Happy Canada Day!
Thursday, June 30, 2011
On Vacation
Due to Canada Day tomorrow and a week off next week, there will be no posts until Monday July 11th.
Happy Canada Day!
Happy Canada Day!
Devil's Advocate - Aurum for Skillpoints
Alright, I'm going to take a contrary position and argue that a micro-transaction that allowed players to buy skill points to allocate as they please (like when learning and social skill points were refunded) is not a bad thing. I am doing this not because I want CCP to start offering non-vanity purchases in the Noble Exchange but rather to make sure that people don't just have knee jerk reactions to micro transactions and are able to adequately defend their positions.
So our basic assumption is that CCP should not sell anything that gives an in game advantage to player A that player B cannot get through any other means. An example of this would be "gold ammo" with high statistics than regular ammo. Also, "other means" does not include stealing or buying the "gold ammo" from player A.
So selling a paint job for a ship is acceptable, selling Gold Antimatter ammo with better stats than even faction Antimatter is not acceptable.
So skill points. They fall into a grey area that is not as cut and dried as the two examples above. Yes, having more skill points is an advantage but skill points accumulate over time equally for all players. Thus CCP would not be selling an advantage so much as they would be trading time for dollars.
Consider this: you want to fly a Rapier recon cruiser but need Minmatar cruiser V and its 14 days off. Whether you log in constantly for those two weeks or not at all, you will only have access to that skill and thus that ship in two weeks. How unbalancing can it be to allow you to get into that ship two weeks earlier? In other words, the in game advantage player A has over player B is an arbitrary point in time, before which you can't fly a ship and after which you can, regardless of the actions or skills or effort of those respective players.
Look at skill points another way: why does CCP not allow all characters on an account to train skills? Simply put, skill points are doled out at a specific rate to only one character at a time to make you pay more money, either by subbing another account to train a second character or to play your single account longer to do all the training you want to do.
Also, after a certain point (I'll guess 10 million skill points) any in game advantage gained by more skill points is not in terms of making player A superior to player B, its in giving player A more options as to what player B can do. Combat skills, manufacturing skills, trade skills, they all have a certain number of skill points that help them get better and then they cap and the player either puts points into another character or another skill set. A a certain point allowing players to purchase skill points would merely unlock other abilities rather than making them better, abilities that player B could get access to in time regardless of effort (ISK costs for skill books not withstanding since it applies to both parties equally).
Finally, selling skill points would allow CCP to address what is perceived as the biggest knock on the skill point system: that newer players can never catch up to older players. We know that this is mitigated a lot by the aforementioned cap of skill points that any area of skills can accept before being full, but selling skill points might prevent some players from leaving early in frustration.
Downsides:
Of course there would be problems with selling skill points. Make it too cheap and easy and suddenly you find that disposable alts that are extremely useful can be had for the price of a six pack of Coke Zero (aside: so thirsty at the moment). People hunting for kills can never be sure if that 6 month old character is easy pickings or skilled up to the gills by dollars (i.e. birthdate becomes more irrelevant). The rewards of careful planning and neural remapping points becomes virtually moot. And most critically, older players who have lots of skill points by virtue of simply playing the game will complain bitterly and loudly that the game is being "dumbed down" and made "too easy" compared to back in their day.
So, TL;DR verion:
Selling skill points would not violate the "in game advantage" downside of bad micro-transactions and would only allow players more options in a less frustrating manner and faster rate.
OK readers, refute!
So our basic assumption is that CCP should not sell anything that gives an in game advantage to player A that player B cannot get through any other means. An example of this would be "gold ammo" with high statistics than regular ammo. Also, "other means" does not include stealing or buying the "gold ammo" from player A.
So selling a paint job for a ship is acceptable, selling Gold Antimatter ammo with better stats than even faction Antimatter is not acceptable.
So skill points. They fall into a grey area that is not as cut and dried as the two examples above. Yes, having more skill points is an advantage but skill points accumulate over time equally for all players. Thus CCP would not be selling an advantage so much as they would be trading time for dollars.
Consider this: you want to fly a Rapier recon cruiser but need Minmatar cruiser V and its 14 days off. Whether you log in constantly for those two weeks or not at all, you will only have access to that skill and thus that ship in two weeks. How unbalancing can it be to allow you to get into that ship two weeks earlier? In other words, the in game advantage player A has over player B is an arbitrary point in time, before which you can't fly a ship and after which you can, regardless of the actions or skills or effort of those respective players.
Look at skill points another way: why does CCP not allow all characters on an account to train skills? Simply put, skill points are doled out at a specific rate to only one character at a time to make you pay more money, either by subbing another account to train a second character or to play your single account longer to do all the training you want to do.
Also, after a certain point (I'll guess 10 million skill points) any in game advantage gained by more skill points is not in terms of making player A superior to player B, its in giving player A more options as to what player B can do. Combat skills, manufacturing skills, trade skills, they all have a certain number of skill points that help them get better and then they cap and the player either puts points into another character or another skill set. A a certain point allowing players to purchase skill points would merely unlock other abilities rather than making them better, abilities that player B could get access to in time regardless of effort (ISK costs for skill books not withstanding since it applies to both parties equally).
Finally, selling skill points would allow CCP to address what is perceived as the biggest knock on the skill point system: that newer players can never catch up to older players. We know that this is mitigated a lot by the aforementioned cap of skill points that any area of skills can accept before being full, but selling skill points might prevent some players from leaving early in frustration.
Downsides:
Of course there would be problems with selling skill points. Make it too cheap and easy and suddenly you find that disposable alts that are extremely useful can be had for the price of a six pack of Coke Zero (aside: so thirsty at the moment). People hunting for kills can never be sure if that 6 month old character is easy pickings or skilled up to the gills by dollars (i.e. birthdate becomes more irrelevant). The rewards of careful planning and neural remapping points becomes virtually moot. And most critically, older players who have lots of skill points by virtue of simply playing the game will complain bitterly and loudly that the game is being "dumbed down" and made "too easy" compared to back in their day.
So, TL;DR verion:
Selling skill points would not violate the "in game advantage" downside of bad micro-transactions and would only allow players more options in a less frustrating manner and faster rate.
OK readers, refute!
Tuesday, June 28, 2011
I Am Weak - In A Good Way
So, non-Eve related post incoming. Brace yourselves.
Ever since I traded in my laptop at work for a desktop that could do the new development I was involved in, I missed having a solid piece of hardware I could use on the go, like on the couch while watching TV or traveling to the inlaws or back home to Greenbush (where the dogs and cats outnumber the inhabitants). I've been eyeing up several things over the past few months and with a work bonus that was higher than expected I found myself with SWMBO permission to indulge in a bit of shopping.
I have a number of criteria to consider:
- it has to be portable
- would be nice if it was easy to use for the carebears and the SWMBO
- has to have fun games, browser, utility apps, etc
- Ability to use Flash a plus
- and I'm interested in developing an app or two on it
I was faced with three options:
1) IPad - since we are an iphone house, this option has the advantage of leveraging a lot we already knew from the phones and it would share the apps we already bought/downloaded through Itunes on the PC. Kids could operate it, wife could use it, got the apps... but no Flash in browser. And I'm getting put off by some other Apple policies, and ITunes is a piece of shit... so I'm reluctant to buy into an Apple product once again.
2) Android tablet - a lot of the functionality of the IPad, plus not an Apple product and supports (possibly) Flash in the browser. However, there is a lot of variation in quality and prices of the tablets and I'm nervous about getting one that looks good but falls apart in the first month. Plus the app pool is not as developed as IOs apps are but is improving.
3) Notebook - for maximum flexibility, I could go notebook and get Windows OS on it and have access to everything the net has to offer, as well as possibly some light PC games. However, no touch screen making it harder for family to use, and possibly the extra bulkiness might be annoying after a while. Plus developing a windows app does not inspire me right now.
