EVE, the (pay-to-)free-to-play game

[Liptonez]

Is it just me or :captainobvious: is EVE starting to become CCPs retard child they never wanted to grow up? So now they're just making a money machine out of it, like showing the retard kid in circus.

No major stuff added to the game, just enough to keep people interested. With all due respect, but where are the "real" expansions from back in the day (when I haven't even been around), like Trinity engine, POSes, caps, supers, wormholes, drone lands (as bad as some of the implementations may have been). Back when CCP had just like 100 employees they created better and more content than they do now.

And even more than back then, you need to pay for fucking anything you want. Paying 15€ for a character transfer is bad enough, imo, but PLEX charity, PLEX for fanfest, PLEX for supers, PLEX for buddy invite. And I bet I forgot so many more. I'm pretty sure I'm not too far off when I say that there's between 3 and 5k super accounts in EVE.

To me it's a wonder why PLEXes aren't up to 1b or so yet.

Does this bug anyone else, or am I just starting to become bitter?

Don't get me wrong, I still <3 EVE, but I'm mad that CCP makes tons more of money but only does shit for the game. Not nerfing supers (or making them dockable heh) because of RL money is just the prime example, imo.

Edited title because it was retarded.

[Leviathan]

needs more ships and space.. jove space or w/e you wanna role play. no caps in this space and no HS- at least the size of 2 regions.

[joe space]

need an engine trails emote right about now

[Mike deVoid]

Spaceship development is hitting a slow patch as they deploy Incarna technology due to the sunk cost (so they might as well get something out of it, right?). We've 2 releases of mostly Incarna stuff and then they can get right back into spaceships.

I'm still amazed at how little they released with Tyrannis a year ago though.

[Catari Taga]

To me it's a wonder why PLEXes aren't up to 1b or so yet.

Does this bug anyone else, or am I just starting to become bitter?

Don't get me wrong, I still <3 EVE, but I'm mad that CCP makes tons more of money but only does shit for the game. Not nerfing supers (or making them dockable heh) because of RL money is just the prime example, imo.
PLEX is CCP's system to allow players to buy ISK from other players. Since this is subject to standard market dynamics and in particular demand for PLEX is not infinite, the system can grind to a halt when there is an oversupply of PLEX and players simply cannot reliably convert their PLEX into ISK, forcing them to look for third party ISK sellers again. As far as I had understood, such an oversupply was actually becoming an issue, and thus CCP creating additional demand for PLEX makes sense.

Not making supers dockable may be a financial consideration, but it is certainly also game play consideration, because their numbers would sky rocket even more if they did (I certainly would have gotten one of every race just like I had at least one of every other non-unique dockable ship in the game).

And finally, CCP trying to conquer the market for non-flying in space games and neglecting classic EVE in the process isn't exactly news (:18 months:).

[Bacchanalian]

Yeah, seriously, I mean in the last couple years we've only gotten T3s, Wormholes, Incursions, a new mothership, game-changing buffs to faction ships that were previously shit, and the beginnings of a completely new facet to the game that may not appeal to everyone but certainly does appeal to many. Did I forget to mention Dust? Oh yeah, that too.

EVE has kinda reached a point where you risk oversaturation. How many more ship classes do we need when CCP still hasn't quite figured out how to balance what we've got to the extent that dozens of ships are still utterly fucking useless?

Count me in the camp of "I'd rather they fix what we've got first and add new shit later" camp. I remember the old expansions where they added a bunch of new shit and broke the server to the point of the game being unplayable for a week after. No thanks.

[TimMc]

Count me in the camp of "I'd rather they fix what we've got first and add new shit later" camp. I remember the old expansions where they added a bunch of new shit and broke the server to the point of the game being unplayable for a week after. No thanks.

This.

[Samp]

It's an odd world in which we have to excuse doing somehting good by arguing it makes money, but that's how things are.

I don't think the company regarding the product as a cash machine is a terrible thing - nobody in the western world is payed to do things right, they are grudingly payed to get the highest number of new sales. So if Eve can keep generating purchaces it's easier to justify it's ongoing development, and it's less likey to die when Emo on-line comes out, or when they fuck up and Dust is released in the middle of term time a day before call of duty 7 and a day after Obama is assasinated by Sarah Palin's porn-double.

