winter patch: Dominion

[Pezzle]

I found that devblog thread.  It looks like Aralis let loose a bit with comments on the upcoming expansion.  I can agree with most of what he said.  The problem (as it is for most of these dev blogs) is lack of useful information.  Maybe CCP themselves do not know how the changes will be implemented?  If they do not, the blog should be more of an invitation to discussion and less authoritative.  If they do, more information should be given out in short order. 

Somehow I remain hopeful we get something, anything, decent out of the expansion.  Without a UI and space/channel management overhaul I am no doubt set up for bitter disappointment. 

[Amarr HM]

Obviously I'm not happy about this.  I don't suppose anyone who understands how 0.0 empires work and is in one is.  But that's a given - the patch is obviously designed to make life harder for 0.0 empires.  How much harder we'd need details to see.  As things currently stand it sounds like holding space in 0.0 wouldn't be realistic for anyone - I doubt it's that bad and there are good parts we have yet to see.

However I'm sure they don't care what I like or dislike.  Like I said this is obviously designed to mess us up so we wouldn't would we?

What puzzles me is what is CCPs aim here?  Is it that they think more people will go to 0.0 if the empires are broken?  Seems very unlikely to me but I could be wrong.  Does anyone have any insight into what CCP are trying to achieve?

I'd guess the aim is to make it so holding space is about playing the game and shooting the people who try to take it off you, rather than having a POS fuelling team treating EVE as a full time unpaid job as they jump from system to system pouring isotopes into towers. A simple sovereignty tax makes 0.0 far more accessable to the small-medium alliances than them having to drag millions of m3 in fuel halfway across the galaxy every month.

I obviously don't know who is in charge of tower logistics for CVA's various corps, but ask them what they think of no longer having to spend untold soul-destroying hours running round Providence with fuel for literally hundreds of towers.

I thought that was a pretty good response and would sum up my feelings on the matter. I think the whole point of case is should we really give a fuck if every alliance goes belly up overnight could be the shakeup 0.0 space needs, if it makes the game more fun for the majority of players while pissing on a few stuck in the muds then its a victory in itself. I mean we pay $ every few month or so for entertainment not to endlessly grind and delegate, Eve has always focused too heavily on grind for my liking. A very basic example of this is jumpbridge passwords get erased from your ship everytime you enter a new system, this is completely ridiculous yet we do it almost robotically and never question why or if it is needed. I have had some people explain to me oh there must be a reason this that and the other 'zen and the art of motorcycle maintenence' level psychobabble. Simple fact is it's just horrible design and players have been completely conditioned to the stage that we have come to accept, oh this is just how it happens. This conditioning has also spread to the higher echelons of the game eg. POS mechanics, ship mechanics etc.. Crazy thing is 5 years on Eve is still a massive WIP, it's just a shame this POS bullshit (I feel so liberated that I can call it that now) got so out of control.

[ajax34i]

Amarr, the same people that coded the jumpbridge password thing are coding this expansion, you know that, right?  I do not know what they're trying to accomplish with the expansion, but until they announce something with the words "major UI overhaul" in the title, I'm not putting my hopes up that the new stuff, while perhaps more "fun", won't be just as frustrating to interface with as the old stuff.

BTW, I laugh at the "oohs and aahs" over the new planet graphics.  X3 Terran Conflict (not a well-known, or even all that great, game), had much better planets last year or two years ago than what CCP is aiming for now.  They suck.

[Pezzle]

[stuff from Eve-O]

I thought that was a pretty good response and would sum up my feelings on the matter. I think the whole point of case is should we really give a fuck if every alliance goes belly up overnight could be the shakeup 0.0 space needs, if it makes the game more fun for the majority of players while pissing on a few stuck in the muds then its a victory in itself. I mean we pay $ every few month or so for entertainment not to endlessly grind and delegate, Eve has always focused too heavily on grind for my liking. A very basic example of this is jumpbridge passwords get erased from your ship everytime you enter a new system, this is completely ridiculous yet we do it almost robotically and never question why or if it is needed. I have had some people explain to me oh there must be a reason this that and the other 'zen and the art of motorcycle maintenence' level psychobabble. Simple fact is it's just horrible design and players have been completely conditioned to the stage that we have come to accept, oh this is just how it happens. This conditioning has also spread to the higher echelons of the game eg. POS mechanics, ship mechanics etc.. Crazy thing is 5 years on Eve is still a massive WIP, it's just a shame this POS bullshit (I feel so liberated that I can call it that now) got so out of control.

