Blog Banter #50 - Changes

With the Rubicon expansion being announced it truly feels like an age of EVE has passed and a new one is dawning.

But which direction is it going? This blog banter can be about several different topics:
- where do you think EVE is going? Is it a good or bad vision ahead?
- if you were EVE's new Executive Producer, where would you take the game?
- What comes (or should come) after Rubicon in terms of the mechanics and ship balancing we've seen?
- Is there anything in EVE's ten year past that should be resurrected? Or buried and forgotten?
- What is the future of the community? What should or should not change?

Blog Banter #50 - Changes

When I started participating in blog banters it was an accident. I simply kept popping up with topics the same time they came out as the banters. Eventually, as I dipped my toes deeper into the community I began to active participate in them. With the banter moving to Kirith Kodachi's care the topics are more regular and focused. However, as with any time topics are presented, sometimes you will dislike them.

I don't care for this topic. I don't care for it because it is too focused on what it asks. And because of that, I shall ignore that focus and ponder the topic itself.


Change is something that comes to the game. The change may be changes made by the game company or it may be the death of the game itself due to stagnation. Change happens. It may be pleasant or it may not be. We may understand it or we may not. We may direct it or we made ride the wave but no matter what we do we will experience change.

The change can come from us. It can be a factor or person life, work life, heath, relationships, economic status or anything else. It can come from the game as it ages. It may come from our inner game social circle as that changes and fluctuations due to everyone experiencing something else.

We discuss the butterfly effect a lot. The idea that the stroke of a butterflies wings will, down the course of action meets reaction, cause something that appeared to be unlinked. It is a beautiful concept and a true one. However, ripples are more in water is what I use more often because that is something that we understand our tangible experience at.

Today, I was having a discussion about change and the fact that sometimes when we achieve the change that we want the changes that happen are not what we expect. It may be reactionary changes or it may be the result of the path that was forged to achieve the goal. One way or another what we have now and what we want, when we reach what we want, may no longer be what we want.

Therefore I hate guessing about the future. I hate guessing about it because it is just a guess. When one reaches the future what one reached for may be gone or so altered that it is no longer recognized. How often do people step into a position of power only to find out that it is not what they thought it would be. The goal to fix things and change things suddenly become hard once one reaches the point where they can fix and change them.

I'm a believer in re evaluating situations regularly. Is this what I want. Is it still what I want? Sometimes it is exactly what you wanted but along the way to reaching it you no longer have any desire for it. This happened to me rather personally IRL. I accomplished a major life goal and when I had it I realized that I no longer wanted it. I had changed so much over the years that my goal no longer held the ability to focus and motivate me. While it may be wicked and evil for me to use a real example to represent a game, this is not an uncommon action that happens in Eve.

From reaching a spaceship to becoming the leader of a group, taking out Fleets or rolling in the space richness, sometimes people find they are somewhere that they didn't realize they would be at. It isn't a matter of good or bad it is a manifestation of the fact that what is and what should be may not be when they are there.

What is Eve's future? I hope Eve stays productive and active and a place that I am happy to be. I know that Eve will not be the now that I am in. It will not be the future that I will want. What I can hope for and strive to assist in is molding Eve towards a direction that I can be happy with. Everything is about compromise. The current, the now, the future, all of it is about compromise. Be we players or the head of CCP games. The view now is not the view then and won't be the future.

I've never been one to make predictions on the future. I may lack the scope and imagination need to answer the questions presented. I am not CCPs executive producer. I do not have the information that that position would give me. I am not a developer. I do not have the knowledge and background to push forward what can, cannot, and may be. I am a subscriber for an experience I enjoy. All I can offer to the future is my continued participation in what I want and what I do not want and what compromises can be reached to achieve these things. I can offer my opinions of what I experience and how I believe it can be improved. I can offer the results of my experiences and what they have and have not changed. I can bring to the table my experiences and from them I can help to drop the next stone and mold the path of the future.

But with the future one can only push in the direction and attempt to shape the results as they come in. And with the past, hindsight is perfect and one must remember their imperfections even as they seek to learn from their own mistakes. It is easy to dwell in the what was and hard to move towards the what will be. I'll take those steps. I'll use what I have learned and what I will learn in an attempt to support and help structure the what will be.

But I know not what Eve's future is.

I only have some knowledge of the past.

But I will continue on this ride because I enjoy it and I will support it as I am able.

That's about all I can offer.