Remember when CCP mentioned the new EVE Launcher before releasing Crucible? So here they mentioned it again. It seems that the Launcher is almost ready – it is now part of the Singularity client, so it is possible to give it a go.
What does it do?
It shows a handy collection of EVE related links: Account Management, PLEX services and Buddy Program.
It shows the current news from the game
It checks that EVE Online client is up to date and patches it automatically if it isn’t
It can repair the client in case it’s broken
No need to restart the client when there is new patch to download
Works on Windows and Mac OS X
To the contrary of what CCP is saying, the EVE Launcher is not something new. The original EVE Second Genesis client also featured a launcher, although it was not this powerful. The original Launcher did not feature anything useful, so it has been removed at some point.
If you do not have/do not want to install the Singularity client, here is a screenshot from the most current version:
And here is the forementioned original launcher dating back to 2003:
What happens next?
CCP Topknot has mentioned three things
peer-to-peer technology for downloads instead of current CCP content delivery network
limited gameplay (corporate forum access, chat channel interfaces, etc.) while patching
more smaller patches instead of big staged releases
One impression I can’t get out of my mind is that some other colourful, fluffy singleplayer MMO have such p2p-based autopatching launcher already implemented for a while… Is CCP learning from Blizzard?
Players have been voicing their concerns about Black Ops ships being underpowered for quite a while (almost for as long as Black Ops are in game). People complain, that BO are weaker than their Tech I counterparts, have limited jump range and so on. When CCP run the crowdsourcing poll to see what areas of the game need improvement, Black Ops were quite high on the list.
One might wonder, did CCP really just overlook this group in Crucible, or was this intentional? Are Black Ops ships really this ineffective?
The answer is: Not really.
Black Ops are Tech II battleships, which cost as much as a carrier, have on-board jump drive, no targeting delay after decloaking and can bridge other ships into the fray. They are already quite powerful, and the reason why they are not so commonly used is only their price rather than their capabilities. A skilled team of pilots can destroy almost any target by dropping a gang of BO, recons and T3s.
The voice of concerns claim that Black Ops jump range is too short. I say it’s ok. Give them more range, and people begin hot dropping to anywhere in New Eden straight from Jita. Do we really need an unstoppable gang of battleships that are able to deploy instantly almost anywhere in the game?
Others ask for T2 resists, because the ship is too expensive to be paper thin. Au contraire, mes amis: repelling a BO hot drop is already quite hard as it is, and when done properly, no Black Ops losses should happen at all in a fight. In my opinion, the EHP and resists are just fine.
Some players claim, that the DPS is not high enough. Then I ask you this: since when 700 DPS is low for a Battleship? Mind that a covert hot drop might also have some tiny, cloaky, ultra-mobile DPS called Stealth Bombers. Having the element of surprise on your side, you don’t really need a lot of DPS.
The list of complaints contains one more issue: fuel bay capacity. As it is right now, fuel bay capacity is sufficient for ship’s own jump drives, but when it comes to bridging other ships, fuel runs out pretty quickly. IMHO this is the only valid concern and should be looked into. With the current fuel constraints, bridging one recon to the furthest reach of the Black Ops range (4.5 ly) takes as much as a third of the total fuel. Players of EVE are a resourceful bunch, when it comes to adapting, so they just take a Blockade Runner full of isotopes with them just to remedy this issue. In my eyes this should not however be necessary. Either the fuel bay should be increased in capacity, or the amount of fuel required for bridging should be reduced.
And one more thing: if you think the points above are not valid, please see Burn Eden’s killboard. This group has mastered the art of using Black Ops (and other jump capable ships) to perfection.
Edit 1
I will be answering here to let others see my replies as well:
@RockCalledSteve: 700 /is/ low for a battleship. It is, however, perfect for a stealth ship. Also, we don’t want massive range, just 2 extra AU.
Well, 700 dps indeed is not a lot, my Talos can fling about 700 dps over 40km while travelling at 700 m/s. But 700 dps with the element of surprise is… Well, a very nasty surprise.
2 extra lightyears after the Jump Drive Calibration skill is applied, or before? I would vote after the skill, because 6.5 ly gives BO almost regional range. Please mind that Black Ops can be safely deployed from high sec, and capital ships cannot. Increasing jump range makes them even safer to deploy, but yes, this would also allow more tactics.
