THE BENIFESTO

Introduction

The Benifesto outlines ten key issues that I am concerned with on a personal level to varying degrees. Of course these are all secondary to the concerns of the greater constituency, but in many cases they have formed on the basis of said greater concerns anyway.

I plan to reveal and write about each of these one by one during the next few weeks, roughly in ascending order of priority. They won't necessarily come with solutions, but they will definitely come with questions. And don't forget, if you have any questions or comments of your own, feel free to post your thoughts on the eve-o Q&A thread.

  1. New stuff: how much is too much?
  2. Cloaking: the lazy way out
  3. NPC standings: what's the point again?
  4. Market improvements: the little things
  5. Nano-PvP: is speed the new WCS?
  6. Farmers: the not-so-phantom menace
  7. Low-sec: where's the love?
  8. People are broken: fix the forums
  9. The lag monster of hideous death
  10. The real reason why we're all here
(2008-04-04) Back to top

#10: New stuff: how much is too much?

My subscription to Eve began in May of 2004. At that time the game was already a year past beta, but to the new player of 2008, the game as it was then would be almost unrecognisable. With a peak online population of around 6000, space had a much emptier feeling. This was especially true of 0.0, where conquerable stations had only recently been introduced into regions that, prior to their arrival, were almost considered a wasteland. The Tech II concept was very much in its infancy; Miner IIs were about the only T2 module in existence (that I remember at least), and the first class of T2 ships - called interceptors - was about to be introduced.

Eve was considered an unfinished, unpolished game by many at first, and still by some in 2004. Yet, even in those earlier days, many players grappled with what complexity the game did still offer. In my own case, the only reason I felt I was able to persevere with the game at first was that my brother KelThuzad had subscribed a couple of weeks earlier, so his advice and encouragement was invaluable to me.

Now, four years later, I look back at all that has been added to the game since then, and certainly it has matured greatly with the introduction of all sorts of features such as POSs, static complexes followed by exploration sites, Level 4 and Level 5 missions, the deployment of outposts and the development of the sovereignty concept, the opening of the drone regions, and countless new ship and module types, both T1 and T2.

As well, many of these additional features have come with the introduction of additional skills, some merely existing as pre-requisite timesinks to get to the good stuff. Now, for a player who's been around a while, all this means is a slight re-evaluation of his/her skill plan as the goalposts are moved back a little further. But for new players arriving to Eve in 2008, who could blame them for feeling intimidated out of the game before they even begin?

Certainly Eve as a complicated game is GOOD, especially for as long as subscriber numbers continue to grow. It proves that there's a lot of smart cookies out there, and that in turn CCP don't *need* to dumb the game down in order to achieve growth. So this isn't so much of a problem... yet. But at what point will Eve's feature creep begin to cause more harm than good? How much longer can the "oooh shiny" effect be used to attract people without turning more away? As new stuff continues to be added to the game, could we be looking at a future where Eve's biggest threat is in fact Eve itself?

(2008-04-05) Back to top

#9: Cloaking: the lazy way out

In 1966 a man by the name of Ray Davies wrote a song called Dedicated Follower of Fashion. He may as well have being referring to everyone who fits cloaking devices to their combat ships.

The basic reason why anyone would want to fit a cloak is as a defensive measure, so that they cannot be found. It's clearly about risk aversion which is fine to a degree, but when it goes as far as near-immunity at the click of a button, surely something's wrong. Hardly a roaming PvP gang goes by when I don't run into someone that just vanishes from scans seconds after entering system. Farmers are the worst of course, but other players do it too.

I don't blame people for doing it though. I'm not above the tactic myself; I have occasionally fitted a cloaking device to my interceptor. And why not? My only penalties are a few seconds before I can lock after decloaking, and a doubled locking time. Well, the first issue is only ever momentary, and the second? Twice of very little is still not that much. Cloaks on interdictors are also commonplace, but it gets downright ridiculous when people start believing that cloaks on fleet battleships are a good idea. Yes, there are even people out there who think this.