I debated back and forth, browsed the options, talked to people with the various types, and ultimately went with an Android tablet. Specifically, an ASUS Transformer which a co-worker has and enjoys.It should arrive in a couple days and I'll probably have a review post on it next week.
Until then, any recommendations on apps to install?
Ever since I traded in my laptop at work for a desktop that could do the new development I was involved in, I missed having a solid piece of hardware I could use on the go, like on the couch while watching TV or traveling to the inlaws or back home to Greenbush (where the dogs and cats outnumber the inhabitants). I've been eyeing up several things over the past few months and with a work bonus that was higher than expected I found myself with SWMBO permission to indulge in a bit of shopping.
I have a number of criteria to consider:
- it has to be portable
- would be nice if it was easy to use for the carebears and the SWMBO
- has to have fun games, browser, utility apps, etc
- Ability to use Flash a plus
- and I'm interested in developing an app or two on it
I was faced with three options:
1) IPad - since we are an iphone house, this option has the advantage of leveraging a lot we already knew from the phones and it would share the apps we already bought/downloaded through Itunes on the PC. Kids could operate it, wife could use it, got the apps... but no Flash in browser. And I'm getting put off by some other Apple policies, and ITunes is a piece of shit... so I'm reluctant to buy into an Apple product once again.
2) Android tablet - a lot of the functionality of the IPad, plus not an Apple product and supports (possibly) Flash in the browser. However, there is a lot of variation in quality and prices of the tablets and I'm nervous about getting one that looks good but falls apart in the first month. Plus the app pool is not as developed as IOs apps are but is improving.
3) Notebook - for maximum flexibility, I could go notebook and get Windows OS on it and have access to everything the net has to offer, as well as possibly some light PC games. However, no touch screen making it harder for family to use, and possibly the extra bulkiness might be annoying after a while. Plus developing a windows app does not inspire me right now.
I debated back and forth, browsed the options, talked to people with the various types, and ultimately went with an Android tablet. Specifically, an ASUS Transformer which a co-worker has and enjoys.It should arrive in a couple days and I'll probably have a review post on it next week.
Until then, any recommendations on apps to install?
Monday, June 27, 2011
Minority Report
Over at the Eve Tribune I have an article today advising people to judge CCP for what they do, not what they think. We are not the Future Crimes division.
I'm Home
Last night I logged in and found pretty much most of the corporation off in Perpetuum Online so I was left to my own devices. That's OK, I wanted to do more exploration so I hoped in my Buzzard and got the probes a-humming.
There was only two cosmic signatures in system so I started into the one with the lowest signature strength. Soon I had it resolved to a wormhole to Unknown space. A class 1 or 2 then. I poked my head in and found a Magnetar system but no local inhabitants out and about.
The next signature was also a wormhole to Unknown space and there was two hurricanes, a retriever, and a Cheetah on scan. I quickly narrowed it down to a moon and sure enough, they were sitting at an active POS, with only the Cheetah having a pilot in it and he seemed disinclined to move out. Ah well.
With the cosmic signatures checked out, and lots of anomalies but lots of risk with hostiles in low sec local in a dead end low sec system, I decided to pack up the carrier with some ships and make a jump to a larger chain of low sec. In fact, I jumped down to Pelille, my first true home in Eve. Ah, memories.
Next step is to set up some bookmarks (and see if any of the five year old ones are still good) and then get exploring some more!
There was only two cosmic signatures in system so I started into the one with the lowest signature strength. Soon I had it resolved to a wormhole to Unknown space. A class 1 or 2 then. I poked my head in and found a Magnetar system but no local inhabitants out and about.
The next signature was also a wormhole to Unknown space and there was two hurricanes, a retriever, and a Cheetah on scan. I quickly narrowed it down to a moon and sure enough, they were sitting at an active POS, with only the Cheetah having a pilot in it and he seemed disinclined to move out. Ah well.
With the cosmic signatures checked out, and lots of anomalies but lots of risk with hostiles in low sec local in a dead end low sec system, I decided to pack up the carrier with some ships and make a jump to a larger chain of low sec. In fact, I jumped down to Pelille, my first true home in Eve. Ah, memories.
Next step is to set up some bookmarks (and see if any of the five year old ones are still good) and then get exploring some more!
Friday, June 24, 2011
Fiction Friday - Series 4: part 1
"Finally, you're awake."
Well, I wouldn't go that far, I thought to myself grimly as I closed my eyes against the stabbing pain that the dim lights of the bedroom drove into my skull. I laid there in bed for a few moments and considered rolling over and going back to sleep, but a small voice in the back of my head kept harassing me with the question, "who said that?" over and over again.
I tried to recall last night. I had been good for a few weeks, laying off the drugs, but yesterday I finished a mission for a Republic Security agent up in Hek and he gave me a referral to a more senior agent in Gulfonodi. I had packed up all my stuff and moved down that system in the Molden Heath region of the republic and after all that work decided to celebrate with a little blue pill and some sexy Minmatar ladies. Then my memory got hazy, so I reluctantly opened my eyes again despite the flash of pain to confirm I was in my quarters on the Fleet Logistic Support station.
Metal bulkheads, haphazard ceiling layout, two burnt out pot lights, improvised vent cover... yep, Minmatar station.
I closed my eyes again and took a deep breath that sort of turned into a groan at the end of the exhale. Why do I do this to myself? I wondered again for the millionth time, then flashes of music, dancing, and hard curved bodies floated up from my memory of last night. Oh yeah, right.
I slowly forced myself up, throwing my legs over the edge of the bed first and allowing my centre of gravity to help leverage my torso up. My head pounded and I wished I had remember to put the pain killers on the bed's shelf before taking that pill because I always feel this bad upon coming down from the high, but they were still packed in some random container I had not bothered to open before starting the celebrations. I opened my eyes for a third time and found that not staring at the lights in the ceiling, however dim, helped keep the pain to a tolerable level. I was alone in the messed up "king sized" bed (in the rest of the cluster it would have been called a double sized bed, I figure the Minmatar sleep on top of each other to conserve space in their cramped stations) and I looked around to find a figure sitting in a kitchen chair near the doorway at the end of my bed.
"You're not..." I struggled a second to remember the names of the girls I picked up last night before giving up, "... one of my friends from last night."
The stranger was a woman with straight shoulder length hair and wearing a dark pantsuit. I could not tell in the dim lights of the room what colour her hair and skin was, but she didn't look Minmatar from what I could tell.
"No, I sent them on their way after they let me in once you had passed out," she said matter of factly, and then added, "just like I paid them to do."
"Lights, on," I commanded the room. Nothing happened.
My visitor sighed and reached up to turn a dial. The lights flared and I squinted and rubbed my temples. "You're in tribal space now, not the Federation anymore."
"Just who the hell are you?" I demanded.
Well, I wouldn't go that far, I thought to myself grimly as I closed my eyes against the stabbing pain that the dim lights of the bedroom drove into my skull. I laid there in bed for a few moments and considered rolling over and going back to sleep, but a small voice in the back of my head kept harassing me with the question, "who said that?" over and over again.
I tried to recall last night. I had been good for a few weeks, laying off the drugs, but yesterday I finished a mission for a Republic Security agent up in Hek and he gave me a referral to a more senior agent in Gulfonodi. I had packed up all my stuff and moved down that system in the Molden Heath region of the republic and after all that work decided to celebrate with a little blue pill and some sexy Minmatar ladies. Then my memory got hazy, so I reluctantly opened my eyes again despite the flash of pain to confirm I was in my quarters on the Fleet Logistic Support station.
Metal bulkheads, haphazard ceiling layout, two burnt out pot lights, improvised vent cover... yep, Minmatar station.