I know that Sin is the weakest BO, but it was the first one I had the skills for when they were introduced (this is why there is Sin on the screenshots). Nowadays I’m flying a Panther instead.
Edit 2
The reason I have picked up this topic is because I am concerned. This is similar to what happened to Motherships (which are now known as Supercarriers). Players were not using them, because of their pricetag and only slightly better stats than normal Carriers. Community was complaining and CCP listened to these complaints. Result of the buff made Supercarriers the biggest solo pwnmobiles in EVE to the date. Of course, other part of the EVE Community began complaining about SCs being overpowered. Black Ops are very specific flavour of ships and it is very easy to make them too powerful. This in turn will result in nerfbat hitting them sooner or later…
What do You think? Should CCP buff the BO or leave them be? Comments are welcome.
Like mana from Valhalla (yes I know I’m mixing my religious metaphors), the recent Dev Blog by CCP Legion asks questions which make for perfect Blog Bantering. To quote him,
“…we want to make the first days, weeks and months in EVE enjoyable and not just something ‘you have to plough through in order to get to the good stuff’” and the newly formed Player Experience team will focus on “…where and why people lose interest in EVE…”.
“We invite you to pour your heart (or guts) out and tell us what you think is good or bad with the current new player experience and what you think could be done about the problems.”
So let’s get self-eviscerating. Banter on.
My online presence this february was severely limited, and this reply to Blog Banter #33 is long overdue. But I always say, better late, than never.
The current EVE Online community has grown quite big: New Eden is no longer an empty universe filled with NPCs. CCP has been gradually removing the NPCs from market and economy of New Eden, has provided some group oriented PVE and PVP content (Incursions and Faction Warfare respectively), but never thought of grouping newbies together. The new player experience as it is right now, is still based on a single player experience. The handy instructions from Aura and tutorial missions from the first handful of agents don’t pull the newcomer into the great and amazing community of players. Instead, the NPE ends with a “Tutorials are finished, now go find yourself a corporation”.
It is true from psychology point of view, from real life experience and from multiplayer gaming experience, that you make the strongest ties with people you started with. Be it coleagues at school, be it players who started the game at roughly the same time, or co-workers who arrived in the company at the same time. I don’t say newbies have to be hardened for PVP from day one; let the tutorials still be a PVE experience. But grouping newbies together, giving them a mission, will give them a great opportunity to make friendships, which will last throughout their entire EVE Online experience. I still keep in touch with the first group of friends from EVE, even though we are from different countries. Some of us managed to meet out of game and we had a really good time. These are the people, most of whom I met in EVE 6 years ago! If not for the solo New Player Experience, I would have a chance to get to know these great people much earlier.
One more thing I remember very well was the “CASTO“. CASTO meant Center for Advanced Studies Tactical Operations. It was a channel where noobs met experienced pilots, who took them to do level 4 missions together. I remember being in a fleet of 20+ ships, most of them frigates and dessys doing an L4 mission together. Payout was not that important, but the fact that we did it as a group was a lot of fun.
Dear CCP, it can be done. Please give new players a meaningful task, that will give them a common goal and bring them together, letting them forge friendships of their own.
Some time ago I have been discussing the evolution of EVE Online with @RockCalledSteve. EVE Online, just like any other MMO game is in a contant loop of evolution – the perfect example of that is the Scorpion battleship evolution, which I have already covered here.
As much as graphic assets usually look better when iterated upon by CCPers, I miss the Old jumpgate sound (c) CCP hf., that has been replaced by a less pronounced, muted sound effect a few expansions ago.
Of course, you can count on my reports once the new expansion shows up on SiSi. Until then, the list of features in EVE Online: Inferno is rather short and lacks details:
Rookie ships makeover – details can be found in this dev-blog. You can also watch your favourite CCP Guard in the first episode of new “In development” series. You will find the video just below this post.This change will be pushed as part of Crucible 1.5
Faction Warfare – more fun and more reasons to fight for your nation
Corp vs Corp/Alliance Warfare (CONCORD sanctioned wars) – new things which will mix up all forms of combat,
Dust514 link – bringing collaboration between console and PC players to a new level
Improvements and usability fixes
Hopefully, Amarr and Minmatar ships are going to get the V3 overhaul
Focus is back on spaceships, but CCP does not forget about avatars. New forms of bipedal gameplay will be released as soon as they are ready. Ever wanted your character to have a sleeve tattoo? Then read this dev-blog for details.
