Summer Expansion - Incarna

[Goumindong]

Skill points for isk....that would give them a nice short term income.

My head hurts trying to figure out what that would do to the game.   The whole plex->aur thing makes it really convoluted.

Increase the price of PLEX but not much else. You're basically advancing time for you and no one else, so it makes it easier to be a newbie.

Also reduces the value of characters heavily[since if i want a minnie BS 5 pilot i can just trade in the plex to get the skills instead of finding a character that has what I want]

It is kinda strange since training is one of the main advantages of subscribing. It might seriously reduce alt-accounts [at least ones that don't need to multi-box, since you could just buy the skills on your other 2 char slots]

[Reg]

It will also make anonymity much easier when you can whip up a fresh new character with no history that has the skills you need.

[ajax34i]

Theoretically, as a newbie I would spend some dollars to buy all the skills needed for T2 everything and carrier pilot, then some more dollars -> plex and try to sell the plexes for ISK cause now I need the ships I just trained for, then some more dollars -> plex cause I undocked and lost the ships due to being clueless about game mechanics, and then in a week or so when I realize that none of the major alliances or good corps will have me, I'd quit.  Because the EVE game itself kinda sucks, and is not really worth paying a subscription for if you already "have everything."

CCP would get a huge influx of cash now, but everyone who's currently emo-raging about how they suck would be able to actually cancel subscription once they get the skills and ships they want.  Then CCP would have to deliver content and quality in order to keep people playing.  Or, if it's the community that's making the content, CCP would have to keep the community happy.

[Amaron]

Skill points for isk....that would give them a nice short term income.

My head hurts trying to figure out what that would do to the game.   The whole plex->aur thing makes it really convoluted.

Increase the price of PLEX but not much else.

That's oversimplifying.  A bunch of stuff would happen.

- An amount of people would rage and quit.
- Plex prices would go up by some amount due to people buying them for AUR.
- An amount of people would quit due to plex prices going up.
- Plex prices would go down due to all the people that quit not buying them.
- Plex prices would go back down due to people buying more when the isk value is higher.
- Some new/old people would try out the game if they could buy skill points with isk.

I seriously doubt they'd just sell raw skill points of course.   They'll probably sell skill acceleration or some such though.

[Phildo]

What it would also do is ratchet up the supercapital arms race in 0.0 to a ridiculous pace, unless making a specialized 30m sp guy costs more than a few thousand dollars.

[eldaec]

The only thing stopping 300 vs 300 supercapital fights is mineral supply.

EVE guys to fly the supercaps are already ten a penny, so is production capacity. The only constraint is the cost of materials (and the fact that DBRB is allowed in capswarm).

[Goumindong]

.
- Plex prices would go down due to all the people that quit not buying them.
- Plex prices would go back down due to people buying more when the isk value is higher.

Uhh no. Demand shifts do not cause supply shifts. [re the second point]. And demand shifts that increase demand do not cause people to buy less. People may get pushed out of the market, but only because they're replaced by others

[Amaron]

Uhh no. Demand shifts do not cause supply shifts. [re the second point].

Why?  Because if you get more ISK per plex then you need to buy less plex?  I guess it is a bit more complicated than at first thought.  That's why I said this makes my head hurt.

And demand shifts that increase demand do not cause people to buy less. People may get pushed out of the market, but only because they're replaced by others

That's exactly what I said.   They'd quit (get pushed out of the market).   Thing is in this case they won't come back if the price drops again.

[Sparky]

Slopes for the slope throne!



CCP won't be happy to see that that after such a well hyped expansion.  Looks like all the forum raeg has followed through to player actions for once, sorry Hilmar.  Although the decline might just be players who had their video cards melted by the Captain's Quarters.

[Thrawn]

I wonder how the Perpetuum subs compare to that graph.  Tried it myself but didn't sub, it seems really....not good. (Insert joke about EVE being terrible here.)

[Morfiend]

The newbie systems are currently flooded with new players right now. I don't know if its normal, but most of the "secondary" newbie systems, the ones with the 5 newbie agents seems to have around 200 players in local at prime time. I was in one of the Amarr systems and the Minmatar one. Both flooded with new players.

