The essential question at the heart of this article is based on a very simple premise - where have the revolutionaries in Eve gone?
I've been playing Eve since 2008 and in those days I spent almost all of my time in Null Sec. For over two years I was indoctrinated in the power of Sov, the rewards of owning your own space, and the need to protect it at all costs. I fought in multiple wars defending that space, and then in several other wars invading that space. During all of those early years Null Sec was a dynamic, constantly changing, undulating, powerful mix of waring states. It was constantly exciting.
That is why I kept coming back over and over again. Everything that happened in Null in those days was driven by individuals, people who led great armies. The names are well known to those that care about history. But, in the years since I left, Null has slowly and surely become a placid blue ocean. A splash here. A ripple there. But all succumbed and overwhelmed by the blue tide.
The essential question then, as Taz asks, is who is at fault here? Is it CCP? Is it the Mittani? Is it Moon Goo? Is it the proliferation of Super Caps? And while these things certainly play a role, none of them are answers.
To find the true answer one only has to look at history, real history. One of the things I found fascinating about Null when I first started playing Eve was just how contradictory to human nature it seemed to be. Throughout human history conflict has been driven primarily by a sense of security. The unknown must be subjugated to the will of powerful principles in order for the unknown to be pushed away. Darkness, ignorance, all need to be defeated (in one way or another) for our people to feel safe. We can't have barbarians raiding our cities and killing our people, so we need to kill the barbarians, or at least drive them further away.
Eventually there are no more barbarians. Borders become relatively stable, states descend into trading, people are educated, people make money, states become (more or less) uninterested in killing other people so much. Conflict resolves into ideological, philosophical or religious camps, outdated and ancient baggage still unresolved. But, for the most part, stable and predictable. Borders seldom change much.
I found it interesting when I was in Null that this wasn't happening. That Alliances who held a certain amount of space were not content, and instead initiated conflicts, instead of building allies. This seemed counter-intuitive to human nature. Was this because of Sov mechanics? Why was this happening?
What I failed to realize until much later on, was that it was happening. It was just happening very slowly. Even in 2008 the seeds were being planted, the allies being formed, that would eventually lead us to the Null we have today. The process was already under way. Over the years I've gotten into some rather heated debates with some of my fellow bloggers about this very fact. It wasn't until I left Null that I could see what was happening to Null. My perspective was altered. And over the past four years it has become rather obvious where this was all leading.
Back then I attributed the conflicts in Null to the power of Eve. It was Eve that drove the conflicts, that kept human nature at bay. We'd all be the beneficiaries of Eve's desire to see us all shoot at each other until the servers went dark. But it wasn't Eve. That was a lie. Eve is only a sandbox after all. And human nature cannot be subverted, even by game mechanics.
In my humble opinion it is time that Null sec was set on fire. It needs to burn to the ground. I'm tired of hearing about it. It is dead, it died a few years back and now is nothing more than the artificial playground of the rich and famous. It is boring. It is blue. It is dead.
But who will burn it down? How can they achieve such an ambitious, some would say impossible, goal?
The same way it was done the first time. Slowly, over time, and with great conviction. By a few motivated people. Who are these people? I have no clue. But I am telling you right now that it can be done. It is not impossible. Null sec needs an enema.
The revolutionaries are playing Eve right now.
Viva la revolución!
Comments
regards,
Dinsdale
Hope...Belief...Purpose can be more powerful than money.
No entity is impenetrable. There is always a weakness. Find it. Exploit it.
It's been done before. It'll happen again.
Believe that it will.
When do we want it? NOW!
Who's gonna make it happen? SOMEONE ELSE!
If you had a big fleet meet up and start shooting at a sov structure or whatever, there would be a notification sent to the owner's and you would have 200+ bored supers on your ass.
So how do you do it? The enemy is enormous. You can't match their power out in the open. You would need an insurgency from Hell. You are blue with NO ONE! THERE IS ONLY RED
It would take some focused decentralization. You would need to be fast and strike all over the place at random. Small fleets, even soloers. Run constant interference. Burn their cynos down, kill their mining bots. Shoot at random structures; basically make no sense on a map. Would require a lot of skilled pilots, not to mention FC's. (Sounds like the start of a Standard Operating Procedure!)
Don't loiter in any pocket or pipe for long. If you scare the locals into docking up or going to their POS then move along to the next thing right away.
Keep your enemy guessing. Eventually a system might drop?
Many deep null regions are long pipes in design; so you'll need someone who can light the beacon that takes you out of there when needed. Your own cynos. Lots of them. Or someone with a probe launcher. Take the first K-K WH out.
Make use of these new structures: have siphon units, dscan inhibitors, cyno inhibitors.. everywhere. Refit on the fly to rep your armor/structure damage. Even the industrialists would have to be on a constant patrol scooping the moon goo.
And of course.. spies.
(Just having fun. ;) Would be awesome to see a null revolutionary out there, especially from a pirate background)
The problem is getting it all out again. NPC bounties were the only profitable thing in the end, as there was no local market to sell to, and *everything* else was too bulky to make money from. One battleship mod took up 20% of your hold, and in null, battleship NPC are all you fight.
And that's the problem. Guerrilla warfare doesn't work here. It's your supply lines that are vulnerable, not the bigger, more equipped force. The bigger more equipped force are right next to their factories. Blow up a battleship, and they'll have three more waiting 5 jumps away. Lose a bomber, and that's 10 jumps through bubbled gate camps, a trip through wormholes, and maybe even through low sec too. And you'll be doing that in a pod.
Until someone comes up with a solution to this logistical problem, the kind of skirmish warfare being proposed simply won't work.
And hence the issue is projection. Whether an invasion or a sustained 'Resistance' or a well planned 'Privateer Program' (See 17th Century British Naval Doctrine v/s the then far superior Spanish and Portugese Armada and challenging their Atlantic/New World Domination) .. all analogies fall flat when a Nyx using cyno can cover null-space faster than a manually piloted Interceptor.
That right there is the core of the problem, elsewhere debated as 'Power Projection' issues.
Despite my zero experience in Null, that to me sounds a fair recognition of the problem with large power blocs and their ability to hold the big donut.
Kaal