Module and implant re-naming to make them easier to remember for new players – see details in this post
With Time Dilation introduced on Tranquility, Crucible has brought a substantial number of improvements to EVE Online. TiDi was quite successful at reducing module lag in fleet battles, with response times reduced from as much as 40 seconds to just 1 s. This time devs have focused their efforts on the client performance as well.
In a recent dev-blog, CCP Veritas has described a new set of client optimizations, which will result in increased window drawing performance. To achieve that goal devs have focused their efforts on what is rendered most often: fonts. Additional improvements have been done to the Overview, which is by far the most commonly used tool in EVE.
Overview is much more responsive now, and because of the performance gains, devs have decided to make it refresh every 1 second instead of the current once every 2,5 seconds. Because in-space brackets share the same code, their performance has been increased as well.
Let’s hope these improvements further reduce lag in these huge 1500+ fleet battles, so favored by many New Eden pod-pilots.
First off, there is a big difference between killing new players in EVE Online and griefing. Griefing has only one purpose (frustration), and I am not playing EVE to humiliate others repeatedly. Shooting new players is not a real challenge either, but it can serve another purpose: teaching them a lesson. I actually did kill a newbie for that purpose not long ago.
Real life kept me busy lately, so I was only logging on breifly to change skills, chat with friends and start industry jobs. Last thursday I had a longer timeslot available, so I have decided to have a look at nearby systems. I’ve planned to fly solo, so I’ve chosen HAM fitted Rook (430 DPS with Rage missiles). My usual hanging place had several neutrals from the same alliance, so my chances at catching one of them were rather slim (compared to them catching me), but I’ve scanned the system anyway. Finding no suitable targets, I went through Orvolle to check Oulley and Aubenalle, but haven’t found any lone pilots either. PVP didn’t work well, so I came back to Orvolle and scanned for anoms to pass the time. I was almost done with a Serpentis Hideout, when a Caracal warped in. He immediately started shooting the NPCs and I wouldn’t mind it (I quickly checked him and his corp, also made sure there is no one from their corp in the system). Out of a sudden he’d become blinky red, and my wreck near his boat shown empty. “This is a tarp!” I thought immediately. But it would take anyone more time to arrive at the scene, than for me to kill him, so I have immediately scrammed, ECMed and rained missiles all over his boat (not even bothering to change ammo from Inferno missiles which I have used against the NPC Serpentis). 20 seconds later his Caracal was no more, and his pod on the way to the nearest station.
Most of you know why I killed that noob, but in case you are new player yourself, here is a list of what this guy did wrong:
He warped to my anom and decided to give it a go even though I was almost finished with it,
He stole from my wreck, thus become agressed towards me,
His fitting was a complete lol with mixed t1 weapons and a mixed tank,
He didn’t run after stealing from my wreck.
If he warped away after finding an occupied anomaly, his Caracal would be unsctached. If he killed the remaining rats, I wouldn’t bother attacking him. But he put himself in the position where the only immediate reaction was to pull the trigger.
I am neither a psychology nor sociology professional. I am merely an observer, but I try to keep a close watch as much on myself as on others. Most players agree, that massive multiplayer games are addictive (this is one of the bases on which online games business is built). Two main factors account for the addictive effect:
it takes time to achieve goals in the game,
people socialize and form online friendships in the game,
It’s the second factor, which dominates for most people. Leaving a game is hard not because of the game itself, but because it will most likely sever the connection with the people one was playing with.
This is one of the reasons CCP and other online game developers strongly encourage people to join player-owned corporations and other kinds of groups. Some players who know about this psychological effect of MMO games try to limit their engagement with other players, to limit the amount of time spent in the game.
I was at this stage once, only doing skillchanges, PI production and manufacturing in EVE, talking to my old colleagues, but not actively playing with them.
At some point I have started my own blog, which was a natural place to write about my hobbies, including EVE Online. This introduced me to a yet another part of the EVE community, a bit more loosely connected than inside a corporation, but at a somewhat higher level. You most likely have heard about Chribba, haven’t you? Is he known for things he did in game? The answer is NO. He is famous because of his online tools he have developed and actively maintains, performing an excellent service for the playerbase. You have probably also heard about an individual called Somerset Mahm, who is currently maintaining one of the biggest flash lottos in EVE (this service is known as “SOMERblink“). Again, he is not famous for his in-game deeds, but rather for his out-of-game service. This is what is known as emergent gameplay.
