Grammar. Still no capitalization though. You’re a slow learner I have heard.
I agree with you. Somehow I felt it but didn’t write about it.
For me, the actions derived from this new, new direction on CCP part, invalidate all prior or current attempt to propose solutions.
Some think that it’s because of apathy or that the game is too old or that ideas should have come 5 yrs ago.
The truth is, they did. The community did it’s job.
And this thread is therefore, discarded not for it’s content or the OP idea, but for the current state of affairs which more than ever show lack of conversation or debate on it’s primordial function: To connect customers with the company.
We just end up being rolled and smoked in personals and agendas between us.
Time to unite, perhaps?
And demand.
Wait, wat? Ah yep… we’re already doing that. No one said it, it’s not subscribed to any entity but most agree the path sucks and are protesting by no logging and soon by not renewing, if not already.
Because, based on what’s said above, I truly don’t want to propose anything and just stop until those I’m paying good money solve it, period.
It’s just the same wave that departed from CCP what’s coming back.
1 Like
-Stronger connections to player corps–make searching for , filtering and joining a player corp at least one of the objectives of the tutorial-- same with forums especially the recruiting and tutorials, fiting and recruiting ones.
-change asset safety–make it more like the drop system when things blow up–even add npc haulers that can be killed for a fraction of player loot once things get the armor timer-- don’t leave one can when things blow up…leave a 100 scattered cans with fractions of the drop.
-restore the idea of rock,paper, scissors to eve by making supers virtually useless against subcaps.
-add a significant upkeep fees to keep caps combat capable–could be monthly isk or something more crew related-- food, exotic dancers, etc…does matter. Make it a strong sink or harsh choice to keep extra caps mothballed and capable. “Fuel” one up and put it on a long warm up timer before it can undock.
-more T2 components in cap building–biggest ships in game shouldn’t be easiest to build (huh)
-resource scarcity. Introduce higher ADMs with diminishing returns-- fewer or worse green sites.
-make rats dangerous again–if a diamond mining fleet have a strong fleet response–so should named rats in combat anoms
-for newer folks, or folks returning, introduce arena combat in certain HS/LS systems (or even something a fortizer can install in NS)–set rewards so can be good for new bro but not too attractive for older characters (say tops 30m/hour). solo pvp, small gang, free for alls 24/7 that anyone can drop into over a lunch break.
–give corps a few of the special toys enjoyed by alliances but only for low-sec and npc null-- low mass limited gates for example
-a bit more specialization in ships-- Dscan to 20 AU for recon frigs for example.
-phase out some of the unused/unloved ships to make things a bit simpler.
even more chaos.
Triglaves hit trade hubs–(think burn jita was something…hold my beer haha)
occasional direct and unlimited mass wormholes
Triglaves hit overbuilt systems
Loose to a triglave invasion and they establish npc null there.
just a few ideas.
2 Likes
nope no caps, try harder 
One more.
Reverse how mining anoms work and make unused NS the best ore systems in the game but with a slow renewal rate once mined. Use the indy ADM to increase the renewal rate back to it’s unmined state.
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FWIW, I really wish CCP simply stopped breaking for no reason things that worked and fixed the ones that don’t. Also, if only they introduced changes that render ships or forms of gameplay no longer viable in a more gradual way… Some examples:
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Some time ago they removed the Agent Finder without providing a working alternative. Only recently was a new version of the Agent Finder added to The Agency. It’s still worse than the old one and takes a ridiculously large amount of screen space, but at least it works again… But why on earth or whatever planet they live in didn’t they at least wait for this new thing to be ready before removing the old one?
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They made drastic changes to ECM jamming that rendered those ships completely useless for 1v1 PvP, unlike all other recon ships which can still be used for that. If you read the devblog explaining the reasons for the change, you’ll see that they could have allowed ECM jammers to at least break all locks from the jammed ship when successful, including those on the jamming ship, without having to change a single word in that blog, i.e. that would have been a less drastic change that would still have accomplished what they said were the goals without rendering the affected ships completely useless for some forms of gameplay. Why didn’t they do that initially at least?
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They revamped the wardec system requiring not only the wardec’ed corp to have a structure in order to be war eligible (which sounds about right until they come up with a better system to opt out of wars if desired), but also the wardec’ing corp to have a War HQ, regardless of corp size or number of wars, which of course resulted in the merging of previously rivaling merc alliances into a single one and made it impractical for small corps to have a handful of focused wardecs. Couldn’t they have made the change less drastic and allow corps to still be able to declare a few wars, say 3 or 5, without requiring them to also have a War HQ, and make the War HQ mandatory only to be able to exceed that number of wardecs?
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New chat system still not working properly.
