EVE Online: Difference between revisions

Unlike most MMOs, the player base is not divided into different stand-alone servers, but coexists in a single universe. ''EVE Online'' contains almost 8,000 solar systems, each with their own planetary system and asteroid belts. EVE's record for logged-in accounts currently stands at over 64,000 simultaneous connections.

 

 

''EVE'' occasionally pops up in the [http://eve.klaki.net/heist/ gaming] [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WEx0eJutrG0 press] (and sometimes the [http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/7905924.stm?lss mainstream press]) for extraordinary feats of sabotage, theft and other devious exploits carried out by a player or group of players. Feats like this, that might get the responsible group banned in about any other MMO, are legal gameplay in ''EVE'' and these events become player-generated [[Crowning Moment of Awesome|Crowning Moments of Awesome]]. On the other hand, ''EVE'' is known for having not so much a learning curve as a [http://www.eve-pirate.com/uploads/LearningCurve.jpg learning cliff] - though recent updates have smoothed things out for new players considerably. One ''EVE'' blogger/podcaster calls the game "a sandbox with landmines" due to the often brutal [[Player Versus Player]] focus of the game. It keeps some potential players away, but many players see it as a good thing, on the assumption that you have to be at least halfway competent to survive in the game.

''EVE'' is the first online game to have its own democratically elected (real world) player oversight committee, known as the Council of Stellar Management, the members of which serve one-year terms, as of the fifth CSM. The CSM is flown to CCP's Iceland headquarters, where they meet with CCP engineers, present players' concerns, and discuss future features and expansions of the game. They also help mediate between CCP and the player community in case of scandals. As with other parts of any massive community the CSM has moments of drama between themselves and with the larger playerbase (also often seen as a good thing).

 

 

{{tropelist}}

** The Chronicle [http://www.eveonline.com/background/potw/default.asp?cid=02-11-09 A Beautiful Face] deals with a company who has developed the technology to swap faces into anything a person wants. When Walking In Stations (now officially "Incarna") is released this tech will probably be available to the player characters to justify character customization.

* [[Black Market]]: The "Unholy Rage" banning of over 6000 macro accounts in June 22, 2009. Led to a timer being placed on the forums as the macro miners sought revenge. Extensively examined by the lead economist [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OSgVeU7e9tU at fanfest]

* [[Blue and Orange Morality]]: Because they treat bodies as little more than shells and wield spaceships capable of killing tens of thousands of people in a few minutes, any capsuleer who claims to have moral standards will almost inevitably end up like this, even if they don't realize it. A lot of capsuleers avoid this problem by simply not even trying.

** Nuclear ammunition for projectile and missile weapons exists in the game, and capsuleers of the same corporation will occasionally fire on or destroy each other "[[It Amused Me|for the lulz]]" or as training. Consider what this means in terms you may be more familiar with: capsuleers will use ''nuclear weapons'' for ''entertainment''.

** ECM ships in general are this. Logistics pilots also don't have the most exciting jobs ([[Shoot the Medic First|for]] [[Kinetic Clicking|some]]) but they're critical to fleet success.

* [[But for Me It Was Tuesday]]: A capsuleer can come along, blow up your colony, destroy every ship in the fleet defending it, kill everyone you ever loved and leave you dying in the ruined shell of a space habitat. If you survive and by some miracle manage to get face time with them to talk about it, they probably won't even remember that it was Tuesday. In fact, they probably left about ten thousand people like you in precisely the same situation on that same Tuesday.

* [[Can Only Move the Eyes]] How Sansha's nation abducts planetary population. Nanites attack the motor neurons in the neck, causing the victim to walk out into the open where they are scooped up by tractor beams. Victims can, and probably do, scream all the while this is happening.

* [[Cap]]: [[Averted Trope|Averted]] on the area of player population by CCP's design, having no (theoretical) limit on the number of players that can be connected to the single server, and allowing an arbitrary number of players to be present in any given system. They did make a single exception for the Jita system, a very popular trade hub in CONCORD-protected space due to its popularity occasionally overloading the server, but the cap is so high and the server has been better optimized since the cap was placed that it is rarely a consideration.

