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Decline in numbers... starting to turn into RAPID!!!

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Royal Amarr Institute
Amarr Empire
#1881 - 2015-09-17 21:39:45 UTC
Market McSelling Alt wrote:
Jonah Gravenstein wrote:
Market McSelling Alt wrote:
Because we have had no new content since 2009 and all the patches since December 2009 have been focused on "Fixing" existing stuff.
The focus on fixing stuff is post summer 2011, the period 2009-summer 2011 saw the introduction of the Pirate epic arcs, Planetary Interaction and Incursions, unfortunately it also saw CCP waste precious dev cycles on failing to deliver WiS in any meaningful way.

Incarna was the death knell for jesus features and the 6 monthly release cycle, the focus since then on fixing all the broken stuff incrementally, while not breaking anything else too badly, should be beneficial in the long run if CCP Seagulls vision comes to fruition.

Delivering new content relies on there being a robust and functional foundation to build upon, fixing code that is the better part of a decade old and probably undocumented is necessary for CCP to be able to have that robust and functional framework in place. Much still needs to be revisited, and CCP appear to be doing so in order to deliver us something that may be Apocrypha-like in scale if it manages to live up to their 5 year plan.

TL;DR What we see in the client and the patchnotes isn't the only dev work going on at CCP. They could be a little more forthcoming about how close they are to player stargates etc though, being kept in the dark does give the illusion that there is no plan, or that it isn't being followed.



Please go back through your history.

Incursions were introduced in 2010 (incursion)
Planetary Interaction was introduced in 2010 (Tyrannus)
New Epic Arcs added with WHs in 2009 (Apochrypha)
Wormholes in 2009 (Apochrypha)
Faction Warfare (2008)

So, starting in 2009/2010 everything we have in the game content wise was already in the game or announced for release. Again, we have had no real content added in over 5 years.



Agree, additionally we have had tinkering/improvements sold to use as new features eg Thera.
Jonah Gravenstein
Machiavellian Space Bastards
#1882 - 2015-09-17 21:52:38 UTC  |  Edited by: Jonah Gravenstein
Market McSelling Alt wrote:
Jonah Gravenstein wrote:
Market McSelling Alt wrote:
Because we have had no new content since 2009 and all the patches since December 2009 have been focused on "Fixing" existing stuff.
The focus on fixing stuff is post summer 2011, the period 2009-summer 2011 saw the introduction of the Pirate epic arcs, Planetary Interaction and Incursions, unfortunately it also saw CCP waste precious dev cycles on failing to deliver WiS in any meaningful way.

Incarna was the death knell for jesus features and the 6 monthly release cycle, the focus since then on fixing all the broken stuff incrementally, while not breaking anything else too badly, should be beneficial in the long run if CCP Seagulls vision comes to fruition.

Delivering new content relies on there being a robust and functional foundation to build upon, fixing code that is the better part of a decade old and probably undocumented is necessary for CCP to be able to have that robust and functional framework in place. Much still needs to be revisited, and CCP appear to be doing so in order to deliver us something that may be Apocrypha-like in scale if it manages to live up to their 5 year plan.

TL;DR What we see in the client and the patchnotes isn't the only dev work going on at CCP. They could be a little more forthcoming about how close they are to player stargates etc though, being kept in the dark does give the illusion that there is no plan, or that it isn't being followed.



Please go back through your history.

Incursions were introduced in 2010 (incursion)
Planetary Interaction was introduced in 2010 (Tyrannus)
New Epic Arcs added with WHs in 2009 (Apochrypha)
Wormholes in 2009 (Apochrypha)
Faction Warfare (2008)

So, starting in 2009/2010 everything we have in the game content wise was already in the game or announced for release. Again, we have had no real content added in over 5 years.

Pirate Epic Arcs was Dominion not Apocrypha, or Apocrypha 1.5

You explicitly stated that we'd had no new content since 2009 and that the cycle of fixing was responsible for that lack of content, I merely pointed out that content had indeed been added in the period 2009-2011, although CCP had wasted dev cycles on WiS that could have been better spent in a more constructive manner. The concentration on fixing began post Incarna which was the summer expansion of 2011.