Emergent gameplay refers to complex situations in video games, board games, or table top role-playing games that emerge from the interaction of relatively simple game mechanics.
More recently game designers have attempted to encourage emergent play by providing tools to players such as placing web browsers within the game engine (such as in EVE Online, The Matrix Online), providing XML integration tools and programming languages (Second Life [and EVE API]), […]
Emergent gameplay is often called as “metagaming“, but for the sake of accuracy, metagaming is a broader term, including emergent gameplay, but also strategies and tactics based on understanding of game mechanics and/or real life knowledge and experience, rather than in-character knowledge.
Blogging is a bit less pronounced than performing services for the playerbase, but is also a part of the emergent gameplay experience. Initiatives like #tweetfleet on Twitter, EVE News 24, Blog banter or EVE blog pack are just a few examples of how blogging enriches emergent games such as EVE Online, performing a service both to the community, but to the developer as well.
So, how “social” adds to all this?
Pretty social graph!
Socializing is anything that introduces human interaction: be it PVP, discussing on the forums or writing your own blog.
Blogging, metagaming and using social networks creates just one more social ring to the already established “corporation” and “alliance” ones. And this ring will get you in touch with individuals considered celebirties of EVE, but with the CCP employees as well. If you are not on Twitter yet, I really recommend registering an account and adding the #tweetfleet channel to favourites.
Plus, you are more likely to go to the Fanfest. Why? To meet these excellent people in person obviously. Since most bloggers are on #tweetfleet as well, they create an international community. To get in touch, one must attend a global event, and Fanfest is just the most obvious one. Corp level meetings are mostly local (be it in players from the same country or continent at best). I have attended a local meeting of my corp, and actually enjoyed it. Having out of game fun with people I spent a lot of time online, playing EVE, killing stuff and chatting on Teamspeak, was a refreshing experience. It allowed me to get to know their “offline” side better, making even closer friends. Unfortunately, no one from my corp ever went to Fanfest. Being a part of the blogging community, I now have a real reason to actually go to the Fanfest and get to know other excellent bloggers, and CCP devs as well.
Obviously, this is very tempting, but “real life comes first” rule will prevent me from going to Iceland. As much as I’d like to go, my RL obligations (work, family) keep me occupied (and I actually enjoy it; boredom is such a nasty thing!). And it’s worth mentioning, that blogging about a game is just another layer to the addictive quality of online games (I would stop playing, but what happens to my webiste then?).
Limited spare time leads to another fundamental question: “To write about EVE or to play EVE?” But this is a topic for another post.
If you’re reading this, you might wonder. What this Rox guy is about here? It’s actually pretty simple. Apple has published a dedicated App yesterday for it’s iTunes University spin-off thing, which allows universities and schools to publish their courses online (and most of them do it for free). So without thinking much, I’ve signed up for the iTunes U version ofStanford’s CS193P course, which is about iOS programming. But how does programming connect to spaceships you ask?
It seems that Paul Hegarty from Stanford University likes networked spaceships a lot:
“You’ve got the spaceship game and some other client (it’s a networkd thing) and some other client shoots your spaceship. Now the model has changed, because your spaceship took damage.”
If you own an Apple mobile device, have some object-oriented programming experience and would like to know more about programming for iOS, this course is for you. If you are an EVE player, you will laugh jut a bit more often, when professor Hegarty mentions his internet spaceship game example.
The course covers such areas as:
The Model, View, Controller paradigm
Objective C basics
Cocoa touch UI and various input methods
Multithreading
Persistence and iCloud
One question remains: is this a pure coincidence, or does professor Hegarty actually play Eve Online?
This month’s Blog Banter comes from Drackarn of Sand, Cider and Spaceships. He has foolishly chosen to poke the hornets’ nest that is the non-consensual PvP debate. Whilst you read his question, I’ll be finding a safe place to hide.
“A quick view of the Eve Online forums can always find someone complaining about being suicide ganked, whining about some scam they fell for or other such tears. With the Goons’ Ice Interdiction claiming a vast amount of mining ships there were calls for an “opt out of PvP” option.