I closed my eyes again and took a deep breath that sort of turned into a groan at the end of the exhale. Why do I do this to myself? I wondered again for the millionth time, then flashes of music, dancing, and hard curved bodies floated up from my memory of last night. Oh yeah, right.
I slowly forced myself up, throwing my legs over the edge of the bed first and allowing my centre of gravity to help leverage my torso up. My head pounded and I wished I had remember to put the pain killers on the bed's shelf before taking that pill because I always feel this bad upon coming down from the high, but they were still packed in some random container I had not bothered to open before starting the celebrations. I opened my eyes for a third time and found that not staring at the lights in the ceiling, however dim, helped keep the pain to a tolerable level. I was alone in the messed up "king sized" bed (in the rest of the cluster it would have been called a double sized bed, I figure the Minmatar sleep on top of each other to conserve space in their cramped stations) and I looked around to find a figure sitting in a kitchen chair near the doorway at the end of my bed.
"You're not..." I struggled a second to remember the names of the girls I picked up last night before giving up, "... one of my friends from last night."
The stranger was a woman with straight shoulder length hair and wearing a dark pantsuit. I could not tell in the dim lights of the room what colour her hair and skin was, but she didn't look Minmatar from what I could tell.
"No, I sent them on their way after they let me in once you had passed out," she said matter of factly, and then added, "just like I paid them to do."
"Lights, on," I commanded the room. Nothing happened.
My visitor sighed and reached up to turn a dial. The lights flared and I squinted and rubbed my temples. "You're in tribal space now, not the Federation anymore."
"Just who the hell are you?" I demanded.
Thursday, June 23, 2011
[Lottery] Ninveah Lottery #6 - Thanatos Carrier
New week, new lottery, this time for a Thanatos carrier. See details here.
Tickets are 10 million ISK or 100 Aurum each ;) (Just Kidding about the Aurum...)
Tickets are 10 million ISK or 100 Aurum each ;) (Just Kidding about the Aurum...)
Wait and See
I admit to being shaken by the events of the past week.
- The insane price of items in the Noble Exchange
- Reports from others of hardware issues due to captian's quarters
- The supposedly leaked internal CCP memo listing possible future micro transactions for standings, ammo, ships as "convenience" (read: advantage)
Of the three items, the hardware issues worry me the least in the long term because I'm willing to be there are programming solutions that CCP is working on right now. The high price of the vanity items is offputting but if that is there business model than whatever.
But the internal memo is the most disturbing because it starts to go against the line that players have been insistent upon from the start: vanity items only. If they start to offer "convenience" instead of just "vanity" then we've gone too far down that slippery slope we've heard the doomsayers talk so much about and I'm not happy about it.
This is assuming that the memo is authentic and reflects the opinion of the product managers driving Eve's development.
Right now I'm using the wait and see option. We're watching, CCP; your move.
- The insane price of items in the Noble Exchange
- Reports from others of hardware issues due to captian's quarters
- The supposedly leaked internal CCP memo listing possible future micro transactions for standings, ammo, ships as "convenience" (read: advantage)
Of the three items, the hardware issues worry me the least in the long term because I'm willing to be there are programming solutions that CCP is working on right now. The high price of the vanity items is offputting but if that is there business model than whatever.
But the internal memo is the most disturbing because it starts to go against the line that players have been insistent upon from the start: vanity items only. If they start to offer "convenience" instead of just "vanity" then we've gone too far down that slippery slope we've heard the doomsayers talk so much about and I'm not happy about it.
This is assuming that the memo is authentic and reflects the opinion of the product managers driving Eve's development.
Right now I'm using the wait and see option. We're watching, CCP; your move.
Wednesday, June 22, 2011
Incarna - So Far, So Good
Back in the beginning of 2010 I tried out Star Trek Online and had this to say about the avatar part of the game:
Overall, I was impressed. The visuals were nice, the avatar was more lifelike than the dummies at STO, and the controls seemed natural to move around so far to a newb-to-avatars like me. In the ten minutes I putzed around I had no problems (i.e. bugs, lags, etc).
I need more time to give it a real workout but so far I'm giving Captain's Quarters an A for effort and a B+ for execution (the lower score reflecting the lack of things to do in this initial release).
Here are some screenshots.
As for the Noble Exchange and the crazy prices, I've heard rumours that they did the prices high on purpose to prevent a run on PLEXes and crazy price hike for them. I'm going to believe that because otherwise the prices are outrageous and unfeasible. Encourage people to buy many small inexpensive items, not big wallet-hemorrhaging items!
I was disappointed with the character controls. The camera was annoying, turning in the direction I wanted to move instead of facing a single direciton... unless something was targeted which I didn't get at first. The animations looked... off. During one fight watching the NPCs bounce around like jackrabbits with springs in their boots to get over obstacles was very offputting. And I ran everywhere; dude slow down! It didn't look like a Triple-A game from 2010 in my humble opinion.So last night when I logged into Eve with the new Incarna build I was comparing Eve's version of an avatar to that in my head to start. Note: I did not try Captain's Quarters on Duality or Serenity.
Then again, I just came off of finishing the awesome Batman: Arkham Asylum last week so maybe I'm just spoiled and STO is following MMO standards that I'm not used to because of Eve being so different. Also, I understand MMOs have to make allowances for network latency but still... I think they could do better.
Overall, I was impressed. The visuals were nice, the avatar was more lifelike than the dummies at STO, and the controls seemed natural to move around so far to a newb-to-avatars like me. In the ten minutes I putzed around I had no problems (i.e. bugs, lags, etc).
I need more time to give it a real workout but so far I'm giving Captain's Quarters an A for effort and a B+ for execution (the lower score reflecting the lack of things to do in this initial release).
Here are some screenshots.
 |
| Ok, I can do stuff while it loads... |
 |
| Oh! There I am! Handsome devil... |
 |
| Where's my ship? |
 |
| Oh... there it is... jesus! Its HUGE! (That's what she said) |
 |
| So pretty... *sniff* |
 |
| Heroic Pose Wallpaper! |
Tuesday, June 21, 2011
Eve-olution
Today will be the day people look back and say "that was the day Eve changed".
Incarna. Walking in stations. Avatars. You are no longer just a ship, you are a person. Actual immersion for roleplaying can begin. Like Clear Skies movies? How about with super detailed avatars instead of the Half Life stand ins? This is a game changer and while pretty limited right now, if CCP sticks to the plan for Incarna then this is only the first step.
Eve is changing. In the podcast community people are doing more parody songs, and they are starting to do more dramatizations and projects beyond the "what I did in Eve today" podcasts. Clear Skies shows conclusively that the community has an appetite for this kind of Eve, an Eve where Internet Spaceships are Not-So-Serious business.
Make no mistake, Eve has been changing for a long time already. Learning skills? Gone. Mission Agent Quality and hordes of social skills? Gone. Improving new player experience, certificates to guide skill training, Incursions for more advanced group PvE play, micro-transactions for vanity items... Eve is changing.
There are going to be many who hate the changes and rail against them. Many have already left, feeling the game that they loved is already gone and this new one is unrecognizable or at least unlikeable. They feel that the spaceships have been abandoned and the game is flawed in many areas that are not addressed in expansion after expansion. Sometimes they are wrong, many times they are right, but CCP faced a choice to support a relatively static player base for hardcore internet spaceships or work to court a larger audience that is not so hardcore for PvP spaceships and more into a "complete sci-fi experience". In the end money will win out and Eve is changing.
Will the gamble pay off? Can they deliver enough station walking experience in the next year or two to pass the gap between old bitter vets leaving and new bright eyed newbs arriving? Time will tell. Will the DUST 514 gamble pay off and add a layer of sophistication to null sec wars unheard of now? Time will tell. Regardless, Eve is changing.