I think EVE might have gotten a bump from SWG closing down.

[Goumindong]

That's exactly what I said.   They'd quit (get pushed out of the market).   Thing is in this case they won't come back if the price drops again.

A demand curve, if you want to be very technical, is a set of people and their corresponding preferences. The amount the set is willing to purchase at a price is what makes up the curve.

A demand shift to the right [or an increase] occurs when either people are willing to buy more plex at any given price or when more people are willing to buy at any given price. So if we have a situation where we have increased demand we are explicitly positing that there are now more people that will purchase at any given price.

So when we say that people would get pushed out of the market, we aren't talking about a price decline. These are people who no longer purchase because someone else is buying what they want at a higher price. But definition their exit cannot reduce the price because they must have been replaced by someone willing to pay more.

E.G. lets you are buying good X and there are a total of 2 units for sale at price Y. Someone else comes along and offers a Y+1. They buy it and now you no longer have that good. The fact that you no longer are in the market [at price = Y+1 ] doesn't matter because someone else is there and paying more.

Lets say that there is someone else willing to sell good X so long as the price is Y+10. And then lets say someone else comes along an offers Y+10. Again the fact that you left, or that that person entered the market, as a result of a price change cannot lower the price.

The only people who will be entering the market to sell plex as a result of price increasing will be demanding higher prices than the current price and therefore this cannot cause a price reduction. If they were not demanding higher prices than the current price they would already be selling plex. The only people who will not be purchasing plex will not be purchasing because someone else was willing, for more money, to purchase that same plex. Thefore the increase in people willing to buy plex cannot have any effect in reducing the price.

Draw an X, supply is the upward sloping, Demand is the downward sloping. Move the demand curve to your right. The interception is the price and quantity. The supply schedule doesn't change, price increases, quantity increases.

[Kitsune]

The newbie systems are currently flooded with new players right now. I don't know if its normal, but most of the "secondary" newbie systems, the ones with the 5 newbie agents seems to have around 200 players in local at prime time. I was in one of the Amarr systems and the Minmatar one. Both flooded with new players.

I think EVE might have gotten a bump from SWG closing down.

The newbie systems are pretty perpetually busy, those numbers don't look out of the ordinary.

[Amaron]

So when we say that people would get pushed out of the market, we aren't talking about a price decline. These are people who no longer purchase because someone else is buying what they want at a higher price. But definition their exit cannot reduce the price because they must have been replaced by someone willing to pay more.

Cannot reduce the price in the present you mean.   In essence in this case a temporary demand increase could lower future demand.   Like if you were a food seller it would be rather dumb to starve a large chunk of your customers to death even if it somehow gave you a massive short term gain.

[VainEldritch]

I think EVE might have gotten a bump from SWG closing down.

Considering Eve's reputation as  sandbox, you're probably right - CCP will grab a few subs from those who can live with Eve's "different" take.

[Goumindong]

Cannot reduce the price in the present you mean.   In essence in this case a temporary demand increase could lower future demand.   Like if you were a food seller it would be rather dumb to starve a large chunk of your customers to death even if it somehow gave you a massive short term gain.

You're positing two shocks to demand and using as an example shocks to supply... you should quit while you're behind.

The price increases from people wanting to buy more cannot "starve people out of the market" because it is achieved by people willing to buy more stuff at any given price. They were bought out of the market and will continue to be bought out of the market.

[Morfiend]

You can search for #csm6 on twitter to follow the CSM meetings going on right now at CCP if interested.

[Amaron]

They were bought out of the market and will continue to be bought out of the market.

Why?  The example we're discussing is only a temporary increase in demand by definition.  How can you possibly make some argument like you KNOW with 100% certainty that the price will not drop down to normal prices again in any example anyways?   Also I'm not arguing I don't know that much about econ I'm actually asking about all this so there's no "quitting while I'm behind".   If I sound like I'm arguing I'm merely totally baffled how you keep discussing econ like it's a science.

