So the other day I was talking to a long ago friend of mine who I used to play Eve with and he wanted to know if I was still active in Eve, and more importantly if he should make the transition from Aion back to Eve. His stated reason for leaving Aion was that it was getting too "blobby" but that he still wanted "Large fights."
I was a little stunned, I mean, in my opinion Eve took the blob, perfected it and then used it to ruin every other game. Wait, was that Eve or human nature? Meh! Probably Eve. Anyways, wanting to leave the zerg and the blob behind but still get into large fights, they sounded pretty similar to me, so I didn't know where to go.
Anywho, I talked to him about some other options, if he was looking for battles on the mid-scale, but he wanted something larger, or maybe something more persistent. So in the end we still spent an age talking about Eve, but I was careful to reminded him of all the reasons why getting a desired battle is tricky, especially for someone coming back into the game.
Lots of new meta out there, like ships not showing up on Dscan, new shiptypes, new mechanics around guns and lots to learn. But most importantly, to remember to choose the battle you want to be in and deny the rest. Without that impulse, I see people come back to eve, dive into what they think is the right fight and end up hopelessly outmanned and outclassed due to continual escalation and a shift in meta they were not aware of.
It also made me wonder what, and where a lower skilled pilot would go to get into PvP, and where the main recruitment pipelines were for newer PvPers. In the end it goes back to the Eve forums, but it seems like the main pipeline are the following standouts. Brave has more or less hung up it's lowsec/highsec focus, but that doesn't mean they aren't a great place to get some footing and more importantly exposed to a high number of fights and talented teachers and a strong program to bring early players onto the right track. Well what about returning combat vets? Maybe RedvBlue, or perhaps one of the many facwar locations. I ended up suggesting Facwar because, let's face it, it's a good place for most sizes of combat, with far more fights rather than utter tidi slugfests, and I'm a bit biased towards smaller or even mid-sized fights for enjoyment.
I'll be the first to admit I have been favoring World of Tanks a lot more now recently than I have Eve online, but that's no excuse to forget the fun that can be had in Eve, and the challenge in eve that lots of other games just can't offer. In the end it is the shifting meta, the strange and cool new fits you stumble upon in your lifetime of flight, those battles you take and don't take, those ones you win and lose.
I hope he comes back to eve and finds the kinds of fights he is looking for, I'm sure he will if he looks for them. In the meantime, back into space with me and off to find adventures of my own.
