would be even better if the Jita Cam would change positions every now and then. Stations in trade centers such as Jita, Amarr, Dodixie, Oursulaert, Rens, Hek, or the busiest star gates along the trade routes between them, could provide enough interesting scenery.

But let's take this one step further. From a technical point of view, I'm not sure what's required to produce the imagery, but I imagine it requires in game recording: something (a ship?) needs to be in game, in the camera position in order to acquire the images being transmitted. If that is true, couldn't that ship move? What if the stream could be hooked up to a Polaris frigate, piloted by an ISD volunteer? CCP is often aware of large battles about to take place (for instance because it has been reported in order to have the server hardware node reinforced in time); wouldn't it be interesting if Jita cam could provide live imagery of these battles? This was more or less done when CCP pilots staged their own 'incursion' in November 2011, which ended in a battle near Tama; live footage of the event was broadcasted via eve radio, where it can still be viewed.

Ideally there would be a few 'streaming enabled' clients available to CCP and/or designated ISD volunteers. CCP would stream either a live feed of the aforementioned undock areas of the busiest stations in New Eden, the traffic at star gates, or if possible live footage of ongoing battles. Prerecorded visuals of interesting locations in New Eden, and reruns of previously acquired imagery of interest could also be used.

From experience I've learned not to say "it can be done easily, and it's cheap!" when it comes to implementing new ICT related stuff, but I'm sure it can be done in this case. I'm just not sure about the cost, and of course there has to be a benefit to CCP as well. That benefit is probably in the area of marketing: it would allow CCP to advertise live, dynamic content (scenery, events) from within New Eden, to those outside of it. Of course Youtube clips offer somewhat the same, but those are often player made and CCP doesn't have much control over how Eve Online is presented in those.

Knowing the Eve Online player base, I'm pretty sure there would be some entertaining 'emergent gameplay' surrounding these camera vantage points or ISD reporter ships, too. What would be more cool than to have your kill recorded by the ISD Jita Cam operator! Or attempt to kill that operator, of course :)

Anyway, did I mention I'm volunteering for the position of ISD Jita Cam operator..? I'd happily spend time flying around New Eden (in a Polaris frigate of course) to gather the footage :-)

An unhappy pilot

“There’s two level of paranoia: total and insufficient” (Dave Kern, IBM, at a conference in 2006)

As I have mentioned on this blog earlier, No Fixed Abode (NOFAD) is currently recruiting. For the first time we are running an open channel (No Fixed Channel) and it’s quite interesting to see who drops by! One of those who contacted us there has joined NOFAD a short while later; in the past weekend he has scored more kills than I usually do in a month (..or two). A good start! There were time zone issues with a few other potential members, one of which I knew from the blogs and tweetfleet, and another one was referred to an US TZ corp in our alliance.

An interesting thing happened last Friday, when our open channel’s member list suddenly listed a pilot with a negative standing. A guy from a hostile alliance, trying to join us..? We struck up a conversation, trying to get an idea of what was going on. He related his tale: he had been a mercenary or pirate for most of his Eve career, resulting in a current security standing of -8. His employment history was very, very long, although for the past year he’d mostly been in two corps, hopping from one to another and back again a few times, apparently for deployment reasons. His alliance does a lot of dirty jobs, deploying all over the cluster to execute contracts, harassing or griefing here and there. This often required redeploying on short notice, mandatory operations et cetera. He had also done his fair share of infiltration and spying, something he confessed forthright.

But after years of this, he grew tired of it; having a few young kids and a job is not really compatible with that kind of lifestyle. Time to settle down, find a group of like minded guys to talk football and rugby, have a bit of pvp every now and then with a bit of ratting on the side to generate the necessary ISK..

The story above came to light in bits and pieces, over the course of the evening. Frankly I didn’t know what to make of it, but he sounded honest all right. Were we being misled? Is he doing some intricate social engineering on us? We're a small corp in a sov holding alliance and we're recruiting, so we might be a target for infiltration. Our older GMT pilots liked the guy, probably because he was so similar to them (football, rugby, beer, wife, kids..). Googling his pilot name I couldn’t find much of interest: some innocuous posts on the forums and lots of killboard entries. He had been largely inactive for about a month or two prior to contacting us, which was uncommon for him (his killboard stats go back years without interruption) but in line with his story. Someone from alliance leadership informed us that the negative standing was caused by a few roams his alliance did through our sov, the previous year; nothing to worry about, really.

