I really like the idea guiding freelance jobs, but what would corps actually use this for? What kinds of things would corps create a job and pay the upkeep for, instead of just doing it themselves and/or going to Jita?
Baiting, scamming, ganking⌠I guess if theyâve maxed their corporation contracts this would give them another +100 jobs to outsource. Someone did ask the question: Why wouldnât corporations just setup a contract if they needed x number of minerals or resources?
Maybe the last job - âShip Insuranceâ - is a giveaway. Corporations can basically beg for ships (and I would assume also ISK?) They used an example of ship replacement for new players, but I think itâs basically a large âDonate To The War Effortâ button.
Iâm really trying not to be pessimistic, but this feature looks to be DOA for the vast majority of players (especially high-sec). As you so aptly point out - why couldnât I just run a mission or mine for myself and not worry about being scammed or ganked?
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what i got from the presentation is that the jobs are pointless, itâs just a recruiting tool so you can see what players perform well completing said pointless jobs and invite them to corp
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Corps without better external tools will likely use it.
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I see some good potential with this. I mean there are plenty of âFreelancersâ out there that you could also call solo players. Some groups like e.g. Eve University probably can utilize these jobs well maybe?
My first thought was that you can now extend corporation projects for you alliance so thatâs something i see as a positive sort of quality of life improvement. Though one could ask the question of why not just expand corp projects with check box âMake as alliance projectâ? I donât know.
Baiting⌠Yeah⌠Hmmhmm⌠They did state that theyâve considered various shenanigans Eve players - being Eve players - will try to pull off. My prediction is that the price of these jobs will settle around some middle ground where it becomes cost vs. benefit question for the baiters.
Like e.g. the payout for a job needs to be the cost of the ship used plus some. Or something like this. Of course you can always try to bait and people will probably take the bait at first⌠F¤"# around to find out right? But yeah. TLDR payout for worker and cost for employee will probably act as some sort of âsafeguardâ against baiting.
That or a sign to hang around a corporation begging for donations and ships.
I havenât seen the details on Freelancing yet, but I assume it will largely depend on how ârichâ the framework for creating and rewarding jobs is.
If itâs just âdeliver X to station Yâ or âSet up trade orders for X in system Yâ, then I donât imagine it will be a significant factor.
However if they allow for campaign-oriented jobs (like EVE Pandora), or a wider range of tasks, like âDestroy X million ISK worth of Corp Yâs assetsâ or âRun missions that give X standing to members of our corpâ, broader things like that⌠then it could get more interesting.
Going off memory, there were six (6) types:
⢠Destroy NPCs
⢠Damage Capsuleers
⢠2x FW-specific
⢠A mining job (I think)
⢠Ship Insurance (donate ships)
Maybe this will be expanded on release - and maybe there are sub-components to these (they didnât go into specifics). Hopefully more details will be forthcoming before May 27.
I think youâve got that backwards. I listened to that part of the presentation again, and CCP Nomad framed it as the corporations reimbursing players. He said, ââŚlike if you feel benevolent and if you want to impress on your player and reimburse their Rifter that they are losing in a mission or in a gate campâŚâ
So itâs an SRP to players outside the corp (and this is one freelance job type a corp would probably want to limit to new players).
EDIT to add:
The job types are (from the slide):
- Destroy Non-Capsuleers
- Damage Capsuleers
- Mine Minerals
- Capture FW Complex
- Defend FW Complex
- Ship Insurance
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Entirely possible I misunderstood - thanks for the different perspective. Iâm still unclear as to how this would work, but since vets can masquerade as noobies Iâm not sure if youâd be able to restrict it as intended.
Mining and non-capsuleers (ratting) are fairly self-explanatory, but again Iâm not sure I see the point of either unless itâs some kind of recruiting aspect for new players.
The two FW tasks make the most sense as it allows FW leaders to âoutsourceâ FW efforts.
Damage capsuleers could be used as a form of privateer license to incentivize ganking or other forms of disruptive warfare, but Iâd need to see more details on what kind of options are available.
The general consensus on Reddit seems to be that these are aimed solely as recruiting tools.
Well yeah, I saw this list. I meant the question from a standpoint of how it will actually play out in game.
This is what Iâm wondering. The quote (and this wonât be exact) from the presentations was that the goal is âAll content you participate in, is player createdâ. From a pvp perspective, I can see how that could happen with this type of system. What I donât see, and hope Iâm wrong, is any way corps/alliances would ever use this for anything pve/industry.
When they first revealed it I think a lot of players thought this might eventually replace or at least enhance the current framework for missions.
Then it was kind of implied that theyâre looking to move away from expanding on the new player experience and handing that off to the corporations.
So this basically looks like a recruiting tool for corporations and alliances that willp have minimal (if any) impact on gameplay for anyone but new players.
The fact that these assignments are by corporations (only) leads me to believe this isnât aimed at the existing playerbase.
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Which means that this part of the expansion is for High Sec while the rest of it is for Null sec.
I posted that for reference because Arthur mentioned, âoff the top of my headâ and since I had the stream recording right there with the slide and everything⌠I would have offered a more in-depth reply, but after getting up at the ass crack of dawn to watch todayâs fanfest stream, I kind of needed a nap.
With that nap now out of the way, how will freelance projects actually play out? I donât know. My guess is, they wonât be game-changing in their current iteration, and certainly not enough that CCP should have any right to go around saying, âand thatâs why we wonât fix career agents, weâll let the players do that.â Which I think was a stupid thing to admit at yesterdayâs keynote.
Freelance projects have the potential to be an interesting feature, but I expect in their current form, theyâll only be used by a handful of large corps and alliances to recruit even more newbies (and possibly, by others, to grift easy marks). I also expect that in the coming years, CCP will not devote sufficient dev resources to actually make freelancing into something compelling, and it will eventually become another half-baked feature (while missions continue to linger in disrepair).
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âThe old Python code scares usâŚâ
Thatâs my prediction as well. So no more fixing, updating or expanding on missions or similar type of content. Basically we want players to get indoctrinated âinto the cogâ - making it even more challenging for solo players.
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Yeah, that too. I was actually surprised they highlighted that. I was under the false impression theyâd already made that conversion, because it was talked about previously some years ago (and because Python 2.7 went EOL five years ago. FFSâŚ).
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I think the Python mission code is even older than that⌠probably ancient by todayâs standards.
Hereâs one way they could improve Freelance jobs from the outset: Have the major Factions generate jobs that tack-on to existing gameplay, ie: missions, mining and ratting. Freelance availability and rewards would be based solely on standings, ie: the better my standings - the juicier the Freelance jobs and rewards.
For example, I could choose various Freelance jobs to kill a wide array of NPCs in the course of ratting or missioning for the Caldari State. My L4 income gets augmented in the process.
Another possibility is that accepting a Freelance job could increase the difficulty of existing tasks, ie: adding more NPCs to missions, NPCs to belts and combat sites, etc.
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I do feel that something has shifted on that front, and I sense a general disregard for solo players that seems to be gathering. Granted, EVE is an MMO, so I would never expect the solo experience to be of primary concern. But there are a lot of solo players out there (I run into them all the time), so to hear CCP Berger (IIRC) use the phrase âtreading waterâ to describe those people not part of a corp or alliance? That was disheartening.
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