Propaganda: Basic Reactions

Balancing equations has never been easier, thanks to the Reddit comments of our friends in Circle of Two!

When balancing equations, don't skimp on the salt.

Enjoy the war, and study for Chem 101 at the same time.

Remembrance and Idealism

Lately, there's been a lot of talk about Dominion sov and Aegis sov. Caprisunkraftfoods, a former alliance-mate and veteran of Black Legion and TISHU, shared some concerns about where Eve is headed. His concerns are incredibly valid, and demonstrate an awareness about the fundamental nature of conflict within the game. I share his concerns, for instance, about industrial citadels, and agree that I don't want POSes to be completely overridden by citadels.

Another former alliance-mate and fellow writer, Seraph Basarab (leaving out the Roman numerals) countered with his own perspective. In his write-up, he widens the focus conveyed within Capri's write-up to show that the story isn't as narrowly focused as one might think. His arguments are all incredibly reasonable.

Though both of them are in TISHU, they have some different interpretations about gameplay, the trajectory of Eve, and the general quality of recent changes. Both of them are right, and that fact alone reveals the complexity of what CCP is trying to accomplish. The simple fact is that yes, CCP has blindly followed their roadmap while completely ignoring player warnings about the inevitable results. This can have terrible consequences if they do everything they intend to do. Yet, the changes they have made to date have a lot of positive results to the game, as Seraph points out. I don't blame Capri for his lack of faith; that position is well-supported by recent rebalances. But nor is Seraph wrong in seeing the positives.

This discussion, though, has spawned a lot of conversation, though, and through that conversation, I've seen a lot of poorly constructed arguments, filled with fallacies that need to be addressed. This piece isn't an attempt to refute either Capri or Seraph, but rather to unpack and deflate some misconceptions and deliberate tricks being used by those supporting the both of them.

A Third Hotspot?

For years, a very limited number of interesting things happened in nullsec. You essentially had two major empires, the CFC and the Russians, with Provibloc seemingly content with its modest region in Providence. But - largely, nothing of much importance happened in other regions of space. The whole south, for instance, was a vast renter wasteland.

Mind you, things happened. Empires lived there, they built up their space, and did all the things people do will null systems. But when you were planning a roam or deciding whether to roam around the systems near where your wormhole popped up, would you even really waste your time going through any other area of space? There was simply too much of nothing around.

And on top of that, Russian space outside of RUTZ was pretty well-known for being botland, filled with pilots who dock/safe up like clockwork when you entered local. I mean, ridiculously consistently, with - dare I say? - machine-like efficiency. It was kind of a dead zone for entertainment, despite the population.

Around each of those areas, you saw satellite activity pop up. the pirates moved there, and provided more targets for you to shoot. Both the owners and the pirates had to make isk and enjoy the content, so they tended to spread into the nearby FW areas, buoying the action there. You ended up with two main hotspots surrounded by opportunists and hunters. Two centers of content, if you will. But it was all made possible by the concentration of active players in the north.

And that's all about to change. Goonswarm is leaving the north.

Razor Leaves(ish) the Imperium

My in-game activity has been somewhat diminished over the past four weeks or so as the NHL playoffs came to an end. But now that they have ended - and successfully, with my Penguins winning the Cup! - I'm turning my attention back to Eve in a big way.

There are some groups in Eve I can't help but track based on fond memories. Alliances and corporations where I had a lot of great fun, but ultimately left for various reasons. Unlike when I was a member, I'm able to look at them a bit more honestly now and see them for their strengths and weaknesses... warts and all, as they say.

One of those groups is Razor Alliance, of whom I was a member for over two years. So, you can imagine that I was somewhat interested in the fact that they're leaving the Imperium. But thye are keeping blue status to "the Imperium" for the time being.

The first reddit posts announcing this departure didn't provide much more information than this, and my reaction was predictable. If you leave the Imperium but don't change your standings, you really haven't left. It's a cheap attempt to remove the target on your back without actually taking on any more risk. And the whole point of World War Bee was to smash a stable coalition to introduce more risk and more conflict into the game. Kill the "big blue doughnut" by smashing the entity most responsible for it.