It's gotten to a point where I believe the existing penalties on non-covert cloaking devices are insufficient. There's all sorts of ways to change that of course: increase existing penalties, add new ones, boost existing probes or introduce new ones; any or all of the above. But surely the status quo can't continue to be an option. Surely something has to change?

Don't get me wrong, NPCs are there to be hunted. But in 0.0, so are NPCers. In the meantime, there's always POSs, and there's always Empire.

(2008-04-08) Back to top

#8: NPC standings: what's the point again?

Over the years in Eve we've seen a lot of existing game concepts greatly expanded from their earlier arrangement. This is of course to be expected as a natural result of on-going development of the game we all love, and has manifested mainly through the gradual introduction of T2 ships/items and their requisite skills, but also in other ways as well.

For example, the Red Moon Rising patch of Christmas 2005 introduced a greatly expanded roster of NPCs to hunt. Another patch in early 2005 revamped the way in which both electronic warfare and missiles worked. It was as if a thousand Caldari battleship pilots cried out in terror... well, there was much whining at least, but both areas of the game were altered in such a way that required a completely different approach in order to continue to be successful in those fields.

And now, I think the concept of NPC standings is in need of the same kind of expansion.

Firstly, I believe the consequences of negative standings (aside from those with CONCORD) are too few. If I have -8 standings with the Guristas Pirates for example, why am I still allowed to dock at their stations in Venal? This idea was in fact implemented in another space combat game called Freelancer, and it went a long way to inspire more careful consideration as to which way one was to guide their standings with the various NPC organisations.

Secondly, I believe that repairing standings (again, aside from CONCORD) can prove overly difficult for players who proverbially paint themselves into a standings corner. Borrowing once again from Freelancer, perhaps an alternative method for standings recovery is in order: bribing the agents. Update: I'm told this was actually possible in the earliest days of Eve also, before my time. This might only be possible in low-sec (another area of the game I will write about later), and might cause other consequences such as reduced security status for example.

And then of course there's Factional Warfare - those two magic words touted as the great problem-solver for all those looking for a new reason to fight - which will play no small role in redefining how NPC standings work I'm sure... when it arrives. Perhaps it will even render this whole issue redundant? One can always hope.

(2008-04-11) Back to top

#7: Market improvements: the little things

The market in Eve is one of the game's biggest drawing points. While there are NPC-seeded elements, the great majority of trade occurs at prices set by the players themselves, creating an economy whose dynamics are so fascinating to so many that CCP have seen fit to hire an economist to measure and understand it further.

I'll be the first to admit that I don't play this side of the game as much as I wish I had the time and courage to do so. I'm not one to play the .01 game in Jita, nor do I tend to sink too much capital into anything that I don't trust the ability to return a good profit on - and I'm paranoid enough for that to apply to most things. Having said that, I do enough to warrant keeping alts parked in three different regions for price checking; enough to make me wonder a few different things about how the market functionality in Eve could possibly be improved.

As it stands, the reasons behind why I might choose one person's product over another is a fairly short list: it's the cheapest, the closest, or a good compromise between the two. Sometimes if I can't decide between two similar looking sell orders I might choose the one that's closest to expiry just to do the seller a possible favour if it's been up there for a while, but aside from that, there isn't really much else guiding my buying decisions.

One thing that could make things much more interesting could be for the customer to be able to identify the seller without having to purchase from their order. At the same time, it could be optional on the seller's part, creating question in the buyer's mind as to why the seller would want to hide their identity. But at the very least, a standings indicator beside each order would be really dandy. My enemy could be using the same market; why would I want to deal with him/her if I have the choice to buy from someone else?

Then there's the issue of hubs. The convenience factor is clear, especially when prices are often no worse than elsewhere; but the side effect of lag is a nasty one to deal with, particularly at the larger centres like Jita or Rens. My suggestion for this would be for CCP to make market taxes more dynamic, so that it costs more to set up a sell order where there are already many in place. The RP line can be that stations are perhaps running out of room to store all the extra wares. As a consequence, sellers might increase their prices to offset the charge, raising the incentive for buyers to perhaps choose cheaper goods with added travel instead. In turn, the pressure on hubs eases and lag eases. Could it be that simple?