While we did receive reduced content in the winter 2009 - summer 2011 period due to the concentration on WiS, we did get some; nothing in your, slightly incorrect, rebuttal contradicts what I said, if anything it contradicts your original statement.

In the beginning there was nothing, which exploded.

New Player FAQ

Feyd's Survival Pack
Market McSelling Alt
Doomheim
#1883 - 2015-09-17 21:57:44 UTC  |  Edited by: Market McSelling Alt
Jonah Gravenstein wrote:
Market McSelling Alt wrote:
Jonah Gravenstein wrote:
Market McSelling Alt wrote:
Because we have had no new content since 2009 and all the patches since December 2009 have been focused on "Fixing" existing stuff.
The focus on fixing stuff is post summer 2011, the period 2009-summer 2011 saw the introduction of the Pirate epic arcs, Planetary Interaction and Incursions, unfortunately it also saw CCP waste precious dev cycles on failing to deliver WiS in any meaningful way.

Incarna was the death knell for jesus features and the 6 monthly release cycle, the focus since then on fixing all the broken stuff incrementally, while not breaking anything else too badly, should be beneficial in the long run if CCP Seagulls vision comes to fruition.

Delivering new content relies on there being a robust and functional foundation to build upon, fixing code that is the better part of a decade old and probably undocumented is necessary for CCP to be able to have that robust and functional framework in place. Much still needs to be revisited, and CCP appear to be doing so in order to deliver us something that may be Apocrypha-like in scale if it manages to live up to their 5 year plan.

TL;DR What we see in the client and the patchnotes isn't the only dev work going on at CCP. They could be a little more forthcoming about how close they are to player stargates etc though, being kept in the dark does give the illusion that there is no plan, or that it isn't being followed.



Please go back through your history.

Incursions were introduced in 2010 (incursion)
Planetary Interaction was introduced in 2010 (Tyrannus)
New Epic Arcs added with WHs in 2009 (Apochrypha)
Wormholes in 2009 (Apochrypha)
Faction Warfare (2008)

So, starting in 2009/2010 everything we have in the game content wise was already in the game or announced for release. Again, we have had no real content added in over 5 years.

Pirate Epic Arcs was Dominion not Apocrypha, or Apocrypha 1.5

You explicitly stated that we'd had no new content since 2009 and that the cycle of fixing was responsible for that lack of content, I merely pointed out that content had indeed been added in the period 2009-2011, although CCP had wasted dev cycles on WiS that could have been better spent in a more constructive manner.

While we did receive reduced content in the winter 2009 - summer 2011 period due to the concentration on WiS, we did get some; nothing in your, slightly incorrect, rebuttal contradicts what I said, if anything it contradicts your original statement.


New epic arcs were added in August 2009 in Apochrypha 1.5, The last two pirate arcs were added December 2009 in Dominion. 2009 is 2009.

Also, Dominion was released in December 2009

2010 was the last content expansion if you count Incursions as content. Reality is that at any one point in time only a few hundred players can participate in Incursions at a time, or they are contesting each other. It also was arguably a terrible content idea.

We knew about incursions at the end of 2009. So my statement stands, 2009 and arguably 2010 was the last time we had content added to the game. Everything since has been tweaks and candy to appease us.

Half incomplete and abandoned WIS is not content, spin some more.

CCP Quant: Of all those who logon in Eve, 1.5% do Incursions, 13.8% PVP and 19.2% run Missions while 22.4% mine.

40.7% Join a fleet. The idea that Eve is a PVP game is false, the social fabric is in Missions and Mining.
Scotchmo
Royal Amarr Institute
Amarr Empire
#1884 - 2015-09-17 22:11:43 UTC
Market McSelling Alt wrote:
Jonah Gravenstein wrote:
Market McSelling Alt wrote:
Jonah Gravenstein wrote:
Market McSelling Alt wrote:
Because we have had no new content since 2009 and all the patches since December 2009 have been focused on "Fixing" existing stuff.
The focus on fixing stuff is post summer 2011, the period 2009-summer 2011 saw the introduction of the Pirate epic arcs, Planetary Interaction and Incursions, unfortunately it also saw CCP waste precious dev cycles on failing to deliver WiS in any meaningful way.