Now, since then, more info came out in a soundcloud in which it became clear that the blue status would be short-term to help Razor extract its assets and ships from allied areas. And that's a very different animal than keeping permanent blue standing. This is a temporary status to help them disengage from coalition functions.

But, I had the inevitable person comment about unfair standards. And that just doesn't do to go unanswered.

Enough with the False Parallels

I really like Wilhelm Arcturus' perspective on the game. He's a good writer, but recently, he parroted the latest talking point in the Imperium's increasingly desperate repertoire of attempted propaganda:

"In their effort to defeat us, our enemy has had to become us. As the CFC/Imperium had often been called Band of Brothers 2.0, the Moneybadgers have begun to look a bit like the Imperium 2.0."

This is an obvious propaganda point, and a pretty bad one at that. Why? Because it relies upon a false parallel that assumes the reader is foolish enough to believe all coalitions are the same. It's disingenuous, and it frustrates me to know end.

Here's a tip to those who resonate with this argument: the people shooting you aren't a coalition, despite the naming.

Let's consider the nature of the two groups being compared.

Don't Occupy, Modify

Well, this is going to be awkward...

Neville Smit is a good writer, a great thinker, and a very dedicated Eve player. He also represents a style of Eve play that is quite different from mine. It's for all those reasons that I have him on my blogroll, read him regularly, and appreciate his insights.

I saw his recent post, Occupy New Eden, before he sent me a note asking for me to comment on it. I confess, I was already going to do so. It's a dense post that packs a lot of issues into a single manifesto. I must apologize for the length of my reply, but there's a lot in there to discuss. You're getting your pageview's worth today.

The tl;dr (for those of that persuasion) is that I agree with his suggestions, but not for anything resembling the same reasons. I also challenge some of his premises pretty fiercely.

Traitorous or Sensible?

What does the timing of their departure say about the corporations and pilots abandoning the CFC right now?

That was the question I started contemplating over the weekend, and it led to an uncharacteristic ambiguity on my part. I've said before that I highly pride my tendency to look at a situation and come to a conclusion. Talking endlessly around every topic without ever giving your position is the sign of a weak will.

But I honestly don't know what to make of these departures. Looking at Dotlan, you can see dozens of corporations and pilots fleeing the sinking ship of the CFC in droves. Consider all of the "former corporations" between February 1 and April 15 for SMA. Or between March 1 and April 15 for FCON, TNT, or LAWN. And if you look at the pilot counts alone, you can see individual pilots cutting bait and running for the door.

Money Badger Coalition sources would argue these are awakenings of those blinded by the propaganda of the CFC for all these years. CFC alliances would argue this is shedding dead weight as ratters and fair-weather friends leave. The truth is probably somewhere in between. Certainly - if you can take anything from Circle of Two's switching of sides, some PvPers and formerly content organizations are disenchanted with what the CFC has become. At the same time, large numbers of these corporation are joining other alliances well-known for being renters or other ratting-focused alliances. There are definitely a lot of useless members - from a sov defense sense - leaving for stability and safety.

But I can see support for both viewing each group as both a traitor abandoning the CFC in its time of need and as a rational decision made as the result of leaks from Goonswarm leadership about the depth of contempt for their allies.

The Circle Closes

The noose is certainly tightening around the CFC. Tenal and Fade are completely overrun. Vale and Pure Blind are operationally out of the CFC’s control. Even Branch – far in the corner and away from everything, is on fire, with a quarter of it already taken. Deklein hasn’t been hit yet and likely won’t be attacked until more CFC allies abandon the cause, but it’s being isolated steadily. Very soon, GSF won’t have a reliable allied supply route. Not that they really need it, being in Saranen and all.

I’ve spoken before about how the myth of the CFC – the idea that combining into a coalition would provide protection and ensure longevity – is gone. While Dominion Sov certainly benefitted from the blog, FozzieSov depends on the weakest link. He who cannot protect his space is doomed to lose it.

And over the years, all of the poachings of decent corps from member alliances by Goonswarm, the increasing reliance on coalition-wide content generation and essential capabilities, and the increasing reliance on ratting as a primary sov alliance’s activity has resulted in the non-Goonswarm members of the CFC being weak.

