The Trains Keep Moving

Honestly, sometimes I feel excited about EVE Online, and sometimes I don't. For example, yesterday I saw CCP Paradox post the new stats for the Pacifier and Enforcer on the Test Server Feedback section of the official forums.

Today’s update included some further changes, most notably includes a first set of changes to the Pacifier and Enforcer and updating the Covert Cyno deployables industry requirements and skill to anchor.

Pacifier

• PG increased to 60
• 1 Extra High Slot
• Max Velocity increased to 340
• Increased both max turret/launcher hardpoints to 4

Enforcer:

• PG increased to 1150
• 1 Extra High Slot
• Max velocity increased to 190
• Added Drone capability: Capacity 25m3 and Bandwidth at 25Mbit/s

Increased both max turret/launcher hardpoints to 5

Changes are still in progress and may be updated.

Yes, I own 2 Pacifiers, 2 Enforcers, 2 Pacifier blueprint copies, and an Enforcer BPC. Just the announcement of the changes inspired me to start playing Project Discovery again to try to pick up a couple of more BPCs. But I think I'm in the minority on that. Still, Op Success for CCP!

On the other hand, every time I see numbers I start getting concerned. The latest instance was my last visit to The Ancient Gaming Noob. He had a really good analysis of the May Monthly Economic Report up currently. But his weekly update of the war kind of got me down when I got down to the weekly PCU counts.

I'm going to jump the gun by a week making the following comparison. On 5 July 2020, the first full day of the war, the number of peak concurrent users was 38,838. The PCU peaked at 40,359 on 18 October. At that point, the numbers started to decline until the PCU reached 33,758 on 16 May. From the beginning of the war to week 45, the PCU had fallen by 5080.

In the following 6 weeks, the PCU dropped from 33,758 down to 25,661 this past Sunday. I know PCU is not the best metric for measuring activity, but the number of average concurrent users has dropped by around 5000 accounts during the same time. 

Shadowbringers is 60% off again as part of the Summer Steam Sale

With the war winding down, I can't help but think players are wandering off to do other things. Perhaps the timing is coincidental, but the rapid decline began the week Blizzard launched the pre-patch for The Burning Crusade Classic. The following week saw Square Enix, perhaps in an effort to pick off disgruntled WoW players, offering 60% off Shadowbringers from 25 May to 9 June. Then ZeniMax launched its Blackwood expansion for Elder Scrolls Online on 1 June, the same day Blizzard opened up the TBC Classic servers. And who knows what the effect of today's Patch 9.1 for Retail WoW will be.

The healthiest thing I can do is totally ignore the EVE subreddit. That's doable. But I keep poking my head out to look at the activity numbers. I can't help myself. Looking at the activity is like looking at a looming train wreck. I just hope the trains can stop in time.