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[Gesakaarin]

So, I've been reading the latest news about Evaulon and Rilnais and it got me to thinking... does CCP actually present the Federation using any initiative at all? I mean, when you consider:

- The destruction of Reschard
- The destruction of Seyllin
- The State invasion and destruction of the Fed fleet in Algogille and Luminaire
- The occupation of Luminaire
- The invasion of Solitude by Kador
- The bombardment of Rilnais

Does CCP have some sort perverse interest in presenting the only news to occur in the Federation to be an ongoing series of tragedies and calamities where everyone has to drop everything at the news of the next cosmic or man-made disaster and the expectation is to scream out, "Oh the humanity! Will no one ever think of the children?!"

It's almost reaching the point of just being a cliche about now, because whilst other factions have had their own disasters etc. there was also often a solid social or political subtext to it which when written for the Fed seems to be lacking.

I sometimes wish there was some more depth to the news that happens in the Fed both foreign and domestic than wondering what's the next Fed planet or system to suddenly explode or get invaded requiring humanitarian aid. 

[Katrina Oniseki]

I noticed this. There is a distinct lack of actual political or cultural intrigue for Fed lore right now.

[NISYN Aelisha]

I have to say, now that the State has had a good looking at, I am very much in favour of things like this being dealt with.  The Factions in eve are far from cardboard cut outs now (though the Tribes need some wiki love), but I still want more meat on the bones of the Federation. 

After all, every bit of info we can get on the topic is character building for the Federation and every rper who interacts with it (almost all of us, and all of us through someone we interact with).  Disasters are all well and good, but to have them all happening to the bastion of freedom and liberty in the cluster does seem over done - though there may be a good, as of yet undisclosed reason for this. 

[Seriphyn]

There's some rationalizations provided in the FedGov article but...

I dunno, got an uncanny feeling it's because we all live in democracies IRL, so it's the easiest to sympathize with. Can you imagine if it was the Amarr Empire? People would be like "lol slavers dying". Even the Caldari State is sufficiently alien enough...combined with hardcoreness/badassness which means nothing bad could possibly happen to them ever. Even if Fed is written to be third world (according to the new article at least) in how much it keeps its shit together, one would expect the Minmatar Republic to be far worse.

I think it's that whole familiarity thing.

[Gesakaarin]

There's some rationalizations provided in the FedGov article but...

I dunno, got an uncanny feeling it's because we all live in democracies IRL, so it's the easiest to sympathize with. Can you imagine if it was the Amarr Empire? People would be like "lol slavers dying". Even the Caldari State is sufficiently alien enough...combined with hardcoreness/badassness which means nothing bad could possibly happen to them ever. Even if Fed is written to be third world (according to the new article at least) in how much it keeps its shit together, one would expect the Minmatar Republic to be far worse.

I think it's that whole familiarity thing.

The thing I don't get is when there's probably so much more to write about the Fed in its politics and society the almost recurring theme now with it is the "Epic disaster" arcs whether its foreign invasion, Sansha abductions (Oddly, most of them seemed to happen in the Fed given news articles), millions dying in rogue planetary attacks or just good old fashioned random celestial destruction. It's reached the point where it's happened so often the glassing of Rilnais made me just say to myself, "Oh wow, yet again the Fed is a victim of unsolicited tragedy."

I mean... the insorum attacks at Mabnen by Blood Raiders is about the only time it's happened outside outside of the Fed, where it seems to suffer about the same sort of thing every few months. I sometimes wonder if there's conversations along the lines of, "Hey guys we need an epic concept to get people interested in what's happening in the storyline how about we have some event that kills millions of people in the Fed like all those other times millions of Feds died during [insert event here]."

I bring it up only because like it or not the Fed and State need each other in order to drive each others stories through conflict and confrontation, but when all that seems to happen in the Fed from CCP is tragic event after tragic event about the only response to it is just, "Condolences, here have some humanitarian aid," and that's about it. There's absolutely no tension or anything to grab on to with it  to promote some cross-faction RP of any variety nor does it add any depth to the Fed.

[Seriphyn]

Yeah, guess you're right. Don't think I really have any explanations for it...I did say in the past, funnily enough, that for the Empyrean Age expansion in summer 2008, Fed lost an entire planet for the DT event (Caldari Prime). For the summer expansion next year, Fed lost an entire planet again for the DT event.

[Silas Vitalia]

To be fair, the Fed Navy gave House Kador fleet a good kicking all the way back to their home region, and Empress Jamyl confiscated their forces and laid a good smacking on him for going solo without approval.

[BloodBird]

To be fair, the Fed Navy gave House Kador fleet a good kicking all the way back to their home region, and Empress Jamyl confiscated their forces and laid a good smacking on him for going solo without approval.

I was about to mention this myself.

The only sad part about it is that it was to date the only time the Federation went out and got agressive about something without letting their capsuleers do all the work for them.

