Drake Iddon for CSM20 - Inflict me upon the devs for another year

Hi all, I am Drake Iddon; current member of CSM 19, avid 1400mm artillery enjoyer and a die hard resident of Pochven since it’s inception

Over the past year I have had the amazing opportunity to serve on CSM 19 as one of the two CCP selected representatives, and I have been far more productive in my tenure than I could ever have imagined.

In less than a year the internal balance of the black-sheep region has improved drastically, its unhealthy wealth generation curtailed and redistributed across a larger swathe of players and groups, its sites reworked, unhealthy areas of its ecosystem addressed, exploits closed, hundreds of bugs and inconsistencies fixed both inside the region and elsewhere, and by my count; hundreds (if not, thousands) of cheating accounts banned.

Pochven has not been my sole focus of CSM19, from aiding in identifying and removing botting networks around the game, assisting players with reproducing and reporting bugs, and most importantly conveying player feedback to CCP every step of the way.

There is still much more to do and I intend to continue this work should the player base support me in doing so.

My major contributions to the game while on CSM 19

I have had an honestly absurd amount of input into the game beginning with the Revenant expansion, below is a condensed version that goes beyond simple tweaks and QOL changes

Pochven-specific:

  • If you want to see the full list of Pochven changes, here is sixteen pages of (just the Pochven) patchnotes that I have worked on over my tenure on CSM 19

  • Completely replaced flashpoints with a version built on a dynamic dungeon system, supporting all 4 empire factions and not just the Amarr.

  • Simultaneously added region wide visibility of anomalies, adding a permanent counter to AFK cloaking regionwide, and cracking down on botted CCTV networks to remove unassailable advantages that stifled combat in the region.

  • Fixed the bugged NPC AI in the region where they would be asleep until one of their spawn group was killed.

  • Reworked the smaller sites which were previously not worth running, except torpids for standings, to be viable for solo and micro gang sizes to run for reasonable income

  • Added salvage beacons to anomalies so that salvagers can access them after the site is completed.

  • Prevented roaming NPCS from warping to interior rooms of multi-grid dungeons, preventing bots from self-farming LP and ISK in every system, simply by orbiting the site 23/7

  • Added support for Triglavian clade standings, allowing for reduced taxes and will support future features in pochven in the future. (I hope)

  • Rebalanced Overmind Nursery sites to provide a new source of Triglavian salvage, helping to offset the market shock due to the popularity of the Babaroga.

  • Ongoing, Data and player driven, balancing of all sites

Outside of Pochven:

  • Removing the missile rate of fire and turret damage bonuses for using the standard cerebral accelerator brand new characters, closing an extremely abused system when combined with skill injectors to create unassailable bonuses that other characters cannot match.
  • Removing the Omega window popup, eliminating an abuse case where gifting someone omega could disable their game for a period of time while out in space.
  • Closed an ESI abuse case: you can no longer use a repeating query to spam invites to a player via ESI in order to see if they were online or offline, depending on the return value of the query. (this has been around for a long long time and good riddance)
  • Advocating for an increase in skyhook raidability duration to 2 hours, and increasing their visibility ahead of time on the map. (big thanks to fellow CSM candidate Itaer for providing direct input on this)
  • Work on Force projection limitation: Filament changes and Ansiblex changes in the revenant major update.
  • Input (along with the rest of the CSM) on the feedback from the overpowered nature of the originally advertised system effect generators.
  • Advocating for finally removing the last half of the surgical strike resist nerf.
  • The Babaroga – Input during its stat design.
  • Input on freelance jobs with regards to potential abuse cases.
  • Work and testing on the global plex market.
  • Ongoing feedback from players to devs throughout the drifter crisis.
  • Pushing for as many people as possible to provide direct effective feedback to CCP regarding the ingoing problems with VRAM and stability issues after the GPU pipeline update (ongoing).
  • Advocating for a single button to disband fleet as fleet boss (a QoL change, but this one has been requested for a long time).
  • Allowing for direct enlistment to pirate factions while in Zarzakh.
  • Closed a few abuse cases surrounding wars that stopped people from fighting back, fight honourably you cowards.
  • Changes to the core system behind gates and keys, allowing the server to remember if you have used a key on a specific gate, you will no longer lose multiple keys for spam activating a gate, or if you stopped your ship after activating.

On top of the above, I have relentlessly pursued those who break the ToS, anywhere from botting to input broadcasting, to RMT and irl threats. I absolutely despise players who decide that they do not need to adhere to the baseline rules that makes EVE enjoyable for us all.

