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Guess what? Solo players ARE the majority in EVE.

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Zyrbalax III
Goldcrest Enterprises
#181 - 2013-01-23 11:43:27 UTC
Ghazu wrote:
FloppieTheBanjoClown wrote:
I did solo Eve for quite a long time. The thing to remember is that there's more social contact to Eve than being in a group. The majority of my contacts in Eve come from the days when I roamed all over New Eden and w-space at my whim, getting to know the locals through cooperation and combat.

What I find problematic is the vast numbers of players in NPC corps.

Yes you may be solo, but you are subject to eve, the problem is the people who want their safe instances.


Very nicely put. For me the nature of EVE (and other EVE players) is part of what I love about this game; so I don't want safe instances, and if I get mugged doing something stupid, that's part of the game and something I expect to happen every now and again.

Z3
Zyrbalax III
Goldcrest Enterprises
#182 - 2013-01-23 11:53:38 UTC
dark heartt wrote:
Ishtanchuk Fazmarai wrote:

What I got is that they've noticed that without the 1,000 dudes paying the bills, you and CCP would be FUBAR.

There would not be architects without 100 someones laying the bricks and pouring the concrete, and there would not be100 someones laying bricks without 10,000 no-ones buying the damn houses.

EVE is quite focused on "successful" players, but in doing so it neglects that many players just are "losers" and nobody pays 15 € per month to be a "loser" in a game. (Success= find the viable gameplay venues, like good corps/good mechanics and fail= get stuck in not viable gameplay venues like wrong corps/wrong mechanics)

In my words, it's the "politically incorrect" players who play the "wrong way" the ones who keep the show running. And so far, CCP has neglected them, treating them like expendable assets, until their numbers have begun to shrink.


Do you mind if I ask what it is you do in eve? Are you a miner, a mission runner or an explorer? Do you do industry or solo PVP?

There is no right and wrong way to play this game (that's the idea of the sandbox), however there are basic principles of this universe that shouldn't be changed, as it would lead to a worse game. I totally agree that for every CSM member or Alliance leader there are thousands of people who play solo or in small groups and there is nothing wrong with the solo player.

I was for almost a year a solo miner. I would go out in my hulk and mine on my main, and use my alt to haul for me. I was a member of nobody's corp except my own, and I did very little actual interaction with others during this time. I know what it's like to be that guy in a dead end system running level 4 missions in a Raven. But when my hulk got suicide ganked or someone ninja salvaged my mission loot I didn't come to the forums and cry for change. I learned to tank my hulk, and plain ignored the salvager.

There have been at least 5 or 6 different occasions when I did stupid things (my very first raven was killed in 0.0 space with small guns a shield and armour tank and a MWD that was too small). But I still didn't cry about how CCP made this game hard for the solo guy or how it was all too hard, I learned from my mistakes.

It seems I keep posting walls of text, but I feel really passionate about this point: EVE is harsh and unforgiving and everything should be easier as a group because of this.
There is no problem with adding content that can be done solo, and in fact you need that content for new players. But everything that can be done solo needs to be able to be done in a group and made easier because of this. It may seem like punishment to the solo player, but look at it this way.

If I wanted to dig a really big hole and I did it on my own it would be harder than say me getting 5 of my mates together and sharing the workload. The same basic principle applies in Eve. What can be done by someone alone can be done quicker and in some cases better by a group.

The truth is, Eve is made by the people playing it. and in my honest opinion you are missing out if you don't get to interact with this community in some way. Hell reading about the politics in 0.0 and the player run market were two of the things that got me into Eve, and they are all about the interactions that people have with each other. Solo play in Eve is in truth not really solo, because that ship you are flying was made by someone, that mission loot or minerals that you are selling are going to a player and no solo player I know can tell me any different.

Introduce more solo play for people, but for the love of everything Eve, don't make it easy.



I like the way you think, and agree with you pretty much 100%. As a (mostly) solo player I don't want anything safe or easy, just more variety in the stuff I can do solo. I'm very happy if it's stuff that can be done easier, quicker or better in groups, because even though I choose not to play in groups myself at the moment, I understand that's the nature of the game.

I too get p'd off when people complain about it not being fair that they lost stuff because of the nasty ebil piwate... but I also get p'd off by players who don't seem able to accept that it is actually ALLOWED to play an MMO on your own, and that some of us actually find it FUN! Sure we might have moar fun if we played in a group, but for lots of us RL does not allow unconstrained playtime, so we take what fun we can from the game we love.