That is a fine sentiment and not really the point.  Of course we want less logistic toil for towers.  Aralis is mostly talking about CCP going in crazy different directions all at once.  More things to do with space is good.  Lack of proper management tools is bad.  Simplified sov is good.  Having to rep your sov holding unit every day is bad.  

CCP wants space holders to develop their neck of 0.0 and then hint at it being very difficult to hold?  You need stability in order to develop 0.0.  I am not saying we should all hold hands.  What I am saying is their signals are not encouraging.  If they are developing an interlaced 0.0 system why are they removing outpost control from sov?  It may be a good reason, but who knows?

What is next?  CCP saying they adopt CVA style 0.0 growth and promptly coding in destructible outposts and off grid stealth bombers that can shoot your fixed structures?  Humor aside, let's be clear.  While I am naturally concerned with the fate of my part of EVE my view is a long one.  I do not see the pieces fitting the rhetorical mold. 

CCP likes to play catch up with their information for some reason I cannot grasp.  Do they have a system or is this guesswork?  It does not have to be fully coded to tell players what is actually going on.  Who knows, maybe some feedback on it would catch glaring errors?  

We have no mention on how the tools will change, if at all.  Do not sell me a massive revamp based on theorycraft and pixie dust.  A real overhaul of 0.0 will be more than sov and more than more things to do.  They are selling an expansion with pretty words.  In some sections of f13 people get shouted down for lack of information.  The blog goes at length hitting key notes without actual substance.  More questions they are not answering and it annoys and concerns people.

 

[Amarr HM]

Aye I probably missed the point somewhat as I only skimmed through most of it. But I think the whole point of the revamp re:the blog is not to necessarily to rollout a working replacement, but to rollout a replacement that can be made to work. This might take time and player involvement but at least with a complete refresh they can build towards something more core to their vision of how it should work.

Also Ajax the oohs and ahs aren't over the Planet GFX it's mainly ooh aah Planets in "EVE".

[ajax34i]

CCP likes to play catch up with their information for some reason I cannot grasp.  Do they have a system or is this guesswork?

Their behavior makes sense to me, actually:

1.  I think they'd rather not have mentioned any details about the expansion, complete blackout, and just one day we try to log on and it's been patched in, deal with it.

2.  But, they are forced to advertise and generate some publicity - other developers are announcing new MMO's or expansions at this point in time.

3.  And also, they are forced to bugtest their code, so it must go on the test servers, at which point we'll figure out more info about it whether they like it or not.

[Pezzle]

Whatever the reasons, a media blackout or general vagueness on new expansions is a terrible idea.  Especially when it comes to persistent worlds.


*edit*

Oh, and with all the bugle blowing they are absolutely rolling out a working replacement.  They are touting a total change, ground up.  If it does not work it is a disaster and the same thing we have, years of random ideas patched together into a functioning but broken system.

[Endie]

CVA are in an unusually vulnerable situation with what has been discussed so far.  As the long-term holders of the "destination of choice for bored roaming gangs" award, there is a real risk that the Providence block will find themselves constantly repping their sov artifacts which have been shot to provoke "good fights".

At the same time, one of the reasons that Providence has been so stable is that the space is so awful.  Sustained assaults are unusual (two in three years?) because the space is almost as bad as it gets.  And the competitors for that crown in the NW at least have far more high quality moons, even if PL owns them all.

However, what if this expansion really does offer the realistic prospect of substantially improving sovereign space?  The good logistics of Providence, together with the putative decreases to the value of Prom and Dyspro moons (CVA have only two, I think?) might even persuade someone that the notoriety of being the people who threw out CVA is worth a shot.

There's a lot of info still needed - much of what has been released is mere incidental mechanics and not the most important elements in assessing the viability of holding space: cost, logistics and return.  But I do hope that we're looking at the eventual point of equilibrium being substantially different from where we are today, because apart from a small number of GFFL events, I have barely done more than change skills in months.

[Pezzle]

CVA are in an unusually vulnerable situation with what has been discussed so far.  As the long-term holders of the "destination of choice for bored roaming gangs" award, there is a real risk that the Providence block will find themselves constantly repping their sov artifacts which have been shot to provoke "good fights".