*** How bad did the above get? [http://www.evenews24.com/2011/07/19/sotg-mister-vee-leaned-over-and-kissed-dbrb-passionately-and-the-test-and-goons-cheered-because-the-invasion-was-finally-over-the-end/ 72 hours later], not only did they give up invading Goonspace, they are actively running across the universe to escape the wrath of the Goons.

** History repeated itself in December 2011 when White Noise. (extraneous period intentional) alliance and friends declared they were (again) invading Goonswarm space, the speech declaring this making the statement "Deklein by February." Goon spies got wind of this and counter-invaded the region of Branch over Christmas. White Noise. were caught by surprise and failed to mount any successful defence of their region and were relieved of their teritory approximately two weeks later. [http://www.evenews24.com/2012/01/09/goonswarm-federation-on-branch-mission-accomplished/ ~words~]

** [[Lampshade Hanging|Lampshaded]] in the forums in response to [http://community.eveonline.com/ingameboard.asp?a=topic&threadID=588807&page=8 someone] going [[Leeroy Jenkins]] against a hostile capital fleet with a single poorly-fitted dreadnaught and no backup:

{{quote| ''[[Too Dumb to Live|Stupidity]] [[Darwin Award|is not a survival trait.]]''<br />

* [[Did You Just Punch Out Cthulhu?]]: Any baseliner that ever manages to seriously inconvenience a capsuleer. ''The Burning Life'' provides a particularly impressive example.

* [[Diminishing Returns for Balance]]: Multiple damage or defense upgrades receive "stacking penalties". The first such module has full effect, the second approximately 80%, and after the third a fourth becomes near-pointless.

* [[Doomsday Device]]: See [[Weapon of Mass Destruction]] below for details.

* [[Dramatic Space Drifting]]: A major fleet fight could leave hundreds of wrecks in a space, ranging from the metal jumble of support ships to the drifting husks of capital ships, right down to the corpses of pilots who got podded. Of course these fields are often salvaged for loot and the corpses scooped as trophies.

** also seen at the start of the [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zDVEHE10nHc Dominion trailer].

* [[Eagle Land]]: The Gallente - Everyone watches their TV, listens to their pop music and drinks their soft drinks. They like to bang on about freedom at every possible opportunity. And their government consists of a President, a Senate, and a Supreme Court. Sounds rather like America, except they're ''French''.

*** [[Darths and Droids|Space French]].

* [[Earthshattering Kaboom]]: The [[Lost Technology]] device that opened wormholes in ''Apocrypha'' destroyed Seyllin I along with 2 billion inhabitants as a ''side effect''.

* [[The Empire]]: The Amarr Empire -- aforementioned Catholic megalomaniacs with a serious hard-on for colonialism. Emperor Heiderran tried to tone it down (writing the Pax Amaria celebrating the Empire's opportunities to affect peace) and was awarded a prestigious Gallentean peace prize for it, but after his death from old age he's been replaced by a series of expansionists.

** Militas have declared temporary truces and even 0.0 alliances have partcipated...though in their case typically for the lulz.

* [[Even Evil Has Standards]]: Normally, scamming, griefing and general malice are positively encouraged, but it's completely forbidden to scam or grief CCP's charity fundraiser events.

** In-game "legal" scamming, scheming and plotting are all done within the boundaries of the EULA and in-game rules. Sometimes, the in-game rules may be used or turned against the unfortunate victim, but hey, it's still legal according to the EULA!.

** And so it was.

* [[Evilutionary Biologist]]: {{spoiler|1=The researcher in ''[http://www.eveonline.com/background/potw/default.asp?cid=04-05-10 Extinction Burst].''}}

** While [[Serious Business|CAOD]] and [[Acceptable Targets|IGS]] posters usually do not get along very well, there are certain individuals that [[Enemy Mine|both groups will actively troll]] for the [[Small Name, Big Ego|exact]] [[Sesquipedalian Loquaciousness|same]] [[Wall of Text|reasons]].

* [[Fragile Speedster]]: The [[Hat]] worn by any Interceptor pilot, but [[Up to Eleven|pushed quite close to eleven]] with the Crusader and the [[Names to Run Away From Really Fast|Claw]]. Meanwhile, the Dramiel, the fastest ship in the game, is often considered a Lightning Bruiser for a frigate, as it combines the mobility of an Interceptor and resilience/firepower of an Assault Ship in a single package, counterbalanced only by cost.

