Show me a situation where I have referred to the data and not provided it in the past?
Of course, if you want to ignore the sum of all the information CCP have provided and only focus on one of those things.
I know it’s far easier to stick your head in the sand and find anyway to justify why you are actually right and evidence to the contrary is wrong, but that comes back to what I wrote earlier, that the argument is full of bias (on both sides).
I don’t need to tell you that you are ignorant. Here I can show you from my killboard where my kills are:
This is why the counter point is just as valid. Lazy posters like yourself feel so entitled that you can’t even spend 30 seconds validating whether your view is correct or not, before lecturing to others, all while also never backing up a thing you say.
Are you talking about the claim that new players who get killed in PvP combat are more likely to stay, and hence being killed contributes to players staying?
Any data will obviously be severely skewed by “self-selection bias”, since the odds of an active player engaging in PvP increase fast with time played, and the kinds of in-game activities player engages in.
That makes is very difficult to prove (i.e. establish causation) without the kind of data that has definitely (100%) not been presented (directly or via links) in this forum in the last 2 months.
Which means this applies:
Even for CCP data collection to establish causation regarding new-player retention would be difficult.
According to them, a relatively small proportion of players stay - and they would require good data on themas well as on the ones that stay to establish causation
Data on why people stop playing would require either “exit interviews” with a statistically meaningful proportion of such players, or very detailed data on their activities
CCP have shown no signs of having the kind of data they’d need to analyze the activities of players who leave within a month or two - which suggests they’re not collecting it
In such cases, it’s up to the party making the shaky claim to provide the evidence of causation.
Funny how a “PvP wannabe” has bigger balls than most people who call themselves “PvPer” and had more influence on this game than the other 99.99%. Especially the newer generations of players are nothing but willing ants and consumers.
She’s nothing but a wannabe intellectual with nothing to back her up.
I’ve never made that claim, no; and neither is that the only data CCP have presented that creates a consistent picture.
That’s not what CCP ever directly said either, only that there is a correlation between players that die and the rate at which they subscribe, from being new players.
CCP have also preseented analysis that shows that the #1 factor determining if a player is playing in month 4 (after what CCP call the onboarding period odf 3 months) is whether they have died. Those that have died have the highest rate of staying with the game.
However, there may be a number of reasons for that, that together represent a range of causes, not just that they die. For example, they may have been players that joined the game because of it’s PVP reputation and so go looking for it, more than players that insulate themselves away.
Either way, CCP’s analysis still provides them with actionable information from the game design and business perspective, as exposing players to pvp in their first 3 months does lead to greater retention. That’s better than not exposing them to pvp and they leave anyway, even if they would have stayed.
On your link for correlation v causation, congrats, you won the internet I guess. You can forget about any deeper thought beyond that (for example the other just as famous statement - there is no causation without correlation) and there is a whole lot of thought that can go into what correlation and causation means. There’s been whole careers that have focused on that. But, much easier to not even think about it at all and just dismiss anything you don’t like.
My post was related to that “month 4, player has died => player more likely to stay” claim.
That data is useless for establishing causation. IIRC the wikipedia article explains it well, with some good examples.
IIRC I’ve seen several posts in this forum explain that CCP said either hat they were wrong, or that it actually came from a innumerate journalist and they’d never made it themselves.
(BTW I’m not going to look for thoise postscheck it, because no part of my previous email was a guess: this version “At month 4, player has died at least once → more likely to stay” is completely meaningless.
For what it’s worth, I agree with part of this:
There’s no sign that they have actionable information.
The second sentence is almost meaningless (3 months without any PvP would be interesting, the reverse not so much)
This bit though:
I absolutely agree with. I think it’s insane that CCP don’t provide an interesting, instructive, and enjoyable PvP experience as part of the NPE. That doesn’t include lining them up to be ganked though: for most new players being ganked is boring, teaches only to avoid other players, and no fun at all.
And they don’t meet “gankers with a heart of gold” anything like as often as posters in this forum like to claim.
