I was going to avoid venting about CCP/Fenris being dumb and just do dry “just the facts ma’am” post about the Cradle or War update.  Why make the Ansiblex nerf and the company’s low sec, small gang fetish out to be more than it is?

But you know who is going all in to emphasize the Ansiblex nerf?  CCP/Fenris!  I mean, what is featured on the logo for the update?  Is it a faction warfare site?  No, it is an Ansiblex jump bridge!  A MAJOR UPDATE!

When somebody shows you who they are, believe them

Tell me what your most important objective is without telling me what your most important objective is… or just tell me by telling I guess.  They aren’t even being subtle.

The usual update announcements and patch notes were not enough.  As pointed out over at TNG, this was such a big deal that the company felt they had to issue a press release about how they were sticking it to null sec.  I mean, it is one thing to have the usual hacks on Reddit crowing about how they are going to kill off null sec empires (again), but having the company stoking those flames?  Well, we knew Rattati and Okami hated null sec, but I guess it is official company policy now.  So now it is RANT ON!

Laying a bit of groundwork, the last I checked, which was with the September 20206 Monthly Economic Report, sovereign null sec is where more destruction occurs than any other band of space

Destruction Across Security Bands

Rather than asking what they could do to encourage that destruction… which is good for the game… or get more people to undock in null sec… I can assure you that we would dearly like to lose some more capital ships… the company decided to make fights more difficult and remove a conflict driver.  You want a fight?  Last week you would go shoot somebody’s Ansiblex.  They’ll show up.  Worked like voodoo magic.  Now… not so much.

It is like they want to make their internet spaceship game more boring.

The irony is that the work that went into the convoluted Ansiblex update will be mostly wasted.  Low sec partisans are loudly declaring their victory over null sec on Reddit, egged on by Okami, who has clearly shown who he listens to.

Meanwhile null sec groups rolled up their sleeves, re-organized their logistics, briefed their members, and life went on.

GSF moved its capital and redid its Ansiblex network.  A lot of that going around last week.

A new capital declared

No empires will collapse, no coalitions will shatter.  There will be not renaissance of new alliances springing up in sov null.  Here is the part where I invoke Malcanis.  We all know the famous Malcanis Law, right?

Whenever a mechanics change is proposed on behalf of new players, that change is always to the overwhelming advantage of richer, older players.

The corollary is that the reverse is true as well, that when you try to nerf richer, older players you inevitably pull up the ladder and lock out the poorer, younger players.

The Imperium declaring the drone lands “bloc free” has done more to encourage small groups than the company ever has.  And the nerf will likely hinder that because small groups won’t be able to cooperate as easily in the face of a threat.  But they can always solve that by consolidating into a single alliance!

The fact that alliances can only use their own Ansiblex network is going to be a bit of a pain for us even, but we’re used to pain.  Null sec is a self-selecting group that likes 10% tidi battles, and GSF culturally prides itself on being willing to endure inconvenience.  So now we’ll take an Ansiblex to a titan and bridge rather than taking two Ansiblex jumps.

So alliance operations will be unhindered. We’ll still drop 50 Harpies or 100 Feroxes on your gate camp or ESS incursion still.

Individual pilots will get screwed over though, because the autopilot will absolutely send you to an Ansiblex without the capacitor to let you jump through.  Absolute piece of shit design right there.

Just going back to jump fatigue still feels like it would have had a more meaningful impact… can’t take an Ansiblex then a titan bridge in quick succession with that in play… and used less dev time to boot.  I wrote, when they introduced the Ansiblex and other FLEX Structures back in 2018, that not including jump fatigue was a strange omission.

But, as always, the company only listens to player voices when they agree with the plan they are already working on.  So when the press release declares that they worked with the CSM, they actually ignored all negative feedback and just listened to that one guy who has made “force projection” the cause of all the ills of New Eden.  The fact that the patch notes point back to the original dev blog for details indicates that there was zero listening done after the announcement.  Same as it ever was.

I will allow that they at least put in some UI about the Ansiblex capacitor status, because out the gate, when they first announced this whole dumb idea, it was going to include no UI… because why waste time on us.  So maybe they did listen to that ONE thing.

See, you get Ansiblex capacitor status now

So now we get free jumps out to the 5 lightyear line and back from the 10 lightyear line and anything beyond that is just for priority missions for GSOL and scouts or something.

So rant over.

Meanwhile, there were other things in the update.  Some of they even important.  But CCP/Fenris chose what they wanted to emphasize, what they felt was absolutely the most important thing for the audience they are pitching to.

So what else did we get?  From the update announcement we have:

  • Insurgencies Intensified (low sec buff, because CCP likes them best)
    • Pirate Insurgencies are faster and more contested. Capsuleers on both sides have more influence on how an Insurgency spreads, Forward Operating Base (FOB) reinforcement cycles are shorter, and more of the total reward now comes from winning the Insurgency outright.
  • Them’s Fightin’ Wormholes (WH buff, but they deserve it)
    • Class 1 to Class 3 wormhole combat sites have been modernized. NPCs make smarter use of electronic warfare, capsuleers can bring energy neutralization to bear against them, objectives appear in the info panel, and the sites have had a visual pass.
  • Pochven Updates (nerf? buff? I can’t even tell anymore)
    • Vigilance Points now take fleets of up to 12 pilots, with payouts adjusted to match, while Observatory Flashpoints come down from 15 to 12. Intra-Pochven and extra-Pochven wormholes have been iterated on, and roaming NPC fleets move through the region in greater numbers. Additionally, four new mutaplasmids create new opportunities to experiment with drone support modules.
  • Ship Balance Pass (somebody is mad at the meta again)
    • The balance pass reaches marauders, black ops battleships, heavy assault cruisers, and assault frigates. Lower mass on marauders and black ops matters most when traversing wormholes, the Deimos, Phobos, and Vigilant regain range lost to earlier medium railgun changes, and lancer dreadnoughts carry stronger resistance profiles.
  • Achievement Tracking (high and low sec focus)
    • Keeping track of progress is easier. (It should have been easy in the first place, but on its third try the company still can’t get achievements right.  And I would bet money it isn’t as easy as it should be post patch.)
  • War Dec Cost Increase (Not actually mentioned in the announcement but important)
    • Increased the cost of declaring war on a corporation or an alliance to 500,000,000 ISK, up from 100,000,000 ISK
  • Show Me The Money (the cash shop must be served)
    • There are special packs in the store.  I know, they have to pay for things… though it is mostly their shooter and their blockchain scam title.

So there we go.  Now we’re just waiting for the Q4 expansion, which will also be all about low sec.  Well, that and for the same low sec voices to start demanding null sec get nerfed again because their cunning plan did not get them the result they desired.

Related:

  • CCP/Fenris – Cradle of War Major Update Is Live
  • CCP/Fenris – Patch Notes
  • CCP/Fenris – Cradle of War Press Release