As you may know, CCP is looking into changing NPC station fees in preparation for player owned Citidels. Post change optimally low NPC broker fees will increase from .4% or so to 3.5%. Meanwhile Citidel broker fees will be set by Citidel owning players meaning owning players will be allowed to charge as little or as much as those players choose.
“So ends NPC Jita 4-4’s reign,” wail the masses. This puzzles me. 1) NPC stations will continue to provide services Citidels won’t like contracts and ranged orders. 2) NPC stations remain undestroyable. 3) NPC stations like Jita 4-4 won’t deny you access. 4) NPC stations won’t underhandedly jack up broker fees on you. As full range dependable service is a pretty big deal, I’m confident many a Capsuleer, myself included, will continue making extensive use of NPC stations.
Premature Jita 4-4 death knell prognostications aside, I’m even more puzzled by what many players conclude the fee change really means. CCP states, “The goal of such changes is to give more flexibility for Citadel owners to make a profit when charging their services to the public, while making sure they are profitable enough to compete versus NPC station services.” Meanwhile fellow soloish player Luobote Kong concludes something altogether more sinister, “The ‘choice’ CCP present[s] is to either be taxed heavily by NPC stations or submit to the gameplay of the large ingame groups.”
As a fellow soloish Eve player these last seven years, I can appreciate Kong’s anti-group approach but it saddens me to see such approach shackle his view of CCP’s game design intentions. When CCP says they’re trying to make Citidels competitive I’m inclined to believe them. Anti-group dissident Kong can’t see only that. Rather, he sees CCP intentionally forcing him into group reliant submission. CCP, according to Kong aren’t merely attempting to enable/enhance group play, rather they are equally motivated by desire to destroy soloish play. Such zero sum thinking puzzles me.
If you play Eve ‘to win’ I suppose Eve is a zero-sum game. Being a winner requires defeated losers after all. So far I haven’t been motivated to win Eve. I’ve merely wanted to thrive. Accordingly, when CCP dishes me change (and over seven years plenty of change has been dished) I rarely worry about whether I, or anybody else are being handed glorious victory or ignominious defeat. Instead, I examine the new environment looking for ways to adapt and thrive. Post Citidels, currying favor with NPC entities will remain long grind work. Meanwhile, currying favor with fellow players – should it come to that – will remain mostly making friendly noises. I can adapt to that and I suspect Kong can too though it may grate on him because the wrong players – group players – are ‘winning’. Why thriving isn’t good enough for fellow soloish players like Kong is mystery to me.
CasualEve 
EVE becomes a zero-sum game if anyone you interact with is playing ‘to win’, not just you personally. Even if a soloish player is content simply to thrive, that doesn’t mean much if a larger victory-oriented group decides to make them into one of those requisite ‘losers’.
For the record, I don’t expect the worst-case scenarios to come true this time around, and I’m not all that concerned about Citadels. I’ll keep trading in NPC hubs as long as it’s feasible, and cross any other bridges only if they actually materialise.
That doesn’t mean I don’t understand the concern, though. Player-ownership of the game’s major trade hubs would represent an incredibly powerful economic weapon – not only through the massive war-chests that can be filled by the fees, but also through the ability to cut off access to said markets.
In EVE as it stands today, even the largest group has limits on it’s power and reach – it is possible to thumb one’s nose at them and thrive regardless. I suspect that what Kong fears is a scenario where that is no longer an option.
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Raphael,
I agree in one sense and disagree in two senses.
Agree:
Worst case scenario fears are overblown.
Disagree:
1) I believe Kong is more than merely concerned that in the future he won’t be able to thumb his nose at the largest groups. I believe he’s annoyed at the very prospect of those groups thriving. It’s a strange stance if you ask me since it means he derives at least some of his Eve pleasure not from what he actually does in game but rather from ongoing, disconnected large group misery. It would make more sense if Kong pursued tormenting large groups in game but I’ve seen no evidence of that. Accordingly, he’s mostly watching the spectacle while vociferously complaining that CCP doesn’t persecute the gladiators enough.
2) “EVE becomes a zero-sum game if anyone you interact with is playing ‘to win’, not just you personally.” I’m reminded of a story from several years back. I was eating lunch with several other employees when the fellow next to me enthusiastically declared, “I win!” I looked at him puzzled so he elaborated, “I finished my lunch before you finished yours. I win!” I replied with bemused eye roll. His enthusiastic declaration that not only was a competition underfoot but that he had won and I had lost didn’t make it so. It takes at least two to compete. Eve is no different. Discovering you can’t blithely do what you want where you want when you want in New Eden is not humiliating defeat, rather its learning that Eve is a dangerous place you must navigate. Each player chooses for themselves how to steer the hazardous shoals. Whether danger originates from menacing NPCs (like all powerful CONCORD) or malevolent players (Grrr Goons!) makes no difference.
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“It takes at least two to compete”.
True, in a sense, but only for one definition of ‘compete’. You can choose whether or not to try to defeat an aggressor, but you don’t always have a choice over whether to respond. If your coworker had decided that his victory condition was eating your lunch as well as his own, I suspect that you would have needed a stronger response than just an eye-roll.