At the same time, one of the reasons that Providence has been so stable is that the space is so awful.  Sustained assaults are unusual (two in three years?) because the space is almost as bad as it gets.  And the competitors for that crown in the NW at least have far more high quality moons, even if PL owns them all.

However, what if this expansion really does offer the realistic prospect of substantially improving sovereign space?  The good logistics of Providence, together with the putative decreases to the value of Prom and Dyspro moons (CVA have only two, I think?) might even persuade someone that the notoriety of being the people who threw out CVA is worth a shot.

There's a lot of info still needed - much of what has been released is mere incidental mechanics and not the most important elements in assessing the viability of holding space: cost, logistics and return.  But I do hope that we're looking at the eventual point of equilibrium being substantially different from where we are today, because apart from a small number of GFFL events, I have barely done more than change skills in months.

There are plenty of interesting possibilities.  

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoO0UXX5Acs&feature=PlayList&p=10838E1219A2EC16&index=12

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoO0UXX5Acs&feature=PlayList&p=10838E1219A2EC16&index=14
Those two bits concern me a great deal.  You do not need sov to hold the outpost, you need the outpost to benefit from what is currently possible with Sov (jammers and the like).  We now have Outpost majority over Providence with 43.  We may have traded fueling towers for repping outposts.  It is more appealing now to try for an outpost simply to screw up hangers.  Do you think Empire based industrialists are going to take a chance with those mechanics?  Speaking of that dead horse, we have no mention of management mechanics improving either.  

Since there is no mention of the methods or amounts of upgrades we are rightfully worried.  At least our space is so terrible the moon nerf will not hit us much.  I can see sov mining bonuses and T2 moon miners on the horizon..

43 outposts.. cripes

[Amarr HM]

CCP talk about dominion and future expansions.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SKZZGVonhAA&NR=1

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5pusXTQkeIM

[lac]

Pezzle, your youtube links seem to go nowhere for me.

Also CCP loves what CVA is doing. Through this patch they want to lead everybody to the model CVA is employing. Their mantra of 'develop your space' and 'attract the empire carebears' is what CVA has been doing for so long now. Unfortunately that doesn't mean they won't screw you over but at least they feel your vision of 0.0 life is the way they want to go.

[Pezzle]

Links fixed. 

Maybe CCP loves what we do, I am not sure they understand what makes it possible, or if they want it sustainable in the least.

[Amarr HM]

Links fixed.  

Maybe CCP loves what we do, I am not sure they understand what makes it possible, or if they want it sustainable in the least.

You missed this one, it's quite revealing.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wja2wrO_VUE&feature=SeriesPlayList&p=10838E1219A2EC16&index=14

[mokianna]

  I think they'd rather not have mentioned any details about the expansion, complete blackout, and just one day we try to log on and it's been patched in, deal with it.

I remember when Sony did that to Star Wars Galaxies, the NGE (non-gaming experience). That was the day I quit swg.

[DLRiley]

Pezzle, your youtube links seem to go nowhere for me.

Also CCP loves what CVA is doing. Through this patch they want to lead everybody to the model CVA is employing. Their mantra of 'develop your space' and 'attract the empire carebears' is what CVA has been doing for so long now. Unfortunately that doesn't mean they won't screw you over but at least they feel your vision of 0.0 life is the way they want to go.

I don't think CCP realizes that the only reason CVA is successful is because no one bothers attacking CVA...

[Sir T]

And that's whats nagging at me. To be honest I'm trying to imaging what people will actually do and frankly what I've seen dosen't sound like fun to me. And the "sov module" looks to me that they are grabbing the ideas from the low sec faction war and transplanting it. I know a guy who did faction warfare and he hated it.

I really need more info before I make a decision on this.

[stahlregen]

I can't wait till we've got fleets of like 50 unkillable supercarriers and titans rolling around.

[ajax34i]

I don't think CCP realizes that the only reason CVA is successful is because no one bothers attacking CVA...

Sounds like CCP loves the CVA model, including the skirmishes and the influx of empire players into their space, but doesn't particularly care whether CVA specifically will survive.  Or the Goons or any other specific alliance.  They'll just force the CVA type of 0.0 space to be the only possibility, and then who cares who owns any particular corner of 0.0, that's a player concern not a developer concern. 

