EVE Fiction

So.

The PF has for the most part maintained that the Empires (the 4 major Empires at least), maintain navies far in excess and in power to anything assembled by any of the capsuleers alliances in the outer regions. In numbers, ship types, force projection, you name it.

This has of course been a tricky line to walk because for many of the 'live events' the number of NPC ships on grid has been very small. (big events with ONE titan, or big events with a handful of dreadnaughts, etc) I personally chalk this up to CCP not being interested in having 100 devs multibox huge capital fleets, etc.

ANYWAY. The expansions and seeming retconning the last few patches seem to recently be going in a direction of 'capsuleer supremacy.' Suddenly the Empires are scared of the capsuleers, as seen in the frowny-faced CONCORD man in the "eve: origins" trailer. CCP seems to have a huge direction lately for 'empowering' us the players. Suddenly the null sec stuff is important (exclamation point!) to the PF, and the big capsuleer fights are suddenly the biggest and most important pew pew the cluster has ever seen.

This for me wraps up a whole ball of retconning and inconsistancies with CONCORD, Capsuleers, The Empires, etc.

Is CONCORD in charge of our capsules or are they not? Do they still cut the puppet strings? I don't see how any of this works PF-wise, if they are retconning the null groups into being the biggest and scariest things ever, CONCORD and the Empires would cut those strings right away, yes? I don't see how the capsuleers can be a threat to the Empires under the current capsuleer stranglehold for cloning/CONCORD, etc.

I feel like the old PF was of the flavor that yes big important battles happen in null sec but these are small potatoes to what happens in the Empires.

New PF retcon versions are saying null battles are the biggest and most baddest space pew pew ever seen by human eyes and the Empires are shaking in their boots at the mighty capsuleers, but they don't seem interested in deading all the clones and killing the capsuleers?)

I R Confused.

If we can establish once and for all the limits of CONCORD, their power, the power of the Empires, we can get a realistic assessment of these conflicts.

Either the Empires and CONCORD maintain all the power (pay your sov bills or lose your station!), or they maintain nothing. The current direction of expansions and some PF indicates the capsuleers are suddenly super scary and the Empires are terrified, even though they maintain control over nearly 100% of capsuleer activity.

Thoughts?

Yes, one. What's a PF?

Apart from that, you sound right of course, although this paradox has always been there, or at least for a longer time than you think. If you take the chronicles for instance, I haven't finished reading them but so far (I started with the oldest ones) the empires are rarely commiting more than a handful battleships at a time. The "powerful empire" thing has been around for a while, but right at the beggining where bits of the story already implying the opposite.

If the empires ever got sick of capsuleers and pulled the plug on all services, the only capsuleers left by the end of the month would be the few in nullsec corps that owned territory with POSs with manufacturing & manufacturing and Rorquals. That's the only way a capsuleer can truly call themselves "independent" from the empires.

Even then we'd be completely at the mercy of all current BPO holders, as the only other way to get more would be copies (POS, above), which requires BPOs and the pirate BPCs that turn up from exploration. That and trying to live off meta loot like the frikkin' Road Warrior or something.

Basically, it would not end well, both in game and financially for CCP.

Not really, because he's still paying for his capsuleer license to CONCORD, either via PLEX or other means.
So in theory they can still pull the plug on any non-NPC capsuleer.

CONCORD is like the United Nations.
They like to think they are in charge and the like to talk big and butt into everyone's business, but at the end of the day nobody really gives a **** what they say, think or do.

Players ignore CONCORD regulations all the time routinely suicide ganking each other and podding as standard practice, and plenty of the live events and lore have the empires brazenly defying CONCORD, between ignoring them saying to stop to outright blowing up their ships.

By interstellar treaty, CONCORD is in charge, but the defacto situation differs from the de jure one.