That said, the feeling that some degree of cashing-in some of accumulated loyalty is going on is one coming over me too. ISK from L4s was reduced. ISK from 0.0 was reduced. There is talk of datacores going and we are hours away from a shake up of ISK from LP.

The company seems to want the game to be more expencive to play.

The ISK we can't get from the game will either be replaced by more poeple buying more plex, or by players changing expectations about how much fun they can have, and what kind of ships they can afford to fly.

Boting super empires will always have the most ISK, but smaller entities will feel the ISK pressure for sure. Since the more established players who pay for subs with ISK in the end need newer players (or you know ebayers or whatever) to pay cash to get it, this means that the new player experience is going to involve spending more real money and still being far far behind in terms of possiblities in game, compared to the macroing power blocks.

That said - what is the alernative?

Keep providing a good game and don't rince the players? There are maybe 7 or 8 poeple on the planet who would credit that as a good idea, and I'm one so the chances of anyone who thinks that being in managment in CCP are so remote as to be be fairly discounted as a possibility.

Put the Sub price up? Who isn't on the verge of quitting anyway? This will be the last straw to many vets, and if you just started playing 2 months ago and it's 'already' gone up that's going to send the message that playing is an escalating cost - that smacks of telling the customers some kind of truth - but of corse you would get a lot of money in the IMEADIATE - and that in business is all that matters. So the question here is how much of CCP is in business and how much is in it to make cool stuff.

Option 3 is where we are now - make the players in game poorer in the hope they will be aided by their fat counterparts in real life.

All things end. Eve will die. I know there's a 100 year plan for delevlopment but there's no 100 year plan for investors - they want more money now. If it kills the product AFTER they get paid, why the fuck would they care?

I don't want it to die yet, so I understand there are compromises to be made. Some of the quality of service / $ paid will be lost over time but that extends the life of the project.

If you're in business becasue you think the world really should have the thing you make, your mission has to be to stay under cover as a vicious souless money grubbing fuck while secretly injecting quality while the boss isn't looking and talking efficiency when he is.

The line between coruption and capitulation is blurred and the jouney accross it mindless.

Many who started this enterprise because it was cool will now be in positions where they feel they have to be like business poeple are, they have to grow up and be responcible and get all the money now. This unraveling is slow, and we have time yet to enjoy, or to be enraged by this game.

Also 2 AM posts; best posts.

[Liptonez]

Count me in the camp of "I'd rather they fix what we've got first and add new shit later" camp. I remember the old expansions where they added a bunch of new shit and broke the server to the point of the game being unplayable for a week after. No thanks.

This.

I'm absolutely in for that too. I don't really care about new content. Like you say all the new content is fucked up and has stayed that way. All up for fixing the stuff that's ingame, but then also fucking do it.

Tier system, POSes, supers/caps, jump drives, tier balance, weapon system and ship balance, sov, moons come to mind.

I just haven't seen CCP doing either of it in a long time. Apocrypha wasn't all that bad IMO. But all the expansions afterwards, and a couple before it were just :facepalm:

[Herschel Yamamoto]

Samp: You realize that selling PLEX doesn't actually give CCP much money, right? It's a bit higher than your subscription fee, but really not a lot.

[Bacchanalian]

They fixed faction ships, for instance. They're about to tweak jump bridges (/me points and laughs at all the whining carebears) and on-board scanning (woohoo for not having to gimp tackle inty fits with core probe launchers anymore to catch plexers). A handful of changes come to mind over the last few years, such as the projectile changes (wtb blaster buff), the upcoming changes to mission-related skills (I know fuck-all about missioning, so don't ask me if those are good or bad). I'm drawing a blank on other changes, but I know I'm forgetting several.

They're not coming quickly, but they're coming, and again going back to CCP's record of rolling shit out quickly, I'd prefer they take their time about it and do it right (or closer to right than they have in the past).

[Rakshasa The Cat]

Apocrypha is the perfect example of player expectation and reality clashing; that expansion pulled together both Atlanta and Iceland studios on a massive effort that due to the time and content requirements built up a lot of technical debt (e.g ducttape code) that they spent several expansions cleaning up.