[Pezzle]

The influx only happens because we have an open door policy and spent years building the security.  Taking away sov security will drive some industry types back to empire.  Honestly?  I do not see the changes encouraging people to try 0.0.

[Goumindong]

I don't think CCP realizes that the only reason CVA is successful is because no one bothers attacking CVA...

Sounds like CCP loves the CVA model, including the skirmishes and the influx of empire players into their space, but doesn't particularly care whether CVA specifically will survive.  Or the Goons or any other specific alliance.  They'll just force the CVA type of 0.0 space to be the only possibility, and then who cares who owns any particular corner of 0.0, that's a player concern not a developer concern. 

The problem is that the CVA model, including the skirmishes and influx of empire players into their space, occurs only because CVA specifically survives AND isn't attacked.

The CVA model cannot stand under real sustained sov warfare. The empire carebears and skirmishes will be pushed out.

So if you want skirmishes and an influx of empire players you have to be content with there not being any big SOV shakeups. There needs to be stability. If you want a war, you're going to kill the only CVA model not make more of them.

[Endie]

The influx only happens because we have an open door policy and spent years building the security.  Taking away sov security will drive some industry types back to empire.  Honestly?  I do not see the changes encouraging people to try 0.0.

I think that the picture on that will come when we see the balance sheet: what will be the hikes to personal income that we've been promised, and what will be the costs to holding space?  With the highly differentiated holdings in Providence, it is kinda well-placed to weather the supposed increased costs of holding large amounts of space, after all.  And it looks like breaking sov will require something like 24 to 36 hours of constant blobbing of a system.

[eldaec]

Seems to me that the sov model is perfect for pure military alliances who only want a small amount of space to base out of, and who don't have space today. Kenny basically.

Also not terrible for a hypothetical bizarro-Goonswarm (lots of players interested in individual level bike riding), but with people who will log in without a 'great war' to take part in.

And so far it sounds deadly for CVA and the NRDS concept.

It also sounds deadly to deep space areas. I don't understand the design value in having hard logistics space be the least valuable. Easy empire access is just a luxury for a major power, but it is critical to the new groups ccp want to attract. If empire adjacent is as good as it gets, the major powers will just squat along the border, while upcoming alliances are forced to make their first 0.0 steps in deep space  - this is retarded in all sorts of ways.

[ajax34i]

So if you want skirmishes and an influx of empire players you have to be content with there not being any big SOV shakeups. There needs to be stability.

I think that there will be stability and no big SOV shakeups because all the big name alliances will be wiped out by the ISK cost of claiming space, and a sea of little 3-corp alliances will sprout up in their place, each holding a star system or maybe a constellation, but each incapable of "big SOV shakeups" or anything more than skirmishes.  

Bye bye dinosaurs, hello small furry mammals.  And then, roaming sharks bent on destruction.  Followed by empty 0.0, or 0.0 that looks like lowsec: all pirates, no carebears.  Which means, no empire players out there in the end anyway.

[stahlregen]

The more i hear from CCP, the more discussion and theorycraft i read and the more i look back on how the devs dealt with gameplay problems in the past i can't help but feel that these changes are going to have entirely the opposite effect to what was intended. So here i am jumping on the 'ccp don't know shit bout nothin' bandwagon.

[lac]

Here are some SiSi screenies (I took from SHC) that should how pilot actions influence sov.

[Comstar]

So Sov depends on killing rats, and destroying enemy POS's?

Blackops will need to create PvE ships to kill enemy rats in hostile systems. Crappy systems with crappy rats would fall very quickly if you just need to kill rat cruisers while the players who actually live there don't bother and go to more profitable systems. Do it in enemy jump bridge systems that don't have stations.

Conversely, large player empire will need pets/renters to stay in such systems to keep the sov for the jump bridges. Quick, someone invite Sweet Snak into Goonswarm.

[Amarr HM]

I was going to respond to the post below by saying the way it's looking like alliances now actually need macros carebears in their alliance but was waiting to get more info, now it seems clear.

I think that there will be stability and no big SOV shakeups because all the big name alliances will be wiped out by the ISK cost of claiming space, and a sea of little 3-corp alliances will sprout up in their place, each holding a star system or maybe a constellation, but each incapable of "big SOV shakeups" or anything more than skirmishes.  