Incarna was the death knell for jesus features and the 6 monthly release cycle, the focus since then on fixing all the broken stuff incrementally, while not breaking anything else too badly, should be beneficial in the long run if CCP Seagulls vision comes to fruition.

Delivering new content relies on there being a robust and functional foundation to build upon, fixing code that is the better part of a decade old and probably undocumented is necessary for CCP to be able to have that robust and functional framework in place. Much still needs to be revisited, and CCP appear to be doing so in order to deliver us something that may be Apocrypha-like in scale if it manages to live up to their 5 year plan.

TL;DR What we see in the client and the patchnotes isn't the only dev work going on at CCP. They could be a little more forthcoming about how close they are to player stargates etc though, being kept in the dark does give the illusion that there is no plan, or that it isn't being followed.



Please go back through your history.

Incursions were introduced in 2010 (incursion)
Planetary Interaction was introduced in 2010 (Tyrannus)
New Epic Arcs added with WHs in 2009 (Apochrypha)
Wormholes in 2009 (Apochrypha)
Faction Warfare (2008)

So, starting in 2009/2010 everything we have in the game content wise was already in the game or announced for release. Again, we have had no real content added in over 5 years.

Pirate Epic Arcs was Dominion not Apocrypha, or Apocrypha 1.5

You explicitly stated that we'd had no new content since 2009 and that the cycle of fixing was responsible for that lack of content, I merely pointed out that content had indeed been added in the period 2009-2011, although CCP had wasted dev cycles on WiS that could have been better spent in a more constructive manner.

While we did receive reduced content in the winter 2009 - summer 2011 period due to the concentration on WiS, we did get some; nothing in your, slightly incorrect, rebuttal contradicts what I said, if anything it contradicts your original statement.


New epic arcs were added in August 2009 in Apochrypha 1.5, The last two pirate arcs were added December 2009 in Dominion. 2009 is 2009.

Also, Dominion was released in December 2009

2010 was the last content expansion if you count Incursions as content. Reality is that at any one point in time only a few hundred players can participate in Incursions at a time, or they are contesting each other. It also was arguably a terrible content idea.

We knew about incursions at the end of 2009. So my statement stands, 2009 and arguably 2010 was the last time we had content added to the game. Everything since has been tweaks and candy to appease us.

Half incomplete and abandoned WIS is not content, spin some more.


I agree with nothing substantial added since 2009-2010.

I was asked by a reddit thread what was added in the last 5 years that I could tell to a newbro to get him to sub. I cant really.

They are however bringing Expansions back which is pretty amazing, but that also could just be a way to delay citadels indefinitely.

I was complaining about the lack of long term investment in EVE and they addressed that today.
Market McSelling Alt
Doomheim
#1885 - 2015-09-17 22:18:07 UTC
Scotchmo wrote:


I agree with nothing substantial added since 2009-2010.

I was asked by a reddit thread what was added in the last 5 years that I could tell to a newbro to get him to sub. I cant really.

They are however bringing Expansions back which is pretty amazing, but that also could just be a way to delay citadels indefinitely.

I was complaining about the lack of long term investment in EVE and they addressed that today.



I like the move they announced today, but yes it does feel like an excuse to go back to PROMISE AND NEVER DELIVER™

I too fear Citadels might be doomed, they just announced they are going to be like POS and not entosisable at all. Backpedeling on a core idea (albeit a bad one) of their new direction.

CCP Quant: Of all those who logon in Eve, 1.5% do Incursions, 13.8% PVP and 19.2% run Missions while 22.4% mine.

40.7% Join a fleet. The idea that Eve is a PVP game is false, the social fabric is in Missions and Mining.
Drago Shouna
Doomheim
#1886 - 2015-09-17 22:18:31 UTC
I hope tonight's o7 show and its announcements will halt the decline a bit, along with the Citadel dev blog.

Solecist Project...." They refuse to play by the rules and laws of the game and use it as excuse ..." " They don't care about how you play as long as they get to play how they want."

Welcome to EVE.
Jonah Gravenstein
Machiavellian Space Bastards
#1887 - 2015-09-17 22:21:53 UTC  |  Edited by: Jonah Gravenstein
Market McSelling Alt wrote:
2010 was the last content expansion if you count Incursions as content. Reality is that at any one point in time only a few hundred players can participate in Incursions at a time, or they are contesting each other. It also was arguably a terrible content idea.

