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How would EVE break if we removed skills altogether?

First post
Author
Tyberius Franklin
Federal Navy Academy
Gallente Federation
#261 - 2015-10-05 20:24:32 UTC
Dror wrote:
"Billions of ISK", "vets leveling their Golem" -- where is any of this implied? If new players are "leveling up their Raven" for the first sub or so, that still counts as part of the NPE. The original challenge on the idea of fresh characters in BSs is as follows:
The golem statement refers to the general end game created by the "leveling your raven" path. You could really substitute any mission end ship there, probably the mach would be the current most accurate single ship, but the exact ship is immaterial. The "leveling your raven" issue is only interpreted as literally only the raven by someone who's missing the fundamental point, which is the gameplay about simply increasing PvE effectiveness, regardless of the exact hull, peaking, then leaving the game for lack of anywhere further to progress. It was not about true new players either as those characters aren't the ones maxing out those "ravens."

So to answer your question directly, it was implied by CCP Rise during his presentation.

Quote:
That's already how it is.
If this is the case your entire premise is a lie. Either SP is holding people back or it isn't. If PLEX is already a substitute then we clearly have no issues on the character progression front.

Tyberius Franklin wrote:
The NPE videos claim that the NPE is "not really like B-R or EVE stories at all.. They're there for these emergent, unpredictable, interactive experiences. Instead, what they find is this linear, predictable, reward-based, isolated systems." I, and apparently plenty of scientific studies, can tell you why its helpful fixing this, but it doesn't seem like you have an interesting or accurate argument to start.
When the NPE is NPC driven, which it is currently, it is of course linear. This is independent of the skill system. If you have evidence that the skill system exasperates this or worse is the primary factor, you've yet to present it. All you've presented are misinterpretations of CCP presentations. Your criticism of accuracy in arguments is laughable with your evidenced level of comprehension given the claims you have made regarding CCP presentations.

You have yet to actually present anything remotely resembling scientific evidence of your claims. All you need do is simply produce on those claims.
Teckos Pech
Hogyoku
Goonswarm Federation
#262 - 2015-10-05 20:32:03 UTC
Aerasia wrote:
Corraidhin Farsaidh wrote:
Meta game-wise you would basically destroy the market, there would be a flood of minerals, ore, PI, and every other material used in production. This would lead to price crash on everything. Additionally since everyone can use tech II and tech III perfectly there would be very little if any market for all tech I and virtually no market for the meta modules. Since anyone could produce anything perfectly there would be no means in which any manufacturer could compete in the market.

There would be nothing flying other than tech II, pirate, and tech III ships except for gankers.

Core game-wise you just tore the heart out of a character building game.

And the flood of minerals wouldn't be offset by the sudden uptick in demand for the products needed to harvest them? By the explosion in T2 gear purchases? By the increase in more expensive things being exploded?

And it doesn't mean there cannot be personalization, or module diversity. Right now Meta 1-4 are held back by the fact they are intended to be the stepping stone for people who haven't skilled V for whatever it is. Getting rid of SP means that you can rebalance those to be specializations of T2 gear, instead of inferior versions of it. The current market of Meta 4 often being worth several times T2 would go away, but that's not a death knell to dropped mods as a whole.

You can also have character difference without enforcing a time gated power mechanic. Other competitive games have been doing this for decades, in offering ways to specialize a character in certain areas at the expense of others. You could still have the ability to specialize in manufacturing if you like, and have that tied to something like a remap mechanic instead of a time waster offline skill bar.


The changes to supply and demand are hard to predict. You cannot reason as you have Areasia, at least not as precisely as you have stated things. People do this all the time and it is completely wrong headed to do so. For some goods demand might actually fall, as players can now access other ships they might prefer over others.

Your second paragraph implicitly admits that removing skills from the existing game would be unbalancing. That part where you say "rebalanced".

"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

Teckos Pech
Hogyoku
Goonswarm Federation
#263 - 2015-10-05 20:36:23 UTC  |  Edited by: Teckos Pech
Aerasia wrote:
Corraidhin Farsaidh wrote:
rebalance the meta stuff? All of it? That's huge change and again a huge gamble.
For the good of your own heart, don't google "Teiricide".

Or market equilibrium.


That's hilarious considering you post about the meta 1-4 would be very heavily effected. In its current form those markets might simply cease to exist for all intents and purposes if nobody needs it any more there might be very little or even no demand.

See why your statement about "demand would increase too, no problems" was short sighted and foolish?

"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

Teckos Pech
Hogyoku
Goonswarm Federation
#264 - 2015-10-05 20:38:47 UTC
Dror wrote:
Teckos Pech wrote:
Dror wrote:


Techos Peck wrote:
No new player is going to have the detailed knowledge to make use [of no SP].

EVE's a pretty simple experience. A fresh player can't be shown what it's like playing well if they're limited to T1 ammo and frigates.

Also, freedom benefiting veterans is fine. They're already benefited by an insurmountable "achievement" over fresh subs. Making power and effectiveness correlative with "money paid" cheapens the experience and the sandbox feature list. We're talking about motivation. If newbies can achieve something, the idea is that they will. If they can't, the idea is that they unsub. Why wouldn't the true sandbox be the best design?


