This series of posts is intended as a discussion and my thoughts in how ISK affects PvP and how PvP Affects ISK; further entrys can be found here.

As I discussed in my last post as an individual pilot in 0.0 income directly through PvP is almost non-existent for the majority. But there are plenty of money faucets in 0.0; so where is the money going? The simple answer is “To a select few leaders”. Most people are well aware of the RMT trade, and the accusations (and indeed evidence) that most large Alliance Leaders are earning a real life wage from their ISK profits. Assuming that this is the case (Alliances aren’t in the habit of giving out API account access to the public), what’s gone wrong. Why is there such a gap between the “wage” of the 0.0 pilot and a 0.0 Alliance leader?

My simple brain tells me that there are two basic ways for money to flow in a hierarchical system such as EvE:

Bottom Up (Socialist)
Where the pilots earn the money and pay a (small) fee to those above them for the privilege of using their money making system. The current Corporation Tax system would be the foundation for such a system. A pilot makes money by running PLEXs & a small percentage of this money goes to the corporation. But we would need to extend this to the alliance level with a percentage of the corporation’s profits being paid to the alliance. In this system every pilot would be able to make a profit, those who take on roles in corporations or Alliances would be able to draw an additional wage from the coffers of their employers.

Top Down (Capitalist)
This is where wealth is gained by the Alliance and distributed downwards through wages and subsidisation. For example an Alliance gets money from Moon Goo, and pays its Corporations and Leaders for their contributions to the cause. Corporations then in turn pay their Leaders and active members and/or subsidize the cost of helping to hold this space i.e ship replacement programs.

Of course this is a polarization, and a mix of systems can also exist.

As we can see both systems already have some supporting functionality within EvE. However it’s very rare to experience either in the wild. So what is happening? To me it would at least appear that simple human greed means the money rarely flows up or down the systems. Pilots don’t want to share the rewards of solo pursuits through huge tax rates, and Alliance leaders don’t want to distribute the Moon Goo wealth downwards to subordinates.

This is what makes the Income Gap so large in 0.0 Alliances. Pilots are left to earn what they can to survive, while Alliance High Commands earn wealth intended to fund entire Alliances.

So how can we fix the System? If CCP wanted to fix the current system without adding new features, they would need to greatly increase the rewards of Solo 0.0 money spinners (Plex, mining & anomalies), while reducing the Organised Money making opportunities until they could support only a few people (Roughly the number of people needed to run the schemes and their equipment).

But what about in a dream world; how could we close this gap?

The first step I think would be to implement a “wage” system into the game. Allowing CEO’s, Alliance leaders, Diplomats and other alliance positions (right down to Player) to draw a wage would go a long way to allowing both top down and bottom up systems to work. We would also need CCP to recognize Alliances as an entity in itself, allowing a wallet and API to be given for it.

– In a top down system this would allow Active players to draw a regular wage for their efforts.
– In a bottom up system the CEO and other official positions would be able to draw a wage from the funds for their additional efforts.

Once this is in place we need to make a choice between systems and Bias the income streams towards those methods. To either make the individuals dependent on the group or the group dependent on the individuals. As we are talking about a dream world here, adjust the Sov mechanics a bit. In order to place TCUs an alliance must first place a capital TCU in a system. These function exactly the same as normal units (for a higher price) except they have a toggle switch*:

Socialist Government Infrastructure Node
– Moons can now be mined using Crust Buster Lasers
– Each player using a Crust buster laser is charged a fee linked to the market price of the Goo
– All Plex and Ratting bounties are increased by 20%
– All Corporation, POCO & Alliance tax rates cannot be set above 20%

Nomadic Infrastructure Node
– Alliance wallet disabled
– Moon Goo yield reduced by 50%
– Plex and anomaly bounty increased by 40%

Capitalist Government Infrastructure Node
– Corporation, POCO & Alliance tax rates cannot be set lower than 80%
– Moons can now only be mined by Moon Harvesting Arrays
– All players are paid a basic wage for being (active) in the alliance (active requirements set by the alliance)
– Bonuses can be automated for activity’s such as joining fleets
– Bonuses can also be paid out manually by Alliance Directors

By forcing a single revenue stream either at the top or the bottom of an alliance the members would be forced to move wealth up and down the levels. A Socialist Alliance would soon keel over if members stopped passing money up the chain of command. After all who would go to the effort of running an alliance for no money what so ever? Equally if the Alliance earned all the money and passed none to its members (who could no longer earn any independently) they would soon quit (or go bankrupt).

This all ties in quite nicely with my last post. Is this where that middle ground lies? If Alliances and Corporations were forced to provide for their members (or vice versa) we wouldn’t not be opening a new ISK faucet, but instead redistributing wealth to the masses. By stopping the accumulation of vast wealth we may even be so bold as to suggest that the RMT issue might be reduced. Of course for those who hold capitalism dear, using the capitalist methodology would still allow for vast accumulation of wealth by Alliance leaders, but only if they can persuade their members to put up with it.