We knew about incursions at the end of 2009. So my statement stands, 2009 and arguably 2010 was the last time we had content added to the game. Everything since has been tweaks and candy to appease us.
I'm not disagreeing with you, there has been a dearth of content while they concentrate on fixing and preparing the game for a real expansion; I question your timescale.

Quote:
Half incomplete and abandoned WIS is not content, spin some more.
Nowhere have I even intimated that I consider WiS in its current state to be content; I make it perfectly clear that I consider the dev time spent on it to be an utter waste on an empty promise. If CCP had held it back and developed some actual purposeful gameplay for it before pushing it out as a major expansion things may well have been different.

In the beginning there was nothing, which exploded.

New Player FAQ

Feyd's Survival Pack
Mike Adoulin
Happys Happy Hamster Hunting Club
#1888 - 2015-09-17 23:16:06 UTC
You can expect a major dip in folks online for the following reasons:


Fallout 4

XCOM2

World of Warships (went live today)

Armored Warfare (open beta soon)

Mad Max (is now live)

And Elite Dangerous has dragged some folks away as well.

Plus the ISboxing ban made quite a few folks delete/stop using many alt accounts.

Everything in EVE is a trap.

And if it isn't, it's your job to make it a trap...:)

You want to know what immorality in EVE Online looks like? Look no further than Ripard "Jester" Teg.

Chribba is the Chuck Norris of EVE.
Spurty
#1889 - 2015-09-17 23:20:01 UTC
I've recently plopped money on sword coast ledgends and the kids want to level their never winter chars, so although I'm subbed for 6months the majority of my play times here for the next month or so. I'll be back where the new to me stuff is tired and old.

That and the odd moose house open fleet roam

There are good ships,

And wood ships,

And ships that sail the sea

But the best ships are Spaceships

Built by CCP
Salvos Rhoska
#1890 - 2015-09-17 23:23:00 UTC  |  Edited by: Salvos Rhoska
Buy PLEX with all the isk you can spare.

Sell everything you dont need, to buy as much of PLEX as you can.

Either as an investment, or inorder to sub.

Do it now before its too late.

PvE v PvP <> Old School Exploration <> CODE Licenses <> CODE Special Agent
Unezka Turigahl
Det Som Engang Var
#1891 - 2015-09-18 02:05:54 UTC
Mike Adoulin wrote:
You can expect a major dip in folks online for the following reasons:

Fallout 4

...

Mad Max (is now live)


Yeah I'll definitely be picking up those two games. Though, before I play Fallout 4 I need to get around to playing Fallout 3 and NV. hah. I also need to get around to playing Oblivion, Skyrim, Stalker, Bioshock, Assassin's Creed, Mass Effect 1 & 3, and whatever other games I've bought on Steam and never played and forgotten about. Time to take a loooooong break from EVE I think. It's been grabbing up all my game time for a bit too long. Blink
Teckos Pech
Hogyoku
Goonswarm Federation
#1892 - 2015-09-18 03:27:34 UTC
Luckytania wrote:
Teckos Pech wrote:
Wow, I can't believe a post based on an a gross misunderstanding of seasonality is still going. P
Ignorance explains many things.

Look at the five year chart.

Eve Offline

No doubt there can be many explanations.

"Seasonality" is not one of them.


Dude...that was horrible.

Go re-read the OP. The OP made an egregious error by noting a seasonal low, and assuming it was close to the (4-5 month moving average). That 14,793 or whatever it was the OP sited was a daily low point or close too it.

Even the OPs claim of 16,000 players online in August is Bravo Sierra and likely to conflating the number on the client as the monthly average.

For example, through most of June the average number of logged in players: 21,000
For August: 21,000.

I'm going to guess that August was 21,000 as well.

"The curious task of economics is to demonstrate to men how little they really know about what they imagine they can design."--Friedrich August von Hayek

8 Golden Rules for EVE Online
lord xavier
Rubbed Out
#1893 - 2015-09-18 03:36:08 UTC
I have gone down to 6 accounts. If plex prices keep moving as quickly as they are, I will continue to drop accounts. I suspect many other players are as well. I wouldn't be surprised if the majority of the active accounts number dropping is related to this, and continues to be.
Salvos Rhoska
#1894 - 2015-09-18 04:34:36 UTC  |  Edited by: Salvos Rhoska
lord xavier wrote:
I have gone down to 6 accounts. If plex prices keep moving as quickly as they are, I will continue to drop accounts. I suspect many other players are as well. I wouldn't be surprised if the majority of the active accounts number dropping is related to this, and continues to be.