Incarna. Walking in stations. Avatars. You are no longer just a ship, you are a person. Actual immersion for roleplaying can begin. Like Clear Skies movies? How about with super detailed avatars instead of the Half Life stand ins? This is a game changer and while pretty limited right now, if CCP sticks to the plan for Incarna then this is only the first step.
Eve is changing. In the podcast community people are doing more parody songs, and they are starting to do more dramatizations and projects beyond the "what I did in Eve today" podcasts. Clear Skies shows conclusively that the community has an appetite for this kind of Eve, an Eve where Internet Spaceships are Not-So-Serious business.
Make no mistake, Eve has been changing for a long time already. Learning skills? Gone. Mission Agent Quality and hordes of social skills? Gone. Improving new player experience, certificates to guide skill training, Incursions for more advanced group PvE play, micro-transactions for vanity items... Eve is changing.
There are going to be many who hate the changes and rail against them. Many have already left, feeling the game that they loved is already gone and this new one is unrecognizable or at least unlikeable. They feel that the spaceships have been abandoned and the game is flawed in many areas that are not addressed in expansion after expansion. Sometimes they are wrong, many times they are right, but CCP faced a choice to support a relatively static player base for hardcore internet spaceships or work to court a larger audience that is not so hardcore for PvP spaceships and more into a "complete sci-fi experience". In the end money will win out and Eve is changing.
Will the gamble pay off? Can they deliver enough station walking experience in the next year or two to pass the gap between old bitter vets leaving and new bright eyed newbs arriving? Time will tell. Will the DUST 514 gamble pay off and add a layer of sophistication to null sec wars unheard of now? Time will tell. Regardless, Eve is changing.
Monday, June 20, 2011
Frustrations
My streak of bad luck in finding PvP continues. The last three weeks I've logged in, joined FCON fleets, and missed any action whatsoever. To say I am frustrated is an understatement.
Take for example this past weekend. My game night was late last week so I had it Friday. I joined up a home defence fleet and before we were completely organized an Agony Unleashed fleet rolled through. We formed up behind it and gave chase but they gave us the slip and we never saw another red for the rest of the roam.
Then, last night there was a fleet that promised an 86% chance of fighting hostiles. We formed up, me in the Onyx hictor, and we moved out to Syndicate to repair a POS tower of ours coming out of reinforced. Hostile presence? Nada.
By the time the tower was repaired and the fleet was ready to move out, I was out of time and logged out somewhere in the middle of Syndicate region. To be honest, I don't mind that part as I love the thrills of running through null sec with my ship on fire. Spice of life and all that.
I don't know what the matter is with me. Am I not spending enough time online to get to the fights, or is it just bad luck? Either way, I think I've had enough of futzing around null sec, time to return to basics, my roots, and get back to finding some ships to shoot.
* * * * *
Nashh Kadvar is celebrating his thirtieth birthday this Friday:
Take for example this past weekend. My game night was late last week so I had it Friday. I joined up a home defence fleet and before we were completely organized an Agony Unleashed fleet rolled through. We formed up behind it and gave chase but they gave us the slip and we never saw another red for the rest of the roam.
Then, last night there was a fleet that promised an 86% chance of fighting hostiles. We formed up, me in the Onyx hictor, and we moved out to Syndicate to repair a POS tower of ours coming out of reinforced. Hostile presence? Nada.
By the time the tower was repaired and the fleet was ready to move out, I was out of time and logged out somewhere in the middle of Syndicate region. To be honest, I don't mind that part as I love the thrills of running through null sec with my ship on fire. Spice of life and all that.
I don't know what the matter is with me. Am I not spending enough time online to get to the fights, or is it just bad luck? Either way, I think I've had enough of futzing around null sec, time to return to basics, my roots, and get back to finding some ships to shoot.
* * * * *
Nashh Kadvar is celebrating his thirtieth birthday this Friday:
So you wonder what? Why should you care? Well, I would like to hereby invite anyone reading this to come to Evati on Friday the 24th June 2011 and bring a frigate of your choosing for some pewpew. I will arrange for some (100) t1 fit frigates of various flavours to be available and anyone attending is free to use these to cause havoc on any willing or unwilling Pilot in system. Btw, I hate disco's but feel free if you have to...Read the whole thing for more details.
Sunday, June 19, 2011
Sunday Special Lottery - Chimera
For my fifth lottery, we have a brand new, never-been-flown, Chimera carrier! Instructions to buy tickets are found here: http://lotteries.idiofx.com/ninveah/
Friday, June 17, 2011
Fiction Friday - Series 4: Prologue
The recon cruiser slipped into the warp tunnel while its cloaking field activated, making it appear to any observers as if it stretched out while shifting into nothingness. With red shifted space behind and blue shifted space in front, it glided unseen through the system to its destination.
It dropped out of warp while maintaining the cloak. The desolate moon was off the starboard bow and there was no sign of any mining operations or starbases, nor of any other ship activity.
The ship paused there, still cloaked, while its commander checked directional scanners and pinged the CONCORD outpost feed for pod pilot activity. Both came back negative so the ship disengaged the cloaking device and as it came into view starlight from the distant sun reflected off a golden hull polished to a sheen.
The pilot within a pod within the ship gave a mental command and a cynosaural field generator spun into activity while consuming vast amounts of liquid ozone to cool its sub-spatial manifold coils. The fabric of space screamed as it was ripped by the energies and a pulse faster than light raced from the originating point to all points via the subspace structure of the universe. Deftly encoded in the pulse was an identification code so that those listening for a specific signature of a beacon would recognize it.
Moments after the energies streamed from the rip in space there was another larger sub space flux as a wormhole appeared a few thousand meters from the beacon and mass detectors in the recon ship flared as a new ship passed through the artificial passage. The wormhole collapsed and left behind the gleaming golden hull of an Amarrian Archon carrier. While the two ships initiated handshake protocols and AI networking for most efficient fleet coordination, the two pod pilots inside exchanged pleasantries.
"Welcome to Holden Heath, my lord."
It dropped out of warp while maintaining the cloak. The desolate moon was off the starboard bow and there was no sign of any mining operations or starbases, nor of any other ship activity.
The ship paused there, still cloaked, while its commander checked directional scanners and pinged the CONCORD outpost feed for pod pilot activity. Both came back negative so the ship disengaged the cloaking device and as it came into view starlight from the distant sun reflected off a golden hull polished to a sheen.
The pilot within a pod within the ship gave a mental command and a cynosaural field generator spun into activity while consuming vast amounts of liquid ozone to cool its sub-spatial manifold coils. The fabric of space screamed as it was ripped by the energies and a pulse faster than light raced from the originating point to all points via the subspace structure of the universe. Deftly encoded in the pulse was an identification code so that those listening for a specific signature of a beacon would recognize it.
Moments after the energies streamed from the rip in space there was another larger sub space flux as a wormhole appeared a few thousand meters from the beacon and mass detectors in the recon ship flared as a new ship passed through the artificial passage. The wormhole collapsed and left behind the gleaming golden hull of an Amarrian Archon carrier. While the two ships initiated handshake protocols and AI networking for most efficient fleet coordination, the two pod pilots inside exchanged pleasantries.
"Welcome to Holden Heath, my lord."
Thursday, June 16, 2011
Who Let The Lawyers In Here?
A shit storm has been released with the dev blog released yesterday called dev track feedback: monetizing your apps and services.
While this blog is mostly about 3rd party application developers being allowed to charge users money for using their apps once they purchase a license from CCP for $99 per year, the shit storm stems from the following statements in the blog:
*stunned silence*
I am assuming in this case "services" refers to out of game services or this statement is ludicrous, but even in that case this means that people like Rixx Javix who make banners for ISK, or Somer's lottery service, or even podcasters that charge ISK for advertises would require a $99 dollar per year commercial license.
THIS MAKES NO SENSE AT ALL.