Also, they really need to do something about the New Player Experience (NPE) to help new players not only become familiarised with basic game mechanics, but also basic concepts of what EvE is about that they may not expect, such as suicide ganking and why autopiloting may not be a good idea.
Only after getting basic things like those right would I think about how to improve the game in other more imaginative ways.
7 Likes
It’s clear across various MMO’s and genres that the group you play with is key to playing (and paying) longer. CCP really needs to explore options to expand ways players group together.
Better corp-finding tools would help. As would allowing players to write “reviews/ratings” of corps. If I’m looking at a corp I’d really like to know what the people who’ve left it have to say as well as those in it.
At the moment, players can easily go solo (either in a personal corp or even an NPC corp) and enjoy various tax benefits, corp features, wardec safety etc. Corps also don’t really feel pressure to recruit more players other than as a whim. It’s a tossup for many corps whether they really want to recruit new members or not because the risk/effort/reward tradeoff isn’t really compelling.
Some changes to the corp system could encourage both joining corps and recruiting members into corps, as well as treating them/supporting them well enough to retain them (in the corp).
- NPC corp tax boosted to 15%
- Corps have a “minimum” tax rate (payable to Concord/Interbus/whoever). Let’s say it starts at 8 or 10%. This tax is added to the corp tax rate - the minimum is an ISK sink/fee, the corp rate goes to the corp. The “minimum” would drop as a factor of corp member size, probably a sliding scale: -1% at 3/5/10/20/50/100/200/500 members or something.
Possibly also unlock various ‘corporate benefits’ at various levels of membership, so players who join get a benefit too. Discounts for insurance or trading cost refuctions or something. Maybe add an incentive for the length of time spent in a corp to make corp-hoping a bit less attractive.
Another approach would be to put in content that encourages impromptu fleeting together. Such as daily/weekly missions/tasks/mini ‘personal events’ that require a fleet. Or making something like Resource Wars and Faction Warfare have spawned events that require/reward tackling them in a small fleet. Preferably something that the event makes it easy to slap a fleet together on the fly from local or whatever.
If ‘the social aspect’ is what attracts and retains players for longer, then it’s kind of silly not to have social tools and rewards for social behaviour in the game.
3 Likes
Frankly, EvE is doomed. Blackout was a step in prolonging its life but CCP wasn’t prepared to lose the bot accounts which gives appearance to the game having life. Star Citizen is shaping up nicely and it is the EvE killer.
Multiple people on one ship, carriers with individual pilots in fighters onboard and every trade in this game is in that one in some form or another.
Not to mention first person combat.
The game has been on the downward spiral since Incarna.
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This would encourage people to just make alts or recruit people without engaging them.
The other stuff sounds ok. Reviews especially.
Also exploitable with alts?
sorry, are you real? 
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What part of fitting a cyno is not proactive play?
Exactly.
Who cares? The game is stuffed with alts already anyway. CCP deliberately encouages alts and always has.
“Exploitable” generally means ‘exploiting’ some game mechanic for measurable gain. In this concept, CCP would be adding an expense/ISK sink and then using corp member count to reduce the cost of the ISK sink. No benefit is gained, it’s still an ISK sink that doesn’t currently exist.
A decent coder could set it up so that only active members count, or other limits. But even without limitations on alt-activity, some people will use alts, some will recruit members, who cares? An approach doesn’t have to be ‘perfect’ to be beneficial.
The “fleet together” idea you also say “exploitable with alts” to. Again, who cares? Using other alts in a fleet means you are either paying Omega for all those alts, or you are using trickery to get around Alpha limitations (a very limited portion of the player base). For 90% of players it will be an incentive to either Omega multiple accounts or fleet up with other people.
Here’s a scenario: CCP implements a slightly modified new Triglavian mechanic. A “Triglavian Conduit” beacon opens in a system. People warp to it, it has a Concord ship there which carries special “Conduit filaments”. The ship dialog says you need 3, 5 or 7 Conduit filaments to open a warp tunnel into the conduit. You slap together a fleet of (at least) 3, 5 or 7 ships, each ship buys a filament from the Concord ship (this is an ‘actively present’ check as well as an ISK sink), they activate them, Conduit opens, they jump in.
Goal is to destroy 3, 6 or 9 structures inside, while fighting the defenders, before the Conduit activates. Failure, no payment. Success, a new “Concord Scramble Alert” type of LP is paid to the whole fleet. 70% of the payout (depending on 3/5/7 size) is divided between the fleet evenly. 20% goes to the top DPS. 10% to the second highest.
Scramble Alert stores trade LP for packages of ISK, SP, or Standings boosters. Also, a more expensive ‘random’ box that can award the above, or Triglav salvage, Cerebral accelerators, skins, whatever.