Bye bye dinosaurs, hello small furry mammals.  And then, roaming sharks bent on destruction.  Followed by empty 0.0, or 0.0 that looks like lowsec: all pirates, no carebears.  Which means, no empire players out there in the end anyway.

Giving ratting a meaningful purpose is actually not a terrible idea, but we'll see.

[Thrawn]

Attatching ratting to sov in any way is a terrible idea.  Chinese farmers with bots would conquer all of 0.0.

[eldaec]

If they really want to help NRDS, they'll set it up so that anyone killing rats strengthens the current owner's claim on sov (increases resists of sov module, extends time to disrupt, whatever).

This makes some kind of sense if you consider all rats to be insurgent agents vs the status quo.

[lac]

I think they are trying to make a system where constructive activity, like ratting, gives a boost to the sov level of the system it is happening in. While destructive activity, those legendary wulfpax coming through blowing  stuff up, detracts from that extra amount of sov points your alliance has accumulated.
Where time used to be the determining factor in how hard it was to capture a system through sov levels, this mechanic allows activity to be the deciding factor (although I assume it would have a much smaller impact than the previous sov 4 protection benefits).

It would be a system that runs on top of the anchoring sov beacon mechanic and maybe affects the time window or gives other bonusses to how a system can be defended/attacked. This way active systems are harder to take and sending roaming gangs through enemy territory actually makes it easier to capture it later when the big guns come out to shoot the sov beacon.
It doesn't allow you to take a system by just roaming through it or defend one through extensive ratting since it only affects the bonus modifiers and not the hard capture the flag mechanics.

[Amarr HM]

Attatching ratting to sov in any way is a terrible idea.  Chinese farmers with bots would conquer all of 0.0.

Well actually that's one of the reasons I was thinking it's not a bad idea, It should go hand in hand with CCP doing a genuine clampdown on macros. If they don't then it's a terrible idea.

[Endie]

Attatching ratting to sov in any way is a terrible idea.  Chinese farmers with bots would conquer all of 0.0.

This struck me immediately, as well.  But, like Amarr, I suspect it wouldn't be much of a boon to them if they were in an alliance and so capable of holding sov:

"Haeruldaelfen Siggurerurinternalauditingsson, why does thirty-man alliance 'The Tiger Descends the Mountain' have sov in thirty systems in the south?"

[Simond]

It's time for Theta Squad to take control. 

[tgr]

"Haeruldaelfen Siggurerurinternalauditingsson, why does thirty-man alliance 'The Tiger Descends the Mountain' have sov in thirty systems in the south?"

Grounds for Great War 3, everyone vs macro alliances?

Personally, the more I read about the sov changes, the more ambiguous my thoughts are regarding the changes. I don't do combat very well (always tended to avoid it if I could, which means I'm /extremely/ rusty and horrible at it), so I've never seen myself as one of the PVP armies to be used for taking over systems, I'm thinking more of myself as one of the guys that goes in aftewards and makes it not suck for the PVPers to stay there. However, I am starting to get the impression that the system might be prone to a lot of disruptions, or the space one can reliably hold will be very small.

I like the premise of the idea that ratting etc goes towards making the area you live in more attractive (since that means players like me will be desired to move out to 0.0), but I also fear that players like me will be having tons of issues due to constant disruptions by roaming gangs. Last time I was in 0.0 seriously made me think of the tons-of-blues-and-one-red bit of http://m-devillers.ruhosting.nl/rmrnstuff.html as there was just no structure at all, and everyone ended up blaming everyone else for the suckage, instead of repelling gangs.

On the other hand, alliances such as the one I was in back then really shouldn't even have any space, so I suppose it'll even itself out, but I'm going to stay in the sceptical but hopeful camp until we see the final effect of the changes.

Re: sov mechanics, I must say I'm surprised by the gate deal, I was expecting it to move from POSes to planets, as that would make more sense to me. Problem with that again is, it would really just be moving the sov gameplay from POSes to fewer but bigger planets, it wouldn't really be that much of a change from today's situation.

[Amarr HM]

"Haeruldaelfen Siggurerurinternalauditingsson, why does thirty-man alliance 'The Tiger Descends the Mountain' have sov in thirty systems in the south?"

Doesn't he work in the CCP Department for Silly names? Seriously I lolled when I read this