And no new player knows enough nor has the ISK to take advantage of CCP Rise's idea. The players that do, will be the veterans.

This is no valid criticism of the idea. The new player can play the same with or without SP, but depth makes them more interested because of more diversity, fairness (helping motivation), options for promoting fantasy, options for feeling relevant and promoting socialization, and playstyles to learn.


It is because it will swing things further in favor of the veterans, something you have posted ad nauseam about. Suddenly you switch over to talking out of the other side of your mouth.Roll

Question, do new characters still get the accelerated training bonus till 1.6 million SP?

"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

Tyberius Franklin
Federal Navy Academy
Gallente Federation
#265 - 2015-10-05 20:43:28 UTC
Aerasia wrote:
And the flood of minerals wouldn't be offset by the sudden uptick in demand for the products needed to harvest them? By the explosion in T2 gear purchases? By the increase in more expensive things being exploded?

And it doesn't mean there cannot be personalization, or module diversity. Right now Meta 1-4 are held back by the fact they are intended to be the stepping stone for people who haven't skilled V for whatever it is. Getting rid of SP means that you can rebalance those to be specializations of T2 gear, instead of inferior versions of it. The current market of Meta 4 often being worth several times T2 would go away, but that's not a death knell to dropped mods as a whole.
What's the source of this uptick in demand? What's the impetus for all the increased activity, specifically that which induces loss, being claimed?

Also your claim about meta items being restrained due to players who can't use T2 mods makes me wonder the extent of your ship fitting experience given that a) Meta4 is sometimes better than T2 for certain modules (though tiericide seems to be reducing those cases) and b) Meta modules are often used to get around fitting restrictions by those that can use them as T2 mods often have the highest fitting costs across meta levels of an item (and tiericide only makes this more relevant with the "compact" type).

This leaves aside that the most effective modules in the game, deadspace and officer mods (and faction ships for that matter), don't have T2 requirements.
Dror
Center for Advanced Studies
Gallente Federation
#266 - 2015-10-05 20:48:16 UTC
Tyberius Franklin wrote:
Dror wrote:
"Billions of ISK", "vets leveling their Golem" -- where is any of this implied? If new players are "leveling up their Raven" for the first sub or so, that still counts as part of the NPE. The original challenge on the idea of fresh characters in BSs is as follows:
The golem statement refers to the general end game created by the "leveling your raven" path. You could really substitute any mission end ship there, probably the mach would be the current most accurate single ship, but the exact ship is immaterial. The "leveling your raven" issue is only interpreted as literally only the raven by someone who's missing the fundamental point, which is the gameplay about simply increasing PvE effectiveness, regardless of the exact hull, peaking, then leaving the game for lack of anywhere further to progress. It was not about true new players either as those characters aren't the ones maxing out those "ravens."

So to answer your question directly, it was implied by CCP Rise during his presentation.

Quote:
That's already how it is.
If this is the case your entire premise is a lie. Either SP is holding people back or it isn't. If PLEX is already a substitute then we clearly have no issues on the character progression front.

Tyberius Franklin wrote:
The NPE videos claim that the NPE is "not really like B-R or EVE stories at all.. They're there for these emergent, unpredictable, interactive experiences. Instead, what they find is this linear, predictable, reward-based, isolated systems." I, and apparently plenty of scientific studies, can tell you why its helpful fixing this, but it doesn't seem like you have an interesting or accurate argument to start.
When the NPE is NPC driven, which it is currently, it is of course linear. This is independent of the skill system. If you have evidence that the skill system exasperates this or worse is the primary factor, you've yet to present it. All you've presented are misinterpretations of CCP presentations. Your criticism of accuracy in arguments is laughable with your evidenced level of comprehension given the claims you have made regarding CCP presentations.

You have yet to actually present anything remotely resembling scientific evidence of your claims. All you need do is simply produce on those claims.

There's no logical progression from BSs, for the NPE, for including Marauders. It's like saying that just because they fly t1 cruisers, they fly t3 cruisers. The proper interpretation is just "BSs". Further on the point, "maxing out" is unstated. Please stop including irrelevant ideas. Thereof, there is no implication of Marauder-level play It's complete conjecture.

SP can hold fresh pilots back with or without the option of paying extra money for progression. They're not playing the game to pay more money, just to experience whatever news article motivated them to come. For a decent percentage, that's B-R levels of ideas. The point made in the videos is that "the problem is finding linear, predictable, reward-based system". It's obvious that this applies to SP. That's just true.

"SP is helpful for the game?" Here's all of the research on motivation -- it says the opposite! What purpose does it serve, then? Starter corps are non-competitive. Sov is unchallenged. "Fix sov!" you say? Remove SP.

Teckos Pech
Hogyoku
Goonswarm Federation
#267 - 2015-10-05 20:59:25 UTC
Tyberius Franklin wrote:
Aerasia wrote:
And the flood of minerals wouldn't be offset by the sudden uptick in demand for the products needed to harvest them? By the explosion in T2 gear purchases? By the increase in more expensive things being exploded?