These are only a couple of issues concerning the market, and I'm sure that the more industry- and trade-focused out there have plenty more thoughts to offer. If you are one of those people, be assured that I will consider your ideas also. ♥

(2008-04-14) Back to top

#6: Nano-PvP: is speed the new WCS?

In answer to the title question? Yes and no. Nanoships are used today for the same reasons that WCS were used in the past, but it's not new.

In 2004 speed was all the rage, due mainly to the ability to fit multiple MWDs and/or oversized afterburners to ships. The Raven was a popular ship in the case of the former, and interceptors such as the Crow shone with a 10MN Afterburner, as it boosted as effectively as a 1MN MWD but without the cap and sig radius penalties.

Even in the Exodus aftermath when those strategies were made impossible by CCP, players pursued the angle further by fitting an AB in combination with a MWD, giving rise to what were called "wideboy" setups. Cruisers and battlecruisers such as the Maller and Prophecy became the new flavours of the month, with nothing else in the game capable of stopping them except for other wideboys. Finally CCP were left with no choice but to restrict ship fittings further, to allow only one AB or MWD, but not both.

The first speed craze was effectively halted at that point, but in the meantime the game in general has continued to evolve and grow. Since then, other new ways to subtly increase ship speed have crept back into Eve one by one: Advanced Skirmish Warfare and Mindlinks, T2 overdrives and nanofibers, speed and mass reduction hardwiring implants, deadspace and officer microwarpdrives, and speed and mass reduction rigs. The end result is very much reminiscent of the wideboy era 3.5 years ago: if you can't catch me, you can't kill me.

Still, two key differences exist between then and now: firstly, there are some counters available other than flying a nanoship oneself in the form of recons (Curse to reduce the cap, Huginn/Rapier to reduce the speed, Arazu/Lachesis to slow their locking, Falcon/Rook to break their locking), though on their own they will rarely actually kill a nanoship. The other difference however is that blobs are far bigger and more numerous today; entire nanogangs will waste no time in putting down recons as their primaries, and they continue to dominate as a shipform of choice for roaming gangs today.

Would I support a speed nerf? Possibly, but not to the extent where people are turned off speed setups altogether; perhaps just a tweak. There are PvP situations other than roaming gangs where nanoships aren't so ideal, but in their favoured field, they are hard to beat. It's certainly an issue that crops up on the forums on at least a semi-regular basis, so it's hard to see this issue not getting some discussion time within the CSM at some point.

(2008-04-15) Back to top

#5: Farmers: the not-so-phantom menace

We've all seen them. The Caldari Achura Raven pilot with a security status of 5.0, the hauler noob running courier missions in low-sec with suspicious frequency, the barge pilot gangs parked 24/7 along an ice belt. Almost always in NPC corps, almost always with a name that wouldn't look out of place in a bowl of alphabet soup. And they're not going away anytime soon.

The first question I would ask CCP is how seriously they themselves take this whole issue. I do actually feel sorry for them to a degree, because in a way they're in a no-win situation. Every player they ban is lost income for the company, but on the other hand every player that gets away with it is lost confidence in the company from the rest of us, which at some point will inevitably translate into accounts being cancelled out of frustation, with the same end result for CCP.

One point I do believe is that CCP aren't forthcoming enough with information on actions they *have* taken against such people in the past. They don't need to reveal their methods, but just numbers such as "we've banned X players this month" on a regular basis would surely go a long way to restoring confidence in CCP on this issue. Without this information it's easy for us to assume that CCP aren't doing anything, when in fact they just aren't doing enough - a subtle but important difference.

(On a personal note I also take issue with the fact that CCP goes to great lengths to protect the privacy of these characters, meanwhile a CSM candidate looking to make a positive difference for the game is to expect their real life name to be published? I don't mind my real name being out there, my point is one of consistency, or the lack thereof.)