[palmer_eldritch]

I'm no expert on designing hardware but it strikes me that if you design a video card that can melt if it's fed the wrong instructions by software, the problem really lies with the card.

[luckton]

You can search for #csm6 on twitter to follow the CSM meetings going on right now at CCP if interested.

Relevant: http://treborofthecsm.blogspot.com/2011/06/peace-talks-day-one.html

[Amarr HM]

I'm no expert on designing hardware but it strikes me that if you design a video card that can melt if it's fed the wrong instructions by software, the problem really lies with the card.

It's a mixture of both, likely it can fixed easily with an Ati driver update but CCP need to at least warn people in big letters to update these drivers before patching. If they didn't then they are a really fucking irresponsible shower & it's just boot.ini all over again. Fool me once shame on you, fool me twice..

[Pezzle]

You can search for #csm6 on twitter to follow the CSM meetings going on right now at CCP if interested.

Relevant: http://treborofthecsm.blogspot.com/2011/06/peace-talks-day-one.html

Yea, we had this talk with CCP about many issues.  We cannot talk about it but you should feel better.  Expect a devbog sometime.  We will talk more tomorrow.

Lots of words to say they are discussing all facets of the issues and CCP will be blogging again soon.

[Comstar]

The only reason I can think of that the first question wasn't "is PaytoWin coming", would be if the CSM is going to surrender the Sudentaland tomorrow.

[ajax34i]

I'm no expert on designing hardware but it strikes me that if you design a video card that can melt if it's fed the wrong instructions by software, the problem really lies with the card.

There's a setting in the EVE control pannel that lets you specify "Interval = immediate" and I'm guessing it forces the drivers to bypass some of the "protection" measures built in.  Hardware has no choice but to execute software commands, and you have the card manufacturer being a separate entity from the DirectX spec designers being a separate entity from CCP.

[Comstar]

Turns out surrendering Czechoslovakia takes more than 1 day - it's going to take an entire extra day to write the final text.

[Sir T]

Thats funny, it took me 30 seconds.

"Don't worry. We're here to tell you that CCP listened to us. Everything is fine. Trust us. Trust CCP."

Never has such a half assed company demanded such quasi-religious levels of trust.

[ajax34i]

They're going to take all this time to carefully write this reply that's supposed to fix everything and then they'll discover that:

- it takes way more effort than one blog to fix the crap they've gotten themselves into
- just like they ignore the forums and look at subscription numbers, we also don't trust them and will look at what they do not what they say, and not in 18 months either

So, yeah whatever.

[IainC]

Thats funny, it took me 30 seconds.

"Don't worry. We're here to tell you that CCP listened to us. Everything is fine. Trust us. Trust CCP."

Never has such a half assed company demanded such quasi-religious levels of trust.

This and other posts inspired me to make this:

[Goumindong]

Why?  The example we're discussing is only a temporary increase in demand by definition.  How can you possibly make some argument like you KNOW with 100% certainty that the price will not drop down to normal prices again in any example anyways?   Also I'm not arguing I don't know that much about econ I'm actually asking about all this so there's no "quitting while I'm behind".   If I sound like I'm arguing I'm merely totally baffled how you keep discussing econ like it's a science.

1) Economics is a science. It follows the scientific method. It is as much a science as any other science that must use possibly unreliable readings, such a climate science, or physics. The difference is that with economics, contrary to physics, you cannot ethically build experiments, which means you must use natural experiments and statistical analysis, precisely the same way as climate scientists use natural experiments and statistical analysis. You not understanding what science is does not make it less science.

Now it can certainly be harder to get precise measurements but again, that is like saying that physics wasn't a science 200 years ago because they couldn't measure as precisely. Or that we can't look at the constant of gravity because the mass of the earth is constantly changing as material is added[asteroids] or subtracted[venting/launching stuff into space] which will change the mass of the earth and therefore change the constant of gravity.