And it doesn't mean there cannot be personalization, or module diversity. Right now Meta 1-4 are held back by the fact they are intended to be the stepping stone for people who haven't skilled V for whatever it is. Getting rid of SP means that you can rebalance those to be specializations of T2 gear, instead of inferior versions of it. The current market of Meta 4 often being worth several times T2 would go away, but that's not a death knell to dropped mods as a whole.
What's the source of this uptick in demand? What's the impetus for all the increased activity, specifically that which induces loss, being claimed?

Also your claim about meta items being restrained due to players who can't use T2 mods makes me wonder the extent of your ship fitting experience given that a) Meta4 is sometimes better than T2 for certain modules (though tiericide seems to be reducing those cases) and b) Meta modules are often used to get around fitting restrictions by those that can use them as T2 mods often have the highest fitting costs across meta levels of an item (and tiericide only makes this more relevant with the "compact" type).

This leaves aside that the most effective modules in the game, deadspace and officer mods (and faction ships for that matter), don't have T2 requirements.


Well, people might want to purchase a given ship, but due to skills and SP cannot. So if you give them the skills and the SP then they'd buy the ship, thus increasing the demand.

However, the problem with Areasia's logic is that people have limited ISK just as in RL we have limited income. So, if I buy a car I might buy less of other things. So lets say I'm currently flying a raven, to go with the popular example, till I get the skills/SP to use a golem. Remove that barrier now the only thing holding me back is the ISK. And when I get that I'll buy the golem...but my demand for the raven will go to zero effectively. So the demand for ravens could conceivably take a big hit, whereas the demand for golems go up quite a bit.

In net, like an aggregate demand concept (which I don't think is really terribly valid) it is unclear if demand would go up or down.

This is why I urged caution and dislike it when people make such blithe pronouncements about the in game economy.

"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

Tyberius Franklin
Federal Navy Academy
Gallente Federation
#268 - 2015-10-05 21:14:25 UTC
Dror wrote:
There's no logical progression from BSs, for the NPE, for including Marauders. It's like saying that just because they fly t1 cruisers, they fly t3 cruisers. The proper interpretation is just "BSs". Further on the point, "maxing out" is unstated. Please stop including irrelevant ideas. Thereof, there is no implication of Marauder-level play It's complete conjecture.
There is an implication of upgrading that playstyle to a point of stagnation then quitting. Considering pirate and Marauder BSs are upgrades that implication holds with both. It's entirely relevant because the statement you brought up was about these players, the "raven levelers" and how the NPC driven NPE set them down this path. The presentation you brought up discussed the end game of these characters with the "leveling their raven" comments, and how the NPE effected that.

If that part of the presentation is relevant that the tenured players it refers to and their tools are relevant.

Dror wrote:
SP can hold fresh pilots back with or without the option of paying extra money for progression. They're not playing the game to pay more money, just to experience whatever news article motivated them to come. For a decent percentage, that's B-R levels of ideas. The point made in the videos is that "the problem is finding linear, predictable, reward-based system". It's obvious that this applies to SP. That's just true.
No, there is no obvious link between the skills system and the "linear, predictable, reward-based system". There never has been, which is why you aren't presenting evidence, you have none as your premise is false.

Also there are a number of factors preventing players from experiencing B-R level events. First and foremost is the rate at which such events occur. 2nd is being a part of the organizations that are capable of creating such events. A new player, even with no SP limits, is in no way equipped to control these factors nor competent enough to be effective with the tools that tend to receive top mentions like the titan deaths particularly in B-R.

So we go from a situation with players unable to participate in the next B-R to a situation with players unable to participate in the next B-R. Great plan.
Tyberius Franklin
Federal Navy Academy
Gallente Federation
#269 - 2015-10-05 21:22:51 UTC
Teckos Pech wrote:
Well, people might want to purchase a given ship, but due to skills and SP cannot. So if you give them the skills and the SP then they'd buy the ship, thus increasing the demand.

However, the problem with Areasia's logic is that people have limited ISK just as in RL we have limited income. So, if I buy a car I might buy less of other things. So lets say I'm currently flying a raven, to go with the popular example, till I get the skills/SP to use a golem. Remove that barrier now the only thing holding me back is the ISK. And when I get that I'll buy the golem...but my demand for the raven will go to zero effectively. So the demand for ravens could conceivably take a big hit, whereas the demand for golems go up quite a bit.

In net, like an aggregate demand concept (which I don't think is really terribly valid) it is unclear if demand would go up or down.

This is why I urged caution and dislike it when people make such blithe pronouncements about the in game economy.

Realistically is that an increase in demand overall, which is what actually effects the economy, or just a shift from one product to another? That's the issue I have with this grand idea of supposed economic massive booster shot. Sure the price difference is something, but that has more to do with material restrictions for T2 items.

My point was, given the nature of only being able to fly one ship at a time, unless that one ship you gain access to has you flying and losing it a lot more than anything else you had access to prior, which seems unlikely, there isn't a notable increase in demand for ships overall to alter the general economy.