BTW:
“Correlation is not Causation” is a very common logical fallacy. People who can think straight don’t make it, or reconsider their position when it’s pointed out.
Sure. Knock yourself out with your view on that (that may seem a bad statement, it’s just as Australian slang term - you do you is a kind of equivalent).
Meanwhile, business globally, including CCP (at least until 3-4 years ago anyway), will continue to make business decisions on the basis of correlations, even where the causes cannot be determined. It happens all the time.
CCP have analysed their data and come to their conclusions. Anything beyond that, that we hurf-blurf about in the forum is even more irrelevant than having a detailed list of causes (that would be ideal, but in a lot of situations, just not possible, yet decisions have to be made regardless). Businsesses try to make good decisions in the absence of perfect information all the time.
You’re so fixated on causation as the only thing that matters. It isn’t and I have never focused on it, because in the data doesn’t identify the causes, only the outcomes.
Smart people use correlations as indicators to create hypotheses and test them to see if there is a cause and effect relationship. Mistakes can still happen, but many will be avoided.
People or organizations who jump to conclusions make a lot of mistakes.
With all the data and comments they’ve made, it’s fair in my view, to say CCP haven’t jumped to conclusions.
They’ve made a lot of bad decisions though.
Yes, if you have an observation (eg. from the data CCP have presented) and then make a change to the game, the outcome of that change would feed back into future decisions.
That’s not what part of the community want though. They see data they don’t like, so dismiss it as useless, because changes that might be made on the basis of those observations, won’t make the game safer. That’s ok, CCP will do what they do (and in the process are making the game safer anyway).
Just to get back towards some sort of interesting discussion (I won’t say ‘the point’, since the OP was intentionally - and cleverly, I think - left blank):
It would be better and more productive in these endless backbiting debates we have, to start saying “This is the goal I want to see reached. This is the game I am pushing for. This is what we need more of, this is what we need less of.”
For instance, I generally will post a reply to things that say “Safe high sec PvP is the devil, more high sec PvP will fix EVE”. Because this is a shallow, 1-dimensional view of the problems with EVE. But since I say that, all the PvP wannabe trolls jump on and say “You just want safer high sec, you carebear!”.
This is a ‘does not follow’ type fallacy… they make an assumption of my position (they even say “the changes you suggest will kill the game” type things… when I have suggested no changes other than to look beyond high sec).
So here, for the record, is my position:
First and foremost, more players, more active players, less bots and farmers.
Gameplay and mechanics that require more active participation, and less endless, bottable, farmable, repetitive grind.
More engaging combat mechanics, both PvE and PvP.
More PvP in every sector type. High, Low, and Null. Atm WH space is probably closest to being in a good place, the other three are seriously broken. FW badly broken as well.
An NPE that doesn’t lose over 50% of players right off the bat.
An NPE that steers new players towards PvP.
Game mechanics that provide a development path for players to start working together, fleeting up, and tackling progressively tougher and more risky content. Because regardless of the validity of ‘getting killed makes people stay longer’, pretty much every MMO ever has shown that ‘finding a decent group to play with makes you stay longer and pay more’.
Game mechanics in every region that promote risk-taking, conflict, and emergent behaviour.
The problem of course is that all this has to be accomplished with a team that has major difficulty making any programming changes, with massive established interests (nullsec alliances) that will exploit to the max any vulnerability introduced, and a design/management team that seems immune to new ideas because, despite all evidence to the contrary over the past dozen years, they think the way they’ve been doing things so far is a good plan.
It can be done, but it won’t be easy, comfortable or popular.
What difficulty in programming do the developers have? I’m curious to learn because I don’t know, but it seems like you have some reliable information to show.
I’m not sure what you’re trying to say here. Are you suggesting that Nullsec alliances have the ability to control what the developers do?
I mean, they literally just updated the Agency and introduced a brand new Invasion event. So I’m not sure where you’re getting the idea that they are “immune to new ideas.”
