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EVE Evolved: Features coming in Oceanus and beyond
It's been almost four months since EVE Online switched from publishing two major expansions per year to releasing ten smaller updates, and so far it looks like the new schedule has been a huge success. Rather than forcing the industry overhaul out the door in Kronos before it was ready, CCP was able to push it forward to the Crius release window seven weeks later and the extra development time meant the feature launched in a very polished state. It may be too early to tell if the new schedule's success can be seen in the concurrent player graph for Tranquility, but the numbers have remained steady for the past few months in what is typically the annual low-point for player activity. The Oceanus update is scheduled to go live in just two day's time, adding several graphical upgrades, more difficult burner missions, an experimental new notification feature, and other small improvements. The scale of the update seems to be on par with the recent Hyperion release, consisting of mostly small features and minor iterations on gameplay. While we're told that CCP is still working on large projects behind the scenes, the new release schedule means they won't be rushed out the door and so we may not see them for some time. In this edition of EVE Evolved, I summarise everything we know about Tuesday's Oceanus update, and take a look at what's to come in further releases.
EVE Evolved: Getting ready for Rubicon
EVE Online's Rubicon expansion goes live in just two days on Tuesday, November 19th, introducing four brand-new personal deployable structures and revamping PvP across the board with a seemingly innocuous warp acceleration fix. The expansion represents the first step in new Senior Producer Andie Nordgren's plan to bring true player-run deep-space colonisation to EVE Online. The new Mobile Depot that can be placed anywhere in space is possibly the most sandboxy feature since the introduction of player-owned starbases back in 2004. Players have been coming up with plans for the device since its first announcement, but I think we'll see its true potential revealed in the coming weeks and months. If you've been saving up your Sisters of EVE loyalty points to get your hands on the faction's new exploration ships, be prepared to buy and build the blueprints as soon as the server comes up. These will be the first pirate faction ship blueprints that are available in high-security space, and a recent devblog confirmed that players have been collecting Sisters of EVE loyalty points like crazy lately in anticipation of the expansion, but those who get the built ships to market first will make an absolute killing. For the rest of us, getting ready for the expansion means planning where to set up a Mobile Depot for some quick profit-making enterprise or building a few small PvP ships to put the new warp speed mechanics to the test. In this week's EVE Evolved, I look at some of the best places to set up a Mobile Depot, re-consider the lure of low-security space, and propose adapting your PvP fleets to take advantage of the warp acceleration changes.
EVE Evolved: Ghost Sites and PvE goals
PvE in most MMOs revolves around killing hordes of NPCs for currency, XP, tokens, or loot, and EVE Online is no exception. Players can hunt for rare pirate ships in nullsec asteroid belts, farm Sansha incursions for ISK and loyalty points, or team up against Sleeper ships in dangerous wormhole space, but most prefer the safe and steady income of mission-running. Missions are essentially repeatable quests that can be spawned on request, providing an endless stream of bad guys to blow up in the comfort of high-security space. Completing a mission will earn you some ISK and a few hundred or thousand loyalty points, but most of the ISK in mission-running comes from the bounties on the NPCs spawned in the mission sites. Similar deadspace sites with better loot are also distributed randomly throughout the galaxy and can be tracked down using scanner probes. But what would happen if the NPCs in these sites were a dangerous and unexpected interference that could get you killed, rather than space piñatas ready to explode in a shower of ISK? This is a question CCP plans to test with the Rubicon expansion's upcoming Ghost Sites feature, which promises to introduce a whole new form of high-risk, high-reward PvE. In this week's EVE Evolved, I look at EVE's upcoming ghost sites and explain why I think its goal-oriented approach to PvE should be adopted in other areas of the game.
EVE Evolved: Everything we know about Rubicon
Back in April, EVE Online Senior Producer Andie Nordgren delivered an incredible long-term vision for the game's future that included deep space colonisation, player-built stargates, and players controlling practically everything that's currently run by NPC empires. This vision sets the tone and direction for development over the next ten expansions, each of which will introduce a small component of the overall goal. In a live interview session earlier this week, CCP revealed the first steps it will take toward space colonisation in its upcoming winter expansion. Named Rubicon, the expansion will be in players' hands on November 19th and promises to give individuals and small groups unprecedented control over the sandbox. It will let players fight over planetary customs offices in high security space, significantly buff the ability of small ships to participate in hit-and-run style warfare, and even introduce a new set of personal deployable structures that can be hidden anywhere in space. All this comes alongside two new Sisters of EVE ships, twitch livestream integration, and significant balance changes to Marauders, Interceptors, Interdictors, and Electronic Attack Frigates. In this week's EVE Evolved, I run down all of the new features and changes announced so far for EVE Online's Rubicon expansion.