This smells of some idiot lawyer trying to cover some obscure legal base and screwing every awesome non-real-dollar service out there. This will have a massive dampening effect and is the most stupid thing I can imagine. I kind of wonder if this is a result of PLEX and Aurum in game and tying, however tangentially, real money to ISK. Regardless, its insane.
CCP, fix this. Claim it was a draft, a typo, anything, but fix this shit now.
While this blog is mostly about 3rd party application developers being allowed to charge users money for using their apps once they purchase a license from CCP for $99 per year, the shit storm stems from the following statements in the blog:
Wait, what? Non-commercial websites? What the hell are they?
Highlights
- Simple process - Sign up on a webpage, get started straight away
- Inexpensive - $99 per year, no other fees
- Developer-friendly - Very few restrictions
- Open-ended - You can charge subscription fees, receive donations, sell your app in an app-store and more
- Non-commercial websites and apps will now require a (free) license
Grueling legal detailsOk, fansites. Like this one. Seems odd but I get it. Protect the IP and all that. Hopefully it is not used to shut down blogs and websites that say things they don't like but it feels more like having to show they are making an effort to protect their IP in order to fight real threats to their IP.
[...]
- CCP also allows non-commercial apps and services, subject to simple clickwrap agreement substantially similar to the one that is provided to registered fansites.
Will services for in-game currency require a commercial license?
Yes, if you require any sort of payment for your services you will need a commercial license.
*stunned silence*
I am assuming in this case "services" refers to out of game services or this statement is ludicrous, but even in that case this means that people like Rixx Javix who make banners for ISK, or Somer's lottery service, or even podcasters that charge ISK for advertises would require a $99 dollar per year commercial license.
THIS MAKES NO SENSE AT ALL.
This smells of some idiot lawyer trying to cover some obscure legal base and screwing every awesome non-real-dollar service out there. This will have a massive dampening effect and is the most stupid thing I can imagine. I kind of wonder if this is a result of PLEX and Aurum in game and tying, however tangentially, real money to ISK. Regardless, its insane.
CCP, fix this. Claim it was a draft, a typo, anything, but fix this shit now.
Tuesday, June 14, 2011
Brainstorming - Results
Before I went on vacation I asked people for ideas to "make it advantageous to have a smaller group to do an operation instead of as many pilots as you can gather". I got lots of comments so we're going to visit some of them and add my own feedback.
I like the idea of some targets requiring non-DPS attacks to neutralize.
We already have Black Ops covert portals and they encourage small gang hot drops already, perhaps more modules like that for other ships is worthwhile. As for the second point, area of effect weapons tend not to break up blobs but simply change their composition. For example, in the day of the AoE doomsday, super-tank battleships and heavy interdictors were the ship of the line. I much prefer the varied fleet types we have no in contrast.
This kind of ties into the "terrain effects" idea from Gabrienne. Having areas of space where the rules do not apply the same definitely creates room for more tactics, and having such a target that assists the larger fleet seems like a good start.
A few comments after Stevie's post were directed to it so I'll jump over those and go right to this:
* * * * *
So all of these ideas hinge on changing the objectives of fleets or the terrain they fight in. While these ideas have merit, I do find them to be full of potential problems and unintended side effects and would probably take a few iterations to find the right balance of incentive and penalty to encourage small fleet warfare.
When I was approaching this question myself, I asked the potentially foolish question: how does real life apply here? I know Eve <> Real Life but we can draw some parallels and inspiration from it.
So why does a Navy not consist of nothing but Aircraft Carriers, currently the king of the seas, but instead has a pyramid of ship types with small destroyers being most numerous? Well, there are several reasons.
- It takes a lot of manpower to operate a carrier.
- They are slower to get where they need to be.
- They are expensive to construct.
- Their operational costs are a lot higher than smaller ships.
I'm sure there is more but I'm writing by the seat of my pants here.
So in Eve, the comparison is obvious:
- a small ship, large ship, the manpower requirement is the same
- smaller fleets move a bit faster but not enough to be an issue most of the time
- usually ISK is not a big consideration as each pilot is responsible for their own vessel in most cases
- The operational costs of all ships is laughably low, big or small.
So there are several avenues of attack we could take to make Eve fleets face the same limitations as real navies, but all of them fly in the face of fun in my opinion, and fun should always win out. And any limitation or cost you put on an organized fleet structure will be circumvented by smaller fleets working together via an FC on teamspeak.
No, the answer lies in the objectives and terrain.
I started playing around with the idea of more acceleration gates in space with ship size limitations and/or mass limitations with recharge rates. But you need something on the other side of those gates to make pilots want to try to get through with the limited fleets. Sov structures? industrial targets? Both possibilities.
Perhaps inspiration from Wormholes and Incursions is in order, system wide effects that make different sized hulls more preferable. Perhaps there can be sov structures that induce these effects and require the unusual fleet sizes and compositions to take out.
In the end, the point is this: CCP needs to take some action to stir up the pot. Its not lack of ideas holding us back, its lack of development will.
S.W. said...
Create minor sov-realted harassment targets, and give those targets a very small sig radius, so large weapons aren't as useful to them. Maybe they require hacking or codebreaking modules to enable for a limited window.
I like the idea of some targets requiring non-DPS attacks to neutralize.
I like the idea of more varied battlefield terrain to mix things up. Not so sure about scaling penalties though, seems overly complex.
Gabrienne said... here's a two-part, simple to implement idea; the code for the first part already exists, and the second isn't terribly complicated
1. add wormhole bonus/penalty anomalies to all space i.e. shield boosting, armor resist, drone damage, etc. you'd do this on a inverted scale tied to sec status, so the penalties/bonuses in 1.0 space would be 0, 0.9 space would be 10%, 0.0 would be 100%, and so on
2. you add new anomalies that make either
a) big ships bad
i.e. make a 50 man fleet of frigates able to compete with a 20 man fleet of BC's
b) small ships better i.e. a scaling tracking modifier where bigger guns, using bigger ammo, don't hit as hard; call it nebula sludge that slows the rate of speed of the ammo. but of course smaller ammo with less mass can pass through it unaffected
c) and this is likely the most effective one, have an effect with a scaling penalty, i.e. if there's 500 people in a system, then everyone suffers a 50% reduction in rate of fire
-these kind of penalties would have to be offense related, or they'd give an advantage to whoever was in system first i.e. alpha down an enemy fleet jumping in on a gate as their defenses get penalized
-making these offense related and tied to # of people in a system instantly makes it bad to bring too many people to fight in one place, as you may gimp your dps to the point where you can't break the enemy's tank (and he can't break yours) creating an instant stalemate
Tom said... Greetings,Interesting concept, but I think I would prefer that your signature is enhanced by number of ships on the grid or in the system such that large fleets are easier to probe out in safe spots. At the same time, I'd make a change to prevent short range scanning for those on grid warp-ins that has killed the sniping battleship, but that's just a pet peeve.
if you saw the movie 'Jumper', a jumper ( warper in our case ) creates a rift in space and jumps through. What if groups of more than 15 ships create a rift large enough that they leave rifts behind which can be used by other ships to follow them wherever they go. Rifts would phase out after 5/10 minutes.
This would make hit and run harder for larger groups since the run part is pretty impossible until they split off.
Joost said...
- Small scale titan-like portals which only allow for a certain mass to pass through. Maybe module that can be fitted on a fleet command-ish battleship or something?
- Area of effect weapons. We all know how devastating 40 stealth bombers can be to a 100 (or 500 for that matter) man fleet. We might want more down that lane. My personal favorite: suicide bombers (fly somewhere and hit 'detonate' to do 10% hull (or perhaps a % of EHP would be fairer?) damage to everyone in a 10km radius. Maybe even with cloaked warp capabilities but with only freighter-like speed. Would be awesome, trying to sneak through the bubbles as far as possible into the heart of an enemy fleet, all while running the risk of being devloaked. But if you succeed in getting 10-ish people in, the hostile (supercap ;D ) blob is gone for the day
We already have Black Ops covert portals and they encourage small gang hot drops already, perhaps more modules like that for other ships is worthwhile. As for the second point, area of effect weapons tend not to break up blobs but simply change their composition. For example, in the day of the AoE doomsday, super-tank battleships and heavy interdictors were the ship of the line. I much prefer the varied fleet types we have no in contrast.