So it sure is good to see someone like you posting a balanced view :o)

Thanks
Z3
Barrogh Habalu
Imperial Shipment
Amarr Empire
#183 - 2013-01-23 11:57:31 UTC
Vaerah Vahrokha wrote:
*Good stuff about life and EVE*

This is one of the best posts on the topic I've read lately.

Future of T3 cruisers - multi-tool they aspired to be instead of sledgehammer they have become
Zyrbalax III
Goldcrest Enterprises
#184 - 2013-01-23 11:58:32 UTC
Vaerah Vahrokha wrote:


I'd like to expand on the "make the loser feel like a winner" bit.

In RL, the hugest majority of people are modest guys who are given a lot of "winner taste and feel" to keep their mind away from the simple fact they are being sucked dry by taxes going to pay somebody else's luxury yacht and cheap women.
They work all their life, they are "sentenced to work 8h a day for 35+ years" for a very moderate wage (sometimes in a job they don't like) while others, "the instigators" and other guys bring in their ideas and basically do what they love and are paid orders of magnitude higher.
One of the great "top RL players" / dominating class ideas has been to slowly spread a nice, numbing attitude that make the poorer folk feel happy and succesful when they work for this low wage and spend their lifetime as a second class category: they can still get an house, form a family, watch / play sports...
... as a Goon leader would say, they get the "farmlands" and are happy. The (RL and EvE) overlords bask in glory and money.
The whole world goes around like that.

Now, the genius who planned the Activision era WoW, was a good sociologist.
Whereas the first WoW was excellent and more free form and catered to succesful, dedicated gameplay players, instigators etc. etc. the game designers noticed it topped at 550,000 players.

WoW being bought by a mainstream mentality corporation, the new owners (they put new designers too) wanted to increase this number.
In order to do so, they just copied RL, something EvE does quite well in many respects but not all.
Therefore WoW planners introduced the RL "feeling of success for everybody" into the game.
Even the worst loser, the crap player could feel happy and succeeded. He perma-loses? He still gets welfare gear and welfare points. The end result is still the same, he's still the rock bottom but hey, HE GETS BLING!
No matter he will never stand a chance, he still gets his poor man's gadget to show. He grows attached to the one game that makes him feel a winner, he pays his sub.

Same for the casual players: they get affordably short to play achievements, they get their little niche of fun and happiness.

This is where EvE has grandiously failed: at not understanding how human mentality works. EvE is stuck at the previous "pro gamer" era.
The reward? The good players win, and win hard.
The price? Low player base, stay a niche game.

In fact, if you look at some EvE phenomenons with RL eyes it's easier to understand them.

Why, WHY the miners? Why the solo L4 players?

They are the two EvE features that give "bling" to even the poorest or time constrained players.
Even if both mining and missioning are so p!ss poorly implemented, they are the STAPLE of EvE, because the large majority IS made of "common folk".
This is also why CCP are always so prudent at implementing features that kick those "commoneers" in the jewels. Because you can't have a game purely populated by lions, you also need the gazelles. Look at how goot it worked the "all lions" model for low sec.

What the EvE "Lions" don't understand, is that by giving crutches, poor man's blings to those commoneers is NOT going to unfairly and negatively affect them. It's going to make the gazelles more and happier to the slaughter and exploitation...

... like it happens in RL.


Nice analysis!
Solstice Project
Sebiestor Tribe
Minmatar Republic
#185 - 2013-01-23 12:18:40 UTC  |  Edited by: Solstice Project
VV got that right.

Part of these imaginary winners then come and whine
about when a player made them lose things,
reminding them that their bloated ego isnt worth a damn.

Really nice analysis. But giving these losers even more to reason to
feel like imaginary winners will only increase the whining,
as soon as the actual eve-reality hits them.

More players? Sure! But at what cost??
Dave Stark
#186 - 2013-01-23 12:23:58 UTC
Solstice Project wrote:
But at what cost??


the cost of the game being fun.

look at wow, 10m subscribers and universally hated.
Seleia O'Sinnor
Drop of Honey
#187 - 2013-01-23 12:44:04 UTC
And why couldn't solo players and non-solo players coexist in one universe? Force the solos out and maybe CCP will pull the resources from WiS, Dust and WoD to cover the losses?

Odyssey: Repacking in POS hangars for modules +1,  but please for other stuff too, especially containers. Make containers openable in POS hangars.
Solstice Project
Sebiestor Tribe
Minmatar Republic
#188 - 2013-01-23 13:33:36 UTC
Dave Stark wrote:
Solstice Project wrote:
But at what cost??


the cost of the game being fun.

look at wow, 10m subscribers and universally hated.

