Author: Phantomite

Here’s my recommended ballot for CSM 18. Do vote, do vote with ALL of your accounts!

If you wish to have these options highlighted for you, please click here to cast your vote.

Phantomite
My aims on the CSM are to modify the game to promote PvP at all scales – this includes nerfing the projection ability that Ansiblex provides, expanding the opportunities for PvP as a profession with imrovements to FW, re-introducing replacements for passive moons and ship cost reductions. I value self-honesty as an important aspect of a CSM member, something that is lacking in most. Check my list of specifics.

 

Stitch Kaneland
Stitch has a strong overlap with the same outlook that I have. He is a smallgang and solo pilot with deep knowledge of ships, fittings and tactics.

 

Drake Iddon
Drake displays a wit and investigative personality that will make him a valuable allycin the fight against anyone trying to push lies and nonsense past CCP.

 

Nuke Michael
Nuke from Snuffed Out is aiming for a future that encourages groups to fight.

 

Cael Caderu
Cael’s outlook on FW is honest and pro-PvP.

 

Gideon Zendikar
Gideon understands and is capable of pushing a similar Ansiblex Agenda.

 

Torvald Uruz
Torvald is a valuable voice for promoting Eve as a streamable game, without asking for any unrealistic “protections” for streamers against stream sniping.

 

Rico Shikkoken
Rico has a strong list of UX improvements to assist with playing the game for people with a wide range of abilities.

 

Mark Resurrectus
Mark is charismatic and persuasive.

 

White 0rchid
White takes a sceptical view on the proclamations of Bloc candidates.

 

 

…Your corp.

 

Something I feel safe to pat myself on the back for is my ongoing ability to leave behind an entrenched lifestyle with whatever my current group in Eve is, if the fun is elsewhere.

It’s hard to do that. You have a ton of ships, you often have a ton (or a few) close internet nerd friends in that group. You joined them in the first place to violently socialise, to build your wealth and to have a good time. Because this is an entertainment computer video game.

I was lucky, in that my first group in Eve cemented my first batch of lifelong nerdfriends. We were a small corporation, most of us relatively young in the game with a long spacefuture ahead of us. These people pushed me forwards, teaching me the basics, and learning and growing with me mainly in the PvP scene.

At the time, My first group pushed forwards faster than I thought was wise – but it always worked out. After that era’s “golden age”, came the inevitable decline – this is natural for Every group in Eve. Every group waxes and wanes, some multiple times, at varying scales.

Myself and just two of the group felt the declining activity, and we jumped ship – leaving behind everything we knew and still loved, a bond based on what was now the past. This was my first of several efforts over the following 15 years to reinvent the fun I was looking to keep alive.

 

It’s a big risk, leaving the certainty of your familiar but declining Corporation/Alliance. We all look back at the past in Eve through rose-tinted glasses, and while we ask a lot of very reasonable things of CCP, the other half of the puzzle is to recognise that CCP fixing or improving aspects of the game is not going to magically bring all of your Golden-era Eve friends back together to give a serious go at finding the fun. You have to do that.

Because of the multiple, often multi-year jumps I’ve made over my Eve career, I’ve made far more in number, opinion and playstyle friends – many of whom have variously accompanied me to one group or another. Sure, half of them won’t be coming back to Eve, but the ones who have survived over a long period of time have managed this by having the balls to start new relationships and endeavours, in the pursuit of finding where the fun is and getting up and going there.

Leave your dead corp from 5 years ago. It’s not going to come back in the manner you hope it will.

But you will find the right set of people and content if you let go. CCP has a lot of work to do, but you can find the fun now if you’re willing.

 

 

Full disclosure, I am actively recruiting for my Corp and Alliance. During my recruiting efforts, I have had conversation with a large number of people insistant that they would rather stay in their long-time dead corporations for senimental reasons, which made me think on this issue.

 

 

Here’s my recommended ballot. As ever, you should make your own choices based on your own research.

PLEASE DO FILL YOUR BALLOT.