Yet, after much deliberation and discussion, his past turned out to be a showstopper. There were objections from alliance leadership and from within NOFAD itself, and in the end we had to decide not to admit him to NOFAD. A shame, really, as I think he would have fit us quite nicely given his age group, family situation and TZ. We informed him and he took it graciously, even though clearly disappointed.

So here we have a pilot with 70+ million skill points, a killboard efficiency of over 90% - and he can’t find a decent place to stay, as his corp history and security status deny him entrance to most normal (non mercenary or non piracy) alliances. I really feel sorry for him.

Which brings me to the 'lessons learned' part: carefully consider what you do with your main pilot, if you're attached to him or her (that happens, especially when that main is your first avatar of sorts).Whenever you decide to become a mercenary, a pirate, make sure you use a throwaway character for it. Or, be prepared to end up with a highly skilled, but virtually unusable character in a few years time.

Come to think of it, when Jenny Twotone first explained to me, back in 2008, that I shouldn't run too many missions against Caldari, I didn't really understand of believe her - until I had to repair the bad standing towards Caldari and Amarr.. 

In closing, let me say that in my opinion it speaks volumes about the depth of Eve Online, that we're discussing multi year plannings for your character development!

Eggs for breakfast

A few days ago some of us were patrolling the pipe between V-3YG7 and U-QVWD . It is one of the busier parts of the area: we often see traffic from HED-GP to GE-8JV and further to LGK-VP in Stain, or to Curse via 0-SHT. CVA for instance uses O-SHT to enter the Catch region when they are looking for PVP, so you might say it’s a lively neighbourhood.

Anyway, one of our pilots called for help in U-QVWD; an enemy that had been camping one of our systems tried to leave the area via that route, and our pilot was trying to hunt him down. A couple of us switched ships and headed that way asap. Pretty soon however it became clear we weren’t going to catch this red: he was cloaked somewhere in system. Right about that moment, we noticed a neutral pod coming down the pipe. I believe we tried to catch it but failed, as a pod is usually fast to warp. You really need a bubble if you want to have a good chance at catching them. And then another one came.. and another one..

At the same time our intel channel lit up with requests to bubble the gates in V-3YG7 or the system behind it, B-3QPD . Soon enough we found out why! A mixed gang of enemies, consisting of CVA and allies, had gotten a beating at the hands of a Cascade Imminent (FAIL) and Against All Authorities (-A-) fleet. The surviving pilots tried to get out of Catch as soon as possible.. through the pipe we were camping.

We bubbled the V-3YG7 gate in B-3QPD, and just sat there waiting for the pods to come through. It was a weird experience.. one by one we cracked the eggs, whose pilots must have been cursing behind their screens. Your pod, pointed, scrammed and webbed in a bubble, in hostile territory, with a dozen enemy ships locking on to you.. At one point a dozen or so enemy ships jumped in and started shooting my Drake, so I burned out of the bubble and warped off. Just when I hit warp, part of the the FAIL/-A- fleet that was pursuing them entered and destroyed what was left of them. And back to the turkey shoot we went. An alliance mate who just logged onto TeamSpeak was informed of what we were doing, and he remarked.. 'Ah, so you guys are having eggs for breakfast!'

Longtime LEGIO pilots particularly enjoyed the evening, as LEGIO and CVA have a history. Once allies, now bitter enemies: there's little love lost between oldtime LEGIO pilots and CVA.

In the end, we killed about nice pods and some ships. Could have been more, but of course FAIL and -A- took their share as well, plus we missed a few pods when they first started to come through. Best catch of the evening: this one billion pod. Thanks CCP for showing implants on killmails!

"Recruitment is open.."

No Fixed Abode is still a small corporation. We have a dozen active members, a few alts and a few inactives, all in all less than 20 pilots on the member list. We are a group of old friends, and most of us will probably be playing eve in the foreseeable future, but still: some growth would be beneficial, and perhaps necessary if we want to remain a viable corporation in the long run. You will lose people, one way or another, so you need new corp members every now and then. 

