CCP dev blog addresses lag issues, new features
The latest EVE Online dev blog comes to use from CCP Atlas, and deals with some sweeping changes to that most problematic of systems in the game: Jita. In "A Tale of Two Cities," CCP Atlas makes an analogy between the conveniences of city life and the similar situation of pilots seeking convenience in EVE, often needing to cross through the busy system to reach a destination. CCP's solution is to decentralize Jita from routes between solar systems. In effect, limiting the non-commerce presence in the Jita system, so it can -- hopefully -- continue in its established role as a market hub in New Eden without being a detriment to the players in terms of lag.
Once the changes go into effect, players will no longer need to navigate through Jita to reach their destination (namely the Ruomo constellation), nor run agent missions in Jita. That is to say, Jita, as previously announced, will be a dead zone for mission agents; mission runners given missions from agents outside of Jita will not be sent into or through Jita as part of their mission completion.
This idea of not needing to go through or be in Jita (aside from trading/commerce) will come to be through a new feature, which is really an enhancement of the autopilot settings. Just as players can currently set their autopilot to avoid systems where others have been pod killed recently, they will be able to create a list of solar systems, constellations, and regions that autopilot simply won't bring them. "This list is preconfigured to avoid the Jita system," CCP Atlas says. CCP Games has not given a definitive timetable for when these changes will be deployed, or if they will all be deployed at once, but CCP Atlas states that it will be "soon."
