In June I hit 100m skill points and 4 years of PVP activity every month. In just a few days I will hit my 5 year anniversary of playing EVE. However, this summer was also my lowest period of activity in 4 years. I did a few solo roams, a few public fleets, updated market orders a few times, and that was about it--a very stark contrast to the fall and winter of 2015 and early 2016 which were my most active months ever. It's not so much that I was tired of EVE, but a few reasons led me to need a break, reasons which probably resonate with many players that share my playstyles.
1. Increased connection issues
Even though I don't experience lag or latency issues in any other online game (and experience very low ping
and a stable connection), my last year playing EVE has been a constant
battle against disconnects, bugs, and socket losses. On an average
play session I will experience roughly 1-2 disconnects, sometimes
many more, even while my internet connection is otherwise stable.
(E.g., on a casual roam through null I typically experience 1-2
disconnects every hour.) There also seems to be a rising number of bugs in the game, some of which affect my playstyle. For instance, the market window frequently "desyncs" when selecting a new item listing, updating the item listing but displaying the previous item's buy/sell orders. It definitely tilts me when I die on a roam due to lag or disconnects,
though in some cases it results in funny fights such as in this video (one of the only EVE pvp videos I've made).
2. Unfortunately, and inescapably, less
players simply means less content for me
One of the best things about being
involved in solo PVP is that you are your own FC, and do not rely on
others for creating content. Yet, in another way, you are entirely
dependent on others for content—you rely on people actually being
in space. When the average number of players drops below 20k, you
feel it acutely. The time in between fights—or even seeing another
player in space—has steadily increased over the years I've played
EVE. These days, even at prime hours, many systems are empty--systems that in 2011-2013 were very active--and few
that are flying in space are looking for a fight (or, if they are,
they are looking for an easy killmail).
Some roams I encounter more people afk
at gates in null than I do solo or small gangs looking for
a fight. Solo PVP has always been a niche activity in a niche game,
but I feel it is hit particularly hard by periods of low player
activity. When the game is buzzing with activity, people solo more;
when it is stagnant, I think people fleet up more. This is true even for me:
my main PVP activity over the past 3 months has been from Zarvox's
amazingly fun Saturday interceptor fleets.
 |
| Saturday = Zarvox interceptor fleet day lately |
Things haven't been entirely terrible;
I've found solo fights here and there, such as a roam in a ferox
where I snagged a
blingy
rapier, then
took
out 2 svipuls
and
a sabre
before
dying to the
6+ other svipuls in the gang. It was fun, but finding such
content just takes so long these days, far longer than I often have
time to play for. I am definitely roaming more lately as activity increases as EVE nears the major November release, but my feeling is that the amount of relatively inactive months out of the year is growing. I hope that trend reverses.
My other main activity is the market,
and it, too, suffers from low player numbers. Sure, my PLEX stack has
risen in value over the past 3 months from when PLEX was sitting around 800-900m (see my previous post!), and I still make a decent
profit from my local market trading, but the markets over the last 3
months have simply been boring. Little activity, little velocity in
isk, little speculation, and slow turnover. Again, the November release should reverse this trend, with new structures and the Alpha clone option coming.
3. The glacially slow balance progress,
even by EVE's standards
The balance pass on T3 destroyers, link
changes, Citadel improvements, and other balance updates were
originally planned for a summer release, and instead mostly got pushed back
to late fall. Announcements at 2016's fanfest were largely for features we knew were coming (with some, like some of the aforementioned, planned for summer, then pushed back), and the year's major focus on capital rebalance was a ton of time for little gain. According to zkill data, carriers are involved in almost 2x more kills than last year, but lost at around the same (or less) numbers. Dreads are roughly used (in kills and losses) the same amount. Remember, CCP's explicitly stated goal was to have capitals used more, and lost much more often, so they at best failed on half of their design goal...the more important half, from my perspective.
I support CCP's decision to move back to expansions,
yet am disappointed with how little balance work 2016 will see
compared to every previous year I've played EVE, where dozens of
ships across multiple classes were rebalanced in interesting ways for
each expansion. From my perspective, it is better for the game to make frequent small balance passes even if it results in some ships being overpowered and others underpowered, than it is to have few balance passes and a stagnant meta for long periods.
These days, the ship balance team (only about 3 devs,
remember) is spread thin—they also work on module and item balance,
structure design and balance, events like the AT that take months of
preparation, and new and important (/s) ship designs and releases
like faction capitals that 1 or maybe 2 players will regularly use.
This has left ships like the Svipul and weapon classes like ECM and Rapid Lights in dire need of even a quick
balance pass—just lowering a few numbers like base speed on the Svipul would have
been a fine temporary patch—for around a year. Sadly, the solution
seems to be that CCP simply needs more developers, and for that they
need more players.
4. Disappointing events
The events CCP were incorporating in
between their rotation of expansions at first showed promise. The
success of the few first events in 2015 like the Crimson Harvest were
based, I think, on the good rewards, the ability to run the sites in
almost any ship or fitting, and the benefits of running the sites in
dangerous space. I had a few great fights (some win and some lose) in
low, null, and wormhole space running these sites or catching someone
running them. Later events, though, jettisoned these elements and
opted for more of a slow grind in sites designed for mission running
ships, culminating in the Shadow of the Serpent Event. I truly did
try to enjoy the event, even getting to the first tier “chest”
unlock, but the event lacked any potential player conflict and took a
monumental amount of largely afk grinding to progress. My
disappointment was widely shared by players, especially since the
event turned out to be the only real content over the summer months. The more recent Purity of the Throne event was an improvement, and I really appreciated getting an entire skin set for Amarr ships, but the event did still lack the conflict drivers that we saw in the first few.
Am I hopeful for brighter days in EVE's
future, days of 40k average players logged in, better and faster
balance and bug passes, and tons of people to fight? Definitely. I am
hopeful that the “freemium” mode coming in November will bring in
a large chunk of new and returning players to the game. I would love
to see the average number of players double or triple in November or
return to 2010-2014 levels, and stay that way more permanently this
time. I believe EVE is a good enough game to deserve far more players
than it currently has, and hopeful that the Alpha clone option will
be enough to hook many new players.