Similarly, there are no shortage of players in EVE who measure their own success in game by the damage they inflict on other players – in real terms, not just in symbolic, ‘I finished first’ gestures. To borrow a phrase: progress is measured in colonies burned, ships destroyed, people killed, money earned. Crossing paths with a player like that doesn’t mean you’re forced to try to beat them at their own game … but even if you choose to evade-and-survive instead of going toe-to-toe with them, you can’t choose not to engage at all. (Or, at least, the only way to do so is to log out and play something else – which is a direct loss for the game as a whole.)
The more resources said players have access to, the more dangerous the universe becomes for anyone who finds themselves in their sights – which sounds an awful lot like ‘zero-sum’ to me.
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So erm… seems I said something. So my selective quote would be: “Now I don’t want to believe this is CCP’s intention, but I am struggling to see how it isn’t. I was a Citadel enthusiast but where is the carrot?” Doesn’t really fit your narrative.
But onto your selective quote “The ‘choice’ CCP present[s] is to either be taxed heavily by NPC stations or submit to the gameplay of the large ingame groups.”. Now this isn’t actually wrong. It is the design intention of CCP to make people use citadels. Citadels owned by a small subset of the playerbase. To do this they have decided to make NPC stations less attractive. It’s not sinister. CCP have stated it. To say i can’t see it is a tad disingenuous.
Now the bit where I get precious is where I become dependent on another entity to play my game. Currently I don’t need anyone. In future I might well not have an alternative. It’s a big change if it is a defining characteristic of you game. Irrelevant if it is not. But for me it’s a big change. Either I am independent or I am not. So yes perhaps zero sum there but should it not sadden you that the playstyle ecology of Eve is being thinned out a little? Thanks for reading though and discourse is always a good thing.
So now @Dire. You are being a rascal. I don’t have any ingame interaction with any large group (positive or negative) apart from occasionally with Signal Cartel. The large groups just aren’t relevant to my gameplay so ingame I have no opinion of them. Out of game is slightly different. I write occasionally for CZ which is a frothing den of people from all of Eve’s persuasions. But I rarely mention names or groups until I get dragged in. Imperium declaring war on everyone for example, Sion and his stance on the community and indeed TMC for citing my post on Tea as part of an anti goon conspiracy.
But why should I torment anyone in game? It’s not what I do. It is the antithesis of what I do.
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Kong! I’m pleased you happened along. I never know when I’m talking about somebody behind their back if I should inform them or not. Usually I include links to the whispered about’s statements allowing readers to decide for themselves if I’m treating them fairly. And I am being a bit of a rascal, at least in the sense of using your statements as vehicle to get at points I want to make. Now on to the topic at hand . . .
It’s the nature of the language in your original post and this follow up comment that captures my attention. Quoting you:
“either be taxed heavily by NPC stations or submit to the gameplay of the large ingame groups”
‘Submit’? If at some point in the future I decide to conduct business out of a player owned citadel, it won’t be a capitulation on my part, it will be a hardnosed, improve my situation choice.
Quoting you again:
“if you wish to remain independent then it is likely if not certain that you will be paying more ISK for the privilege”
‘Privilege’? Choosing to be a soloish independent player is not a special exemption we have to pay extra for, rather it’s the ‘state of nature’ where we all begin and many stay. Over the years CCP have tweaked taxes and fees but I’ve always felt they were motivated by desire to nurture a healthy ecosystem rather than buff or nerf my specific game.
And finally:
“It is the design intention of CCP to make people use citadels”
‘Make’? If CCP wanted to force us out of NPC stations they could simply alter the underlying code and deny us access.
All CCP is doing is trying to give citadel sized groups a realistic opportunity to drop a citadel and attempt to entice me and people like me out of our cozy NPC station homes. There’s the carrot. If a citadel owner is going entice me and people like me into working with them I’m going to expect a healthy tuber slice. Sans slice, I’ll stick with my NPC buddies.
If large groups are genuinely irrelevant to our gameplay Kong, what difference does it make to us who owns the station/citadel we’re working out of?
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So your last point first. Currently large groups are irrelevant yes. In future no. I cannot set up a medium citadel with a market. CCP has disallowed that option specifically because they want larger groups to set up first with L and XL Citadels. Not me saying that. CSM minutes and dev blogs say that. CCP have also said in the past (though it might have been draft thinking and their view might have changed) that they want to remove NPC stations.
What difference does it make to us who owns the station/citadel we’re working out of? Why wouldn’t it matter? Why should I have to pay another player entity any ISK at all? And I don’t, but my future choice is to use NPC market with an increased activity tax or I pay more – stupidly more in time and ISK to set up a L Citadel if I wish to remain independent as I currently am.
So it costs more to do the same and possibly less (but still more than now in all likelihood) to use third party citadels. Therefore choosing to play Eve – the privilege of playing Eve has just got more expensive (Time/ISK/PLEX) but offers only the same service as you had before. This is not an improvement. It is not extra fun or engagement or ingame opportunity. It is an additional toll to just do the same but it has no personal value proposition. Sure the citadel builders have more toys and options, but their personal joy will not recompense the disadvantage placed on my gameplay.. .
Now the obvious retort is I should wipe away any tears and play Eve differently. Its an option. But I sort of tried that before. Frankly, I really didn’t like that Eve. I just didn’t find it that impressive (and that might hint at my pseudo anti establishment stance). The solo independent lifestyle was my second choice and my last shot at it after a break of about a year. It worked. But, while I care deeply about Eve (I wouldn’t have kept trying it if I didn’t), I don’t think I could stomach starting it over again. I would just concede the Eve has won. But we are not at that point yet. Lets see what fanfest announces first
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