To be blunt and upfront immediately, I could not care less about live events. I talked a bit yesterday about the contrivances of online roleplaying. I find the idea of players affecting some overarching developer-defined story to be even more contrived.
So what's my problem with developer-derived plot-driven events? Well, for one, these events are simply carrots. Most players show up to them hoping for loot drops or cool killmails on favourite (or not) developers. It doesn't really matter what story-element is meant to be forwarded by these events, because those story-elements will always be driven-forward. The event will always "be successful" in the players' favour. These things are mostly linear, and it would take a complete meltdown of the player community if enough people didn't show up to complete the objective. Completion of the objective is nearly a guarantee, which is hardly effective storytelling.
The story itself is hardly even the point. And most players have no clue what's going on. All most people know is "Devs, cool stuff in their holds, kill them, get loot." Imagine a live event, the backstory being a small group of rebels is heading out to kill the Amarrian Empress, Jamyl Sarum. If the small group of rebels is destroyed, the assassination plot fails. This would be the usual local chatter during the event:
Player01: What is this about? I heard devs were here. Is this some story thing?The small rebel fleet of devs is, of course, killed. They were mauled by over 100 players. Later, on the forums, six people crow about how cool it was to alter and have an effect on the storyline of EVE.
Player02: Just kill devs. They have deadspace and officer mods equipped.
Player01: Oh. Cool.
Player03: WHERE ARE THE DEVS?
Player02: Planet 2, Moon 6.
Player04: Can I use a cruiser to destroy devs?
Player05: If devs kill me can I petition to get my ship back? I don't think devs should be killing players.
Player06: Kill: CCP Punkturis (Vindicator)
Player06: Woot!
(And even if, through some billion-to-one chance where players didn't show up in droves, Jamyl Sarum were killed, what effect would it have on the game? None, at all. Some new NPC leader would be appointed and the game would carry on as it ever does.)
The problem with live events, in any MMO, not just EVE Online, is that they are devoid of consequence. Even if two possible outcomes are given for an event, the outcomes are never negative. Events always result in some net positive to the player community (usually loot drops), or nothing at all. The face of the game never changes, the game remains as static as it ever was. So the stories themselves are meaningless.
Rather than waste time and resources on these live events, companies, such as CCP, should be developing more tools so that players can affect the status quo themselves. In a sandbox, like EVE Online, players are the content, they create the content. More ability to shake up the static nature of the game should be available, especially to highsec and npc nullsec space (areas of New Eden don't get more static and meaningless than this.)
Take sovereignty nullsec. Or faction warfare lowsec space. These are areas of space where players have control over their stories, and the outcomes of their stories have a meaningful effect on the gameplay of other players. They're dynamic environments. In faction warfare, the results of battles can result in the loss of access to stations, can result in the lowering of loyalty point rewards. These are meaningful mechanics that create positive and negative outcomes.
Nothing players do can affect anything in highsec. Or NPC nullsec. So rather than waste time and energy on live events, which have no consequences on the gamespace, the development of mechanics that can affect the gamespace in these areas would be useful, perhaps even needed and lauded.
Hell, perhaps the results of faction warfare have an effect on their factions as a whole. Perhaps if the Amarr are losing their war against the Minmatar, taxes and broker fees increase across the board in Amarr space. The converse happens if a faction is winning the war. Perhaps key systems are programmed to flip allegiances or stargates are programmed to turn off/on given the current status of a war. There are likely a tonne of ideas that could be implemented. Things that don't overly skew the game towards any particular side, but give (or take away) enough utility to make players care a tad more about involving themselves in the player-content.
Live events. I think they're a waste of time. Some of you don't. For those that do support live events, what exactly do you get out of them? How do they benefit the game overall?
Your previous post (about how your character's corp history only makes sense in an out-of-game context) illuminates part of the problem. Players have weak (if any) ties to the game-lore factions. It's not like the fleet defending against the Serpentis fleet was mostly Gallente bloodline characters, and it's not like any groups seriously considered supporting the CCP squad.
