Eve Rule #42: The only way to have an active Corp in Eve is to be active in your Corp.
I've been running Stay Frosty for a year, eight months and twenty days as of today. Some of my younger readers may not be aware that I've been involved in various Corporation and Alliance leadership roles since I started playing Eve. From Null Sec, to Industry, to Sov Holders, Gankers, Mercs and beyond - I've been involved in one way or another with just about all of it.
In that time thousands of players have passed in and out of Corporations I've been involved with. Just in Stay Frosty alone I estimate we've seen about one thousand players pass thru our doors in almost two years. And far and away the biggest reason people give for leaving is "Activity". Some variation on that theme is the primary reason people give for leaving a Corporation. At least in my experience.
Granted, an active Corporation is much better than an in-active one. And everyone's judgement about what makes an active Corporation is going to be different. I'm not here today to debate what is and or isn't an active Corporation. I'm here today to give you a glimpse into the other side of that equation. A glimpse into what your leadership might be thinking about what you just said. Or, at least, what I've heard other leaders say and what I've said myself from time to time.
You see, the truth is - the person leaving because of activity? They are not active players. I know this is probably going to hurt some feelings, but it is the truth. In general, those leaving don't have very many posts on the forums. They don't respond to emails. They don't join in on chat channels. They rarely x up for fleets or gangs. Or jump on opportunities that happen while they are on-line. They are usually the quiet ones. And yet, when pressed, they will be the first to say, "I wish we had more fleets.", or "We need more FCs".
Of course we do. Every Corporation in Eve struggles with this problem. Even Stay Frosty struggles with this problem. I'm the first to admit it. We are not perfect either. But where do fleets and gangs and opportunities and FCs come from? Where does activity derive? No mystery here, there is only ONE place - from YOU!
And that is why Rule #42 rings true. Because it is. The only way to have an active Corporation is for YOU to be active in your Corporation. Your leaders will love you for it. Your Corp mates will love you for it. And soon, others will take your example and become more active as well. And before you know it, you'll be in an insanely active Corporation. Surrounded by people just like you, that are driven to engage. Create content. And generally get off their ass and do stuff together.
One problem with Corporations like Stay Frosty is people like me. And I've seen this in other Corporations as well. When one person is the focal point the tendency is to rely on that person to generate content. Which they happen to excel at. However, they are only one person. And when they are not active, or not generating content, the tendency is to simply log-off. It's a lot like a Traffic Jam. One person at the head of the line lightly taps on their brakes, the person behind them does the same, and eventually - down the line - traffic comes to a complete stop.
I can't possible generate enough content to keep 200 people happy, much less 500+ Alliance players. It is impossible. I have a career, a family, friends, hobbies, projects, and an endless list of things that Eve is a part of - but not always a priority of. We all do. So relying on me is a silly proposition.
You should be relying on no one but yourself. And it doesn't take much. Just like the Traffic Jam, Corporation activity works the opposite way. A little movement makes a huge difference.
Make a difference in your Corporation or Alliance. Be the type of player you want others to be. And before long you will be surrounded by those players. And if it doesn't work where you are, those other players? They will follow you to the next place.
Engage. Eve is a much, much better game when you do.
This, this, and so much more this.
ReplyDeleteI think a large part of it is that every other MMO on the planet is geared to spoon-feed content. It seems in EVE that is also the case, though instead of NPCs doing the spooning, it's Corp leaders, FCs, etc.
So that begs the question, besides writing blog posts & tweets, how do we go about changing that attitude?
changing the attitude is a simple one. make the game fun and exciting. show new players how to do that and in a corp or alliance environment and soon everyone will be thinking of hings to do.
DeleteWith the bastards one of the guys called Ithica Hawk is amazing at thinking of new content. We ran a full police comet roam, industrial races and our training corp versus our vets.its taking something that sounds stupid like RR Punishers and roaming with them to see if you can get fights and not worry about killboards and so on.
also using a forum to plan operations is key. give people time to get the ships and fittings or better get the ships ready and sell them to people on the day. means people just coming on can join in and you not waiting about for one person trying to get jita to buy 1 item.
also start players early with fcing. allowing them to fc early in their game experience means its a normal thing. if you have only 3 fcs and they are the only people allowed to fc you going to have problems when 2 of them leave. I like brand new players to fc because it gets them over the fear ofcing early and having support their for them to grow is key again. they will in return be your next content creators. I would rather have 30 ok fcs than 3 great ones. it meamns 30 people can create things to do.
In a recent post, you mentioned that essentially you are dedicated to the solo life. There is some fleeting and whatnot, but for the most part, it sounds like your corp is a collection of loners with friends. Which kind of raises the obvious question, if everyone is supposed to generate their own content, what's the point of being in the corp? They could just as easily be friends and acquaintances in the area of operations.
ReplyDeleteGood question. First of all everyone is not supposed to generate "all" of their own content, so that is not exactly correct. We, as Corp and Alliance, generate a lot of content for our players. From daily gangs, ops, long-term goals and events. Not to mention Alliance wide activities that anyone can participate in. Secondly being in Corp allows players the opportunity to generate their own content with people that share those goals, giving the player access to potential content, that they themselves can add to, create, or participate in. Something that you can't do outside a Corp/Alliance on your own.
DeleteThe value, ultimately, that is brought to such an experience is up to the individual player. The more active you become the more activity you find. This is not unique to any specific type of Corporation/Alliance. This is true of all of them.
You haven't really addressed the question, Rixx. If the primary activity of a group is solo, then why join a corp? Other than the tax breaks, the other things you mention could be generated just by having people in a shared chat channel. It would seem to me that people leaving a solo-oriented corp due to activity concerns is, well, natural and not worthy of criticism at all.
DeleteTruth be told, I never did understand the purpose of loners 'grouping' so they could do their loner activities, well, alone in a group :)
I do, however, take your larger point. I've been on both sides of the equation. In my opinion, when activity levels threaten a corp, it's the fault of both leadership and the members. Maybe fault is too strong a word. Responsibility is better and much more accurate.
Leadership is responsible for the success or failure of whatever group they are leading. Period. However, if the leadership gets little support from their followers, well, it's very hard to lead a group that doesn't want to be led.
I absolutely agree with you on individual goals being the key to enjoying EVE, be it in a small or large group. Having such an open-ended game is not the natural state of gaming - and EVE players need to get over our elitist disregard of reality - and when a player finishes doing most of the things in EVE and there's nothing new to do, that's when the problems set it. It is so vital for players new and old to keep inventing a goal(s) to accomplish, short-term and long-term.
So, yeah, as long as the leaders and the led do their bit to help each other, then activity usually takes care of itself (time zone considerations aside).
Well the post wasn't intended to be about Stay Frosty. Just Corporations in general.
DeleteHowever, since it has been brought up. As we discussed today in the ABA Podcast, which will be out soon, Stay Frosty isn't a bunch of Solo players but rather something I prefer to call Solo With Friends. We primarily fly small gang, which can be working as a unit or as solo players with back up if needed. This doesn't even take into account the benefits of bring in a larger group, for intel, group ops, help with freighters, moving, selling, setting up markets, and all the other things that being a part of a group helps with.There are so many things happening in a group that might be overlooked that help support a "solo" player.
As people who leave Stay Frosty already know, there is no criticism for leaving. In fact, I support their decision and tell them the door is always open if they want to come back someday. We make no excuses for being who we are, and not everyone is going to like it.