Forums, Corp recruitment
So recently, I have been looking at recruitment. Whom to contact, whom to offer a position? Whom can I ask without endangering the relation with their current CEO or corp? It hasn’t been easy, as many corps we once had friends in have gone dormant in 2011. 

 

Yesterday I posted an advert via the Corporation menu in the Eve client. The text space is limited, so I had to be brief in my description of No Fixed Abode ("we shoot reds, rats and ‘roids"), assigned corp colleagues Alexander Weitgereist, CEO Dadellus myself as recruitment officers and listed our open No Fixed Channel as recruitment channel. I wonder how many prospective pilots get to see it, if at all.. there’s no way to see how many hits or reads this kind of advert gets. It will be interesting to see if it draws any responses.

For the past few weeks I have also been reading the Eve Online recruitment forum. What’s notable there: many nullsec and WH corps asking for new pilots, but only a few individuals looking for a corp! If I take a look at the pilots ‘LF’ a new corp and filter out some basic requirements such as a suitable timezone and play style, there remain only a handful of matching applicants for us. Apparently, fresh blood is hard to come by.

"I think we have what you’re looking for!"

Pilots who offer themselves on the recruitment forums, often get a lot of replies. If you’ve read through a handful of them, you’ll notice the same recruitment officers replying again and again to each and every ‘LF corp’ post.  Usually, they paste the same happy “I think we have what you’re looking for!” in every reply, even when their offer clearly doesn’t match what’s being requested. These guys seem to target just about everyone, apparently not very concerned whether the prospective member will be a good fit for their corp. Doesn’t inspire much confidence, does it?

On the other hand, pilots - knowing full well they have a choice, here - aren't shy to post their demands either. Of course they should list their requirements, but some pilots are not above showing a little attitude or arrogance when they do. Of course they'll still be hired because someone really does need them, but I steer clear of these guys. I want to have fun in Eve Online and don't feel like dealing with prima donnas.  

Hard to get

Amusing are the corps who announce they are open for recruitment. Between all the corps vying for new blood on the forums, would the mere, bland announcement ‘..now open for recruitment’ result in a lot of applications? They make it look like they are providing you with a rare opportunity to get in, playing all ‘hard to get’. Perhaps there really are lots of people waiting for just this advert from this specific corp, I don’t know, but I have a feeling many of these posts won’t have much effect.

Where are the new pilots, anyway?

But why is it so difficult to find new pilots in the first place? Corps looking for players in the recruitment forum, tend to be nullsec or WH corps, looking for new PVP pilots. As for WH corps, I understand it can be difficult to attract new pilots. Almost by definition they lead a somewhat secluded life, sneaking in and out of their wormhole, preferably spending their time in lockdown if possible. And how are you going to find new friends if you never meet anyone?

But nullsec corps.. shouldn’t they be overflowing with applicants? It is supposed to be ‘the endgame’ for Eve Online, the goal, the thing to aspire to. Many new pilots get drawn in the game after reading about epic battles involving thousands of pilots, after all. Why, then, are so many nullsec corps struggling to find new members? There must be thousands of pilots languishing in highsec who could really use a stay in nullsec to spice up their Eve life.  

 We all know about the famous learning cliff in Eve Online - many pilots don’t make it past trial or a few months of subscribing. For those who do, moving from PVE dominant highsec to the PVP territory that is nullsec, may be the second barrier to overcome.. And it does seem that many never make it past, given that most Eve players live in highsec. Now there’s a task for CCP! And perhaps the nullsec dominant CSM too: think about ways to get these highsec players to try out nullsec. Could be a nice topic for a blog banter too.

In the mean time.. Yes, No Fixed Abode is ‘open for recruitment’ ;-) Here’s our advert on the forum: https://forums.eveonline.com/default.aspx?g=posts&t=69235&find=unread. You’re welcome to contact us if you'd like to fly with us!

Alliance and corp survival

I’ll admit, I am getting slightly addicted to Evemaps these days; it's the site with the most accurate information on what’s going on in New Eden in terms of sovereignty, alliances, corps and such. The ebb and flow of the never ending New Eden wars are reflected on evemaps: alliances losing sov and bleeding members while others surge. When an alliance or corp is struggling, evemaps is the place where this becomes mercilessly visible.

