When I think I was almost going to propose to form an independent fleet composed of a bomber wolfpack with a few tackling/neutralizing recons that could have been blackops bridged into at least one of the target system, then bomb the hell out of the defenders, and at least try to do something...
Then I told myself meh, whatever, less than 2 hours left anyway. Everyone was already ready to be part of their respective fleets. And how to send even a covops covert cyno there since it was probably already camped to death ?
But the more I think again about it, the more I have regrets not trying it.
Alright.
Let's do this in AAR fashion. It's easy to pick up the terribad-CCP-hang-your-head-in-shame chant; let's get something actionable out of it. Esna's got a lot of it already. I'm just going to hit a few things as I think of them, and hopefully we can flesh it all out nicely.
In no particular order, the problems;
* Time dilation for the empire fleet;
* Nullsec chokepoints channeled empire fleet into null blocs' guns;
* Events all EU TZ during week;
* Short notice;
* Roleplay background weak.
Some of these have conflicting solutions. For instance, reinforcing a node can only do so much, especially when hundreds or thousands of players are moving; one solution would be to not do a news broadcast CTA which draws players like moths to the flame. This, however, runs the risk of events occurring for only the select few that have been made aware of it; this can lead to accusations of favoritism, wastes of resources, and so on. So-- I'm going to offer a few solutions per bullet point, and we can see which ones keep coming up.
* Time dilation for the empire fleet;
1) Smaller player counts. This can be done either by avoiding mass CTAs by alluding to events instead of posting mass invites, or by posting immediately before events instead of a day or more. An alternative example: "CONCORD announced that it will be requesting assistance for task forces venturing into unsecure space in the coming days and weeks. Pilots wishing to assist CONCORD are directed to monitor neocom channel 'XYZ blahdiblah' for the formation of task forces. Operational security requires that rally points, destinations, and times not be announced until immediately before an operation."
2) A jump bridge may have reduced travel-related tidi; instead of dozens of systems of travel, it would have been a single session change. I'm not sure if a bridge is a possibility, given game rules; it might be possible to bridge out, but not in, or it may simply not be possible to open a bridge at all.
2) Reinforcing nodes. Jita hosts impressive player counts, but most are docked up, and combat is fairly light, if constant. Odds are a reinforced node will help with time dilation, but the question is one of degrees, not absolutes. A thousand players shooting at each other will almost certainly hit 10% tidi.
* Nullsec chokepoints channeled empire fleet into null blocs' guns;
1) Destinations should not be broadcast before the event. If an opfor rally point is announced, it needs to be far enough away that the destination isn't clear; odds are the defenders/opfor will be closer, and so any time advantage will make the opfor gatecamp significantly more potent.
2) A jump bridge would move combat from the gates to a cyno; this would prevent an established camp with tacticals and anchored bubbles on gate. While it's still likely to be a slaughter with a nullsec alliance against a kitchen sink event fleet, it increases the ability of players to get through the blockade. Further, it cuts the time advantage of the defenders, time from destination announcement to arrival is cut to minutes from hours. Possible issue as before; can a jump bridge be opened in high security space? If not, an Empire titan in lowsec would be a MASSIVE bullseye. Frig. Can you imagine trying to explain that in prime fiction?
3) Alternatively, possibly using faction contacts to invite support from appropriate blocs would reduce the zerging of nullsec alliances? However, this runs smack into favoritism accusations again by multiple angles.
* Events all EU TZ during week;
Preamble: this is a known issue. At present, there isn't a reliable solution as event staff are bulked out by CCP volunteers, and CCP's event staff operates from Iceland. If additional event staff are hired at Atlanta, we may see more reliable non-EU TZ events.
1) Smaller events in US TZ may deal with US TZ being unable to attend any events; this reduces but doesn't eliminate the Iceland TZ issue, as while they'd still need event staff hours, CCP wouldn't be as reliant on volunteers to fill out bodies for large actor fleets.
2) ???
* Short notice;
Preamble: this runs into the issues above. Too much notice, and even if CCP tries to mitigate tidi and camping, the server will explode as players all plan to jam into a system at a given time.
Question: is there a solution that allows players to schedule time without killing CCP's hamsters?
* Roleplay background weak;
Preamble: I think we all agree this is a bit silly. "It's a big deal! Everyone wants players to join up! Join up, join up! Piwats, join those guys! Big deal time!"
1) Events need a longer lead-up, fluff-wise; this went from OH HAI NEWS to OH HAI EVENT in a single post and chronicle. Longer lead-time gives more opportunities for devious events that are more than shoot-actors-at-X-day-and-time, and for more player involvement in fluff. Further, it gives more time to explain strange alliances. Why would Sansha want to be there, for instance? Given the ideological differences between factions and how these are often posed as deep divisions, we may need to reestablish that, indeed, these factions often ally themselves out of necessity and convenience. Having Angel and Sansha interaction over Jove tech makes a lot of sense, if we remember to portray the Sansha as more than EVE Borg. (with all due respect to TS-F and Shaktipat; this is more an issue with common misconceptions of EVE lore, and CCP's sparing news updates reducing factions to simple stereotypes)
2) ?