I *still* want to be among the vanguard of Serpentis' destruction and the invasion of Fountain to burn down the pestilence, the Fed has not done anything agressive and totally badass until something like this happens, IMHO.

And they should. Zag is right, so far the Fed holds the dedicated victimball and serve as the cluster's punching bag. This needs to fucking stop.

[Uraniae]

Well you could look at it another way, mainly, IC.  The thing you're seeing in the news are being presented by the news.  The term "disaster porn" comes to mind.  From an IC standpoint the fact that its seemingly just a string of disaster after disaster could be explained away as media bias or manipulation.  It is after all entirely possible that various agencies and people within the Fed might be doing things that would make wonderful or terrible news, and perhaps some of those agencies and people are ensuring the media focuses on these disasters.  I know, lots of speculation and assumption, but it is plausible.

An OOC point to consider, tragedy is one of the oldest and is supposed to be one of the most moving themes in literature.  On some level we all know that, regardless of if you agree with it, and that means the devs know it as well.  Also it could simply be a matter of taste coming into play.  I think it would be safe to say most people can appreciate a good fictional explosion, while less people will appreciate political machinations and social intrigue.

[Lyn Farel]

In the past they focused a little less on instant drama porn and a little more on gritty stuff like in the Jovian Wet Grave and the likes. Ofc we still had disasters here and there but it was less systematic imho.

[Gesakaarin]

Well you could look at it another way, mainly, IC.  The thing you're seeing in the news are being presented by the news.  The term "disaster porn" comes to mind.  From an IC standpoint the fact that its seemingly just a string of disaster after disaster could be explained away as media bias or manipulation.  It is after all entirely possible that various agencies and people within the Fed might be doing things that would make wonderful or terrible news, and perhaps some of those agencies and people are ensuring the media focuses on these disasters.  I know, lots of speculation and assumption, but it is plausible.

That might be the case but then again just taking a look at the different recent pirate live events it does seem to be a CCP thing to make the Fed on the receiving end of human disaster. In comparison:

Angel attacks: A limited strike on bio vaults which creates speculation about, "Why attack them?"

Gurista attacks: Get trapped in a Nugoeihuvi station which creates speculation about, "Are NOH and the Gurista working together?"

Blood Raider attacks: Peek around the Bleak Lands which creates speculation about, "What do the Raiders want and what are they looking for?"

Serpentis attacks: Bomb an entire city with millions dead - "Oh the humanity!"

All that I'm seeing is that the other factions get a degree of intrigue and mystery to their news which the Federation often does not due to all the disasters. I mean, the crisis and disasters that occur elsewhere like the Caldari mining collapse or the riots over the Starkmanir practicing the Amarrian faith also pointed to interesting social and political factors at play due to them - and those crisis/disasters didn't occur at the same scale when its done in the Fed where if it is was, it would no doubt involve millions dying or entire planetary destruction.

I mean when there's so much else to write about happening in the Fed like:

- Are there any Supreme Court challenges conducted by activists against the SDII or Roden?
- What's the Senate doing these days?
- Is there any news from those different planetary governments or issues involving the Jin-Mei, Intaki, Mannar etc.?
- The relationship between the Federation and Minmatar whether they're in the Republic or Federation.
- Is there anything involving Federal corporations recently?

That's just a few short points, but in the end the Federation is supposed to be this politically active and charged place encompassing hundreds if not thousands of different planetary governments in addition to trillions of citizens of differing ideological, cultural and ethnic viewpoints and the best CCP can do with the Fed in news items is: "Today, yet another disaster of unimaginable scale has occured."?

It's somewhat disappointing and underwhelming.

[Lyn Farel]

In the past they had quite a lot of Foiritain vs Blaque intrigue iirc.

[Silas Vitalia]

Much of this can be directly tied to the emphasis on 'events' instead of 'plot.'

When you have sporadic 'events' it lends itself to more dramatic things happening.

When there is an ongoing plot with variety, we get more in-depth approaches.

It's a small team rotating through the events so I give them plenty of slack, but would love for more simple text / news advancement on these fronts.

[BloodBird]

Somewhat on an aside, I'd love the return of semi-regular IC news items. They don't have to foreshadow any major event or anything. They don't have to be tied together, or even be very entertaining or interesting all the time.

They just have to be there, twice a week, weekly or even bi-weekly news that says 'things happen and the universe keeps spinning, sometimes it's interesting'. Would give you a sense the universe you play in is alive. The events may still be enacted on top of this and minor 'events' could still happen.

Well given CCP's track record I honestly think we could one day see this happen, it would take some resources I'm sure and demand some work, but if they find enough interest in doing it and a few people to keep it happening, I believe it would seriously enrich people's experience in EVE, might even prompt more people to try RP out.

Until then I am however, glad to see events back, it's a huge plus. Shame I'm not around to take part, but that's my problem Now it would be great if many of the overly negative ones took place in more sections of the cluster than just one specific quarter of it.

[Ava Starfire]

I think its just a case of CCP being able to write anything that isnt endless grimdark. Its getting old, really.