StevieTopSiders said... I think Meatay touched on a key point. It's not that there are so many pilots, but that there are so many pilots who can field effective ships. I know it would be very un-fun to have pilots say, "I can't afford to fleet up, so I guess I'll ship spin," but currently, fielding a fleet-fit BS isn't that big of a deal.
Anyway, my pet "small-gang objective" is the CONCORD Relay Station. This is a celestial object in every 0.0 system; it is easily seen on the overview. Canonically, the CRS is a CONCORD outpost that runs coms for the CONCORD vessels and capsuleers who roam null-sec. The Outpost is indestructible, but it has two stages of reinforced.
In the beginning, the CRS is not reinforced, and Local chat displays both the number of people in the system and their names. Suppose, however, that an alliance sends a small roaming gang into enemy space. This roaming gang can attack the CRS and put it into reinforced 1. This will take the structure to armor. At that time, Local ceases to show who is in the system. It only details the number of capsuleers in the system and names people who have talked in the past 15 minutes.
The CRS remains in reinforced for 15 minutes. After that, it can be attacked again, and when its armor is destroyed it enters reinforced 2. At this stage, Local either a) goes offline or b) shows only the people who have spoken.
Reinforced 1 mode lasts 2 hours, and the shields slowly begin to recharge after the 15-minute timer. Reinforced 2 mode lasts 4 hours, and armor/shields begin repping immediately after being taken to structure.
I think reinforced 1 should take about 10 average-DPS frigates to make it come about. Reinforced 2 should require a slightly larger/more powerful gang. I imagine 20 average-DPS frigates, or a smaller number of Cruisers, Assault Ships, or something else. Somewhere between 5-10 minutes of shooting should do the trick.
Additionally, I think the CRS needs to broadcast in Local (or in the sov-holding alliance's Alliance chat; not sure...) when it is being attacked. That gives the inhabitants of the system warning, so they may either mount a counterattack or call in reinforcements to keep the CRS from entering reinforced 2.
So why is this helpful? It allows small gangs an objective that is useful to larger fleets. An invading alliance could send gangs into various systems, destroying their Local. The defenders would then not be able to rely on a ratter in his POS telling them, "300-man DRF fleet in UMI-KK," but instead they would need to have defensive scouts in the system, scanning and watching for fleet movements. On the other hand, reinforcing the CRS will allert the defenders to a coming attack.
This kind of ties into the "terrain effects" idea from Gabrienne. Having areas of space where the rules do not apply the same definitely creates room for more tactics, and having such a target that assists the larger fleet seems like a good start.
A few comments after Stevie's post were directed to it so I'll jump over those and go right to this:
Talinthi said...I don't know how to make it work but having multiple objectives that have to completed at the same time or some sort of pre-programmed scaling defence might slow down a large blob faster than a small one.
Not sure if this was mentioned yet, but why not make some sov targets similar in style to incursion sites?? I know it doesnt directly relate but the scaling of isk making in incursions is directly related to the number of people in the fleet, why not make some sov targets based on that same scaling??
* * * * *
So all of these ideas hinge on changing the objectives of fleets or the terrain they fight in. While these ideas have merit, I do find them to be full of potential problems and unintended side effects and would probably take a few iterations to find the right balance of incentive and penalty to encourage small fleet warfare.
When I was approaching this question myself, I asked the potentially foolish question: how does real life apply here? I know Eve <> Real Life but we can draw some parallels and inspiration from it.
So why does a Navy not consist of nothing but Aircraft Carriers, currently the king of the seas, but instead has a pyramid of ship types with small destroyers being most numerous? Well, there are several reasons.
- It takes a lot of manpower to operate a carrier.
- They are slower to get where they need to be.
- They are expensive to construct.
- Their operational costs are a lot higher than smaller ships.
I'm sure there is more but I'm writing by the seat of my pants here.
So in Eve, the comparison is obvious:
- a small ship, large ship, the manpower requirement is the same
- smaller fleets move a bit faster but not enough to be an issue most of the time
- usually ISK is not a big consideration as each pilot is responsible for their own vessel in most cases
- The operational costs of all ships is laughably low, big or small.
So there are several avenues of attack we could take to make Eve fleets face the same limitations as real navies, but all of them fly in the face of fun in my opinion, and fun should always win out. And any limitation or cost you put on an organized fleet structure will be circumvented by smaller fleets working together via an FC on teamspeak.
No, the answer lies in the objectives and terrain.
I started playing around with the idea of more acceleration gates in space with ship size limitations and/or mass limitations with recharge rates. But you need something on the other side of those gates to make pilots want to try to get through with the limited fleets. Sov structures? industrial targets? Both possibilities.
Perhaps inspiration from Wormholes and Incursions is in order, system wide effects that make different sized hulls more preferable. Perhaps there can be sov structures that induce these effects and require the unusual fleet sizes and compositions to take out.
In the end, the point is this: CCP needs to take some action to stir up the pot. Its not lack of ideas holding us back, its lack of development will.
Monday, June 13, 2011
I Survived My Family Trip
Our family trip to Toronto was a four day affair and I got back pretty exhausted Sunday afternoon. Its not the Carebear Brigade's fault. In fact, for two three-year-olds and a one year old they were exceptionally well behaved. But the hotel is boring and small compared to home and they got restless. Thank god they slept like angels.
Anyway, that is a long ass excuse for not having a real post today. I plan to take the responses from last Wednesday's brainstorming piece and go over them as there is some really good ideas and concepts in there. That is tomorrow's output.
Tonight, I'll suffice with a little celebration as Fighter Bombers V is complete ( yay!) and pimp another lottery for an Archon carrier, details found here.
Anyway, that is a long ass excuse for not having a real post today. I plan to take the responses from last Wednesday's brainstorming piece and go over them as there is some really good ideas and concepts in there. That is tomorrow's output.
Tonight, I'll suffice with a little celebration as Fighter Bombers V is complete ( yay!) and pimp another lottery for an Archon carrier, details found here.
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| "And then these fish here will consume the corpse..." |
Wednesday, June 08, 2011
Brainstorming
In the latest Voices from the Void podcast Hallen Turrek said something very true and often a problem in Eve when he was going over some ideas for more small fleet objectives in null sec proposed by Gevlin of Space Monkeys Alliance in Speakers Corner forum. He said, and I'm going off of memory here, "there is nothing there that a large fleet couldn't do faster" when talking about destroying enemy objectives.
This is the crux of all problems relating to fleet warfare in Eve: it is almost always better to have more pilots if you can. Nobody ever tells 5 pilots to stand down because 20 pilots is sufficient. Overwhelming firepower and all that, right?
The question is how do you make it advantageous to have a smaller group to do an operation instead of as many pilots as you can gather?
So I put the question out to you, dear readers. What change can be made to make smaller gangs preferable to a larger one?
* * * * *
Out of the office for the next couple days, blogging resumes as normal on Monday.
This is the crux of all problems relating to fleet warfare in Eve: it is almost always better to have more pilots if you can. Nobody ever tells 5 pilots to stand down because 20 pilots is sufficient. Overwhelming firepower and all that, right?
The question is how do you make it advantageous to have a smaller group to do an operation instead of as many pilots as you can gather?
So I put the question out to you, dear readers. What change can be made to make smaller gangs preferable to a larger one?
* * * * *
Out of the office for the next couple days, blogging resumes as normal on Monday.
