“With the Winter expansion possibly being named ‘Crucible’, it certainly is a melting pot of refinements and tweaks aimed at making the EVE experience smoother and more wholesome. If the developers suddenly found themselves some spare resources and approached you for an additional feature to include before release, what single concept would you pitch them and how would you implement it?
For bonus points, the one thing lacking from this “patchwork” of iterations is a cohesive storyline to package “The Crucible” together. How could this expansion be marketed to potential new customers?”
He closed the news channel down and stared up at the ceiling. “Something is up but I cannot put my finger on it.”
Free looked over and frowned but held her peace knowing a Gallente man could not and would not stay quiet for long. She was right.
“You ever hear the saying once is bad luck, twice is coincidence . . . ”
‘Three times is enemy action. Yes, that is why we constantly shift our tactics. Last thing we want is the Slavers to start noticing what we are doing.” She looked at him sideways. “What are you looking at that is making you worried?”
“Good things, on the surface.” Mike waved a hand in the air and smiled. “The Talos is going to be a beauty, been talking to some guys who have been in the test flights and they all seem to like it . . . ”
“But?” She prompted.
“But the Amarr, Caldari, and Minmatar are all getting similar ships at the same damn time. It is like the corps had a meeting and decided now was the right time to release these glass cannons. That is what they are, Free, big guns and no armor . . . kinda like you when you are dancing.” He grinned
She threw a cushion at him laughing. “So you think that counts as some sort of enemy action?”
“Hear me out. I just got notice that I am going to have to spend a day in my ship while they ‘redesign’ this luxurious suite. I asked around and a lot of pilots are getting this in a lot of stations. When you have worked a mission have you ever wished you could have complete access for a day to the targets home?”
She stopped laughing. “Yes.” A small pause. “You are only at ‘two’, aren’t you?”
Mike nodded and continued. “They are making some major changes to the POS mechanics including simplifying fuel management to the point that any monkey can start thinking about setting one up.” He ticked off his fingers as he continued his list. “Gallente guns are being retooled, jump bridge security protocols are shifting, filters for overwhelming forces are being revamped so ships don’t shut down when too many things happen at once, planetary complexes are getting better operations systems for greater efficiency, boosters . . . some of the side effects are being removed encouraging more people to use chemical edges for a bit more combat advantage.”
“All of these are good things, aren’t they?”
“One at a time, yeah. But all at once? It is like someone has been saving them up and then is overwhelming us with these additions. Pilots won’t know where to go or what to try next. I dunno why but when too many good things happen I start to think I am being lead down the primrose path.”
“So what could be the evil plot behind all of this, Nostrodummy?” She asked curiously.
He jumped off of the couch and ran into the kitchen, returning a moment later with some tinfoil which he molded to his head and twisted to give himself some credible viking horns. “There, now their mind control and monitoring won’t get me.” He laughed in a strange skittering giggle that made Free a bit nervous. “I think we are being set up by someone with a bit more subtlety the Kuvey-Bear Sansha. All these glass cannons and the POS’s and the boosters . . . I think one of the Cartels may be getting ready to make a move. They have the engineers and tech to push and/or hold back tech until they want it released. They want people to make nice big fat targets so they make POS’s easier and convince us to fly ships that shoot big and blow up easy. I wouldn’t be surprised if there isn’t a new modification to salvagers that is going to make for better salvage on wrecks. All of the good things feel like they are encouraging a new level of violence and economic reasons for us to wander off into lowsec. It is setting the nulls up to have bigger and bigger wars. It . . . bah” He knocked the hat off and started laughing so hard he fell off of the couch.
“Woo hoo! It is going to be great and I am looking forward to all of it. I can play paranoid for a bit but in the end I just want to get my hands on some of that stuff. I already have buddies asking me to get them some blueprints for Customs stations with my concord connections.”
“Going to make a profit on all of this. like your advisor told you?”
“Nope, They are friends.” Mike looked up at her from the floor and grinned. “Like you, only not as beautiful.”
She looked at him on the floor and smiled. “It is almost time for me to head back out. I wouldn’t want to outstay my welcome.”
Mike sighed and nodded. “I understand, but I will leave this suite keyed for you, if you even need a rabbit hole to jump down. You need any funds?”
“We always need funds. But I am not asking for charity.” Free straightened a little which did marvelous things from Mikes point of view.
“Concord pays me well. Have your people send me some drop info for how and where I can make a deposit or two. Free, be careful out there. You are the only girl I know who uses her pod status to do more out of the ship than in.” He held up a hand which she took to pull him to his feet.
“Do you really think there is something going on?” She asked as he balled up the tinfoil and tossed it back into the kitchen.
“Free, this is New Eden. There is always something going on and usually you know nothing about it until it shoots you or your wallet is empty. Yes, I think there is something going on but I am like the optimistic twin.”
“What?”