ReplyDeletePerhaps the solution is to try and calcify player allegiance by linking player corps to the major in-game factions. Perhaps every player corp has to pledge allegiance to one of the NPC factions. Once you do this, players have a connection to the story. Anyone who aligns with Serpentis can get standings (or LP, or ISK, or ...) for helping the CCP Serpentis fleet, while Gallente players can get the same rewards for attacking the fleet.
I think this will provide motivation for players to fight on both sides of future live events. And when there are players on both sides, victory becomes both relative and uncertain, which means it becomes possible for players to influence the lore.
Of course, this approach won't stop such events becoming a clusterf*ck, with random other factions making an appearance to whore on KMs and bow up random players. But simply attach rewards/penalties to these actions, and bam! Instant meaning!
But Eve is about the players making the game. That is the problem with some of the apathetic nature of these events.
DeleteIf I want to be tied to one 'side' or the other I'll go and join faction warfare or roleplay.
I want to play spaceships with other players. I want to play in a world where its about my intaractions with the other players for reasons we have as people. I do not *care* about the NPCs or their 'lore' nor do I want to.
Your meaning only has meaning if someone cares about those things. Many people do not care about many of those things. ISK, LP, etc. That's not what drives people. Forcing them into it would suck. What about Sov Null? Why would they align with an empire faction? Why then would others be penalized by being forced to align with one when they want to avoid null.
Neutrality is a real thing and a powerful force. Some people want to chose every side or both sides. To chose one, to align with it already has a place in the game for people to go to if that is what they wish.
It should not be forced on everyone.
TL;DR: Sugar does not approve of players being forced to roleplay
Then just ignore them and don't take part in them... simple
DeleteLive events don't need no ISK or loot as reward beacause they arent about geting you rich
DeleteI agree that factions have no consequence today. If Amarr got hosed in FW causing taxes to go up then people would just empty out of Amarr. As the earlier post noted, there is nothing that makes an Amarr character favor that faction.
DeleteIf you wanted the factions to matter then you could have a mechanic to declare a citizenship per character (no connection to FW corps) and anyone who isn't a citizen of the faction has to pay a higher set of taxes/fees. If you really want to be rough, have them pay a fee just to traverse that faction's gates.
But more importantly, CCP direction appears to be towards making lore and factions irrelevant. In the spirit of player-driven content, if you want factions to be relevant then you need to have players driving them. Allow for a yearly selection of the leaders of each faction and allow them to set some attributes of that faction. The selection method might vary based on the lore of that faction, but should only involve characters who are citizens of that faction. Gallente would elect based on one character one vote, Caldari perhaps by bidding war, Amarr or Minmitar via trial by combat? At first CCP might tie this to FW, allowing them to match up faction-wide tax rates to LP store payouts in FW. If the idea is successful, then this could be extending to setting security status of system or even changing who the opponents in FW are so we aren't locked into the same one we have now.
Disagree with the OP. So what if the live event is just a pretext? Getting the Devs into the game pewpewing with players is what counts. Plus (and I say this as someone who doesn't give a crap about the lore and has never participated in a live event) they are probably pretty fun for the players and the Devs. The Devs can spare a few hours from working on the code to interact with the players in an entertaining fashion. It's a good way for the Devs to blow off steam, every player who participates enjoys it, it shows the Devs involvement with the players, and at most it delays the next patch by a day. Where's the harm?
ReplyDeleteI'm sure the devs have better ways to blow off steam than play EVE. And if they're participating in a live event, at their desks, in the office ... then it's still a job for them.
DeleteI could really give a crap if the devs fly around and allow themselves to get blown up by players or not. What purpose does it serve? Does it really attract new people to the game? Wouldn't it be better to have tools that allow players to affect the game, rather than these loot carrots the devs throw out every so often?