Yep.

And yet with players with far less resilience than you dropping more accounts in ever larger numbers:

Why is the price perpetually rising?

PvE v PvP <> Old School Exploration <> CODE Licenses <> CODE Special Agent
lord xavier
Rubbed Out
#1895 - 2015-09-18 05:48:26 UTC
Salvos Rhoska wrote:
lord xavier wrote:
I have gone down to 6 accounts. If plex prices keep moving as quickly as they are, I will continue to drop accounts. I suspect many other players are as well. I wouldn't be surprised if the majority of the active accounts number dropping is related to this, and continues to be.

Yep.

And yet with players with far less resilience than you dropping more accounts in ever larger numbers:

Why is the price perpetually rising?


People are taking stock in large amounts of plex. With them rising, its a good stock to hold. The issue is when a single player is holding onto 2000+ of them, and alot of traders are doing this for a long term investment. You're seeing less turn around plex, which just means its 1 more off the market every time one is bought by one of these people holding them.

Question is: how long do you hold the investment before you start to actually detract away from it? Lets say there is 200,000 plex being held up in stock. That is 10 months of game time for the current active accounts that are online at peak and most likely its 3-4 months of sub time for all the active accounts in Eve currently.
That is alot of plex being removed from the market, but how long before the price just effects how many people stop logging on all together?

I currently attend school full time and do not work. So, paying for multiple accounts for me is out of the question. My style of gameplay generally involves a minimum of 3 active accounts. for me to make isk, i ideally need a 4th and 5th for the income I make with mission running. So when I am having a minimum of 5 accounts active, and plex is 1.3b. You are talking 6.5b a month for me to play. It is not fun as the price goes up. The more it goes up, the less accounts I have active. It will just get to a point that will all go inactive due to my lack of care to PVE for 10 of 30 days. Which I already am on maybe 15-20 days in a month. So 50-75% of my game time is done paying for 5-10 days of care free playing? bah.
Nevyn Auscent
Broke Sauce
#1896 - 2015-09-18 05:49:39 UTC
Salvos Rhoska wrote:

Yep.

And yet with players with far less resilience than you dropping more accounts in ever larger numbers:

Why is the price perpetually rising?

Because the Plex market is being used as an investment market by resellers, a fact confirmed by CCP themselves a while back when they said the average number of intermediate steps on a plex is 2.5.
So the average plex goes through 2 or 3 investors before reaching an actual user on the 3rd or 4th sale. Note that counting the initial person who sold the plex that actually makes it the 4th or 5th player who actually uses the plex themselves.
Assuming I understood and remember the presentation correctly anyway.

Meaning it's actually irrelevant now how many end users are buying plex, because the entire hype on plex price rising is fueling speculative trades on plex purely for the sake of profit.
Aerasia
Republic University
Minmatar Republic
#1897 - 2015-09-18 07:02:28 UTC
Salvos Rhoska wrote:
Buy PLEX with all the isk you can spare.
Good advice, but it's spelled "Sell".
Algarion Getz
Aideron Corp
#1898 - 2015-09-18 07:52:33 UTC  |  Edited by: Algarion Getz
lord xavier wrote:
Salvos Rhoska wrote:
lord xavier wrote:
I have gone down to 6 accounts. If plex prices keep moving as quickly as they are, I will continue to drop accounts. I suspect many other players are as well. I wouldn't be surprised if the majority of the active accounts number dropping is related to this, and continues to be.

Yep.

And yet with players with far less resilience than you dropping more accounts in ever larger numbers:

Why is the price perpetually rising?


People are taking stock in large amounts of plex. With them rising, its a good stock to hold. The issue is when a single player is holding onto 2000+ of them, and alot of traders are doing this for a long term investment. You're seeing less turn around plex, which just means its 1 more off the market every time one is bought by one of these people holding them.

