A more bloodthirsty, fair, and much more fashionable New Eden - Drake Iddon for CSM19

Council Of Stellar Management CSM Campaigns
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Who am I and why should you care

A fair amount of people will already know who I am from in-game if they have ever interacted in Pochven, but to cut things short I have been a resident of Pochven since it’s inception, Initially starting out as a line member in one of the Triglavian aligned corps, then becoming part of elite (read: we were awful but the other people were worse) 4 man team of Castlekickers that brought seagulling into Pochven, bringing the “blue triangle” alliances of the area to their knees due to their absolute inability to be able to kill maledictions.

Nowadays I am known for essentially two things: Stewarding the Region, and one shotting people in my (increasingly stupidly fit) panther.

Pochven

For nearly three years I have continued to be the steward of the region, primarily focusing heavily on dealing with cheaters and RMTs that rear their ugly heads, but also spending a huge amount of time on continuing to run player round tables in order to improve and balance the region, along with, more recently, unfortunately having to engage in player safety when people cant play nice and the game spills out into real life.

The round tables I would say have been as successful as one could expect without having a CSM member that focused on the region, it has been responsible for a few things (from oldest to newest):

  • Reverting the “respawn bug fix” from December 2022, a timer that, when added, reduced the PvP activity by nearly 90%, PvP on Flashpoint grids by essentially 100%, but barely impacted the actual isk faucet of the region, making it even more unhealthy to the eve economy than it already was
  • Increasing the activation range of acceleration gates in the region, preventing single interdictor alts from perfectly protecting a site from would-be attackers. The result of this simply allowed for far less waterboarding in the region which resulted in way more actual fights happening. (This change alone is a large contributor behind Pochven being consistently the highest destruction region since its inclusion)
  • Very quickly alerting CCP to a new form of holding the sites hostage and making them unable to be ran without considerable time investment to reset the site, this one was particularly successful as the issue was declared part of the existing hostage exploit notification within days of it becoming a problem
  • The most recent one and one I have been pushing CCP to add for years, Mobile Observatories are now anchorable. While Mobile Observatories are far too ineffective to be a full solution to the CCTV networks that plague the region, this was a crucial step in at least having a potential way to counteract CCTV. Even now I consider it successful as multiple CCTV networks have moved from cloaks to ECCM ships and any botted networks are suddenly much easier to identify and ban

There is still far more that the region needs to be considered remotely healthy and feature complete, a few examples would be:

  • ~15% reduction in payouts for flashpoints, use some of this this ~3T windfall to actually give worthwhile completion rewards to other sites (wormholes, sleeper hives, watch posts, scout fleets, etc) which will in turn allow for smaller gangs to krab and to fight other gangs In the process
  • Turn some (or all) of the OBS payout value from direct isk injection into red loot that must be looted when the site is completed, this would actually add risk to chaining sites back-to-back, encourages PvP to steal the red loot from other fleets, allows for backstabbing, thefts, and should naturally decrease the inflationary impact that Pochven has on the wider eve economy
  • Addition of triglavian salvage to the LP store, the same way edencom has theirs in the DED LP store
  • Add cultural semiosis data and protective equipment patterns to drop tables of rats in the system so that all the LP store items are actually able to be redeemed (this does not need to be a high drop chance, it should be rare)
  • Filament rebalance, Pochven filaments are absurdly overpowered in their current form and massively detracts from potential content in k-space

Cheaters, Crime, and punishment

I do not think this is a surprising thing but I ■■■■■■■ hate cheaters, it decreases the quality of the game for everyone and everything it touches ultimately turns incredibly toxic

A very frank discussion needs to happen with CCP in order to hash out some more useful ways of reacting to and dealing with cheaters, most importantly in the way that the game now actively helps banned players get back on their feet instantly thanks to no limitation on skill injectors and the inclusion of the games most powerful drug being completely free for newly span up accounts.

There also needs to be some form of discussion and development of what CCP’s resources are for player safety and how it is used, there have been multiple player safety issues in Pochven alone this past year which have not been fun to deal with at all, this will also become an even larger issue if/when CCP goes to full release with Eve Frontier, so its incredibly important that this gets hashed out sooner rather than later.

K-space and Customisation

Pochven and naughty bois are not the only things I have my eyes on, there are a lot of lessons learned inside Pochven that can be put to use in K-space to create more dynamic, more dangerous, and more importantly far more lucrative sites and events which could naturally draw new players from all over the map to clap, get clapped, and get rich.