So-- other problems? Solutions to existing problems? Madness and lunacy on my part?
Jump bridges : even if that doesn't work in high sec with dev tools - which I highly doubt, it should work fine - they can just deploy a titan or a just large collidable jump bridges or even unstable wormholes like they did for the sansha events and say "THIS IS YOUR BRIDGE PILOTS" and then space magic teleport us into the target area like they already do for the alliance tournament.
I'm hoping to get some clarity into this mess, from the fallout ensuing in the following days. Because right now, anyone that said "null folks are going ot get force-fed loads of kills" were completely right on the money.
I'm more disgusted with null getting more shit they don't deserve handed to them, than CCP's fuck-ups. How many times is this going to happen before someone in CCP realizes that people that live in high-sec/low-sec are not free food for their beloved Empyrians out in null?
Nullsec alliances are unofficial shareholders. They have to keep them happy.
Either way, they need to make the event last longer so that their whole player base can play. Sometimes, that means CCP people might have to go to work early to monitor the server or stay up late. I used to pull 60-72 hours to get our EMEA Starbucks projects done by deadline, so maybe I'm looking at this from the wrong angle? They could just stagger their staff. If you want to put on an event, it makes sense to have people around for the entire time.
I wouldnt want that my company suddenly told me to make so many extra hours at night just like that. Even if it's a job in the gaming industry, it remains a job, one which is exhausting. Gaming industry may be famous for that kind of things - they must be a job they love after all, why not doing extra unpaid hours ? - but if they really want to extend their hours to other timezones, either they hire event actors in Atlanta again, or either they hire specific job where it's written on the contract that they can have to shift their hours to later hours some special days. By the way, when the event actors were all based in Atlanta, most events used to happen in US TZ. EU were at that time the ones bitching about the hours of most events iirc. But most of the time, for the sansha events for example, they tried to remain in the main EU TZ though, and accomodate both.
4. Short notice probably wasn't intentional. This all smacks of horrible planning on CCP's part, which is why the theory Kalaratiri related doesn't make any sense (we aren't pissed at our empires or CONCORD, we're pissed at CCP). If they wanted us to be pissed at the Empires or CONCORD, they should have gotten the capsuleers to the target efficiently, then betrayed them there. All in all, it looks like CCP just thought they'd put this together for fun and ended up shooting themselves in the foot with bad planning and execution.
From experience, I would say that you are very optimistic. People are already ICly trashing CONCORD even more for being crass incompetent. Like if it wasnt already the case before. Everyone trashes on CONCORD. It has always been a fad, "CONCORD prevents me to blow up planets !" "CONCORD prevents me to shoot at other people and I don't care if there is wardecs for that !" "CONCORD kill mothers and eat children !" etc etc.
Then it comes to something slightly off topic, but the way the event team is handling their events and the "live" lore of the universe, is being utterly done at the expense of minor factions. It's always about the Minmatar Republic, the Gallente Federation, the Caldari State and the Amarr Empire, because that would be too complicated for the average player otherwise or I don't know... But on the long run it is seriously harming the lesser factions that either get into oblivion (the less damage) or dragged like CONCORD into the mud again and again and again because after all, nobody cares. I have never asked for them to do a specific event only including Mordu loyalists or whatever, but they could include them sometimes as a central incentive to the plot, or flesh them out a little more.
I'll also add that I have a fundamental issue with pre-determined live event conclusions.
Because wtf is the point if no side has a chance to effect what happens?
It has always been the case with CCP, bare a few recent counter example with that freighter event... They don't really think this is roleplaying, for them it's just pay your ticket and enjoy your movie, you are spectator. It has always been like that, even with Aurora.
As a pirate sider who was there, here are my few thoughts.
It was a complete clusterfuck. Even before the amarr/caldari fleet arrived to Doril gates the "pirate defenders" we're quite happily killing each other as they were waiting for the main course. I ended up as Tornado food myself. There was no organization on the pirate side either. To add insult to injury for the empire folks the easiest way to Curse has a bunch of nulsec alliances living in it who camp the system almost daily. So when CCP announces "Free buffet" on news feed all of them are going to log in.
I went anyway since, at least I did want to try to put my space action inline with the RP even though I knew exactly what I was walking into - gotta keep stacking that Angel Cred, yo. As far as I can tell I was the only Angel Cartel loyalist wizard hatter in Utopia and RMOC-W amidst bunch of nulseccers.
Only thing that really makes me annoyed is the fact that the game was rigged from the start. It didn't matter for the empire forces if they broke through or not if the objectives could not actually be destroyed, and that frankly sucks and makes the whole event pointless. Not to mention it makes it a hollow victory, if you can even call it that.
On the other hand. Yay, Angel Cartel event. And ICly "Yay, Angel Cartel wins".
I heard that Stillwater managed to ask the event actors permission to go camp elsewhere since they feared to get crushed by goons in the local system, and they managed to kill a lot of reinforcement or fleeing empire loyalists.
At least that was good improvisation, but they are a rare example where it was possible.
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Topic: BREAKING NEWS: THE EMPIRES CALL FOR AID (Read 19315 times)