Click here to pre-select

1. Phantomite
-End the powerblocs through removal of strong foundations. Instability creates content.
-Offer income and content outside of joining large groups. Chances for new groups to form and new stories to be told.
-Blended PvE and PvP to offer income while fighting, rather than having the two be endlessly separate.
2. Mark Ressurectus
-Mark offers experience for wormhole balance, but understands combat all over Eve.
3. Torvald Uruz
-Torvald spearheaded what would become this year’s focus on a major FW revamp, and is a strong voice against other CSMs who aim to maintain their status quo.
4. Ithica Hawk
-Subject matter expert for tournaments and smallgang PvP
5. Drake Iddon
-Drake brings enthusiasm and Pochven-style experience and can champion similar mechanics for the rest of Eve.
-Stands up against blatent lies
6. Arsia Elkin
-Voice in favour of FW and pro small-group
7. Stitch Kaneland
-Expert theoriser for ship and weapon balance
8. Baldin Tarmain
-Industrialist who can tell the difference between entitled risk averse opinions and the true nature of Eve.
9. Keacte
-Approcahable and enthusiastic with content creation
10. Jinx De’Caire
-A very unbloc-y bloc-alike candidate

 

 

As ever, please do join my discord, please do vote for me, and please do vote for me WITH ALL of your available accounts!

Your accounts must be older than 60 days. Your account must be an omega at the time of voting.

Hello,
Given recent events, I have decided to leave Snuffed Out. For the past few months I struggled to ignore the toxicity of an unsurprising lineup of “boy’s club” Snuff members, and the exploitative and dishonest behaviour of Hy.

This toxicity and dishonesty lost any subtlety a few months back. A Snuff member sent me an evemail me just to say “no-one likes you”. Hy messaged me to say “people are saying CCP doesn’t like talking to you”. Hy knows this to be false as a result of my repeated attempts to reach out to him to try and involve him in the CSM process. I let him know that I was making contact and good progress with CCP devs.

A few days later I hear from several other alliance leaders that Hy himself is soliciting them for votes. He spread this lie amongst them in an attempt to redirect votes from myself. He himself was the source of this lie, spreading it while knowing it has no base in reality. Yes Hy, I’ve known for a while.
I have involved myself in helpful activities in the alliance wherever possible. I volunteered my help with first-port-of-call recruitment, finding content and leading smaller fleets, and doctrine discussion. My thanks for my efforts was laughter and mockery when asking for help killing a tackled Kronos. Fortunately, a handful of Korean Snuff members were more enthusiastic and came to assist.

I knew a few weeks ago that I was no longer welcome, but didn’t leave for fear of it appearing to be a cheap move for votes. The reaction I saw today to the offer of a Kronos kill made staying an impossibility. I’m sick of this alliance’s hellish toxicity.

To anyone from Snuff reading this, it’s not the majority of you. As ever, an entrenched toxic minority spoiled it, and will continue to do so indefinitely.

I look forward to engaging with Faction Warfare whether or not I get the opportunity to help guide it on the CSM.

 

On Friday the 22nd April, 2022 CCP announced an up to 33% price hike for subcriptions to Eve online.

Times are financially difficult for most people and some businesses. Regular people are rapidly find their disposable income dwindling at best, many others now have no disposable income and can’t even afford regular living expenses.

CCP is also affected, with inflation making their income not as large, and the total loss of all income from the Russian market due to sanctions. So what are they going to offer us for this higher price?

Eve was never a particularly cheap game, and now it’s the most expensive “premium/traditional model” MMO on the market. What exactly are we getting for this incredibly steep price? Since the advent of multiple chilling-effect changes to Eve, primarily the anti-content design of Citadels, action in Eve online has been in a endless boring decline. CCP puts plenty of resources into CCP-Curated content, which does indeed include some PvP – but it lasts as long as the event, doesn’t spur war and is navelgazing when it comes to the problem surrounding chilled player created content.

If you check the video above, you’ll see CCP Paragon reading and slightly answering my question. During the Q&A surround the price hike, he kept promising that there would be a reveal at fanfest which “justfies the increased price” of Eve.

 

If they announce another CCP curated content event, it means utterly nothing. The only thing that can save Eve is a total revamp of multiple areas of the game ro reverse the stagnation and get groups to be endlessly, meaningfully at real war again.

I will be there to make them answer for their lack of care to the single thing that drove Eve: The players. Not their events.