Customisation is also (FINALLY) partially implemented into the game, it had an extremely shaky start and still needs tonnes of work, Last year I said that CCP is missing out on amazing monetisation options that the players wont actively detest (if they get it right and don’t take the piss, like they did with the initial ship skinr system patch). I still am baffled why they do not invest far more into this and would love to work with CCP on bringing player identity options fully into the light

I am open to any questions and can be reached either by eve mailing me in game, or throwing me a DM to drakeiddonmob in discord

I hope you vote for me and if you aren’t too sure; you dont need to take my word for it, see other recommendations of why you should vote for me from last year (Including from the now FABULOUS CCP Jotunn (he was always fabulous, but now he’s also CCP))

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I would vote for Drake, he is good people.

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What are your thoughts on the Player Security Status system?

It’s obviously supposed to be a deterrent/punishment for people who engage in illegal PvP to an excessive degree, but the sysytem is a paper tiger in its current form. Issues include:

  1. Being easy/cheap to reset, especially if you only go from -10 to -5. (Roughly 58m according to Fuzzworks). Going from -5 to 0 is more expensive (Roughly 355m), but still isn’t that large an amount. Especially if you’re popping haulers full of valuable cargo.

  2. Slow to change. So long as you resist the urge to pod people, it takes a fair bit of effort to actually tank you sec status in the first place.

  3. Easy to bypass. You can still dock up in a pod, so all you need to do is have a backlog of cheap ships to undock and warp to a tackling ally with. The need to undock does slow the gank down, but it’s still a potential issue. Especially if you have a “clean” alt/Corp mate to ferry cheap destroyers around for you to various stations. (Ex. Clean alt buying ships in Jita, and hauling them to Uedama/Ahbazon to fuel the gank squads.)

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my vote for Sneed Sneeddon!

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Drake has consistently shown that he can mediate between groups with vastly different interests and goals in the subspace of Pochven. He has compiled and presented results of a Pochven Roundtable between a variety of groups on multiple occasions, all of which have resulted in important, core changes and fixes to the region.

The space needs some massive changes which are not just important to it’s own ecosystem, but critical so Pochven does not further negatively contribute to the overall ingame economy.

While normally one would be forgiven to think that a CSM elected as representation of a certain space would favour its inhabitants versus the rest of New Eden, I can confidently say that I trust Drake to make changes that are positive for the whole of the game, not just current Pochven residents. Contrary to expectation, change would most likely reduce total payout for the participants already presently there while spreading and distributing it to more participants and opening it back up.

I personally think many of the changes he proposed in this article (payout as loot instead of liquid, distribution, etc) would make my own life in the game harder - nevertheless I realize these would be measures to relieve some of the current problems. As such, I’ll gladly vote for someone that while making things more difficult to myself as a resident, will hopefully revitalize the space and ‘fix’ it’s current problematic state in the current meta where participation is mostly reserved for select few multiboxing entities.

Best of luck on getting elected!

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someone solely focused on the pochven minigame hasn’t realized you aren’t a dev and you typed your wishlist for nothing

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I think the entire system is worthless honestly and no matter what you do to change it, you can very easily spin up new characters to get around it

it does kill pirates every so often, i have seen more than a fair share of dead blingy frigs because people forgot about police

It does have one good incidental feature, its very easy to set up your overview settings so low sec status people flash in local, a pretty obvious and easy counter to gankers that new players should be taught at some point

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I’m fully aware my wishlist is just that, a wishlist

however that wishlist has, over the years, slowly gotten smaller and smaller as we get things ticked off the list, the question is how much faster can that be done with more direct access to CCP

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Do you think removing the easy “one click” status restoration would make it more of a hobble to people who spam ganks? (Be it in high sec OR low.)

Make it so that people either learn to behave, to a manageable degree, or they learn to live in low sec with the rest of the “bad actors”?

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i’m not massively against making it more of a pain in the ass for gankers IF ganking becomes a serious problem, its not like they are stupid, they will very easily be able to cope with the increased cost

that being said i don’t exactly consider ganking right now as a problem, its annoying to some but it is an absolutely vital part of the eve economy. Having a perfectly safe area of space which allows for income and asset accumulation inevitably turns into a botting paradise that leads to rampant inflation, while at the same time suppressing normal supply and demand for ships and equipment

Eve echoes removed PVP from Hisec and the consequence was that the economy is completely ruined almost overnight, with 99% of the population living in hisec, most of which are just botting 24/7

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The way I see it there are two options.

