I've been getting a fair few mails and skype messages from players and a fair few from people in lower class wormholes saying they are having similar issues to my alt corp in the C4.
One of the issues with wormholes is if you have had enough and want to leave. Its a fair bit of work you need to do, unless you just want to lose everything in your wormhole. You have a crap load to pack up, ships to move out, spare ammo, mods, any sleeper loot you have. Then your pos and the pos modules.
When Aharm moved out of Nova they had 120 million m3 of stuff to move out over 3000 ships a 100 capitals and over 50 pos's. They expected it to take 2 months but managed to get it done in 3 weeks.
Small groups won't have anywhere near that amount of stuff, But then they won't also have the manpower to help either. Either way it will probably take a while to move out. What this means is that some stats just won't show up for a while.
Anyway on to the prediction.
In the next 2 to 3 weeks alot of smaller groups in C1 to C4 will find that with the new frig wormholes and the fact that closing statics is alot harder they won't be able to farm anywhere near enough to cover loses they have due to losing stuff rolling or running sites. They'll move out stubborn ones will stay. While others go to hisec to farm incursions. (its worth noting low class income is pretty terrible anyway and what with the new risks will make it even worse)
The next month will see the bigger groups start to maybe not feel any isk pressure. But they will notice alot less people in W-space. In NoHo we have HUGE chains due to the frig wormholes, there all well and good but if all the wormholes are empty, whats the point?
Some of them might run in to issues when connected to bigger groups they cant fight. I can see some corps/alliances merging.
Some due to lack of content and stuff to fight will leave and join null or lowsec groups.
At the 3 month point I see things settling down people who haven't left at this point won't, you'll have the die hard of wormhole space left, that's it. Lower class wormholes will be a barren waste land due to the fact its just not worth the risk to live in, combined with there being much better income else where like highsec incursions. The larger groups that are left will probably spend most of there time doing nullsec roams for pvp.
By this point I can see anywhere from 20% to 40% of the wormhole population gone. Which is dire. I really hope it doesn't get that bad, and that CCP make some changes. The issue is changes might already be to late. People are leaving and once they have left the chance of them coming back isn't great.
For all the people who have sent me mails/skype messages of support and thanks, its really appreciated.
One thing that many many people haven't addressed (and CCP seems to have deleted out of the spawn-distance threadnaught) is the motivations CCP has for making these changes. The way I see it, it comes down to one singluar motivation: Money.
ReplyDeleteLooking at the changes in the game over the last year or so, it appears to me that they've been pushing towards a more combative EVE- more combat, more ships lost- and more people spending isk (and consequently buying PLEX) to replace their losses. I know I have done it in the past, and I know friends that have as well. It's a great income mechanic for CCP and it helps keep their coffers full, but I think that they're attacking the income problem from the wrong end.
Right now, we're seeing a shrinking pool of players who are playing and paying for more accounts. This is in part why (I think) PLEX prices have risen so dramatically in the last 12-18 months. Right now, they're nearly 2x what they were a year or so ago. Economics tells us that this is due to a higher demand and I think it's because more and more people are plexing their accounts.
CCP is also probably seeing a reduction in revenue as people are dropping subscriptions to PLEXed accounts as more and more players are unable to afford to pay isk for PLEX and are likely unwilling or unable to pay for a monthly subscriptions. (This is purely conjecture, but I think it holds some water based on observational evidence and market prices.)
Their short term answer: make things harder for players. Make it more likely that you'll lose ships and more difficult to earn isk. Right now, they're trying it in a micro-scale (compared to Null) to see what the reaction of the player base is, the consequences to their overall game, and get a litmus test to see what will happen if they begin making similar changes to Null Sec, High Sec incursions, and the like. I expect we'll see more balancing over the next while to impact those sections of the game.