On this blog, I talk a lot about eschewing the easy path in favor of the meaningful path. I don’t use links because I feel they give you an advantage renders victory hollow, I don’t hurf and blurf about killing a single ship with 10 friends. I’ve argued that you need to take fights that are marginal; anyone can kill an Iteron with a Tornado, but can you kill a Sleipnir with a Curse? The only way you learn, in my opinion, is to put yourself in danger and fight your way out of it. The only victories worth celebrating are the ones where you fly brilliantly, or pull off an unlikely kill despite overwhelming odds.

Let’s compare that to the CFC of the past couple years. Alliances avoiding running their own deployments because towing the line with the coalition is easier. Indeed, the CFC skyteam (read, Goonswarm skyteam) was complaining that FCON was trying to do its own thing instead of folding into the benevolent, protective embrace of the CFC by deploying to Saranen. Time and again, alliance leadership has elected to lean on the CFC infrastructure instead of developing its own infrastructure.

How’s that working for you?

Though Much is Lost...

My favorite novel is The Lions of Al-Rassan by Guy Gavriel Kay. Not "one of" my favorite, and not "a good book". My single, favorite novel of all time. It’s a fantasy story that is very, very light on fantasy – limited to a young boy who can see what’s happening around his family members, specifically when they’re in danger.

The novel itself is a parallel of the Moorish kingdoms at the dawn of the Spanish Reconquista. It’s a tale of the lesser kingdoms of Al-Rassan as they struggle with the fact of their waning power in comparison to the strength of three successor kingdoms of Esperana, specifically the kingdom of Valledo. To top it off, Al-Rassan follows the religion of Ashar, whereas the kingdoms of Esperana worship Jad, the god of the sun. Added into the mix is the Kindath, a religion of wanderers hated by both.

Pretty basic stuff, right? You’ve got surrogate cultures representing Islam, Christianity, and Judaism, and a setting that closely mirrors the Spanish and Moorish kingdoms when the tide turns on the Iberian Peninsula. You can find the same thing anywhere, right?

The difference comes in the way Kay presents his five main characters, weaving compelling and heart-wrenching characterizations that you, as a reader, can really relate to. For, even though each has a religion and a nationality, throughout the story, Kay offers compelling reasons for each character to feel torn in their loyalties. I’ve never read a story that better conveys the sense of confusion and uncertainty when one culture gives way to another.

Eve of the Battle of VFK

Today, in approximately five hours, will be a hugely significant battle in the nascent World War Bee - the conflict that has been brewing for quite some time. All accounts suggest that it could be the largest battle in Eve history.

For those of you who are new to null politics or just looking at a map, VFK doesn't seem to be that critical. It's the only system reinforced in Deklein, far behind the front, and almost impossible for the allies to use as a forward base even if they win today. But, numbers and facts don't matter here.

For, VFK was the long-time capital of this iteration of Goonswarm Federation, changed only as a result of FozzieSov and jump changes last year. In the same way that Rome was still important to the Roman Empire even after the capital was moved, should VFK fall, it would be a watershed moment in the course of Eve history.  It would symbolize the loss of the most important relic in the Goon religion. Down would come "RIP Vile Rat", almost certainly to be replaced with a taunt against the CFC itself.

From a military strategy perspective, though, it's a gutsy move, whether it was intended to be or not.

Propaganda and World War Bee

For those of you who aren’t up on your latest reddit posting, the reddit community has named this latest war, “World War Bee” in honor of the fact that Goons are the primary enemy, and the CFC is attracting absolutely no third-party assistance to its side. Whereas the “good guys” are likely willing to accept pretty much any CFC alliance into its ranks as a turncoat, that doesn’t hold true for Goonswarm itself.

After all, it’s very clear to everyone involved that the CFC is Goonswarm with various alliances arrayed around it to serve as protection and a firebreak. Unless something catastrophic happens, this war isn’t going to end until Goonswarm is kicked out of its space and Fortress Deklein is rendered into ash.

A couple articles ago, I wrote about how this war is about rage. The forces arrayed against the CFC are a hydra, with no single head to bribe off. And that is reflected in the quality of posting on the major forums. While the CFC owns themittani.com, and presumably would have “thought superiority” because of it, we’re seeing the exact opposite.