EVE Evolved: Four ways Guild Wars 2 is like EVE Online
With its single-shard server structure and sandbox ruleset, EVE Online seems to have little in common with a sharded fantasy themepark like Guild Wars 2. But dig a little deeper past GW2's fluffy exterior and you'll find it shares some core game mechanics and ideas with the world's biggest PvP sandbox. GW2's Trading Post bears a striking resemblance to EVE's Jita 4-4 market, and many of the same market tricks that work in New Eden have proven just as effective in the land of Tyria. EVE's PLEX system lets people buy game time for in-game ISK and undercuts illicit RMT by giving players a legitimate way to buy ISK, a system that's very closely mirrored in GW2's gem trade. GW2's Karma system resembles a heavily restricted version of EVE's loyalty point mechanic, and PvP in both games may be more similar than it appears. The same strategies that work for faction warfare fleets in the depths of space are currently helping guilds win World vs. World vs. World PvP. In this week's EVE Evolved, I look at four Guild Wars 2 game mechanics that are similar to those in EVE Online and how lessons from EVE can be applied to GW2.
EVE Evolved: Making your first billion ISK
A lot of the people I introduce to EVE Online ask about the possibility of playing for free by buying game time codes with in-game ISK. It's a legitimate way to turn EVE into a free-to-play game, but the rising price tag of a 30-day PLEX can make it seem as if only veteran players can afford to do it. New players typically scrape together just a few million ISK by the end of their free trial periods, making the 500 million per month required to pay via PLEX seem like a tall order. With the right guidance, a new player can actually pull in over a billion ISK in his first month or two of play and quickly become able to afford a PLEX each month. Farming missions requires a bit of time investment but can pull in 20-30 million ISK per hour once you're set up, and exploration and salvaging can lead to some unexpected big hauls. There are also plenty of newbie-friendly corps that run group activities, and those who aren't interested in grinding to their first billion ISK might try their hands at trading or turn to a life of crime. It's all possible in the sandbox. In this week's EVE Evolved, I give some practical tips on making your first billion ISK, from scraping together the seed capital to buy your first big ship to reliable farming methods and some more underhanded methods.
EVE Evolved: Risk vs. reward in lowsec
In EVE Online's early years, one of its core design philosophies was adherence to a strict risk vs. reward balance scheme. There were riches out there to be found, but to get them, you had to put yourself in the firing line. Police ships patrolled high-security space to keep players safe from piracy, but the only resources available there were low-bounty frigate NPCs and inexpensive ores like Veldspar, Scordite and Omber. In the lawless far-reaches of nullsec, huge NPC bounties and rare ores containing Megacyte and Zydrine tempted hundreds of pilots to head out and make their fortunes. Nullsec offered absolutely no protection against player attacks, and the only safety to be found was in sheer military force. The biggest and best corporations hoarded these gold mines for themselves, locking down the few entrances into the regions and patrolling the skies for unwanted visitors. Low-security space offered a middle-ground between these two extremes, a place where the everyday pilot could enjoy increased income and pirates were easier to spot. At some time in the past nine years, lowsec lost its place in the game and became simply not worth the effort. But how did that happen, and what can be done to fix it? In this week's EVE Evolved, I look at why lowsec systems are now ghost towns and suggest an alternative design philosophy that I think could revitalise these under-used areas.
EVE Evolved: The new player experience, part 2
Two weeks ago, I began an experiment to look into EVE Online's new player experience from the perspective of someone who has never played the game before. I convinced my friend Kajatta to try the game for the first time, with his only prior knowledge being the same stories, videos and screenshots that anyone will have seen before signing up to give the game a shot. In the first part of this investigation into the new player experience, Kajatta delivered a harsh first impression of the user interface and character creation. A common story I've heard when I'm talking to current EVE players is that many didn't really get into the game the first time they played. As happened to Kajatta, some found adapting to the UI and control scheme a jarring experience and were put off as a result. It was usually the second time they played EVE that seemed to make the game stick, whether that was restarting a new character immediately or giving the game a second try up to a year later. Could it be that EVE is most likely to appeal to new players the second time they play it? To put this theory to the test, this week Kajatta took a fresh second stab at EVE Online and played through all the career agent content. But has his first attempt provide the equipment necessary to scale EVE's famous learning cliff, or did the UI and control scheme prove as impenetrable a barrier as ever? In this week's EVE Evolved, Kajatta delivers his verdict on whether EVE is better the second time around and delves into the Cash Flow For Capsuleers combat missions.
