CSM Campaigns

You are missing a surprising end game.

'The first half of the ship Tiericide initiative was a mixed bag – it made new players more powerful in PVP engagements in frigates and cruisers (a positive), but it also increased cruiser build cost significantly and made it much more crippling for a new player to lose a ship. This is a significant issue – when I was a rookie, a Vexor cost 6 million ISK, or about 3 hours of running level 2 missions with low skills and little game knowledge. Now it’s 11 million, or about 5 hours, despite the mineral price index being about the same.'

And yet you actively support destroying newbie mining ships costing much more than the 11million isk. The current cost of a retriever costs about 30 million almost three times as much as the 11 million vexor. A low skilled retriever pilot can easily be killed by couple of New Order catalysts costing an couple of million isk (which is fully reimbursable). So just to recap the costs newbie mining pilot 30million isk ( about 15 hour grind (3*5) ) against Sabriz's two New Order pilots 2 million isk ( reimbursable 0 hrs).

I guess the guy was a 'goofus' for mining. Seems ok doesn't it??

EDIT :
'Newbies and wardecs. Newbies cannot fly freighters or afford them (anyone with those SP and resources is not a newb). Our primary targets are exhumers (a month to train into), Orcas and freighters (multiple months), and mining barges as a low priority (which still require more SP to sit in than battleships). '

Mining barges low priority? From CODE. zkillboard
Exhumers 8,384 Mining Barges 13,895

EDIT2: Hiasa Kite Posted: 2014.12.06 18:15
I think you missed the point that the CODE CSM hopefull doesn't really care about nuturing new players and indeed if a new player mines they are pretty much fair game. My experience of the New Order is that rather than send a helpful mail offer advice they are more likely to try to send you one to attempt to make you upset so they get get a reply to post on their blog.

The retriever is the optimal ship for solo mining when you start mining in a procurer you are not using the best ship for solo mining. Where the procurer shines as you mention is in its defensive capabilities which as you point out is considerable and should be recommended to newer players because there is group of players that specifically target the newbie retriever pilots.

Since when was a retriever considered a suboptimal ship? It is a great little ship and indeed the New Order along with Sabriz Adoudel thinks is too good a ship and wants it nerfed.

Salutations dear Sabriz

New player retention is an issue with this game and our play style can and does effect this.

A new player mining in his first retriever very well may quit after his first gank. There is also the chance he will be thrilled and excited and maybe curious. This all depends on the player and how others interact with him or her. Many see you as a negative effect on players but do not see all the help you give them. Any ideas on mechanics that may help them? I believe solo ganking is terribly easy on people like this [solo new player alone in a belt]. I feel the best answer is community support on current mechanics and heavier interaction between players but well you know how some people are.


Don Purple.

What a joke. This is about as funny as your campaign on ganking incursion runners. Probably end up about as successful.

Also, per your comment in Tora's thread.

"Out of game - he's absolutely, positively someone the CSM needs, and will probably receive second (maybe third) place on my recommended how to vote list."

You sure sound full of yourself, even have a recommended how to vote list, for the sheep?

Just another ******, trying for some Eve fame.

In addition to helping create a stereotype of what his opponents are like.

OK. I promised to respond more in detail to this when I had time; so I'll do so now.

PVE content in highsec is currently designed to be grind-based and fairly low player interaction. Anomalies are the most competitive content in highsec but they have their rewards tuned so low that noone runs them.

With the exception of quite new players, this leads to an environment where PVE stops being about "Can I succeed at this mission" and instead becomes about "How can I most quickly/efficiently succeed at this mission". Efficiency becomes everything, and PVE does not remain interesting once you get efficiency focused.

Fundamentally, this comes down to the fact that player opponents are dynamic and unpredictable, while NPC opponents are static and predictable. Even where NPCs have very high stats (such as the burner missions) it all comes down to learning an established efficient way to beat them and doing so.

Add in competition with other players (not necessarily starship combat) and this becomes a very different equation. Look at how *terrible* the PVE aspect of Factional Warfare is - 'kill one rat, orbit a beacon, kill the rat when it respawns, then sometimes shoot a structure'. This utterly terrible PVE content entertains thousands of players because of the involvement of other players.