I won’t sit on the fence on this one like I did the last post. Instead I’m going to straight up admit that I would love to see this system implemented; but I doubt it will. CCP have said they intend to adjust how players make money in 0.0, and even mentioned moons becoming player mined so who knows maybe something is in the works.

Thanks for reading

Hark¬

This series of posts is intended as a discussion and my thoughts in how ISK affects PvP and how PvP Affects ISK; further entrys can be found here.
Losing ships is expensive. “No shit Sherlock” right? But have you ever stopped to think what that actually means? I can’t think of many other games where (arguably) what is the “End Game Content” actually costs in game money to do. Even in the dreaded WoW (I’ve been clean for 3 years now), the “End Game” Raids can earn anywhere between some and significant amounts of money, dependent on how good your Raid Group is. Can you imagine if Call of Duty or Battlefield required you to earn money (or maybe respect points) by performing Drill, Peeling Potatoes and “Cleaning the Head” (whatever that means) before you could afford to play a PvP match? Yet in EvE this is effectively what you have to do.

Now some might argue that 0.0 (Wormholes too, and to some extent Low Sec) PvP does earn you money, as winning in PvP dictates who holds sovereignty over the systems. Yet, the only income available as individuals is through Plex, Anomalies and mining. To draw back on the FPS analogy, we are now able to perform Parades, peel New Potatoes (without the horrid sprouty bits), and Sprucing up the Officers Powder Room. The actions are the same as High Sec, we just earn more for them.

The only people who do earn money directly PvP, are Alliance/Corporation leaders (Moon Goo), Mercenary Groups (Contracts), Small Gang/Solo PvP’ers (loot) and that guy who always seems to be able to scoop loot before I do at gate camps (wanker). That’s a pretty small percentage of PvP players.

Don’t get me wrong here I’m not rallying for change, nor incandescent with rage at this indecency. No I find this an interesting study in our psychology as gamers, and perhaps as an insight into the level of grip EvE PvP has on us.

Now I will admit that as someone who really doesn’t enjoy extended periods of Mission running or mining; my first thought on this subject was “Wouldn’t it be nice if PvP earned me money”. Perhaps with each killer earning a percentage of the market value of the victim’s ship and its fittings? Or a mechanism for Corporations/Alliances to automatically distribute funds to pilots when they participate in fleets. This could aid the currently inhibited top down money flow (a topic I will discuss in the next in this series).

We might also see an increase in numbers flocking to the more lawless areas of space. In the head of a Carebear (I was one once) acquisition of money is often the key motivator, perhaps if PvP were a real money spinner, we might see a bigger migration flow to Null/Low Sec. Furthermore if PvP paid money we could also see more wars, and more people in fleets (that’s a good thing right?).

It sounds wonderful but how would it affect those of us already PvPing, and indeed the landscape of PvP space? Currently the people who are in Null Sec are the people who really want to be there. Because of the cost of entry we have invested time and money into our position, and we are dedicated to our causes. Would an influx of money seekers begin to muddy the waters? To water down that passion? PvP for profit would herald an entire new mentality in Null/Low Sec. Wars would be fought by entrepreneurs rather than Zealots (not the ship). We already see blobs more and more every month in eve, and with the current effectiveness of Super Capitals, and other Low Risk PvP methods (improbable Tengus et al) we might also see the decline of “Gud Fights” in favor of “No risk PvP”.

As a note here; I’m not a fan of the argument “I had to go through it so why shouldn’t you HTFU”. It’s a little bit too close to the British Boarding School mentality which brought us Fagging. The point I’m trying to make is that maybe we shouldn’t work too hard to bring High Sec dwellers into Null/Low Sec; if they don’t want to be out here, and we shouldn’t change our game to make room for them.

We would also have to consider the economy. Every Carebear that moves to Null/Low Sec is one less mining our jump fuel and building our ships, even mission runners source the faction modules we love so much. Economy speculation is not really my strong point, but my feeling is that if an ISK faucet opened in Null/Low Sec opened up, the exodus of Carebears would hitch the prices of our trade’s tools until the profits we made were nullified. And even if they didn’t the economy of EvE would require CCP to develop even more ISK sinks for us (something they are teetering on doing any way).

Making PvP profitable would change how we as PvPers in any form view combat. Right now life in Null is a wonderful lesson in self-support, and risk. If we were making money hand over fist, the risk/reward ratio would shift furthermore we might not get the same buzz from our kills, and the “ISK war” would become far more important that it already is.

I think as with most things there is a middle ground to be had with this. I do feel that Null Sec profits rest in the hands of too few, encouraging a trickle down of funds (or indeed trickle up) is a great idea (the next topic in the series). But equally too much profit in PvP would be a bad thing for our landscape in the long run.

Of course equally, should someone wish to give me a chunk of cash for PvPing, I would not complain.

Thanks for reading,

Hark¬