Keynote

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sOGnPAbHKDk

I watched the Fanfest 2015 Keynote on the weekend. It was run by EVE Executive Producer CCP Seagull (Andie Nordgren). She received a great reception at the start – a sign of how many fans she has within the player group.

In the past CCP Seagull has had an endearing lack of polish to her presentations, but she spoke with far more confidence here. Her enthusiasm and passion however were as clear to see as they have always been.

I am not going to go over everything in detail – it is old news and has already been covered by others. I am just musing over what I found interesting from my perspective as a solo / long term player.

The speakers and the transition between them were all fine, but for much of the presentation I felt it lacked a real Keynote vibe. It wasn’t until towards the end – with the discussions about structures that I felt it had been worth my while to watch instead of just sticking with the blog summaries others had already posted.

The keynote started with a short outline on how much CCP had accomplished over the last year within the game, and it was frankly impressive. I’d simply forgotten the half of it.

The next bit that I noted was a well presented section of Statistic Porn. While it covered the types of damage being done within the game and highlighted anomalies such as the battle in B-R5RB or the move to player owned POCO in High-sec, it was their graphical depiction of how they classify their players which I found most interesting:

Less than 10% of players are considered to be the archetype of Aggressors. They are well outnumbered by Social players (who don’t undock much), Traditional MMO players (who tend to play solo or in small groups and interact more with the environment), and the Entrepreneurs (whose statistics fall more into the industry type tasks). I could almost crow that the people who yell the loudest in EVE are clearly in the absolute minority.

I would be wrong however. The largest group of players in EVE are the Professionals. These players basically do a bit of everything, including combat. If you consider a proportion of the Aggressors would have ISK generating Alts in the other classes, it would seem that around half the player base are the type who would occasionally check their killboard statistics. More than what I would have thought to be honest.

Not sure where I lie – my statistics might say Traditional. I don’t however ignore other players, I make a pointed effort to avoid being on their killboards. Maybe I am in the Entrepreneur bracket.

The next item I noted was reference to a new EVE site, where they will highlight up and coming changes, and keep an archive of past changes to the game. You can view it here. Worth bookmarking.

http://updates.eveonline.com/

We should see functionality this year called Ghost fitting – basically an EFT type clone in the client. From the example shown it won’t be as detailed as EFT, but it is functionality that EVE should have had years ago.

There was a longish section on new physical products, including the latest EVE related book “The Art of New Eden”. I haven’t mentioned it here, but I have already ordered the Limited Edition. I got a tracking email this morning suggesting it will be delivered today.

I have the EVE Collector’s Edition and the EVE Source Limited Edition books – but frankly I have to admit I have barely looked at them. I questioned myself on why I was considered ordering the Art book, and came to a somewhat surprising realisation. I have been playing EVE for more than 8 years now, and frankly there is nothing concrete to show for it. The books give me something physical to show my future self or others which give an indication of what I have been a part of.

CCP reiterated that they would be looking at the roles of Capital Ships – and I get the impression it could be a substantial change. However they said they would be aiming to make it worthwhile and aspirational to own them. I hope I am given reason and opportunity to undock my own capitals more often.

The section I found most interesting was about where In-Space-Structures should be heading. There is a blog covering the basics here:

http://community.eveonline.com/news/dev-blogs/back-into-the-structure/

I think it pays to listen to the presentation to pick up some of the nuance behind the explanations and ideas.

I have an active POS and a number of POCO. I have always found it aspirational – like owning Capitals – to have my own space homes. I would very much like more access to this sort of thing moving forward.

There are apparently 62,000 active POS in game, and 1,100 Player Build Stations.

While we should start seeing some of these new structures this year, it will be a long term process to introduce all of them. They will run the old and new structures in parallel to allow a transition. There will be a lot less restrictions on where you can place them (no longer just on moons for POS for example). They are looking at different sizes and personal, corporation and public use. The structures will be role based – Assembly Arrays, Research Laboratories, Market and Office Hubs, Drilling Platforms, Observatory Arrays, Gates, Administration Hubs and Advertisement Centers. They will have a fitting window like ships do with High, Mid and Low slots. You will be able to customise them further with Rig and Service slots.

They mentioned possible new game features such as Datacore farming on Research Labs, Belt mining with Drilling Platforms, Clone and Market services in the Office Hub and Player Locator agents in Observatory Arrays. Basically players should be able to replicate almost everything the NPC’s are doing. They will also be introducing the concept of docking in these structures – or mooring if your ship is too big.

It seems the larger structures will use a subset of the upcoming Sov Mechanics – specifically the Entosis link, as part of the process to take them over. If a structure is destroyed they will have a wreck mechanic to allow people to extract their assets which are stored in them. This is really a requirement to encourage people to accept using them.

I am going to be very interested to see how these changes are done, what impact they will have on Hi-Sec, and what parts I can be involved in from a solo point of view.

All told the Keynote speech left me with lots to think about.