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Bald face assertions are just that...bald face assertions and not worthy of a serious response.

And the continuing appeal on the behalf of new players only undermines your argument.

You could write a doctoral thesis paper based on all the assumption you are making there Rob.

First off, a large Citadel BPO is 70 Bil. It's a lot, but it's not an insurmountable amount. Certainly not for a BPO that would be considered a long term strategic asset. If less than 200 of them are sold on day 1, I'll be very very surprised. Some of those will go into research, but a lot will start pumping out 0 (Or more likely 3-4) ME Citadel copies for people who want a citadel NOW more than they want to save a mere 400-700 mil worth of materials. Give a few weeks and you can expect a dozen BPC's being cranked out every day. Not 5 BPO's.

Isk inflation and concentration has been increasing for years. When a multiboxing nullsec miner can pull 300 mil an hour with a 4 accounts, a multibox ratter 200 an hour with 2 characters, a highsec inventor/builder can pull in couple bil a month in profit, a hardcore Incursion runner can pull in a few bil in a weekend. And lets not even get into how much a good trader can make.

Things like Titans, supercarriers, or 70 bil isk L Citadel BPO's are no longer something only for group efforts. There are tons of relatively wealthy players who will get one as well, on top of all the groups getting them for their own use or industrial copying and sale.


The second ridiculous assumption is that there's going to be a prolonged and concerted effort to bash these Citadels by nullsec groups. Given that the CFC is A: already richer than Midas, and B: has plenty of their own problems atm, trying to wrangle enough nerds to wardec and bash dozens of highsec structures on a regular basis to try and maintain a market monopoly is extremely unlikely. And basically everyone else has either far better things to worry about, or the attention span of a gnat (looking at you here PL)

The third and most ridiculous assumption is the idea that just because it may end poorly means that eve players will stop doing something.

People still try to invade CFC space. People still form mining corps and advertise in highsec despite it being a wardec magnet. People still haul stupid amounts of items in Charons through Niarja. People still let Pantsufan into an alliance leadership position. People still accept duels in highsec. People still try and form one man corps and then build a thriving corp with no experience or way to attract decent recruits. People use dreads within range of PL. People escalate fights when HK tackles a ratter.

We are really bad at not doing things that may end in disaster, and really good at giving those bad ideas a shot anyway. So the idea that eve players will stop building citadels with market citadels because a big group might shoot them?

About as likely as everyone suddenly realizing that hauling 5 Bil in a cargo fit freighter through Niarja at 22:00 is a bad idea.

Players will build citadels. Players will put markets in them. Unless some big Ebil group is prepared to wardec and bash a bunch of citadels on a very regular basis, there's not going to be an iron fist monopoly of trade.

And I don't buy that. Let's be serious here, the most organized activity outside of their own space that the CFC has done in years was the Burn Jita and Hulkageddon events, and even those were a tiny fraction of the sustained effort that would be required to wardec and siege everyone who wanted to build a market citadel.

It might be ridiculous to assume that any group would continually bash dozens of citadels to maintain a market monopoly, but that might not even be necessary. There might only be a couple citadels at any time that would be worth bashing to maintain control over most of the market. It would be even easier just to hire someone to camp a system and gank anything that comes or goes to keep the competition from growing. The wealth from a popular citadel could be massive. I doubt many groups wouldn't be interested in a market monopoly even if they are "richer than Midas".

@Teckos, exactly how much did Standard Oil make whilst struggling to enforce their monopoly?

There are a few *small* buildings and institutions it started, you know...

Edit: because I think it bears spelling out.

Repeating "Oh, but it's hard!" as a reason it won't happen is pretty ******* stupid. We literally have proof in real life that "it's too hard" is the stupidest, most incorrect reason things won't happen.

Could you explain, for the ignorant, who and what broke up Standard Oil, and what forces they had at their disposal? Could you identify how that force functions in Eve, and what self-imposed limitations they have?

Alot, but ironically their big advantage was the rebates from the rail roads. Rockefeller played the railroads off of one another basically, he also threatened to build piplines instead of using the railroads. It allowed him to keep his costs low and thus his prices and undercut competitors.