As for empire supremacy, I don't think that's a retcon as much as something that hasn't been touched on well enough recently. Large alliances weren't always able to send a hundred titans into battle, so at one time the Empires were more powerful. CCP just needs to make a note in the lore that was 5 years ago. The reality is the situation has progressed, it's just that CCP hasn't touched on it until recently, so it only seems like the change of status is sudden.

The null blocks being more of a threat just doesn't work with current game mechanics is my point.

How can someone be a threat when CONCORD can turn off your entire starbase shields if you don't pay your rent? They can stop you from using stargates, decide whether or not you can use cyno jammers, pay you for your work, they are in charge of your clone contracts, etc, etc.

If the PF were to adapt to reflect or deal with these sorts of issues it would make more sense to me, but not as currently.

It would just be a matter of CONCORD turning off all the stargates, offlining all of the null sec starbases, pos towers, revoking all medical clones, removing all capsuleer items from the markets, etc.

Once Concord took any such action to embargo capsuleers movement on a major Alliance level they would identify themselves as a threat to the four empires. Concord exists thru the permission of the empires which is why they can be an impartial referee. Turn off starbase shields because you do not like the alliance and what is your next step? You start moving against the Gallente because you do not like who they elect as leader?

If Concord does anything outside their agreement with the empires they risk unraveling the order in the EVE cluster so CCP can not go down that path. CCP needs to update official canon to be more reflective of current facts in gameplay.

Shut down access to stargates and jump bridges are still available to alliances in null sec and cynos in low sec. Could Concord keep capsuleers out of highsec? It's possible in theory but what would that do to the economy of EVE? Most players are highsec residents not members of major nullsec alliances so one would easily surmise they function as part of the empires economies.

The growing power of capsuleers has to b acknowledged by CCP in the official canon at some point, even the empires are all being led by capsuleers at this point, if I am not mistaken, or have had a capsuleer recently in charge.

I might not have been clear with my earlier point Lucien, I meant that CONCORD still maintains a very (PF) strange stanglehold over the NULL alliances. None of their sovereignty, or player made starbases, or jump bridges, etc, work without the consent of CONCORD. That's kind of my main ?? with the PF right now.

If they establish that the null groups are completely 'on their own' and update some of the lore to reflect this then it starts reflecting the scenario you talk about.

I don't have the opinion that CONCORD has any power over the Empire Navies at all, just like you. Concord serves at the pleasure of the agreement of the 4 main factions under the Yulai Accords, and it gives concord authority to govern the 'freelance' capsuleers (that we represent as players).

Until the PF comes up with a method for the 'freelance' (us) capsuleers to cut the concord puppet strings things are in a bit of a lore-limbo.

Concords 'power' is more about their Jovian jump bridging than the actual ships themselves. They alluded to this in Empyrean Age I believe. Basically they were glad none of the Empires realized how few in number they were, and that they appear to be 'everywhere' since they can bridge into a situation instantly. But if all hell were to break loose they would be outnumbered rather fast.

Let's not forget some of the major events that took place in the expansions over the last few years:

• Loss of CONCORD HQ at Yulai
• Frequent FW between the four empires
• The Sansha invasions
• The continued escalation and militarization of the nullsec capsuleer empires
• The Dust514 development

It was fair to say a few years back that the Empires were still the dominant forces in the galaxy (at least on paper for canon) but the tables have turned in the last few years. If CCP were to theoretically cut off the infinite CONCORD fleet boogey-men and grant capsuleers the chance to conquer Empire space, I think we could all agree that it could feasibly happen - it'd be a hell of a fight, and a lot of newbs would lose their **** - but it could happen.

I've also noticed that switch in recent tone that the Empires feel threatened by the capsuleers, but if you go back and read even the earliest Chronicle stories that tone has always been there. It's only been recent developments which mean that nullsec corps are growing too powerful.

In my opinion, I think it's fairly consistent. Not to say that it's all perfect (after all - since when do the Sisters of EVE have any interest in building ships, much less exploring unknown space?) but it's all within reason.