From establishing a (one way, by design) liaison with team security to quickly highlight to them areas where cheating/RMT/etc is occuring, and also assisting players with ways to effectivly identify, document, and report cheaters, I can proudly and confidently say that multiple hundreds if not thousands of infringing accounts have been banned throughout CSM 19.

My goals (my continued work) if elected to CSM 20

Pochven-specific:

  • Rework Stellar deployment sites into the dynamic dungeon system
  • Pull out World Ark Flashpoints in full and rework, rebalance, and redesign it, laying the final ground work for an LP store overhaul and fixing an honestly insane amount of issues that the site has currently
  • Rework the (currently, 64 separate) wormhole dungeons and the wormholes themselves, address spawn logic issues with the wormholes themselves, make the sites worthwhile to run, and rebalance the roaming gangs that spawn from them
  • Rip out the LP store root and stem, and replace with an entirely new LP store that actually adds value to the players using it, that adds a viable and needed isk sink to the region, one that does not have impossible to redeem items, one that actually offers trig salvage much like the DED LP Store
  • If resources allow, look into significantly changing Home-systems that are currently no different to the rest of pochven, with the sole exception of its home mineral field
    • The most resource intensive part of this would be turning the Anchorages into an actual dockable station, one that provides useful bonuses such as, manufacturing, reactions, and reprocessing, for those with high standings, allowing the home systems to serve as a hub for the respective Clades.
  • More wishlisty bit here: There are multiple triglavian ship assets that are not flyable by players, while it isn’t easy work it seems a no brainer to allow many of these ships to be built and flown by players.

Outside of Pochven:

  • Continue to work on closing multiple abuse cases that exist in the game
  • Continue to work as an effective liaison between players and Team Security to continue to crackdown on cheaters and RMT
  • Continue to be proactive in fixing as many bugs as possible, actively responding to players who find a bug, working with them to re-create it, and submitting details of said issues to internal CCP channels to effectively get fixes rolled out as fast as they can
  • Roll out various accessibility options for deaf and colour-blind players, I have done a fair amount of work with this already alongside CCP k1p1.

I was granted a vote of confidence from the playerbase and CCP last year, I hope that I have lived up to expectations and ask for that confidence once again from you all.

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reserved for media and other items to be added later

Past Interviews:

Lorumerth

The Meta Show

Voices of New Eden

Schadsquatch

Declarations of War Podcast

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Say less.

The fact that cheaters and rule breakers hate him yet pochven has experienced another wave of activity shows just how influential he is.

He has my vote but he cannot marry my sister

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I have known Drake for years, and we have always gotten along well. As the steward of pochven he really goes in-depth to make sure the space is healthy and active, and keeps on top of every issue. You should definitely vote for him, even if I can neither confirm nor deny that he spends his hard-earned money to buy vast ammounts of chocolate for devs, for their hard work.

Drake is also outspoken in keeping the integrity of the game free of cheaters, and is one of the few 1-account veterans who can talk about that experience with CCP.

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The shoe is firmly in the egg.

Since we started our adventures years ago starting with a convo asking for cyno help for grandprix stuff, and me saying I think i’ve found an interesting mechanic in a new space called pochven - you have lived and breathed the region we all know and love.

You have worked tirelessly to try and shed the reputation the region has gotten over the years and your hard work has paid off as evedent by the resurge in activity by real human groups entering the fray again.

There is no other spacebrother I could ever see doing what you have for our beloved region and I salute you. You have my votes,always.

KaKawwwwwwwwww brother, from krabslider to CSM (as ordained)

ß

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We may know Drake as the “Purveyor of Pochven,” but the truth is this man is a WEALTH of knowledge for EVE Online. He provides a level of understanding surrounding the EVE ecosystem today that stands out among the top members of the CSM. He is also one of the few CSM who have taken the time to attend WH UN Meetings to help be an advocate for our space.

Drake has certainly “fought me” (in all ways but physically) for developer time on projects, I would still want to have him hands down for CSM 20.

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I am voting for Drake Iddon because I know he is willing to do whatever it takes take improve EVE.

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I was hoping you would run again so seeing this makes me really happy. You’re a great addition to the CSM and you will be on my ballot for sure.

Even though I’m not in the pro-trig camp, I fully agree that Pochven has a lot more to offer and I want to see you continue to advocate for positive changes for this region instead of it just being seen as a source of income through the OBS.