At best we see greater moo goo demands, but those can't be scaled by activity so they just bottleneck rather than provide the supposed incentive that gets more people doing "x" and getting shot at.
Teckos Pech
Hogyoku
Goonswarm Federation
#270 - 2015-10-05 21:52:14 UTC
Tyberius Franklin wrote:
Teckos Pech wrote:
Well, people might want to purchase a given ship, but due to skills and SP cannot. So if you give them the skills and the SP then they'd buy the ship, thus increasing the demand.

However, the problem with Areasia's logic is that people have limited ISK just as in RL we have limited income. So, if I buy a car I might buy less of other things. So lets say I'm currently flying a raven, to go with the popular example, till I get the skills/SP to use a golem. Remove that barrier now the only thing holding me back is the ISK. And when I get that I'll buy the golem...but my demand for the raven will go to zero effectively. So the demand for ravens could conceivably take a big hit, whereas the demand for golems go up quite a bit.

In net, like an aggregate demand concept (which I don't think is really terribly valid) it is unclear if demand would go up or down.

This is why I urged caution and dislike it when people make such blithe pronouncements about the in game economy.

Realistically is that an increase in demand overall, which is what actually effects the economy, or just a shift from one product to another? That's the issue I have with this grand idea of supposed economic massive booster shot. Sure the price difference is something, but that has more to do with material restrictions for T2 items.

My point was, given the nature of only being able to fly one ship at a time, unless that one ship you gain access to has you flying and losing it a lot more than anything else you had access to prior, which seems unlikely, there isn't a notable increase in demand for ships overall to alter the general economy.

At best we see greater moo goo demands, but those can't be scaled by activity so they just bottleneck rather than provide the supposed incentive that gets more people doing "x" and getting shot at.


I largely agree, but there is the possibility of using alchemy to cover the moon goo issue. But the only time I've done alchemy was when technetium prices were horribly out of whack, so there could still be a problem there.

But over all I agree with you, I don't see this as necessarily being good for the in game economy. It could be terrible. People saying it will be good, no impact, or great are talking out of their asses, IMO.

"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

Aerasia
Republic University
Minmatar Republic
#271 - 2015-10-05 22:43:48 UTC
Tyberius Franklin wrote:
Also your claim about meta items being restrained due to players who can't use T2 mods makes me wonder the extent of your ship fitting experience
Mostly because you're reaching for a counterargument.

I'm referring to the design of the meta modules. Once upon a time they were intended to be part of the officer/deadspace module track that would form a rarity and desirability ladder. The incredibly rarity and cost of the deadspace, along with the steep skill reqs of T2 causing a massive demand skew for Meta 4 has broken this somewhat.

Removing the pre-reqs for T2, but retaining their place in the power lineup would mean needing to retool the lower meta levels as their skill req advantage would be gone. In theory it could be done now, but considering how plentiful those mods are currently you'd likely end up either destroying T2 completely by drowning them out, or giving Meta 1-3 the same pricing "problem" that 4 has.

Tyberius Franklin wrote:
What's the source of this uptick in demand? What's the impetus for all the increased activity, specifically that which induces loss, being claimed?
Other than people suddenly using all the things they've been skilling for?

I mean, maybe you're right. Maybe nobody plays this game for anything other than the skill queue, and if you remove it then the playerbase will collectively sigh... bask in their fully levelled Raven and quit. Demand for all things drops to zero.

Considering how many people say that the queue doesn't inhibit anything, and you can play just fine no matter the SP, I find that hard to believe. More likely, you see an uptick in T2 usage as it becomes the de-facto standard for flying. Add in the other types of ships people suddenly want, and that means an enormous surge in demand for those items, along with a continued higher plateau.
Zan Shiro
Doomheim
#272 - 2015-10-05 23:06:17 UTC  |  Edited by: Zan Shiro
Tyberius Franklin wrote:
So we go from a situation with players unable to participate in the next B-R to a situation with players unable to participate in the next B-R. Great plan.


Funny thing is if you ask some people who were there...they aren't missing much. Tidi making the game play like total ass not the green grass some make it out to be. Some of the bitters I know at BR.....this made them even more bitter lol. I can relate, saw the grandeur of this style of fight in H-W in the IT/NC (no dot) war. Week of wtf is this crap lag. death....was a release really. It got you back to station (when the server actually caught up to your podding) to actually have the game client work right again.

Way I hear BR went down....tidi was not the savior to lag it was advertised as. Same crap, different name.

Also think the whole noob in frigates "iimitation" quite funny. TBH eve's most welcome change of late I have seen was removal of clone upgrade costs. It got older players like me back into frigates and cruisers. Well let me rephrase, back in them not going sigh, if this diaf's my clone is 4 times the cost of the damn ship (assuming t2 frig, t2 fit). Grand scheme of eve, imo, its the frigates and cruisers that are the hardest yet most worthwhile ships to run in the game. Very welcome change from land, target press f1 which is BS and above combat. BC's a mixed bag of experience but can be almost as bad.
Tyberius Franklin
Federal Navy Academy
Gallente Federation
#273 - 2015-10-05 23:09:02 UTC  |  Edited by: Tyberius Franklin
Aerasia wrote:
Mostly because you're reaching for a counterargument.