** The in-game currency unit is the '''I'''nter'''S'''tellar '''K'''redit. which happens to share an acronym with the Icelandic Króna (ISK).

** PIRATE, as suggested in the Help channel once, is an acronym for Protector of Interstellar asteRoids And Their Environment. Their actions are, however, still not forgiven.

** The Caldari state fought a war of independence to protect their patriotic and meritocratic ideals from Gallente imperialism. {{spoiler|And for the right to order their society into a collection of [[Corrupt Corporate Executive|brutal corporate fiefdoms]].}}

** The Minmatar are a proud tribal civilization who broke free from Amarr slavery to found their own republic. {{spoiler|A republic rife with corruption and a standard of living that only occasionally dips below the slavery they escaped.}}

* [[Griefer]]: As you may have gathered from the rest of the article, this game is a griefer's paradise, and most of the player base ''loves'' it that way. As long as you don't use a hacked client or a known and classified exploit, any method you can find to unfairly kill players or steal their hard earned goods is allowed, including finding ways to subvert the anti-pvp measures in the beginning, "safe" areas.

* [[Heroic Sociopath]]: ''EVERYONE''. You think I'm joking, don't you?

* [[High-Class Glass]]: [[Enforced Trope]] with the new monocle which costs $70 in real-life money. Player reaction has been overwhelmingly negative.

* [[Hired Guns]]: ''DUST 514'' allows players to interact with ''EVE'' players as this. [[Metaphorgotten|In other words]], [[Heroic Sociopath|Heroic Sociopaths]] hire [[Mook|Mooks]]!

* [[Hub Level]]: Jita, high-sec trading center in Caldari space. The other three empires have their own hubs but Jita trumps them by far.

** Unlike trading hubs in most games which feature a cluster of NPC shops, there's nothing special about Jita except its location (location location). It became a trading hub through players following economic pressure.

* [[Hyperspeed Escape]]: Know in game as "Warping Off". A significant portion of PVP is preventing it by scrambling the warp drive or deploying a [["No Warping" Zone|bubble]].

* [[Hyperspace Lanes]]: Jump gates are used to travel between systems. In addition, Titans (large, capital-level ships) can create their own jump gates.

** And Subverted by [[Suicide Attack|Suicide]] [[Griefer|Ganking]]

*** And arguably Averted by the fact [[Death Is Cheap]]

*** [http://myeve.eve-online.com/news.asp?a=single&nid=2713&tid=7 Proof of the market manipulation part.]

*** Referred to as "PVP Economics".

* [[Point Defenseless]]: Defender missiles need multiple hits to kill torpedoes, must be manually fired, cannot intercept missiles fired at friendly ships, and can easily be overwhelmed by multiple missile-spamming opponents.

* [[Portal Network]]: Solar systems are connected with stargates, while sufficiently advanced groups of players may wield the portable version, jump portal generators.

*** Or to other systems in known space, be they in (relatively) safe Empire space, or out in the middle of nowhere in Outlaw space.

* [[Power Crystal]]: Laser turret crystals. And Mining Crystals.

** Possible, right. CCP apparently haven't read The Origin of Consciousness. . .

* [[The Power of Trust]]: In a game where any member of your corporation can kill and/or rob you without police intervention, trust ends up being one of the most important assets a corporation can possess. EVE Online is rather famous for cases of said trust being [[The Infiltration|magnificently broken]].

** Chribba. A man who somehow managed to be trusted by the majority of EVE - trusted enough, in fact, to handle multi-hundred-billion ISK transfers and ship trades. His third-party transfer service is well-known and loved throughout all corners of EVE and has built him a reputation as "The Only Honest Man in EVE". At one point, grateful members of an alliance ''gave'' him a star system. And to top it off, [[Cherry Tapping|he mines veldspar in a dreadnought]]. ''In hi-sec''.

* [[Promotional Powerless Pieces of Garbage]]: The Interbus Shuttle. It came with the boxed set of Eve and a new account must be created in order to get it. It is a Gallente Shuttle with a [[Palette Swap]] and double the cargo capacity. Meaning it has zero offensive ability, extremely limited defensive abilities and 1/10 of the cargo capacity of a frigate.

** Most anniversery and christmas gifts fall under this catagory as well. The Apothesis is a shuttle with a cool new model and the Zephyr will not be targeted by Sleeper drones, but is poor in every other respect and can only fit what amounts to be a core probe launcher.