Yes. A game full of imaginery winners that start crying as soon as
the hard reality of EvE shows them what they really are.
Yuri Wayfare
Suddenly Ninjas
Tear Extraction And Reclamation Service
#189 - 2013-01-23 13:42:02 UTC
Vaerah Vahrokha wrote:
In RL, the hugest majority of people are modest guys who are given a lot of "winner taste and feel" to keep their mind away from the simple fact they are being sucked dry by taxes going to pay somebody else's luxury yacht and cheap women.

I assure you, our women are *not* cheap (we'd rather skimp on the yacht a bit).

"Suddenly, trash pickers! HUNDREDS of winos going through your recyclables." -Piugattuk

Be careful what you wish for.
Dave Stark
#190 - 2013-01-23 13:44:40 UTC
Solstice Project wrote:
Dave Stark wrote:
Solstice Project wrote:
But at what cost??


the cost of the game being fun.

look at wow, 10m subscribers and universally hated.

Yes. A game full of imaginery winners that start crying as soon as
the hard reality of EvE shows them what they really are.


pretty much the reason why i quit wow and started eve, because i was fed up of every shitlord and his grandma being told "go on little timmy, you can do it!"

no little timmy, you can't do it, that's why we don't give you a raid spot. because no matter how much free gear blizzard give you, you just don't know how to move out of the ******* fire.
Jenn aSide
Soul Machines
The Initiative.
#191 - 2013-01-23 13:46:42 UTC
Yuri Wayfare wrote:
Vaerah Vahrokha wrote:
In RL, the hugest majority of people are modest guys who are given a lot of "winner taste and feel" to keep their mind away from the simple fact they are being sucked dry by taxes going to pay somebody else's luxury yacht and cheap women.

I assure you, our women are *not* cheap (we'd rather skimp on the yacht a bit).


Well said, I only go for luxury women and cheap yachts.
Jenn aSide
Soul Machines
The Initiative.
#192 - 2013-01-23 13:58:13 UTC
Seleia O'Sinnor wrote:
And why couldn't solo players and non-solo players coexist in one universe? Force the solos out and maybe CCP will pull the resources from WiS, Dust and WoD to cover the losses?


Solo/casual and group/hardcore (and every combination in between) players DO coexist every day in EVE, and i'm cool with it, EVE has a lot of things people with time constraints can do.

But a couple things:

#1. Just because you CAN "solo/casual" doesn't mean that should be the focus of the game. EVE is a multiplayer hard core non-consensual pvp EVERYWHERE (hell, now with incursions, if yo pass one in null or low sec eve is now a non-consensual PVE game too lol), monstrous "lose all your stuff if your stupid enough to put all your eggs in one basket" death penalty kind of sandbox game.

THAT is what makes EVE great, and any changes made to accommodate "solo/casual" people is a bad move. They shouldn't be excluded, they should just understand that they are choosing to play a hardcore game casually.

#2. Closely related to #1, it's not the "carebears" and casual etc that folks like me don't care for, it's the insidious **** roach -cancer like "EVE would be great if [insert self serving idea here]" types that don't like EVE they way it is and don't understand that what they always ask ccp for ("stop ganking", "stop afk cloaking", "stop scams" etc etc) would simply make EVE stop being EVE.
Radamant Nemess
Fusion Enterprises Ltd
#193 - 2013-01-23 14:17:29 UTC
BuckBoomBoom wrote:
There are really 2 types of ppl that CCP really cares about or should anyway. The new player and the Vets. That is where there money comes from.


But there also ls the problem. Changing the game in the way that suits new players will result in the rage from the vets. On the other hand, current state of the game is pretty much hostile to newcomers.

i can fail at any speed you like
Dave Stark
#194 - 2013-01-23 14:30:56 UTC
Radamant Nemess wrote:
BuckBoomBoom wrote:
There are really 2 types of ppl that CCP really cares about or should anyway. The new player and the Vets. That is where there money comes from.


But there also ls the problem. Changing the game in the way that suits new players will result in the rage from the vets. On the other hand, current state of the game is pretty much hostile to newcomers.


the game is hostile to every one, not just newcomers.
Ishtanchuk Fazmarai
#195 - 2013-01-23 14:31:23 UTC
Vaerah Vahrokha wrote:
Ishtanchuk Fazmarai wrote:
Alekseyev Karrde wrote:


Wonderfully articulate post.

/serious

What I got out of Unifex was that my social value as an instigator was worth like +1000 other dudes. I've always known that of course, but there's something very affirming about hearing it with a bright British accent. Pirate


What I got is that they've noticed that without the 1,000 dudes paying the bills, you and CCP would be FUBAR.