Having been part of a failscading powerbloc once, I’m always kind of interested to learn what happens to the corps who leave an alliance. Where do they go? Evemaps, ever helpfully, provides this information in the list of former corps for an alliance: if the departed corps have joined a new alliance, it is visible there.

Surprisingly, if you take a look at that list, many corps never join a new alliance after leaving one. Whether they left their previous alliance on their own accord of were forced out I don’t know; whether that alliance failscaded or just somehow faded (as happens to highsec carebear alliances sometimes) I don’t know either. But the fact remains, that hundreds, if not thousands, of corps (and their pilots!) once were part of an alliance but are now alone.

Take another look at a list of former corps (for instance that of LEGIO) and sort it by member. A new pattern emerges: the largest corps who’ve left LEGIO in the past, have found a new home in another alliance. Many corps who haven’t, currently have single digit membership numbers. And at the bottom, there’s a set of corps who haven’t survived; they are dead. I have checked this for several other alliances, and it’s not always a given, but as a rule of thumb, the bigger corps are more likely to be part of a new alliance when compared with the smaller ones.

I can think of several reasons for this pattern. A corp may lose members when it fails to provide it’s members with access to nullsec, wh space or other lucrative resources or fun activities, for a prolonged period of time; in the end, only a few inactive pilots and a handfull of die hards will remain. Or, when you are already a small corp, it may be more difficult to be accepted into a new alliance, as your size makes it less likely that you’ll provide added value to a new host alliance.

For any pilot involved in corp leadership, there are useful lessons to be learned here. Whenever you find your corp without an alliance, make it a priority to find a new, suitable one as soon as possible (without compromising on the ‘suitable’ part of course). And second: make sure you have enough good, active pilots, in order to provide added value to your (prospective) alliance.

For a regular corp member, there's something to learn as well. If your corp is no longer part of an alliance, and leadership isn't doing their utter best to correct that situation, the long term viability of your corp may be in danger. It would be wise to keep an eye out for alternatives.

Finally, I have - a while ago - checked up on several corps we were once in an alliance with. Most of seem to suffer from a low level of activity, even when they still hold a reasonable membership number. Eve is still a game, and when that game becomes less fun because the alliance or corp isn't functioning well, people will login less too; after a while they will probably unsub. Many of these corps are in a slow decline towards death, taking an unknown number of subscriptions with them.
In this regard, CCP is more or less dependent on the player corps and alliances (overwhelmingly run by well meaning amateurs, I might add) to keep the pilots engaged and active, and hence, CCP's business afloat. What a scary thought..

(2012-01-27 made some small editorial changes; content didn't change - Sered)

Blog Banter 32 - for the children

"This month's Blog Banter comes from Drackarn of Sand, Cider and Spaceships. He has foolishly chosen to poke the hornet's nest that is the non-consensual PvP debate. Whilst you read his question, I'll be finding a safe place to hide.

A quick view of the Eve Online forums can always find someone complaining about being suicide ganked, whining about some scam they fell for or other such tears. With the Goons' Ice Interdiction claiming a vast amount of mining ships, there were calls for an "opt out of PvP" option.

 

Should this happen? Should people be able to opt-out of PvP in Eve Online. Should CONCORD prevent crime rather than just handing out justice after the event? Or do the hi-sec population already have too much protection from the scum and villainy that inhabits the game?"

*update* a list of other blog responses to the queston raised above, can be found at Freebooted.

.................................................................................................................................................................

Raise the price of nonconsensual PVP

After the Goons’ ice interdiction and their recent promise of a much more devastating ‘victory lap’ through highsec, we are again confronted with the question: should CCP do something about nonconsensual PVP? Should it be possible in New Eden to opt out of PVP altogether?

Yes

Eve Online has a reputation of being notoriously difficult. One of the hardest parts to understand - for inexperienced pilots anyway - are the aggression mechanics. This allows older, more experienced pilots to can flip or can bait newbie pilots - or they can resort to just suicide ganking them; that doesn't mean much to the older, more experienced pilot. I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: I find very little to defend in this practice. It is no sport, it doesn’t require intelligence or courage, it isn’t ‘educating the n00bs’. In my opinion, it’s just griefing, nothing more. There’s no reasonable way a  n00b miner can defend himself against these practices; it’s either accept that you’re being robbed, or lose your ship. 