“Old joke . . . ”
***********************************************
Lessons
I want to thank Seismic for keeping this going. I am sloow to write this down because I let it ricochet about my skull for a few days and then suddenly Skyrim
Some of the folks are right, there is not a lot of real connections between all the GOOD things about to happen to us. Doesn’t mean that I cannot make one up for my own amusement.
BFF and papercuts fixing is fantastic but it is hard to market to new players as being a great thing. “Now with working systems!”
Why are the pirate faction ships better?
I’ll try to remember to tell the joke next time.
Oh, If you want someone with a few Concord points to get you a customs office . . . drop me a line. I could stand to sell a few, having saved up some points.
Comments here will count as entries into a draw for a couple of faction mods for tanking. We may need them soon.
fly it like you won it
m
A Missioneer in Eve 
tinfoil hattery ftw!
I thought the Viking horns was a nice touch
Hey Mike,
I’ll shoot you a line in-game, but I’d like to get one of those BPOs from you for the customs office. Don’t need a deal on it — just want someone I know to get the money.
Always willing to help out. Contact me when they go live
Ooh… In character tin-foil hatterey… I like.
Re the glass cannons, I’m thinking they are gonna see use as cheap cap-killers, battle cruiser sig radius with large guns? Toss in a couple of logis and I’m thinking these will be a credible threat to even a squad of cap ships.
As for the rest of the changes… The ‘eve is becoming WoW’ crowd needs to take a deep breath and calm down… Small simplicity tweaks do not a sandbox wreak. Your sandcastle is still customizable, you just have a better template to work from.
Yeah gank fleets are going to be. . . interesting for a while
I think “Crucible” is the right name since it will be a trial by fire to see if Eve survives and wins back some of the lost player base and support flitted away in and expansion that no one wanted and years of unresolved technical issues over the simplest of things. I don’t know how or what they can do to have a unifying theme or some other kind of catchy hook like other expansions have had. I do know that a lot of space seems empty and there are less people on now than even when I started and I am a wet behind the ears noob. As for one thing that would really turn the tide in building customer relations and/or player base, I have to suggest two.
First, let people write front end UI addons so that they can take what they want, get rid of what they don’t and go from there. Likely not going to happen, but really, who doesn’t want to change up the overview and so on?
Second, clean up the pile of manure that is aggression mechanics when it comes to alliance fleets or fleets of non-corp mates in regards to PvP. It is just absurd that you can be in an alliance fleet doing PvE or whatever and get aggressed from someone and your fleet/alliance mates must sit around and let you pop because if they attack they will get Concorded or take sec hits. There must be a way to have some common sense in this that is reasonable and workable. You fleet with people, you should be able to defend them or attack their target.
Just my 2 ISK.
I have seen some suggestions for aggro repair but they all seem to have a loophole that can be exploited one way or another.
Always going to be a loophole. I would still like to see perhaps if you are in fleet with someone and they are aggressed you share that with them. It would make fleet PvE a lot more realistic. How can it be reasonable that someone catches your fleet on the exit of something and because you picked up an out of corp Logi or Sniper or whatever, they can pop them and you can’t shoot to defend them? Everything can be abused, this is just ridiculous and I have seen it happen.
Great Blog as always Mike. I particularly liked the tinfoil hat. 🙂
This patch is exactly the sort of thing I imagined you championing for the CSM. Lots of fixes to address the ‘little things’. Maybe someone in CCP reads your blog?
I really hope you run for CSM again, you will have my full support and hopefully I can add some finances to assist your campaign trail.
If you look back you will see I did stand for a lot of these things over the last elections. Damn it now what will I do for platform planks?
The irritating thing is that this csm is going to take credit for all of this but they have no minutes to show they asked or pushed for anything other than time dilation, the only thing they publically acknowledged pushing for
m
*scribbles notes* Dang it. Mike, do you have a BPO for that hat I could buy? I’ll make a KILLING on the NeX!
Crucible is looking to be a good set of changes, but yea the unifying theme could be thin. But then that’s just part of the cycle. Some expansions are purely technical, some are almost entirely story.
I’d also like to point out that Incarna wasn’t an expansion nobody wanted. It was an expansion a small but loyal demographic wanted, which was promised 6 years ago and then neglected till this past summer… and then they forgot to release 80% of it. *blinks* Okay, so the Incarna we got was n expansion nobody wanted. I still want the expansion they promised, damnit!
Enjoyed the read 🙂 I look forward to more 🙂
Can’t wait until this expansion goes live!
And the new BCs will be fun trying to take down in a frig. Tank like a small bc, weps like a BS. Interesting fights alll around!
Since I’m not a nullsec pilot, I didn’t even think of the ramifications of these new ships in capital fleets as Gabriel’s henchman brought up. That was an interesting point.
I was more interested in their capacity for highsec shenanigans like the upcoming hulkageddon. I’m not much of a miner but on occasion I’ve been known to spend some time mining while chatting. These will be fun for the ‘it’s a game’ crowd and a nightmare for the ‘highsec should be safe’ crowd.
The UI scaling will help me a lot too because my eyes aren’t getting any better as I get older.
Interesting times are upon us.