Dealing with the isk farmers without impacting on the rest of us is the real crux of the issue though. For example, CCP could restrict lop-sided contracts but then scamming would suffer. Maybe they could require that players must belong to player corps in order to fly certain shiptypes, but then genuine solo players could suffer. The more ideas anyone can come up with on this, the merrier.

CCP have generally been reluctant to impose such sweeping changes to game mechanics in the past unless they've felt they've had no other choice, such as when bookmarks were replaced with warp-to-zero to combat lag. The time for more drastic changes to combat isk farmers is near (if not now), but each step in this direction still needs to be very carefully considered for possible side-effects.

In the meantime, if you buy isk, you're part of the problem. Learn to GTC or learn to play.

(2008-04-20) Back to top

#4: Low-sec: where's the love?

This has been one of the most heavily debated subjects in recent times, and with good reason. Low-sec as it currently stands is - in my opinion - not worth the trouble. So what to fix, the worth, or the trouble?

CCP have already boosted low-sec several times in the past with the addition of zydrine traces in the mid-level ores, high quality agents and warp-to-zero. It hasn't been enough so far; even systems with multiple L4 Q20 agents in one station are completely empty, as I have noted when moving cyno alts around. And meanwhile, newer hazards such as capital ships and heavy interdictors are becoming commonplace.

Now, they could continue to increase those rewards further - so long as they don't exceed the rewards of 0.0 of course - despite the lack of evidence that such boosts will do anything to foster growth in low-sec. Or, they could fix the trouble.

Don't worry, I'm not talking about nerfing piracy at all; what I'd like to see instead is anti-piracy/bounty hunting become more viable. There have been some very good threads on eve-o in the last month or so discussing security status mechanics, and my position is reinforced on their basis:

This way, the responsibility of breathing new life into low-sec is placed in the hands of the players, which is where it ought to be. New professions for the good guys, more targets for the bad guys. Everybody wins! \o/

(2008-04-25) Back to top

#3: People are broken: fix the forums

Eve is my first - and probably my last - MMO, so I can't say I have a basis for comparison when it comes to rating the general online behaviour of the Eve community versus that of other games such as WoW. But what I have observed over the last four years is that the standard of conduct of the Eve community itself has certainly declined. Yes, I'm talking about the forums.

The same number of quality discussions are still taking place; they're just getting harder to find in a growing cesspool of so-called memes and supposedly hilarious one-liners. Everybody wants to be the funny guy, but the problem is, not everybody shares the same brand of humour. Where I come from, posting for the sake of posting is not funny, personal attacks are not funny, and mocking the dead is most certainly not funny.

I don't think it's just a case of more subscribers meaning more idiots either. It's more than the law of averages; the worst stuff is getting worse. Too many people are posting for no purpose other than to stink it up for the rest of us, so if the people can't be relied upon to regulate their own behaviour (as sad as that is in itself), it's time for CCP to regulate the people instead. The question is though, are they brave enough to try? I sure wish they were.

There's little doubt in my mind that CCP are behind the curve as far as controlling the forums goes. While the revision of the forum warning system last Christmas along with the addition of the Report function is certainly a step in the right direction, there are many more steps that need to be taken in order for things to begin to improve.

Let's crank up the punishment system some more. What about a Block feature, along the lines of the CAOD Cleaner? What about exposing the mains of alts once in a while? What about isk fines on top of existing warnings? What about people being muted in-game simultaneously while serving temporary forum bans? What about permabanning the most serious forum offenders from the game entirely?

It shouldn't have to come to any of this of course, but come on people. Behind those keyboards we're all human beings and it's time some of us started acting like it. +5 Cloak Of Internet Anonymity be damned.

If only I'd had the time to accept that ISD offer... :|

(2008-04-25) Back to top

#2: The lag monster of hideous death

Lag. It's a subject discussed so commonly these days that I sometimes wonder if there's anyone left in Eve who *isn't* affected by - and concerned with - this issue. It does not discriminate; whether you're a mission runner in Motsu, a trader in Jita, a territorial 0.0 PvPer or someone unlucky enough to be sharing the same node as entire fleets of said territorial 0.0 PvPers, you'll have felt its effects at some point.