Should this happen? Should people be able to opt-out of PvP in Eve Online. Should CONCORD prevent crime rather than just handing out justice after the event? Or do the hi-sec population already have too much protection from the scum and villainy that inhabits the game?
EVE Online is a game that tries to model the reality, at least when it comes to people interaction. In real life there is no security status, is there? Innocent people get hurt sometimes and offenders go to jail. This is life. Why should a game world be different? Other games let you choose if you want to interact with other players or not, but this is from my point of view completely flawed. Why? Massive multiplayer games are about being massive and multiplayer, right? Then why should people be given the ability to play completely solo? This is against my idea of a multiplayer game.
EVE Online developers decided it is a PVP game in as many aspects as possible. PVP is not just pure combat: undercutting market prices by traders is a form of PVP, because the one with the best prices will get his goods sold, and will make ISK, while the one with higher prices will not make a dime. PVP is present in industry, where players try to minimize their operating cost, so they can compete with other industrialists. Alliances fight alliances over space and a place to have other activities. As you can see from the examples above, PVP is basically another term for competition, about someone being better at the game and someone being not as good. Players with better intel, better ships, bigger numbers, or better business plan WIN.
By starting EVE Online account you agree to the game rules.
By signing up you have agreed that EVE is a PVP game, and that PVP exists everywhere in the game, even in high sec. If you decide to fly a paper thin ship that mines Ice, it is your decision in the first place. You know that someone might come in and destroy it, no matter the security status of the system. If you jump to low sec or null sec, you know there will be others who might want to destroy your ship. You have to accept this fact, embrace it. Treat this ship as already lost, calculate it into your costs. If ships weren’t lost, the precious EVE economy would be ruined and irrevocably lost. One of the things that make EVE “real” would be gone. Isn’t that why you play EVE and not, say, World of Warcraft?
As soon as opting out of PVP is introduced to EVE, I will ragequit over it think how this affects me and act accordingly.
Miners don’t stand a chance
I agree that both Mining Barges and their tech 2 counterparts are paper-thin, which makes them ideal targets for suicide attacks. Miners have everything against them: big signature, low EHP, low speed, low agility, the element of surprise and even the NPCs. Most gankers fit their ships to alpha their targets – kill them with the first volley. I agree that there is no real counter against it, but preventing gank by the game rules is not the way to solve the problem.
If miners want to combat gankers, they should be given a tool for that – better tank, some weapons, or just different ship. For mining ore the best solution to avoid being ganked is mining with a battleship: a Rokh can sport more than 85k of EHP, while easily outmining a Retriever. Unfortunately it will not work for mining Ice, as mining barges are the only ships which can do it.
Orca pilots can easily hull tank their expensive Command Ships. An Orca with DC II, Reinforced Bulkheads II and 3 active shield hardeners in meds has about 194k EHP, compared to 51,7k EHP when fitted with cargo expanders and cargo rigs. Remember: modules (and rigs) used for increasing the capacity of your cargohold reduce hull (and armor) HP!
So here is my solution:
Make new ice cubes which will be 10 times smaller and contain 1/10 of the isotopes,
Introduce a new Ice Miner I (and II) turret, which will mine 1 new ice cube per cycle,
Current “Strip” Ice Harvester modules will mine 10 new ice cubes per cycle,
This will give ice miners the tool they need really: a choice to mine more ice in a weaker ship, or mine less, but in a less vulnerable one.
EDIT: One more idea.
After reading what other Blog Banter participants have to say (both pro and against the “opt out of PVP” button), one more idea came up to me. It’s similar approach to Kirith’s, but a bit different. The Isolation Matrix is a ship setting, I would see it as a module instead.
I think there are other ways to improve safety of miners and mission runners, like specific “siege type” module that would be increasing your resists to 99% for example (let’s call it an Invulnerability Core for the moment), but disallowing you to target, warp, move or dock and makes your drone bandwidth 0 mbit. Or instead of resists, make you untargetable (this one would be called Signature Scrambling Core). It could only be fitted on mining barges (+exhumers and orcas obviously) and would only work in 0.5 and above. What do you think about such solution?
Some time ago I have been discussing the evolution of EVE Online with @RockCalledSteve. EVE Online, just like any other MMO game is in a contant loop of evolution – the perfect example of that is the 