EVE Evolved: A new nullsec for everyone
Several weeks ago, EVE Online developer CCP Greyscale published possibly the single most important devblog of the past two years. Titled Nullsec development: Design goals, the blog laid the ground rules for high-level discussion on EVE's upcoming nullsec revamp. For those who live in nullsec, territorial warfare and nullsec life represent the true endgame of EVE. It's in these massive lawless regions of space that players forge alliances, build their own empires, and lead massive fleets of ships into enemy territory to kick over some space sandcastles. Over the past two weeks, I've been delving into the discussion surrounding the upcoming nullsec revamp and speculating on what changes we might see. I started with a look back at the early days of nullsec industry and went on to give some ideas aimed at reclaiming those glory days. I followed that up with last week's summary of EVE Online's empire-building history, the problems faced by today's territorial warfare mechanics, and further speculation on how the system could be radically changed for the better. In this week's EVE Evolved, I conclude this series of articles on the upcoming nullsec revamp with an examination of the discussion surrounding PvE, the local channel, and the potentially revolutionary smallholding system that could give even casual and solo players a taste of nullsec.
EVE Evolved: The evolution of microtransactions
Two weeks ago, the escalating drama in EVE Online saw me drained of my normal enthusiasm as I contemplated the very real possibility that my time in the game I love was coming to an end. While the forums were filled with the most vocal and angry players, discussions with veteran players featured mainly disappointment and a distinct sadness. For those few days spent in limbo waiting for the results of the emergency CSM meeting, I and many of my in-game friends remained a hair's breadth from giving up on EVE entirely. It was a delicate situation based more on perception and poor communication than intent or fact, and I think CCP pulled things back well with formal statements from both itself and the CSM in addition to an in-depth follow-up press conference. One of the big points to come out of the press conference was that while CCP and the CSM are both confident that none of the future microtransaction plans are game-breaking, the company did not restrict itself to vanity goods such as Incarna clothing. While the CSM was convinced that CCP planned only to produce pure vanity goods, CCP Zulu was careful not to rule out gameplay-affecting microtransactions altogether. Both CCP and the CSM also talked about "game-breaking" sales rather than using a clearer term like "gameplay-affecting" or "non-vanity." It's reasonable then to assume that in the future we might eventually get non-vanity goods that do interact with gameplay but aren't game-breaking in terms of balance, mechanics or interaction with the in-game economy. In this week's EVE Evolved, I show exactly why options like selling ships would be game-breaking and then let my imagination run wild as I speculate on possible non-vanity microtransactions for the far future that shouldn't disrupt gameplay.
EVE Online's new agent finder detailed [Updated]
Hey capsuleers, did you take the day off work to sample the wonders of Incarna? We hope not, because CCP has extended the downtime for EVE Online's latest update. If you did take a day, or if you're simply in need of some juicy New Eden-related reading material, you'll want to have a look at the newest CCP dev blog. The entry examines the new agent finder functionality, and CCP Punkturis has some interesting tidbits to share along with a few interface screencaps. The goal, as outlined in an earlier agent-related dev blog, was to simplify the convoluted mission-running system and allow players to more easily find agents of an appropriate skill level, faction, and activity. The new finder filters agents by faction standing and also sorts them by distance (meaning you'll get info on the closest contacts first). Players may also filter various agent-related searches like mission types, and you can read all the details and leave feedback at the official EVE website. [Update]: CCP's dev blog gnomes are apparently working overtime today, as the company has just released an extensive look at the making of Incarna's turret system renovation.
EVE Evolved: Building a better UI
It's no secret that EVE Online has a poor user interface. With its drop-down menus for interacting with objects and text lists to show information like market orders and nearby objects in space, EVE has thoroughly earned the nickname "spreadsheets in space." The UI has changed drastically since I started playing in 2004, but in recent years, it's fallen behind the development curve. In a new devblog this week, CCP Snowlax suggested that the UI developers at CCP have lacked the framework necessary to do what they wanted with it. The existing framework had become bloated with eight years of development, and the underlying rendering engine wasn't even capable of using custom shaders. With Incursion 1.6, CCP pushed live a completely new UI framework that makes cool features like holographic UI elements possible. With the new Carbon UI framework in place, developers are taking another look at redesigning the EVE user interface. Screenshots of the new features being used in the upcoming Incarna expansion are impressive, but that's all taking place inside stations. I can't help but wonder how these new technologies could be applied to the space-faring portion of EVE and whether there are more fundamental challenges to overcome in UI design than adding flashy graphics. In this week's EVE Evolved, I give some thoughts on the development of EVE's UI, from the necessary evil of the overview to some things I'd like to see change.