The “good guys” have pumped out hundreds of propaganda pieces and dominated the press, specifically because the source of all that content isn’t a single cabal directing its minions, but rather a groundswell of public sentiment with many sources. Hundreds of people are pumping out propaganda every day, and the sheer volume is a testament to the degree of pent up aggression and passion driving it. Even a formal “news” site can’t keep up with that. As a result, while TMC has put out a couple pieces focused on spinning specific events, the other side is hammering every aspect of the CFC, and responding faster and in more unique ways to every breaking story.

How could I not be delighted by that?

The First Defectors: Circle of Two

News is coming in hard and fast on the CFC front. On the one hand, we have Get Off My Lawn and The Bastion abandoning Vale of the Silent. They're spinning it as an attempt to pull back to more defensible territory, but that's obviously a silly statement. If it were true, they'd pull back to chokepoints, and those rarely follow region lines. In looking at Vale, surrendering the whole region leaves Tribute undefendable, with no fewer than three entry points that leave fully half of the region in danger.

And, apparently, this has also been the last straw for competent CFC alliance CO2, who today announced that they were seceeding from the CFC.

Boy, when I'm right, I'm right.

Flashpoint: The CFC Reckoning

I was a part of Razor Alliance back when it owned only five systems in Pure Blind, before the conquest of the north. I participated in that campaign, as the CFC conquered region after region from NC., White Noise, and other alliances that were well-entrenched there. I was proud to be a part of that effort, because we were taking on the larger coalitions.

It was a great time to play the game. We were losing fleets, but we were learning, proving ourselves relentless, and welding together a bunch of alliances into a coalition of interconnectivity. We fought each campaign together, and started to feel camaraderie with our other coalition alliances. The goal was always to blend the fingers into one fist, and that worked remarkably well.

As time went on, though, I started to become aware of a number of trends. The pilots became increasingly arrogant and focused on blob tactics. I watched small gang content be constantly ridiculed, and the arrogance factor of various CFC new recruits ratchet up several notches. The CFC would wave its power around like the captain of the football team five years after graduation, no longer a heavy hitter and now just an asshole. With no existential threats, it became indiscriminate in how it behaved, and devalued anything that didn’t rely upon blob warfare and an approved way of thinking.

Because only alliances – not players – die in Eve, every war saw more players have a reason to hate the CFC. During every Burn Jita event, high-sec players interacted with the CFC for perhaps the only time all year – and it was in the CFC ganking their ships.

They told everyone “we’re not here to ruin the game, we’re here to ruin your game.” They scammed players relentlessly at every possible opportunity, and with very few exceptions. In their eyes, they were living up to the very point of Eve – whatever you can do, you may do.  And they were right.

But they were also creating a lot of ill will. They were engendering a lot of hate. Yes, the CFC positioned itself in the role of villain, but every good story requires the fall of the villain to be truly satisfying.  And every day saw the number of people who saw the CFC as a cancer increase.

Add on to that, the audacity and hypocrisy of some of its policies. When renting out space became “a thing” again, they suddenly started the Greater Western Co-Prosperity Sphere, the ticker of which was PBLRD, or a derogatory term for casuals (publord). Even when they wanted folks’ money, they still insulted them. They suddenly banned rental scamming, as if that would suddenly make everyone forget their years of abuse. As a result, PBLRD was a dismal failure compared to Northern Associates and Brothers of Tangra (NC. and PL’s, respectively).

Now, we’re seeing a massive group of alliances coalesce around one unified goal: making the CFC suffer.  It’s been done before, but never before under FozzieSov. And it’s already accomplished something the other attempts haven’t been able to accomplish: to force the CFC to abandon a region of space, Vale of the Silent.

No matter what happens from this point forward, this attack has already done something that cannot be taken back, cannot be undone. It’s destroyed the myth of the CFC.

Tipping Point

The act of moving is a surprisingly complicated one.  Not only do you need pack up your stuff and unpack it at the other place – which takes at least twelve or fifteen hours in and of itself, for a small move – but you also need to go through a number of simultaneous processes at the same time.

First, you have the “keep or toss” debate about every object in your house.  As you spend time in a location, you accrue.  Some of the things you gather is “stuff” that is useful.  Some is “shit” that was formerly useful or the result of a temporary lapse in judgment. But each item has to go through that analysis.  I spent the last five days doing exactly that, and carted off two cars’ worth of “shit” for the dumpster.