There would not be architects without 100 someones laying the bricks and pouring the concrete, and there would not be100 someones laying bricks without 10,000 no-ones buying the damn houses.

EVE is quite focused on "successful" players, but in doing so it neglects that many players just are "losers" and nobody pays 15 € per month to be a "loser" in a game. (Success= find the viable gameplay venues, like good corps/good mechanics and fail= get stuck in not viable gameplay venues like wrong corps/wrong mechanics)

In my words, it's the "politically incorrect" players who play the "wrong way" the ones who keep the show running. And so far, CCP has neglected them, treating them like expendable assets, until their numbers have begun to shrink.


I agree both with Alekseyev (a person I really admire) and Ishtanchuk.

I'd like to expand on the "make the loser feel like a winner" bit.

In RL, the hugest majority of people are modest guys who are given a lot of "winner taste and feel" to keep their mind away from the simple fact they are being sucked dry by taxes going to pay somebody else's luxury yacht and cheap women.
They work all their life, they are "sentenced to work 8h a day for 35+ years" for a very moderate wage (sometimes in a job they don't like) while others, "the instigators" and other guys bring in their ideas and basically do what they love and are paid orders of magnitude higher.
One of the great "top RL players" / dominating class ideas has been to slowly spread a nice, numbing attitude that make the poorer folk feel happy and succesful when they work for this low wage and spend their lifetime as a second class category: they can still get an house, form a family, watch / play sports...
... as a Goon leader would say, they get the "farmlands" and are happy. The (RL and EvE) overlords bask in glory and money.
The whole world goes around like that.

Now, the genius who planned the Activision era WoW, was a good sociologist.
Whereas the first WoW was excellent and more free form and catered to succesful, dedicated gameplay players, instigators etc. etc. the game designers noticed it topped at 550,000 players.

WoW being bought by a mainstream mentality corporation, the new owners (they put new designers too) wanted to increase this number.
In order to do so, they just copied RL, something EvE does quite well in many respects but not all.
Therefore WoW planners introduced the RL "feeling of success for everybody" into the game.
Even the worst loser, the crap player could feel happy and succeeded. He perma-loses? He still gets welfare gear and welfare points. The end result is still the same, he's still the rock bottom but hey, HE GETS BLING!
No matter he will never stand a chance, he still gets his poor man's gadget to show. He grows attached to the one game that makes him feel a winner, he pays his sub.

Same for the casual players: they get affordably short to play achievements, they get their little niche of fun and happiness.

This is where EvE has grandiously failed: at not understanding how human mentality works. EvE is stuck at the previous "pro gamer" era.
The reward? The good players win, and win hard.
The price? Low player base, stay a niche game.


In fact, if you look at some EvE phenomenons with RL eyes it's easier to understand them.

Why, WHY the miners? Why the solo L4 players?

They are the two EvE features that give "bling" to even the poorest or time constrained players.
Even if both mining and missioning are so p!ss poorly implemented, they are the STAPLE of EvE, because the large majority IS made of "common folk".
This is also why CCP are always so prudent at implementing features that kick those "commoneers" in the jewels. Because you can't have a game purely populated by lions, you also need the gazelles. Look at how goot it worked the "all lions" model for low sec.


What the EvE "Lions" don't understand, is that by giving crutches, poor man's blings to those commoneers is NOT going to unfairly and negatively affect them. It's going to make the gazelles more and happier to the slaughter and exploitation...

... like it happens in RL.


Love you, dude. Lol

Albeit I can't buy wholeheartedly the premises of EVE, I don't ask EVE to change. My complain is that I just ran out of niches where I could fit, and what was excitement and fulfillment in achieving my goals became boredom and disappointment -even not accocunting the disastrous case of human avatars- for a lack of further or just newer goals.

There is nothing I could or would want to do now in EVE, that I couldn't or wouldn't had done 4 years ago. Along the way, some things I wanted to do were gone before I could try them (Lvl 5 missions, FAI). And provided how CCP got 4 years and 900+ euros from me, I barely feel responsible on how they never bothered to do anything for me since October 2008...

Roses are red / Violets are blue / I am an Alpha / And so it's you
Natsett Amuinn
Caldari Provisions
Caldari State
#196 - 2013-01-23 14:34:44 UTC
Pretty much everything in EVE is already designed around both solo and group play.

VERY few things emphasize solo or group situations, and usually when it's a "group" thing, it involves some form of shooting other people.

CCP has a very intelligent design when it comes to the way you outfit your ship.
You can fit that salvager, but it may make it harder to take on those red crosses.

