That’s not what anyone looking at the facts has concluded:
I mean, I’ll agree with you that being a “douchebag” - being rude, insulting, and generally dickish to new players isn’t very nice nor a good way to get them to stick around. But that is not the same thing as shooting them or otherwise playing the game with them.
After all, that’s what Eve is all about. Better to play with them and help them learn how to play (exactly as this thread is trying to do) than to put them in a corner and ignore them because you think they are too fragile to play the game. They are new players, not children or people with special needs. You should treat them like gamers, not delicate flowers too fragile to play the game.
But as you said, anything goes, why just shoot them when you can grief, camp, harass and bump? No rules against it, and the 8 simple rules state it’s encouraged, but that runs counter to any claims of wishing the game or its player base or community to grow. Cheating someone and claiming it’s for their own good isn’t usually conducive to a genuine learning experience, wanting others to grow and learn so that the game can grow as a result isn’t asking anyone to be friends, it’s asking people to show self interest, because why wouldn’t you want a game you enjoy to grow?
There are rules against lots of this. You are not allowed to scam/explode new players when they are starting out or exploit their lack of knowledge of the game. You can’t grief or harass anybody, as per CCP’s definitions and guidelines, which don’t include shooting an imaginary spaceship or running a space scam, but do include unpleasant and persistent behaviour that designed to upset the person behind the keyboard.
And this is as it should be. New players need some time to learn the UI and basic game concepts, and no one should be subjected to harassment, vile insults or be prevented from playing the game. But the game is all about interacting competitively with other players, both economically and with space ship violence, so of course those activities are cool and are in fact why the game has grown so much over almost two decades.
Almost everyone who plays this game loves new players and wants them to stay. But this idea that more new players will stick around if you remove all the interesting bits of the game is silly. It’s a trap many Eve players fall into where they infantilize new players and try to bubble-wrap them from all the interesting things. New players really aren’t children - they are adults looking for an entertaining gaming experience. Sure, by all means teach them the rules and the mechanics and help them have fun and be successful, but most gamers can handle losing sometimes, especially when they are starting out and when what happened to them is explained to them so they can improve.
But to answer your implied question, no, I’d rather not that Eve grow at the cost of neutering all the dynamic parts of the game that make it the unique experience it is. Because what would be left would be some Eve Echoes-esque empty shell of a game that wouldn’t be worth playing. Good thing that isn’t the choice though, and CCP’s efforts to make Eve more challenging are being met with success and activity and player counts are on the upswing.
It’s not my/our task (we’re not CCP marketing), and even more important: Growth for growth’s sake is not good at all.
It’s much more healthy for the game if those who play know what they do and be told early what they have to cope with. That’s what we do, stick to the rules and show new players ways. We’re not here to discuss these rules; they are result of a 17 year evolution.
You can send your ideas to CCP (we are just players and have no influence at all).
That sad little bump blog is filled with evidence that runs counter to the claim that CODE / other salt farmers are just “playing the game” they’re openly and actively engaged in the harassment of other PLAYERS, not the characters they play in game, they go out of their way to attempt to engage people in an out of game context, this is childish and sad at best, sociopathic and dangerous at worst.
You don’t have to be a “carebear” to not want to be stalked and harassed.
You are allowed to shoot mining ships in this game. You are allowed to bump mining ships in this game. You are allowed to form a group of space terrorists/extortionists to sell “mining permits” to people mining in the space you claim as your own. You can even have a blog chronicling it all.
This freedom is what makes Eve such a great game. You’d think if this was all “harassment” and “sociopathic” CCP would do something and ban all these players. But of course, why would they? Criminals and crime are intended professions and activities in this game.
I’ll agree with that. There are plenty of examples of miners legitimately threatening, stalking and harassing CODE. agents on minerbumping.com for all to see. No one should have to put up with such bad behaviour.
But it feels to me you are still conflating these EULA-breaking behaviours with legit in-game activities like extortion, ship bumping or suicide ganking. I think I have made this point, so in order to not drag this thread off-topic anymore, I’ll stop now.
