CSM Report: Week Forty Four
Xander Phoena
New Sov
CSM9 continue to provide feedback to CCP on the new sovereignty system you have all now had some time to read and digest. Some of the feedback is being collated from the relevant threads, blogs and private conversations while some of it is our own direct feedback. What I am hearing from the community, both internally within the likes of PL and more publicly on #tweetfleet and elsewhere is very mixed. Some people hate it, some love it, most sit somewhere on the spectrum. I will say, a lot of the pilots I have personally spoken to seem to have more concerns with some of the specifics as opposed to the overall plan. One of the key points of contention is definitely that of the vulnerability window. Most seem to argue that the window should be bigger or perhaps somehow tied into one of the indices being used. Some have asked me if CCP could include the ability to reinforce a structure outside of the window but at a slower rate – an idea I actually like a lot. We’ve had Endie from GSF, Progodlegend from Nulli and Manny and Grath from PL on CZ to discuss this. All are prominent members of their respective alliances with massive experience in sov warfare. They all seems broadly positive on new sov with some very important caveats. They and others are quite correctly pointing out that Phase 3 – the Phase in which we are actually given concrete reasons to want to take sov from someone else – is going to be key. At the moment, there is a lot of conquerable space out there which can best be described as ‘bad’. On the other hand, I understand and agree with CCP doing Phase 3 after the new sov of Phase 2. The other way round would have seen a period of time where the current major blocs simply grow even richer and stronger before sovereignty is changed and that simply couldn’t have happened. A number of people have also talked about the abhorrent state capitals and above are in after new sov hits. It was something I brought up briefly in last week’s report and have leaned on CCP on. Needless to say, they are well aware of the issue. Fozzie spitballed some ideas on an episode of the Eve Down Under Show from last weekend (around 51 minutes in) and some of the people I have spoken are not keen on some of his suggestions – the thought of supers becoming giant link boats does not appeal. I can tell you that CSM9 hadn’t heard this idea before Fozzie mentioned it on the EDU Show – we heard it for the first time when you did. I also don’t think this is in anyway a concrete, definite concept. Clearly the ships need looked at closely but getting sovereignty right is a monumental task. I don’t think capitals and above should be touched until new sov is on TQ and functioning somewhat ‘correctly’. Trying to do a bottom down rework of caps and above at the same time as implementing new sov is likely to result in disaster. There’s clearly a very delicate path they need to weave through this that encompasses new sov, Phase 3, capitals and above rework and rebalancing the likes of T3 cruisers and bombers. Assisting CCP in navigating a course filled with dangers is going to make CSMX’s tenure tough. I missed Friday’s meeting due to being stuck on this here oil rig so I am a little more out the loop than I would like to be. On top of that, I am trying to get all my ducks in a row for Fanfest while continuing to solicit feedback on the shedload of news that has been shovelled our way in the past week or two. I can’t wait to see what else CCP have to announce at Fanfest based on what we’ve got so far. Voting for CSMX closed today so I guess we’ll see if I will be involved in the continuing work next term!About the author
Xander Phoena
The good looking, funny, intelligent member of the team, Xander set up Crossing Zebras with Jeg in April 2012 mainly because he was talking too much about Eve on his other podcast. Playing the game for almost five years, Xander still has absolutely zero clue about how to actually play Eve but somehow still manages to talk a good game.