Monday, June 06, 2011
Why Aurum Exists
I covered this in episode 48 of my podcast but in case you are like Hallen Turrek and don't listen to anyone else, here it is in a nutshell.
Now CCP could generate ISK directly from a PLEX out of nothing, but since ISK is used for everything in game that could quickly destabilize the economy and game if that generated ISK does not go to micro transaction vanity items. In order to ensure that the consumed PLEX goes to vanity items in microtransactions, they generate Aurum instead of ISK. This has the added benefit of controlling the real life price of the microtransaction items (i.e. it is not determined by player supply and demand).
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| Click to Embiggen |
About Face!
So there I was, admiring my Abaddon Hellcat that I was looking forward to taking out into battle soon when my mail icon flashed. Alliance mail, is it? I opened the new entry and saw to my dismay... new fleet setups.
*forehead slap*
It seems that for various reasons we are going to a number of new fleet setups and I am seriously lacking in having ships for them. The Maelstrom alpha fleet is making a comeback and with Kal'strit out of the action I'm forced to admit that maybe its time I train the two weeks to get the basic Maelstrom and Large Projectile skills.
For the meantime,ships that fits in with the new fleet doctrines and that I can fly are the usual suspects: interceptors, interdictors, Onyx, Vulture... I have the first three, might pick me up a Vulture to add some variety. Also, Tengu fleets might be a possibility in the future so I'm tempted to refit my Tengu for PvP in these fleets. Its pretty close already and only a few changes to make it ready.
As for the rest of the 20 or so ships in my hanger, I'll be keeping them handy for small gang stuff as needed.
*forehead slap*
It seems that for various reasons we are going to a number of new fleet setups and I am seriously lacking in having ships for them. The Maelstrom alpha fleet is making a comeback and with Kal'strit out of the action I'm forced to admit that maybe its time I train the two weeks to get the basic Maelstrom and Large Projectile skills.
For the meantime,ships that fits in with the new fleet doctrines and that I can fly are the usual suspects: interceptors, interdictors, Onyx, Vulture... I have the first three, might pick me up a Vulture to add some variety. Also, Tengu fleets might be a possibility in the future so I'm tempted to refit my Tengu for PvP in these fleets. Its pretty close already and only a few changes to make it ready.
As for the rest of the 20 or so ships in my hanger, I'll be keeping them handy for small gang stuff as needed.
[Lottery] Ninveah Lottery #3 - Archon Carrier
Another lottery up, this time for the Golden Barge, aka Archon carrier. Get your tickets via instructions found here.
Friday, June 03, 2011
Collapsing the Waveform
I pulled Kla'strit out of m3 Corp this morning. When I get a chance to swap Selia out of the Wyvern so she can dock up, I'm pulling her out as well.
The last couple months have been shitty for me on the PvP front. With the NC not deploying the super capitals as often as it used to I found myself scrambling to find the appropriate ship to join the fleets up in Tribute and Vale, and many times to poor results on the killboards. One measly kill in two months is unacceptable, but it wasn't for lack of trying.
The stress of failing to get on the killboard was getting to me. I felt like I was letting my corp down in a major way and I considered leaving entirely to stop pulling the stats down but I am at home in m3 Corp and its not their fault we had been deployed to a collapsing front with increasingly spastic and gun-shy FCs in the coalition. I'm hoping that more time at home in Pure Blind with local FCs and smaller fleet sizes will loosen things up and get the kills flowing again.
I've also decided to stop worrying about the killmails as much. I have no control other than logging in and X-ing up so I'll keep doing that and let the chips fall where they may. In order to relax a little more I'm also going to do more exploration in null sec and low sec because I enjoy the occasional site. That does mean I'm going to need some hacking and archeology skills though.
The reason I'm pulling my alts out of the corp is because I want to focus purely on Kirith and flying his ships. Kla'strit was handy for moving the Wyvern around but right now its more of a boondoggle than boon with the enemy having scared the NC into hiding their supercaps for the most part. If I find I need it, I know where it is, but I want to concentrate on smaller ships for a while.
* * * * *
Misc Notes:
- I have an Archon and Thanatos for sale, and another Archon going up on Lottery this weekend. Contact me if interested.
- Short week next week as I am away Thursday and Friday.
- Fiction Friday starts again the week after next.
The last couple months have been shitty for me on the PvP front. With the NC not deploying the super capitals as often as it used to I found myself scrambling to find the appropriate ship to join the fleets up in Tribute and Vale, and many times to poor results on the killboards. One measly kill in two months is unacceptable, but it wasn't for lack of trying.
The stress of failing to get on the killboard was getting to me. I felt like I was letting my corp down in a major way and I considered leaving entirely to stop pulling the stats down but I am at home in m3 Corp and its not their fault we had been deployed to a collapsing front with increasingly spastic and gun-shy FCs in the coalition. I'm hoping that more time at home in Pure Blind with local FCs and smaller fleet sizes will loosen things up and get the kills flowing again.
I've also decided to stop worrying about the killmails as much. I have no control other than logging in and X-ing up so I'll keep doing that and let the chips fall where they may. In order to relax a little more I'm also going to do more exploration in null sec and low sec because I enjoy the occasional site. That does mean I'm going to need some hacking and archeology skills though.
The reason I'm pulling my alts out of the corp is because I want to focus purely on Kirith and flying his ships. Kla'strit was handy for moving the Wyvern around but right now its more of a boondoggle than boon with the enemy having scared the NC into hiding their supercaps for the most part. If I find I need it, I know where it is, but I want to concentrate on smaller ships for a while.
* * * * *
Misc Notes:
- I have an Archon and Thanatos for sale, and another Archon going up on Lottery this weekend. Contact me if interested.
- Short week next week as I am away Thursday and Friday.
- Fiction Friday starts again the week after next.
Thursday, June 02, 2011
Wyvern Versus Abaddon - Rough Analysis
Yesterday, in a comment to my post, SW said:
Our target supercarrier will be me Wyvern with an estimated 2.7 million shield points and 90% shield resistances at the least. We're going to ignore shield recharge for this discussion.
Our opponents have a fleet of Abaddons, let's say geared for damage in the range of 1000 DPS with pulse lasers and drones. Nice easy round numbers.
So if you had a fleet of 50 Abaddons firing on the Wyvern, it would go down in about 9 minutes, ignoring shield recharge and other ships repping it, getting jammed from the ECM Burst, losing ships, etc.
Now our Abaddons have 166,000 armour hit points at average 75% resistances and the Wyvern using Fighters does about 2000 DPS per second. That means the Wyvern kills an Abaddon every 6 minutes, ignoring reps from logistics.
So what happens when 10 Wyverns meets 50 Abaddons? Before the first Wyvern can be destroyed about 15 Abaddons are dead, making it impossible for the remaining 35 to actually kill that Wyvern in 9 minutes, and every 6 minutes another 10 are dead... simply put, the Abaddons would be wiped out without a single Wyvern loss.
Double the number of Abaddons and you have more success until the enemy doubles the number of Wyverns. And so on.
To put it quite simply, I'd estimate that for a sub-cap fleet to defeat a super carrier fleet it needs about 10 to 1 odds, and I'm wondering if that its perhaps an exponential growth ratio. And throw on to all of that the 15 minute logoff timer meaning a subcap fleet has to defeat its target in a set amount of time before it is safe, and you get the frustrating situation facing battleship pilots today: barring extraordinary circumstances, a subcap fleet cannot win against a supercap fleet.
(The situation gets worse with the massive armour hitpoints of the Aeon or the higher damage fighters of the Nyx.)
* * * * *
I realize this is a dead horse, but the fact remains Supercarriers are overpowered. Too flexible against any target (except large POS towers), massive tactical and strategic range, and a tank that requires massive firepower to overcome. In ones and twos, they can be dealt with; but in 10s and 50s they are an unopposable force without your own fleet of them.