I know for a fact that these practices have cost CCP subscribers. I have personally known several pilots who ended their fresh subscriptions (or never converted trial to paying subscription) after losing ships this way or hearing about such losses. Heck, if I hadn’t been accepted in a good newbie corp, I would have quit too, after losing my first, hard earned, shiny new Incursus to a griefer.

No

Yet the whole premise of New Eden is, that there is no safety, ever. It is a harsh, cold place and that is by design; it’s not by accident. It remains a single shard sandbox, fraught with danger. CONCORD was not meant to prevent crime there; not easily anyway. Let's not dumb down Eve Online even further, shall we?

Compromise: raise the stakes

Coming from a carebear background, I have a lot of sympathy for my less experienced brethren in highsec. Implementing some extra protection for them does appeal to my sense of fairness - and it would be good for CCP’s baseline as well. Yet I wouldn’t want to fundamentally change New Eden to accomplish it. But I can think of a few measures that would at least level the playing field somewhat.

For instance some extra protection, in the first 12 weeks (or 8, or 10.. please debate) of being a pod pilot. Let's determine a 'graduation age': below that, you're afforded some extra protection, if you're older than that, nothing changes when compared to the situation now. 

After the graduation period ends, the n00b pilot receives a note stating he has completed his basic training and should now be aware of all the dangers out there. The note contains a link to a evelopedia page on piracy, such as this one. No extra protection is now available for the graduated pilot.

So what kind of extra protection am I thinking about? Suicide ganking n00bs is now a very one sided event, as I mentioned above, and I propose to level the playing field somewhat, by making sure the griefer/ganker gets to feel the pain too. The ganker should have to think about his action: is this kill really worth it, or not?  The first step in this direction was removing insurance payout; let's take this line of thought a little further. I propose raising the security status penalties for ship killings under specific circumstances: when the pilot is below the graduation age, and the security status of the system is higher than 0.6 (or 0.5, 0.7.. up for debate), the security standings penalty is significantly raised. Penalties would be stackable: killing a mining vessel in 1.0, piloted by a pilot fresh out of trial, should carry a much more severe penalty than, for instance, killing an eight week old ratter in 0.8. Killing a two week old cyno alt in lowsec or nullsec should not carry (extra) penalties at all.

Added to this - and perhaps this should be implemented for all kinds of highsec ganks, not only for n00b bashing - the offending pilot should feel some real pain: a fine, and doing some jail time seems appropriate. So, no jumping/undocking for at least 24 hours after a suicide gank; ISK fines to you or your corp's wallet. 
I'd like to see some ISK compensation for the victim too, preferrably via the insurance route, but am struggling to find a way that would allow something like that to be implemented without being exploited immediately. Suggestions are welcome..

To prevent gankers from working with throwaway characters: the griefing/ganking character is 'on probation' and can't be biomassed or sold for at least two (four?) weeks. 

To prevent can flipping/baiting, I would simply suggest the ability to set a password on any jettisoned can. Anyone still can baited after that is just lazy and deserves some punishment :)

Pro and con

The upside of this (or a similar) approach would be, that nonconsensual PVP would still be available - but at a much steeper price to the ganker; this would be something you can't do too often before a character (or an account) becomes totally useless.The gank should really be worth it!

A downside is, that it's quite a convoluted system, a tad difficult to understand and implement without making it exploitable somehow. I'm sure, however, that the experienced game devs at CCP have ways around that. 

Another downside; certain high sec areas would - at least for younger pilots -become temporary save havens. They’ll probably flock around the few meager belts available there, without venturing outside too much. Will the youngsters muster the courage to exit the reservation? 

My final concern with any protection measure is: how will the griefers/gankers exploit it to their profit? This is something that needs to be thought of. 

The written word

Earlier this week I published a review of Roc Wieler’s YC113. In the introduction I mentioned that art and creativity wasn’t really a part of the Eve community, except for video. 

I was primarily referring to, of course, the award winning machinima series ‘Clear Skies’. But, there are more well known Eve videos such as the ‘Clarion call’ series by Rooks and Kings alliance  (and the parody Noirion Call) and countless frapsed battle reports on Youtube. Recently, CCP hosted a contest for this kind of content on eveisreal.net , allowing pod pilots to show off their video editing powers.

