EVE Fiction

Mostly located here...

http://www.eveonline.com/universe/the-world-of-eve/#the-world-of-eve-tab
http://www.eveonline.com/universe/people-personalities/#people-and-personalities-of-eve-tab

While these are nice, I can't help but note the wording of some of these paragraphs seem more in favour of one faction than another, as if actively encouraging new players to sign on for one in particular.

Take the Caldari State's intro in World of EVE. Absolutely flawless, with the very attractive subtitle of "Megacorporations and Militarism"...but isn't there a mention of the fact that it's not a nice place to live? It's authoritarian for starters, under the rule of a rabidly-racist dictator. While they're efficient, it's not a nice place to live. There's also millions of people who fell off the the bottom of the corporate ladder. Sure they might have deserved it, but what about the children that were born under them?

Meanwhile, the Federation gets that trite subtitle of the "Paradox of Democracy", because democracy can never work, even in the future with technology to assist it (and not being built on top of centuries of out-dated, old-fashioned law from pre-industrial times). The second paragraph is a full-on critique about how the Federation is just Not Very Good at foreign policy...the Amarr don't emerge in top form either.

There's also zero mention of the sectarianism and corruption in the Minmatar Republic either. It's very easy to simplify your IP to new players with...

Amarr = Evil slavers
Caldari = Perfectly efficient soldiers
Gallente = Clumsy meddlers
Minmatar = Unjustly-treated, poor, poor slaves

Let's see some three-dimensionality! The Caldari are hyperefficient, yes, but this comes at the cost of possible indoctrination and authoritarianism. The Amarr endorse slavery but also have an incredibly stable and efficient society. The Minmatar are poor ex-slaves and deserve some sympathy, but they're not exactly innocent of attacking their fellow kinsmen just for their religious beliefs. Meanwhile, while the Gallente offer unrestricted freedom that can bring anything from poverty to decadence, they have created a working society that can accomodate multiple cultures and nations within its borders, with hopefully the goal to include all within its democratic empire.

Just another EVE Fiction Q_Q brought to you by another self-entitled RPer :)

Oh, I'm listening.

With respect, I think you're taking the worst interpretation of the material dealing with your own favoured faction but I am listening.

The new eveonline.com is a huge change in the presentation of our IP to an intended audience of people who know little about the EVE Universe. It's not a particularly easy problem and I'd be the first to admit that there is room for improvement.

For example, personally, I regret that there isn't any material on the pirate, renegade and other factions, such as the Guristas, Sansha's Nation or Mordu's Legion. That's something I'd like to look at, as well as deepening the material on the core empires. The challenge is maintaining accessibility and immediacy while communicating the essentials of what is a very dense and rich IP.

I'm aware there is a large audience of people who care deeply about the IP, many of them remaining fairly silent a lot of the time, and I'd encourage people to speak up and give feedback. It all helps.

I can't promise that we'll please everyone, and do remember the site has a very different set of goals to, say, the official fiction portal on EVElopedia. But we will certainly be listening.

I'd finally add that I take an old school approach to things in that I believe that in a game like EVE the key is to create and maintain a believable, compelling and living science fiction IP, against the background of which the players can create their own stories. I do try to measure the material against that standard and, again, I wouldn't claim perfection.

This and the general Jita factor - if you are going to do an alt that is going to care about Caldari Navy standings, why not just start out as Caldari?

Well, that and the fact that newbs usually have the misconception that if they want to fly Drake the PvE pwnmobile, well... it is Caldari, so lets roll Caldari. Heck, I've even heard of people who trialed EVE, then either biomassed their char or flat out started a new trial / new account just so they can then "reroll Caldari" because of Drake/Tengu factor. ( insert facepalm.jpg )

You'll never balance the player races until every race has equally competitive PvE mission boats (which most likely will never happen).

And I obviously know that your character race has nothing to do with what you can fly. I'm just stating that new players usually have this misconception and it can influence race choice.

Of course. Everyone's out to get the Feds after all ^^

Balancing out my late-night rant, and addressing what you've said otherwise, yes, I think this is a much needed update to the website introductions, and overall they're quite good. In contrast to the World introduction, the People intro is a lot more 'balanced' (by balanced, I mean positive of course). I think I agree that this is a basic introduction...Abraxas mentioned updating the four main faction pages on the Fiction Portal at some time, and I imagine these will be massive and follow the same sort of template as http://wiki.eveonline.com/en/wiki/Sansha%27s_Nation . Perhaps when they're done, there could be a hyperlinked "More..." to an extended article that gives a wider introduction?

It's fine having 'negative' paragraphs for each of the factions, especially for a democratic empire that could easily be in danger of appearing very white hat (Federal government uses its spectacular PR system to do grimdark things behind the scenes?). But each empire should have a couple of sentences for why they aren't so great. I believe ye olde Caldari description from 2003 even mentioned that exile and suicide is necessary for those who aren't cut from the finest cloth.

I might be misappropiating. The faction FMVs in the character generator are all very good introductions. And if you were to errorneously and arbitrarily take the Ancestries to represent three thirds of each bloodline, then 1/3 of all Civire are not happy bunnies with the State at all.

This is just another case of CCP forcing the Gallente and Minmatar taking the backseat like it's two annoying children. Amarr and Caldari get to ride shotgun.

I for one picked Gallente because they felt like semi utopian good guys and that their flaws, errors and setbacks came from individuals and not their whole society is rotten and corrupt to the core. Any player that took fluff and ship design into consideriation when choosing agrees.

I suggest you fix that description if you want new players making Gallente characters or at least avoid having a Jekyll/Dr. Hyde incident.