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EVE New Citizens Q&A

 
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New Alpha Clone; Old Player
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Xiu Kahn
Federal Navy Academy
Gallente Federation
#1 - 2017-01-04 03:24:42 UTC
New Alpha Clone; Old Player

So marketing worked as intended and I've been exploring Eve as an Alpha. I even bought a Plex. As others have noted it's not really fully FTP but a stop along the way to full subscription. It's been useful for organizing the garbage in my hangars and figuring out what's what in the game nowadays. The NPE was interesting and much better than anything in previous incarnations. However, as a returning player I think it's a bit misleading. Eve is about PvP. Story driven missions are PvE. The NPE really doesn't help with getting podded out of the gate regardless of where you are, hi, lo or nowhere in particular.

From my perspective this makes the NPE incomplete and a bit misleading. As it sets up players to expect story driven play and linear progression similar to RPG and other MMO styles. I suggest an NPE part 2 that functions around the real fundamentals of staying alive in Eve. When I started long, long ago it would have been more than helpful to know how to "instadock", what those blank spots on my were good for and "Cap is life. Amarr lasers don't go here. " Simulating a small gang and explaining roles with NPCs or even a random 3 or 4 man team would make much more sense than sending new players to Career Agents first.

The learning curve in Eve is high because most of the relevant information exists outside the game. This is good in that the player base has advanced skills and is generous with time and knowledge, also not so good because much of information and relationships amongst and between items and areas should be accessible in the game. It's 2017 already! I thought Aura would be a bit more Siri or Cortana like and perhaps explain some relationships like d-scan is a good idea at a relic site. Not "You need to be in range..." I think the NPE a good start, but not quite on the mark. The Alpha state is fine. But I think being able to evolve one or two good characters will inspire long term subscription because you're more vested than making an army of alts half baked.







"The maze is not mean't for you."
Black Locust
Imperial Shipment
Amarr Empire
#2 - 2017-01-04 16:43:44 UTC
I started an alt a week or so ago, and also went through the NPE. I have to agree that it is leaps and bounds ahead of what existed before, although considering what was there before it would not have taken much!

I agree with what you are saying, an intro to the PVE side of eve is certainly required, as there are a large number of players who will only do PVE, but an intro to PVP would also be a great addition as even the most hardcore PVE`er will at some point run into a PVP situation.

The main problem I see would be making sure only new Alphas could participate in the PVP intro, as you would not want older, more experienced pilots welping newbs for laughs. Maybe some kind of FFA arena that new players can duke it out in until they either quit the mission, or graduate by hitting x number of kills could be cool.

I dont think going too far into PVP training would be required, like teaching about gatecamps, fleet battles and mission invaders etc, as I think it would take some of the mystery and trepidation out of the EVE universe, which would be a bad thing. Some of my most memorable moments in EVE generally ended with me exploding whilst trying to work out what the heck just happened :)
Memphis Baas
#3 - 2017-01-04 17:54:02 UTC
There is no way to simulate PVP by using NPC's. Even if they use the typical PVP tactics, we'll just put it on a website with instructions how to beat the system.

But more importantly, you've done it solo and you've done it without access to the Rookie Help channel, I'm guessing. Or Reddit. Pretty much all the places that offer advice to newbies will actively funnel them into PVP groups like Karma Fleet, Pandemic Horde, Brave Newbies, wormhole exploration corps, FW, and the like. A lot of them don't even wait for them to finish the career agents, they just grab them right after the tutorial.

So the veteran playerbase is simulating the PVP aspects of EVE, using real PVP.
Iria Ahrens
Space Perverts and Forum Pirates
#4 - 2017-01-04 23:38:01 UTC
Well, a lot of games require the player fight a duel, or do some quest in a pk zone, to expose them to pk.

My choice of pronouns is based on your avatar. Even if I know what is behind the avatar.
Jonah Gravenstein
Machiavellian Space Bastards
#5 - 2017-01-04 23:50:51 UTC
I'd like to see a mission or series of missions for new characters that pits them against other new characters from an opposing faction for the objective.

Word the descriptions in such a way that it encourages teamwork, especially for any missions that involve more than a couple of players.

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ergherhdfgh
Imperial Academy
Amarr Empire
#6 - 2017-01-04 23:54:18 UTC
Xiu Kahn wrote:

From my perspective this makes the NPE incomplete and a bit misleading. As it sets up players to expect story driven play and linear progression similar to RPG and other MMO styles.

Yes. This is known. The devs have talked about this repeatedly over the years.

They have a huge washout rate to this game because of the steep learning curve. New players would whine about the lack of tutorials so they invented tutorials and then players left in even greater numbers because after the tutorials were over they felt abandoned.

The main problem is that eve is a game for people who love to problem solve. Pretty much everyone that I know that plays this game is in IT in some way or another, so like network security specialists or programmers or web developers etc. More heavily tilted to the back end of things, essentially jobs dealing with logic more than pretty pictures.

So you have a small and limited but dedicated group of players. On the other hand you have WoW with 18 Million subs. Dumbed down and linear, theme park style MMO. CCP on the other hand is currently looking at hundreds of thousands of subs not MIllions. It would seem that the only way to get from 6 figure subs to 7 figure subs is to dumb a game down and make it so linear that you are holding player's hands and walking them through everything.

We live in a capitalist world so a company being happy with 300K subscriptions is not something that can happen. If they have 300K they need to be chasing after 600K and if they reach 600K then they need to chase after 1.2 Million etc...

It seems inevitable that CCP will have to gradually and slowly dumb the game down. Hoping to bring on twice as many new players as they loose until eventually this is just a theme park MMO or gone under. Grow or die trying I think is the moto.
Xiu Kahn wrote:

The learning curve in Eve is high because most of the relevant information exists outside the game.

I think that is largely due to the exploratory nature of the game. IMHO one of the things that did the most damage to WoW was all of the sites that gave you step by step instructions as to how to level fast, or listed the best in slot gear and who dropped it etc... It took all the discovery out of the game.

You can't have official and detailed instructions readily available from the game without destroying the exploration / discovery aspect of the game. At that point you might as well just introduce damage meters and queueable, instanced raids with automated group loot mechanics.

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Xiu Kahn
Federal Navy Academy
Gallente Federation
#7 - 2017-01-05 20:41:25 UTC
Jonah Gravenstein wrote:
I'd like to see a mission or series of missions for new characters that pits them against other new characters from an opposing faction for the objective.

Word the descriptions in such a way that it encourages teamwork, especially for any missions that involve more than a couple of players.


I agree. I think having team or a one vs one PvP tutorial would be more fun for players coming into the game. If ship size and gang size were restricted then experienced players could also join in as part of the learning experience. There are scores of scenarios that could be played based on live game encounters.

There is a disconnect happening between how the game universe really functions and what it is being presented as through the NPE. Eve is never going to have a "walkthrough " to an endgame. But it does have vastly different play styles in a universe designed around PvP. Yet the NPE never introduces the core game concept.

Having relevant information on hand does not dumb down a game. The mechanics remain the same, it is simply a better experience if you have some idea of what is actually going on. This doesn't remove the fun of discovery. Information should improve the player ability to explore in a capable manner and make play feel rewarding.

"The maze is not mean't for you."