EVE Evolved: Massively Mob Mission Mash
In last week's EVE Evolved, I released details of the brand-new Massively Mob corporation in EVE Online. Although the Massively Mob corp is a great place for readers to congregate, chat and play together, its primary purpose is to provide a financial safety net for new players. Anyone can join the corp and gain access to a stockpile of modules, skillbooks, implants and pre-insured ships that can be used to explore everything the game has to offer. The idea is to take the harsh fear of death and learning curve out of EVE for new players and so encourage them to try new things. To help with that, the Mob will be running regular themed event nights during which we explore different aspects of EVE's gameplay. Over the coming months, we plan to run events on mission-running, skirmish PvP, exploration and more. Once January hits and the Incursion expansion's final feature is released, we'll begin actively taking part in battling the Sansha menace. Each event will be geared toward showing newer players what they can expect from the game if they continue to play, and having a bit of a laugh while doing it. There will be prizes, medals and special mentions on Massively for older players who help organise these events or younger players who perform well in them. To take part, you don't even need to be a part of the Massively Mob corporation! With just over a hundred pilots signed up to the corp and more sure to come, there's no time like the present to kick off the first big event night. Skip past the cut to find out how you can get involved in the Massively Mission Mash, and leave us a comment if you have an idea for a future event.
EVE Evolved: Joining the Massively Mob
At the end of last week's article on preparing for EVE Online's Incursion expansion, I mentioned that part of our expansion preparation here at Massively would involve opening a Massively corporation in the game. This is something I've always wanted to do but haven't had the time to properly launch. I've been running the Pillowsoft corporation in EVE for the past six years or so, during which time the corp has been involved in almost every major game expansion. In two and a half years of the EVE Evolved column, I've had countless readers ask to join my corporation and have had to turn them all down. With Incursion rapidly approaching and Pillowsoft's latest wormhole expedition coming to an end, we now have the perfect opportunity to start a proper Massively corporation. In addition to providing financial help and some solid guidance to newer EVE players, the corp will be running frequent contests and event nights for any readers who want to participate. If you don't want to leave your current corporation but still want to hang out with other Massively readers and take part in our contests and events, don't worry. We also have an option just for you! In this week's EVE Evolved, I introduce the EVE Online Massively Mob and explain how you can get involved.
EVE Evolved: Preparing for Incursion
Several months ago, pirate faction Sansha's Nation began invading the populated systems of New Eden in force and abducting colonists from the defenseless planets. Using a frightening new technology, Sansha's forces have been able to open controlled wormholes directly in orbit of their target planets. CONCORD and the local faction navies have been unable to defend against the incursions, leaving the fate of EVE Online's planets solely in the hands of capsuleers. EVE players immediately began to organise intelligence networks and corporations dedicated to detecting and fighting the Sansha threat. In the upcoming Incursion expansion, Sansha's Nation will be stepping up its attacks to full-scale invasions of entire constellations. Having converted the millions of colonists they've abducted to mindless drones of the Nation and even having moved a conquered Jovian space station into their hidden wormhole home, Sansha's forces have never been stronger. When the Incursion expansion's main feature goes live in January of next year, players will find themselves on the front-lines of a war. We'll group up in fleets of 5-10, 10-20 or 20-40 players to tackle the various incursion sites and ultimately destroy each invasion wave's mothership. With the first Incursion release scheduled for this month and less than two months to go until the constellation-wide Sansha attacks begin, now is the perfect time to prepare for the expansion. In this week's EVE Evolved, I look at some of the ways you can benefit from the upcoming expansion and what players can do to prepare for the war against Sansha's Nation.
EVE Evolved: Group PvE in EVE Online
EVE Online is often thought of as a strongly PvP-based game, with player conflict and competition at the heart of practically every activity the game offers. Competition for resources, power, and notoriety routinely drive players to disintegrate each other's ships, but this effect isn't limited to just PvP. Miners compete with each other for ore on a daily basis, for example, and traders fight for market supremacy. EVE's competitive sandbox element is such a headline feature that PvE often takes a back seat in discussions about the game. EVE's combat-based PvE comes in the form of repeatable agent missions, hidden exploration sites, and deadly Sleeper encounters. While most of these can be completed solo by experienced pilots with a well-designed ship, they're often much faster and more fun when done in groups. The lack of a limit to how many pilots can be brought on PvE expeditions even makes it feasible to take newer players along to tough missions, something that doesn't happen in most MMOs. In this week's EVE Evolved, I look at why EVE's PvE is so inherently soloable, which types of PvE encounters are well suited to group play, and what the future holds for EVE's possibly neglected group PvE content.