Scoots, sadly, your history of posting over the past few weeks shows that you pretty much ignore everything useful in a person’s post, in order to pick out a point or three that you can argue/troll over.
I don’t feed trolls.
If you make a valid point, like the “Is this type of behaviour wrong?” post, I will respond. If you are completely ignorant (like the “undocking is a reason to engage in risky behaviour” post) I will ignore it.
If you are simply trolling/arguing for no purpose, and/or ignorant of CCP history like the many, many programming problems they have encountered, then you might get ignored, or you might get a short post like this one.
I’m guessing the questions I posed to you were too challenging to answer right now so you’re just going to brush aside everything and attack me personally. That’s good to know. Thanks for being willing to get back on the ‘discussion’.
You merely say this because it fits your narrative, but there has never been anything approaching an actual study released by anyone that remotely says:
‘most new players that are ganked found it boring’.
Or if there has, where is it?
I know you believe what you say, but you don’t understand that what you say has zero basis in fact.
Did we say that?
Or did we say something a long the lines of: all data points to a safe hi-sec making the game boring, breaking the market and fundamentally changing eve’s core concepts.
Yes.
They CSM are a medium through which ccp get an idea of what players want with the benefit of being above average in capabilities and understanding the game. They are also pre-filtering out the ■■■■ that players ask for before taking it to CCP. CSM have influenced ccp’s decisions in the pastz that’s without doubt.
The risk however is bias. The CSM is made almost entirely of null lobbyists. And has been for as long as can remember.
Player issues regarding null tend to get fixed sooner than issues regarding other areas of space. Ship balances affecting null fleet meta are quicker than those affecting small gang. Interceptors with null interdiction. Even wardecs back in 2012 were reiterated upon pretty quick because null blocks didn’t like something to do with the ally mechanic. The watch list was taken out despite small gang hunting’s reliance on it because titan pilots didn’t like when people saw them log in.
I don’t really see where the bias is though. You yourself even say:
I would much rather put my trust in the hands of players who are “above average in capabilities and understanding” than say, a couple of highsec carebears who are too afraid to leave high sec because the number on the top left of their screen is orange or red.
Sure, there are a lot of nullsec candidates, but most of them understand EVE Online a higher perspective. They’re not worried about one or two freighters getting bumped, or some afk miner getting ganked by Code. They’re thinking about ways to keep their thousand+ members entertained by giving them content.
I would much rather see CSM be comprised mostly of people who, for lack of a better term, matter. A couple of whiny highsec carebears? They don’t matter. Alliances of hundreds of players and hundreds more alts? Those definitely matter.
Right. But what they know is null-sec and more null-sec. The Mittani himself said that those that argue for changes in areas they aren’t familiar with don’t deserve to just be ignored, they deserve contempt! (a few weeks before suggesting changes to hi-sec )
Most CSM members have little to zero knowledge of the hi-sec, low-sec and WH space situation, which is why change is so freaking slow in these areas. Like wardecs weren’t iterated on, AT ALL, for six and a half years! And thats despite near weekly threads on the subject. Faction warfare, again it’s been seven years since devs have mentioned it with any significance other than bots.
And for every player in null, there is something like 5-10 players in hi-sec. JUST hisec.
Me too. Don’t get me wrong.
If the CSM was changed tomorrow to have an equal share of members across all types of space, I wouldn’t be the least bit surprised if the hi-sec members tended to be unorganised or otherwise tripe. I’m definitely not saying that’s what we should do.
But the CSM do influence CCP’s decisions. And the CSM unfortunately has a tunnel vision for null. And null is a minority population.
Edit-
And another thing (last rant i promise).
When player activity started to drop in late 2014, ccp must of put their feelers out as to what the problem might be. What did the CSM feedback?
Blue donut. Stagnant null.
70% of players are in hi-sec. But if the active player base halves, it must be because null is broken. /s
Thanks for being willing to get back on the ‘discussion’.
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