EVE Online Patch Notes: Skyhook Enhancements And FAQ

CCP is in the process of dropping the last of the Equinox sovereignty system into EVE Online's null security space before the winter expansion arrives in the next month or two. Yesterday's patch updated orbital skyhooks, one of the lynchpins of the new sov system. The deadline for switching to Equinox sov is Tuesday, 29 October. Not much time which is why CCP also published an FAQ for what is coming up next. I figured having both the FAQ and patch notes in one place might be helpful. I'll start with the FAQ.

Frequently Asked Questions

 

What happens to my old upgrades and territorial claim units (TCUs)? 

Your old upgrades and existing TCUs have had their reprocessing rates adjusted so you will get back the full bill of materials upon reprocessing them. 

When will the grace period for removing rigs end? 

On 29 October at 11:00 UTC. 

What happens if I am in the process of building a supercapital manufacturing upgrade in a system that can no longer support it after the transition? 

The building process will be paused. If your system cannot physically install the necessary upgrades, the Game Masters will refund you for your build’s bill of materials. 

Where will information about skyhook vulnerability be visible? 

Vulnerable skyhooks will appear in the Agency and on the map. 

When can the secure bay be emptied? 

The secure bay can be emptied at any time. 

When a skyhook comes out of reinforced mode, is the next vulnerability period based on that timer or the original vulnerability timer? 

Skyhooks will always use the reinforcement timer to determine their next vulnerability period. 

How is the skyhook vulnerability window calculated? 

The vulnerability window for the skyhook is determined by its reinforcement timer, which is calculated using a normal distribution within a 3-hour standard deviation. The next vulnerability window is 72 hours +/- the variance from the normal distribution, shown below. 

Does this mean that the timer will start exactly every 3 days? 

Not quite. Initially, timers may seem to follow an exact 3-day cycle, but as the system continues to generate timers with random offsets, they will gradually start spreading more evenly across the days. Below is a worst-case scenario simulation of how the vulnerability windows distribute in a hypothetical situation where every skyhook had the same reinforcement timer. In practice, this will even out much faster.  

How long is the window to raid a skyhook before it becomes invulnerable? 

A skyhook will remain raidable for one hour after the vulnerability window opens. 

Will I see the skyhook timer anywhere in space, or will I have to warp to the skyhook to see it? 

All vulnerable skyhooks are visible through the Agency and on the map, and all pilots belonging the same corporation as the skyhook owner, with the correct roles, can see the vulnerability timers in a new tab on the structure browsers. 

However, if you do not belong to the same corporation as the owner, and if it is currently invulnerable, you will need to warp to the skyhook to see its timer. 

I started the post with the FAQ because I know how much people love reading patch notes. But anyone trying to figure out how to min/max orbital skyhook mechanics probably wants to read the details as well. Below are the patch notes for yesterday's update.

Patch Notes for 2024-10-1.1

Features & Changes:

Sovereignty:

• Skyhooks have now been updated to Upwell’s latest firmware → Equinox Update: Enhanced Skyhooks | EVE Online
  
  
• Skyhooks now have a Secure Bay and a Surplus Bay, rather than an Immature and Mature Bay.
  
  
• The Secure bay can be accessed by players on the ACL at any time, and 50% of all the materials harvested from the Skyhook enter into the secure bay.
  
  
• The Surplus bay can only be accessed through the Skyhook raiding gameplay, and contains the other 50% of the reagents generated.
  
  
• There is no longer any waste when raiding a Skyhook, you get 100% of the surplus bay contents on a successful raid, the secure bay is not affected.
  
  
• The Skyhook Reagent silo is now only vulnerable to being attacked during a 1 hour interval, every 3-4 days, the time period for the surplus bay is loosely based on the 6 hour exit window chosen by the Skyhook owner for their reinforcement timer.
  
  
• It should be noted that while it is likely for a Skyhook theft event to come out in a timezone favorable to the defender, Skyhooks theft events can actually happen at any time of the day. Skyhooks use a gaussian distribution to determine the next vulnerability window.

• In this example, a Skyhook has a 68.2% chance to come out sometime in the 17:00 to 23:00 window set by the defenders, but it does have also have a chance to come out at anytime of the day. There is a 27.2% chance that it will instead come out at some time in the 3 hour window before or after their preferred time, a 4.2% chance it will come out 6 hours before or after their preferred 6 hour long time window, or 0.2% chance to end up at a time in the completely opposite timezone.
  
  
• If a Skyhook is not raided during it’s 1 hour interval, then it will reschedule a new time, and the materials in the surplus bay will remain inside and effectively roll over, meaning the next time it’s vulnerable, if it was raided, it would have 6-8 days worth of reagents inside and so on.
  
  
• If a Skyhook is successfully raided, then its vulnerability will end early and reschedule, so any vulnerable Skyhook you raid will be guaranteed to have 3-4 days worth of reagents in it at minimum.
  
  
• If the Skyhook owner changes the reinforcement timer of a Skyhook, then the current scheduled vulnerability will not change, and the new reinforcement timer will only have an influence on the Skyhook when the next Skyhook theft vulnerability window is chosen.
  
  
• Skyhook owners can no longer offline or turn off Skyhooks on reagent planets (Ice/Lava).
  
  
• Skyhook owners with the Station Manager or Director roles can see the vulnerability timers of their Skyhooks remotely using the my Skyhook page on the structure browser.
  
  
• Skyhooks which are currently vulnerable can be seen by any player using the world map Vulnerable Skyhooks filter or by using the Colony Resources page in the Agency and choosing to view theft vulnerable Skyhooks.
  
  
• All Players can also see the vulnerability schedule of a Skyhook if they warp to the Skyhook grid.
  
  
• The Link period for players who are on the Skyhook Reagent ACL has been reduced to 5 minutes instead of 10 minutes.
  
  
• Skyhooks will immediately alert everyone within 2 jumps of a Skyhook if a "friendly theft" is activated, just like the notification which would happen if a regular raid was at the 5 minute mark.
  
  
• Skyhooks have a 50% chance to drop all of the contents in their Secure and Surplus bays when killed (just like regular player ships).