Cradle of War Patch Notes: Exordium, The New Starter Region

With the Cradle of War expansion Fenris Creations did something CCP Games never did in 23 years: create a starter region where PvP is totally disabled. Those wanting a more hard-core starting experience are invited to go to EVE Frontier where Hilmar, Fenris' CEO, is busy seeing his EVE dreams come to life. I was busy over the weekend trying to finish up a grind in Final Fantasy XIV so I could concentrate on giving the expansion launch more attention that usual. As a reminder to myself I'm creating this post with information from the expansion notes.

Starter Space: Exordium

The previously introduced 53 new systems and their associated region, Exordium, is now fully operational as New Eden’s new starting region, and construction of the Manifest V - AIR Laboratories Trade Center has been completed.

All newly created capsuleers will now begin their journey in this starter region, where they will have access to introductory missions, career agents, exploration opportunities, and cooperative activities designed to introduce EVE's core gameplay systems.

Players can continue their progress within Exordium or opt to venture into the wider cluster through the stargate connecting the Exordium hub system of Manifest with Yulai.

As a reminder, systems within Exordium have a dedicated 1.0 security class designed to prevent all forms of PvP.

What goes around comes around. In the early days all roads led to Yulai and the home of CONCORD. Yulai is also located in Genesis, the first region humanity encountered after emerging through the EVE Gate. Hopefully the change in location will lead more new players to visit the EVE Gate, located in the system of New Eden. 

Just a note about the region. Each of the four major NPC empires controls a 7 system constellation, then another four 6-system constellations exist with other (hopefully) interesting content for new players. The 53rd system, the one in the middle of the region, is the exit point to the rest of the game.

The developers did have to make some changes to the game in order to make a region where new players are safe from experienced players.

Within Exordium:

• Safety settings are permanently locked to green.
• War Declarations and Factional Warfare combat are disabled.
• Duels cannot be initiated.
• Killrights cannot be activated.
• Characters with combat flags such as suspect, criminal, and limited engagements cannot jump into Exordium or undock within the region until their timer expires.
• Players cannot freely attack other capsuleers.
• Upwell Structures cannot be deployed.
• Deployables and anchored containers cannot be placed.

The developers also needed to maintain the "risk vs reward" principle when creating the new starter region. As a result ISK that looks amazing to new players will lead vets to ignore the region in favor of more lucrative activities.

Starter Space Economic Balancing

Exordium is intended as a starting environment for new capsuleers. Economic activities within the region have reduced payouts compared to standard highsec space.

• Mission ISK rewards, LP rewards, and NPC bounties reduced by 20%.
• Additional 5% market fees added to non-instant orders.
• Industry installation fees increased by 5% for manufacturing , material efficiency research, time efficiency research and invention.
• Ores found within Exordium are of a new “Grade 0” type with lower mineral yield than their standard variants.
• Exploration sites within Exordium contain distinct loot tables with lower value loot and items optimized for new players.
• Homefront Operations within Exordium have reduced difficulty, as well as reduced rewards.

I do want to point out something about the mission givers in Exordium. I see no distribution mission agents. As a result botters and RMTers cannot use Exordium as a nice safe region to level up faction standings with hordes of bots flying Badgers.

Agents & Mission Content within Exordium

Exordium includes a broad range of empire-aligned agents designed to introduce new players to mission running, mining, security gameplay, and faction identity.

The following agents are now available for interactions:

• Level 1 and Level 2 Security agents.
• Level 1 and Level 2 Mining agents.
• Sisters of EVE agents.
• Paragon agents.

I do anticipate botters trying to use Exordium to level SoE standings, but those are the dumb ones who deserve the bans they get. Hopefully the GM and security staff have instructions to treat botters in the newbie region a lot more harshly than in the rest of the game. If I may be so bold, I'd argue subjecting new players to illegal activities like botting is a form of new player harassment and should be treated accordingly.

Finally comes the connectivity from the starter region to high security space. I just hope new players get a lot of warnings about leaving the region. After all, I don't think players will really want to travel back to Yulai to get a bunch of stuff.

Shipcasters

The empire shipcaster network within Exordium is now active.

• After completing their initial onboarding experience, new capsuleers can use shipcasters located within the empire embassy constellations to travel directly to their chosen empire's high-security space. These shipcasters provide a faster path into New Eden and are intended to help players begin exploring the wider universe and connect with their preferred faction. The shipcasters provide a one-time use, one-way travel, from Exordium into empire space.

The four shipcasters are:

• State Rookie Shipcaster:
• Tatrys to Onnamon
  
  
• Federation Rookie Shipcaster:
• Mondaekus to Intaki
  
  
• Republic Rookie Shipcaster:
• Dettisolin to Amo
  
  
• Imperial Rookie Shipcaster:
• Ichorah to Mehatoor

Four new stargate pairs have been constructed in order to improve connectivity for new players travelling out of Exordium towards key locations in around highsec. The new stargate connections are:

• Kassigainen <-> Pakhshi
• Kemerk <-> Bania
• Rayeret <-> Jakri
• Mehatoor <-> Akes

All in all I'm hopeful for the new system. I also want to see the changes in activity the new starter system will create. If EVE history teaches one thing, it is that developers playing with transit gates in Yulai will have a greater influence on the universe that originally intended.