Question is: how long do you hold the investment before you start to actually detract away from it? Lets say there is 200,000 plex being held up in stock. That is 10 months of game time for the current active accounts that are online at peak and most likely its 3-4 months of sub time for all the active accounts in Eve currently.
That is alot of plex being removed from the market, but how long before the price just effects how many people stop logging on all together?

I currently attend school full time and do not work. So, paying for multiple accounts for me is out of the question. My style of gameplay generally involves a minimum of 3 active accounts. for me to make isk, i ideally need a 4th and 5th for the income I make with mission running. So when I am having a minimum of 5 accounts active, and plex is 1.3b. You are talking 6.5b a month for me to play. It is not fun as the price goes up. The more it goes up, the less accounts I have active. It will just get to a point that will all go inactive due to my lack of care to PVE for 10 of 30 days. Which I already am on maybe 15-20 days in a month. So 50-75% of my game time is done paying for 5-10 days of care free playing? bah.

Im in a similar situation. Full time student in our captial with high living cost, which means i can only afford 1 acc with RL cash. In the past it was pretty easy to pay for my 3 alts with PLEX, but with the current prices, EVE is turning into a job. (The PvE in EVE is just dead boring.) If the prices dont go down (and there is no sign they will), i will let my accounts lapse. Probably even my main, because playing EVE without alts is simply too tedious and time-consuming.

I don't understand why CCP isnt putting more restrictions on PLEX. It isnt a normal item, its an item wich can increase active player numbers and active players is THE most important asset CCP has. The more players, the better the sandbox, the better the game.

Its not only vets like me who use PLEX to pay for their alts, but also a lot of new players. One of the most asked question of new players is "How hard is it to pay for the subscription with ingame money?". We are in the age of Free2Play. Many modern F2P games are decent, the times in which F2P meant Pay2Win and mind numbing grind are (mostly) over. In EVE you still have to do a lot of mind numbing grind if you want to play for free so many of the potential new players are turning away from the game.

The traders and rich players who hoard hundreds or even thousands of PLEX as investment or gold reserve are really hurting the game. It should be CCPs main goal to increase active player numbers, not to make a few rich players happy with an unrestricted gold standard item. The situation is critical. The decline of active players is turning into a big problem, we went from 36k average active players to 18k in just 1 year ... High PLEX prices are not the only cause for the decline, but they definitely add to it.
widgetman
Widgetland
#1899 - 2015-09-18 08:35:20 UTC
I will quote from the Steam Eve Online page where people can buy the game:

About This Game.

Explore. Build. Conquer. EVE Online immerses you in a sci-fi experience where your every action can have rippling effects across a massive online universe. Team with and compete against over 500,000 players in epic starship battles or wage economic warfare on the galactic player-controlled market.

CCP state there are over 500,000 players to play against, so the where are people getting such low figures from?

Honestly i believe the price is simply too high when you look at many other free games.

People will go to free games like World of Warships, World of Tanks, Armored Warfare, or one off payment games like Battlefront, Elite etc.....

Plex is an issue , but really if they made the game £5 a month people would not mind, it is a fine line to manage with the fact there is no real injection of content etc.......

Eve was great in 2004-2006 and when i first started playing and had 2-3k players on......
Lan Wang
Princess Aiko Hold My Hand
Safety. Net
#1900 - 2015-09-18 09:31:51 UTC  |  Edited by: Lan Wang
widgetman wrote:
Honestly i believe the price is simply too high when you look at many other free games.

People will go to free games like World of Warships, World of Tanks, Armored Warfare, or one off payment games like Battlefront, Elite etc.....

Plex is an issue , but really if they made the game £5 a month people would not mind, it is a fine line to manage with the fact there is no real injection of content etc.......

Eve was great in 2004-2006 and when i first started playing and had 2-3k players on......


its 9.99 a month stop being cheap considering the support and the size of the game and the fact you can do anything you want not to mention the free expansions, world of tanks is a totally different kind game, its a matchmaking arena game you cant possibly compare these games to eve. no injection of content, are you actually being serious?

Domination Nephilim - Angel Cartel

Calm down miner. As you pointed out, people think they can get away with stuff they would not in rl... Like for example illegal mining... - Ima Wreckyou*