Now you have a mechanic, that is basically a few tweaks on existing mechanics, that introduces multiple benefits (ISK sinks, players fleeting together, new content, new rewards, ‘random’ boxes). At that point it is irrelevant if some people use alts to do it - the benefits far outweigh any alt abuse.
The biggest benefit in my eyes though, is that now you have a mechanic that is only one step away from “make two fleets, jump them in and have them engage in competitive struggle/PvP for a goal”. Which is what (IMO) ‘Resource Wars’ always should have been.
The problem isn’t the number of new players being recruited. It’s that they aren’t being engaged when they are recruited.
At the moment there is no reason to NOT recruit players and skim corp tax off of them.
Compared to a corp that doesn’t do it there would be a benefit gained. This is undeniable.
It could still be gamed and we could still do better.
Again, the issue is not numbers. It is engagement.
We don’t need an incentive for a few players to play with more alts. We need reasons for more players to play and enjoy the game. What you’re proposing doesn’t promote more interaction as much as it promotes alt corps and bot farms.
Well, that’s your opinion, but I don’t see a lot of ideas coming from your direction. Well, other than “we need more easy targets and less Concord in high sec”, I guess.
You understand (or maybe you don’t) that one suggestion, to address one issue, is not meant to solve all the issues? You understand that making changes to corps is about corporation tools, and that engagement is another topic? That encouraging people to fleet up to tackle content actually is about engagement?
I know it is typical for you to simply find ways to disagree with everything you can. But occasionally, you should try adding to, improving, or submitting an alternative idea of your own - rather than finding one sentence in an entire post you can disagree with. and ignoring all the rest.
LOL…
3 Likes
If you don’t know my ideas for social corps vs normal corps you must have been living under a rock for the past 5 years.
This thread is about new player retention yes? Retention that is troubled by engagement. We don’t have a shortage of characters in corps.
You partially understand that getting players together helps MMOS grow, but don’t seem to understand that keeping these players is about engagement.
What you say here is correct but then propose a solution that does not actually encourage groups of players, it encourages people to make alts.
To which your answer is ‘so what. That’s what eve is’. And that’s the problem. We don’t need more of the same. We need something that actually encourages groups of players and not groups of alts.
Putting more characters into corps is not the answer. Putting players behind characters is.
Sadly, reading comprehension isn’t what it should be among some forumites. The thread is actually about this:
“How to retain players” (not new players) “while remaining true to EVE’s core philosophy”.
People like Daichi might use alts to create fleets and stuff corps. Normal players will simply join corps, recruit other players, and fleet up with their main accounts. An extremely small portion of the playerbase will use Omega-alts or against-the-TOS-tricks to fleet with their own alts.
As said, the point of the idea is to develop mechanics that appeal to the 80% of the player base who mostly PVE’s most of the time and doesn’t alt-multibox, while taking them (and game mechanics) one step closer to fleet/group PvPing. Alts are a smokescreen issue which have already been dealt with in the above threads. As usual, you (Daichi) simply didn’t comprehend what was being said.
By saying this you’re suggesting there’s a reason not to recruit en mass now.
Given the immunity to decs, 0% npc tax, offices etc. All there is to offer by being in a corp. What reason do people have to not recruit?
And you mention the ‘average player wont do this’. And yet multibox mining is the norm, alpha alts are numerous and plague FW, skill farming is a thing, trading alts, cyno alts, cloaky camping alts, PI alts…eve players are already using alts to maximise gains, and often to detrimental effect to other players.
You are very naive if you don’t think your proposal won’t suffer the same.
What we need from CCP is a better grasp on what exactly the EVE player population is, both in terms of actual player size ( omega/alpha), as well as where they spend the majority of their time. Add into this data how many run multiple accounts. Where do they spend the majority of their time? Doing what as their main activity? In what security level systems? What sector has lost the most players?
Since CCP is NOT going to release the above information, players are left making poor guesses on what exactly is needed to revitalize EVE, usually basing their opinion on what they enjoy or do in EVE. Complicating the whole mess is the inate drive by a large number of players to min/max the system, pushing up to and, sometimes, across, the legal line of player/game conduct. That CCP has failed to resolve many of the problems in EVE, despite having far more data than we do, indicates it is a much tougher job than most poeple assume.
So we can post ideas all we want, both good and bad, in the hopes that we uncover an idea or concept that the devs have overlooked or need to be re-examined. I just wish that CCP would offer us a little more insight into the current population makeup so that the forum ideas generated could become more focused based on the numbers and trends, not perceptions and preferences. However, I don’t imagine CCP will become more transparent and their gameplay changes will continue to leave many of us baffled.
1 Like