Garett McAndrew
Madhatters Inc. M. PIRE
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Posted - 2007.08.09 17:21:00 -
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We're getting a new ship (class) soon so this bring up something I've been thinking about a long time:
How about prototyping a ship first rather than seed (or a more appropriate term: flood) the market with BPO.
It makes sense from the role playing perspective: Usually a company starts with a prototype and tests it or it will let other companies test it in a practical environment. After successful testing the company starts mass production.
The Mechanics
Lets take a ship. A appropriate NPC corp would start giving away one-run BPCs. You can obtain them through the RP lottery, but they are bound to some rules: You have to do what the NPC corp demands or your license will be revoked.
What can that be?
- Produce the BPC within xx days
- Do not leave the corp with the BPC
- Do not sell the BPC
- Do not sell the ship to opposing faction
- Do not hand over the ship to Caldari or Amarr
- Be part of a real corporation (so no NPC alts)
- Be a member of of a race
- Be a member of a clean corp that only allows one or two races
- Must be build at Rodden Shipyards
- You, your corp and even your alliance will be in the news. You have to agree to that, *everyone* will know who to target. :D
- Bring it into a fleet battle
- etc,... there's much more possible from the role playing POV
All of these points could be optional. For example, a Velator Mark II would require only 3.) and 1.) while a Tier 2 Titan would probably use as much rules as possible. Although Titans had a prototyping phase due to the logistical nightmare back in the days.
In order to avoid much programming this will be monitored by CCP staff, it won't take long and you have a perfect beta test of the new ship classes within TQ. Isn't that something? :) And if the test is not fast enough because the contractor sleeps: Revoke the offer or even take the BPC away. One could even think for more drastic punishments: You sell the BPC? Well, that's it with researching with our corp: Forever! They might place a bounty on your head, you get standing hits or mercenaries are being hired in order to hunt you, maybe even your corp (as long as the corp agress to start a contract with the research agent).
Timeframes per ship
First one run BPC to just a single inhabitant within Eve. Let it fly x days
After x days introduce a wider test, give out 1-3 run BPCs to more people, not necessarily within the same corporation. Let them fly x*2 days. Same rules apply, or maybe less rules? Maybe get your hand on one of the first ships through a contract? Who knows?
After a longer time, start up mass production. Depending on the tech level seed BPCs via the market or the research agents.
Advantages
- Makes sense, more role playing regarding R&D and production
- Devs can monitor ships in real situations rather than a test server and tweak them accordingly
- RPs have another use
- Change of publicity for some corps. You have the chance to be one of the first to be killed in the new ship
- Maybe one ship will get special escort from Concorde on the maiden flight?
There are some negative points of course: You have to wait a bit longer for announced ships to arrive. They won't be available immediately after a patch. Also this might increase the load on some devs. :)
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