We could move up to Dreadnoughts and we would find the situation only marginally better as they have a lot more hitpoints but do only marginally more damage unless in siege mode, and with the numerous spies in the organizations any large mobilization of dreadnoughts will either warn the enemy to retreat from the field or the more likely possibility of get more supercaps online.
Kirith - my understanding is that SC damage to subcaps is minimal at best (of course you have aggregated damage from dozens of supers but that's aggregate damage). Did they bring such balanced super+subcap fleets that your leadership really couldn't get enough pilots to make it a fight, or was there a higher-level lack of desire to lose internet spaceship pixels?I was so taken aback that someone that Supercarriers were a minimal threat to sub-caps that I simply replied:
This isn't pointed at you - but leadership who chose not to fight even at the subcap level, or failed to do so successfully. It's not like they had enough Titans to DD your entire subcap fleet in one volley, or did they?
A supercarrier can launch 20 Orge II or 20 Warrior IIs, etc. A supercarrier has hundreds of thousand effective hitpoints, a powerful ECM burst. Titans doomsdays work on battleships, cruisers, etc in some (many?) cases.Today I want to add some basic EFT numbers to my assertion.
Simply put, your average sub-cap fleet (hell, cap fleet) when hotdropped by 20-40+ supercarriers and titans dies while taking none of the enemy ships with them.
Add to that the enemy subcap fleets and titan jump portals and you have a recipe for disaster.
Our target supercarrier will be me Wyvern with an estimated 2.7 million shield points and 90% shield resistances at the least. We're going to ignore shield recharge for this discussion.
Our opponents have a fleet of Abaddons, let's say geared for damage in the range of 1000 DPS with pulse lasers and drones. Nice easy round numbers.
So if you had a fleet of 50 Abaddons firing on the Wyvern, it would go down in about 9 minutes, ignoring shield recharge and other ships repping it, getting jammed from the ECM Burst, losing ships, etc.
Now our Abaddons have 166,000 armour hit points at average 75% resistances and the Wyvern using Fighters does about 2000 DPS per second. That means the Wyvern kills an Abaddon every 6 minutes, ignoring reps from logistics.
So what happens when 10 Wyverns meets 50 Abaddons? Before the first Wyvern can be destroyed about 15 Abaddons are dead, making it impossible for the remaining 35 to actually kill that Wyvern in 9 minutes, and every 6 minutes another 10 are dead... simply put, the Abaddons would be wiped out without a single Wyvern loss.
Double the number of Abaddons and you have more success until the enemy doubles the number of Wyverns. And so on.
To put it quite simply, I'd estimate that for a sub-cap fleet to defeat a super carrier fleet it needs about 10 to 1 odds, and I'm wondering if that its perhaps an exponential growth ratio. And throw on to all of that the 15 minute logoff timer meaning a subcap fleet has to defeat its target in a set amount of time before it is safe, and you get the frustrating situation facing battleship pilots today: barring extraordinary circumstances, a subcap fleet cannot win against a supercap fleet.
(The situation gets worse with the massive armour hitpoints of the Aeon or the higher damage fighters of the Nyx.)
* * * * *
I realize this is a dead horse, but the fact remains Supercarriers are overpowered. Too flexible against any target (except large POS towers), massive tactical and strategic range, and a tank that requires massive firepower to overcome. In ones and twos, they can be dealt with; but in 10s and 50s they are an unopposable force without your own fleet of them.
We could move up to Dreadnoughts and we would find the situation only marginally better as they have a lot more hitpoints but do only marginally more damage unless in siege mode, and with the numerous spies in the organizations any large mobilization of dreadnoughts will either warn the enemy to retreat from the field or the more likely possibility of get more supercaps online.
Wednesday, June 01, 2011
The Fall of the NC from a Casual Grunt's View
If you read this blog you know that I'm pretty much as casual as you can get as an Eve player: one main night a week on average I log in and PvP my heart out. I'm also pretty far removed from the workings of FCON alliance leadership not to mention the NC's leadership.
In other words, I 'm a grunt who gets once a week in the trenches snapshots of the state of the NC for the past months as the war with DRF / PL / NC. / Ev0ke developed.
So how did we go from fighting tooth and nail for O2O-2X in Geminate in February to writing obituaries in the beginning of June? One simple truth, my friends, and I'm going to say it loud and clear:
There is no counter to a super cap fleet except a BIGGER super cap fleet.1
The NC was out blobbed on the field, pure and simple. Not by sheer bodies but by number of super cap pilots in the warzone. As soon as Pandemic Legion entered the conflict with their supers in the North American timezone, and the willingness to use them, all subcap and sub-supercap ops were vulnerable to a hot drop and the NC became terrified to use their own supercaps in retaliation due to spies and fear of getting whelped.
Without the NC super fleet, which became effectively stood down from that point forward, the long slow failure cascade began. Unable to easily destroy or reinforce SBUs, enemy deployment towers, stations, TCUs, IHUBs, etc, and with the enemy able to do so, the advance was simply a matter of time. And with each station taken a few more players were knocked out of the fight, a few more decided to say "screw this" and moved back to empire to regroup.
By the time Goonswarm and TEST weighed in on the NC side to defend Tribute, the psychological and emotional state of NC leadership appears to have been broken beyond repair. Analysis paralysis, fears of spies everywhere, blue ball frustrations when FCs decide to not jump in, failure to adequately lead pilots into battle safely, etc it was all very morale breaking.
Blob wars often go like that: the out-blobbed only seems to shrink making their chances or winning smaller. Its a little ironic that the NC, which was often pulled out as the poster boy of blobbing and why its bad, was killed by a blob of a different sort.
(Its hard to measure concretely, but its worth noting that the Anomaly Nerf and Jump Bridge nerf bothwent down during this period and possibly created some bitter vets on the NC side who simply stopped logging in. I know of a couple personally.)
1 - Supercarriers are BROKEN, CCP; get on with the balancing already.
In other words, I 'm a grunt who gets once a week in the trenches snapshots of the state of the NC for the past months as the war with DRF / PL / NC. / Ev0ke developed.
So how did we go from fighting tooth and nail for O2O-2X in Geminate in February to writing obituaries in the beginning of June? One simple truth, my friends, and I'm going to say it loud and clear:
There is no counter to a super cap fleet except a BIGGER super cap fleet.1
The NC was out blobbed on the field, pure and simple. Not by sheer bodies but by number of super cap pilots in the warzone. As soon as Pandemic Legion entered the conflict with their supers in the North American timezone, and the willingness to use them, all subcap and sub-supercap ops were vulnerable to a hot drop and the NC became terrified to use their own supercaps in retaliation due to spies and fear of getting whelped.
Without the NC super fleet, which became effectively stood down from that point forward, the long slow failure cascade began. Unable to easily destroy or reinforce SBUs, enemy deployment towers, stations, TCUs, IHUBs, etc, and with the enemy able to do so, the advance was simply a matter of time. And with each station taken a few more players were knocked out of the fight, a few more decided to say "screw this" and moved back to empire to regroup.
By the time Goonswarm and TEST weighed in on the NC side to defend Tribute, the psychological and emotional state of NC leadership appears to have been broken beyond repair. Analysis paralysis, fears of spies everywhere, blue ball frustrations when FCs decide to not jump in, failure to adequately lead pilots into battle safely, etc it was all very morale breaking.
Blob wars often go like that: the out-blobbed only seems to shrink making their chances or winning smaller. Its a little ironic that the NC, which was often pulled out as the poster boy of blobbing and why its bad, was killed by a blob of a different sort.
(Its hard to measure concretely, but its worth noting that the Anomaly Nerf and Jump Bridge nerf bothwent down during this period and possibly created some bitter vets on the NC side who simply stopped logging in. I know of a couple personally.)
1 - Supercarriers are BROKEN, CCP; get on with the balancing already.
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