[Shin_getter]

That said, the feeling that some degree of cashing-in some of accumulated loyalty is going on is one coming over me too. ISK from L4s was reduced. ISK from 0.0 was reduced. There is talk of datacores going and we are hours away from a shake up of ISK from LP.

All this makes relatively little difference, since all it does is result in deflation.

The purchasing power in eve is dominated by mineral and moon material production. If there is this much material being mined, it needs to be turned into ships and products to sell to someone else. If there is very little isk in the system it just means the isk price would be lower. As deflation runs around, the plex cost would fall in response to the new currency generation situation. Now reduction in LP generation might increase faction item prices, but a influx of nullbears post sanctum nerf may reverse that effect.

Deflation do benefit players with the most assets in raw isk, which is older players who do not have assets tied up in things they actually have to use, but pretty much all market changes benefit old players anyways.

--
There is also a sizable lobby that is consistently demanding that ccp makes everyone "poorer" to stop "supercapital online" or some variant of the pitch. It may happen as a side effect of bot bannings, however in terms of power balance it means people that already is part of supercapital online is going to be even harder to challenge since those ships would become more expensive, in terms of manhours, in the future.


Since the more established players who pay for subs with ISK in the end need newer players (or you know ebayers or whatever) to pay cash to get it, this means that the new player experience is going to involve spending more real money and still being far far behind in terms of possiblities in game, compared to the macroing power blocks.
Looking at the demographics at here, I'm quite sure this is exactly what most players here wants. Just fiddle with the t2bpo sets, speculate on some patch items and watch the newbies pay for their sub or grind the hell out of everything to make ends meet.

If bittervets really do have greater influence (and they certainly are more organized), this set up is exactly what they'd support.


Since this is subject to standard market dynamics and in particular demand for PLEX is not infinite, the system can grind to a halt when there is an oversupply of PLEX and players simply cannot reliably convert their PLEX into ISK, forcing them to look for third party ISK sellers again. As far as I had understood, such an oversupply was actually becoming an issue, and thus CCP creating additional demand for PLEX makes sense.
I don't think there is PLEX conversion difficulties, as its still hell expensive for someone that wants to play for free without effort, and there is always jita buy orders at 2% below sell, I think there is just simply a excessive stockpile of plex everywhere that is left unused. People that grind hard and save internet spaceship money wants a value preserving asset to keep their wealth, and they choose plex because it has "real value". Someone on eve-o talked about how ccp wants to cut the amount of outlying plex just floating around and that is why they created all these additional uses. In any case, more money for CCP.

[RoemySchneider]

i remember the term of "technical debt" a couple of months ago when lag began to piss off even the biggest fanbois.
with team BFF installed, combing over some of the rougher mishaps, we're at a point where this turns into "game development debt". CCP is about to surrender to lag with that time dilettante thingy but the (lack of) balance has made this game pretty stale - and they don't even sport a balancing team. mistakes in the economy have been going on for years (technetium) and are even going to become worse (nerf to anoms, nerf to missions/R&D, no nerf to the belt bots) leaving us with undeserved if not cheated billions and therefore inflation. meanwhile PI could do with a revision, sov/pos/stations needed reiterating the day they switched to this new system, the entire economy goes through jita (all of 0.0 included) which is euphemistically called 'logistics', the problem of unprobebale ships was ignored when the probing system was still on sisi [by itself not that big a deal but T3s were introduced in the same expansion], T3s have made some recons obsolete, supercaps have cannibalized caps, dramiel is feasting on ceptors, tier1 faction cruisers were never able to even compete against 'popular' T1 cruisers, despite 80% of them being useless, one half of the BC line seems to only exist for invention purposes, the same basically holds true for anything smaller than a rupture, miners have killed themselves by demanding bigger&better toys to make their profession 'more efficient' and the juiciest of stuff available to everyone - even the insurance nerf hurt them despite the fact that the newscycle/threadnaughts that led to it was motivated by (a) hulkageddon -- and i'm sure i can come up with dozens more if i set my mind to it and once the coffee has found its way through the machine.

by itself such issues seem fixable. however, you can't just 'turn around' the economy; the damage has been done, there's trillions of excess cash and/or thousands of motherships - try nerfing those without an amok threadnaught now, i dare ya... anyways, everything is affordable and if this keeps up, we'll have to fit deadspace mods to stay competitive in ~2 years' time (well, we already started with c-type platings </nitpick> besides... if this supercaps-online keeps going we'll be there even sooner).