I'm referring to the design of the meta modules. Once upon a time they were intended to be part of the officer/deadspace module track that would form a rarity and desirability ladder. The incredibly rarity and cost of the deadspace, along with the steep skill reqs of T2 causing a massive demand skew for Meta 4 has broken this somewhat.

Removing the pre-reqs for T2, but retaining their place in the power lineup would mean needing to retool the lower meta levels as their skill req advantage would be gone. In theory it could be done now, but considering how plentiful those mods are currently you'd likely end up either destroying T2 completely by drowning them out, or giving Meta 1-3 the same pricing "problem" that 4 has.
This only holds if the T2 mods are wholly superior in every way but prerequisites, offering no advantage to other meta levels. This is not the case. As stated, variances in fitting, cap consumptions and drawbacks are designed to give purpose to meta mods even for those that can use T2. This exists because no matter how much SP you have cap and fitting resources are not infinite.

And this meta role is being reinforced through tiericide.

The funny thing about your conclusions is that all of the recent balance work was done with upper levels in mind while narrowing gaps for lower levels. This means that module/ship balance is happening in a way that offers use to the veteran characters even at low meta levels.

Quote:
Other than people suddenly using all the things they've been skilling for?

I mean, maybe you're right. Maybe nobody plays this game for anything other than the skill queue, and if you remove it then the playerbase will collectively sigh... bask in their fully levelled Raven and quit. Demand for all things drops to zero.

Considering how many people say that the queue doesn't inhibit anything, and you can play just fine no matter the SP, I find that hard to believe. More likely, you see an uptick in T2 usage as it becomes the de-facto standard for flying. Add in the other types of ships people suddenly want, and that means an enormous surge in demand for those items, along with a continued higher plateau.
Yours is the premise that is pretty much predicated on the idea of no one using anything until their skilled for the one thing they apparently want exclusively. Unless no one is playing because they are waiting for something to train it doesn't make sense to conclude that removing SP increases activity of loss.

You are the one claiming that no one plays anything but skill queue online, not me. An aside being the "leveling your raven" issue, which was identified by CCP, not me, which is more taking the NPC guided tour and peaking then leaving. That's a real subset of players per CCP and I don't have the evidence to counter their conclusions.

That and this aren't really tangibly related for the reason you state though. In the end an SP focused player who doesn't do much doesn't have clear incentive to become suddenly active when an SP milestone is reached and similarly an active player likely doesn't likely become super active for the same reason. That's why the conclusion doesn't make sense. It doesn't follow whether you play "skill queue online or not", and as such whether I think most play skills queue online or not is pretty irrelevant.

The increased demand for T2 also doesn't constitute an increase in overall demand because, as stated, a new de-facto standard functionally shifts T1 demand rather than being a new impetus to ptoduce. There is no gain obvious gain.
Dror
Center for Advanced Studies
Gallente Federation
#274 - 2015-10-05 23:22:27 UTC
Tyberius Franklin wrote:
Dror wrote:
There's no logical progression from BSs, for the NPE, for including Marauders. It's like saying that just because they fly t1 cruisers, they fly t3 cruisers. The proper interpretation is just "BSs". Further on the point, "maxing out" is unstated. Please stop including irrelevant ideas. Thereof, there is no implication of Marauder-level play It's complete conjecture.
There is an implication of upgrading that playstyle to a point of stagnation then quitting. Considering pirate and Marauder BSs are upgrades that implication holds with both. It's entirely relevant because the statement you brought up was about these players, the "raven levelers" and how the NPC driven NPE set them down this path. The presentation you brought up discussed the end game of these characters with the "leveling their raven" comments, and how the NPE effected that.

If that part of the presentation is relevant that the tenured players it refers to and their tools are relevant.

Dror wrote:
SP can hold fresh pilots back with or without the option of paying extra money for progression. They're not playing the game to pay more money, just to experience whatever news article motivated them to come. For a decent percentage, that's B-R levels of ideas. The point made in the videos is that "the problem is finding linear, predictable, reward-based system". It's obvious that this applies to SP. That's just true.
No, there is no obvious link between the skills system and the "linear, predictable, reward-based system". There never has been, which is why you aren't presenting evidence, you have none as your premise is false.

Also there are a number of factors preventing players from experiencing B-R level events. First and foremost is the rate at which such events occur. 2nd is being a part of the organizations that are capable of creating such events. A new player, even with no SP limits, is in no way equipped to control these factors nor competent enough to be effective with the tools that tend to receive top mentions like the titan deaths particularly in B-R.

So we go from a situation with players unable to participate in the next B-R to a situation with players unable to participate in the next B-R. Great plan.

Yet, there's no reason to imply that fresh subs are even making it to the idea of Golems, much less actually skilling for them. It's complete speculation and an unnecessary tangent of any helpful discussion.