Or you can bring that other guy along that doesn't mind salvaging, and pay him to do the salvaging for you so that you can shoot more red crosses easier. Guys are doing this constantly in null.

Solo players can even take part in incursions, it may not be the part of full blown shoot'em up red cross bashing, but you there are OPPORTUNITIES, for the lone wolf to do SOMETHING.

I see people doign plexes solo, some difficult ones, and then when they reach the point that they can't they usually sell a bookmark or they pay for a cleaning service to come clear the remainder for them.

Hell, I took a month old alt into an exploration site in high sec some time ago, and proceeded to get run out by a whole bunch of really unfriendly red crosses. It wasn't a site DESIGNED for group play, but it wasn't designed for ME to solo at that time, or in the ship I was in. I could have bookmarked, changed ships, and come back to play with the red crosses, or I could have called on someone to give me a hand then and there.


It's a ****** system that says that this content is for 1 guy, this content for 5 guys, this content for 25 guys, etc.
It's shallow and unintelligent.

What do people do in high sec?
They clear a mission, bookmark, leave, change ship, come back and salvage.

People do not deserve to ask for group focused content. CCP give people a reason to bring someone else along and a bunvh of you **** all over the mechanic to maximize your isk/ per hour.


Lack of grouping is self inflicted.
It's a relult of virtual greed.

It's a favorite pasttime in EVE to self inflict a wound, and then tell CCP to make it so you can't hurt yourself.
Solstice Project
Sebiestor Tribe
Minmatar Republic
#197 - 2013-01-23 14:45:56 UTC
Radamant Nemess wrote:
BuckBoomBoom wrote:
There are really 2 types of ppl that CCP really cares about or should anyway. The new player and the Vets. That is where there money comes from.


But there also ls the problem. Changing the game in the way that suits new players will result in the rage from the vets. On the other hand, current state of the game is pretty much hostile to newcomers.

Whats hostile to the new players is the lack of the proper eve mentality.

They shouldnt be forced to run missions or mine to make their first income.
They need more options to make money outside of the imaginary safetyzone,
to experience more of Eve and its possibilities.
The venture was a great start for this.

Hell, i declared my corp noobfriendly. A noob following me around,
scanning ships and collecting loot of a single gank learns more about Eve
than missions will ever teach him, while making him enough money to make him happy
and actually get a sense for real achievements, which lie in everything thats related to player2player interaction. Not missions or mining.
Ishtanchuk Fazmarai
#198 - 2013-01-23 14:50:36 UTC  |  Edited by: Ishtanchuk Fazmarai
Solstice Project wrote:
Radamant Nemess wrote:
BuckBoomBoom wrote:
There are really 2 types of ppl that CCP really cares about or should anyway. The new player and the Vets. That is where there money comes from.


But there also ls the problem. Changing the game in the way that suits new players will result in the rage from the vets. On the other hand, current state of the game is pretty much hostile to newcomers.

Whats hostile to the new players is the lack of the proper eve mentality.

They shouldnt be forced to run missions or mine to make their first income.
They need more options to make money outside of the imaginary safetyzone,
to experience more of Eve and its possibilities.
The venture was a great start for this.

Hell, i declared my corp noobfriendly. A noob following me around,
scanning ships and collecting loot of a single gank learns more about Eve
than missions will ever teach him, while making him enough money to make him happy
and actually get a sense for real achievements, which lie in everything thats related to player2player interaction. Not missions or mining.


Yay, tha'ts why I would pay a game with my money, just to be somebody else's lapdog in order to "play it correctly".

Roses are red / Violets are blue / I am an Alpha / And so it's you
Not Politically Correct
Doomheim
#199 - 2013-01-23 15:11:54 UTC
If the number of players who want less non-consensual PvP is larger that the number who want more, what does that suggest to you?

The 'hard-core' players don't seem to have any problem telling the less hard-core to quit whining. If the majority of the players didn't mind getting involved in the forum flame wars so they could have their say, who would be the whiners then?

Every issue has two sides, or it probably wouldn't be an issue. The current societal paradigm seems to be "Do what does the most good for the most people", as a guideline to make decisions about issues.

It appears to me that the hard-core players are a special interest group trying to dominate the discussion by making the loudest noises.
Malcanis
Vanishing Point.
The Initiative.
#200 - 2013-01-23 15:13:19 UTC
Not Politically Correct wrote:
If the number of players who want less non-consensual PvP is larger that the number who want more, what does that suggest to you?


If 9 out of 10 people think that 3+3=5, they're still wrong.

"Just remember later that I warned against any change to jump ranges or fatigue. You earned whats coming."

Grath Telkin, 11.10.2016