Right, but what does it hurt? We're talking about a few hours of CCP code-work-time in exchange for their interaction with the players and first-hand experience of actual gameplay.
Delete"According to the developers Eve Online evolved from the classic computer game Elite, which itself was based on concepts from the science-fiction role-playing game Traveller."
ReplyDeletehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eve_Online
I was pretty happy on the event which happen after incarna, as it was another way for the devs to makes us understand they were back, and the event was a pretty funny battle.
ReplyDeleteHowever, I didn't went at all on the last ones, as it was a pain to move, and they weren't lasting long enough to bother.
I like story elements on MMOs, but only when you have control of the rhythm. Like playing a story quest when you want, taking your time to watch cinematics and reading the stuff, and doing that when you're on the mood. Well in fact I said something important, I said I was "watching it", not that I was playing a part on it. Lore is something you don't control.
And lore on a MMO is often wrong done. I'll always remember when I was playing WoW as a low level long ago, when I first saw the nice dragon spy because of the action of another player when I was moving around, and got spoiled for something 40lv later.
For me lore are story elements that are made to be soloplayer, they don't fill well with multiplayer.
I likes events which last a few days on a game, but honestly I don't really care about an events which last a few hours and, as you said, won't change anything for us.
Seriously if they want to do these kind of things, they should offer some tools for players who wants to, with some little GM power carefully monitored. I'm sure lots of roleplayers would love that, and use it way better than the devs themselves.
what purpose is your flying and explosing for those who dont give crap about fw ? i like reading your blog. bit lately it seems you have nothing to say, so you rant about random things.
ReplyDeleteI've never had a specific topic focus for the blog.
DeleteLive events neither make nor break the game. Just like the Alliance Tournaments, they are just something to break up the monotony.
ReplyDeletePersonally, though, I'd like to see more devs actually playing the game. At least, they might make fewer stupid mistakes when tweaking around with the code and game design.
And, ofc, put Soundwave and Co. in mining ships and let them run a mining op, or ask them to run a bunch of goodies in haulers from Jita to other stations in high sec. Let's see how long they last before they get ganked.
On anonymous characters? They'd probably never get ganked provided they didn't do something like not tank their easy to fit mining ship or put massive amounts of high value items in a t1 industrial or freighter.
DeleteNo, not on anonymous characters.
Delete"... provided they didn't do something like not tank their easy to fit mining ship or put massive amounts of high value items in a t1 industrial or freighter."
What's to say they would not do exactly this? Few, if any, of the devs have any experience in mining or hauling.
Nor, for that matter, much experience in anything to do with high sec game play. This is evident from many of the bad game design decisions and implementations in the recent expansions, such as the wardec system.
In short: No, live events aren't a waste of time.
ReplyDeleteThey just add another kind of flavor to the universe. It doesn't seem to hit your flavor but that doesn't mean no one else could enjoy it.
"Well, for one, these events are simply carrots. Most players show up to them hoping for loot drops or cool killmails on favourite (or not) developers."
ReplyDeleteYou know live events arent about loot. Yes most people from null and some pirates from low give a fuck about live events(and about the lore) and go there just fuck everyone up beacause everything must be ass they see fit.
You don't have to take part if them, but they will still be there.
Dev actors that kill you during live event wont refund you your ship beacause you petition it.
Me any many other people like them if you are not evere.
PS. DevCaravan is/was not a live event.
It's I COULD NOT CARE LESS, what you wrote makes zero sense! *angryfist*
ReplyDeleteIntegral story in eve is worse than pointless, IMO, as it's counterproductive to the player-made narrative in nearly all examples.
The Incursion community is/was a perfect example of this; exactly no-one cared about the 'story' and instead immediately turned it into a farming exercise, and the narrative became one of "evil griefers vs carebears."
Content in Eve should always be like lego blocks, and not a book.
