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News-hungry Capsuleers,
Day two of Fanfest 2022 has been incredible. It was packed with amazing presentations, roundtables, developer interviews and updates, which means there’s a whole lot more news to share today, following all that was announced yesterday.
Here you’ll find a round-up of key news, updates and announcements from day two of Fanfest, most of which takes a deeper dive into what was revealed at the previous day’s keynote which you can watch in full here. You can also catch up on lots of Fanfest content over at CCP TV.
LOTS MORE ON FACTIONAL WARFARE
Fanfest day-two provided a chance to learn a little more about factional warfare. This will involve iterating on and improving content and systems such as structure mechanics, territory control, ship and fleet balance, activities, faction warfare complexes, and amazing new 'battlefield' sites.
The goal with these improvements is to create meaningful, dynamic geography in New Eden, reward player loyalty to their chosen faction, make players’ choices have greater impact in the factional warfare context, create lots of new content for pilots of all kinds, and encourage more of you to become part of shaping the player-driven stories the new factional warfare system is designed to create.
As you can see, there’s a lot going on. That’s why, as we work on this, we're putting lots of care and consideration into making sure all the new factional warfare elements work together as a cohesive whole that balances effort, risk and reward. We're also putting player interaction first, meaning the new factional warfare framework is designed to bring players together in ways that see different playstyles and approaches combine to deliver truly memorable and distinct experiences.
We'll also be introducing a new system for creating allegiance and loyalty to bring the best out of factional warfare. You’ll be able to declare allegiance to a faction – all without needing to leave your corporation. This system is separate from (but connected to) standings.
You’ll also see that NPC factions will set their own goals, adding to the dynamic, ever changing experience factional warfare will soon offer. Players allied with those NPC factions will be rewarded for helping them achieve those goals – and success or failure will never be pre-determined.
Ultimately, the new factional warfare system will let you share in your organization's successes by joining in with more of their endeavours. You'll be rewarded for your loyalty too. So, get ready to ally with your Empire of choice (perhaps even a Pirate faction!).
DYNAMIC FRONTLINES
180 total star systems form the setting of current factional warfare, with each being entirely equal in terms of gameplay. Now it’s time to mix that up! Factional warfare star systems which border an enemy controlled system will become clearly marked on the in-game map, making it easier to identify and get to the real action. There you will find better rewards, faster turnover than seen in other systems, and more unique, added content. Meanwhile, the existence of uncapturable Highsec systems will ensure there is always a frontline, even if the warzone is dominated by one side.
SET YOUR FACTIONAL WARFARE GOALS!
Each faction will have its own agenda and be able to declare objectives to see them achieved. The nature of these objectives will be introduced through narrative elements, while we make sure the victory conditions will be explicitly clear. Players who assist their allied faction in achieving stated objectives will be generously rewarded.
And by adding new gameplay experiences via factional warfare, we can service a wider range of interests and types of pilots. That means bringing more people – and more life – into the warzone, which in turn will be supported by new goals, new activities and new content.
The work here is ongoing, and we are carefully examining and exploring how new factional warfare objectives could include activities such as warzone logistics, battlefield salvaging, hacking, espionage, and more!
REBALANCING STRUCTURES
A lot of changes are coming to structures, with a focus on motivating more attacks and interaction. Future adjustments will ensure the era of near instant replacement of destroyed FLEX structures comes to an end. We’ll also be working to offer more open tactical windows before defenders can replace them. Capital ship re-tether time will also be adjusted to more appropriately scale with their larger HP – again, with a view to improving interactions with structures. We’re also putting a lot of care into improving gameplay and counterplay around ansiblex gates. And we will continue to replace POS functionality, in terms of forward operating bases with limited capacity and services.
NARRATIVE DRIVEN DESIGN AND NARRATRIVE ARCS
New narrative arcs are being introduced to EVE. Each arc will tell a cohesive story in which you play an important role in helping decide the outcome.
Each arc features a steady stream of narrative-driven events and content that ultimately leads you to a climactic moment that reveals a significant change to New Eden.
To deliver the absolute best arcs possible, we’ve been taking a new approach of narrative-driven design. It’s a method shaped to deliver more moments where you take a part in a story unfolding on a grand scale that leaves permanent marks on New Eden. That means your decisions, actions and allegiances help determine the outcome. Many new features will be introduced through narrative arcs too, with some focussed on bringing you a more meaningful sense of belonging to your faction.
In other words, arcs do more to make you an important part of the future of New Eden.
EXPANSIONS ARE MAKING THEIR RETURN
We’re reintroducing expansions to EVE. Going forward, expansions will become the major content releases in EVE. They will contain big content moments presented as immersive arcs, new features, significant tech evolutions, art and audio enhancements, and much more. However, a key difference here with this new era of expansions is that you can still expect a steady stream of releases, seasonal events, challenges, story progression moments, and balance changes in between. You can expect the first in this new era for expansions is coming in Q4 of this year.
MORE ON HERALDRY AND INTERBUS CREDITS
The coming heraldry system lets you show off your achievements by displaying logos, visual changes to your ships, holograms that reflect your social standings, killmarks, structure skins and other customizations. You’ll be able to purchase those items with InterBus credits, which are earned by doing activities in-game. Those activities could be as simple as a daily challenges or events, or something more complicated. In almost every case, the activities will be focused on the social and interacting with fellow pilots.
To go along with this there’s a new unified fitting window coming that will combine heraldry and modules.
We’re also aiming to establish strong, healthy corporations, giving their members plenty of activities and goals, while providing more tools for corps to recruit, train and retain new pilots as they grow their member base.
We’ll also be helping corp leaders streamline their corp’s activities by making InterBus credits, taxable (though they won’t be tradable). We’ll also be giving corporations the tools to automate these arduous bookkeeping tasks with two optional taxes, LP Tax (on earned LP) and Value Tax (on sold goods on the market), in addition to the new Spreadsheets in Space tool mentioned in yesterday’s keynote that exports data directly from EVE into Microsoft excel.
This is all to help strengthen corporations in New Eden.
MADE BY PLAYERS FOR PLAYERS
A new program will soon be introduced allowing you to manufacture or purchase items, making them available for other players to purchase. Players who participate will be rewarded with heraldry, which unlocks many cosmetic items that help you establish your individual and alliance identity in New Eden. This is all aimed to lean into EVE’s player-driven economy and provide more avenues to participate in the economy, and be rewarded.
EXPLORATION OF OTHER QoL IMPROVEMENTS
Improvements to several other aspects of EVE are also being explored, including balance changes to many different ship classes (including navy ships), adjustments to station jump clone cooldown, improving the readability of maps, and applying a clearer focus on reducing ganking to make PvP gameplay in Highsec more equitable and fun for all players.
DAY 2 IN CLOSING
All these new updates and features are focused on making EVE even more of a living online universe that unites the players that shape it, with New Eden existing as a vibrant, dynamic metropolis that is influenced by factional warfare and narrative arcs. We’re bringing more content, more experience and more ways to play – and we want our amazing and diverse spread of pilots to all get more from every moment they put into EVE.
There have been so many great presentations and discussions all day and we hope you get the chance to catch up on all the fun on CCP TV
Otherwise, we’ll be sure to see you at Jita 4-4. Either at the Top of the World, or in New Eden.
Fly Safe!