The Mittani: Time To Put Up Or Shut Up

On Tuesday CCP Soundwave published a dev blog about planned changes to null sec.  I don't know if the changes are good or bad, but upon hearing the news Kirith Kodachi used coarse language and Mord Fiddle engaged in a bit of "I told you so."

The news is about changes to the jump bridge mechanic:

"We’ve been looking into players interacting and how that ties into movement and security. Jump bridges have become a bit too much of a crutch in terms of getting around, so we’re going to apply a three changes. Basically, it’s become a very easy, convenient and safe way to travel, with little or no downside. That’s not to say you’re invincible when using jumpbridges, but if you’re in an alliance with an intel channel and a semi-decent jumpbridge network, you have a pretty overwhelming degree of safety. That safety is detrimental to interaction, both in terms of meeting friendly and unfriendly players, which is the base of our change. If it’s difficult catching people moving around, roaming/open world pvp becomes more sidelined, which we’re against. On the other hand, we don't want to take jumpbridges out, since they provide a great way of reaching whatever content you’re using quickly. Anyway, this is what’s happening:

"The first change is the removal of ships with jumpdrives from the jumpbridge eligibility list. This isn’t very dramatic and long overdue. Basically if your ship has a jumpdrive, it can’t use the jumpbridge (Black Ops ships are exempt from this rule). This change will go in on the 17th of this month.

"The second and third changes will go in next month, with the main patch. We will be limiting the number of jumpbridges you can have in a system to one, while upping the fuelbay to 30.000 (3x) to avoid suicide among players who do logistics. We would suggest you start reconfiguring your jumpbridge network as soon as possible.

"Hopefully, this will better balance the rewards of fast travel with the risk of getting caught on the way. So you’ll still be able to use jumpbridges, but every jumpbridge link adds a normal gate jump too. Anyway, that’s short term."

The second part is where The Mittani steps in.  CCP Soundwave then goes on to write, "Luckily, the CSM will be joining us this month so the players are adequately represented. We’ll have several sessions with them and hopefully they will be able to contribute to our goal."  This is exactly what The Mittani campaigned on during the CSM elections.  Let me just give a couple of quotes.  First, from his Ten Ton Hammer column:

"Unfortunately for nullsec, CSM5 actually did matter - in all the wrong ways. With the year-long term, stakeholder status and a gaggle of bushy-tailed representatives, CSM5 and CCP prepared to tackle all sorts of issues - including the crippling failures of the Dominion system which alliance citizens must cope with daily. This meeting of the minds took place at a summit where the single remaining nullsec representative on the CSM, Vuk Lau, was not present, meaning that whatever discussions that took place could at best be described as ‘completely uninformed by actual experience’. The less polite reaction, from CSM Alternate Helen Highwater, described the CSM5 principals as “drooling retards.” In the aftermath of this, Vuk Lau resigned at the end of his term, forfeiting a free trip to Fanfest in protest."

So the null sec alliances got together to make sure CCP did not screw over the residents of null sec.  And who was the leader?  Our friend from Wisconsin with the really cute puppy:

"Every candidate is going to tell you that they want to bring your ideas to CCP. I want to bring CCP to our ideas.

"We play their game, we pay their upkeep, we use their features and we suffer from their shortsightedness. For this they give us one resource, the CSM, and they treat it like a mere focus group, not a stakeholder to be respected. On the CSM, I’ll do what I can to make it better, but I’m not going to promise you the moon and the stars, because I can’t deliver on that.

"What I can deliver is me being a ruthless, manipulative bastard. And you need that, if you want to see the CSM become a real advocate for the playerbase, one that cannot be dismissed by CCP. Thus far, the CSM has never been united. It has been a cacophony of individuals, mostly deluded by the false notion that their election has given them a designer’s position, bleating out their personal ‘fixes’ and being surprised when the devs ignore them. A divided CSM isn’t an effective advocate for the playerbase.

"If the CSM doesn’t band together to oppose CCP when they suggest ******ed things, the interests of the playerbase get steamrolled. Obvious, preventable imbalances get implemented. You need someone who knows how to build a coalition, how to make people want to work together, how to make members feel like their voice and their opinion makes the collective union stronger. I have brought together a coalition of people who normally can't agree on the color of an orange and directed them in a war that most players can only dream of. If I can bring these people together, I can do the same for the CSM as its chair."

Well, now is the time for The Mittani to live up to his campaign rhetoric.  Will he succeed in bringing the players ideas to CCP or will he wind up labeled a "drooling retard"?