The randomized counter accusations sound just as confused, looks like a bunch of people let the game get out of hand, in reality it just seems like a bunch of people acted shitty towards each other in game and when they were unable to take out their frustrations in a satisfying way within the context of the game they resorted to shitty behavior outside the game. As long as people are encouraged to scam, they can do so at any time, and often preemptively scam to avoid a perceived future scam. I don’t see how a new player could read a thread like that, full of vitriol, awful behavior, and creepy elements of irl crossover / ban avoidance / possible fraud (involving a major player faction that specifically targets newer players), and not wonder why they should continue playing if they’re just going to end up getting scammed out of their accomplishments or worse?
It is a shame that this thread has devolved into internet lawyering and arguing over semantics/philosophy.
The “Golden Rules” are not supposed to be a “play this way or else” mantra. Nor are they a “green light” for truly abusive behavior.
The “rules” as they appear in the first post are merely guidelines… a “heads up”… that people can use to better prepare themselves in a game that was, and to a degree still is, designed to be a dystopian take on space. Nothing more or less.
Now… to address certain points:
For the CHALLENGE.
There are not that many games out there where a player is tossed into an environment that allows for players to be “predatory.”
Too many games out there are all about being the “hero” or simply building for the sake of building.
This game does allow one “be someone” as they wish to be within their narrative. People CAN build things.
But it also gives other players the mechanical freedom to run counter to any single player’s desires.
THAT is the challenge. THAT is what the game is about.
There is… a lot to unpack here.
To start: This isn’t a “good vs evil” game.
Everyone is a hero or a villain in someone else’s book. It is all subjective.
Examples:
I find a random player in my area that I don’t recognize. I shoot and destroy them. I am a “hero” in the eyes of my teammates because I have eliminated a potential threat (however small). I am a villain in the eyes of the player that was just blown up.
I suicide-gank some miners. I am the “hero” in the eyes of the miners/industrialists that supply me with ships and modules because I have scared away their competition. I am a villain in the eyes of all miners who are not my friends.
I am going to go on a limb and assume that you are thinking of the many, many threads out there where someone is complaining about an aspect of the game (or just something bad happening to them) and forum regulars jeering at them.
Don’t misunderstand this.
This isn’t people not wanting others to learn. It is merely an issue of attitude.
If someone comes to the forums asking how to improve or what something is… we as a community are MORE than willing to help… even if a little saltiness is thrown our way.
If someone comes to the forums complaining about how the game is going to die unless X mechanic is changed or how it doesn’t jive their their preconceived notions about how a space game should work… they are “fair game” in our book.
Put it this way:
It is like someone going into an old-school motorcycle club and complaining about all the “inconvenient” aspects of a motorcycle, riding one, and the people who ride one.
It’s basically a slap in the face to the people who like things for what they are and want others to join in for the same reason.
People can say what they will about CODE.
The one thing that no one can dispute is that they got the playerbase ENGAGED in some form or another.
Groups of players actually formed up against them!
Counter-tactics were devised where they didn’t exist beforehand.
The DEVs had to introduce some mechanical changes to the game specifically because of stuff they did!
They ARE the “villains” in many people’s books… and that is the entire point of their existence!
They wanted to play as a “cultish mafia!” And they succeeded!
As mentioned by others, there is a fairly clear sentiment on what the GMs consider “harassment” and malicious behavior.
This may not jive with what you consider to be harassment… but that is more of a personal issue than a true game issue.
As mentioned before… this is not a “black and white” game. Everything is a shade of grey.
Yes… no one wants to lose. That is why the game is FUN for some of us! The challenge of NOT losing.
If no one loses… what’s the point?
Things get pretty boring, pretty fast.
Sorry… but this sounds an awful lot like projecting.
This… is not how scamming work.
It actually requires a fair bit of time, effort, and finesse to pull off. And, in my experience, most people are too lazy.
And doing it to others does not mean it will not happen to oneself in the future.
Ironically… it was stories like this that brought me to this game.
I was so utterly bored by the predictability of other games and gave this one a try.
11 years, multiple rage-quits, and I still haven’t left.
I saw a gank kill on a 3-day old noob in an Ibis who was flying around starter space with 32.2B of starter packs and other things. I do not remember the killmail, but it was really depressing. This guy has been doing this for years. Maybe CCP can have an extremely-disparate-gank zKill watching bot for review. It was a Thrasher pilot. You can look through zKill if you want.