another 'side-effect' is acceptance. the influx of fresh meat doesn't remember the days when lag didnt make the drake the backbone of every fleet. or when T2 was still expensive rnough to leave T1 cruisers as an option. i'm not saying everything was better back then, but all the now-useless ships don't even interest pattern anymore, he'd rather have new stuff to make even more of the old obsolete. a WoW-like throw-away mentality is setting in where noobs can ignore the T1 and named stuff and get right to the rare items (faction/T2) if not unique (supercaps) and expansions are expected to add and shift to that. grinding becomes powercreeping towards supercaps, bot proliferation being at an all time high accelerates the incline of the threshold. and although i'm not a fan of the slippery slope argument, i'm sure that the prospect of 3 accs with super caps being 'required' for 0.0 isnt that far fetched.
and we'll probably still lol at railguns -.-

[Shin_getter]

TROLL POST

Yahweh is about to surrender to darwin with that evolution thingy but the (lack of) balance has made this game pretty stale - and they don't even sport a balancing team. mistakes in the economy have been going on for years (crude oil) and are even going to become worse (nerf to farming, nerf to manufacturing, no nerf to software developers) leaving us with undeserved if not cheated billions and therefore inflation. meanwhile service industries could do with a revision, nations/fortresses/missile silos needed reiterating the day they switched to this new system, the entire economy goes through internet (even Nigeria) which is euphemistically called 'telecommunications', the problem of submarines was ignored when the electronic detection systems was still experimental , Submarines have made some surface ships obsolete, Super Carriers have cannibalized battleships, stealth fighters is feasting on, 3rd gen fighters, Attack oriented missile battlecruisers (kirov) were never able to even compete against cheaper defensive cruisers, despite 80% of them being useless compared to an AEGIS, most of the ship hull designs never make it off the drawing board, especially for ships the size of patrol craft, miners have killed themselves by funding the development of new automation technology to make their profession 'more efficient' and make the juiciest of stuff available to everyone - even the end to large scale warfare hurt them despite the fact that miners have consistently supported peace! -- and i'm sure i can come up with dozens more if i set my mind to it and once the coffee has found its way through the machine.

by itself such issues seem fixable. however, you can't just 'turn around' the economy; the damage has been done, there's trillions of excess cash and/or thousands of cellphones SUVs, houses, and computers- try nerfing those without an amok threadnaught now, i dare ya... anyways, everything is affordable and if this keeps up, we'll have to buy a hybrid car and a multi-monitor gaming setup to stay competitive in ~2 years' time (well, we already started with iphones </nitpick> besides... if this consumerism-online keeps going we'll be there even sooner).

another 'side-effect' is acceptance. the influx of fresh meat doesn't remember the days when pollution didn't make everyone drink tap water, or when cars was still expensive rnough to leave horse cart as an option. i'm not saying everything was better back then, but all the now-useless items don't even interest pattern anymore, he'd rather have new stuff to make even more of the old obsolete. a WoW-like throw-away mentality is setting in where noobs can ignore the handmade and simple stuff and get right to the rare items (made out of multinational supply chains) if not unique and expansions are expected to add and shift to that. grinding becomes powercreeping towards greater wealth, automation proliferation being at an all time high accelerates the incline of the threshold. and although i'm not a fan of the slippery slope argument, i'm sure that the prospect of 80k income with 2 cars being 'required' for suburb living isnt that far fetched.
and we'll probably still lol at railguns -.-

[b]/Troll post

Man, real life, so broken :(

That said, if you view eve as an alternative world with its own life, then change, growth and obsolence (and some unfairness) is totally natural.

From a fun perspective I'd rather they add more stuff and break more stuff as opposed to keeping everything balanced (and thus, dead since balanced things don't get changed to be unbalanced again). One could make it a game on how to exploit every new thing in the world.

[Goldsnake]

fuck plex, bring back 30day GTC's on sale for 150mil :cut:

[Ask Unbeatable]

:companioncube: PLEX, I made a lot of money playing with that market

[zangorus]

Give me one and i will be your friend <3

[cillisia]

Samp: You realize that selling PLEX doesn't actually give CCP much money, right? It's a bit higher than your subscription fee, but really not a lot.