Do you mission? Do you enjoy taking out trash? So.. repetitive, predictable ideas become less interesting and plausibly worth avoiding -- there's millions of cases for evidence, and that includes the very prevalent stereotype of having to be told to take out the trash, that it's not something that's payed to do for entertainment. "There are plenty of options for entertainment, why would I clean?" The videos clearly state that fresh subs are expecting B-R. Is setting a queue that shows exactly how little of a sub is relevant, for any interest, an emergent playground? Is play abounding from initiative coming from fantasizing about a ship? Here are all these negatives for SP, but how is it non-linear then? There's no finding an empty Nyx in space and taking it to sell. So, where's the sandbox progression? If I ask for a sandbox and am told that I can get a specific toy for improving the sandbox, progressively until I have them all, how is that not linear? How is that not predictable?

It's a pretty small achievement getting the 1.5B or so for a carrier. If nothing else, that's about a PLEX -- and $20 is like an outing at a bar. That being no option is literally worthless for gameplay. That helps nothing for mining and the ore prices, nor the potential purchase, nor the industry production, nor the content that comes from the capital. If newbies aren't in capitals, from what can come the B-R style of gameplay?

"SP is helpful for the game?" Here's all of the research on motivation -- it says the opposite! What purpose does it serve, then? Starter corps are non-competitive. Sov is unchallenged. "Fix sov!" you say? Remove SP.

Tyberius Franklin
Federal Navy Academy
Gallente Federation
#275 - 2015-10-06 00:21:29 UTC
Dror wrote:
Yet, there's no reason to imply that fresh subs are even making it to the idea of Golems, much less actually skilling for them. It's complete speculation and an unnecessary tangent of any helpful discussion.

Do you mission? Do you enjoy taking out trash? So.. repetitive, predictable ideas become less interesting and plausibly worth avoiding -- there's millions of cases for evidence, and that includes the very prevalent stereotype of having to be told to take out the trash, that it's not something that's payed to do for entertainment. "There are plenty of options for entertainment, why would I clean?"
Because it's a sandbox, and some people do like cleaning. Not everyone wants to be part of the next B-R. Not everyone who once wanted to be part of the next B-R will when/if it happens. That's where the non-linear part kicks in. Some people ran the PvE to find the deadspace/officer mods that fit those titans. Others invested collective years assembling them from resources yet harvested by others.

Someone did the "cleaning" and "took out the trash" to facilitate B-R. That someone probably enjoyed it to some extent, or at least used those resources to fund some other enjoyment.

Dror wrote:
The videos clearly state that fresh subs are expecting B-R.
And as stated, that's an issue because CCP can't deliver that. It's a player construct, and one that isn't beholden to the SP of any single member present. Thus SP isn't an issue, the fact that B-R's aren't happening every weekend is, and eliminating SP doesn't solve that.

Dror wrote:
Is setting a queue that shows exactly how little of a sub is relevant, for any interest, an emergent playground? Is play abounding from initiative coming from fantasizing about a ship? Here are all these negatives for SP, but how is it non-linear then? There's no finding an empty Nyx in space and taking it to sell. So, where's the sandbox progression? If I ask for a sandbox and am told that I can get a specific toy for improving the sandbox, progressively until I have them all, how is that not linear? How is that not predictable?
Why is initiative entirely tied to a single ship at the exclusion of all else? Why is it not tied to the range of abilities one already has? Why can't goals exist with barriers to be overcome giving purpose to actual initiative?

Why is it bad that players might lack abilities causing them to become interdependent with other players who have specializations they lack, creating relationships and emergent content? How is one guy stealing a Nyx less emergent then calling his buddies for help and them getting spotted in transit causing a competition for this prize more linear?

It clearly isn't.

Also there is no specific progression. If there was, you would be able to answer this based on a single piece of information. I just trained HAC V. What's next on the list, what what was prior to it. What ship types would I have not trained? Did racial diversity come linearly after or before T2 ship training? You claim we have a defined one after another sequence, where must I be on it?

Dror wrote:
It's a pretty small achievement getting the 1.5B or so for a carrier. If nothing else, that's about a PLEX -- and $20 is like an outing at a bar. That being no option is literally worthless for gameplay. That helps nothing for mining and the ore prices, nor the potential purchase, nor the industry production, nor the content that comes from the capital. If newbies aren't in capitals, from what can come the B-R style of gameplay?
Fly in the sucap fleets that were present at B-R obviously, securing the system from other forces trying to access it via gates.
Aerasia
Republic University
Minmatar Republic
#276 - 2015-10-06 03:32:38 UTC
Tyberius Franklin wrote:
This only holds if the T2 mods are wholly superior in every way but prerequisites,
Have you not been paying attention to Tiericide? That's exactly what they're doing. You don't even need to log in; just take a look at the shield mods post still pinned in this forum. The end result is the Meta 1 mods being strictly worse than T2. For some that's not a huge deal because the T2 prereq is only skill level 3. There are going to be a lot of unhappy people when that finally gets around to the turrets though.

Which I suppose is technically balancing with the "upper levels" in mind.