Essentially, lag is the result of overcrowding to the point where CCP's hardware cannot sufficiently cope with such concentrated player numbers. But what causes players to "blob"? All sorts of things; some examples are given just above. How do we deal with those causes? I figure the answer could be different for each.

I find it hard to sympathise with mission runners who still work for Caldari Navy. Maybe it's just a lack of awareness that the CN isn't the only corp to offer the faction battleship as the top prize in the LP store. Or maybe people feel "trapped", knowing that running for other corps will certainly make for a smoother missioning experience, but they still want to be able to use their existing LP. Or maybe CCP needs to better distribute the high-quality L4 agents by spreading them around a bit more. Or maybe all of the above?

(I myself used to run for Caldari Navy, but after losing 3 Ravens to the lag I finally packed my things and migrated to another corp. I realised that I could still purchase implants and faction ammo with my CN LP, and that I would be able to work towards larger LP store goals that much more quickly with a more quiet agent. This was about a year ago.)

Those who are at least old enough to remember Yulai will remember how CCP later re-arranged the Empire gate network in an attempt to separate the one market hub into many. While it worked to a degree in helping foster growth in places like Oursulaert, Amarr and Rens, increasing player numbers over the years have meant that the biggest of them all - Jita - is today still considerably busier than what Yulai ever was.

One school of thought is that by rearranging the gates again, another trade hub will simply rise to take Jita's place. I would suggest that just because it's only really happened once before (at least in my Eve lifetime), doesn't necessarily mean it will always be the case. I'd like to see subtle gate changes on an ongoing basis, combined with dynamic NPC taxes based on system activity to help keep the biggest market hubs under control.

And then there's the 0.0 alliance wars. This one is the most difficult to try and counter, because the blobs in 0.0 are only static for as long as at least one side is committed to a cause. I don't have many solid answers to this one personally, except that my preference would be for a solution that does still allow the large fleet battles to take place, like the game has always promised. All I can do is wish CCP luck with this one; they certainly need it.

(2008-04-30) Back to top

#1: The real reason why we're all here

It's become apparent to pretty much everyone following this whole CSM business that the form it has taken has evolved into something quite different from what it was originally set up for.

Now I don't know about you, but I haven't forgotten the chain of events that led to where we are today. My biggest issue with what took place was not so much the events themselves, but the fact that they were exposed to the public. Yes, what happened was wrong, but it was an internal CCP company matter, and certainly wasn't any of our business. Or shouldn't have been, anyway.

But what's done is done, and now here we are with the CSM, a concept that CCP founded in response, that has taken so long to materialise that it now appears to have little to no capacity to be able to help prevent similar such issues from arising again in the future, which makes me wonder: why am I doing this again?

Heck, in its current form, is there even a point to the CSM - as it currently stands - at all? I see a lot of apathy and cynicism out there that suggests to me that many would answer no. And in a way, I can see their point.

While I don't envy anyone with a PR role at CCP, sometimes do I wish they had the courage to really take control of things for themselves. Being a CCP dev must feel like a pretty thankless job at times; no matter what they do, the forums light up in a freshly lobotomised fury. But at the same time, is it such a surprise? Surely having to deal with such reaction must be a part of the job description as well, so why are they looking to effectively offload that responsibility to a bunch of volunteers from around the world?

You might recall at the beginning of the campaign that I said I was sceptical of the CSM's worth at first, and that my decision to run was on the basis that, while the system presented to us is far from perfect, it's an opportunity nonetheless. And given the choice, I'd rather work within an imperfect system than simply decry it from the outside.

So with that said - and yes, I'm fully aware that the Non-Disclosure Agreement (NDA) will likely prevent us from doing this anyway, but - if I do get elected onto the CSM panel, nothing would please me more than having the opportunity to speak with Internal Affairs, and for the CSM as a group to be able to judge for ourselves, that everything at CCP is OK.

Because that's the real reason why we're all here.

(2008-05-04) Back to top