Also, his company was extremely innovative, unlike your typical monopoly, in that it used what was often considered waste products at other refineries either as final goods (vasoline) or as an input (Rockefeller's refineries would use gasoline to power machinery vs. dumping it into rivers). But the bottom line is that kerosene prices dropped considerably making the typical consumer better off. So, if we are going to use this as a template, anyone referencing new players can go **** themselves...preferably spit roast style so they just can't type anymore.*

It was finally broken up by the U.S. government well past its heyday as the largest oil refining company in the U.S. Ironically the break up vastly increased Rockefeller's wealth several fold. And even more ironically, Standard Oil has re-emerged today...now we call it Exxon-Mobil. An analogous institution in the game would be CCP...fortunately CCP is much, much more hands off than the U.S. government.

Your point?

Oh, and as point of reference, Ida Tarbell, the muck-racker that had a particular obsession with Standard...her father owned a refinery and was put out of business by Rockefeller. Not exactly the most unbiased source.

It's amazing what you can learn when you read something besides the popular account of history.

*Some numbers...in 1880 when Standard had a 90% market share the price of kerosene was 9 cents. Down from 58 cents when Rockefeller first got into oil refining (no, I am not attributing that price decrease all to Rockefeller, but for somebody who many regard as the quintessential monopolist he sure was doing it ******* wrong). In the 1890's, the price of kerosene was...7 cents. As a supposed "monopolist" Rockefeller was apparently a ******* moron.

If citadels go the route of Standard Oil, new players and many others will likely be strictly better off with cheaper goods than they otherwise might be. But I am doubtful such an outcome can be obtained. As Anhenka pointed out, explaining why would go a long way towards at least a master's thesis if not a PhD.

Look, Teckos, you answered my questions already!

I can't tell if your obliviousness is deliberate, or if you really do forget the things you post after you post them.



I was raising the upsides of the monopoly which you deliberately ignore.

Standard Oil made Rockefeller ludicrously rich. Even before the Sherman act, he was worth hundreds of billions of dollars. (in today's money).

In Eve, there is no Sherman Act. There is no proactive government.

My point is this: making a ludicrous amount of ISK is unhealthy for the game and for the players.

But please, keep telling me how bad the monopoly of Standard Oil was for Rockefeller, who died a homeless pauper inside one of his failed refineries...

/s.

Monopolies suck. They reduce output and raise prices. That is what they do. Considering Standard Oil did neither of those, IMO, Standard was not a monopoly. Monopolies earn economic profits and introduce a distortion to the economy. But, IMO, in the Standard case this is hard to argue in that prices actually decreased. If anything Standard introduced more effective cost minimization which is a good thing not only for Standard but for society. And if they increased profits, that's good too because profits are not a bad thing either.

There is ludicrious amounts of ISK in the game and some players make ludicrous amounts of ISK. I fail to see the down side of a player or a group of players having stupid amounts of ISK, but perhaps you can elucidate these downsides.

I think Rob's point is that amassing a vast fortune in terms of ISK is bad for the game. Seeing as how many players already have amassed vast fortunes and the game is still here I find Rob's position merely one based on....well I was going to say envy, but to be honest, I have not idea what. Not even sure he does.

I simply find the notion that a player monopoly will develop and it will ruin the game to be a rather strong pair of claims that I'd like to see more of an explanation. Right now the argument seems to go like this:

1. Goons put down an XL citadel in Perimeter.
2. Everyone decides challenging the new Goon hegemony is pointless and don't even try.
3. Goons make even more stupid amounts of ISK.
4. CCP for some reason has to turn off the servers forever.

Talk about bringing people out of the woodwork!

@Marcus, good point. Maybe you're ignoring insurance, but that's not that important.

@Lucas, maybe I'm just misreading your first sentence or perhaps you've dropped a comma, but your first sentence seems to be confused. Because the ISK is being concentrated in the hands of one player, it's not really 'real'? I'm probably not understanding you correctly.

As for IWI and the like, I disapprove of those too :P. I will say that they're an example of player structures developed by players for players, where as this would/will be an example of player structures developed for players by CCP. IWI 'earned' their position, as it were, whereas our future despot is 'given' theirs.

@Teckos, You're the one who initially identified it as a monopoly. If it isn't, that isn't my fault...

@Teckos and Lucas, I'll write the "How to create a monopoly" post which is the post to Teckos I postponed.