Quote:
An aside being the "leveling your raven" issue, which was identified by CCP, not me, which is more taking the NPC guided tour and peaking then leaving. That's a real subset of players per CCP and I don't have the evidence to counter their conclusions.
90% of new players seems like a bigger word than 'subset'. How many of the 50% of paying players that leave in the first month might have stayed if they weren't facing that skill wall? How many of the remaining 40% of dedicated mission runners might have taken another path if only they hadn't spent so much time chasing mission perfection?

I don't know... but I'm also not going to try an minimize the size of that group.

Quote:
You are the one claiming that no one plays anything but skill queue online, not me.
Forgetting all the people in this thread claiming that everyone would quit if you took SP away?
Tyberius Franklin
Federal Navy Academy
Gallente Federation
#277 - 2015-10-06 04:01:00 UTC  |  Edited by: Tyberius Franklin
Aerasia wrote:
Have you not been paying attention to Tiericide? That's exactly what they're doing. ou don't even need to log in; just take a look at the shield mods post still pinned in this forum. The end result is the Meta 1 mods being strictly worse than T2. For some that's not a huge deal because the T2 prereq is only skill level 3. There are going to be a lot of unhappy people when that finally gets around to the turrets though.

Which I suppose is technically balancing with the "upper levels" in mind.
So we're only looking at one stat now? I can't look at the list (firewall won't allow untrusted spreadsheets/etc) but as I recall those lower meta mods still had fitting advantages and drawbacks.

I can point you at MWD's which have 3 flavors of better than T2 at 'x' for the low meta versions.

Edit: Given the pace set thus far and their current state why would turrets make people unhappy?

Edit 2: At a PC now that can view the shield mod changes, everything is as I stated.

Shield recharger: Meta 0 and 1 both save fitting over T2
Shield power relay: Meta 0 and all meta 1's have lower fitting cost and lower cap recharge penalties
Shield flux capacitor: Again, fitting cost on Meta 0 and 1 as well as reduced shield penalty on restrained, while still all being mods of questionable use.

Quote:
90% of new players seems like a bigger word than 'subset'. How many of the 50% of paying players that leave in the first month might have stayed if they weren't facing that skill wall? How many of the remaining 40% of dedicated mission runners might have taken another path if only they hadn't spent so much time chasing mission perfection?

I don't know... but I'm also not going to try an minimize the size of that group.
Anything less than 100% is a subset so yes, 90% is a subset. But 90% weren't identified as raven levelers, not the full non-subs/unsubs. Those Raven levelers were the subset referred to. And in their case the "issue" was largely attributed to something else.

So are you saying I'm minimizing raven levelers by not counting them as 90% of the population then fully attributing their leaving to skill training in contrary to the people ho actually have the numbers? I ask because it seems like you are taking the rather speculative route of saying that because there is doubt that skill training is a factor here, and it conceivably could be, it must be the culprit.

Gutting Eve's skill system is a pretty fundamental change. I would think it would require a stronger rationale than you literally demonstrating uncertainty that it's actually the root of a problem.
Quote:
Forgetting all the people in this thread claiming that everyone would quit if you took SP away?
If I made those claims, that would be relevant to mention to me. I can't and certainly won't be held to justify every rampant speculation someone comes up with.

Edits for clarity.
Teckos Pech
Hogyoku
Goonswarm Federation
#278 - 2015-10-06 04:18:14 UTC  |  Edited by: Teckos Pech
Aerasia wrote:
Tyberius Franklin wrote:
Also your claim about meta items being restrained due to players who can't use T2 mods makes me wonder the extent of your ship fitting experience
Mostly because you're reaching for a counterargument.

I'm referring to the design of the meta modules. Once upon a time they were intended to be part of the officer/deadspace module track that would form a rarity and desirability ladder. The incredibly rarity and cost of the deadspace, along with the steep skill reqs of T2 causing a massive demand skew for Meta 4 has broken this somewhat.

Removing the pre-reqs for T2, but retaining their place in the power lineup would mean needing to retool the lower meta levels as their skill req advantage would be gone. In theory it could be done now, but considering how plentiful those mods are currently you'd likely end up either destroying T2 completely by drowning them out, or giving Meta 1-3 the same pricing "problem" that 4 has.

Tyberius Franklin wrote:
What's the source of this uptick in demand? What's the impetus for all the increased activity, specifically that which induces loss, being claimed?
Other than people suddenly using all the things they've been skilling for?

I mean, maybe you're right. Maybe nobody plays this game for anything other than the skill queue, and if you remove it then the playerbase will collectively sigh... bask in their fully levelled Raven and quit. Demand for all things drops to zero.

Considering how many people say that the queue doesn't inhibit anything, and you can play just fine no matter the SP, I find that hard to believe. More likely, you see an uptick in T2 usage as it becomes the de-facto standard for flying. Add in the other types of ships people suddenly want, and that means an enormous surge in demand for those items, along with a continued higher plateau.


Two problems as I have pointed out already.

First, this would require a re-balancing of the meta 1-4 items, that right there indicates at least that part of the game would be unbalanced. And as Tyberius has pointed out module tiericide is taking a long time as CCP goes slowly and more importantly carefully through module tiericide.