It takes some imagination and creativity to make these, but wouldn’t go as far as to call them ‘art’. It’s like the difference between a Discovery Channel documentary and a motion picture: both can be well made and entertaining, but in my humble opinion the first one remains a documentary, while the second one can sometimes be called art.

Screenshots of Eve Online are often beautiful, and nicely show how impressive New Eden looks these days. I have often done my best to create a specific snapshot, for instance by positioning all elements in a certain way; I have certainly done some post processing too, cropping, adapting contrast and light/dark levels. Is it creative? Sure. Art? Possibly.

But, I have to confess, I haven’t done justice to the Eve Online community. I have neglected to mention written fan fiction! Kirith Kodachi for instance is well known for his ‘fiction Friday’ series. Several bloggers are using a 'role play' style of writing on their blogs. Eve Travel is a good example; it's a travel guide to landmarks in New Eden. And for a fan fiction/RP styled source of news, you can head over to http://tech4news.org/ . 

There are actually quite a few role players in New Eden, who have fully immersed their in game persona in the background story CCP created. Alliances such as CVA and Ushkra’khan, while perhaps not always 100% ‘in character’ are also RP oriented. Pilots participating in factional warfare – war between the human races in New Eden – are also likely to be interested in or actively enaged in role playing. And let's not forget those real life model citizens who, in Eve Online, pose as fearful space pirates.. Many of these pilots maintain their RP persona on their blogs and twitter feeds.

It is in the written word that the Eve Online community displays a lot of it’s creative powers. I hope that, by pointing this out, I’ve made up for the fact that I have forgotten to mention it in the previous blog post..

YC113: a review

The community is always an important part of a gaming experience. Back when I was (more) active in Second Life, I'd admire the creative works of my fellow avatars, and to this day, really beautiful things are created in the Linden Lab world. Second Life's community is a very creative one!

In Eve Online, there's no such thing as an artist or creator. New Eden knows industry - you can create predetermined things based on fixed blueprints -  but no in world, free format creation of objects. The community discusses game mechanics, killmails, fittings, shiptypes, CCP shenanigans, nerfs and buffs.. but only rarely does art or creativity come into play, with the exception of video. Eve Online may be a sandbox where you can choose your own career, but 'artist' is not high on the list.

That's why was pleasantly surprised to see an Eve Online related work of creativity: Roc Wieler's musical effort YC113, which was released October 1, 2011. After listening to it a few times, I have to say It’s an appealing work of art and well worth a listen to. Musically, I’d characterize it as orchestral, with much drama,  power and bombast: some parts could easily have been part of a soundrack to a grand battle scene in a Lord of the Rings movie. But there’s more than just these grand musical landscapes and vistas; there’s also the intimacy of a lonely piano, a deep sense of sorrow in a single woman’s voice. 

If you’re familiar with New Eden, you will find that all these musical elements fit that sandbox universe in which Eve Online takes place.

Why I play Eve Online (again)

There are many reasons why I continue to play Eve Online: excitement, the whole 'single shard sandbox' thing, friendships forged over the years. Plus, of course, the beautiful scenery..

I encountered this planet when I was creating a safe spot somewhere, all alone in a nullsec system in the Catch region. The new nebula, the gas giant with the rather detailed moon in front of it - I love it. Beautiful work.

In December I somehow didn't feel like playing nullsec eve, and I remained pretty much away for a while. Still, these moods usually pass within a few weeks; this time is no different, and I logged quite a bit of space hours over the past two or three days. Back in the saddle.. feels good. And looks good, to boot!

I started reading The Empyrean Age a few days ago, and am planning to do a writeup on it when I'm finished.

Decapitated pilots

Just a quick note on something I hoped I wouldn't see in Crucible anymore: decapitated avatars! For some reason, parts of the avatar sometimed don't load, with this as the result:

As you can see, the avatar is really hollow; the black and grey background is visible when you look down the neck of this poor decapitated pilot!

 I know that WiS features aren't high on the list these days, but this is something that should be fixed I think, as it defeats the whole purpose of Walking in Stations.