There is a form of conflict available in incursions via the mechanics for contested sites, but the stakes are just too low for contests to matter much. If your fleet loses a site contest, you incur no real cost and only a hundred million or so in opportunity costs. You can also quite easily determine who will be likely to win before a contest happens, and if you assess that you can't win a contest you usually just warp out of the site and go and do another one.




Some rough ideas of what player conflict driven PVE content in highsec could look like, from lowest to highest level of PVP:
- Add level 5 security missions to highsec, but have them take place in deadspace areas where CONCORD only responds to PVP aggression towards pods (not towards ships). Unlike lowsec L5s, you will need to be scanned down to be attacked (in lowsec, you can be attacked on gates or undocks as well).
- A new type of mission agent that give missions only once per thirty minutes (at a set time). Everyone gets the same mission in the same deadspace pocket. These missions are designed in such a way that a limited number of people can succeed at them - perhaps you have to land a killing blow on an elite battleship NPC and there are only three of them in the site, or perhaps you have to collect a particular dog tag or cargo item. Penalties for failure are purely ISK (no standings loss) and are at a level that irritates, not a level that cripples.
- New types of anomalies that always offer escalations. However, anyone else doing these anomalies in the constellation or region will also get the same escalation. CONCORD will not respond to PVP aggression in the escalation site.
- New anomalies that always offer escalations, however, the escalations always occur in lowsec.
- Region-wide events where at unpredictable times an NPC fleet fight takes place, and players can join in on the side of their choice, and have the right to shoot both players and NPCs fighting for the other side.

She's talking about adding stuff that will lead to PVP/PVE hybrid situations, that's not 'replacing PVE'. I really can't see why anyone would object to adding stuff like that. Nobody will be forced to run them, they merely add another, imo interesting option.

Because it's all an attempt to gradually move PVE into PVP. I'm sure that the arguments would be made that because it's PVP, thus more risk, that it should then be more rewarding, then traditional PVE would be left behind to rot. And lets face it, the last attempt at hybrid PVE/PVP was FW, and that got abused by people ganking their alts and is now pretty much dominated by double stabbed plexing.

The objection I have is that Sabriz has absolutely no intention of accepting the existence of PVE players. It's in the OP. PVE players don't want PVP. What they want is more engaging PVE. Why should those players be ignored so players who want to PVP can have more hybrid content created for them?

While the first part of your reply is a bit of slippery slope argument, Sabriz seems to be voicing a reasonable position. She is saying that since Eve is a single-universe competitive sandbox, any new PvE content should be designed with fostering this competition and the emergent gameplay that results from it.

You are welcome to disagree, but it doesn't seem to me that Sabriz is proposing anything especially egregious.

Now there are arguments about where best limited development resources should be spent - on more solo PvE content which (according to CCP) the majority of these consumers quit the game quite quickly, or on more interactive content and game mechanisms that promote social interactions and thus player retention. However, that is really a CCP business decision which requires information that I lack to make any solid conclusions.

Ok, sure, but if you frame it that way then any attempts to add mechanics that promote more interaction or competition between players is "an attempt to gradually move PVE into PVP". Even Mike Azariah agrees that CCP should be spending development time on increasing the mechanisms facilitating group and player interaction.

I see no problem adding new, optional, PvE content that is more rewarding but has additional risks (such as, but not limited to, reduced/no CONCORD). It's essentially just a proposal to bring a bit of lowsec into a specific highsec context. Eve is all about risk vs. reward and lowsec (or this hypothetical new mechanic) PvE should be more rewarding.


Perhaps you are right, and more people would stay if the PvE would massively revamped. However, Eve is not a single-player PvE game: it is a sandbox where social interactions, both competitive and cooperative are paramount. CCP seems to have recognized that and everything CCP Seagull has said points to development being focused on a more player-controlled, player-driven Eve universe in the future, so I doubt you are going to see any significant solo PvE content ever again. Even if a complete revamp was done (which for mining might happen eventually), it will be to make it more group orientated and competitive, not make it more solo-friendly and isolationist.

I am not saying you are wrong in your views - you like what you like - but you appear to be fighting an uphill battle against the direction Eve is moving. You've made it clear that Sabriz isn't your candidate, but I am not sure you are going to find many other CSM candidates that share your view that Eve development resources should be spent on expanding Eve solo content over group content, nor even if you did would the developers listen to that CSM member.