At the same time, you also have the chance to “re-roll” the layout and positioning of everything. Always felt your dishes were inconveniently located? You get another chance to lay it out more efficiently. For me, I was never happy with the layout of my living room furniture, and now I’m able to redesign it a lot better, without spending a dime.

But, all of that is incredibly taxing, and this move – even though it’s a mere ten minutes away – has sapped me of any energy I might have. All of that is, of course, a roundabout way of saying, “Sorry for the drought” for the past few days as I moved.

Apparently, I'm not the only one moving; Bat Country and Blawrf McTaggart are too.

Tinkering with Soldiering

We’ve now had quite some time to see how AegisSov (I’m going with the generic name now, as there are too many good ones to pick from, including FozzieSov, Space Wands, and PotterSov) operates in a real-space environment.  Goons did their ProviSmash thing, demonstrating – if nothing else – the speed a which player assets can be wiped away.  The Russians protested the whole thing, which isn’t surprising since they were buying up renter space just as everyone else was getting rid of it.

The devs have clearly been listening to player reactions.  They made some modifications to the capture times and base capture status in Galatea.  Proof is building that the devs genuinely want AegisSov to be enjoyable, realize the limitations in this current iteration, and want to create a balanced yet engaging experience.  That’s incredibly reassuring, and shows that they haven't slipped into old, pre-Incarna habits as some had feared.

At the same time, AegisSov is here to stay and CCP isn't pulling back from weakening the need for coalitions and encouraging chaos in null-sec.  By this time next year, I think we'll be there.

Player engagement appears to be picking up, although a lot of the really capable PvP organizations are moving to low-sec from null.  Whether that’s a temporary reset or not is up for debate, but it’s happening.  Low-sec is booming as a result, albeit not for the reasons we’d like (the health of low, but rather, the perceived unhealthiness of null).

Some time ago, I predicted that hunters would leave sovereignty in favor of attacking sov holders without facing retaliation.  By and large, we're seeing that.  Corporations, players, and whole alliances are leaving for low-sec.  AegisSov makes sovereignty an isk-generating resource, with the obligation to spend most of your time cultivating indexes and repelling attacks.  That just doesn’t suit with the attitude of pre-Aegis null players, and they're adapting... by leaving null.

I’ve spoken before about the way tension and discomfort build up for several months before players make a change (moving to a new corp, moving an existing corp to a new area of space, or following some other paradigm).  We’re thickly in the midst of that tension-building stage, but as the months roll by, I’m certain we’ll see more and more people leaving null-sec alliances to join pirate and “aggressor” corporations.

And this may all be part of the design… to undermine the former main draw of null alliances to weaken and split them before adding in the added benefits CCP promised.  And yet, CCP still has a desire to keep those players in the game, and has a long-stated goal of reducing hassle without reducing the advantage of organization and player experience or increasing the safety.

So, with that context, I’m encouraged and excited by the changes Team Five-O announced for Vanguard and Parallax.

Brave: The Failure of Democracy

So, clearly, nothing at all is happening with Brave.  Oh, except for that whole democracy thing falling through entirely.

Mind you, I’m not trying to kick them while they’re down.  Far from it.  Brave, Eve Uni, PRF, Test… these groups do good with trying to deepen new player immersion in Eve.  And that’s a very good thing.  For the longest time, Brave, however, suffered from “The Modern Sickness”, which affects nearly everything built in the 20^th century.  That sickness, of course, is the foolish belief that democracy is the solution for everything, in all cases and situations.

Uh oh, here we go…

Eve 101: How to Join a Corporation

Joining a player corporation in Eve is the best way to deepen your engagement with the game and become a long-term player.  It gives you access to a community of players, learning opportunities, and forms of content unavailable to the solo player.  When you join a player corporation, you gain access to another source of content.

But joining a corporation isn’t as easy as everyone makes it out to be.  Joining isn’t automatic, and usually involves a rigorous interview and consideration process.  Eve corporations aren’t like guilds in WoW.  Being part of an Eve corporation put you in a position to do serious damage to that corporation if you choose to, and Eve’s sandbox environment means corporations have no recourse to rogue members.  Every major corporation has had its share of spies, awoxers, thieves, and traitors over time, and has adapted to weed out those undesirables from the recruitment process.