* [[Proud Warrior Race Guy]]: The Minmatar Clans, particularly the Brutor tribe.

* [[Psycho for Hire]]: The majority of "mercenary" corps fall under this heading. Many of them are thinly disguised pirates who use the unprovable excuse of being paid to wardec your corp, and most of the rest are thinly disguised pirates who actually ''are'' being paid to wardec your corp.

** The Amarr religion itself a more debatable example. On the one hand, it does have a basic system of morality common to most religions. On the other hand, it condones slavery and forced conversions.

* [[Religious and Mythological Theme Naming]]: Amarr ships named after various religious/mythological concepts, some Caldari ships named after mythological creatures (e.g. Tengu, Kitsune, Phoenix, Chimera), plus a few Minmatar ships named after parts of Norse mythology (Ragnarok, Loki, Sleipnir, Hel, Valkyrie), Gallente tend toward Greek and deities with a sprinkling of Sumerian (Ares, Ishkur, Nyx...). Minmatar also have the Wolf assault ship, said in the description to be named after 'a mythical beast renowned for its voraciousness'

* [[Rule of Symbolism]]: The shape of the capsule [[Blatant Lies|just so happens]] to be similar to a design that, [http://www.eveonline.com/background/potw/default.asp?cid=08-03-10 in Amarr religious symbology, means "man become god."]

* [[Sandbox Mode]]: If you want to, do it.

** Dr. Eyjólfur Guðmundsson<ref>Mercifully abbreviated to Dr. [[Eyjo G]] in most contexts.</ref>, CCP's in-house economist, publishes [http://wiki.eveonline.com/en/wiki/Quarterly_Economic_Newsletter Quarterly Economic Newsletters.] Yes.

* [[Shout-Out]]: "[[Battlestar Galactica|Frak]]" is the [[Unusual Euphemism]] of choice among Eve players, and has even been spotted in Eve Voice ads and mission descriptions.

** In the system of Dead End (two jumps away from the EVE Gate), orbiting the fifth moon of the fifth planet, is a massive black monolith. The description reads "[[2001: A Space Odyssey|It's full of stars.]]"

* [[Shoot the Medic First]]: Logistics ships and their Tech 2 variants are the medics of space ships. They can repair armor and boost the shield of other ships. Of course, they're always the ones who get popped first by an enemy fleet.

*** And ships that aren't moving automatically level themselves at a right angle to "galactic north". Turns out the game made it to beta testing without any of these conveniences, but it was discovered the lack of direction made players feel lost and insecure and the developers became concerned that the game was too hard core. Conf. [[What Could Have Been]]

* [[United Nations]]: The CONCORD Assembly

** In the backstory, the Minmatar were once very technologically savvy (but didn't develop interstellar drives) and the enslavement by the Amarr hindered their advancement considerably. When the Minmatar rebellion came around, they had to use what they had, so early Minmatar ships are not suited for prolonged warfare and battles of the line, relying on hit and run tactics and overwhelming numbers. In the current time, the Sebiestor and Thukker tribes foster some of the best engineers in the cluster; Development of the Jump Freighters are credited to the Thukker, for example.

* [[Unwinnable Training Simulation]]: Describes many core philosophies of Eve.

** Although you can find players willing to buy almost anything. Many low end modules are bought solely for mineral value when reprocessed.

** The reprocessing plant itself could be a considered a [[We Buy Everything]], they will reprocess just about any ship/module and give you the minerals in return for taking a percentage unless you have good enough standing with the station owners. they will reprocess anything except non-metallic items really.

** Although the economy is such that the de-facto unit of currency is in millions of isk. Ask someone for a price, and they say '50', they mean 50 MILLION isk.

* [[Weapon of Mass Destruction]]: Titan-class motherships can fit a Doomsday Device; each of the four major races in the game have slightly different ones but they all operate on the principle of the [[Earthshattering Kaboom]] (or nearly so). Most commonly deployed against large fleets, especially in [[PvP]] alliance warfare, but the effects when used against a planet are [http://www.eveonline.com/news.asp?a=single&nid=1072&tid=5 not] [http://www.eveonline.com/news.asp?a=single&nid=1258&tid=5 pretty]).