That analogy doesn’t work for me.
Also, player skill is completely overrated. EVE is not a difficult game, it just has a bloated, confusing UI.
I completely agree with the first point, without hesitation.
As for the second, no its like saying someone who has only driven a Ford Prefect is allowed into an F1 race because they gave the organisers a million quid.
And of course they can catch you, its not like they are adding new skill levels or new skills all the time.
I joined in 2009, I didnt think I couldnt catch people whod been playing since 2003. Yet 2015 starters couldnt catch me?
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I don’t think your loss of respect in CCP is relevant - we’re talking about the effect of the ability to ‘buy’ skills, not the allegedly ‘broken promise’ of the company that’s selling them.
Sorry, I wasnt being very clear. See my reply to your F1 analogy, thats closer to what I was trying to get to.
But in the skills case, that Ford Prefect driver can only hurt himself, not anyone else - so it;'s up to him/her.
Someone worked out how long it would to take to train all the skills to V without using anytthing but the daily skill allocation of an Omega - I can’t remember how long it was, but it rather suggested that late arrivals should give up as they’d never catch-up in any reasonable timescale.
What I haven’t seen is a good technical reason to not allow newer players to catch-up. Sorry, but all I see is excuses for what I perceive as envy…
I think the feelings of the other F1 drivers would be taken into account in that example. However, your position does have an understandable merit, and tbh Im actually more disappointed that Falcon wasn’t wanting to actually put it as well as you are doing. I get that new players FEEL they cant compete, and its a good business decision to give them a leg up, but it has the knock on effect of insta-alts for (yes Ill invoke it) botting or whatever.
Not a fan here though, because the actual time has not changed asfaik from when I started, so again 2003 ==> 2009 compared to 2009==>2015; why do skills take longer to max in that second set?
Ayway, you asked why Skill extraction/inject was bitter to me, and if it IS just emotive on my part, I feel better when its explained clearly the WHY of why its not a tenable position is all.
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Must say @CCP_Falcon, you’ve been more active and forth coming with opinions on the forums of late.
Add to that @CCP_Hellmar random tweets of ‘lets look at this feature’. It has been a nice insight into how you guys think about and work on the game. It’s prompting a lot of discussion. Please keep it up.
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It isn’t a race to get the most SP. “Catching up” isn’t even a thing. You use this kind of language and it is hard to argue against, because its hard to understand what you’re looking for.
If there were no skill injectors, a 2019 player could still beat a 2005 player in a 1v1, if the 2019 player was savvy on how to win 1v1s and the 2005 player wasn’t. Is “who would win in a 1v1” the standard you are going by? Obviously there must be some competetive metric by which you define “catching up”. Elaborate, and we can discuss more productively.
But Im not against that.
Im not envious that people pay for it.
If I were, Id do it myself.
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Not if the 2005 player had, over time, accumulated the skills for a ship which would (almost inevitably) beat the best ship the 2019 player’s skill allows him to fly - same for weapons, ammunition and offensive/defensive modules. If you want a level playing field where what counts is actual game experience, you have to allow the newer player access to the same resources.
I still have to see an actual reason for restricting the new player’s access to skills, other than “they came later so they have to take as long as we did” - which is simply a form of envy.
No one is talking restriction.
But why injectors and not abitrarily giving new players bonus SPs based on year + X if theres a catch up issue? Edit: Outside of a business case for profit. And if thats the driving reason then I have no come back to that.
And if its for new players, what the reasoning for letting older players have the option?
In that case, why are we even discussing it - there’s no point in objecting to something if you don’t want anything done about it…
It’s a business case, for profit.
See previous answer.
I still don’t understand why you object to it, if it’s not envy (which I can quite understand).
I actually agree with CCP here, even though I would probably limit the usage of those. But I had that issue when I started back in the day - I was missing skills and it was so hard to catch up because it’s only based on time, not activity. I think it’s fair to offer this to players because training skills doesn’t equal actual applied skills in the game - and there was always the option to buy toons anyway.
It’s also logical that CCP wants to monetize this to a certain degree and I think that is fine - and always keep in mind if you restrict certain things it can be quite frustrating for those who won’t be able to participate. A returning veteran might want to get his hands on something that was introduced while he was gone, so this would give him the option to catch up.
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Your case has softened my objection, I believe I mentioned that.
As you say, business decision so thats the end of it.
Im not interested in discussing my opinion of RL business.
Which is handy as you didnt ask and I assume have no interest in 
Fair points.
Im a reasonable being. Im happy to chalk this one up to an emotive reaction on my part, unless someone else provides a sensible case for why its bad.
Tbh it has no effect on my enjoyment of timmying.
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Perception is reality. (or at least, it’s really important to bear it in mind.)
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Eh? We have a prime example of “we cannot mine or rat in null anymore because of blackout” for the last week. Is that perception also a reality?
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@CCP_Falcon thanks for responding to us thou, its pretty damn rare and probably risky on your side to do so but we appreciate it.
It’s not risky at all, here at CCP we’re encouraged to have our own opinions, and to engage and interact with the community when it comes to them.
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If they are unable to perceive a way around the problem…
Yeah?
Bein daft is a reality for some folk.