I think this is exceptionally short sighted on CCP's part as instead of making the game more difficult risk vs. reward, they should be lessening the difficulty and making the game more approachable. One of the amazing things about EVE is the complexity, but the learning curve is amazingly steep and the social aspects of the game need more attention. People play MMOs in part for the social aspect and EVE's initial social aspect is sadly missing.
Unfortunately, I think their approach is going to be a long term losing strategy (even if it earns them short term rewards) and could signal the beginning of the end. Rather than actual investment in the game (with new content, revamping of broken or substandard game mechanics, etc) we're seeing patchwork "fixes" that I can only guess as intending to cause more facile and deeper isk sinks and that require little or no work on CCP's part to implement.. (If I'd gotten a well reasoned "this is why we're doing this" from CCP that argued something else, I might not hold this particular point of view.)
In any case, what will be will be, but I don't see any clearer motiviations for these changes than what I'm laying out above.
Fionna Da'gere
Patriot Security Services
Whether subscription or PLEX, CCP gets the same income from both accounts. PLEXs are only created with real money given to CCP so it matters not to them whether you subscribe yourself or use PLEX. They already have their money. It seems to be a common misconception that PLEX'ed accounts are somehow reducing CCPs income when it is certainly not the case. Whether or not income is dropping is entirely based on the total subscription + PLEX bought equation, not whether account A is subscribing or PLEXing.
DeleteThat's not what he said at all......he said people plexing their accounts would stop and then implied that those ppl plexing accounts can't afford a sub.
DeleteI am one of those very people. The grind for Plex turned the game into a job and a stressor and with the outlandish prices of Plex, I let my accounts lapse almost a month ago, bringing an end to my 3 years in game.
DeleteGood analysis, maybe a little too black and white. The situation in e.g. c4 isn't all that different today than it has been in C2 for a long time. Earning potential is pitiful and with 2 statics we frequently have 4 or more holes. The "lower" end holes are for PvP (except C1, they are for PI). I would hope that the lager pvp corporations spread out into C4, maybe not have 100 pilots / hole but 3 holes with 30. Yes, yes, it will make blobbing harder but it will ensure that ISK / pilot is reasonable and pewpew stays frequent.
ReplyDeleteThe difference is the c2 dont make 300mil/hr when u farm it
DeleteCorbexx I love and respect you as a player. The work you put in the CSM makes prior wormhole CSM look like chumps.
ReplyDeleteI want to put this as quickly and delicately as I can, with as much respect as possible for you.
Please remove your head from your ass and get the fuck over it.
haha we can discuss it on saturday as i'll be on your podcast. as for removing my head from my arse not sure what thats about.
Deleteall.of null sec thinks the WH changes are great and we need to stop crying and let ccp get on to giving them station compression so they can exploit the miners they have been ganking for years. Gotta be honest Indy shit then this game is going to shit a lil more every 6 weeks. I guess we got spoiled by the game actually getting better over time now with the new dev team ccp is making noob mistakes in sandbox design on major feature overhauls. I love seagulls vision but it seems it is old school ccp promise then fail to deliver. If they fuck up doc as bad as they have wh space its over......i guess goons can just move to wh space now if they want tho
DeleteLol incursions, I could have moved my corp (alts and one other person) to a c5 with a c3 static and kept on doing what I was doing in my c4 and had bonus cap escalations. Instead I unsubbed my 5 wh alts and left my pirate with a ton of isk. If ccp dont show small groups some love soon I wont bother resubbing the pirate tbh darkfall 2 is finally getting a new inventory system I think ill grind out gametime there instead of eve. My partner in wh also unsubbed a few alts cuz she dont need them for high sec. Between this and the Indy unsubs maybe we lose 5k more in pcu. Eve will keep going but ccp is running out of places to fuck up. Any slip ups in sov or pos revamp could end up being fatal.......or as mynnna said "fuck um, they wont be missed."
ReplyDeleteSolo play is not small group. Groups involve other players (yes that is the plural version of the word) beside yourself. So I call that working as intended.
DeleteFor me and my group Hyperion has been nothing but a resounding success in every way