As for your claims about the uptick in demand, I'm not buying it. Some things will see an increase, some will see a decrease. Everyone can fly the very best pirate ships, tech 2 and tech 3 ships. Demand for tech 1 might fall into the toilet. Although, perhaps if tech 2 is the preferred ship type then the invention process might pick up the slack demand. However, there is the issue of tech 2 components.

Again, I urge caution here. We are talking about a complex dynamic process where we don't know the magnitude of the tail events. You are just talking out of your ass on this one by insisting that it will be all fine and dandy. It might...but it might not. And what is the downside if it is not fine and dandy? CCP shuttering its operations?

"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

Teckos Pech
Hogyoku
Goonswarm Federation
#279 - 2015-10-06 04:21:44 UTC
Aerasia wrote:


90% of new players seems like a bigger word than 'subset'. How many of the 50% of paying players that leave in the first month might have stayed if they weren't facing that skill wall? How many of the remaining 40% of dedicated mission runners might have taken another path if only they hadn't spent so much time chasing mission perfection?


So we should remove skills and SP because of speculation piled on top of dubious economic prognostications.

"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

Dror
Center for Advanced Studies
Gallente Federation
#280 - 2015-10-06 09:00:39 UTC
Tyberius Franklin wrote:
Aerasia wrote:
Other than people suddenly using all the things they've been skilling for?

I mean, maybe you're right. Maybe nobody plays this game for anything other than the skill queue, and if you remove it then the playerbase will collectively sigh... bask in their fully levelled Raven and quit. Demand for all things drops to zero.

Considering how many people say that the queue doesn't inhibit anything, and you can play just fine no matter the SP, I find that hard to believe. More likely, you see an uptick in T2 usage as it becomes the de-facto standard for flying. Add in the other types of ships people suddenly want, and that means an enormous surge in demand for those items, along with a continued higher plateau.
Yours is the premise that is pretty much predicated on the idea of no one using anything until their skilled for the one thing they apparently want exclusively. Unless no one is playing because they are waiting for something to train it doesn't make sense to conclude that removing SP increases activity of loss.

You are the one claiming that no one plays anything but skill queue online, not me. An aside being the "leveling your raven" issue, which was identified by CCP, not me, which is more taking the NPC guided tour and peaking then leaving. That's a real subset of players per CCP and I don't have the evidence to counter their conclusions.

That and this aren't really tangibly related for the reason you state though. In the end an SP focused player who doesn't do much doesn't have clear incentive to become suddenly active when an SP milestone is reached and similarly an active player likely doesn't likely become super active for the same reason. That's why the conclusion doesn't make sense. It doesn't follow whether you play "skill queue online or not", and as such whether I think most play skills queue online or not is pretty irrelevant.

The increased demand for T2 also doesn't constitute an increase in overall demand because, as stated, a new de-facto standard functionally shifts T1 demand rather than being a new impetus to ptoduce. There is no gain obvious gain.

This seems to miss the idea that whatever's trained can get repetitive. Does it really seem unheard of that a sub stops logging in if the game seems predictable? This comes back on the literal whole of the motivation discussion from the NPE videos. It's incredibly more accurate than just for fresh subs -- that's why the video has relevance, saying there's plenty of studies on extrinsic vs intrinsic motivation. It scales. It's scientific.

The reward for subbing should be playing.. not getting a very linear unlock progression that makes playing seem ineffective and without much for learning fresh ships and roles. Why wouldn't it seem underwhelming (finishing) leveling a single ship like the Raven, for a limited role like missioning, with a decent set of skill points between that and something fresh? What if they had come for one of the stories that purportedly brings in so much traffic? That's how leveling and SP and incentive are correlative. Intrinsic motivation is about the enjoyment over the itemization reward systems. Whether they're there for something engaging or social or deep would technically be more relevant than if they're "unlocking ships", but finding an interesting playstyle requires the ships and fittings.

Requesting more information on motivation? Why not just take what CCP's saying as truth? Yet, there's Self-Determination Theory -- the qualia of intrinsic motivation -- qualifications for playing video games -- and the impacts of video games (from better attention allocation, higher spatial resolution in visual processing, and enhanced mental rotation abilities.. through developing a competence identity, positive emotions, and social benefits). Can it honestly be said that SP makes players feel great and not awful? There's a prevalence. SP can't serve both well. Finishing a skill (say, a level V for unlocking T2) has to split its reward with actually playing with the unlock and is a small "portion" of that training, but the negative feeling associated with limitations and the queues can pervade the assessment of everything else about the game. It feels cheap. It feels non-sandboxy. It undermines competence (learning the game could come much more efficiently without the gating). It reduces autonomy. It also reduces socialization potential, with some characters getting rejected for low SP. All of these studies and definitions are equally relevant. The experience is a sum of them all.

A "B-R" can be newbies in capitals. Both the design philosophy of scale.. and the common sense of the idea are still valid.

"SP is helpful for the game?" Here's all of the research on motivation -- it says the opposite! What purpose does it serve, then? Starter corps are non-competitive. Sov is unchallenged. "Fix sov!" you say? Remove SP.