Fucker. But yeah. I should know better. But maybe I couldn't care less.
DeleteThe live event stories are not even as dynamic as a Choose Your Own Adventure book. Hell, even a Choose Your Own Adventure book has consequences.
Well, having to go back to where you stuck your finger in the pages isn't really a meaningful consequence ;)
DeleteLive events do not have to have predetermined outcomes.
ReplyDeleteIn EVE Live Events often were open-ended to some degree (e.g. the Amarr Succession Trials) or ended in an unexpected fashion that was nevertheless recognized by CCP (e.g. Fatal being podded).
In 2007 a script for a planned live event was leaked that said:
"As said earlier, we can have the ending open if allowed by you or we can stack the cards in favor of Theology Council so that we after the arc go back to a T2 status quo for the Empire, but without any Tetrimon Cult (who will be forever branded traitors of the Empire and utterly wiped out)."
The suggestion that CCP might stack the cards of a live events so it would come to a predetermined outcome regardless of the players' actions lead to a big discussion.
CCP (having to deal with massive accusations of favoritism at the time) reacted heavy-handedly, locking threads and issuing official statements that defended their right to "decid[e] which direction to move EVE's Prime Fiction".
The players were split between "Running an open-ended event is hardly feasible on this scale", "Linear events are meaningless and stupid, this is a sandbox game where players should decide the outcome" and a "Give players many opportunities for choices but make sure all choices redirect to the same limited set of outcomes" (basically the "Choose your own adventure" approach).
The leaked live event's script was never finalized and Aurora was put on hiatus a year afterwards, so the discussion didn't reach any definite resolution.
Live events are the MMO version of Pen&Paper RPGs, their quality depends entirely on the flexibility and ingenuity of the game master and the relationship between game master and players.
At the best times game master and players are following up on each others ideas and work together to make a story take form (a recent example would be EVE Rpers using Gravimetric ECM on the wormholes opened by invading Sansha and CCP playing along allowing gravimetric ECM to collapse the wormholes early in subsequent events).
At the worst times the players feel trapped in a linear script and any attempt to deviate from it gets shut down or ignored by the GM.
Live Events are tools for collaborative storytelling and allow a player to be involved in a much wider range of stories than those that can possibly emerge from alliance politics and pvp.
Is pulling the trigger on Band of Brothers more "meaningful" than podding Fatal?
You would probably say "Yes, it affected many players in a very direct way" and I would argue "But for how long? and how much?"
Player alliances come and go, if the dominant alliance falls it only takes a few months for some other alliance to take their place and after a few years only a handful of bittervets even remember their name and past claim to significance - but there are only two Guristas leaders and one of them is now, and forever, brain-damaged or dead.
I don't see a downside to live events. Could they be more interesting, to more people? Sure. Does the fact that they could be better make them worthless? Nope.
ReplyDeleteI love live events! Especially the ones from Ultima Online. In a sandbox game I think they have a lot of cool potential especially for the RPers. I have only attended one Eve Online "live event" and it wasn't the best experience but it was kind of fun.
ReplyDeleteThe event took place in low sec and was only announced shortly before it happened. Once I got there it was clear a corp already camped the warp in with logi and sniping machariels and would wipe the map with any new comers. Not so much fun. The thing is I was kind of wondering how they were so well deployed in such a short time unless they somehow knew about these events before hand or had some idea it was happening before everyone else. I have some suspicions that these RP corps have some level of relationships with the devs who run these things which as a result typically makes it unfair for everyone. But hey, I am having fun doing PVP so it doesn't really bother me. It just seems like you have to "in the know" to get any value from these type of events.
And the lag...I mean cmon its nearly 2013.
Honestly the best live events will be the ones players create themselves. I had an experience on a player run Ultima Online shard where the guilds would host events but also petition the GMs to help add that extra bit of pizazz to make it truly unique(usually a statue or trophy for participants). It also created a really cool layer of history to the shard.