It's cheaper for ukfags to pay by plex, and I guess eurofags too?

[NoirAvlaa]

Samp: You realize that selling PLEX doesn't actually give CCP much money, right? It's a bit higher than your subscription fee, but really not a lot.

It's cheaper for ukfags to pay by plex, and I guess eurofags too?

Yah works out cheaper to buy GTCs from USA than to buy GTCs from UK/Europe or game time from CCP.

[Herschel Yamamoto]

Wacky. I pay in USD, so a subscription is cheaper here.

[Malcanis]

there's trillions of excess cash and/or thousands of motherships - try nerfing those without an amok threadnaught now, i dare ya...

Are you serious? CCP just nerfed anomalies and jump bridges, and gave the finger to both threadnaughts while they were doing it. Tens of thousands of people whored anoms and used JBs every day and their wails of pain and outrage were all ignored. Nerfing supercaps is going to be easy-peasy in comparison, since everyone who doesn't have one hates them, and quite a few people who do have them accept that they're overpowered.

[Shin_getter]

If one nerfs supers before time dilation happens, we might be seeing mega-lag killing the server more often in sov fights though.....Since willing is back to cramming the most guys into the system as opposed to having the most of the biggest ship.....

[noobcake]

drones contribute to lag far more than anything a 4000 man BS fleet could...

[Shin_getter]

4000 man BS fleet launch drones to clear tackle = ????

or hell, 4000 drakes :E

[killfalcon]

If one nerfs supers before time dilation happens, we might be seeing mega-lag killing the server more often in sov fights though.....Since willing is back to cramming the most guys into the system as opposed to having the most of the biggest ship.....

So, you think that people actually say "fuck it, I don't need the KMs, the supers can handle it?" Knowing that some bugger has to kill the tackle or be the tackle to stop the supers being useless?

Doubt that. If supers don't show, we'll see the same number of ships anyway, just some of them will be smaller.

[Sparq]

re: drones causing lag

I always wondered if it'd reduce lag , if CCP could convert the usual 1 to 5 drones into a drone "cloud" entity. Essentially, an animation of anywhere between 1 to 5 drones become one entity as a "swarm" animation with one set of stats, combined from however many drones are present.

As that entity is worn down by combat, it sheds the matching amount of stats that a lost drone would add, each time a whole drone worth of damage is lost & revert to the next animation down in no. of drones.

I would assume that'd drop the (presumed) calculations needed per second per drone per person, though obviously there is the problem of electronic warfare/stuff hitting all "five" (or however many) drones at once ... meh. Just a thought.

[Rivqua]

there's trillions of excess cash and/or thousands of motherships - try nerfing those without an amok threadnaught now, i dare ya...

Are you serious? CCP just nerfed anomalies and jump bridges, and gave the finger to both threadnaughts while they were doing it. Tens of thousands of people whored anoms and used JBs every day and their wails of pain and outrage were all ignored. Nerfing supercaps is going to be easy-peasy in comparison, since everyone who doesn't have one hates them, and quite a few people who do have them accept that they're overpowered.


Nerfing of future income a tad(anoms) and changing tactics (JBs) != nerfing toys people already have in their hands, which a much stronger feeling of loss to those players. Just saying.

And why do ppl keep mentioning that L4s were nerfed when CCP seems to have all but superbuffed them again ?

[RoemySchneider]

well, from what i understand they were nerfed a couple of weeks/months ago when t1 loot (meta0 i believe... the lowest, buildable kind) dropped considerably less - you'll have to ask a high-sec dweller though.

[Mike deVoid]

last year or before was when they nerfed meta 0 loot, afaicr

[blaad]

last year or before was when they nerfed meta 0 loot, afaicr

It was end of last summer. It was also was supposed to crash mineral market forever. :lol:

[Malcanis]

Uh, it was supposed to help stop the mineral market crashing for ever. They also rebalanced drone loot at that time IIRC.

[Voulture]

fuck plex, bring back 30day GTC's on sale for 150mil :cut:

My first timecode 30d cost 80m. That was the price of set of t2 6x1400 turrets for tempest.

Fuck eve, really.

[Lancehot]

A grand didn't come for free back then *nostalgia*