Suggestion 1: Increase the reset cost by a significant degree. People are still allowed to gank, but spamming ganks on low reward targets will end up draining your assets over time.

Pro: Leaves it as an “emergency option” for people who want to clean up their act.

Con: This won’t deter people who are super ultra space rich, or who are willing to bleed money if it means they can drop 50 Catalysts on Marauders and Freighters all day long without penalty.

Suggestion 2: Straight up remove the option entirely.

Pro: Removes the ability to just slap CONCORD in the face with your wallet.

Con: Gankers will scream bloody murder.

Just curious as to what your thoughts are.

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simply having an increasing reset cost each time you do it would be a decent enough change, tbh the best of both worlds

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Drake is a solid dude. His most admiral quality, I think, is his ability to get along with everyone, a quality I lack. He is mild mannered and passionate about the game and his intentions for the region are pure.

As a CSM, I feel confident that he’d do his best to do what he thinks is in the best interest of the player base. His knowledge of ship mechanics is solid, and he is aware of balance issues in more regions then just Pochven.

Having been on the round tables mentioned in the post since pochvens inception aswel, I do miss some nuance when it comes to whats been achieved by them and to which extent they can be attributed to just Drake, but he is most certainly the driving force that organizes them, and without him I doubt us content creators in the region would get the chance to discuss the region with CCP employees. There certainly are other names you could consider for Pochven CSMs, but Drake probably has the best reputation with all interested parties in the region. This makes him ideally placed to represent most people.

Your list of proposed changes to the region I can fully support. Pochven desperately needs something that can be done in ■■■■ thats not a crab fleet. Your proposed changed are the same as the ones I’ve voiced in the round table for the last 2 years.

Having said all that, I do have some reservations. With the exception of my CSM attempt last year, we have already put our faith in Drake a couple of times, and most of my members and players in my eve circles have been waiting for significant changes to the region that dont cater to the observatory flashpoint crowd for a while now. Most don’t feel confident you would get anything done that will support content that is currently barely being used. We’ve been promised things before. As a result I expect youll have them to convince.

For my part, I’d by happy to support you for Pochven candidate and I wish you the best of luck. I’ll be eagerly awaiting my triglavian t3c bpcs.

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I had pondered on that, and it fits in the mindset of option 1. I suppose it depends on the rate it increases, as well as what it caps out at. I feel certain people could brush it off even at 1b per “stage” of clone tag.

Either way, I feel something needs to be done about gankers getting to eat their cake and have it too. Namely treating High Sec as a one sided Low Sec playground to their advantage with no real penalty. (Which is why Safety. is able to operate as they currently do.)

Keep all this in at least some small part of the back of your mind, and you have my vote.

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Which nerfs do you think should be applied to your own playstyle? What kind of increased costs are you promoting for yourself?

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How would you level this with lowsec activity, like piracy or insurgencies then? It’s already expensive as all hell. Lowsec gass is worth zip now, mining is a higher risk there than mining in highsec or null and ratting in your insurgency area lowers your faction standing.

Sure you’d hit gankers, but highsec is already safe to the point of it hardly being worth pvp’ ing without a wardec. Ganking being pushed back as much as it is already. How much would you be willing to penalize general PVP, a core part of the game, in this regard?

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I have already done so, the mobile obs change in pochven that i have campaigned for is a direct nerf to my playstyle that generally involves sitting around cloaked for long periods of time

I have also previously made it known that black ops ships (and marauders) did not need the role bonues for battleships

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I’m not willing to penalize general pvp at all, the cost is currently miniscule and, as far as lowsec goes, you could have some FW/pirate FW method of bribing police to get your sec status up which doesnt scale each time you use it

also to be clear this was a hypothetical question, it is not something that i personally would be pushing for

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The Pochven spokesperson that the region already has and needs more than ever, all others need not apply

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War decs are how you (legally) PvP in high sec. That’s literally their point, and they’re super cheap too.

If you want non-stop PvP action you’re free to do:

  1. Faction Warfare
  2. Null/J-space
  3. Wardec spam
  4. Low Sec ganking if you already have a “clean” Jita hauling alt anyways.

The very first thing said to a new person shouldn’t be “Go to Null. It’s safer than High Sec.”.

Also, you complain about how high risk mining is in Low Sec, yet at the same time you push for PvP to be completely consequence free for the attacker.

If Sec Status wasn’t super cheap to reset, you could pre-emptively attack “bad actors” without losing security status of your own thanks to them being perma-flashy.