EVE Evolved: The Industrial-Sized Knowledgebase
The EVE Evolved column has been home to dozens of in-depth guides on various aspects of EVE Online. Over the past two years, I've written multi-part guides to many industrial and PvP-oriented topics. On the topic of research and development, we've covered tech 1 research, invention, reverse engineering and five top tips for researchers. Perhaps more useful was the three part series on trading, which first covered the basics before delving into advanced trading strategies and a few useful tips. Other guides which have proven popular among newer players included our three-part guide to mission-running, and the recent three-page guide to exploration. Members of the EVE community regularly produce new guides and tools to help players make the most of their time in New Eden. This week, EVE player Laci surprised the EVE community with the release of an impressive new guide aimed at new players and industralists. The comprehensive 416-page Industrial-Sized Knowledgebase (or ISK for short) covers practically everything a new player could want to know about the game. Until now, the guide had been available only in Hungarian. After intensive translation and design work, the full guide has been released in English. In this week's EVE Evolved, I take a look at this impressive guide and ask its creator Laci a few questions about it.
Changes and improvements to Epic Mission Arcs in EVE Online
When EVE Online players think of what's changed in the game with the recent Dominion expansion release, the game's PvE content may not be the first thing that comes to mind. (Although Dominion introduced Epic Mission Arcs -- branching storylines -- for both the Guristas and Angel Cartel pirate factions.) The Atlanta-based content team at CCP Games has put a lot of work into Epic Mission Arcs for this expansion, though, which is the subject of the latest EVE dev blog. Developer CCP Big Dumb Object walks readers through the changes in game mechanics with the Epic Arcs and gives a breakdown of their adjusted rewards (plus the introduction of faction standings rewards), while paying homage to Led Zeppelin throughout the blog. New mission content is also beginning to reflect how player actions in factional warfare affect the game's setting, specifically the Caldari militia's overwhelming victory over the Gallente. CCP Big Dumb Object mentions two new Gallente storyline missions, adding that "each mission stems from the past year's Faction Warfare results, Heth's resultant sale of key Gallente systems to the Caldari megacorps, and the Federation's reaction."
CCP Games drops more details on EVE's new mission arcs for pirate factions
We recently wrote a bit about the new PvE content coming to EVE Online in the Dominion expansion -- Epic Mission Arcs for the Angel Cartel and Guristas pirate factions where your speed will help you survive. Now CCP Games has dropped more info on these branching pirate missions; the Guristas arc is called "Smash and Grab" while the Angel Cartel arc is "Angel Sound". A dev blog written by CCP Jasonitas walks readers through the standings requirements -- if your Angel Cartel standings are horrible but you have decent standings with either the Minmatar or Amarr, you can still run the Angel arc. Likewise with the Guristas, your Caldari or Gallente faction standings will let you embark on the Guristas pirate arc. In some respects, these arcs will open up pirate faction mission running for many players, given that completion of an arc will impart a 30% standings gain towards that faction. Players have long wanted a way to repair their negative standings towards New Eden's pirate factions and this seems to be the first step towards that. Still, that standings gain won't benefit players who are particularly loathed by a given pirate faction unless the arcs can be repeated some months down the line as with standard Epic Mission Arcs.
EVE Online Lead Content Creator explains epic mission arcs for pirate factions
One of the new content additions coming to EVE Online this December are Epic Mission Arcs for two of New Eden's pirate factions -- the Guristas and the Angel Cartel. Scott Holden (aka CCP Molock) is the Lead Content Creator at CCP Games who has overseen the inclusion of the new pirate missions into EVE. Holden recently discussed some of the specifics of pirate mission running with Mondes Persistants. The epic arcs for the Guristas and Angel Cartel will offer up roughly 10-12 branching missions, says Holden. The Guristas arc will largely be based in nullsec space in Venal, but players will be able to begin in Orvolle (high security) or low security starting points like Taisy. The Angel Cartel epic mission arcs will mostly be based in the Curse region, the stomping grounds of the Cartel. Would-be devotees to the Angel cause (of sabotage, extortion, and general mayhem) will be able to embark on the faction's mission arc from solar systems like Sendaya or Konora in low sec. Surprisingly, it seems that a player doesn't need high pirate faction standings to access either the Guristas or Angel Cartel epic mission arcs. Players with good standings with empire factions will be able to jump into the pirate mission arcs via mission agents found in low security space.