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I have talked to Drake several times this year, including in person at fanfest. I found him to be level headed, well spoken, and proactive. His many accomplishments on CSM 19 are a testament to these qualities. I will be voting for him, and I hope to serve with him on CSM 20!

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This man Killed my tornado and flamed me in Skarkon local

He is the perfect CSM Rep for pochven.

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My favorite CCP shill, makes the right people mad and agrees with me, 10/10 no notes

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Man was instantly reporting issues from the event to the CCP folks!

Man is really helpful!

Man got my vote, even tho I prefer dogs!

We need more people like him!

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Probably the MOST effective CSM in history. EVE is twice as good for us when Drake’s on the job. Living in Pochven, it always feels good to see Drake flying around, either in his Python/Panther, or checking for bugs or input broadcasters. He’ll get my vote every time!

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Drake is an incredibly knowledgeable, reasoned and articulate candidate - solid and wide reach and understanding of the game - get’s my vote!

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Definitely one of the people on my CSM “dream team” - I would feel secure bringing player concerns to him, regardless of what part of space they come from, and I’d know I’d be taken seriously and have good representation. Now, I do have my own in-house CSM so I don’t talk to Drake directly all that often, but I know with certainty that he is highly active putting in the time and effort to be an effective CSM member, constantly engaging with both the community and the other CSM + devs. However I do suspect that “inflict me upon the devs” is a lie; they seemed very happy with him at Fanfest! :smile:

Any independent group, Pochven or otherwise, would be wise to place him at or near the top of their ballot this year and work together to make sure they have such a proven representative on CSM20.

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Drake was a pleasure to work with in CSM19, a strong contributor and worked productively with the team, Solid CCP pick and you should reward that by electing him this year.

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Hello Drake Iddon, first of all good luck with your campaign :flexed_biceps: …and may the best will win ofc :sports_medal:
(I will great every candidate this way :nerd_face: )

Hope you find time to share your thoughts on below topics and game ideas.

1. EVE Vanguard
Have you had an occasion to try it during Operation Nemesis or earlier? What was your impression if any?

What do you think about bidirectional connection planned with EVE Online? Do you see it has a potential to attract more players towards New Eden? And do you think Capsuleers will benefit from it?

2. Information & ISK itemization
How about being able to take a notes from your notepad and put it as an item into container or ship cargo? Same with an amount of ISK? Just like you can do with PLEX.

More details https://forums.eveonline.com/t/information-itemization-put-notes-into-cargo-containers

Would you pitch CCP to consider implementing it?

3. Production Plans
Basically the idea behind this is to bundle all the BPOs (BPCs), required to produce some final product, say, an assembled Drake fully fitted according to some saved fit ready for duty, into a single BPO-like item, and internally arranged into an intricate production workflow. Complete with logistics tasks, if necessary, using delivery corp projects. It could use BPMN diagram editor to arrange.

When installed into industrial job slot it will churn out those Drakes, provided there are required materials in linked containers or pause until they are become available again.

More details https://forums.eveonline.com/t/feature-request-production-plans

Would you pitch CCP to consider implementing it? Or at least expand ESI to allow 3rd party developers to do it?

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I personally think it’s all a load of b******s but this is the best one of these I’ve read so far.

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EVE Vanguard

I put a few days into tests prior to Nemesis and put a fair amount of time into Nemesis itself, the shotgun was godly and its come a long way since its original preview builds. Personally i loved Dust and its fitting system, just wish they would bring that back in full for vanguard

It definitely has the potential to attract more players to the universe itself, its going to be down to how does CCP monetise it, how do they combat cheating that is usually quite rampant in FPS games, and how do they market it in the most saturated genre market in the world

Information & ISK itemization

This system used to exist in some form back when you could turn bookmarks into physical items and name them, its definately a cool idea, I also would like to add to that and tack on the ability for redeem queue items to have some sort of shortcut that you can add to your cargo, which would only be visible to you and would let you consume drugs without having to navigate through that cumbersome menu

Production Plans

It is a cool idea but I think the first thing that needs to happen is some new system for BPCS

  • they are unstackable and you cannot see ME and TE stats easily from a glance
  • the majority of bpcs in the games are generally worthless and have no actual value, so they just take up inventory space
  • form the fact they are singlet items aswell they are actually crippling performance and time wise when trying to use third party tools (or even the excel add-in) when conducting searches

A new system should be developed for them so that QoL can natually stem from that new system

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Vod of my interview on the Meta Show

Show starts at approx 7:25, my section begins at 22:22

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