2) You have posited an increase in demand because people are willing to buy more and pay more. The people who "leave" the demand curve cannot have an effect on the price due to those shifts, because after the shift, they aren't buying anyway. Its as if every WoW player who did not play EVE said "MT in EVE, well i never. I will no longer play that game!". They aren't playing the game anyway, so it can't make a difference. People who have been priced out of the market for plex not buying plex doesn't change the price of plex.

It is only if you can posit why people who are explicitly willing to buy more plex would change their behavior after prices rise. This doesn't make sense because we explicitly listed their changed preference to buy more plex at a higher price in the assumption of demand increasing. If they were not willing to why would they do it originally?

Now it may be the case that demand doesn't increase and supply doesn't decrease. But there is no reason to suspect that, it is certainly less likely than the other theory that demand will increase and supply will decrease if you can buy in game advantages with plex.

[Mrbloodworth]

http://www.eveonline.com/devblog.asp?a=blog&bid=935

I dig how the first few comments in that are spinning new conspiracy theories.



BTW, no streaming client? For shame. Took me hours using steam.  

[Amaron]

1) Economics is a science. ...blahblah... You not understanding what science is does not make it less science.

Economics is not a science.  It is a social science (ie applying scientific rigor to something that's not science).

People who have been priced out of the market for plex not buying plex doesn't change the price of plex.

This is what I mean and am saying poorly I think.   They won't change the price of the plex later.   I don't know what marketing terms you use for that.   The market can go back down and they won't be there anymore.   They will have quit and thus the theoretical demand that they once represented will be gone.

It is only if you can posit why people who are explicitly willing to buy more plex would change their behavior after prices rise.  This doesn't make sense because we explicitly listed their changed preference to buy more plex at a higher price in the assumption of demand increasing. If they were not willing to why would they do it originally?

Hmm why doesn't it make sense?   We're talking about them selling skill points right?  Again I don't know the marketing terms but isn't that clearly a case where demand would spike then drop down?

[tmp]

The CSM helped CCP understand the emotional connection players had with „ship spinning". They vehemently demanded the return of the feature, which  CCP committed to introduce in some form at a future date. Until that functionality is added back in, the option to load station environments will remain in the Settings menu.

Seeing how the various WoW databases can pull it off, I reckon they could make it a web applet thing. 90% of the playerbase wouldn't likely miss the rest of the game attached to it, anyway

[Goumindong]

Economics is not a science.  It is a social science (ie applying scientific rigor to something that's not science).

Social sciences are science! By your definition, phsyics is not a science because it is applying scientific rigor[formal science] to study something not science [natural science], and neither is biology[life science] or engineering [applied science]. Actually out of all of those fields, the applied is the only one you might have a chance of arguing as "not science".

What makes something science is not what is studied. What makes something science is how it is studied.

This is what I mean and am saying poorly I think.   They won't change the price of the plex later.   I don't know what marketing terms you use for that.   The market can go back down and they won't be there anymore.   They will have quit and thus the theoretical demand that they once represented will be gone

If that is what you're saying then you're not saying what you think you're saying.

If they are pushed out of the market it doesn't matter. If the market goes back down. Wait, why would the market go back down? Didn't we just say that people would be willing to buy more at any given price? Why would people stop buying on their previous demand schedule? Except for another shock to the system?

And why would people not come back if it became profitable to do so, you can get a free 4 hour resub to get plex and apply it to your account. Why would people not restart if prices fell?

Now we were not talking about buying skillpoints. But that should not matter anyway. Since people would expect a demand spike they would be able to prepare and ride it out. I.E. if people think prices are going to fall and they will, then they won't leave the market, they will just delay purchase

What we were actually talking about is selling advantages. Things like "+5% damage for your account for x time"

[TripleDES]

Only casually following the whole mess, but 70$ for a virtual monocle? What the fucking hell? Also, the leaked CEO e-mail was fucking hilarious.

[luckton]

Read the CSM/CCP joint release today.  Talk about some killer brainwashing  .  The CSMs even acknowledge the leaked email about the monocle success and how it reeked of pure evil, but then everything else is candy-canes and gum-drops?  All is forgiven?

/cave johnson

"We're done here."