For any alliance that owns assets in space or provides discounted or free ships, fittings, or contracts, it’s better to pass on a candidate than let in a spy.  In fact, it’s better to pass on three candidates than let one spy in.  That said, honest, genuine interest shines through.

Killed In Its Cradle

RIP Trollceptor… we never knew you.  We will not mourn your passing.

Today, Fozzie released the details on the changes to the original null-sec sov revamp plan.  And boy, do I like what I see.

The major issues with the original plan, as identified by players, were the following:

• Time zone control effectively locking ownership of systems into certain time zones (ie. if you can’t log in during EU prime, you’ll never be able to take an EU system) and disincentivizing alliances from spreading across more than one time zone.
• Alliances regularly using their systems should have an even easier time when defending them.
• The initial wave of proposed changes would make it difficult to maintain control over your capital.  Typically, it attracts a lot of enemy attention and has hotdroppers regularly, making ratting and mining extremely hazardous.  With indexes, ironically your staging system would be MORE vulnerable to conquest.
• The ability of players to use entosis links on ships that are uncatchable and unkillable, particularly those that can bypass gatecamps.  The community was concerned that this could create a means of players to reinforce dozens of systems they had no intention of contesting with minimal risk.

Time zone vulnerability that scales based on the combined index of the systems… designated capital systems providing a bonus to indexes… increase in maximum modified from 4x to 6x… each of these provides a good solution to these issues.  While Fozzie repeatedly states that CCP would prefer to use the simplest solution to a problem and I’m not sure these qualify in all cases, I can live with them.

Tease and No Tickle

TheMittani’s recent alliance update drops quite a few bombs in a surprisingly few words. So many, in fact, that I just had to comment in two different posts.  While the first focused on the roleplay aspect, this post is all about shifting coalitions.

First, let’s talk about what we know.  According to Vince Draken’s Twitter account (and confirmed on TMC), NC. Is going to drop sov as of April 18, will reset Northern Associates, their rental alliance, and is presumably bowing out of N3.  Nulli Secunda and Darkness. are losing their space in the black hole that is Delve/Querious/Period Basis (does anyone ever talk about those regions separately?).  And everything N3 built up over the past couple years is being tossed into the “obsolete, not necessary” bin.

There are a few different ways you could take this change.  On the one hand, you could build a #failcascade narrative out of the speed at which the N3 invasion of Fountain turned into the disintegration of the entire coalition and the loss of all of their space.  Personally, what surprises me isn’t that they chose to go their separate ways (for reasons I’ll explain later), but the nonchalance involved.  NC. doesn’t seem to care about their allies currently being hammered in the south, and Nulli and Darkness. don’t seem to be terribly upset that NC. pretty much left them out to hang high and dry.

The Content Must Flow

Yesterday, TheMittani released a simulcast alliance update to the Goonswarm forums and TMC.com that contained a whole bunch of announcements.  While I am going to post about some of them affecting the null-sec game, one mention, in particular, stands apart from the others.

That, of course, was the formal declaration of war by the CFC against the ruler of the Amarr Empire.  The section where he speaks about this is short, and is worth repeating in its entirety.

The first act of our new Imperium: we formally declare our undying loyalty to the True Emperor of Amarr: Maximilian Singularity VI, First of His Name. Anyone in New Eden declaring for the False Empress Jamyl will be violently disabused of their heresy and their territory forfeit. Until the CONCORD-protected zones declare for the True Emperor, we'll have to content ourselves with enforcing the True Emperor's truth across Providence the moment that Fozziesov goes live. We grant Providence the opportunity to reflect upon their sins and seek redemption by bending the knee, just as I have.

Now, it’s absolutely certain that the Providence campaign is nothing more than a test flight of FozzieSov mechanics.  Through it, GSF and allies can learn what works and what doesn’t in attacking and defending a region GSF has no long-term desire to hold and which doesn’t threaten its home.  If you think otherwise, look to the timing; GSF is announcing an invasion two full months in advance… hardly the “keep your cards close…” approach that leads to successful attacks.